Chapter Three

Temple:
The Devotional Flame

Threefold wisdom of Brigid’s oak:

Leaf-wisdom of change, ever releasing,

Branch-wisdom of growth, ever reaching,

Root-wisdom of endurance, ever deepening.

The path you follow is well worn. Back through the mists of time, a thousand years, a thousand more, the voices of women can be heard raised in chants to Brigid. Follow the sound down to the center, the heart of spiritual power. Here is where the flame of devotion is tended, whether it burns in an oak grove, a stone circle, a monastery, a village square, or upon a simple home altar. This is the place of lore, where the devotee comes to learn more about her goddess. Come, enter the temple. Brigid awaits you.

Brigid and the Power of Three

Three is a sacred number that appears everywhere in Celtic lore. The world is made up of earth, sea, and sky. In epic tales, people are often described with three names that signify three characteristics that make up the whole person: Fionn, confounder of giants; Fionn of the bright spear; Fionn the quick-witted. Celtic deities often appear in threes, and invocations and prayers are chanted in a rhythm of three. Breaking out of the rigid structure of dualism, three moves you into the realm of free choice: this thing, that thing, or another thing. In the Celtic view, doing things in threes intensifies an action and completes a cycle or a set. Three is the number of ultimate empowerment.

The Triple Brigid

Like many other Celtic deities, Brigid is known by three aspects, and there are several ways of looking at this. (Celtic spirituality is never simple!) Early observers of the Celts said they worshiped three goddess sisters, each named Brigid. One was associated with healing, one with smithcraft, and one with poetry. These are attributes we associate with Brigid today, though we may not always see her as three individual sisters.

It is a Mystery, in the sacred sense of the word, to comprehend a goddess as having three aspects. Brigid is a triune goddess—one as well as three—just as we are one person made of body, mind, and spirit.

Three folds in my garment, yet only one garment I wear,

Three leaves in a shamrock, yet only one shamrock I bear,

Frost, ice, and snow, these three are only pure water,

Three women in Brigid, yet only one goddess is there.21

The modern Pagan concept of the Triple Goddess as Maiden–Mother–Crone may not have been known to the ancient Celts. Their triple deities were more likely to have equality of stature and roles, such as three mothers or three sisters. Nevertheless, Brigid as Triple Goddess can be associated with her traditional attributes as goddess of poetry, healing, and smithcraft:

• Brigid as Maiden is the poet’s muse, the flash of inspiration, the “glimmering girl,” as the poet Yeats says—she who is forever sought but never contained or commanded.

• Brigid as Mother is mistress of healing lore and the loving touch, the nurturing goddess who draws you close to the hearthfire and asks what ails you.

• Brigid as Crone hammers the soul’s metal into shape with unflinching strength and a sense of time passing, drawing you ever closer to the raging fires of transformation and rebirth.

Even Saint Brigid can be seen as three-in-one. She is the Maiden who chose her own vocation, defying convention to embrace independence and her true calling. She is the Mother who fed the hungry, healed the suffering, and guided her nun daughters (and monk sons) toward their own fulfillment through sacred service. And she is the Crone who talked back to power, stood her ground against injustice, and trusted her own wisdom for guidance.

The Three who are over me,

The Three who are below me,

The Three who are above me here,

The Three who are above me yonder;

The Three who are in the earth,

The Three who are in the air,

The Three who are in the heavens,

The Three who are in the great pouring sea.22

Triskele and Triquetra

Two symbols of the number three are especially significant in Celtic spirituality. Both of these symbols are particularly evocative of Brigid.

The triskele comes in many variations, but always with three spirals around a connecting center. This is the number three as the activator, the initiator of energy. The three spirals rotate together, linked by their common center, and yet each has its individual movement too, spiraling outward and inward, inward and outward. This is Brigid as the triune goddess with her three realms of influence: poetry, healing, and smithcraft. Each is active on its own while blessing and sustaining the whole. Everything is in motion, changing, growing, experiencing the cycles of life.

Tracing the triskele with your finger is a meditation similar to working with a tabletop labyrinth.

1. Print out a full-page version of the pattern (which can be easily found online) or draw one yourself.

2. Laying it on a table before you, start at the center and trace upward around the top spiral to its center, then out again.

3. Move down to the left spiral. Trace into its center and out again.

4. Go to the spiral on the right and do the same thing, and then back to the center and upward, repeating the whole pattern.

Feel the rhythm of Brigid’s great spiral dance with your whole being. Listen for her wisdom as you move along her cosmic paths.

The triquetra is a triple knot design, sometimes with a circle linked through the knots. It is also called the trinity knot and has been adopted as a symbol of Celtic Christianity as well as Celtic-based Paganism. The triquetra symbolizes Brigid as three-in-one, and I also see this knot as representing the triple flame: hearth, temple, and forge. The design still implies movement, like the triskele, but there is stability here too. The serene strength of the triquetra symbolizes the eternal quality of Brigid’s perpetual fire. Through all the changes the centuries have wrought, her flame could not be extinguished—and never will be.

Intertwining Connection of All Things

Jen Delyth

Artist Jen Delyth creates paintings and illustrations that explore the language of myth and symbol inspired by Celtic folklore and the spirit within nature.

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Celtic knotwork art uses a two-dimensional form to talk about a three-dimensional experience. The spirit is what moves within the lines; the energy is created among them. Although we will never truly know what the ancient artists intended, it seems to me that the language of Celtic design patterning, the eternal interlace and spiraling motifs, express the intertwining connection of all things. The key patterns represent our human journey from birth to death and round again. The triple spiral patterns represent the energy and rhythm of life, as do the interlace designs moving to the center and out again, with no beginning and no end. For me it is this creativity and rhythm, the power of the symbols beneath the work, that is most important.

I am an artist and I’m married to a poet, and Brighid is our patron. I love that she is both midwife and mistress of the forge. I see her as a guardian of the fire of inspiration. The womb is the foundry of new life, forged from the elements with fire—sexual fire, the fire of love, and of our life blood, which I visualize as a green fire of life. This esoteric fire is also the source of inspiration of the poets and artists, the musicians. We channel the creative energies through our process to birth and forge our work.

The Celtic tradition expresses a wealth of wisdom and understanding of the natural world of plants and animals, and also the inner world of active imagination and our psyche. Our ancestors’ world was not the wounded, complicated world we now live in. That is not to say that the world of the ancients was a simple paradise. It was often a difficult struggle to survive, and there was much war and bloodshed, as today. We are people of the twenty-first century—I am not advocating a return to the past—but with all our sophistication, we have often created a tangled and disintegrated relationship with ourselves and our environment. Working with the patterns, sacred images, and myths of the ancient Celts renews my connection between the past and the present, the inside and outside, the seen and the unseen—life in all its mystery and interconnectedness, expressed through art and story.

For more about Jen, see the Contributors appendix.

Brigid’s Sisters

One of the wonderful things about practicing a Goddess-based spirituality is that she doesn’t demand monogamy—or, I should say, monotheism. Ours is not a jealous deity but an embracing one, with 10,000 aspects of powerful female divinity. Exploring these aspects allows you to connect to your own cultural roots as well as those that speak to you for reasons that remain a mystery—perhaps a past life, or perhaps just a need your soul has on its journey in this lifetime. The many goddesses provide doorways to understanding yourself, the world, and the cosmos.

Just as women support each other as sisters, Brigid too has sisters among the goddesses—some by traditional associations and some by affinities of purpose. Invoking them in your vision journeys, rituals, and devotional practice can lead to new revelations about Brigid herself and about your connection with her.

Brigid’s Celtic Kin

The Celtic pantheon is rich with powerful aspects of the Goddess. Some of them seem to overlap, and there is confusion in some of their personas, names, and associations. Others, like Brigid, stand unique and unmistakable in their attributes. Other than her triple aspect, there doesn’t seem to be much traditional connection between the lore of Brigid and that of any other Celtic goddess, except that they were all Tuatha Dé Danann, children of the goddess Danu. But then again, few Celtic myths have any of the deities interacting much (unlike, say, Greek myths). That is simply not the focus of their legends or the way of their telling. Nevertheless, I feel sure that these goddesses know each other, support each other, and share power. They are part of Brigid’s world.

The Mórrígan

The Mórrígan is a battle goddess, fierce and uncompromising, whose emblem is the night-black crow of death. But she is also a fertility goddess and a goddess of passionate sexuality. On Samhain, the Dagda (Brigid’s father) and the Mórrígan lay together in a ritual coupling that ensured the protection of the land and its people. As some sources say that Brigid was born in the seventh month, perhaps she is the fruit of this union, and the Mórrígan is her mother. Not everyone agrees with this (remember those six opinions?), but it makes sense to me. A fire goddess could be conceived at a fire festival from two such fiery deities, and if she was born at the end of the seventh month, that could make her birthday on Lughnasadh, another fire festival (July 31; Celtic holidays begin at sunset).

Another clue that the Mórrígan is Brigid’s mother is the legend that the newborn Saint Brigid refused all milk but that of a red-eared white cow. The Mórrígan kept a herd of such faery cattle and shapeshifted into one herself from time to time. Perhaps the story of the infant saint originated with the story of the infant goddess being nursed by her divine mother in the shape of an otherworldly cow. The Mórrígan is also connected with bards and the power of sound and words; in particular, she is the inspirer of war cries and battle songs—all attributes of Brigid. Did the young goddess learn to love poetry at her mother’s knee?

The Mórrígan (whose name means “phantom queen”) is a triple goddess, like Brigid. In her case, the triad is made up of three distinct goddesses: the Mórrígan, Badb, and Nemhain, all war goddesses. Going with the idea of the Mórrígan as Brigid’s mother, let’s get to know her aunts.

