An Urglaawe Ritual Response to the Pulse Massacre

The question has arisen on the main Urglaawe group about how to honor those murdered in the Pulse Massacre. I am thinking this is a time to make use of our color associations. Perhaps six candles:

Red: Representing the blood spilled, calling to Ziu for justice and to Dunner for courage and strength.

Orange: A request to the deities, to the ancestors (our own and those of the victims), to each other, and to ourselves to attain the energy needed to surmount the polarization and hatred that is consuming this world.

Yellow: Our response needs to be appropriately angered, but our love of humanity must be victorious over these hateful actions.

Green: For the growth and expansion of messaging and ideas that toward putting an end to this sort of terror.

Blue: A call for peace and consolation to those who loved the victims.

Violet: Appeal to the sacred and to the things that connect us because, as much as our humanity is what got us into this world plight, it will be our humanity that gets us out.

Per Urglaawe funerary rites, one may also want to get some seeds or something to represent the victims, then wrap the seeds up in four pieces of paper or cloth of different colors. Say the name of a victim while adding each seed.

The first would be red. Set each seed onto a red sheet. The color and action represents the loss of life and blood and the journey to death. Draw a Raidho rune on the red paper pack with the seeds inside.

Then take the red pack and wrap it in yellow-green. Draw the Yaahr/Jera rune on the now yellow-green pack. This represents the commending of the bodies back to nature.

Then take the pack and wrap it in black. Draw the Kenaz rune on it. This represents the Higher Self's journey through The Mill.

Take the pack and wrap it in white. Draw Ingwaz on the pack. This represents the rebirth of those lost into new soul constructs. 

Respectfully place the pack into a sacred fire, asking for Holle to bless the lost.

After that, perhaps add an uncounted number of seeds to a pack formed from purple cloth or paper. Draw the Mannaz rune on that pack, and add it to the fire along with pleads to Ziu, Zisa, and Dunner to aid the victims' loved ones.

I am going to work this into our Dingsege on Saturday. Perhaps if everyone performed the same -- or a related -- ritual at the same time (say, 2:30 PM EDT locally), we can strengthen our cause. 

Feel free to make this idea viral. Perhaps this virus can combat the virus of hate, destruction, and despair that is becoming an epidemic throughout the world.

Hexenkopf Pilgrimage 2016

Hexenkopf is a strange and sacred place located in Williams Township, Northampton County, Pennsylvania. Long associated with activity on Walpurgisnacht or Wonnenacht, this is Holle's home on this continent. For generations, people have reported seeing a White Lady on the mountain pillar or along the road, especially on the night of April 30. This is where the Wild Hunt ends and the Bright Half of the year begins.

The awesome sign at the barn of the owners greets visitors. We always arrange our visits in advance. The site is on private property, and visitors should always plan to be off of the grounds by dusk.

Young Mugwort plants announce the correct entrance into the woods. After a few more weeks, the growth will be thick.

Magnetite had been mined here, and there are said to be odd magnetic patterns here at times. Other oddities are the common sight of uprooted, upside down trees in locations where they could not simply have fallen. Some are at the very top of the pillar, clearly not having anywhere higher to fall from.

Photo credit: Bob Headley

There are four ponds or pools at the site, some of which have a history of being considered curative. That being said, though, two of them I avoid as they have radon (a common gas in Pennsylvania), one is a former magnetite ore hole that has no radon, and the last is a natural pool that is said to provide water sacred to Holle. This holy water is used at Distelfink's rituals throughout the year. 

The site is challenging because of the huge boulders and the rough brush. Indeed, the name "Hexenkopf" means "Witch's Head" because the rock formation appears like the head of a stereotypical witch depiction in the conical hat. None of us got a good pic of the "hat," but there are several large boulder deposits throughout the site.

Photo credit: Bob Headley

There are all sorts of nooks and outcroppings, including one which is a natural sanctuary, where Distelfink holds its rituals.

Photo credit: Bob Headley

In the middle of the sanctuary is a natural altar.

Photo credit: Michelle Jones

Poison Ivy does abound at the site... Fortunately, so does one of our best plant allies: Jewelweed. It came in handy several times for folks who brushed up against the Poison Ivy. 

This is a wondrous site that ties into the Hexerei myth of the Wonnenacht (Night of Joy) and the Wonnedanz (Dance of Joy, also known as the Witches' Dance).

Photo credit: Michelle Jones

Could this be the rock that the soul of Gedreier Eckhart slept in per the instructions of Holle? Hexenkopf sets one's imagination ablaze.

Our crew:

Photo credit: Michelle Jones

Hail Distelfink!

From the Grundsau Burrow

Response to Irish-American Witchcraft: Dressing Old Gods in a New World is an excellent article by the Urglaawe representative in Western PA, Stevie Miller. The tendency to talk about the Deitsch culture, with the exception of the Amish, in the past tense really is something that does not serve us very well. The Deitsch culture, certainly including Urglaawe, is very much alive and expanding.

While you're visiting her site, do check out the other articles, too! :)

Stealing a Quote

Stealing a great quote by Amy Kincheloe, our Urglaawe contact in Kentucky:

"Looking at Paganism and trying to find your path is like looking at a tree. Urglaawe, for me, is looking at the roots, finding where all those leaves came from, the base, the down and dirty part that gives nutrients to the entire thing."

Hail!

Weisser Hund Freibesitz

Jennifer Milby and Robert L. Schreiwer heard the oath at Sacred Space this weekend that established the Weisser Hund Freibesitz (White Dog Freehold) in New Bern, North Carolina. 

Please contact Douglas Helvie for more information.

Hail Weisser Hund Freibesitz!

Distelfink Sippschaft's New Logo

Logo designed and painted by: Rachel Yoder​

Runic wheel border by: Hunter Yoder

THANK YOU for this beautiful design!

Berchtaslaaf

For folks who identify with Urglaawe, there is a meal requirement on Twelfth Night (December 31, the Feast Night of Berchta), of herring, gruel, and Zammede (pancake or dumpling). More Heathens in different traditions are also beginning to adhere to that requirement. See Grimm's "Teutonic Mythology," volume 1, p. 273 (among other references in the work):

Berchta, like Holda, has the oversight of spinners; whatever spinning she finds unfinished the last day of the year, she spoils. Her festival has to be kept with a certain traditional food, gruel and fish. Thor says he has had sildr ok hafra (herring and oats) for supper...; our white lady has prescribed the country folk a dish of fish and oat-grits for evermore, and is angry whenever it is omitted (Deutsche sage, no. 267). The Thuringians in the Saalfeld country wind up the last day of the year with dumplings and herrings.

This meal on Twelfth Night stands in stark contrast to the meal of Twelfth Day (New Year's Day), which is the ornate pork and sauerkraut of old Pennsylvania German traditions. Juxtaposing the end of Yule's darkest times with the beginning of the New Year reminds us of our hopes and dreams for the future.

Blessed end of Yule to all, and best of luck in 2016!