Mabon – A Solitary Ritual

Holidays and holy days are better with friends and family. But many Pagans maintain solitary practices. Even if you work with a group, sometimes you can’t be with them for one reason or another. And sometimes your group meets on a convenient day but you feel the need to celebrate on the exact day. Whatever the reason, many Pagans will be celebrating the Autumn Equinox by themselves.
Mabon is the second of the three Celtic harvest festivals. It’s the apple harvest and the celebration of the equinox, the time of equal day and night. The actual equinox is Wednesday, September 23 at 3:22 AM CDT. For the next six months, the nights will be longer than the days.

Spring Equinox, Ostara: Southern Hemisphere

Midway through Spring!
This is the time of equal day and equal night, the balance of light and dark,
and so at this time we have the chance to invite balance into our lives.

Add this to the energy of Spring, and as we see in our gardens, we also have the opportunity for new growth, fresh starts and new beginnings. Now would be the appropriate time for the Easter Egg hunt!

The trees have come back to life, blossoms are blooming, the grass is growing, the sprouts are ‘taking off’, growth is everywhere! Beautiful smells, sprite-liness and baby animals…
During Spring, everywhere in nature, we see and feel and hear, the energy, the pulse, the sound of new growth.

And so we have the opportunity to consciously align with this energy
and ‘use’ it to fuel whatever new beginnings we are creating in our lives.

Your being, as part of the Earth, part of the cycle of the seasons…

To read the rest of this please click on this link: Ostara

History of Ostara – The Spring Equinox

MANY HOLIDAYS, MANY NAMES

The word Ostara is just one of the names applied to the celebration of the spring equinox on March 21. The Venerable Bede said the origin of the word is actually from Eostre, a Germanic goddess of spring. Of course, it’s also the same time as the Christian Easter celebration, and in the Jewish faith, Passover takes place as well. For early Pagans in the Germanic countries, this was a time to celebrate planting and the new crop season.

Typically, the Celtic peoples did not celebrate Ostara as a holiday, although they were in tune with the changing of the seasons.

According to History.com, “At the ruins of Chichen Itza, the ancient Maya city in Mexico, crowds now gather on the spring (and fall) equinox to watch as the afternoon sun creates shadows that resemble a snake moving along the stairs of the 79-foot-tall Pyramid of Kukulkan,…

To Rest the rest of this article please click on this link: https://www.thoughtco.com/history-of-ostara-the-spring-equinox-2562485

Mabon Lore

Autumn Equinox, one of the Lesser Wiccan Sabbats is celebrated on or around September 20th to 23rd in the Northern Hemisphere and from on or around March 19 to 20th for the Southern Hemisphere. Autumn Equinox is also known as Mabon, Fall Equinox, Wine Harvest and Second Harvest. This is a time of balance and harmony, when our days and nights are equally divided as the days grow shorter and the Wheel of Year turns towards Samhain and Yule.

Traditionally, Second Harvest was celebrated when fruits were picked for jams, jellies, juices, ciders and wines. Our days grow shorter, veggies, fruits and herbs are at the peak for harvesting and preserving. Celebrate the prosperity of harvests whether from your garden or local farmers/gardeners as well as the harvest of spells you have been working. At this time of balance, include in your spells and rituals balance and harmony for your home and work. Decorate your sacred space, altar and home with grapes, vines, squash, leaves, wheat, barley, pine cones, corn, horns of plenty, and acorns.
For continue reading, click here:

https://www.13moons.com/mabon-lore

Imbolc Candle Chant

Imbolc Prayer

Besom Spell

Imbolc in the Southern Hemisphere

by Jenwytch

POSTED ON JULY 20, 2010 BY JENWYTCH AT THE OTHER SIDE. THIS ARTICLE IS ALSO IN THE JULY 2010 EDITION OF THE “AXIS MUNDI”.

Imbolc is a cross-quarter day midway between the winter solstice (Yule) and the spring equinox (Ostara) and is the celebration of the banishing of winter, the imminent arrival of Spring and the stirring of new life in the earth. Imbolc recognizes the maiden aspect of the triple goddess – the fresh, the young, the naïve, the new – and is strongly connected with the Goddess Brigid. It is associated with and also known as the festivals of Oimelc, Imbolg, Imbolic (Irish), Candlemas (British), Feast of Torches, Lupercalia (Italian/Latin), Brigid’s Day, and Brigantia (Scottish).

Here in the southern hemisphere, in 21st century Australia, we are far removed from the climate and rural lifestyles of the people of ancient Europe where this festival, and others that make up the Wheel Of The Year, originated.

Due to the 6 month offset of the seasons between the northern and southern hemispheres …

To read this rest of this article please click on this link: Imbolc in the Southern Hemisphere

Wiccan Holidays in the Southern Hemisphere

What is the Wheel of the Year, or Wiccan holidays, for those in the Southern Hemisphere?

It gets a little tricky, since Wicca was created in the Northern Hemisphere. Since it’s a nature religion, an Earth religion, this makes a big difference.

After all, a Midsummer ritual in the North happens in June.

In the South, though, this is midwinter!

So what does a Southern Witch do?

To read the rest of this article please click on this link: Southern hemisphere Witch’s Holidays

Southern Hemisphere Sabbat Dates

	Traditional Dates	‘Exact’ Times & Dates **
Lughnasadh/Lammas	February 2	February 4, 2017 1:27AM
Mabon (Autumnal Equinox)	March 21	March 20, 2017 8:29PM
Samhain	April 30/May 1	May 5, 2017 5:28PM
Yule (Winter Solstice)	June 21	June 21, 2017 2:24PM
Imbolc	August 1	August 7, 2017 5:40PM
Ostara (Vernal/Spring Equinox)	September 21	September 23, 2017 6:02AM
Beltaine	October 31	November 7, 2017 3:25PM
Litha (Summer Solstice)	December 21	December 22, 2017 2:28AM