Badb and Nemhain

Badb (her name means “scald crow”) is the most fearsome of the three. A shapeshifter like her sisters, she appears most frequently as a shrieking crow over the battlefield but is also seen as a bear, a wolf, a cow, or a deathly hag who foretells the warriors’ doom. Sometimes she wanders along the edges of the battle, ragged robes trailing, her long grey hair blowing in the wind, screaming her prophecies. Or she can be found at the side of a stream, washing bloody linen and weapons in the clear water until it runs red—those who encounter her there are the next to die. This is Badb in her guise as the Washer at the Ford, an aspect of the Bean-Sidhe (Banshee).

Nemhain is the embodiment of her name: “battle frenzy.” Appearing (like her sisters) as a huge crow or raven, her harsh cries incite warriors to panic, resulting in chaos, confusion, and widespread death. Little else is known of her. Unlike the Mórrígan, who is known to take sides in a war—though she sometimes changes her mind later—Nemhain is possessed of simple bloodlust, flying among the warriors and indiscriminately urging them to slaughter.

Since Brigid is such a peace-loving goddess, how could these furies be related to her? Perhaps it is that very difference that provides the answer—great destruction must be balanced by great creation. But Brigid herself knows war. Her sword and shield have seen battle, and she is invoked (as goddess and as saint) for victory in righteous causes. She may not be bloodthirsty like some of her kin, but she does not flee from the good fight.

Now, like almost everything in Celtic mythology, there are arguments about who is who and what is what. Some sources say that “the Mórrígan” is a title rather than a name of an individual goddess, and that it encompasses three goddesses: Badb, Nemhain, and Macha. Others say that Macha is separate, and the triad is made up of the Mórrígan, Badb, and Nemhain. Some say that the Bean-Sidhe is the Mórrígan, others say that she is Badb, and still others maintain that she is a unique entity with no other associations. Brigid has a connection with the Bean-Sidhe through the practice of keening (see page 213). As always, the intricate knotwork of Celtic lore provides endless opportunities for exploration and conjecture. What matters is how the Goddess speaks to you and how she influences your life today.

Ériu, Fódla, and Banba

Another triad of sister goddesses, these three embody the spirit of the land of Ireland itself. When the first human settlers arrived in Ireland, they battled with the Tuatha Dé Danann, who had ruled for thousands of years. The Tuatha, wise and full of foresight, saw that their destiny lay along other paths, and chose to yield the middle-world to humans and remove themselves into otherworldly realms, becoming known as the Sidhe—the faery folk. The humans’ leader, Amairgin, then met with the three goddesses of the land, Ériu, Fódla, and Banba, each of whom demanded that he name the land after her in exchange for her continued blessing of prosperity and happiness. Amairgin chose to swear to Ériu, whose magnificent presence at the very center of Ireland could not be denied. He promised that forever after the land would be called after her, and so it is: Éire is the Irish name for Ireland.

Ériu has an obvious association with Brigid in that she is an embodiment of the sacred land itself and a protector of its welfare. But what of Fódla and Banba? They too are guardians of the land, still invoked as poetic names for the spirit of Ireland. Little is known of Fódla’s lore, but Banba shares some additional symbols with Brigid—the hazelnut of wisdom, the salmon of knowledge, and the pig of prosperity.

Sul

When the Romans conquered the British Isles, one of the sacred sites they came upon was a shrine dedicated to the goddess Sul at a natural hot springs in what is now the city of Bath in southwest England. They built a temple and then a magnificent bath complex there, Aquae Sulis, which became hugely popular among people seeking healing in the miraculous steaming waters. The Romans equated Sul with Minerva, whom they also equated with Brigid. The connection seems clear. Both Sul and Brigid were known to have schools of priestesses who tended a perpetual flame, Brigid’s at Kildare and Sul’s at the hot springs. Both are associated with the sun and with the magical combination of fire and water that brings healing. Both are goddesses who have endured over millennia, through invasions and conquerors and new religions. The timeless waters continue to flow at Bath, and the name of Sul is still spoken there, every day.

Bóand

This Irish goddess, named for the otherworldly white cow, has much in common with Brigid. The River Boyne, named for her, was formed when Bóand lifted the stone that covered a forbidden well and released its waters. The well water was said to confer wisdom on any who drank from it, and now the water rushed through the countryside rather than being contained. How many such tales of women’s rebellion against restriction have we heard over the millennia? From Eve onward, the feminine soul has thirsted for free-flowing knowledge. Bóand and Brigid both offer inspiration as well as wisdom—drinking from the Boyne in June is said to confer the gifts of seership and poetry.

Bóand is the goddess of Newgrange, Brú na Bóinne (palace of Bóand), a sacred site that some have also associated with Brigid in an ancient pre-Celtic aspect. The triple spirals and snake motifs on the walls of Newgrange, and its association with the mystery of light reborn in the depths of darkness, all speak of Brigid as well as Bóand. A familial connection is made through Brigid’s father, the Dagda, with whom Bóand bore a son, Aengus Óg. This half-brother of Brigid was the Tuatha Dé Danann’s god of poetry, and he was always accompanied by four white swans, Brigid’s bird.

Deae Matres

Little is known of this Triple Goddess, yet the Deae Matres (Divine Mothers) or Matronae must surely be included among Brigid’s kin. Hundreds of sculptures of these three mother goddesses have been found throughout the Celtic world, though they are most associated with Britain. The three sacred figures hold baskets or cornucopias with fruit or flowers, and other items that might be bread or votive offerings, and sometimes one of them holds a child. Their faces are strong and serene, their feet are firmly planted, and there is a sense of equality among them, even when one is standing while the other two sit. We can only speculate what the Matronae meant to those who worshiped them—reverence for motherhood, gratefulness for the abundance of the earth, respect for ancestral foremothers. Because the Celts considered the number three to amplify the energy and meaning of a symbol, the Matronae are the power of the Goddess times three.

Sheela na Gig

This fascinating goddess is depicted as a squat, often grinning, naked female figure holding open her vagina with her hands. Her carved image appears on churches and other buildings in Ireland and England, sometimes tucked away in a secret spot and sometimes boldly over the door. The origin of these sculptures isn’t known and is (as ever) the source of much argument. Because some of the Sheelas are made of materials different from the buildings themselves, some scholars think they were brought there by devotees of the Goddess and placed as protest or as additional protection, bringing the old ways into the new. Sometimes the Sheela figures have full breasts and seem to be an image of fertility. Other versions are skeletal, with aged breasts and a lined or tattooed face. Her eyes are often huge, exaggerated, as is her yoni. Sheela na Gig is confrontational, demanding attention, commanding acknowledgment. Does she want to tell us about life, or death, or both?

I include Sheela na Gig among Brigid’s Celtic kin for a couple of reasons. First, like Brigid, she is a connection between ancient beliefs and Christianity. Someone who loved her placed her image on the brick-and-mortar body of the Church itself, and there she remains. There are more than 150 known Sheela carvings, each declaring that the great mystery of the sacred feminine survives despite centuries of patriarchy. Brigid and Sheela also share the imagery of the threshold, the gates of birth and rebirth. The open vagina of the Sheela na Gig is spread wide not as an incitement to lust, but as a symbol of life passing through. Brigid is the midwife catching that new life as it emerges.

The Cailleach

Perhaps the oldest of the goddesses we think of as Celtic, the Cailleach was already present when the first Celts arrived in the Western Isles, and indeed may have been known for more than seven thousand years before the Celts came. Like Brigid, the Cailleach has several names (among them Cailleach Bheur, Black Annis, Bronach, Cally Berry, Carlin, and Caillech Bhear), attesting to her widespread influence, and her roles vary from region to region. She is known as the goddess of the abundant harvest, or as a protector of wild creatures (with her companion, a monstrous cat), or as a shapeshifting woman who bestows blessings of sovereignty on rightful kings.

But her most powerful role is as the great hag of winter, who tucks the natural world in for its long sleep until Brigid wakes it in the spring. She and Brigid are the seasons’ tag team—the Cailleach carries a black staff that she bangs upon the earth, freezing it; at the turn of the year, she hands the staff over to Brigid, and in her warming hands it becomes a white branch budding with new life. The Cailleach then turns to stone, awaiting the turning of the Wheel of the Year when she will again take up her duties.

For people who lived close to the land and depended on it for life itself, the coming of winter was fraught with dread. The frightful appearance of the Cailleach, with her blue skin, her single piercing eye, and her red teeth, expressed just how terrible those frozen months could be. The Celtic deities aren’t always pretty—indeed, pretty is pretty rare. As Thomas Cahill writes, “It would be an understatement to assert that the Irish gods were not the friendliest of figures. Actually, there are few idols that we have retrieved from barrow or bog that would not give a child nightmares and an adult the willies.” 23 But although the Cailleach was feared, the fear was threaded through with respect. None of her myths tell of her harming humans or acting upon them with wrath. The Cailleach is awful—awe-full—and she is a necessary part of the cycle of life and death. Without the harshness of the Cailleach’s winter, would we feel so much joy at the coming of Brigid’s spring?

Sisters Across the Seas

Envision a gathering of goddesses, a conclave of powerful female divinity, called together by Brigid for the benefit of humanity. The realms of her concern are represented, each goddess adding her gifts in her own particular way. Let’s move from table to table and visit with a few of them.

Goddesses of Flame

Her name almost synonymous with “hearth” in the Pagan community, Hestia is honored as the center and spirit of the home. This Greek goddess was not depicted in statuary, as were other members of her pantheon, for she was in the flame itself. The first offering at any feast was given to her, and when a new home was built, fire from the city’s central Hestian altar was brought to bless it. Though she is often associated with Hestia, Vesta is not merely her Roman equivalent. Though she too blesses hearth and home, she has ceremonial associations that are all her own. Her priestesses, the Vestals, tended her temple with its sacred fire, performed rites in her honor, and mediated disputes to keep the peace. In the home, Vesta was honored with daily offerings at the hearth. When you gaze into a hearth flame in Siberia, you are in the presence of Poza-Mama. Like Brigid, she attends to the practical aspects of fire, keeping life-giving warmth alive through the brutal Siberian winters.

