On the last morning of this year's Grand Sabbat gathering, a friend—a priestess of many years' experience—came to me, distraught.
“The campers!” she said. “They have to be moved! They'll ruin the sightlines!”
The campers and caravans were parked on the edge of the meadow through which the Horned departs in the final rite of farewell. We follow him up out of the woods and watch as he walks up the hill and off into the sky.
I could readily understand my friend's concern. The sight of the Antlered disappearing over the horizon is an image of such searing purity and beauty that nothing must interfere with it, nothing.
“Don't worry,” I tell her. “The god will make the campers disappear. You won't even see them.”
And so, indeed, it was.
When the rite was ended, and the tears dried, my friend came to me, wondering.
“You were right,” she said, shaking her head. “They just weren't there.”
Ritual is a function of focus.
Who looks at campers, when there's a god to see?
Photo: Paul B. Rucker, God with Contrail