|
A Free Membership
Celtic Druids Newsletter
B Homestudy Course
Celtic Druids Ritual Ceremony
C Celtic Handfasting
Pagan Weddings for all
D Healing Seminars
Truth reshapes your reality
E Geostress Balancing
Home and Office
F Spirit Release
(Ghost Busting)
G Druidschool Lectures
Self-healing empowerment
H Psychic Readings
Tarot and Geomancy
I Healing (One on One)
Healing and Counselling
J Astro Natal Chart
Incarnational Potential
K Astro Transit Chart
Current Energy Flow
L Astro Love Charts
Compatibility for Couples
M Donations
You can help us in our work
N Druid's Calendar
Landscape Temple Map
O Five Roads to Tara
Gold Road identified
|
TARA na RÍ
This Pilgrimage was a massive success in that we completed our full program of activities smoothly. For me as the organiser – the part I enjoyed most was the Lifting of the Priest Curse. This was because there were so many children running, laughing and dancing barefoot on Tara for over 25 minutes to the sound of multiple drums. Mammies and daddies and their little ones giving it all they had – it was inspiring. My sincere thanks go to them all. At one stage during a break in the drumming and dancing I told the assembled group that I am a very clever Druid because I was getting them to do all the work. This got a roar of laughter and then at my signal the drumming and dancing began again. This happiness with bare foot pounding of the earth brought much Light to the temple. We were in the Rath of the Synods from 8pm when we lifted the curse. For 2006 we will hold a similar ceremony at the same place and time but for 2006 we will call the ceremony – “the Celtic Blessing for Tara”.
We have to admit to a small bit of misdirection because we did the Triple Geis on the night before the Solstice and not on the 21st as given in the program. This was to prevent any unwanted intrusion and to avoid having a large audience. We were lead by a piper playing the war pipes and the Geis was given eight times in Irish, English and French. Many thanks go to the five Ladies and to the Piper who was one of the three men.
The Sunrise was clouded but refreshing to attend. No words were spoken as many individuals and couples just gathered in silence on Rath Grainne to be there when the Sun rose. This was the start of a long day and many of the faces seen here were to be seen at the other ceremonies during the day and night. We also held ceremony for each of the four elements as given in the Western Tradition.
At 8:30am we were at the Holy Well of the Dark Eye (which is also known as the Healer) for our Ceremony for Water. We had to wait a short while to allow the previous druid group to finish and leave. I was surprised to see so many from that group making the shape of little crosses on their third eye and throat and heart to the sound of music from a tape recorder. I can never understand why so many people willingly close down their psychic seeing centre, truth speaking centre and heart feeling centre and always fail to understand why they prefer taped music over our native birdsong and I really cannot understand why they want to call this well St Patricks’ and yet they consider themselves to be ‘druids’! I openly admit to having said this to the 30 people in our group. I did a short bitching session on this topic. We then gathered water from the Holy Well of the Healer and blessed it with our intent to use it in our lifting of the curse in 12 hours time.
At 12:28 when the Sun was in its highest point in the sky and exactly due south we held our Ceremony for Fire. This was given as noon but as we are 6*35’ west of Greenwich we waited until about half twelve. This was a formal ceremony with about 40 people and many photographers. Groups of tourists appeared when we had finished but the Sun briefly broke through the clouds and shone when we called. This ceremony was on the highest point of the Hill of Tara on the east side of the passage cairn that is called the Mound of the Hostages and was held in Irish with English translations. After this ceremony we had a gathering for a chat and we discussed many aspects of healing and the bad medicine of the chemical doctors. A mature couple that I had helped to hand-fast with a Celtic Druids Blessing a few months ago arrived and stood with us smiling brightly and spoke of their happiness.
At 8pm we gathered for the main work of the day. This was on a Tuesday evening and we were delighted to see so many people attend. Having waited the normal ‘few extra minutes’ I called a circle and declared the intention of this gathering to be a lifting of the curse with drumming, barefoot dancing and laughing. The drumming began and one Student Druid began running clockwise inside the drummers circle. After two laps she was joined by another and then another and then the burst of children rushed in. When they were just getting breathless I raised my Staff into the Air and the drumming got faster, the dancers went faster and then I put the Staff to the Earth and the drumming and dancing stopped. Now those who were the watchers clapped and shouted and whistled. At this stage I entered the centre and poured water from the Well of the Healer that we had blessed 12 hours previously onto the small heap of quartz stones as the activator and then I returned to the outer circle. After a minute or so I raised my Staff again and said “agus arís” which is the Irish phrase for “and again”. Because almost all the children were Irish they knew what to do.