Goddesses of Poetry and Learning

As the mother of memory, the Greek goddess Mnemosyne knows well the value of oral tradition, so precious to Brigid. Her nine daughters are the Muses, goddesses of history, comedy, tragedy, music, astronomy, dance, and three flavors of poetry: sacred, love, and epic. These gifts are combined in the Hindu goddess Sarasvati, who blesses all the arts and sciences. There is a lively discussion happening here at our goddess conclave between Sarasvati, the Sumerian Nisaba, and the Egyptian Seshat—each of whom is credited with the invention of writing. Great minds think alike! Nisaba is known for advancing literacy and sharing astrology and other oracular teachings. She has that in common with Seshat as well, along with knowledge of architecture and the most auspicious alignment for buildings and cities.

Goddesses of Healing and Midwifery

The Hindu goddess Ganga is embodied in the river that bears her name, the Ganges. To bathe in her holy waters is to receive soul healing. Even after death, Ganga continues to bless those whose ashes are offered to her. She is matched in divine power by the Persian goddess Anahita, another deity of sacred waters. Anahita is the protector of her people, blessing them with fertility and health; in particular she looks after pregnant and nursing mothers. Ix Chel, the Mayan medicine goddess, is another guardian of birthing mothers, but she also blesses crones in menopause and beyond. The Roman goddess Lucina is a goddess of light (as her name makes clear). Because the first time we see the light is when we are born, Lucina is present at every birth and assists the laboring mother to bring the child forth to greet her. Whether as Juno Lucina, Santa Lucia, or Saint Lucy, she is invoked by candle flame, like her friend Brigid.

Goddesses of Spring

Brigid sets the greening of spring in motion at Imbolc, and the Germanic goddess Eostre and her Roman sister Maia take it from there. Like Brigid, both are fire goddesses, turning up the heat as spring moves toward summer. Eostre’s association with rebirth is marked by the use of her name for the Christian springtime festival of renewal, Easter. Maia gives her name to the month of May, when winter is well and truly banished and the world celebrates the warming days. The Slavic goddess Erce is also busy in the spring, adding a libation of new milk to the freshly plowed furrows to feed the earth so that she may give forth food for her children—evoking Brigid’s miraculous rivers of milk. And then there is Persephone, the Greek goddess whose return from the underworld signals the return of the fertile months. Her deepening time is the winter, when she rules as Queen of the Dead. Emerging when Brigid increases the light at winter’s end, Persephone then moves among the living with compassion and joy.

Goddesses of Craft

The Germanic goddess Perchta has much in common with Brigid. She ensures the fertility of the fields and the well-being of cattle in particular, and she blesses sheep and those who work with their wool. She is exacting in her standards and can be stern with sloppy spinning or weaving work. Like Brigid, she encourages excellence. Greek Athena and her Roman sister Minerva are also matrons of spinning, weaving, and all domestic crafts. They know that these are the basis of civilization itself, and are not trivial “women’s work.” Another who honors women’s work in the world is Mokoš, a Slavic goddess who protects sheep and oversees the production of woolen goods. Like Brigid, she also guards women in labor and their newborn babes. Yet another weaving goddess, Egyptian Neith, weaves the patterns of life and death on her own loom, and bestows her blessings on all domestic arts that are practiced in her name.

Goddesses of Nourishment

These goddesses are the special guests of Saint Brigid, whose particular pleasure is ensuring that there is more than enough food for all. First is Dame Habondia, a Germanic goddess revered by Witches and praised for providing endless abundance in all aspects of life. The Indian goddess Anapurna, whose name means “food-giver,” offers nourishing sips all around from her sacred ladle of sustenance. The Roman goddesses of peace and plenty, Concordia and Copia, came together to our gathering, dispensing endless blessings from their cornucopias, supplying all present with whatever their heart most desires (chocolate flows freely). Finally, Brigid welcomes Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe, nurturing protector of Mexico (her oldest friends call her Tonantzin), from whose loving bounty the needy are cared for and the hungry are fed.

Brigid and Mary

Mary can be controversial in the Goddess-spirit community. Some Pagans, especially those who have been wounded by patriarchal religion, don’t consider Mary to be among the goddesses or hold her in reverence as an exemplar of feminine divinity. My own feeling about Mary is that she is one of the most powerful aspects of the Goddess. As with Brigid and Saint Brigid, qualities of ancient goddesses were overlaid on the human woman Mary and became part of her legend. Like countless primal goddesses of creation, Mary gives birth by parthenogenesis, impregnated by spirit alone. Like Isis and Asherah, she is Queen of Heaven. And like Brigid, she is companion, advocate, and protector of the people.

In the early days of Christianity, Mary played a fairly small role in the religion. But beginning in about the fifth century, Mary inspired a passion in her devotees that echoes the passion people have always felt for the sacred feminine. The Goddess always comes through in a form that is most recognizable and accessible to the culture, and Mary is the latest aspect of the timeless Great Mother. To this day, more churches are named for Notre Dame, Our Lady, than are named for her son.

Over the years, I’ve observed how various goddesses come forward in popularity, which seems to depend upon the world’s need at the time. A few years ago, for example, Kuan Yin was seen everywhere in women’s spirituality, offering an outpouring of mercy and benevolence that was sorely needed. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that the powerful reawakening of interest in the Goddess happened around the time of the election of Pope John Paul II, a pope with a strong and vocal devotion to Mary, to whom he dedicated his life and his work. Sacred feminine energy was swirling around the planet then and continues to do so—Mary in her sphere of influence and the Goddess in hers, working together, bridging faiths.

Mary and Brigid seem to me to be the closest and most loving of sister goddesses. Their iconography is similar, both cloaked in a mantle that symbolizes their encompassing protection. They both are invoked for help in all realms of earthly and spiritual need, from a good birth to a good death. Saint Brigid is known as “Mary of the Gael,” a title given not just for her loving care and compassion but for her influence and her power. She is also known as the “midwife of Mary” and the “foster mother of Christ” (see pages 208 and 216 for more on these roles). Many traditional Celtic prayers invoke both Mary and Brigid:

Incantation of Bride of the locks of gold,

Incantation of the beauteous Mary Virgin,

Incantation of the Virtue of all virtues.24

One of my favorite tales about Mary and Brigid is told by Lady Gregory in her Book of Saints and Wonders. Mary was bothered by crowds that followed her everywhere (yes, even the divine are bothered by fans and paparazzi), and coming upon Brigid, she asked her for help. Brigid said, “I will show them a greater wonder.” She held up a harrow (a farming tool like a large rake with many pins) and caused each pin to burn like a candle. The crowd was dazzled and Mary was able to go on her way. When she later asked Brigid how she would like to be rewarded for this kindness, Brigid said, “Put my day before your own day,” and so it is that Saint Brigid’s day is February 1 (Imbolc) while Mary’s day is February 2 (Candlemas).

Celtic charms and spells often call upon the powers of both Mary and Brigid to work together on behalf of the supplicant, such as this spell against the evil eye:

The spell the great white Mary sent

To Bride the lovely fair,

For sea, for land, for water, and for withering glance,

For teeth of wolf, for testicle of wolf.

Whoso laid on thee the eye,

May it oppress himself,

May it oppress his house,

May it oppress his flocks.

Let me subdue the eye,

Let me avert the eye,

The three complete tongues of fullness,

In the arteries of the heart,

In the vitals of the navel.25

No meek and mild maidens these! Mary and Brigid were (and are) seen as towering figures of protection and righteous justice, and yet their sweetness and comforting love link them as well. The invoking titles for Mary in Celtic prayers can easily be shared with Brigid: vessel of peace, fountain of healing, well-spring of grace, shield of every dwelling, comforter of the world. If you haven’t gotten to know Mary, or if you have a notion of her as being submissive or irrelevant to modern feminist spirituality, invite her to join you and Brigid in your devotions. The combined strength of these two divinities is formidable indeed.

Brigid Between the Worlds

From ancient times, the Celts have been wanderers, a tribal people whose curiosity and inner sense of destiny kept them moving from place to place. Blessings for travelers abound, such as the well-known “May the road rise up to meet you and the wind be at your back…” Brigid herself is a wanderer, moving over the land to bring the spring, going from home to home to bestow blessings, visiting holy wells to bring healing. But it is not just in this middle world that she wanders—Brigid travels between the worlds, tending to our needs from the depths of the underworld, where her chthonic creatures dwell, where her sacred waters spring from the earth’s heart. She moves in the Otherworld, inspiring the poet, the seer, the visionary, the music maker. She draws forth the magic of the worlds unseen and makes them manifest through art and craft and song. Brigid is a presence in our dreams, moving through the cluttered mindscape and setting things to rights, showing us in symbol and metaphor how to better our lives in the waking world.

Seek Brigid in the between-places—the edge of sea, lake, or river, the place where meadow meets forest—and at the “thin times” of day, dawn and dusk, when the passage is easy between the worlds. For all her practicality, Brigid is part of a culture that moves in all the worlds with ease and for whom the possibility of magic is a given. Celtic lore is filled with tales of ghosts, mystical encounters, and shapeshifting creatures. Faeries of all kinds roam the Celtic lands freely, for belief in them has never faltered.

Between the day and the night, between the known and the unknown, a glimmer of faery fire can be seen. It is carried in Brigid’s hand, sheltered from the wind. Walk with her now through the gloaming. In the place between light and dark, you must move slowly, attentively. Everything has meaning if you choose to see it. Brigid has seen all the sorrows of the world and all its joys. In the place between the two, things just are, neither good nor bad, but all accepting. When you reach this place inside yourself, you are open and receptive to Brigid’s wise guidance.

