Happy Winter Solstice 2023

Hello Friends!

Happy Solstice! 

I wanted to send you my best wishes during this holiday season.

I am always touched deeply by the darkness of this time of year, and I think of the days before electricity … of how intense these long nights must have been, even just 100 years ago! 

I find it wonderful that many of the religions developed in the Western and Northern hemispheres have important celebrations at this time of year, which encourage us to bring Light into our lives … while experiencing the quiet of the darkness. 

The Jewish tradition of Hanukkah – also known as the Festival of Lights – centers around lighting 8 candles, signifying the miracle of a lantern that stayed lit for 8 days, when there was sufficient oil for only one. It commemorates the successful reclaiming of the Holy Temple in Jerusalem, after a time of excessive repression, and thus symbolizes freedom. Although it has just ended, it is a celebration that I always enjoy being reminded of.

The Christmas tradition is symbolized by the Star that blazed in the sky around the time of the solstice, indicating that a Savior had been born, someone who could be a new kind of leader in a time of great strife and social and religious oppression in the Middle East, under Roman rule. 

Although there are of course many differences in these traditions, both of them center on the light that shines in the darkness, inspiring and leading the way to a new way of thinking and being. 

If you go outside on these long, dark nights, you can experience how reassuring the lights of the stars can be, especially if there are larger ones like planets occupying the sky.

Photo shared from planetary.org

Jupiter dominates the night sky all month long, and it is thought that Jupiter, together with Saturn, were visible when Jesus of Nazareth was born, and that was the “star” that the shepherds and kings followed to come and worship him. (Incidentally, there was this “Christmas Star” configuration in December of 2020). 

Generally, Jupiter is quite visible in the Northern Hemisphere in the month of December, and even on its own, it offers quite the spectacle! 

And if you are an early riser, you can see Venus for a few hours right before sunrise. Together with Jupiter, who is truly the King due to its sheer size, Venus is one of the most beautiful of the celestial objects, with her clear bluish light.  

I highly suggest stepping out to try to catch a glimpse of her in the east in the early morning hours (from about 4 am on), if you live somewhere you can do that, and where the light pollution from your town or city is not too dense. 

Looking at the night sky with a bright planet shining down can give you a bit of a feeling of the wonder our ancestors had at this time of year. For them, the night sky was not a distant phenomenon they rarely noticed; it was an integral part of their daily experience.

Stars and planets that would appear and be particularly bright brought them to experience the beauty and the wonder of the natural world, along with the mysteries that are a part of our lives – like life itself, and death. It seems that we moderns have increasingly more trouble to stop a moment and reflect on these things, due to our increased comforts and technologies, which have given us a much better life in so many ways, but has also increased our detachment  – and, I would say, even alienation – from nature. 

Instead, by focusing on both the beauty of the night sky, and the mystery it can still evoke (even though now we know so much about our universe, we still have lots we don’t understand, especially about the meaning of life and death!), we can create our own private time of reflection and connection – no matter what religion we may be affiliated with, or not.

Amplifying the Light – the Light of Hope, the Light of Love, the Light of Gratitude for having this unique human experience and for sharing our journey with our families, friends and neighbors – helps us get through these long, dark, days and nights.

My wish for you and for all of us is to be able to take some time in these precious moments during the year, when the cold and the darkness invite us to reflect, to regroup, to ground and remember that life is precious, our own lives are precious, and learning to love ourselves, love others and receive love is one of the most important things we can do. 

Happy Holidays to all, and see below for a couple announcements about things happening in 2024!

With love –