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Reclaiming Your Heritage

6/19/2013

 

Reclaiming Your Heritage

In the Cosmos before numbers, clocks, time, Earth or Sun,
a vast vaporous gas cloud began collapsing under its own weight
spinning ever faster as it spread into a flat disk shape,
with an enormous smoldering crimson red center.

Hundreds of millions years later the heart of the flattened gas cloud
began glowing ever more brilliantly white until it exploded
in a sustained thermonuclear fire—our Day Star, the Sun, was born!

Anonymous among the hundreds of billions of other stars,
yet it was destined to shine for ten billion years.
Picture
Photograph of condensing hydrogen gas taken by Dr. Joe Daglen, a former student and friend.

    Around this baby star, however, blazed a blizzard of inestimable giant rocky asteroids frequently colliding with one another in a nightmare of unimaginable violence. Some were deadly head-on collisions where the two exploded into fiery bits and pieces. Some were crashes merging the two asteroids as one into a new larger body, while a few of these giant asteroids fortunately escaped by discovering safe orbits around the Sun. One of these lucky ones was Earth.

    Planet Earth continued to be battered by bombardments of smaller asteroids, but over the millions of years these collision scar craters cosmetically became oceans and valleys. Meanwhile Earth was being vastly enriched from massive donations from space of organic matter. Today all life on Earth runs on Sun energy, every atom on earth was once—out there! Coal and wood are but harvested ancient Sun star energy. On the upcoming Solar Birthday of our day star Sun, rejoice it’s only middle aged and contrary to apocalyptic prophecies will shine for another 5 billion years.

    Early this Friday morning, June 21st, will occur the Summer Solstice as the tilt of planet earth’s semi-axis is the most inclined towards the Sun. The Romans observed the Solstice on June 24th like other pagans with great bonfires, dancing and feasting. Unable to suppress this pagan, raucously joyful summer holiday the Church baptized it “The Feast of John the Baptist” and shrewdly included in that holy bath the enchanting pagan revelry. As early as the 5th century the Church declared it as one of the highest feast days.

    Unfortunately—and unhappily—today instead of celebrating the Solstice we work or go about our daily routines. Having become an “indoors” people divorced from the cycles of nature we’ve forgotten our hereditary primal holy day of bonfires, feasting, drinking, dancing and, in puritanical abstinence, work instead of play.

    A proposal: Reclaim your heritage of this ageless June Sun holiday. Celebrate it by having fun, by having a sun party or picnic. And don’t forget the symbolic sun—the bonfire—even if it is only a candle flame. To assist you in this hereditary renewal is a ritual blessing I’ve taken from my book Prayers for a Planetary Pilgrim: A Personal Manual for Prayer and Ritual.

The Ritual of the Summer Solstice Fire

Holy is this fire of midsummer's eve,
and holy are you, 0 God,
who from your burning heart
drew forth a fiery ball
and flung it into space.

Your laughter shook the empty cosmos
and echoed again and again
until the darkness of space resounded
with your love and with fire.

You reached in again and drew forth fire
and seeded it like yeast
in each atom, plant and animal,
each bird, fish, man and woman.

And you gave us a special star, our sun,
aflame with a life-evoking energy
to make our planet green and fertile
sun-soaked in your love.

As we celebrate this magic feast,
open our eyes to the countless wonders
and to the sparks of fire-life
that you have planted in each of us.

May this holy and magical night
be aglow with star-fire and God-light
as we once again begin
the sacred season of summer.

Amen+

P.S. If you’re not into rituals or prayers, I offer you a simple mini ceremony for sunrise on Friday, June the 21st or Monday, the 24th. Midsummer folklore held that at sunrise on the Solstice, the Sun briefly pauses tiptoe on the horizon and winks at Earth! I suggest on the Solstice when you first see the Sun at sunrise or whenever, pause briefly, and with a big wide smile wink back at the sun!
Happy Midsummer!
Dan Sanley
6/22/2013 04:25:34 am

Dear Ed,

I was about to proclaim that the good old US of A should begin celebrating Midsummer as a festive holiday, then I discovered that some areas actually do, with perhaps one of the grandest celebrations at St. John the Divine in New York City. It is there that they proclaim “Early in the morning there is a sense of timelessness and possibility!”

Here is a explanation of the celebration by Mr. Paul Winter, organizer of the event held this morning.. Happy Midsummer’s Ed.

When I’m awake in the darkness before dawn – as the birds begin to sing, and the Earth prepares for the Sun – I feel as if life is beginning again. There’s something magical about that virgin time, when we’re free of our habitual patterns and obligations. My dream of evoking this feeling in music was the original inspiration for Summer Solstice.

We begin playing in total darkness at 4:30 a.m. within the awesome space and acoustics of the Cathedral of St. John the Divine. We embark on a continuous two-hour musical journey, with players stationed in distant corners or moving among the audience. Somewhere near the halfway point, listeners gradually realize that the Cathedral’s great stained-glass windows are beginning to illuminate. The light joins the sound to carry us into the first dawning of summer.

The musicians this year will comprise a new “summer consort,” with Eugene Friesen, cello; John Clark, French horn; Marcus Rojas, tuba; Tim Brumfield, organ; yours truly on soprano sax; along with four percussionists. We will be creating a new stage set and audience configuration this year. The audience will be seated in concentric circles under the great dome, surrounded by the musicians and instruments, including our nine huge Balinese Gamelan gongs, and other large percussion instruments.

Dan (again)
6/23/2013 04:32:10 pm

Dear Ed:

Alas Midsummer and it is nice to have a day to celebrate joyously and reclaim our heritage, that vortex of energy which takes us beyond our normal behavioral patterns, all while coming to terms with who I am and the potential that I may hold within. (phew) This cannot be done without the Spirit which interconnects all of us. And what better way to interconnect than dancing, feasting, music, and bonfires?

But then it all was just too good. When the Christians came to Northern Europe it bothered them to see such revelry. In the 7th century St. Eligius declared, “There should be no more dancing, leaping or diabolical chanting.” Midsummer would be no longer celebrated as a pagan holiday but rather a solemn tribute to the Baptist. Many Northern European and Baltic countries now call the holiday St. John’s Day rather than Midsummer. The name of the day may have changed, but the revelry remained. I am ready to celebrate, are you? However, at my age, the custom of leaping over bonfires may have to be reserved for those a tad more youthful. Let us rejoice all the same.

In the words of Paulo Coelho The Alchemist: “We are travelers on a cosmic journey, stardust swirling and dancing in the eddies and whirlpools of infinity. Life is eternal. We have but stopped for a moment to encounter each other, to meet, to love to share. This is a precious moment. It is a little parenthesis in eternity.”

Tom Skorupa
7/21/2013 09:01:18 am

Thanks, Ed, for the encouragement to reclaiming midsummer in small but real ways!


Comments are closed.


    Edward Hays


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