For Old Craft witches, the Winter Solstice, or Midwinter Festival, is the holiest time of the year. It marks the passing of the old and the forthcoming hope attached to the new; it is a time for remembering ‘absent friends’ but it is also a time of feasting and enjoyment.
For the Coven this will be observed by the Initiates going up to the Neolithic monument that now represents the spiritual gateway for our group and taking a basket of goodies to share with those who care to join us from Otherworld. Times may change, climates may alter, calendars may be realigned, but the falling of Midwinter falls at the same turning of the tide as it did 6,000 years ago when our monument was built. The weather forecast isn’t good, but we will brave the elements – come hail, rain or shine – to complete our obsequies. When we return home to a welcoming log fire, we will eat, drink and be merry – exchange our gifts – and on the morrow my guests will depart to spend the rest of the holiday with their respective families.
At this time of great strife we would do well to remember that in the coming days falls the Feast of the Unconquered Sun and the birth of Mithras, god of the Roman Legions, who, if the dice had fallen the other way, would have been the chosen god of the Western world. Perhaps we would be wise to collectively drink to his memory because as Alan Richardson has observed, when we become aware of the Old Gods, they become aware of us. He would be a powerful ally in the face of the violence to come ...