2020 SUMMER SOLSTICE Mary & Martha's Place at - Mary and ...
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SUMMER SOLSTICE
at
Mary & Martha’s Place
2020
© Mary and Martha’s Place, Inc. 2020SUMMER SOLSTICE 2020
Things you might gather for a simple altar: candle, flowers, fruits, vegetables, shells.
Welcome
Invocation
from Earth Prayers
Leader: We call upon the Earth, our planet home, with its beautiful depths and
soaring heights, its vitality and abundance of life, and together we ask:
All: Teach us, and show us the way.
Leader: We call upon the mountains, the high green valleys and meadows filled with
wild flowers, the snows that never melt, the summits of intense silence, and
we ask them:
All: Teach us, and show us the way.
Leader: We call upon the waters that rim the Earth, horizon to horizon, that flow in
our rivers and streams, rains that fall upon our gardens and fields, and we ask
them:
All: Teach us, and show us the way.
Leader: We call upon the land which grows our food, the nurturing soil, the fertile
fields, the abundant gardens and orchards, and we ask them:
All: Teach us, and show us the way.
Leader: We call upon the forests, the great trees reaching strongly to the sky with the
earth in their roots and the heavens in their branches, the fir and the pine and
the cedar, and we ask them:
All: Teach us, and show us the way.Leader: We call upon the creatures of the fields and forests and the seas, our brothers
and sisters the wolves and deer, the eagles and doves, the great whales and the
dolphins, and we ask them:
All: Teach us, and show us the way.
Leader: We call upon the moon and the stars and the sun, who govern the rhythms
and seasons of our lives and remind us that we are part of a great and
wondrous universe, and we ask them:
All: Teach us, and show us the way.
Leader: We call upon all those who have lived on this Earth, our ancestors and our
friends, who dreamed the best for future generations, and upon whose lives
our lives are built, and with thanksgiving, we call upon them:
All: Teach us, and show us the way.
Leader: We call upon all that we hold most sacred, the presence and power of the
Great Spirit of love and truth which flows through all the universe ... to be
with us:
All: Teach us, and show us the way.
Chinook Blessing Litany
For the Earth Forever Turning by Kim Olmer & Nick Page
For the earth forever turning;
For the skies, for every sea;
For our lives, for all we cherish,
Sing we our joyful song of peace.
For the mountains, hills, and pastures
In their silent majesty;
For the stars, for all the heavens,
Sing we our joyful song of peace.For the sun, for rain and thunder,
For the seasons’ harmony,
For our lives, for all creation,
Sing we our joyful praise of Thee.
For the world we raise our voices,
For the home that gives us birth;
In our joy, we sing returning
Home to our blue-green hills of earth.
Foolishness? No, It’s Not by Mary Oliver
Sometimes I spend all day trying to count
the leaves on a single tree. To do this I
have to climb branch by branch and .
write down the numbers in a little book.
So, I suppose, from their point of view,
it’s reasonable that my friends say: what
foolishness! She’s got her head in the clouds
again.
But it’s not. Of course I have to give up,
but by then I’m half crazy with the wonder
of it--the abundance of the leaves, the
quietness of the branches, the hopelessness
of my effort. And I am in the delicious
and important place, roaring with laughter,
full of earth-praise.
MusicThe Cherokee Feast of Days
Can you see the wind? Can you see the fragrance of flowers floating on the breezes? Can
you see thought or what it is that changes a tree from bare limbs and brown leaves to lush
green? Can you see love or joy or peace? We can only see evidence of these invisible
things, and it is enough to make us know they do exist.
Thomas Merton
Let me seek, then, the gift of silence, and poverty, and solitude, where everything I touch is
turned into prayer: where the sky is my prayer, the birds are my prayer, the wind in the
trees is my prayer, for God is all in all.
from “Sometimes” by Mary Oliver
Instructions for living a life:
Pay attention.
Be astonished.
Tell about it.
from Walden by Henry David Thoreau
Sometimes, in a summer morning, having taken my accustomed bath, I sat in my sunny
doorway from sunrise till noon, rapt in revery, amidst the pines and hickories and sumachs,
in undisturbed solitude and stillness, while the birds sang around or flitted noiseless through
the house, until by the sun falling at my west window, or a noise of some traveller’s wagon
on the distant highway, I was reminded of the lapse of time. I grew in those seasons like
corn in the night, and they were far better than any work of the hands would have been.
MusicRaspberries by Luci Shaw
Robins and chickadees, quick as
scissors, are there first,
sighting along the hairy stems,
slanting under leaves, darting
between thorns to the hearts,
pendant as jewels.
The birds think the berries
theirs, and us the shameless thieves.
Our human neighbor, too, is adversarial.
Always the primitive growth threatens
to prickle into his acre,
and last May he fired our canes
(while we were gone) not knowing
you can’t get rid of raspberries
that way -- up from their small holocaust
they grew back twice as thick.
Today, undaunted by the scowl
from next door. l hunker down, squinting,
against the sun, lifting aside
the leaves, plunging. my whole arm
to a bush's heart, my skin crossed
with beaded wires of blood,
my palms bright with a sweet serum.
Thinking of thorns, and blood, and fruit,
I take into my fingers, bit by bit,
the sun of summer.
At this time, if you have a candle on your altar, you are invited to light it and to give blessings and
gratitude to this wondrous planetCircle of the Sun by Tom Wells
Sing...Sun...Sing...Sun... .
We are the circle of the Sun.
Sing together. Together all is one.
Rejoice, Open Up, You and Me.
Let us share the light among us.
Let us wrap the light around us.
Let us share the light among us.
Let us Sing...Sun...Sing...Sun….
Bedtime by Maggie Harney
Night drifts across the lake on a cool breeze.
Honking insistently, Canada geese
glide elegantly ashore,
fluffy yellow goslings trailing dutifully behind.
On flat black feet, they waddle
to their nest behind the mountain laurel,
thump down
and poke their heads beneath their wings.
Spring peepers sing lullabies.
The fire sparks, lights women’s faces.
Pencils whisper on journal pages.“Lord, it is night” borrowed in part from the Liturgy of Night Prayer found in The New Zealand Prayer Book
Gracious Creator,
The evening now draws us
toward the stillness of night.
Let us be still in your presence.
What has been done has been done;
what has not been done has not been done;
let it be.
The night is dark.
Let our fears of the darkness of the world and of our own lives
rest in you.
The night is quiet.
Let the quietness of your peace enfold us,
all dear to us,
and all who have no peace. Amen
Blessing
If you would like to view this Summer Solstice celebration again or share it with
others, it is on Mary & Martha’s Facebook page.
Want to write a haiku about summer?
A haiku is a short poem, usually about nature, with only three lines. Each line has a certain
number of syllables: five syllables in the first line, 7 in the second & 5 on the last line.
For example:
Arms swing up and right
Legs kick left, over the clover
Gingko tree dancingYou can also read
