Merry Samhain

Summer is almost at the point where the season is merely a memory. During the Autumn months the temperatures are trying to cool while the wind sweeps the leaves trying to change color as it moves the treetops. Autumn is the balance between summer's light and winter's dark. The season approaching is one that draws us inward and makes us reflective.

To Witches October 31st is more than trick or treating.

Know as Samhain (sow-een) to the ancient Celts, is the day on which the Celtic New Year and Winter begins. Samhain is the end of one year and the beginning of the next. A time for change, and a time to look to the future. It is the perfect moment to be in touch with Spirit Guides and vision of the way you want you life. The veil between the worlds of the living and the dead is at its thinnest point of the year making communication easier.

To prepare for the ritual bathe in salt to purify the mind, body, heart and soul. Dressed, slip in your pocket a picture of the person you will request to speak with or your Spirit Guide. Indoors or out the summoning of spirit is carried out in dawn or dusk in the glow of flickering lights of candles.

A secluded place is necessary, free from interruption, and then the magical circle is drawn out. The reason for this is to avoidance of contamination from unfriendly spirits.

Pause before you say what's on your mind. Focus on the lit candle wick and slowly breathe in and out to connect with the ebb and flow of the universe.

The universe is comprised of an invisible energy which is synchronized and flows without static. Interlaced threads move from side to side, intersect, sends out ripples and generate a current. Energy swirls around and around in its own inevitable rhythm of waves or vibrations on a vast range of different frequencies. The magical energy is, above and below heaven and earth, and inhabits all living and non-living things. The endless energies can be tapped into.

Acknowledge what you have already been given. You have many blessings to be thankful for. If you woke this morning with a healthy body you are blessed. Some people didn't while others didn't wake at all.

Say aloud:

I am thankful for the wonderful things in my life. I am grateful for all those mundane bounties that can be taken for granted which makes my life more stable - a home, heat, hydro, resources to pay bills and food in the fridge. I appreciate my family and friends cooperation to make my life more peaceful; for mutual consideration and respect.

I pray that peace be with my fellow citizens of my community, my country and the world at large.

Call out to your Spirit Guide bidding to appear.

Spirit Guide who intervenes in my life with guidance and sympathy please come hither.

I am never afraid of what I know - participate in the process of learning and teaching, to fulfil my potential through constructive productivity and whatever state I am in, to be content.

In the previous year there were many ups and downs that I dealt with. Trouble is part of life. Failure builds character. I acknowledge what has been done; and what remains to be done.

This year I will strive to ----

Take time to visualize yourself being the person you want to be, living the life you desire.

Say aloud:

Spirit Guide I request your assistance along the way in the coming year. Say farewell and then close the circle. Blessed Be.

For a variety of reasons, people who have died visit the earthly plane. I don't believe they cut ties or release their attachments to the people they love and care for. If you believe communication with the dead or spirit, it is possible.

A little Halloween history

Halloween orgins date back 2000 years ago to the ancient Celtic festival of Samhain (prodounced sow-in). Saturday October 31st is the Great Sabbat Samhain and fire festival. Samhain means "end of summer" and is an ancient Celtic festival that celebrates the beginning of winter, marked by death and is considered to be the Witches' New Year.

In the seventh century, Pope Boniface IV designated November 1
All Saints' Day, a time to honour saints and martyrs.

It is believed that the pope was attempting to replace Celtic festival of the dead with a related, but church-sanctioned holiday. The celebration was also called
All-hollowmas or(from Middle English Alholwesse meaning All Saints' Day) and the night before it, the night of Samhain, began to be called All-hallows Eve and, eventually Halloween.

November 1, the Day of the Dead (also celebrated by some on November
2)the dead were thought to return to earth. People would leave food
on the tables for them and for would usually stay indoors.



DICTIONARY:

BANSHEE- Spirit of females who come to announce the death of one of their
own number, who is living. Best known in Ireland. The Banshee is mevelovent
and can cause fear-when her wail is low and sweet, an omen of gentle death
is the interpretation, but when she gives an angry wail, death will be
will be violent or fruesome.

HECATE-The goddess ruler of the under world, the queen of the witches.
She gave birth to the Titans; as Artemis (Diana),a figure of night,
she was feared by the Romans and Greeks.

As Artemis-Diana the Earth,Selena-Luna the Sky,Persephone-Proserpine Hell

She has three faces;in the center, that of a woman;on the right
that of a horse;and on the left, that of a dog. Her images were
often placed at crossroads.

She protects witches and helps to make their philters.

MERRY MEET, MERRY PART, TILL MERRY MEET AGAIN

(c)2009Angie Skelhorn

Samhain - Time For Apple Magic

Apple tress that produce blossoms and fruit simultaneously
were one of the features of the Celtic paradise. Avalon, the
paradise to which King Arthur was called, was probably
named after the Welsh word afal. meaning apple. The apple
has always been particularly associated with love and marriage.

Several of the most widely known Halloween's divination
rituals related to apples.

If you want to know the initial of your true loves first name
twist the stalk once for each letter of the alphabet: the stalk
will snap at the right letter.

Place a apple seed representing a potential partner in a hot fire
while saying: 'If you love me, bounce and fly, if you dislike me,
lie and die', and then observing what happens, might produce
the required answer.

If a girl stands before a mirror while eating an apple and combing
her hair at midnight, her future husband's image will be reflected
in the glass over her left shoulder.

At midnight cut an apple into nine pieces, each of which must
be stuck on the point of the knife and held over the left shoulder,
her future husband's image will appear.

Peel an apple in one long piece, and toss the peel over the left shoulder
or into a bowel of water, one will be able to read the first initial of their
future partner's name in the the shape assumed by the discarded peel.

An apple peel hung on a nail by the front door and the initials of the
first man to enter will be the same as those of the unknown lover.

The game of ducking apples: without using their hands, children attempt
to take bites out of apples floating in a bowl of water or suspended on
strings The child is fated to marry the owner of the apple they managed
to bite. The chlidren take their apple to bed and sleeps with the apple under
their pillow so as to receive a vision.

MERRY MEET, MERRY PART, TILL MERRY WE MEET AGAIN")

(c)2009AngieSkelhorn