People have a psychological need to observe rites of passage, from birth to the coming of age, graduation, marriage, and death. There are numerous rites of passage that are less acknowledged by our society, such as divorce and retirement, as well as other occasions. It is important to recognize the big firsts, such as a first job, adoption or birth of a child, and first home. These are special times in your life and deserve to be acknowledged publicly and privately. You can go a long way toward fulfilling this deep psychological need for yourself and the people in your life by creating rituals involving loved ones in them. By marking the special moments of your life, you can ensure better mental and spiritual health, and you can also build closeness to your family, your friends, and your “tribe."
In my spiritual community, we create individual rites and ceremonies to observe life passages such as the first Saturn return, which occurs for every person around age twenty-eight, when the planet Saturn returns to the exact natal placement where it was when he or she was born. Astrologically, this event marks a true initiation into adulthood since we are confronted with the major issues—career, relationships, and destiny—of adulthood. Often at this point in life people move long distance, lose a job, or experience a major breakup or other personal upheaval.
We also acknowledge a woman’s passage from Maiden to Queen or Mother and to Crone. To the contemporary aging population, croning rituals are becoming important and are wonderful opportunities for you to design special rituals for the special people in your life. As people grow older, they often become more isolated, which is a great loss for everyone. Older people have so much wisdom to share, and one way to honor this wisdom is through the medium of ritual.
Society does observe some rites of passage, such as birthdays, anniversaries, graduations, marriages, and funerals, but they have become gift-giving opportunities, mostly devoid of spiritual sophistication. Still, they are usually occasions for bonding and feasting and represent the last vestige of ritual for the masses outside of religion. Confirmation, baptism, and initiations conducted by secret fraternal organizations are also examples of ritual that have continued to the day. The bris practiced by those of the Jewish faith is a wonderful name giving ritual for babies, and circumcision is still practiced although it is now largely thought of as “hygienic” and has lost its ritual aspect. Bar mitzvahs and bat mitzvahs are jubilant community celebrations for young Jewish men and women to mark their passage to adulthood. This wonderful tradition ensures the greater community remains involved in people’s lives in much the same way tribes of older days did.
Early peoples would begin their rites at birth with magic, purification rituals and taboos, such as what foods could or could not be consumed and what length of time a baby and new mother were to be isolated for spiritual safety. Among indigenous peoples such as Congolese tribes, a youth was initiated as “a new person” with circumcision, headdress, tattoos, and special clothing in light of maturation.
In the Dark Ages, May Day was an occasion for ritual combat with jousting, races, and all manner of courtly exercise. Springtime combat between the Queen of May and the King of May in the fields recalled older fertility rituals, where the king of the land would make love with a representative of the Goddess in the fields to ensure health and fertility of the crops for the medieval Europeans.
Dance has long been an important aspect of ritual. Movement and rhythm are vital to many of the traditional ceremonies in this book and should also be included in those you design for yourself and your community.
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