This formula was repeated 10 times and each time the high speed drumming was louder and stronger. Each time when we stopped I activated the quartz centre with the blessed water. When we had finished and I spoke my thanks - I declared that the happiness of the group had broken any spell of desolation. This got much clapping, shouting and whistling from all the different age groups who were with us. Then the Student Druid who had begun the barefoot dancing went into the centre and gave permission to the children to take a quartz stone. She held a stone and said that it now has the memory of the magic of the dance inside it and that all the children could have one. One big red and black-flecked lump from the Jersey Isles was left – one small kid was looking at it and at the Student Druid. “Go on” she said, “You can have it” – the child’s eyes lit up and as the stone was lifted the Ceremony for Earth was finished for real. Then Jimmy Fagan, who is 83 years old and the chief poet of Ireland made his way over to me and blessed us all with a few ancient Irish poems. He told us that he had great respect for us because we respected the old ways. He then arranged to have a photograph taken with him and me and one of my students. I saw this as an honour and I am delighted to have this mans respect. Then the Druids of the Dark Moon Grove left the circle. We had generated so much Light and energy that others quickly appeared and a second (non-ritual) gathering began on the same spot. Now we had fire chain dancers, rappers and drummers, hooting and clapping until way past 12 in the night.
By 10:30 we were gathering at the Fairy Tree for our Ceremony for Air. It was really nice to see so many people bring their own flagpoles with the flashing colours as requested. At this Ceremony of Air the wind blew from the south where we had Venus and Mercury appear, we had the Sun setting and the Moon rising. A simple ceremony was held beside the Fairy Tree on the west slopes of Tara. As I opened this up to the group – one Lady asked that we all make a wish and send it on the wind to go where it is intended. Now we broke and began to organise for the Full Moon “Ritual of Protection” for Tara.
This “Ritual of Protection” has been held at every Full Moon since the Dark Moon of Samhain 2003. Details are elsewhere on this site. This gathering had over 200 people making an egg shaped circle around our sacred fire. Our firebox is a cast iron stove held in a steel inset dish and we only place it on the gravel patch on Tara– never on the grass. This is to prevent any damage to the archaeology or to the ability of archaeologists to ‘see’ with their electronic and magnetic sensing tools when they may scan an area. Only sacred woods are burned in this ritual and we never use painted or treated woods for this work. It was over four hours since we had lifted the curse and replaced it with a Celtic Blessing of Joy and the second gathering at this centre of Light was still drumming. I was in two places – One – I was happy that the Light was flowing enough to keep the drumming going and Two – I wished that they would go quiet so I could hold the “Ritual of Protection”. I gave the Dedication for the Ritual – by this I mean that I explained why I was doing this Ritual and in so doing I shared the most current state of play with regard to the double toll road threat to the Valley between Tara and Skryne. Then we went into the ritual proper. We blessed ourselves with the Celtic Cross of Light and we gave a Blessing to the Three Realms of Sky, Sea and Land. We held the Ritual of Protection, as this is our modern myth or new tradition and as we progressed two things happened. The second gathering of drummers moved about 600 yards away to the west where they regrouped and even though they were still drumming – they were now only a low background beat. The other thing was that a group of three or four people started a fire on top of the Mound of the Hostages. I paused the Ritual and our group of 200 or more looked to the Mound. Their fire flared up briefly and then went out. They left the Mound and re-joined their friends. We were moving and directing great amounts of energy with only our focused intention. We lifted the curse, gave a Celtic blessing, held a ritual to protect Tara, moved noisy drummers to the west and put out a badly located fire. This main ritual of the night took two hours and even though it was a large group and many were first timers it went very smoothly. The last action in this ritual is the throwing of the ‘blanket of darkness’ into the sky and with over 200 intentions merged into one it gave me a terrific rush through my head when we threw it skywards on an out breath. Then we had an informal gathering and chat around the firebox.
The final ceremony was at Sunrise only four hours after sunset. Here we gathered in silence as we had done the day before and waited for the Sun to rise on Rath Grainne. It was cloudy. The Sun rose as it does every day but we did not see it crest the horizon. What we did see was many fantastic cloud shapes in the Sky. Faces, animals, spirits, contrails making the Awen or Druid symbol, a host of angels as we looked at Cirrus, Cirrocumulus and Cirrostratus at over 15,000 feet high. We could also see Altocumulus and Altostratus at over 6,500 feet high and the Sun gave these clouds a multicoloured bed with a crisp blue background. It was the start of a beautiful day and a fitting end to our 24 hours of Light Ceremony for the Tara Pilgrimage 2005.
My thanks go to all who attended and to those who supported us in Spirit.
Grá
Con
6 July 2005
|