Read A Pagan Ritual Prayer Book Online
Authors: Ceisiwr Serith
A Pagan Ritual Prayer Book (9 page)
CHAPTER 3
BEGINNINGS
A pure person is fit to come into the presence of the pure Holy Ones; pure objects are fit for their service; pure space is fit for them to enter. But pure of what? Of all that does not belong—mess, confusion, worries.
Would you invite honored guests to your home and not clean it first? Clean yourself spiritually; purify yourself before inviting those most honored guests, the divine beings.
The first step is to purify your sacred space; identifying it with the cosmos as seen in a sacred manner is the next. Everything you do in such a space is sacred; it is written into sacred reality. By performing actions in your microcosm, you make them real in the macrocosm.
Come today to worship the Kindreds,
Come today,
always come.
Come we together on this holy day,
across the distances which lay between us,
to this time,
to this place,
for one strong purpose:
to worship the Holy Ones in the proper manner.
I call you before the Holy Ones,
into the halls of the All-Gods gathered in council.
Here we will put our petitions to them for the consideration of the Wise,
and for the granting of the True, the Right, the Just,
as those who are True, and Right, and Just decide.
We are here:
we were always here.
We are here now:
we were always here now.
We are here together now:
we were always here together now.
We have always been here like this:
and we are always like this again.
Come and make offerings:
poems or prayers, well-said,
songs or steps well-prepared.
The Deities see
The Ancestors watch
The Land Spirits look on
And they will hear you.
Come, make offerings.
The Gods wait well,
those patient ones,
and will be here when you arrive,
ready to spend time together.
May the beating of the drum be the beating of your heart.
When you follow the beating drum, may your heart follow.
May you come whole-heartedly to the ritual.
A family scattered is a family still.
Today is a family reunion in the home of our Mother and Father.
Individual in existence,
One in purpose,
Neither denying nor losing who each of us is,
we are one, gathered together.
With hands open in giving and receiving
we come to you confidently,
All-Gods.
When the rituals are performed rightly,
all of the ways of the soul are well:
May this ritual be performed rightly.
When the rituals are performed rightly,
all of the relationships in society are well:
May this ritual be performed rightly.
When the rituals are performed rightly,
all of the state is well:
May this ritual be performed rightly.
When the rituals are performed rightly,
all of the things of Heaven and Earth are well:
May this ritual be performed rightly.
When the rituals are performed rightly,
all things that are or may be are well:
May this ritual be performed rightly.
We come together today as a community to worship the Undying Ones.
This is as it should be; it is not good for people to be alone.
When we evolved from the species that came before us it wasn't just our larger brains that gave us an edge,
it wasn't just the tools that our larger brains inspired us to make that did this,
it wasn't just the upright stance that allowed us to use those tools easily that improved our ability to survive.
Most of all it was community.
It was our love of having other humans around us,
to help us when we were weak, to be helped when
they
were weak,to be protected and to protect,
to be loved by and to love,
to gather together to reassure ourselves, to know that things will be okay.
That is one of the great strengths of our species.
It is part of us, not decided on, but written into our bodies, encoded in our DNA.
We may need guidance and explanations to live well in communities, but we do not need outside information to know that we must live together as communities. It is who we are.
So when we come together as a community to worship today, we are doing something that is precisely a human thing to do.
When we worship as a community, we are worshipping as fully human beings.
Let us join now in worship.
A school of fish, responding to currents
A meadow of grass, responding to wind:
each individual, each in the same pattern.
That is us, as we come together for worship.
Still your fears,
replace them with awe;
Prepare for the Holy
with a single mind.
Come to where the people are,
Come to where the Gods are,
Come to the drums, Come to the bells,
Come dancing to the sacred place,
Come dancing, Come singing, Come.
I call, I call, I call you here,
to worship, to worship, the Ancient Ones.
Listen and come to the one who calls
who calls, who calls, who calls to you.
Gather by the tree that rises,
and rise with it to celestial realms,
where Shining Ones gather
to hear our prayers:
make prayers to them here.
Living so long in the polluted world of man
I turn at last to the sacred land,
the pure land of the gods,
the holy land of the goddesses,
which is my true home.
Before a tale is told:
It was a long time ago—
no one knows when, or even if (still the story is true)—
that what happened, happened.
It is still happening, of course, and always will—
that's the way it is with true stories.
Listen carefully, then,
because this story is about where you come from,
or maybe were you are.
Maybe you haven't found it yet.
Maybe it is something that's already happened,
so it will explain where you are,
or maybe it's going on right now,
so it will help you decide what to do,
or maybe it hasn't happened yet—
forewarned is forearmed.
Listen carefully, then:
this story is true.
May I be pure that I might cross through the sacred.
May I cross through the sacred that I might attain the holy.
May I attain the holy that I might be blessed in all things.
The impure is that which doesn't fit a time, a place, an intent.
May this water wash the impure away, and leave behind the fit.
Through pure water, I am pure.
Through pure fire, I am pure.
By the pure, I am pure
to come before the gods of incomprehensible purity.
I make myself pure to receive the pure as guests.
Everything that is not proper to my purpose today,
everything that would offend [deity name],
everything that would interfere with your worship:
May it all drain away,
removed by the purifying water,
replaced totally by that water's purity.
From all that I have done that I should not have done,
may I be purified.
From all that has come to me that should not have come,
may I be purified.
From all that is not in the right place.
or has happened at the wrong time,
may I be purified,
that I may put these things behind me and step again onto the path of the Holy Ones.
May I be pure, may I be pure, may I be pure.
That we aren't impure by nature, and only made so by error, is made clear to us in this ritual. Water washes away only what's on the outside, removes that which does not belong.
I purify you with water, then,
Making you what you truly are,
Making you what you already are,
Making you what you have always been:
pure to be in the presence of the gods.
May this water wash away everything that keeps me from seeing the sacred through which I walk, the Ocean of spirits through which I walk.
May the water with which I anoint my forehead be a stream to wash away the impurities of my everyday life.
