Pagan Festival Shout Out: Imbolc /St. Brigid's Day

Imbolc or Imbolg, also called Brigid's Day, is a Gaelic traditional festival marking the beginning of spring. It is held on 1 February, or about halfway between the winter solstice and the spring equinox. Historically, it was widely observed throughout Ireland, Scotland and the Isle of Man.

It is Feile Brighde, the 'quickening of the year'. The original word Imbolg means 'in the belly'. All is pregnant and expectant - and only just visible if at all, like the gentle curve of a 'just-showing' pregnancy. It is the promise of renewal, of hidden potential, of earth awakening and life-force stirring. 

Imbolc is traditionally the great festival and honouring of Brigid (Brighid, Bride, Brigit), so loved as a pagan Goddess that her worship was woven into the Christian church as St Bridget. She is a Goddess of healing, poetry and smithcraft. She is a Goddess of Fire, of the Sun and of the Hearth. She brings fertility to the land and its people and is closely connected to midwives and new-born babies. She is the Triple Goddess, but at Imbolc she is in her Maiden aspect.


Rituals and Ceremonies: https://www.learnreligions.com/imbolc-rituals-and-ceremonies-4157556

Pagan Festival Shout Out: Winter Solstice

Marks the beginning of Winter and the shortest day and longest night of the year; celebration of the darkness with dancing near the hearth fire. [a/k/a Old European turning-of-the-season day, Neo-Pagan turning-of-the-season day, Wiccan turning-of-the-season day, Winter Sabbat]

Holidays celebrated on the solstice:

Yule or Yuletide ("Yule time" or "Yule season") is a festival historically observed by the Germanic peoples. Scholars have connected the original celebrations of Yule to the Wild Hunt, the god Odin, and the pagan Anglo-Saxon Mōdraniht.

Brumalia  "winter festivals") was an ancient Roman, winter solstice festival honouring Saturn/Cronus and Ceres/Demeter, and Bacchus in some cases. The festival included night-time feasting, drinking, and merriment. During this time, prophetic indications were taken as prospects for the remainder of the winter.

Korochun Koročun or Kračun  one of the names of Slavic pagan holiday Koliada. Currently, it may be used to refer to the winter solstice in certain Eastern European languages, and also to the holiday of Christmas. It was considered the day when the Black God and other spirits associated with decay and darkness were most potent. On this night, Hors, symbolizing old sun, becomes smaller as the days become shorter in the Northern Hemisphere, and dies on December 22, the winter solstice. It is said to be defeated by the dark and evil powers of the Black God. On December 23 Hors is resurrected and becomes the new sun, Koleda.

Pagan Festival Shout Out: Mysteries Of Isis

December 22 is the day of the Mysteries of Isis. 

A priestess representing Isis, wearing her cow horns and solar disk, circles the shrine or coffin of Osiris seven times to signify mourning. She shakes her sistrum to drive away Set and bring about the rebirth of Osiris. The Lament for Osiris is also sung by priestesses representing Isis and their her sister Nephthys.

Additionally, the Rhodophoria, a festival of roses, was held in honor of Isis in some of the places where her worship spread from Egypt. Daily rituals of Isis include a morning ritual to awaken her, held when her image is brought forth for the day; a noontime ritual; an evening ritual, held when her image is shut away for the night; and a midnight ritual.

Pagan Festival Shout Out: Festival Of Evergreens

Old European Festival of Evergreen Trees. Celebrated by planting trees and hanging wreaths (symbols of eternal life).

Pagans in Europe used branches of evergreen fir trees to decorate their homes and brighten their spirits during the winter solstice. Early Romans used evergreens to decorate their temples at the festival of Saturnalia, while ancient Egyptians used green palm rushes as part of their worship of the god Ra

Pagan Festival Shout Out: Old Egyptian Festival of Neteret Bastet,

December 15th

Old Egyptian festival of Neteret Bastet, Cat Goddess who protects the home and fosters domestic harmony. Her image was transported on a bark on the Nile River from Karnak to Bubastis. [Kemetic calendar (leap year)] [Alexandrian calendar 1/25 (leap year)]

Bastet is the Egyptian goddess of the home, domesticity, women's secrets, cats, fertility, and childbirth. She protected the home from evil spirits and disease, especially diseases associated with women and children. As with many Egyptian deities, she also played a role in the afterlife as a guide and helper to the dead although this was not one of her primary duties. She was the daughter of the sun god Ra and is associated with the concept of the Eye of Ra (the all-seeing eye) and the Distant Goddess (a female deity who leaves Ra and returns to bring transfromation).  

