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  • Home: Earth Sanctuaries
  • Pilgrimage Stories
  • Garden Sanctuaries
  • Seasonal Celebrations
  • Natural CommunitiesThis section honors our native plants and animals and the diverse and beautiful habitats in which they live. It includes an article on Drawing the Natural Gardens of North Carolina and selected illustrations of mountain, piedmont, and coastal plain habitats. I hope these drawings of the sacred natural communities where I live will inspire you to savor the wild lands where you live and help to conserve them.
  • About BL
    Contact Me
  • Home: Earth Sanctuaries
  • Pilgrimage Stories
  • Garden Sanctuaries
  • Seasonal Celebrations
  • Natural CommunitiesThis section honors our native plants and animals and the diverse and beautiful habitats in which they live. It includes an article on Drawing the Natural Gardens of North Carolina and selected illustrations of mountain, piedmont, and coastal plain habitats. I hope these drawings of the sacred natural communities where I live will inspire you to savor the wild lands where you live and help to conserve them.
  • About BL
    Contact Me

Seasonal Celebrations

These posts describe both personal seasonal rituals and community-wide Earth-based ceremonies that honor our relationship to nature and spirit throughout the wheel of the year. Perhaps you will gain ideas for creating or participating in some seasonal celebrations of your own, large or small.

Spirit-and-Nature seasonal celebrations are inspired by Celtic myth and legend. They share consciousness of the continuity of Earth and Spirit with worldwide indigenous/animist cultures. In them we aspire to bring to the community an opportunity to share our loving relationship with spirit and nature through live music, crafts, circle dances, song, story, ritual, and ceremony which honors both the ecology of this our sacred Place and the presence of Spirit at these potent times. Western culture is doing its best to split nature from people and nature from spirit. We, as elders, feel the responsibility to try to hold nature/human/spirit together in Love as an act of joyous resistance. Past events are included as an archive of posts dated on or near the day they were presented.

Earth-Dreaming: The Mysterious Tree House
20 Dec 2020

Earth-Dreaming: The Mysterious Tree House

by Betty Lou Chaika | posted in: Seasonal Celebrations | 2

Big Dreams are those especially compelling dreams that provide potent images to guide us in times of need. Some big dreams seem to arise as a call to us from the Earth herself. The process of working on these dreams … Continued

Advent, Buddhist ecology., earth-dreaming, magnolia tree, Stupas, Tree of Life
Indigenous American Thanksgiving
25 Nov 2020

Indigenous American Thanksgiving

by Betty Lou Chaika | posted in: Seasonal Celebrations | 28

Every Thanksgiving I pretend that this is a holy day when we reaffirm that this land is sacred. I have always loved Thanksgiving for two reasons: The excuse it gives to gather with family and friends. And because it is … Continued

First Thanksgiving, gratitude, Native American Perspective on Thanksgiving, native foods
Celebrating Samhain: The Mystery of Transformation
31 Oct 2020

Celebrating Samhain: The Mystery of Transformation

by Betty Lou Chaika | posted in: Seasonal Celebrations | 14

This year the season of Hallowtide feels even more potent than usual. We seek new meaning in the old myths that tell of this being a dangerous time when the spirits of chaos, the forces of disintegration, threaten. Of this … Continued

Autumn Equinox: Circles of Peace
21 Sep 2020

Autumn Equinox: Circles of Peace

by Betty Lou Chaika | posted in: Seasonal Celebrations | 16

In these socially stressful times, with protests against raging inequalities on one side and counter protests that instill fear on the other, any sense of centeredness can be hard to find. Great divisions between left and right have been widened. … Continued

Celebrating Lughnasa: A Vision of Leadership
4 Aug 2020

Celebrating Lughnasa: A Vision of Leadership

by Betty Lou Chaika | posted in: Seasonal Celebrations | 18

On the Celtic Wheel of the Year the cross-quarter festival of Lughnasa falls on August 1, mid-way between Summer Solstice and Autumn Equinox. The mythology of Lughnasa is particularly rich and significant. Amidst this Covid pandemic it has become clear … Continued

Celebrating Beltane: A Passionate Burning
30 Apr 2020

Celebrating Beltane: A Passionate Burning

by Betty Lou Chaika | posted in: Seasonal Celebrations | 14

It takes a whole community to put on the firey celebration of Beltane (la Bealtaine in Irish), replete with music, dance and ceremony.  Many of us who are of European ancestry did not grow up within the intact indigenous traditions … Continued

