I've never been entirely comfortable with any religion. I was raised as a sceptical Christian, if anything. Never went to church, never read the bible. Perhaps I simply lacked the proper upbringing to fully appreciate Christianity. However, from my perspective, a bunch of ancient people took the life of an amazing person and used it to exert power over others. As a result, there are many things that the church stands for that I don't believe Jesus would have ever condoned. From what I gathered, his message was that of love.
I think I believe in Jesus, and some sort of God if that's what we're calling it, but all the peripheral stuff I just couldn't go for. So I happened upon pagan and neopagan religions and though I didn't believe in the underlying gods and goddesses necessarily, the religions seemed better. Any sort of Wicca-like magick religions believe above all else that you can do what you like so long as no one or no thing is hurt in the process. 'An it harm none, do what ye will.' I liked that because that seemed to be a great parallel to Jesus's teachings. I'm all for that feel-good happy stuff.
Anyways, I experimented with paganism and neopaganism primarily from grade 5-11. Part way through that time I stopped wearing a pentacle and stopped identifying myself as such just because of the incredible harrassment from it all. Not as bad as I'm sure most others go through, but I was a sensitive kid. I never stopped being interested though. Then when I moved into residence in my firstyear of university, I couldn't light candles and I had a roommate who had nightmares from listening to Tom Waits let alone coming home to a full on circle of lit candles on the floor. Sure I suppose I could have explained it all to her, but I'm sure that she'd spread the word throughout the house and suddenyl I'd be the outcast. I was a bit of an outcast anyway, but that's my own doing and a story for another day.
What I'm getting to in a very roundabout way is that praying by candle light, and not even really praying so much as reflecting and imagining, was all very important to me, yet I hadn't done it in years. So when the solstice came around this year, and the lunar eclipse happened to be the same day, I just couldn't help but break out the candles and cast a safe circle. Now casting a circle is when you light a circle of candles that surround you. No, it's not meant to be a scary portal to hell. It's meant to make you feel, and be, safe. It's a protective circle made of light and positive emotions. It's a wonderful feeling to be encircled with light, by the way. So on the night of the solstice, I reflected upon the past year in the dark and then lit all the candles and basked in the light as I focused on how to 'bring light' to the coming year. It's quite a nice little ritual, with no actual religious connotations, but positive nonetheless.
I've since left the LED Christmas lights on non-stop as a replacement Yule log/candle since leaving a fire lit all night seems like a poor idea, but I still like the tradition of keeping a light constantly glowing for days.
Today is Christmas Eve and I think I just love holidays so I want to celebrate as many as I can get away with celebrating. I plan on watching the old Christmas special Rudolph the Rednosed Reindeer and snuggling up with some hot chocolate and my husband. This year we decided not to do gifts because we're poor and stressed out, so we didn't want to add to it all. We wanted a good holiday. Instead, we're Skyping with family in the morning and having a fancy dinner at night and I imagine Christmas specials will be watched.
So Happy Holidays to everyone out there. May you be surrounded by friends and family, good food and drink and good old fashioned holiday cheer.
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