The goddess was worshipped primarily at Bubastis but held a tutelary position at Saqqara and elsewhere. The people of Egypt came annually to the great festival of Bastet at Bubastis which was one of the most lavish and popular events of the year. Geraldine Pinch, citing Herodotus, claims, "women were freed from all constraints during the annual festival at Bubastis. They celebrated the festival of the goddess by drinking, dancing, making music, and displaying their genitals" (116). This "raising of the skirts" by the women, described by Herodotus, had as much to do with freedom from social constraints as it did with the fertility associated with the goddess. As with many of the other festivals throughout Egypt, Bastet's celebration was a time to cast aside inhibitions much in the way modern revelers do in Europe during Carnivale or in the United States at Mardi Gras. 

Pagan Festival Shout Out: Fast Of Hod (Hodr)

Old Anglo-Teutonic fast marking Hod (God of Darkness) unintentionally killing Balder (God of Light), and his true love Nanna (Goddess of Flowers) dying of a broken heart. The dead were honored.

Two stories exist referring to Hodr's killing of Balder...

Version One:
Hodr and Baldur were two great war leaders who marshaled their armies against each other due to a dispute over the hand of the beautiful maiden Nanna. Baldur had been nourishing himself with a special, spiritual food that conferred invincibility, and Hodr knew that he would be unable to defeat Baldur by normal means. So Hodr undertook a long and perilous journey to the underworld. There, he obtained a weapon that had been charged with magical powers that would enable him to overcome Baldur’s own magically-induced strength. 

Version Two:
Hodr was the son of Frigg and Odin, and he was blind. Baldur, his brother whom everyone loved, began to have dreams of his impending death. Frigg, in a panic, went out into the world and to get assurances from everyone and everything that they will not hurt her son - everything except for mistletoe. When Loki found out, he fashioned a spear from mistletoe. He brought it to Asgard where other gods were having fun throwing objects and weapons at Baldur and watching them bounce off of him. Loki brought the spear to Hodr, and tricked him into joining in the fun. The spear Hodr launched at Baldur killed him instantly.

Pagan Festival Shout Out: Samhain

Samhain is a pagan religious festival originating from an ancient Celtic spiritual tradition. In modern times, Samhain (a Gaelic word pronounced “sow-win”) is usually celebrated from October 31 to November 1 to welcome in the harvest and usher in “the dark half of the year.”.

Rituals surrounding Samhain include bonfires, dancing, feasting and building altars to honor deceased ancestors. Some pagans bake special loaves of Samhain bread and leave offerings to the spirits outside their homes.

 They base their celebrations and rituals on traditional lore as well as research into the beliefs of the polytheistic Celts. Celtic Reconstructionist Pagans (or CRs) often celebrate Samhain on the date of first frost, or when the last of the harvest is in and the ground is dry enough to have a bonfire.

The Apple is a symbol of life and immortality. In Celtic tradition, apples were buried at Samhain as food for those souls who are waiting to be reborn. The Apple, cut crosswise, reveals the five pointed star, or pentacle at its core, a symbol of the Goddess.

Pagan Festival Shout Out: Kali Puja

Hindu festival honoring Great Goddess Maha Devi as Kali - decay, death, and transformation. Hindus believe all Gods and Goddesses are aspects of the limitless, attributeless, immanent, and transcendent Brahman-Ishvara-Maya.

It coincides with the Lakshmi Puja day of Diwali. While the Bengalis, Chittagonians, Sylhetis, Rangpuris, Odias, Assamese and Maithils worship the goddess Kali on this day, the rest of India worships goddess Lakshmi on Diwali.

Kali Puja (like Durga Puja) worshippers honour the goddess Kali in their homes in the form of clay sculptures and in pandals (temporary shrines or open pavilions). She is worshipped at night. She is prescribed offerings of red hibiscus flowers, sweets, rice and lentils, fish and meat. It is prescribed that a worshipper should meditate throughout the night until dawn

Pagan Festival Shout Out: Isia Festival

October 28-November 3

OldRomano-Egyptian festival recalling Set (God of Destruction) killing God Osiris; Goddess Isis mourning Him, resurrecting Him, and conceiving God Horus with Him; and Osiris becoming Lord of Amenta, realm of the dead. He weighs souls against the Feather of Truth on Goddess Maat's Scale of Justice, but defers to Isis for those who fail the test.

