Category: August 2019
Four Girls Become Young Women Through Sacred Fire’s Initiation
The Sacred Fire Lifeways Women’s Initiation Council is proud to announce that four young women were initiated into adulthood on July 13, 2019.
We wish to acknowledge the learning and hard work that they accomplished and to introduce them: Calista from Ontario (CANADA); Dale from New York (USA); Emma from North Carolina (USA); and Myisha from Massachusetts (USA)
We also wish to acknowledge our outstanding staff of 10 women and four men who supported the week-long ritual: Amber Van Cleave, Andrea Jacobson, Angela Ocone, Jane Jackson, Jen Collins, Katarina Diss, Katie Troy, Leah Watterson, Sherry Morgan, Wendy Kaas, Adam Laufer, Colin Lenhart, Eduardo Deneke, and Gary Weidner. It takes a village to do this work and hold the space for transformation to occur. Thanks to Paige Schlake, Heidi Griswold, Cassandra Starks, and Laurie Perla of the Grand Junction community. And thanks to those who supported this work through your donations and community fires.
Sacred Emergence: Initiation into Adulthood for Young Women is offered in the summertime. Are you or someone you know age 16-24? Applications are accepted year-round.
Deanna Jenné, Jessica De la O, and Lisa Lichtig
Lifeways Women’s Initiation Council
There’s still time to sign up for Fire Speaks in Massachusetts!
The Concord, Massachusetts (USA) Sacred Fire community is busy preparing to host Fire Speaks on August 24. This is an opportunity to meet new friends and enjoy the company of long-standing ones; to spend time connecting, listening to drumming, sharing and slowing down enough to savor relationships with each other. In the evening, after a shared meal and afternoon activities, those gathered will hear and feel the wisdom and recalibrating presence of “Grandfather Fire,” as He responds to questions about how humans can meet their challenges and move through life in a good way.
Part 5: Firekeepers, I Love You for being good role models, being committed, and for seeing the big picture
Firekeepers, I Love You: Part 5
Sacred Fire Firekeepers, you are unique individuals who have some very special qualities that help you to do what you do. You open your homes and hearts to people just like the readers of our posts—people who live in communities in seven countries (and growing)—to come and be human beings together around the fire, just as we humans have always done. Thousands of people each year come to your Sacred Fires for community, connection, healing and growth.
In this final podcast in her series, fire-goer Erin Everett shares three more qualities that Sacred Fire Firekeepers possess and model for her and for their communities.
If you happen to be reading this and listening to our podcasts, feel free to tell your story of what fire or Firekeepers have done for you in the comments of this post.
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Passing on Wisdom: Sharing Lessons Learned
Kyle Steele interviews Patrick Hanaway
In a recent conversation, young adult Kyle Steele sought counsel from Asheville NC (USA) Sacred Fire Firekeeper, Patrick Hanaway. The two spoke about many things, including how the courage to learn from mistakes helps to foster wisdom, and how this wisdom can be passed on to future generations.
Kyle: Patrick, what is the most important thing that you have learned at your age?
Patrick: The most important thing that I’ve learned is that everything is in relationship and connection. And when I say that, I don’t just mean between us as human beings; I mean us as human beings in relationship to all of the other-than-human beings also. Everything that is here: this beautiful tree, the air, the frogs that we hear in the background, the air, the weather, everything…we are meant to be in conscious relationship to it. We are, in fact, intimately connected to the world and it is so easy to forget that. I think that we know this when we are really young and then it gets taught out of us, and we forget by the time we are 2 or 3 years old. And yet this kind of relationship holds the seeds of our healing as humans.
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