Brigid’s Earthly Journey:
Seasons and Festivals

Our knowledge of Celtic seasonal celebrations comes from the first-century Coligny calendar. Two major festivals are shown on this calendar, Beltane and Lughnasadh. Other historical sources filled in the other two significant festivals, Imbolc and Samhain, and these four are the well-known Pagan holidays celebrated today. Imbolc begins the season of spring, Beltane is the first day of summer, Lughnasadh welcomes the autumn, and Samhain opens the door into winter. In the common calendar, the beginnings of seasons are usually noted at the solstices and equinoxes (that is, June 21 being called the first day of summer), but by the Celtic calendar, these are actually the middle of the seasons, not the beginning. Logically, this makes perfect sense. If seasons are measured by the length of days, the arc of summer reaches its zenith on the longest day (summer solstice) and then declines. The winter’s nadir is reached on the shortest day (winter solstice), and then the days grow longer from that point. We see remnants of this when the terms midsummer and midwinter are used poetically for the summer and winter solstices.

In the Celtic reckoning of time, each new day starts at sunset, so the dates for the four holidays are:

Imbolc: Sunset on January 31 to sunset on February 1

Beltane: Sunset on April 30 to sunset on May 1

Lughnasadh: Sunset on July 31 to sunset on August 1

Samhain: Sunset on October 31 to sunset on November 1

Brigid’s new year begins at Imbolc, and we begin there too.

Imbolc

Many people only think of Brigid at Imbolc, though of course she is present throughout the year. It’s rather like your birthday—you are loved year-round, but on your birthday it’s all about you. Imbolc is the day that’s all about Brigid.

Imbolc (or Oimelc) is the point on the Celtic Wheel of the Year where the passing of winter is marked, even though there may still be wintry weather ahead. In the Celtic calendar, the seasons are delineated by changes in light, and by Imbolc the lengthening days are definitely noticeable—an oft-repeated saying is “From Brigid’s festival onwards the days get longer and the nights shorter.” For our rural ancestors whose lives depended on crops and the birth of animals, any sign of the return of spring must have been eagerly sought. Though the earth is still frozen, the light affirms that life is awakening.

The source of the increasing light and heat is Brigid. On Imbolc, she moves across the land, bringing the promise of renewal and the return of joy. The name Imbolc means “in the belly,” and Oimelc means “ewe’s milk.” The fertility of sheep and the abundance of their life-sustaining milk are at the root of this holy day. The dangerous part of winter, when sheep might die, when lambs might freeze, has passed. The tribe has survived.

The many customs of Imbolc speak to how beloved Brigid is and how warmly she is welcomed. Offerings of milk, butter, bread, and beer sustain her on her journeying. (You can partake of these too, as a ceremonial communion with the Goddess.) Brigid’s crosses are made, their sun-wheel shape symbolizing the increasing strength of the light (see page 25). For the first time all winter, the hearthfire is completely extinguished, the hearth is swept, and the fire is rekindled as an invocation of Brigid and an expression of trust in her care. An alternate custom is to smooth the ashes in the fireplace and in the morning look for signs that Brigid has been there.

Another custom evokes the tradition of sacred hospitality and invites Brigid to come and take her rest within the shelter of the home. A symbolic bed is lovingly prepared for her in a basket, and a doll dressed in pure white is made and tucked in for the night. Prayers and lullabies are offered to this Brídeóg, or “Bridey doll,” giving back to the Goddess all the tenderness and care that she bestows throughout the year. A variation of this custom is to dress a sheaf of oats from the last harvest and place it in the bed with a wand-shaped branch, symbolizing the God. The divine couple will join together in a union that ensures the fruitful abundance of the coming seasons.

A Family Imbolc

Margie McArthur

Margie McArthur has been a student of metaphysics, mysteries, and magic for nearly fifty years and a priestess of the Old Religion for almost forty of those years. She is an Archdruidess of the Druid Clan of Dana of the Fellowship of Isis.

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When our kids were little, we described Brigid to them as an important goddess to many people of Celtic descent, including our family. We brought Brigid into our children’s lives primarily at Imbolc, a feast that we’ve come to call simply “Brigid.” Each year when the children were young we had a big celebration that involved as many themes of the festival as possible. We lit a special candle for Brigid and said a special prayer to her. We read stories about her—among our favorites were “The Coming of Angus and Bride” from Donald Mackenzie’s Wonder Tales from Scottish Myth and Legend26 and “The Earth-Shapers” from Ella Young’s Celtic Wonder Tales.27 The children did the Brigid play that’s included in the Imbolc chapter of my book WiccaCraft for Families. We had a feast, which always included foods associated with the celebrations of Brigid—milk, honey, and oats in the form of bannocks. As the children got older, we added other things. We made a Bridey doll and a bed for her, and we designated a piece of cloth to be a “brat” and set it out to be blessed by Brigid as she passed by at night.

One of my favorite memories is of a Brigid weekend in the late 1980s. We were living in the Santa Cruz mountains in California, having moved there a few years earlier from the Los Angeles area. A couple of friends from our old magical group came to visit us for Imbolc and brought their children. So the house was full of children—eight of them—ranging in age from two and a half to thirteen, six of whom were boys. We set up a candle-making station on the dining room table, and all of us quietly circled the table, taking turns dipping weighted wicks into the pot of heated beeswax that sat within a larger pot of hot water on the camp stove, while one of the moms read aloud a wonderful story about Brigid. The kids were enchanted by the sight of their candles growing thicker with each dip. When the candles were done, we decorated them. I had purchased a bag of beeswax strips of many colors, and the kids had fun wrapping the strips around the still warm candles, or cutting the strips into different shapes (stars, diamonds, etc.) and gently pressing them into the candles. In the evening we finished off the day with a special ceremonial dinner, and after that, the Brigid play.

Here is something I wrote many years ago for our family Brigid ceremony:

Blessed Brigid, Flame of Delight in the many worlds,

May the fires of your sacred hearth be rekindled.

May they burn brightly, their flames bridging the many worlds,

Bringing the star-power of the heavens down to enliven

The stars that live deep within the heart of Mother Earth.

Grant us the gift of your brightness and warmth:

The fire that is inspiration.

Let us draw sustenance from your Well of Deep Peace

That nourishes all of life.

Enfold us in your mantle of protection and healing.

Guide us as we heal, and in our creative endeavors.

Grant us the inspiration that enables

The creation of true beauty and harmony.

Blessed One, Fair One,

This do we ask of you,

As we offer you the inextinguishable light

Of our love and homage.

For more about Margie, see the Contributors appendix.

Cloak and Candles

When I first began exploring the Pagan holidays in the early 1980s, it was not as common to refer to Imbolc as such, but rather to use the name Candlemas, which is the Christian holy day of purification and candle blessing. You’ll still see that name used from time to time, and the concept of honoring the sacred flame is part of both holidays. Each Imbolc, I bless eight pairs of altar candles for the coming turn of the Wheel. Some years I simply buy the candles, and other years I set aside the time to make them myself, and you may enjoy doing this too. The simplest to make is a rolled-beeswax candle. The beeswax comes in sheets of many colors, and you simply roll it up around a length of cotton wick. If you cut the rectangular sheets diagonally and stack two different colors of the wax triangles and then roll them from the wide side down to the point, you’ll end up with a two-color spiral candle.

Whether you make or buy your candles, give some thought to what colors (and scents, if you like scented candles) will be appropriate for the coming celebrations of spring equinox, Beltane, summer solstice, Lughnasadh, autumn equinox, Samhain, winter solstice, and Imbolc again. For extra sparkling energy, you can roll your candles in very fine glitter—this can pop a bit when you burn them, so be attentive. Envision the energy of the growing light, and ask Brigid to bless and charge each candle. Wrap them and label them for their intended use, and store in a quiet place where they can retain their power. If you are a flamekeeper, this is a good time to bless candles for that purpose. Cleanse and purify all your flamekeeping tools and candleholders, freshening the energy for the coming year.

This is also a powerful time to make protective and strengthening talismans. One traditional talisman is the brat Bhríde, Brigid’s cloak. This is a length of cloth that is left outside overnight on Imbolc Eve for Brigid to bless as she passes by. It can then be worn, used for healing, or simply placed on your altar, and used each year to be blessed again and again. Irish linen or wool is traditional. I also tie a length of green silk ribbon to a tree and just leave it there all year, to blow in the wind and disperse Brigid’s blessings as the seasons turn.

On Bride’s Morn

There is some disagreement in the Pagan community about the date for Imbolc—is it February 1 or 2? Because Saint Brigid’s feast day is February 1 and so many of her customs are connected to the goddess Brigid, my feeling is that February 1 is the better choice. Since Celtic holidays start at sunset, I put out my brat Bhríde and ribbon on the evening of January 31, and take the brat Bhríde inside the next morning, making sure I give special thanks to the morning light, which is strengthening day by day.

The theme of light returning continues on Groundhog Day (February 2). Its origins are linked to the snake, an oracular animal associated with Brigid. A traditional invocation for Imbolc says:

Early on Bride’s morn

The serpent shall come from the hole.