Bealtaine, Beltane, Fire Celemony, Maypole, Pilgrimage to Sacred Spring
Summer Solstice: Co-Creating Ritual and Ceremony
24 Jun 2019

Summer Solstice: Co-Creating Ritual and Ceremony

by Betty Lou Chaika | posted in: Seasonal Celebrations | 14

Summer Solstice this year was especially full of rich and diverse observances. Each celebration sprang up and flowered exuberantly, just as our gardens are emerging into the height of their flowering. And each one was co-created in a process of … Continued

Thomas Berry: Celebrating a Wise Earth Elder
4 Jun 2019

Thomas Berry: Celebrating a Wise Earth Elder

by Betty Lou Chaika | posted in: Seasonal Celebrations | 20

Thomas Berry was a Passionist monk and a passionate lover of the Earth. He called himself a “geologian,” and he tirelessly shared a vision of the sacredness of the universe, the Earth, and the human whose role, he believed, is … Continued

Earth Sprituality, Thomas Berry, Wild Animals Speak to Us
River of Life: An Elder, A Community, A Ceremony
28 Nov 2018

River of Life: An Elder, A Community, A Ceremony

by Betty Lou Chaika | posted in: Seasonal Celebrations | 26

This is the story of a remarkable elder who deeply affected those who knew him and what happened when his dream group decided to make a ceremony this Halloween to honor the anniversary of his passing. It’s a story about … Continued

Memorial Day Ritual: Grieving for the Trees
4 Jun 2018

Memorial Day Ritual: Grieving for the Trees

by Betty Lou Chaika | posted in: Seasonal Celebrations | 2

A friend and I had tried to find a date to get together. Monday afternoon happened to be the only time she had available any time soon. I said, “It’s Memorial Day. We should do something, and if it’s hot … Continued

grieving ritual, memorial day ritual

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Recent Posts

  • Earth-Dreaming: The Mysterious Tree House December 20th 2020
  • Indigenous American Thanksgiving November 25th 2020
  • Celebrating Samhain: The Mystery of Transformation October 31st 2020
  • The Cailleach: A Witch for Our Times October 15th 2020
  • Autumn Equinox: Circles of Peace September 21st 2020
  • Pond Love August 25th 2020
  • Celebrating Lughnasa: A Vision of Leadership August 4th 2020
  • Ceremony: Welcoming Back the Pollinators June 30th 2020
  • Beltane Maypole Sun Celebrating Beltane: A Passionate Burning April 30th 2020
  • Five bluebird eggs Restoring the Forest, Restoring Ourselves March 28th 2020
  • The Stone Garden The Stone Garden: A Delicate Balance February 21st 2020
  • TundraSwans flying over moon at Pocosin Lakesmoon Miracle at Pocosin Lakes January 30th 2020
  • Drawing of orange marigold Earth-Dreaming: Marigold Transformation December 30th 2019
  • A Magical Stone, A Healing Chant November 29th 2019
  • Sacred Landscape: Native American Effigy Mounds October 13th 2019
  • Turtle Teachings September 9th 2019
  • Sacred Trees: Rag Tree, Rock Tree, Witch Tree August 3rd 2019
  • Summer Solstice: Co-Creating Ritual and Ceremony June 24th 2019
  • Thomas Berry: Celebrating a Wise Earth Elder June 4th 2019
  • Garden Path Earth Day: Temenos Garden Sanctuary April 22nd 2019
  • Inventory of Garden Native Plants and Animals April 1st 2019
  • Earth-Dreaming: Liminal Waters March 19th 2019
  • Divine Feminine/Sacred Landscape: St.Gobnait, Lady of the Bees February 11th 2019
  • Belonging to the Community of Life December 31st 2018
  • River of Life: An Elder, A Community, A Ceremony November 28th 2018
  • Hazelnut Wisdom – Practical, Mythical, Mystical October 26th 2018
  • Pilgrimage: Ireland on One Foot September 27th 2018
  • Visiting Ojibwe Family: Gakina Awiiya – “We Are All Related” August 30th 2018
  • Happily the Rains Subside August 3rd 2018
  • Memorial Day Ritual: Grieving for the Trees June 4th 2018

EarthSanctuaries content © Betty Lou Chaika unless otherwise noted.