Lughnasadh or Lammas

The neo-Pagan festival of Lammas may be based on the ancient Celtic celebration of Lughnasadh.

Lughnasadh marked the beginning of the harvest season, the ripening of first fruits, and was traditionally a time of community gatherings, market festivals, horse races and reunions. Both old Celtic and new Pagan calendars are based on lunar and solar cycles and but others also celebrated the first harvests at this time so it is not positive that there is a relationship between the two festivals. This is another important date that the Catholic Church gave up trying to suppress and started it's own blessing of the wheat on this day.

This year I am planning a day long ritual to celebrate the peak of summer, the first harvest and the turn of the Wheel.
First I am going to go to my favorite walking park and instead of walking fast for exercise (it is 3.5 miles around a small lake) I am going to saunter, take the dogs, watch the water skiers and the runners, the waterfowl (which will be leaving soon), the trees and plants.

Then I am going to my favorite farmer's market, which sells only produce grown on a few neighboring farms and doesn't import anything. I am going to pick up a little of whatever looks good.

For dinner I am going to cook what I bought at the market and offer the day and my appreciation of it to the goddess.

If I had my own garden this year I would offer the first produce to the goddess, but I don't, so this will have to do. And if I lived out in the rural area where I used to live, I would just walk for hours. But the city park will have to do this year.

We don't have to be rural dwellers to appreciate nature, the seasons, the harvest and the deities.

Plan a great day for yourself. You have a whole week to plan.

Lughnasadh or Lammas is next Saturday, August 1.