I will not molest the serpent,

Nor will the serpent molest me.28

Some folktales say that after the snakes left Ireland, the job of coming forth on Brigid’s day was taken over by the badger or the hedgehog. From hedgehog to groundhog isn’t much of a leap! You may wish to do some vision questing with one of these chthonic creatures at Imbolc (see page 100). Their folklore speaks of weather divination—if the day is sunny so their shadows can be seen, it means the Cailleach is gathering firewood for more weeks of winter. For divination of a more personal nature, Lady Wilde (Oscar’s mother) cited an Imbolc custom of lighting a candle for each member of the household and then seeing whose candle went out first. That person would be the first to die, and then the next and the next, ending with the final candle burning, representing the survivor of all. For a more cheerful augury, Lady Wilde also said that whoever hears a lark first thing on Imbolc morning will have good luck that whole day.29

Seasons of Light and Dark

The ancient Celtic year was separated into lunar months, each with a light half and a dark half. This idea of the months being divided into dark and light can extend to other ways we reckon time. Thinking of the year in terms of Brigid, she brings us two seasons of light, spring and summer, and two of dark, autumn and winter. Just as our own concerns and activities vary with the seasons, so Brigid changes and moves with us around the turning of the Wheel.

Brigid in Spring

Brigid in springtime is the life force embodied. She is midwife to the world, drawing it forth from winter’s dark enclosure into the light. This is her best-known aspect, the one who breaks winter’s hold on the earth. The light has been growing since winter solstice, but it is only now, beginning at Imbolc, that we really begin to notice and to see its effects on the wakening world. The restlessness and increase in energy that we call spring fever is part of Brigid too, for she is a wanderer at this time of year, moving over the land and bringing green growth everywhere her cloak touches the earth.

With the increasing warmth comes the birthing of animals. Brigid is the protector of all newborn creatures, and she blesses new mothers with abundant milk and the instinctive knowledge of nurturance. Nesting birds come under her protection too, and the spawning water-life, and the serpents stirring underground. Her watchful eye is everywhere at this time of year as she ensures the continuity of life. The world is waking up, called by the sweet song of Brigid.

Brigid of the lambs,

Brigid of gentleness,

Brigid of the new milk,

I welcome you in.

Springtime Activities to Honor Brigid

• Purification is a theme associated with Imbolc, making this an excellent time to begin a new health regimen or cleanse.

• Use the brightening energy of the returning light to do some spring cleaning, literally and metaphorically! Sweep away what no longer serves you.

• Plant some shamrock seeds to invoke Brigid as the Triple Goddess. You can buy seeds from Ireland online if you can’t find them locally, and you can even buy some Irish soil to plant them in!

Brigid in Summer

Brigid loves to feed the world, and in summer she raises the vegetables from the soil, ripens the fruit on tree and bush, and teases the grain upward toward the sun. Her oak trees provide a shady shelter in which to contemplate the bountiful gifts of the earth. Brigid as healer is especially active in summer, pouring her power into herbs, roots, barks, and all the wild plants that contribute to wellness. As protector of bees, she guides them to their hives, increases their productivity, and provides them with sweet blossoms.

On summer mornings, the dawn light touches the dew-bedecked world with diamond brightness. Brigid is associated with both dew and sun, and her guidance has been called imbas gréine, wisdom from the sun, in which dewdrops are “impregnated” by sunlight and whoever consumes them is touched with poetic inspiration. The custom of rising on the morning of Beltane (May 1) and washing your face in the morning dew may stem from this, though now the recipient is generally said to receive beauty, not genius. Brigid would like you to have both, so take full advantage of her light-filled summer offerings.

Brigid of the noonday sun,

Brigid of wellness,

Brigid of the shining shield,

I welcome you in.

Summertime Activities to Honor Brigid

• If fireworks are legal in your area, use them ceremonially as a fire offering to Brigid. Tuck some away to be used at winter solstice—honor Brigid then with sparklers in the snow!

• If fire is a danger in your area, create a ritual invoking Brigid as goddess of both the flame and the sacred well waters. Ask her to bless and protect the land and its people in this season of wildfire.

• Use the power of the sun at its peak to draw down creative fire for any projects that you want to bring to fruition now and in the months to come.

Brigid in Autumn

The season begins with a blaze of glory as Brigid’s beloved oaks turn to gold and the scarlet rowanberries tremble in the rising winds. The hazel trees of wisdom release their nuts, their branches shaken by crows whose harsh warnings foretell the coming cold. Brigid begins to welcome the dark months of the year by inviting us to draw closer to hearth and home. Ever practical, she energizes us now to prepare for the months to come. The summer’s bounty of food is preserved and stored away. The wool that was shorn and washed in the spring is spun into yarn for the winter’s weaving.

Brigid as the protector of the home urges us to make sure all is in good repair before the storms arrive. In the glowing days of autumn, she fills our hearts with thankfulness for the blessings of comfort, shelter, friends, and family. The harvest of food is safely in, and it’s time to assess the harvest of the inner life as well, as we prepare to descend into the time of deepening wisdom. Brigid is invoked for her discernment, for this is the time of gathering what nourishes and winnowing out what no longer serves.

Brigid of the acorns,

Brigid of the fox cry,

Brigid of the twining root,

I welcome you in.

Autumnal Activities to Honor Brigid

• As you put your garden to bed, invoke Brigid’s blessing. Envision the energy of new life and growth safely slumbering underground.

• Create (or buy) a grain dolly at Lughnasadh that can be used as your Bridey doll at Imbolc.

• Lay in a store of books to be read through the colder months, and make plans for study and creative endeavors.

Brigid in Winter

In winter, bare branches trace stark black patterns against the pale sky. When distractions are minimized, clarity is enhanced. Senses are acutely awake as the winter cold touches skin and breath and bone. Brigid isn’t slumbering through these months—she is deepening, gathering and reserving her strength for the tasks ahead. She blesses and protects the pregnant animals; they too await a new life emerging. She gives her attention to homespun arts, weaving, knitting, discerning the patterns as disparate pieces come together to make a whole. In the long darkness, her flame burns brighter still, its warmth more welcome than ever. In the hush of a deep winter’s night, her voice can be heard and her guidance revealed.

The gifts of Brigid’s winter are contemplation, introspection, and intuition. Sight adjusts to darkness, and our inner sight does too. Look thoroughly and slowly, and move with care over the frozen earth. Whether you sit with Brigid beside a blazing hearth or the smallest glimmering candle flame, give thanks for the beauty of her light. She isn’t absent, not for a moment. Her emergence at Imbolc is just a change of intention, a shift of energy and focus. Reach out your hand in the darkest night and she is there.

Brigid of the iron pot,

Brigid of comfort,

Brigid of the poet’s flame,

I welcome you in.

Wintertime Activities to Honor Brigid

• Remember those less fortunate than you and invoke Brigid’s qualities of compassion, charity, and hospitality. Give generously in every way you can.

• Use the long, cozy nights to write some personal or family history. See page 182 for ideas.

• Be creative with your fire offerings. You can enhance your hearthside fire gazing with additives that make the flames change color. You can buy commercial colorings or easily make your own (look online for instructions). Make some green fire for Brigid!

Brigid in the Land

Sharon Blackie

Sharon Blackie is a writer, storyteller, psychologist, and editor of EarthLines magazine. She lives in a riverside cottage in a small wood in County Donegal, Ireland.

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For four years, until recently, I lived on a working croft by the sea on the Isle of Lewis in the Outer Hebrides, just before the last road south and west gives out at the abandoned village of Mealista and melts into the stony mountains of Harris. From the back of our croft-house we looked out (on a clear day) to St. Kilda, forty miles west; from the front we looked out onto Lewis’s highest mountain, Mealasbhal, and the very clear figure of a reclining woman in profile in the mountains beside it. The first time I saw her there, I knew I was home; I had looked out onto a similar reclining woman in the hills to the front of the house I’d moved from, on the mainland coast of north-west Scotland.

There are a number of locations in Scotland in which the shapes of specific mountains or ranges represent the silhouette of the reclining goddess; the best-known of them is Lewis’s Sleeping Beauty, visible on the southeastern horizon from Callanish stone circle, but many others exist. In the Outer Hebrides, the old Celtic mythologies speak of the goddess of the land in two aspects: Brigid and the blue-faced Cailleach (the Gaelic word for old woman, crone, or hag). The story is that the old woman of winter, the Cailleach, dies and is reborn as Brigid (or Bride), the spring maiden, on the festival day of Imbolc. She is fragile but grows stronger each day as the sun rekindles its fire and turns scarcity into abundance. There are many stories about this battle for the seasons that takes place between Brigid and the Cailleach, but they can clearly be seen as two aspects of life in balance. The reclining women in the hills and mountains are constant reminders of these two very potent spirits of place and seasons.

And so Brigid, to me, represents the land: its fertility, its life. Protector of domestic animals, she looked down from the hills onto our croft—possibly the most windswept in the country, with nothing between us and the prevailing gales in two directions. She watched over us, and over the lambs born to our beautiful black, horned pedigree Hebridean sheep in the damp chill of a Lewis spring. A black Kerry milk cow, who came to us first at Imbolc, was named after her. When spring in the polytunnel greenhouse offered unseasonably early salad and broccoli, it was Brigid I thought to thank. Each morning, as I walked the dogs along the wild salt-splattered and windswept coastline just beyond the croft, it was Brigid, silhouetted in the mountains, who kept me company. I told her my stories, and she told me hers. Hers were older, deeper, wiser, manifested in the to-wheep of oystercatchers and the slow, graceful dance of the resident wild red deer. In our last year there, when many things began to fall apart and there were many small deaths, it was Brigid’s rocky bones that supported me, Brigid’s green arms that cradled me, Brigid’s whispered promise of a new spring that sustained me. And now, called home to Ireland, and a beautiful old cottage by a waterfall in a small grove of trees, it is Brigid’s wells and waters that quench my long thirst.

For more about Sharon, see the Contributors appendix.

Brigid of the White Moon

The ancient Celtic calendar was lunar, and the start of the month was most likely marked at the full moon, rather than at the new moon as most Pagan systems now use. This makes sense—it’s easier to notice the full moon rising than it is to be aware of the absence of moon, or even the arrival of the first slender crescent, which hangs so fleetingly on the horizon. More modern Celts held the first greeting of the crescent moon as fortuitous, as recorded in the dozen or so invocations to the new moon in Carmina Gadelica, a collection of folk prayers and incantations. Here’s one of my favorites:

Hail unto thee,

Jewel of the night!