In the Egyptian month of Khoiak, the ancients held a festival for Osiris that remembered His conflict with His brother Set, His death, and His resurrection through the holy magic of Isis. In ancient Rome the festival is only mentioned minutely, making it known simply that the festival existed. 

The Egyptians moulded images of Osiris from the Nile mud, special spices, talismanic stones, and seeds. The images were watered so that the grain sprouted, a fitting symbol of new life. (We should also know that this was about the time of year when the Nile flood was receding so that the fields could be planted with new crops.) The festival ended with the raising of the Djed pillar, symbol of the resurrection of the God Himself as Lord of the Otherworld.

Pagan Festival Shout Out: Armilustrium

In ancient Roman religion, the Armilustrium was a festival in honor of Mars, the god of war, celebrated on October 19. On this day the weapons of the soldiers were ritually purified and stored for winter. The army would be assembled and reviewed in the Circus Maximus, garlanded with flowers.

During the festival the Romans held a special sacrifice ritual around the October Horse. It is the only time in ancient Rome that horses were sacrificial. I don't do animal sacrifice, but then again I don't practical actual ritual service beyond my personal altar to acknowledge the gods on their special day and a ceremonial fire during solstice, equinox times.  

Pagan Festival Shout Out: Divine Spirit Ameretat

Zoroastrian celebration of Divine Spirit Ameretat (Immortality), creator and protector of vegetation. [a/k/a Ayathrima, Herds-Homecoming] [Fasli calendar]

Ameretat is the Avestan language name of the Zoroastrian divinity/divine concept of immortality. Ameretat is the Amesha Spenta of long life on earth and perpetuality in the hereafter.

Ameretat is very closely allied to Haurvatat, who was the goddess of Water, Prosperity/Wholeness, and Health. Zoroaster, the prophet of Zoroastrianism, had stated “both Wholeness and Immortality are for sustenance” in the kingdom of Ahura Mazda.

Ameretat has a counterpart like most deities in Zoroastrianism, who is the Daeva, Shud. Both Ameretat and Haurvatat represent the reward of the righteous after death .

Ameretat along with 5 other Amesha Spentas, took part in creation.

Pagan Festival Shout Out: Thesmophoria

The Thesmophoria (Ancient Greek: Θεσμοφόρια) was an ancient Greek religious festival, held in honor of the goddess Demeter and her daughter Persephone. The festival was held annually at Autumn during the period when Fall seeds were sown and harvests were brought in. It is time which celebrated human and agricultural fertility.

The Thesmophoria was one of the most widespread ancient Greek festivals. The fact that it was celebrated across the Greek world suggests that it dates back to before the Greek settlement in Ionia in the eleventh century BCE. The festival was dedicated to Demeter and her daughter Persephone and was celebrated in order to promote fertility, both human and agricultural. It was celebrated only by women, and men were forbidden to see or hear about the rites. However these are modern times and antiquated gender-biased concepts should be shed. Spiritual expression and ritual practice should be open to all who wish to participate. What god or goddess wouldn't welcome more worship from the devoted?

The festival lasted three days, although in Attica it was lengthened to five. The original days were Pyanopsion (October) 12–14 and were called respectively anodos (or kathodos), nēsteia, and kalligeneia. At least a great part of the Thesmophoria was carried out by torchlight and was accompanied by ceremonial coarse abuse.

Pagan Festival Shout Out: Tanabata

Shinto rite honoring the Kami of the Stars. [a/k/a Star Kami Festival]

On the seventh day of the seventh month, two mythical lovers—represented by the stars Altair and Vega—find a way to come together once a year, against all odds. Today’s Doodle celebrates Tanabata, also known in Japan as the “Star Festival.”

Inspired by the Chinese Qixi Festival, Tanabata became popular in Japan during the Heian Period (794–1185). The story of Hikoboshi, a humble cowherd who falls in love with Orihime, the daughter of the Sky King, has captured the imagination of lovers for centuries. Their separation by a mighty river, represented by the Milky Way, and eventual reunion is a timeless tale.

Writing their wishes on colorful strips of paper known as tanzaku, Tanabata celebrants hang them on bamboo poles or trees and pray that their dreams will come true. The wishes are set afloat the following day, drifting on rivers toward the sea.

