The Spring Equinox: Wednesday 21st March 2018

Many of us experience a sense of awe at the natural world, and want to mark our connectedness with nature, and express our thanks for its sustaining goodness. Particular points in the turning year may be understood as corresponding with different stages of our lives – which may help us to make some sense of our life experiences, and to go onwards more cheerfully and trustingly.

The Spring Equinox is celebrated around 21^st March in the Northern Hemisphere, and 21^st September in the Southern Hemisphere. This festival of the Sun marks a time of equality of day and night, when light is increasing. We recognise around us signs of Spring, as flowers appear, trees come into leaf, and we sow the seeds for the fruits and plants which will ripen in the summer. It is also a time when we may remember the Spring of our own lives, when we were children, growing, exploring, learning, playing: preparing our bodies, minds, hearts, and souls for adulthood. And we are reminded of the pleasures and responsibilities that adults bear, in nurturing the youngsters who are part of our lives.

The short responsive liturgy, below, is appropriate for use by individuals or by any group of people, especially before sharing a meal together. If possible, sit in a circle. You will need a pile of stones and a container of water (big enough to hold all the stones), and a Loving Cup – a large cup or beaker of wine or juice, enough for everyone present to take a sip of. Everyone is invited to join in saying the words in bold type.

The liturgies, celebrations, ceremonies, prayers, and reflections offered on this blog are the result of my thoughts, reflections, and experiences, woven together using my own words and sometimes adapting the words others have used: I am indebted to their wisdom. Please use these liturgies freely, adapting them as suits your own context. I am always pleased to hear from people who have used them.

The Welcome and Thanksgiving:

Welcome to you all, as we gather today to celebrate the Spring Equinox.

We offer thanks for the arrival of this Spring Equinox,

for the wonder & glory of the life of the world around us,

and for the mysteries, the strengths, and the vulnerabilities of nature:

       We offer thanks!

We offer thanks for our human lives, so full of possibility and potential,

for our own strengths and vulnerabilities,

for all we have experienced thus far,

and for the children, and the child-like, in our lives:

       We offer thanks!

As adults and as children, help us to fulfil our own potential,

to enable others to lead full lives,

and to delight in our world, and in one another:

       We offer thanks for the gift of life,

       and for all the blessings bestowed on us.

A short time of quiet is kept,

to reflect on what we are particularly thankful for,

and what we particularly regret.

The Cleansing:

Within the wonder of human life,

we have the freedom to choose our own actions and words:

       Sometimes we make mistakes

       and do things or say things that we regret.

Sometimes we allow these mistakes and regrets to become burdens:

       Burdens which weigh us down and hold us back.

Here and now, we can choose to release these burdens:

       We are thankful for what they have taught us,

       and have confident hope to move on from them.

If you wish, take a stone,

which represents the burdens of past mistakes and regrets.

Hold the stone until you are ready to let it, and the past, go.

Then release the stone gently into the water.

These stones have represented for us our past mistakes and regrets:

       I have learnt from you and I let you go.

       Be gone and be free.

The Sharing:

Everyday is a new beginning:

       And a new opportunity to share the blessings of life and love.

This Loving Cup is a sign of all that we share together:

       I share with you the Cup of Blessing.

The Loving Cup is passed around the circle for all to drink from.

The Closing:

We have given thanks:

       We have released our burden of regret,

       and we have shared the Cup of Love and Blessing.

Now we lift our future to our Creator's care:

       As we grow in age, may we grow also in grace.

May the sun bring us new energy by day:

       May the moon softly restore us by night.

May the rain wash away our worries:

       May the breeze fill us with new strength.

May we walk gently through the world:

       And may we know its beauty all the days of our lives.

       Amen! So mote it be!

Food for the Feast:

The festival of Nowruz (Persian new year) falls on the same date as the Spring Equinox, and is traditionally celebrated with a special dinner of seven symbolic food dishes each beginning with the letter 'S': sabzeh (sprouted seeds of wheat, barley or lentils), samanu (a wheat pudding), senjed (dried oleaster berries), sīr (garlic), sīb (apples), somaq (sumac berries) and serkeh (vinegar). The feast may also include herby omelettes, rice pilaf, stuffed vine leaves, and various sweet pastries – all sounding very tempting!

Slightly simpler, our own dinner is planned around eggs, seeds, and grains - all significant reminders of new life: frittata, salads and spring greens, seedy bread rolls, buckwheat pilaf, creamy rice pudding, and spicy ginger cake.

Decorative details:

As you would by now expect of me, I could make another wreath for our front door, using some of the whippy green spring growth from our trees, hedges, and shrubs as a base (yellow flowered forsythia would be great for this), and adding in some bright colours using spring flowers, ribbons, and decorative butterflies or birds. But instead I'm going to use an idea I saw on the Country Living website, and hang a pretty semi-closed umbrella on the door by its handle, and fill it with greenery and flowers. Simple! (And it's always handy to have an umbrella at this time of year!)

Indoors, the main decoration will of course be an egg tree, again very simple to make, using a large twig in a jug, and decorated egg shells, either blown or halves (no wonder we want to keep our own chickens!) hung from ribbon or string. (There are lots of illustrations on-line if you're not familiar with egg trees.)

And finally my candle-in-a-pot idea, that I used at the Winter Solstice, will make a re-appearance down the table centre, but this time topping the pots with small stones (like the ones used in the liturgy) rather than moss, and alternating along the plank with pots of spring flowers – whatever has survived this week's snow and is still flowering at the time: crocus, primroses, jonquils, or grape hyacinth.