St. John’s Tide Bonfire and Celebration at Ashwood
There will be a gathering of people on Thursday June 24, 7:30 PM at Rosewood ECC for social time and a bonfire, to be lit at dusk. We will collect dry Christmas greens and brush at the fire circle after June 11. If you would like more information, to share ideas about the celebration, or help plan a special activity for children, please call Susan Junge (236-0505).
Everyone is encouraged to work this festival into their family life on whatever scale feels most comfortable. If you can’t join us at Ashwood, maybe you can have a campfire at home with a few friends on June 24th.
This is a high summer festival that occurs after the solstice, once the shortening of daylight can be observed. It has been celebrated from ancient times with diverse stories picturing the earth and all it’s life forms reaching up into the heavens, communing with the spiritual world. The soil expands with the heat, water rises into clouds, plants grow tall, and animals raise their young in the time of warmth and nourishment. We human beings have turned gratefully towards the sun too. We enjoy the long warm days, the ripening fruits and vegetables, and the more frequent opportunities to socialize with each other during what most of us call ‘summer vacation’. All this stretching upwards also means that our imaginations explore higher ideals of who we are and can become. In this spirit we join around the bonfire: to celebrate what is good and beautiful in our world and in ourselves, and to affirm our intentions to continue creating out of this love.
Happy St. John’s Tide!
From Steiner Books http://www.steinerbooks.org/detail.html?id=9780880105705 on The Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily, A Fairy Tale:
“Goethe’s fairy tale is one of the most important stories of the Anthroposophic and Rosicrucian streams. It is a timeless, allegorical tale of initiation and had a profound impact on Rudolf Steiner and on the formulation of his teachings. He called the fairy tale a kind of “secret revelation,” an “apocalypse.”As the authors point out in The Time Is At Hand! Goethe’s fairy tale begins with a specific image: a river separating two lands that contrast to each other, as do the sensory world and the spiritual world. The story ends with a bridge, created through sacrifice, that spans the river between the two lands.”
Please join us for one or all of our March, April or May gatherings to read and discuss this important tale about spiritual and social renewal. Each will take place at the Ashwood Campus in the Early Childhood Center on the third Sunday of the month, 4-5:30. Dates: March 21, April 18, May 16, 2010. See poster below.
The Wed. evening Esoteric Study Group will take a hiatus at the end of February. It is unclear at this point if it will reconvene at a later date.
In our conversation about the generations that each of us experience, it took on an immediately personal turn when Susan Silverio enumerated the characteristics of those people born to live through the World Wars and the great Depression, versus those of us Baby Boomers, or Generation Xers, Millennials, or since 2000, Gen-Y. These are labels and generalities that raised questions and a few hackles, yet there were also opportunities to see into the larger possibilities for understanding destiny and human relationships.
We alternated between social observations, anecdotes, and brief histories - in an attempt to build up these categories into something realistic enough to think about and use. This conversation became especially substantive when applied to the youngest generation surrounding us now, and the upsurge of challenges they face in their health, education and environment.
There were no momentous conclusions, just an awareness and respect for the complexity of human experience, whether it is looked at macro or micro-cosmically
As happens with many of us in mid-life, Susan has responded to the call to tend to her aging parents in Ohio on the date previously scheduled for her talk. She regrets any inconvenience to those planning to attend on Jan. 31.
The NEW date for her presentation will be the following weekend, February 7. Same place, same time. We realize that Feb. 7, is also “Super Bowl Sunday” and again regret any conflicts, but this seemed like the only reasonable time with school vacation and Valentines being the following week.
See details below.
An invitation to a community conversation, on Sunday January 31 from 4 pm to 5:30 pm at Ashwood’s Early Childhood Center:
Generation Gap? Or Differences to be Celebrated?
While at Rudolf Steiner College this summer with a gathering of early childhood training directors, Susan Silverio had the pleasure of having dinner with Waldorf educator Betty Staley, author of many books including Between Form and Freedom: A Practical Guide to the Teenage Years and Tapestries: Weaving Life’s Journeys.. Betty described her current research on the Four Generations, those generations - including one’s own - with which each of us is in some contact.
How does your world view differ from your parents…your grandparents…your children? And what does that mean?
Let’s compare our observations. Susan will share some of Betty Staley’s insights. This event is sponsored by Midcoast Anthroposophical Society Group, so call Bridget Qualey (236-2019) bridget@qualey.net or Susan Junge (236-0505) for more information.
“
Calendar of the Soul
[January 10, 2010 - January 16, 2010]
Fortieth Week
And when I live in spirit depths
And dwell within my soul’s foundations,
There streams from love-worlds of the heart,
To fill the vain delusion of the self,
The fiery power of the cosmic Word.
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English translation by Ruth and Hans Pusch
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Und bin ich in den Geistestiefen,
Erfüllt in meinen Seelengründen
Aus Herzens Liebewelten
Der Eigenheiten leerer Wahn
Sich mit des Weltenwortes Feuerkraft.
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Created for: The Rudolf Steiner Archive by:
The e.Lib, Inc. (c) 1990-2010
The pleasure of your company is requested. Will you join us? According to ancient tradition (at least 5 years now) We will gather at the Silverio’s on January 3, Sunday at 7:00 p.m. for a dramatic reading of The Three Kings Play from the medieval island town of Oberufer. Who ever finds a bean in her/his cake will be a king, we will draw lots for the other parts. R.S.V.P to silverio@tidewater.net so we can arrange seating!
The New Years eve offering at Seth and Cheryl’s was postponed due to conflicts in schedules. They have rescheduled and invite you to come to Lincolnville for one last Holy Night offering at Cheryl Martine and Seth Lester’s home on Proctor Road, Tuesday, Jan. 5, at 7 pm.
We will finish Prokofieff’s short book on John the Baptist and John the Evangelist and discover how they were the two pillars at the birth and death of the Christ.
Please rsvp to Cheryl Martine cmartine@tidewater.net or call 763 4388 for directions and so that she can make space for all. Thanks! Hope to see you there.