Pagan Festival Shout Out: Summer Solstice/ Litha

Marks the beginning of Summer and the longest day and shortest night of the year; celebration of the light with dancing around a bonfire. [a/k/a Old European turning-of-the-season day, Neo-Pagan turning-of-the-season day, Wiccan turning-of-the-season day, Summer Sabbat]

In northern Europe, the longest day of the year was known as Midsummer, while wiccans and other pagan groups called it Litha. People were thought to wear protective garlands of herbs and flowers to ward off evil spirits that appear on the summer solstice.The most powerful of these, was “chase devil,” known today as St John’s Wort because of its association with St John’s Day.

Folklore also holds that bonfires on Midsummer, as the solstice was known among northern Europeans, would banish demons and evil spirits and lead young maidens to their future husbands. 

Decorate your altar with summer flowers, herbs and fruits, and summer colors like yellow, green and blue. This is a traditional time for rites of re-dedication to the God and Goddess, as well as divination related to love and romance. Keep at least one candle lit throughout the day to honor the Sun, and if possible hold your Litha rituals at noon, when the Sun is at its highest point in the sky. 

Pagan Festival Shout Out: feast of Orisha Babalu Aye

Babalu Aye is simultaneously one of the most feared and revered Orishas in Yoruban tradition. Presiding over the powers of life and death, his influence was so widespread that his worship grew from a single tribe in West Benin to many tribes all along the western coast of Africa. He is the patron deity of those who are suffering from sickness or infirmity. His domain is twofold -- he can cure the sick, and send illnesses as punishment for the wicked. 

Babalu Aye's shrine is a terracotta pot adorned with cowrie shells. It is kept in a dark, quiet place where he will not be bothered, along with 18 loose cowrie shells used to communicate with him in diloggun divination. Call on Babalu Aye in times of sickness, whether to heal the sick or send those who cannot be cured peacefully to their deaths. Although he is feared for his power to give and take away illness, he is also a happy and merciful deity.

Make offerings of his favorite foods: roasted or popped corn, beans, or other grains. Rum, tobacco, or dry white wine are also appreciated. Peanuts and sesame seeds are taboo. Animals associated with him are vultures, buzzards, and other carrion birds, and his gemstones are  bloodstone, tanzanite, snowflake obsidian, and jasper.

To communicate with Babalu Aye, recite the following prayer: 

"God of the epidemics and the sick.
I pray to you now, have pity on us your children. 
Oh, glorious father, keep sickness away from my home, and protect your children from epidemics. 
Thank you my father."

Pagan Festival Shout Out: Old Slavic Kupala

Kupala Night is a Slavic celebration of ancient pagan origin marking the end of the summer solstice and the beginning of the harvest (midsummer). In the western Ukrainian Lemko region and Prešov region it was called Sobitka.

Kupalo was believed to be the god of love and of the harvest and the personification of the earth’s fertility. According to popular belief, ‘Kupalo eve’ (‘Ivan’s eve’) was the only time of the year when the earth revealed its secrets and made ferns bloom to mark places where its treasures were buried, and the only time when trees spoke and even moved and when witches gathered. It was also the only time of the year when free love received popular sanction.

Young men and women gathered outside the village in the forest or near a stream or pond. There they built ‘Kupalo fires’—a relic of the pagan custom of bringing sacrifice—around which they performed ritual dances and sang ritual songs, often erotic. They leaped over the fires, bathed in the water (an act of purification), and played physical games with obviously sexual connotations.

Pagan Festival Shout Out: Suijin Matsuri

Suijin Matsuri: Shinto rite honoring the Kami of Water.

The term Suijin (literally water kami or water deity) refers to the many heavenly and earthly manifestations of the benevolent Shintō divinity of water. But it also refers to a wide variety of mythological and magical creatures found in lakes, ponds, springs and wells, including serpents (snakes and dragons), eels, fish, turtles, and the flesh-eating kappa. 

The observances have the significant role of exorcism of bad spirits and purification, especially aimed at dangerous epidemic diseases and water-related disasters which commonly happen during the summer. 

Following a ceremony in the neighborhood shrine, the local men carry the mikoshi (portable shrine) to the accompaniment of flute and drum. 
It is taken down to a boat waiting at the river’s edge. One boat carries the mikoshi, the musicians, three priests, three boatmen while a second boat carries a group of young men and several ceremonial bamboo, gohei (a ritual wand) and sakaki (Cleyera japonica) branches.