Beauty of the heavens,

Jewel of the night!

Mother of the stars,

Jewel of the night!

Fosterling of the sun,

Jewel of the night!

Majesty of the stars,

Jewel of the night!

The Celtic lunar cycle has a mystical and poetic quality: marking the new month with the full moon, observing the descent into the dark moon, watching for the first appearance of that “jewel of the night,” and then watching her wax full again until the beginning of the next lunar month.

You’re probably familiar with names given to the full moons, drawn from various traditions: Wolf Moon, Rose Moon, and so on. Many people adapt these to fit with the seasonal qualities of their own locations—for example, Winter Rains Moon rather than Snow Moon. Where the Celtic holy days fall in relation to each month’s full moon influences the energy of the moon cycle: a full moon near the beginning of October has a very different mood than a full moon at Samhain. Brigid is often considered to be a sun goddess, but her passage through the seasons can also be observed moon to moon, with each full moon and its lunar cycle dedicated to one of her attributes. I invite you to explore the lunar year with Brigid, as she walks through the seasons under the full moonlight.

The Spring Moons

February: Milk Moon

This is the full moon closest to Imbolc, also known as Oimelc, “ewe’s milk.” As the lambs of early spring are born and their mothers swell with milk, dedicate this moon cycle to the birthing of your own new projects, hopes, and aspirations. Nurture them with tender care, and feel Brigid’s presence sustaining you in your endeavors.

March: Budding Moon

The first blossoms of springtime make their way to the surface now, blessed by Brigid’s warming breath. Dedicate this moon cycle that encompasses the spring equinox to the observance of the quickening of life everywhere. The more you pay attention to the beauties of the world around you, the more you will be filled with grateful wonder.

April: Music Moon

Birdsong fills the air, awakening each day with melody. The winds of spring turn the trees into Aeolian harps raising a song in praise of life. Dedicate this moon cycle to the celebration of music and of Brigid as the matron goddess of song. Make music yourself in every way you can—even by whistling!—and explore other people’s musical offerings, listening with all your heart and soul.

The Summer Moons

May: Bonfire Moon

This is the full moon closest to Beltane, traditionally the festival when cattle were freed to graze in the summer pastures. The cows were walked between two bonfires to bless and protect them in the months to come, and surely Brigid was invoked, both as fire goddess and as protector of cattle. Recreate this ritual for yourself (with bonfires if you can or symbolically with smaller flames) and receive Brigid’s blessing for all your summer activities.

June: Poetry Moon

The world is filled with loveliness this month, with flowers at their peak, the weather warm and soft, and the cares of winter long forgotten. Give thanks to Brigid with the reading of poetry that praises the beauties of the natural world and its creatures, or perhaps with a reading of love poetry, if you are so moved. Poetry read aloud by moonlight touches the soul and may inspire creative offerings of your own.

July: Green Oak Moon

Trees are at their most full and lush, and Brigid’s oaks are green sanctuaries where her wisdom can be sought in cool shade. As the full moon rises, seek out a favorite tree (oak or any other) and sit beneath it to watch the moonlit world for a while. Let silence enfold you. Listen for Brigid’s voice as she teaches you earth lore.

The Autumn Moons

July: Blackberry Moon

This is the full moon nearest the festival of Lughnasadh, the beginning of the autumn season. Lughnasadh is sometimes called the “feast of first fruits,” when berries in particular are at their most perfectly ripe and luscious. The blackberry is sacred to Brigid; invoke her by baking Bridey’s Brambly Crumble (see page 49) and sharing it with your dear ones.

August: Sunbeam Moon

While the weather may still be saying summer, the slant of sunlight confirms that this is the season of autumn. The angle of the sun’s rays in the late afternoons evokes the story of Saint Brigid hanging her cloak on a sunbeam to dry. What would you like to hang on a sunbeam? Hand over your sodden spirits and moist moods to Brigid, and let her warm them in her healing golden light. Then go watch the sunset and moonrise with a peaceful heart.

September: Harvest Moon

This is the full moon closest to the autumn equinox, and it’s often the brightest and largest moon of the year. Brigid as both goddess and saint finds satisfaction in feeding people well. Honor her with a harvest home supper in the full moonlight. Make a special point of inviting those who may be in need of the comfort of a home-cooked meal. The next day, share your bounty through a donation to a local food bank.

The Winter Moons

October: Prophecy Moon

The moon closest to Samhain draws out the wisdom of the ancestors that is always within you. Make an offering shrine to them and then use your favorite divination methods to see what lies ahead in the next turning of the Wheel of the Year. Invoke Brigid’s gifts of seership and clarity of vision to understand your readings.

November: Migration Moon

The great flocks of migrating birds fill the air with their haunting calls, pulling your attention skyward. They and all migrating creatures have a deep instinctual knowledge of their rightful place in every season. As the full moon rises over the frosty earth, ask Brigid to bless you with this knowledge, that you may always be headed in the right direction and always find your way home.

December: Hearth Moon

Whether you have an actual hearth in your home or not, the spirit of the warming center is strong now. Tend that fire well with whatever traditions truly feed your inner flame. Remember, Brigid awaits you in the quiet moments, so be sure to make space for those amid your seasonal celebrations. As the moon rises, open your spirit to midwinter’s mysteries.

Brigid’s Earthly Allies

Exploring the creatures, plants, and stones that are associated with Brigid is another way to know her, just as you learn about your friends as you discover the things they enjoy. The affinities you share draw you closer together.

As I mentioned in the last chapter, books often list certain plants or animals as belonging to Brigid, but you may need to use your intuition and knowledge of symbols to understand why (or if) this is so. Remember, your relationship with Brigid is uniquely your own, and she may very well introduce you to other allies that strengthen a particular aspect of your soul work in this lifetime.

As you explore Brigid’s allies, first get to know the ally on a personal level. What are your own feelings about it? What do you understand about it intuitively? What gift can it bring to you or bring out in you? Make a prayer or charm based on what you feel you need from this ally: “Speed of the salmon be mine” or “Strength of the oak be mine” and so on. After this initial intuitive exploration, you may want to do some research—using books as well as the Internet—and become acquainted with what other people have felt about the stone, plant, or creature. Seek out myths and folklore, and interpret their symbology. Question everything to see if it feels true to you. This is Brigid’s way of teaching: a combination of lore and the inner wisdom that adds to that lore.

If you can interact with the ally tangibly, by all means do so (some will be easier than others—wild boars, for example, should be approached with caution). Visualizations and meditations will connect you with the ally’s spirit. All allies can be visited on the astral plane; be sure to keep watch for them on the physical plane too. Once you establish a connection with an ally, it may appear in unexpected ways. These are all beings that Brigid blesses, protects, and calls her own, just as she does with you.

Birds, Beasts, and Fish

Brigid has so many aspects and qualities that it’s no surprise she is associated with such a variety of creatures. Let’s meet a few of them.

Swan

The fairy swan of Bride of flocks …30

When I hear the thrilling call of migrating flocks overhead, it echoes in some longing part of my heart. The wisdom offered by all migrating birds is to heed that heart-call and follow it home. In Ireland swans migrate at Imbolc, and their departure is a sign of spring approaching. They return at Samhain, bringing the winter. The swan’s instinctive knowledge of where it needs to be in every season is one reason it is Brigid’s bird. This is the knowledge of Home in its deepest sense, where your soul finds peace. It’s about timing, direction, courage, and grace.

The swan is also Brigid’s bird because of its association with poetry and music. Master bards wore the tugen, a ceremonial cloak of swan feathers, to invoke the soul’s flight toward poetic inspiration. Swans dwell at the liminal places between the worlds, and in Celtic lore they transport souls to the afterlife, the shining land of Tir na nOg, to await rebirth. As midwife of souls into and out of life, Brigid guides this journey.

Swans are often considered a symbol of peace because of their graceful, calm appearance. They bring a note of peaceful beauty to a rural scene. But swans are powerful and fierce, especially when protecting their nests. Invoke the protection of Brigid’s swan for your own nest, her white wings spread wide to repel negative energy.

The two birds that appear most often in Celtic tales of shapeshifting are the swan and the raven. The transformation from human form to raven is voluntary, but human-to-swan can be the result of a spell or curse. Enchanted swans wear silver or golden chains as a sign of their otherworldliness, and if you encounter these swans or follow them, you may be taken into the Otherworld yourself. Some swan maidens cast off their feathered form and become human at dawn or twilight—again, the theme of liminality, the between-times and the between-places. The swan is a threshold creature.

Raven

At Imbolc, ravens are the first birds to nest in Ireland, their presence a sign that Brigid is bringing spring back to the land. That alone would be enough to associate ravens and crows with Brigid, but there are other affinities as well.31 Brigid’s mother and aunts (the Mórrígan, Badb, and Nemhain) are all shapeshifter goddesses who take on crow form, so there is a familial fondness for these birds. Although the Mórrígan and her sisters invoke the warlike aspects of carrion crows, the connection between Brigid and ravens is more peaceable. Ravens hold the spirit of sovereignty over a place, asserting the owner’s right to dwell there and guarding all within. Ravens point out injustices and tell the truth, no matter the consequences. They are among the most intelligent of all creatures, the keepers of memory, the historians of the mythic world. All these are aspects of Brigid.

Ravens and crows are also Brigid’s birds of divination, offering warnings and oracular messages, and drawing your attention to matters of interest. I have many crows around my house, and they always have a lot to say. Count the number of crows you see flying by, or count the number of caws you hear, and consider what significance that number has for you. When a crow caws in a way that seems meant especially for you, take it seriously.

