In March, Humming Bird spoke to us about “holding up the Sky” by showing up in life and doing what we can.
Our Firekeepers show up and bring us the healing medicine of Fire centered community life. They have lovely things to say about how their community members work together to hold up the sky.
Minda Simmons has been holding fires since 2002 in the White Mountains hamlet of rural North East Arizona. She appreciates community members bringing wholesome and nourishing food to potlucks, doing all the potluck clean up while she starts and consecrates the fire; and, bringing topics and personal experiences to the fire. She is deeply moved to see community members reach out to one another between fires as she knows this support acts to weave community together despite folks being spread over a large area.
For two years, Kateri McCue has been Firekeeper to the Pepperell hamlet that serves suburban Boston, Massachusetts. The hamlet was established in 2001. Their fires are held not at Kateri’s home but at the Carnese’s home. In this most fundamental way their community has worked together to make it possible to hold fires. They have also formed a Hamlet Council which acts both as a decision making body for the community and to assure hamlet needs are met. Kateri attributes the success of building a large fire community primarily to the activities of the Council’s Outreach and Welcoming Committee that makes a special effort to orient new people to the fires and the community. Several members of Kateri’s hamlet also now hold, or have held in the past, key positions in the larger Sacred Fire Community and it’s sister Fire Organizations, the Blue Deer Center, the Sacred Fire Foundation, and the Plant Spirit Medicine Association.
Both Minda and Kateri express deep appreciation for their community’s willingness to provide financial and physical support not only for ongoing basics like gathering, chopping and hauling wood; but, also for the expenses incurred to become initiated as Firekeepers and then to attend ongoing necessary Firekeeper trainings.
How do you and others show up in your fire hamlet? Please be so kind as to post below so others around the world can share in your successes and receive a bit of the flavor of your community.
If you are interested in helping to hold up the Sky of the larger Sacred Fire Community Organization, and bring the medicine of fire to our world, new position openings can be found here that include Events Manager (whooty hoot, partaaay!!), along with openings in the Marketplace, Communications and Lifeways. For more information on any open positions, please contact SkyFox.
Learn about the path of Firekeeping.
Read about the Dance of Deep Community