Pagan Festival Shout Out: Vestalia

Roman festival honoring Goddess Vesta (Greek Hestia). Women made food offerings at the sacred hearths of home and temple.

Domestic and family life in general were represented by the festival of the goddess of the house and of the spirits of the storechamber — Vesta and the Penates — on Vestalia. On the first day of festivities the penus Vestae (sanctum sanctorum of the temple of Vesta which was usually curtained off) was opened, for the only time during the year, at which women offered sacrifices. As long as the curtain remained open, mothers could come, barefoot and disheveled, to leave offerings to the goddess in exchange for a blessing to them and their family.

For the celebration of Vestalia, the Vestales made a sacred cake, using water carried in consecrated jugs from a holy spring. The water was never permitted to come into contact with the earth between the spring and the cake, which also included sacred salt and ritually prepared brine as ingredients. The hard-baked cakes were then cut into slices and offered to Vesta.D

Duringthe eight days of the Vestalia, only women were permitted to enter Vesta's temple for worship. When they arrived, they removed their shoes and made offerings to the goddess. At the end of Vestalia, the Vestales cleaned the temple from top to bottom, sweeping the floors of dust and debris, and carrying it away for disposal in the Tiber river. Ovid tells us that the last day of Vestalia, the Ides of June, became a holiday for people who worked with grain, such as millers and bakers. They took the day off and hung flower garlands and small loaves of bread from their millstones and shop stalls.

Here’s a cleansing spell you can try:

“Salt and Sage, cleanse this broom and let it come to power for me, and me alone.

Goddess Vesta, guard my home and my hearth, and let your fire burn bright

In every room.”

Pagan Festival Shout Out: Lukumi Feast Day

Lukumi Feast Day for the Orisha Ochosi, the Divine Hunter.

The deities or gods worshipped in Lukumí religion are called orishas. All the orishas are direct emanations and representatives of Olodumare whom He created and placed on earth to aid and supervise humankind. The orishas serve as mediators between the cosmos and as the major means of communication with the Supreme Being.

Oshosi is the orisha of hunting. He protects all those who are persecuted unjustly and punishes the guilty. Close friend of Elegbá and Ogún: they share many of the same domains. Fugitive slaves would plea to Oshosi, seeking his aid to escape from their white masters. They invoked Oshosi so he would impede their being found since Oshosi is known to have the ability of going into the densest of forests and finding his way out without the slightest difficulty. Yet Oshosi does not live in the forest.

Though Oshosi enters the forest, he does so only to hunt. Oshosi is an urban orisha, residing in Obatalá’s compound. He was Obatalá’s favorite hunter and rendered all the fruits of his labor to the creation divinity. Most of his life was spent in the service of Obatalá and living within his palace and not in the forest.

Oshosi was the first Yoruba wizard or magician. The Yoruba word oshó means wizard. The Lukumí often associated him with the Bantú magico-religious practices known in the island as Regla de Congos or Palo Mayombe. As a result, many include a Congo vititi mensu, divinatory instrument prepared and employed by the Bantú priests. Oshosi has no roads.

Celebration: June 6
Garments: Dark Blue and gold, ornamented with hides and cowries
Beads: Dark blue, amber, & red, with coral and jet beads
Ritual implement: Bow and arrow
Sacrifices: He-goats, deer, agoutis, roosters, quails, pigeons, guinea hens, and all hunted animals.
Taboos: None
Ritual Numbers: 3, 7, and 21

Pagan Festival Shout Out: Ambarvalia

A rural festival among the Romans for the purification (lustratio) of the country, and for invoking the blessing of Ceres upon the fruits of the earth. At these festivals they sacrificed a bull, a sow, and a sheep, which, before the sacrifice, were led in procession thrice around the fields; whence the feast is supposed to have taken its name, ambio, I go round, and arvum, field. This sacrifice was called a suovetaurilia in Latin. These feasts were of two kinds, public and private. 

The Ambarvalia furnish one of several instances —the Saturnalia at Christmas being another—of heathen festivals taken up by the Church and adapted to Christian uses. There is a close resemblance to these rites in the ceremonies of the three Rogation Days which precede Ascension Day, occurring nearly at the same time of year. “They were anciently in England called ‘Gangdays,’ because processions went out on those days; hymns and canticles being sung, and prayers offered at various halting-spots or stations for a blessing on the fruits of the earth.”