Community Building Ritual

[Vigdisdotter]

Okay, looking for ideas and input :)

I want to do a public ritual. It's meant to help the community heal, but I will NOT call it a community healing ritual as this idea has been tried and failed, since people just roll heir eyes and walk away, assuming it's a fluffy-bunny feel good effort.

Now, some background. My city's community is SEVERELY fractured. and that's putting it mildly. We've seen a lot of blow ups and implosions that were often the result of egos and power games, some of which were malicious in intent but others were well meaning. Needless to say, there is a LOT of hurt feelings all around.

And we humans don't like to forgive or forget....never mind that both of those aren't always appropriate.

Honestly, I'm not looking to have anyone forgive OR forget so much as acknowledge the past and move on.

So now I'm stuck on how to accomplish this without seeming like I want to pretend nothing bad ever happened.

And for the record, I was in midst of many of those blow ups, so I can sympothize with how people feel.

[Nitefalle]

This may be a bit corny, but this makes me think of those things that companies do to build "team work", those silly exercises where everyone has to work together to achieve results. Maybe doing something like that....and if it's small groups competing against each other, you could break up cliques and assign groups and stuff like that. Or maybe, instead of a ritual, it could be like a family day, with things like games & contests and stuff.

[Vigdisdotter]

Or maybe, instead of a ritual, it could be like a family day, with things like games & contests and stuff.


I like that :) Maybe I could have the ritual part of a family day..... <wanders off to ponder>

[Ivy Artemisia]

Hi there!

When you say community, are you looking to be specific to those who were involved in the 'blow ups,' or also include other people? The reason I ask is that if you make your circle too specific and include people who weren't involved, those people might become involved if there is any leftover bad feelings going on.

What are your biggest concerns about the circle? Are you worried about turnout, or just how to create some sort of healing without dredging up the past?

How are you planning to time the ritual? Will it coincide with a Sabbat, Esbat or planning on presenting it at a community event? If I were planning something like this, I'd plan it on a full moon, on a weekend so that you'll have a good turn out.

I would get different groups involved... invite four groups, and have them each call a quarter in their tradition.

For the actual working, heres an idea... theme it like, "leaving the past behind you, and opening yourself up to new happiness" or something. Which is healing, but this way, it makes it accessable to others new to the community, etc. You take a basket full of stones, and hand one to each participant. Ask them to put all leftover anger, hurt, sadness, embarassment into the stone. Then, when they are ready, they place the stones into a cauldron. In my head, I'm picturing the medium sized heavy gray stones that some put in their garden- and a relatively large kettle. Once this is done, you can pour alcohol into the cauldron and light it on fire (or if you are able to- you can create a fire, and place the stones into the fire) . Fire is transformational and can represent burning away of all these negative feelings.

Once this is done, it might be a good idea to do a circle dance of some sort. The one that comes to mind- of course I don't know the name of it- is one I used to do in square dancing, it reminds me of weaving the maypole. You count people off into 2 groups, everyother person. All the 1's turn to their left, all the 2's to their right (this only works in an even number group). So you have pairs of people facing eachother. Then each person extends their left hand, and moves around their paired person. This will move everyone, and then you are facing a new person. Then you do the same with the right hand. Everyone moves to face eachother again. Its as though you have 2 circles weaving together. Once you get it going to a beat, its pretty fun, swinging hand to hand like that. And basically, it weaves the energy together. Its a little difficult, but you could teach it beforehand, if you wanted, or during the circle. We taught it to 1st-5th graders in girlscouts, so it can't be that difficult. A spiral dance might be good as an alternate.

Just a few ideas...

[Rhianna813]

Ooooh I wish you had been at the Ritual I attended on Summer Solstice. I hardly ever travel, especially since parenthood arrived hehehe but I had the opportunity to attend a wonderful Festival north of San Francisco, called Ancient Ways. I was visiting from Oregon but most of those attending at from SF area. The festival was going through some changes and they made this the tone of the main ritual.

Here is my best description of the ritual and hopefully you will glean some ideas. I sure did! Earlier in the day we made masks (decorated plastic mardi gras masks) and when we entered the circle, everyone wore their masks. This was cool but not very important to the main aspect of the ritual. They did heavily detailed invocation of 4 Goddess. Each woman was dressed as their Goddess with an attendant to bless, adorn and invoke them.