Cow

Give the milk, my treasure,

With steady flow and calmly.32

Brigid is protectress of both the earthly cow whose milk sustains the body and the white red-eared otherworldly cow whose milk sustains the soul. Her mother, the Mórrígan, is also a keeper of these faery cows, just as Saint Brigid’s mother was a dairywoman and taught her daughter the skills of caring for cattle.

Milk and butter were two primary sources of nourishment in traditional Celtic life. For rural Celts, the cow was a treasure, ensuring against starvation. The loss of a cow was ruinous for country folk, and Saint Brigid was known to magically restore cows to their owners. She also turned well water into milk, caused cows to give three times their usual milk, and blessed vessels to contain milk until the last hungry person had been satisfied. The milk from her own white cows was so nourishing that no other food was needed. The goddess Brigid’s otherworldly white cows give milk that can bestow poetic prowess or imbue the drinker with knowledge of healing lore.

The cow also represents the goodness of the green land that sustains it—the land that Brigid awakens to fertility by her warming presence. A family cow (or a herd of cattle for a tribe) meant wealth and security. Brigid’s fire was invoked for their protection, such as walking cows between two bonfires, waving torches over them or embers under their udders, and sprinkling them with ashes from the hearthfire.

Brigid’s qualities of constancy, generosity, and nourishment are called forth when you align yourself with her cow ally. Calmness is another of Brigid’s most-mentioned qualities, and a placid cow is the very embodiment of calm. It is easy to envision Brigid walking in deep contentment alongside her cows and resting in their quiet company. When you ruminate over a problem or a choice, taking your time with thoughtful deliberation, you are moving at cow speed. But calm doesn’t mean passive or complacent. Cows can move fast when they feel like it, and great energy is required to generate milk. Milk is a symbol of the sacred feminine and of wisdom passed from mother to daughter. The cow is symbolic of Brigid’s constant nurturing, her care that never ceases. The cow must always be milked, no matter what. People must be fed. The milk must not be wasted.

Sheep

Brigid’s association with sheep is simple and sweet. In the early days of spring, she guards the lambs when they are born and acts as midwife to protect their mothers. She brings on the milk to sustain the young ones. (Brigid’s holy day of Imbolc is also called Oimelc, “ewe’s milk.”) She blesses the fields where her sheep graze and protects them from predators. When it is time, she blesses spinners and weavers of wool and all who work with woolen crafts. Her healing gifts can be invoked by bringing three sheep into your house to sleep for three nights. (If you do this, I want pictures.) The qualities Brigid offers with this ally are peacefulness, community, and trust. Cozy up to Brigid’s sheep when you feel the need for comfort.

Boar

Brigid is not just mistress of the contented cow and the peaceful sheep. The fierce wild boar is part of her nature as well. Though boars are often thought of as symbolizing masculine power, this may be because strength and leadership have been considered male traits in patriarchal societies. Not so for the ancient Celts, who honored power in both men and women. Brigid does not shrink from righteous battle, nor does she hesitate to act swiftly in the defense of the weak. The king of all boars, Torc Triath, is her companion in these causes.

The boar was the symbol of the Celtic warrior spirit. Boar imagery adorned jewelry, weaponry, battle trumpets, coins, ceremonial offerings, and helmets. In parts of Celtic culture, eating the wild boar was forbidden, and some individuals had a geis (a ritual taboo) upon them to never taste the flesh of a boar. But for most Celts, boars and domestic pigs were symbolic of prosperity, and their meat was considered the finest food in this life (and the afterlife). There are magical tales of pigs that were roasted for the night’s feast but were alive again in the morning, in a never-ending cycle of abundance. Saint Brigid’s miracles often included bacon as one of the foods she magically provided. Boars and pigs eat acorns fallen from Brigid’s sacred oak trees, imbuing them with oak-wisdom that passes along to those who consume their flesh.

Is it wrong to honor an ally of the Goddess by eating it? You must listen to your own inner guidance here, as in all things. Ask Brigid how she feels about it for you personally, and ascertain your own geis about meat-eating, with no judgment about others. Thankfulness and respect are at the core of this matter. Coming from that point of view, taking in an ally’s body to become part of your body is profound magic—you could even see it as a type of shapeshifting.

Chthonic Creatures: Serpent and Badger

Animals who live in both the dark and the light pass over that liminal threshold place where both worlds are known and understood. Their deepening time is balanced by a time of action. Two creatures from this world who belong to Brigid are the serpent and the badger.

Wait a minute—how can the serpent be one of Brigid’s creatures when there are no snakes in Ireland and never were? First of all, remember that Brigid is not just an Irish goddess. The Celtic tribes were far-ranging and their beliefs are part of many lands. But beyond that, Brigid is present today, all around the world, and as such her lore will always be expanding, as long as we don’t become stultified and dogmatic about it. There are snakes in many of the places where Brigid is known and loved.

As I mentioned earlier, the serpent comes forth on Imbolc as a sign of warmth returning:

Early on Bride’s morn

The serpent shall come from the hole.

I will not molest the serpent,

Nor will the serpent molest me.33

The serpent’s entire body touches the land and feels its energy and seasons through that intimate connection. Its knowledge of transformation and regeneration makes Brigid’s serpent her ally of healing. The serpent is a guardian of sacred wells; seeing a snake near one of these holy places is a fortuitous sign indeed. Watchful and silent, the snake observes the well’s visitors and judges their conduct.

The badger also emerges on Imbolc morning and works some rather counterintuitive weather divination: a sunny day that reveals its shadow means more wintry weather is ahead, while stormy and cold conditions mean warm weather will soon follow. This is because if Imbolc is fine and sunny, the Cailleach sets out to gather dry firewood before hunkering down to brew up more winter. If Imbolc is stormy, the Cailleach and Brigid are meeting to exchange seasons, and the Cailleach is having one last blast in farewell before retiring to her long sleep. Beyond this seasonal connection, the serpent and the badger are both symbols of wisdom, lore, and knowledge shared only with initiates. This is the teacher aspect of Brigid, she who guides you toward understanding your own potential—if, like serpent and badger, you are willing to go deep.

Salmon

According to Celtic legend, the oldest creature in the world is the Salmon of Knowledge. This venerable salmon lives in a well that is surrounded by nine sacred hazel trees, whose nuts of wisdom feed it.34 There is (as always) some variance in the details of these legends. Some say there is a single Well of Knowledge and a single Salmon of Knowledge. Others say there are several such wells and each of them contain a salmon of knowledge. Some lore says that every river in Ireland has such a well at its head, and the salmon that come from these waters carry their knowledge throughout the land. It is also said that the well and its hazel trees are in the Otherworld, and the water is a portal between the worlds. All of these feel true to me at their core.

The salmon’s knowledge comes to humans by receiving the gift of a hazelnut from the salmon, drinking or bathing in the water that flows from its well, or eating the salmon itself: “And whoever could catch and eat one of these salmon would be indued with the sublimest poetic intellect.” 35 The links between Brigid and salmon are strong: sacred waters, poetic gifts, and knowledge mystically obtained and divinely inspired. Salmon is also a symbol of plenty; indeed, at spawning time the salmon runs may be so plentiful that the fish seem to leap right into the fisherfolk’s arms. As we know, one of Brigid’s greatest joys is providing more than enough food to nourish the body and cheer the spirit. Her salmon ally contributes to this generosity.

The salmon holds the knowledge of seasonal death and rebirth as it returns to its birthplace to spawn. It is a keeper of memory and ancestral wisdom, blessed by Brigid with a powerful instinct that tells it how to find its way home.

Wolf

Here is a tale of Saint Brigid: In Ireland long ago, a man was sentenced to death for accidentally killing the king’s tame wolf. Always an advocate for prisoners, Brigid traveled to the court to ask the king to be merciful. As she drove her cart through the woods, a huge grey wolf rushed toward her. But Brigid had no fear and reached out toward the fierce animal, calling it to her. The wolf leaped into the cart and lay down beside her, licking her bare feet. She went on her way to court, and the sight of her walking with the wild wolf at her side amazed the king. Brigid asked for compassion and clemency for the prisoner, and offered the wolf in exchange for the one that was killed. In some versions of the story, the wolf stays happily with the king, and in other tellings the wolf leaves with Brigid. In any case, the prisoner was spared.

I almost didn’t include the wolf in this section about Brigid’s animals. The story above is the only “official” connection between Brigid and wolves, and in some versions the animal is a fox. But I felt she strongly wanted the wolf included, which can be seen in artwork depicting Brigid—the wolf is often included in her iconography, as if she put the idea into the artist’s mind as strongly as she put it into mine. In meditating on why this might be, I was guided toward Celtic tales of wolf packs magically helping to herd sheep and pigs into shelter, of wolves returning lambs unharmed to their mothers, and of wolves shapeshifting into humans and back again. In each resource I read, “Though wolves are now extinct in Ireland … ,” and that plaintive phrase resonated like a keening howl on the wind.

A Celtic symbol of strength and courage, Brigid’s wolf companion counters the ferocious stereotype of the big, bad wolf with the reality of its noble nature. Her wolf walks beside those who fight for the protection of its earthly kin. Invoke its presence in prayers for the earth, and invoke Brigid’s eloquence and vision as you work in practical ways for the survival of all endangered creatures.

A Shapeshifting Journey

In The Once and Future King, by T. H. White, the future King Arthur is educated by the great wizard Merlyn through being transformed into various creatures and living among the creatures’ societies. He learns about power and courage, freedom and honor, beauty and wildness. Brigid, too, offers the gift of shapeshifting. It is an ancient part of Celtic myth and spirituality (which is of course why Merlyn the Druid knew of it), with countless tales of both mortals and immortals turning into birds or animals, or even grain or ocean waves. While you may not possess the magic to shift your physical form, you can shift your consciousness to align yourself with Brigid’s allies and receive their teachings.

