What is necessary in order to conclude or close a ritual? Why? Email us your thoughts, share some of your experience, tell us what works for you and what doesn't (150 words or less, or send us a full article).
Mark Williams : For us the end of a rite it is always touched with regret. We usually have lapsed into silence and have being sitting in our woodland circle for some time. As a result, we end the rite in a low-key but reverent way. Someone bids farewell to the Gods, and then someone else bids farewell to the Ancestors, usually ending with the words: ‘we thank you for you blessing and your presence.’ Then the quarters are honoured in silence. We simply turn to face the appropriate direction, usually east-south-west-north, and kneel. Each person puts their hands together in the classic ‘prayer’ position, and touches them to their hearts, with bowed heads. Then we raise our hands, still together, and touch them to our foreheads. Then we raise them still further, out and forwards, still with heads bowed. This physical gesture of thankfulness and reverence, made in total silence, works better for us than rambling on about invisible hawks, stags etc., and how nice it was of them to come. The last thing, of course, which we do is thank the spirits of the place as we leave, with a deep bow or a kissing of the earth.
Susa Black : Ending the ritual should be as powerful and evocative as the beginning and middle. After thanking the Deities and Spirits for attending and witnessing the rite, I end with:
In our Sacred Glade
The Earth will turn
The Water will flow
The Fire will burn
The Air will blow
and the Grove will fade.
Kris Hughes : The closing of the rite slowly brings the space back to the normal reality of the 21st century, as the veil once again drapes shut. Our awareness of the ordinary slowly infiltrates the consciousness as we sense the pull of density sing us back into ordinariness. The circle is honoured as each stone and its attribution is thanked for its blessing, for its inspiration. The tribe gathers together hands clasped in unity, feeling, sensing each other as individual songs within the world, as the earth beneath us becomes firmer, grasping us in her magnetic field, pulling the spirit. The tribe is honoured and the doors are closed.
Phil Ryder : The closing needs as much thought as the rest of the rite. It is the time when we acknowledge the success of our intent but it is also a time of parting. We give thanks to all who have made the rite a success, both seen and unseen, and we declare our intent to meet again. It is very easy to have a set formula for closing that is almost rushed, but we should think carefully about what we say and to who we are saying it. A simple example might be our ancestors. Do we bid them all ‘hail and farewell’? Ours are with us always, it is like bidding a family member farewell and then going home with them. Another is ‘spirit of place’, if it is a place we use often then our farewell is far less final than say at a place we are unlikely to ever visit again. My thoughts are that the way we depart can colour the way in which we next meet; it isn’t something to be rushed but rather lingered over with an acknowledged level of reluctance.
Ximena Eduarda : Given that so many doors/portals/vortex/giddiness open, my rituals always need special care to return each thing to its place and intensity. Thanksgiving is essential, not only so that fluids are not blocked, also so that all existences involved may go on with their paths. In some occasions, fire is left for self consumption and others water is applied, when the ritual is with water, it is returned to soil at closure, burying offers/sacrifices if they are not consumed by fire or ashes themselves to close portals and emanations are important to me also. One can bring over ritual vibrations, but what happens over there belongs there and cannot come walking with me.
