Cerealia - April festival

[Lunar Rose]

I have been reading about Ceres, the Roman Goddess of grain and harvest, recently. I was reading about Cerealia, a week long festival in April celebrating Ceres in order to bless the people with abundant harvests.

I found a really nice ritual, you light a beeswax candle and provide an offering of bread and honey. Then whilst visualising fields of abundant crops, you recite;

"Lady Ceres, bless our seed,
May we never want or need,
Wave your hand across our fields,
Bless us with abundant yields."

But then, after reading about the ancient festival, I saw that part of the celebration was to tie torches of fire to foxes tails and make them run around in the circus!

That has really put a downer on what I was looking forward to. I know that the Goddess probably didn't condone such actions, and we would never even contemplate doing such things in modern times (one would hope!). But I can't help but think that I don't feel comfortable partaking in a festival where so many poor animals were treated like that. Which sucks, as I was really looking forward to it!

Had anyone else ever experienced something like this, or have any suggestions?

BB

[Lunar Rose]

Also, just to clarify, I do understand that there are plenty of other nasty things that have happened over the centuries.

But my question is, has a negative thought relating to a ritual ever stopped you from doing it? As much as I was looking forward to it, I can't shake the thought from my head.

[Seraphin]

Hiya Lunar Rose!

It's undeniable that animal sacrifices were an integral part of Ancient Mystery Religions (Greco-Roman, Celtic, Egyptian, Babylonian, Chaldean). A lot of ancient magickal writings and papyris center on the various laws of sacrifice pertaining to the Deities and Nature Spirits. Indeed, even today I know some traditionalists are still practicing these things. Nonetheless we modern pagans wondered why the Deities demanded such brutal, violent, bloody and gory sacrifices of animals like that as part of Their worship. Surely they have no physical need for those things.

A lot of sages, occultists and historians attempted to explain the significance of the sacrificial system. Most of them agreed that the sacrifices were Divine decrees that were intended to be offered as a sign of devotion to the Deities. Some also said that they were made for people to easily and tangibly approach their Gods.

The nature of a sacrificial ritual as well as that which was to be sacrificed varied from one God to another God, from one cult to another cult. For the Ancient people, these sacrifices weren't an act of violence at all; instead, they were divine practice in which everyone was a willing participant: mortals, immortals, and animals. Well, that's the "consciousness" of the people at that time and we have to accept and respect that even though how gruesome and horrific we think they were. For them, these animal sacrifices is no more cruel and violent than slaughtering animals for food. Sacrifices developed due to the particular needs and conditions of the people at the time. To the ancient people, the sacrificial services or ceremonies was principally a spiritual one. In order to understand them, I think we need to look at this from a very different perspective to make sense of it; we have to remove our modern shoes and put ourselves in ancient shoes to see the value and experiential quality of it all.

But this must not bother you or affect your devotion to the Goddess Ceres. Because I believe that the Deities don't prefer any type of sacrifice or worship; what they are looking for is the "sacrifice", period. It's up to us to decide what to give. We have to understand that "Worship" is a personal thing. Each of us has his/her own system of worship and beliefs and no one should ever impose his/her own systems and beliefs on others.

Your actions and materials in worshiping your Goddess need not be checked or approved by an authority figure like a priest because you're the "priestess"!

Well, in fact, I believe our meditations, spells and rituals are like the ancient sacrifices before. The principal aspect of the sacrifices was never terminated. Just the outer aspects that the Ancients did, those can't be applied today.

I believe there's no essential difference between the ancient sacrifices and our chosen modern sacrifices. Both of them are vehicles to our Deities. They carry the same essence -- whether it's a peace offering, thanksgiving, harvest offerings, animal sacrifices or festive sacrifices. These vehicles are there to commune with the highest Spiritual Being.

I also think it's good to adapt some traditions and customs of the Ancient that we can still apply today so that we'll have an anchor or foundation. But the best type of sacrifice or worship you can practice is the one that you live.

Hope this helps!

[Lunar Rose]

Thanks, Seraphin. That does help

[Seraphin]

You are welcome lady!

Have a happy celebration!

[seidkonacat]

Thank you for the info on this. My dad's side of the family is full-blooded Italian, so I love reading about Roman gods.

As for the way the festival was celebrated in the past....as a historian, I can tell you this: if you try to frame the actions of your ancestors in a modern light, they WILL look bad. You can't judge past celebrations by your own current set of moral standards. Those standards, at that time, did not exist.

You can't go into ancient pagan festivals thinking you're going to do everything they did. It'll just never work. Frankly, ancient pagans did some messed-up stuff in the name of their Gods--killing, rape, torture, etc.

I would advise you to alter the ritual to your liking or comfort level and perform it. There's no reason your celebration must reflect what you view as mistakes fro the past. Times change, religion has to change with them.

[Lunar Rose]

Thanks, I understand that they were different times and that we can't compare them to modern day rituals.

My question was more to do with negative feelings, like when you get a nagging voice at the back of your mind, and no matter how hard you try to rationalise or ignore it, it won't go away.

This was what was putting me off doing my ritual, as I was worried that the negative thought may interfere. In the end, I did do my ritual, I meditated beforehand to help quiet my thoughts, and it went really well. I guess it just goes to show how important meditation really is!

BB

[Seraphin]

Good for you! Another progress indeed.

Don't let your negative thoughts bother you. Listen to your own heart and to your reason.