Michaelmas

We have been building up a festival in the past years, and every year something adds up that makes sense or at least brings a new meaning/layer to it.

We gather in the already cold outdoors for a dyeing project, with goldenrod, aspen leaves, etc..everybody brings some to the steaming big pot and then we simmer the white silk and other yarns/stuff. the following week the children take part in a ceremony where golden capes (out of the silky white fabric) are put on.

This year we combine this in the frame of the Christian Community celebration of Michaelmas and I found so many interesting points that relate somehow to this form of festival that has been shaping up:

The lectures at this time focus on the images given in the book of revelation, that of the Madonna, the white rider, the wedding, the New Jerusalem....

Exceptionally, the symbolism of the royal wedding parable told on Matthew 22 is part of what this golden cape the children are invested with, a special garment for attending this occasion, when our souls would be clean and purified, ready to be united. And also with the reading of Ephesians 6 (The Armour of God): "When we actively take up the loving proximity of the divine world, and mould it into the strength of the Christian virtues, we make the borrowed garment our own."

In these lines also the songs that accompany us during the stirring of 500 for fall preparations are also linked: Scareborough Fair with the white garment, and Spirit Triumphant.

 

Are you going to Scarborough Fair?

Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme;

Remember me to one who lives there,

For once she was a true love of mine.

Tell her to make me a cambric shirt,

Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme;

Without any seam or needlework,

Then she shall be a true lover of mine.

Tell her to wash it in yonder well,

Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme;

Where never spring water or rain ever fell,

And she shall be a true lover of mine.

Tell her to dry it on yonder thorn,

Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme;

Which never bore blossom since Adam was born,

Then she shall be a true lover of mine.

Now he has asked me questions three,

Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme;

I hope he'll answer as many for me

Before he shall be a true lover of mine.

Tell him to buy me an acre of land,

Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme;

Betwixt the salt water and the sea sand,

Then he shall be a true lover of mine.

Tell him to plough it with a ram's horn,

Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme;

And sow it all over with one pepper corn,

And he shall be a true lover of mine.

Tell him to shear it with a sickle of leather,

Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme;

And bind it up with a peacock feather.

And he shall be a true lover of mine.

Tell him to thrash it on yonder wall,

Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme,

And never let one corn of it fall,

Then he shall be a true lover of mine.

When he has done and finished his work.

Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme:

Oh, tell him to come and he'll have his shirt,

And he shall be a true lover of mine.