Here we are on the eve of the summer solstice and I would venture a guess that most of us haven’t a clue why this is significant.
I bought a great book on this subject a few years ago. I can highly recommend: Celebrate the Solstice: Honoring the Earth’s Seasonal Rhythms through Festival and Ceremony.
From this book I learned that for centuries “our ancestors have marked the seasons of the year with festivals. These festivals — of which the greatest and most universally observed were the twice-yearly Solstices — served many functions. They bound together young and old, women and men, rich and poor. They gave people an emotional outlet and a break from ordinary cultural strictures and boundaries. All work was put aside; prisoners were freed; masters and servants traded places.”
Some think that these traditions were pagan in nature, but solstices transcend religious ideology. They were simply astronomical facts, celebrated by ancient people everywhere in the world, not just by the inhabitants of pagan Europe. But the early Christians were quick to appropriate ancient festivals into their own calendar of holy days, like Christmas being deliberately timed to coincide with the winter Solstice.
How do you celebrate the solstice or mark and honor your days and years here on earth? Learning more about our ancestors’ practices can add meaning and significance to your present and presence here at this important time in human history.
