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New Year 2007

by Crystal Pomeroy

Summer Solstice is fairy’s Christmas. On June 20, Spring’s sunlight culminated in the longest day of the year. Summer then began, darkness initiating its gradual return to dominion in the hours of the day. Nature is buzzing with solar force and yet Sol has moved from Gemini’s realm of reason into Cancer’s intuitive mystery. This time is ripe for magic of many kinds. Ancestral wisdom offers diverse ways of synchronizing with this portal, which the Church absorbed into its liturgy as St. John the Baptist’s Day, celebrated on June 23 or 24.

One of the most beautiful solstice portal usages I have come across is what I have dubbed a Mexica Morsel Ceremony, retrieved from ancient oral tradition in Mexico, where I live. Anyone can do this simple exercise in the comfort of home, yard or open space. Its ancient treasures include a millenary, indigenous food blessing, in this case, a blessing of the ingredients for a honey-based concoction, before the latter is prepared and shared with friends or family. The intention, “for the reconciliation of humankind with nature,” seems even more timely now than when it was popular centuries years ago. Another fascinating feature is the use of the cardinal cross, a vital symbol in pagan Mexico. If you travel to country villages, you can glimpse remnants of similar ceremonies, where women make the sign of the cross over a vessel of water, or—chile in hand—over the bowl when they are about to make salsa.

Since Cancer is associated with both nourishment and the cardinal cross, this ceremony seems particularly in keeping with the renovating promise of the current Solstice portal. This ceremony appears below, perhaps for the first time in English, adapted especially for Daykeeper readers. It is quite close to the original version which was shown to me by an initiate in the Mexica tradition. The ingredients have been adapted so that you can readily find them outside of Mexico and other subtle changes—such as the addition of archangels corresponding to the cardinal points, and consecration said the in affirmative—were made after consulting them with my source.

The Ceremony

Place the ingredients below in a small-to-medium sized mixing bowl, preferably not plastic:

½ cup honey, or more as needed to bind the following ingredients into a thick paste

About a cup of amaranth or other edible seeds, such as shelled sunflower or sesame

About 2 oz. of cocoa or unsweetened chocolate chunks or shavings

Tequila, rum or other liquor, just enough to thin your paste down

A small amount of corn or whole wheat flour

Light copal or other incense. Hold the burning incense in one hand and the bowl with contents in the other, and, facing east, get into a half-kneeling position by placing your left knee on the ground. Hold the burning incense under the bowl as you kneel, smoking the ingredients as you consecrate them to the forces of the east in the manner described below. (We did this in my prayer group and discovered that most of us needed someone else to help hold the either the incense or the bowl, which actually made the ceremony more participatory and interesting.):

• One person will serve as facilitator, and begins by facing East, with their left knee on the floor as s/he holds the ingredients and smoking incense under them as described above.
  
  
• Each participant takes a moment to concentrate on a healing intention of whatever circumstance they choose.
  
  
• All present say,

“From my heart flowers bloom.”

• The facilitator calls on the guardians of the East in the following manner:

“We call on Archangel Raphael, on the forces of Light, of Quetzalcoatl, of Precious Knowledge, Intelligence, on the Lord of the Sunrise. We receive your light to bless these holy foods so that their sharing may reconcile humankind with Nature.”

• Still on her/his knee and still holding the ingredients and smoking incense under them, the facilitator then moves around, as if drawing a circle with a two-yard radius, until s/he faces west. From that position, she says,

“We call on Archangel Gabriel, on the Mother, Giver of Life, on the forces of renovation, on women who have made brave sacrifices for the good of all. We receive your renovating blessing to consecrate these holy foods so that their sharing may reconcile humankind with Nature.”  

• Turning now to the North, the facilitator calls on the forces of that cardinal point,

“Archangel Uriel, guardians of the dimension beyond, visited before us by our ancestors, may you bless us with the clarity of intent that these sacred foods be blessed and there follow a reconciliation of humankind with Nature.”

• The facilitator turns to the South, saying something like,

“Archangel Michael, Huiztilopochtli, forces of will and prodigious memory, of courage in the face of adverse appearances, bless us and these sacred foods with your powers so that humankind may reconcile with Nature.”

• The facilitator moves to the center of her or his circle, and still on her knees, lifts the foods and incense up, and requests the blessing of the Eagle, Father Sun at Solstice, of the forces of sky and fire.
• Finally, from that same position, the facilitator moves the food and the incense under it downward toward the Earth, asking for the blessing of Mother Earth, with her powers of stability, beauty, manifestation, love and growth.
• Once the ingredients have been presented and consecrated to the four cardinal points, sky and earth, the facilitator mixes them with a spoon and all present partake of the product, preferably while dancing.

There are many ceremonies of beauty and power in the ancient Mexica tradition, but few are as simple as the one above, for those readers who don’t happen to have on hand a shaman, a wild jungle, a mountain to walk up or a cave or sweat lodge to hole up in until dawn. I find its ancestral food consecration especially moving in this time when science has confirmed the power of words and symbols to organize the frequency of the elements they touch.