Traditionally there were four major festivals in the Celtic calendar year. The year began with Samhain on the first of November. The other festivals were Imbolc (Feb 1st) Bealtine (May 1st) and Lughnasa, the harvest festival celebrated on the 1st of August.
Beginning the new year in November was in tune with what was happening in the natural world. During the darkest days of the year, the seeds of new life of next year’s growth are already germinating.
The word Samhain means ‘the end of summer’ and was traditionally associated with the remembrance of ancestors. It was a threshold time, when the visible known world and the invisible unconscious world were seen as one. It was a time for telling stories and getting in touch with imaginings, dreams and longings not yet expressed.
There was a custom among people in rural Ireland which survived until recently of leaving gates and doors open to facilitate the movement of the spirits from one place to another during Halloween. At the very heart of Celtic spirituality was the importance given to hospitality and welcome. On the eve of Samhain, people went to bed early leaving the fire alight and food ready on the table to welcome the dead ancestors whom they believed would assemble in the house during the night. The Celts understood that only in a place of hospitality could the soul be encouraged to find its own natural pathway. These traditions recognized too that the beginning of Samhain was a time of transition, risk, even some danger, and that some of the spirits would be dark and frightening.
The Christian calendar continues the old beliefs by marking the beginning of winter with a remembrance of All Saints on November 1st and All Souls on November 2nd. The spirits of all the people who have gone before us on our earthly journey are included in this remembrance.
Samhain provides an ideal opportunity to spend time in a soulful and creative way. It is a time to pause and reflect on our personal journey but also on that bigger, universal story of which we are all by nature a part. It is a time to take note of dreams and create plans for the future. Most of all, though, Samhain is a time for remembering.
We have chosen four main themes as an aid to reflection during the month of November. They are: threshold, remembrance, longing and reconciliation. These themes are explored through questions which will hopefully connect with personal experience in a very real way.
THRESHOLD
Where have you come from? Who do you say you are? What does your experience tell you?
REMEMBRANCE
Who [or what] do you find yourself remembering? Do you listen and respond to your memories? What wisdom have you inherited?
LONGING
What longings have you abandoned? Which of your dreams do you most want to come true? What would give you new life?
RECONCILIATION
What part of your shadow would you like to befriend? What is your ‘inner diamond’? What reconciliation do you seek?
Programme designed by Michael Rodgers and Gill McCarthy