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TWV Presents... Popular Pagan Holidays [Show all] Views: 5,329,859 Holiday: ... Autumn: The Croning Time The Hidden God: an Observance of Samhain It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Chri... Yuletide! The Holly King Presents Christmas's Pagan Origins Samhain: A Time for Introspection---and Activism Daily Goddess Awareness Well, You Don’t Celebrate Christmas... The Dark Half of the Year La Befana The Path to Avalon: An Inner Journey for Samhain The Halloween Witch: Sense of Humor or Sense of Ire The Holiday Season, The Constitution and What's REALLY Important What Is A Real Witch's Sabbat? Spiritual Aspects of Yule A Beltane Celebration The Beltaine Storm The Most Wonderful Time of the Year Virginia, Get a Life. Alicia Meets Grandmother Autumn: A Children’s Story Winter Solstice By Any Other Name For A Religion So Opposed to Paganism, You Sure Stole a Lot of Our Stuff! Supermoms’ and Superdads’ Defense Against “Holiday Kryptonite” Key Points of the Pagan Wheel of the Year Lughnasadh, The Ritual Mabon: Preparing the Celebration Mabon and the Coming of Autumn The Ostara Transformation A Story For Autumn The Solstice Flame: A Yule Story Yule Traditions, Old and New A Meditation on Samhain: How Lucky You Are. The Babylonian Ghost Festival Let Slip The Past, Free The Now: The Alchemy of Samhaine Samhain: The Ritual The Theme of Mabon Samhain: Learning to Release November Days Samhain The Celtic Origins of Samhain Ostara: Enter the Light! Mabon Equinox. Circa September 21st August: Celebrating The Harvest Honor The Father, Honor the Sun: A Summer Solstice Tribute Happy Interfaith Pagan Christmas Yule Holiday Season January: The Solitude of Winter Those Magickal, Mellow Days of Summer Solstice Swim at Beach 69, Puako, Hawaii Musings On October The Best Thing About Death Yule and Tarot: The Year in Review Connection To The Dead: The Meaning Of The Fall Season Samhain is Ablaze with Reflections of My Father First Thanksgiving... in China A White Christmas in Fuyang Imbolc...or As The Wheel Turns Holiday: All ... A New Pattern Glimpsed in the Holidays We Want them Back! (A Pagan View of the Holidays) A Beginner's Guide To The 8 Sabbats How to Get the Most Out of Your Year The Wheel of the Year: Round and Round She Goes and Where She Stops! Turning The Wheel By Choice Holiday: beltaine ... INDEX: Beltane Beltane -- Holiday Details and History You Call it May Day, We Call it Beltane In Praise of Pagan Men Beltane -- Enlightening Links Beltane Essay (4) Beltaine - Our May Morn Beltane: Return To Feeling Mother Earth and Sister Moon: A Beltaine Story of Creation Holiday: imbolc ... INDEX: Imbolc You Call It Groundhog Day, We Call It Imbolc Imbolc Regained: The Tale of Valentine's Day Holiday: lughnasadh ... INDEX: Lughnasadh Lughnasadh - Overview by Christina Holiday: mabon ... INDEX: Mabon/Autumn Equinox Mabon - Overview by Christina Mabon and the Harvest in Modern Times You Call it the Autumnal Equinox, We Call it Mabon You Call it the Autumn Equinox, We Call it Mabon NOTE: For a complete list of articles related to this chapter... Visit the Main Index FOR this section.

Article Specs Article ID: 3673 VoxAcct: 34547 Section: holidays Age Group: Adult Days Up: 3,034 Times Read: 14,905 The Mighty Dead, the Beloved Dead and Us Author: M Macha Nightmare Posted: October 21st. 2001 Times Viewed: 14,905 The Mighty Dead, the Beloved Dead and Us © 2001 by M. Macha NightMare     Recently I've been giving a lot of thought to our concepts of the Dead. A seasonal musing each year around this time.     I don't know how many other Craft traditions have these concepts, but both of mine do. Surely everyone has Beloved Dead, meaning those we've loved who've passed on from this realm. We celebrate these ancestors every year at Samhain. We grieve together and we often communicate directly with them, as well. The Mighty Dead are a bit different. The Mighty Dead are said to be those practitioners of our religion who are on the Other Side now, but who still take great interest in the activities of Witches on this side of the Veil. They have pledged to watch, to help and to teach. It is those Mighty Dead who stand behind us, or with us, in circle so frequently.     In some cases, the Beloved Dead and the Mighty Dead may be the same people. For instance, two late friends of mine, Raven Moonshadow and Judy (Calypso Iris) Foster, now are revered as Mighty Dead amongst many Reclaiming Witches. Raven was a powerful priest and a talented teacher, complex and possessing of human foibles like all of us are. Judy is also among the Mighty Dead of NROOGD tradition, although I'm not certain that NROOGD uses this concept. The point being that Judy was a priestess, and a very influential one, one deeply involved in our work and our evolution as a faith tradition, of both traditions.     Another recent example - one no one would quarrel with - is the late Victor H. Anderson (May 21, 1917 - September 20, 2001) , oldest known practitioner of Faery/Feri tradition Craft. I have no doubt, and neither do the many other Witches he's trained, influenced or who've descended from him, that Victor's over there, and that he'll come dance with us in the Marin Headlands on Halloween.     In past years, at Samhain, I've called specific Mighty Dead into our circles. In general, I don't make a distinction between which particular tradition "own" individual Mighty Dead. So I've called Grandma Julie (Tower Family tradition out of the San Jose area, now having two lines) and Gwydion Penderwen (Faery tradition), for example, to Reclaiming Samhain rituals.     One year at a Reclaiming's Women's Samhain, after the Quarters had been called, I faced each Quarter and called one of the four women of the Golden Dawn - Moina Mathers, Annie Horniman, Florence Farr and Maud Gonne - into the circle. Although I don't consider them technically to be Mighty Dead of the Craft, I do indeed consider them to be prominent among our magical foremothers. It was for this reason I called them.     At this ritual, we had set up a central tiered dining table set with beautiful plates, silver service, seasonal vegetation (pumpkins, squash, Indian corn, grapevines, Autumn leaves). Women wrote on place cards and put their place cards at the settings on the table. So I wrote the names of each of these magical foremothers on place cards so that they had an honored place at our table.     I believe it behooves us to honor such people. And what better time than at Samhain, when we honor our ancestors and mourn our Beloved Dead. M. Macha NightMare Sunday, October 22nd, 2001 ABOUT... M Macha Nightmare Location: San Rafael, California Website: http://www.machanightmare.com Author's Profile: To learn more about M Macha Nightmare - Click HERE Other Articles: M Macha Nightmare has posted 9 additional articles- View them? Other Listings: To view ALL of my listings: Click HERE Email M Macha Nightmare... (No, I have NOT opted to receive Pagan Invites! Please do NOT send me anonymous invites to groups, sales and events.) To send a private message to M Macha Nightmare ... 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