How to Become a Witch, Amber K. [new books to read .txt] 📗

Love Gods: Eros, Cupid, Kamadeva

Love Goddesses: Aphrodite, Venus, Freya, Erzulie, Astarte

A Divine Loving Couple: Krishna and Radha

The merrymount maypole scandal

One of the early maypoles in the New World was set up by Thomas Morton in 1626, at the colony of Merrymount in Massachusetts. It was 80 feet tall, and the dances and feasting brought settlers and native people from miles around. Unfortunately, the local Puritan elders had no patience with such heathen goings-on, and in 1628 they sent Miles Standish to arrest Morton and burn the great maypole. Morton was exiled to Maine, where he spent the rest of his life. We have no record as to whether he erected any maypoles in Maine.

Litha

Litha is the Summer Solstice, around June 21, and marks the longest day and shortest night of the year. The Oak King and the Holly King battle it out again, but this time the Holly King wins to reign until Yule, when we decorate with his shiny dark leaves and bright red berries. Litha celebrates the full height of the summer sun and the Sun God in his glory, his warmth and energy pouring down on the crops as they ripen.

It also brings the Sun God’s transition to Grain God, as sun and earth together bring forth the grains, vegetables, and fruits.

What It Means to You: This is the ideal time to focus your power where it will bring you the greatest harvest. What are your priorities? These are the longest days of the year, so you have more hours to work—and play! Call upon your favorite solar deity to help.

Ask yourself: What are my sources of power? What are my strengths? Am I using them to my best advantage? What new sources of energy can I cultivate in myself now, while the sun is high? Remember your own radiance; like Aten in the ancient Egyptian Hymn to Ra, you can “Rise in splendor, fill every land with your beauty.”

For women, it’s a good season to get in touch with your active, accomplishing masculine side, what C. G. Jung called your animus. Cherish all parts of your nature; when you are a whole spiritual being, your power will be complete.

Activities for Litha: Use sun tea and summer wines to toast the solar gods and goddesses. Bask in the heat of the sun. Set off fireworks. Honor the sun. Tell stories long into the evening light.

Deities for the Season

Sun Gods: Ra, Horus, Helios, Apollo, Bel, Shamash, Sol Invictus, Holly King

Sun Goddesses: Amaterasu, Bast, Sekhmet, Hathor, Arinna, Sol, Sunna, Saule

Bonfires on the hilltops

In olden days, people would often celebrate Beltane and Litha by building bonfires on hilltops. The word Beltane means “Bel’s fire,” Bel being a sun god worshiped in many lands.

Bonfire may have come from “boon-fire,” a fire made from wood asked as a boon, or gift, or “good fire” (French bon or Scots bonny), or “bone fire,” since bones burn hot and long.

Bonfires brought warmth and light, and they were wonderful for dancing around, or for cooking food for the feast to encourage the sun, or for magickally burning away illness. A bonfire is a staple at many Pagan festivals today.

Lughnassad

Lughnassad, or Lammas, is the first of the three harvest festivals, celebrated around August 1. This is the harvest where the god of the grain gives his life so that we may live through the winter. The themes are self-sacrifice for the community or individual initiation to a higher level of spiritual existence.

Other themes are abundance and how we allocate, store, and use resources. The wise management of wealth becomes an issue at harvest time, when we once again have material prosperity.

This is also the special day of Lugh, a Celtic sun god who was also High King of Ireland and the Tuatha De Danaan, “the people of the goddess Danu.” He is a master of all skills: warrior, bard, healer, blacksmith, and more. According to legend, he started Olympic-style games in honor of his mother, Tailltu.

What It Means to You: Celebrate your projects that have come to fruition. Finally, you are reaping tangible results from all your work—or if not, why is your personal harvest delayed? Or are you harvesting something you didn’t plan for?

Once your harvest is on track, you can think about preparing for the winter ahead, whether that means storing food, getting a new furnace, or weatherproofing your house.

Think about self-sacrifice. What sacrifices will you make for your family and community? What sacrifices will you make in order to learn, grow, and stretch yourself?

Remember that Lugh mastered many skills; maybe it’s time for you to add to yours. Have confidence, be willing to sacrifice time and effort, and you can master the new skills you wish.

Activities for Lughnassad: Bake special breads to share. Hold your own “Taillteann Games” with contests and prizes. Make corn dollies out of wheat stalks or corn husks. Make a corn man with whole ears of corn, “sacrifice” him in the bonfire, and eat buttered corn on the cob. Find stories about Lugh’s adventures and tell them around the fire.

Deities for the Season: In addition to Lugh, you may want to meet:

Dying and Resurrected Gods: Baal, Adonis, Melqart, Osiris, Mithras, Dumuzi or Tammuz

Deities of Many Skills: Mercury, Hermes, Minerva (Goddess of a Thousand Works), the Walawag Sisters

Earth and Grain Goddesses: Gaia, Mahimata, Pachamama, Changing Woman, Ceres, Demeter, Taillte

Mabon

Mabon, the Fall Equinox, is the second harvest festival, about September 21. The gardens and orchards are giving up their ripening bounty. The days are growing noticeably shorter—the days and nights are of equal length, and there is an autumn crispness in the air.

It is a time to share our abundance and be grateful—the “Pagan Thanksgiving.” We are moving toward completion of our goals, tying up loose ends. But we’ll make time to eat, drink, and be merry.

The holiday is named for Mabon ap Modron, who appeared in The Mabinogion, a collection of Welsh myths. He is a divine son. According