Maiden: Flora – she challenged us to bring more innocence, more play and lightness to our community.

Lover: Aphrodite – she challenged us to bring more passion, drive and deep seated love to the community. She was way erotic sexy in outfit and talked a lot about taking all that creativity and sexual energy but using it higher purposes.

Mother: Gaia – she challenged us to bring more sense of family, connection and healing to the community. To bring your gifts, your abundance and help grow the community you want to be apart of.

Crone: Hecate – she challenged us to get past the BS and bring more personal responsibility, wisdom and respect to the community.

Pretty much each Goddess was asking what holds us back from being apart of our Pagan community, from getting involved and really committing to it’s growth. Some people in the circle had scripted “call outs” and some of them walked into the circle and up to the a Goddess, saying things like….

“I feel afraid for my family and wonder what my neighbors might think”
“ I have given so much in the past and now I feel burnt out”
“ Life is too busy and I just don’t have the energy to get involved”
“ I get sick of politics and petty gossip!”
" I don't know what I can offer as a new Pagan"

Pretty much really valid things many of us think and feel. Use whatever you think your community needs to hear.

The Goddesses went on to talk about healing and getting beyond past hurts. We then did a group exercise where we turned to 2-3 others in the circle and had the option to say out loud where we struggle in the Pagan community. I think we were still masked at this point…. Then right after that everyone tossed their masks off and the energy raising started.

This ritual (held at night with a large bonfire) was not fluffy or cutsey. It was very intense but uplifting. More attention given to creating a new future, not aching about the past.

Another idea, and this is what we use when we start a new Moon circle each year. Is to take red yarn and wrap it around your wrist, passing it onto the next guy. This binds the community to whateve extent you are focusing on. Then cut the yarn and each keeps their own tied around their wrist, as a reminder. Any elaborate use of cleansing and purifying within the circle can help with moving away from past issues/hurts.

As far as what to call your ritual…. Can you hold the ritual on a Sabbat and therefore would not need to give it a special name? There are always ways to give a hint at theme of the ritual without revealing too much. Words like challenge, purifying, power of community, cauldron of change, transformation…. Rather than blessing, healing, rebirth which yeah, can sound all soft and gentle. Healing isn’t always gentle and it takes a lot of power and intensity.

If I think of more ideas I’ll let you know. Great idea for a community ritual and I think very needed as more Pagan communities come into existence.

Rhianna

[Vigdisdotter]

Hi there!

When you say community, are you looking to be specific to those who were involved in the 'blow ups,' or also include other people?

I'm just about to head to bed, but I wanted to address this :)

It's EVERYONE, since the old feuds ARE seen and picked up on my those that have come along YEARS after the fact and it's very off putting.

Will look at the rest later :) Thanks for everyone's input!

[~Elise~]

Check your email--I'll send you a community building ritual that I've done several times in the past.

It incorporates 5 total leaders--each calling a direction in their particular direction. I've found it works well. It's one I wrote myself.

Elise

[Ivy Artemisia]

I was thinking about you this weekend, and I hope all is going well in your ritual planning! :)

[~Elise~]

Did my email finally show up??? took me a while to find where I'd filed the rituals away at.

Elise

[Lunacie]

My initial thought was to call it "A New Beginning" for the Pagan community. I loved the idea of masked people bringing their concerns and fears to the gods/goddesses - I may incorporate that into our next Full Moon ritual.

[Vigdisdotter]

I was thinking about you this weekend, and I hope all is going well in your ritual planning! :)


It is :) I'm just taking my time. I'm going to see if I can talk to the gent in charge of my town's Pagan Pride and see if it can be incorporated next year.

[Vigdisdotter]

Did my email finally show up??? took me a while to find where I'd filed the rituals away at.

It did, thank you very much :)

[Vigdisdotter]

My initial thought was to call it "A New Beginning" for the Pagan community.

A New Beginning is certainly what it would be. But from experience, I know how many hackles that one would raise ^_^;;

I loved the idea of masked people bringing their concerns and fears to the gods/goddesses - I may incorporate that into our next Full Moon ritual.

Me too! And it means I get to be crafty. Mwahahahahah!