This is a visualization to be done at bedtime. The misty edge of sleep is one of the liminal between-times when magic is potent. If you usually share your bed with someone, you may want to spend this night on your own, or simply wait until your bedmate has fallen asleep.

In the dark, in your soft bed, begin by breathing slowly and deeply. Keep your eyes closed and open your inner vision so that you willingly see what will be given to you. You sense a presence, soft as a whisper, and feel Brigid’s hand passing over your closed eyes. She places in your mind an image of one of her creatures—perhaps one mentioned in this book or perhaps another that she wishes you to learn from.

Observe the creature for a moment, and then begin to feel yourself shapeshifting into the same type of creature. Feel the shape of your body, the weight or lightness, the abilities you do not have as a human, and the human abilities you no longer have. Notice how the world looks through your new eyes, and how your other senses work. Join the creature-guide that Brigid has sent to you, and go where the guide and the vision take you. It may be a time of connection between just the two of you, or you may join the creature’s flock or herd or school. Don’t try to consciously direct the scenario—the whole point of this journey is to teach you things you don’t know in your usual human state of mind.

Unlike other visualizations where you bring yourself back to full awareness at the end, in this shapeshifting you move directly into sleep. Don’t fight the pull of slumber, as each visit with Brigid’s allies will take just as long as is needed, and there will be other visits. Float easily into the dreamworld.

In the morning, make note of any dreams you remember, but don’t worry if you don’t recall any. According to Celtic shapeshifting lore, the essence of the creature you became is always with you. You don’t need to strive or strain for understanding of the allies’ lessons—they are part of you now and will reveal their gifts in good time. Just give thanks to every ally you come to know, and to their benefactress Brigid.

Plants

Brigid is associated with many plants and trees, including dandelion, oats, angelica, mint, watercress, cowslip, fennel, flax, mugwort, figwort, all brambles and thorns, the rowan tree of protection, and the hazel tree of poetic inspiration. You could spend a lifetime getting to know her green allies and what they have to offer you magically, medicinally, and symbolically. Here are some to get you started.

Oak

Today the oak is mainly associated with Brigid because of Kildare, cill dara, church of the oaks, but the connection goes back much further. The ancient Celts practiced their rites in sacred oak groves known as nemetons, from the Old Irish fidnemed, a shrine in a forest. According to the Celts’ Roman chroniclers, there were also fearsome oak groves where light never penetrated and where no one—not even the Druids—set foot, where “the glare of conflagrations came from trees that were not on fire, and serpents twined and glided around their stems.” 36 This combination of otherworldly attributes speaks strongly of Brigid—fire that has no earthly source and oracular serpents entwined with the trees of wisdom. Could these groves that were forbidden to priests have been where Brigid’s priestesses kept her flame? It’s an intriguing thought. Oaks have another association with Brigid’s illuminating fire; folklore says that oaks attract lightning more than other trees, and that wood from a lightning-struck tree holds divine inspiration. Above all, oaks are associated with wisdom—the wisdom that comes with age and endurance.

Rushes

Rushes represent Brigid’s blessings of shelter, hospitality, and protection. In Celtic country cottages, rushes were used for roof thatching and were strewn on the dirt floors, bestowing those blessings on the home from top to bottom. Rushes were ceremonially placed across the threshold at Imbolc to make Brigid welcome and to welcome others in her name. Rushlights were also made and burned in honor of Brigid. These are the dried pith (the center part) of rushes, dipped in tallow or other fat and used in place of costly candles by country folk. This was one of those household tasks that needed to be done faithfully and often, as rushlights burned for no more than forty minutes or so. Brigid’s crosses (see page 25) are traditionally made from rushes, and the leftover bits can be saved for charms to tuck under mattresses for healing or carry for protection when traveling, especially on water. Rushes are a water plant associated with holy wells and springs—Saint Brigid was known to cause wellsprings to arise where rushes were pulled from the earth. Rushes grow in wetlands, one of the liminal places blessed by Brigid. Faeries may be found there too, hiding among the rushes. If you come upon one, apologize and depart as quickly as possible.

Shamrocks

Oh the Shamrock, the green, immortal Shamrock!

Chosen leaf

Of Bard and Chief,

Old Erin’s native Shamrock! 37

The name shamrock is an Anglicization of seamair óg, young clover. Saint Brigid is said to have to have chosen Kildare as the site for her monastery because of its glorious green fields of clover, which would serve well for grazing purposes. There is a lively debate about what plant is the true shamrock, and there are half a dozen varieties of clover that vie for the title. Some people say that the shamrock isn’t clover at all but a distinct plant that grows only in Ireland—not true, but it shows how passionately the Irish have embraced the symbol. The usual explanation of the shamrock’s significance is that Saint Patrick used it to illustrate the idea of the Holy Trinity to the Druids, who couldn’t grasp the concept of a deity who was three in one. This is ridiculous, of course, as triune deities were well known to the Celts. I like to imagine the scene was something like this: Patrick held up the shamrock and pointed to the three leaves on one stem, and the Druids said, “Oh, you mean like Brigid!” In any case, that story wasn’t told until 1,200 years after Patrick’s time, and it doesn’t appear in any of his own writings. (The Internet didn’t invent the concept of perpetuating misattributed quotes!) We can embrace the shamrock as a symbol of Brigid’s triplicity. The four-leafed clover is considered lucky because of its rarity, but to me the three-leafed seamair óg holds the true luck—the luck of knowing Brigid.

Stones

Although the Celts revered stones both great and small, there are no specific stones or crystals traditionally associated with Brigid, as far as I know. But I’ve been working with stones since the crystal craze of the 1980s, and I like to include them in my devotions. I’ve made my own associations for Brigid’s stone allies, and I encourage you to find some too. All stones have intrinsic qualities and energies that are brought forth when held or worn. There are lots of books that give the generally accepted properties of stones and crystals. You may agree with these books, but don’t be limited by them. Sometimes you will establish your own connection with a stone that tells you something completely different.

To get you started, here are stones that invoke Brigid. You can work with these stones singly or in combination (rather like jelly beans). All of them are easy to find in raw or polished/tumbled stones, as well as in jewelry.

• Healing: Garnet. This rich red stone promotes and affirms your natural state of healthy well-being. It restores balance and subdues chaos (such as viruses) throughout your body and outward through your aura. When you wear or hold garnet, you can feel Brigid “setting things to rights.”

• Courage: Citrine. This is the golden variety of quartz crystal, and its energy feels like holding a sunbeam in your hand. It is one of the few stones that never takes on negative energy but radiates pure optimism and invincibility. Fear cannot touch you when you wear or carry citrine, a stone much beloved by Brigid.

• Self-esteem: Amber. Amber was held in high regard by the ancient Celts. Not technically a stone, this fossilized sap calls forth your Brigid-given strengths and personal power, helping you aspire to excellence. Amber is a jewel of leadership, confidence, and nobility.

• Peace: Moss agate. This stone with its soft greens and grey-blues evokes Brigid of the well waters. Its mineral inclusions resemble moss and ferns that seem to float in its translucence. When you wear or hold moss agate, the soft murmur of water over stones echoes in the deep places of your heart … the deep peace of Brigid.

• Transformation: Rainbow obsidian. Born of fire, this volcanic-glass stone blasts through stuck patterns of grief, despair, blame, addiction, anger … whatever no longer serves you or perhaps never did serve. Within its black depths, iridescent fires gleam. Obsidian is reflective, acting as a dark mirror to reveal what you may have been refusing to see. With Brigid at your side, you have nothing to fear.

Besides wearing and carrying these stone allies, you can also make elixirs charged with their essence. Pure spring or well water, whiskey (uisce beatha, water of life), or a mix of the two may be used. Simply place the stone and liquid in a glass or pottery vessel, seal it, and let it sit for a period of time that feels right to you, such as a moon cycle, from holy day to holy day, or over a nineteen-day flame vigil. Even just twenty-four hours will make a potent potion, especially if empowered by sunlight and moonlight and prayer. You can sip these elixirs to infuse your being with the energetic blessings of the stones.

Brigid’s Sacred Places

As I was starting this book, a friend was preparing to leave for Ireland, with the intention of visiting sites dedicated to Brigid. I had two glimmering golden calcite stones on the Brigid altar in my home workspace, and I gave her one to place somewhere in Ireland for me, to energetically tie the two places together, which she very kindly did, at Brigid’s well near Liscannor. One morning, while lighting my morning candle on my altar, I took in my hands the stone that remained behind, closed my eyes, and envisioned that other stone, seeing the energies between them as a luminous light stream. I thanked Brigid for such a strong link to a place that was sacred to her, and heard a clear reply: This too is a place that is sacred to me. But of course! Brigid isn’t just in Ireland or in those ancient and revered spots. She is everywhere, in every place where she is loved. The Celts took their deities with them when they moved from place to place, and so it is with me, and with you. As with my two stones, wherever we make sacred space for Brigid, we connect our energy with the well-known places that hold her essence.

Kildare

The name Kildare is from cill dara, church of the oak, but the oaks were there long before the Church. The Druids practiced their rites there beneath great oaks, their most beloved tree. Legends say that the goddess Brigid was worshiped there, her perpetual flame tended by nineteen priestesses, each for one day. On the twentieth day, Brigid herself kept the flame burning. These few things are commonly told, but the history of Kildare is filled with gaps, and as with much of Brigid’s lore, we must piece it together with guesswork as the glue. The website for the town itself says that Saint Brigid may have been a convert from the group of priestesses who tended the flame of the goddess on that spot, which is an interesting version of Brigid’s tale. Maybe Saint Brigid wandered from her home to Kildare, met the priestesses there, became one of them, and then converted to Christianity (perhaps because her mother was a Christian).

If the perpetual flame was tended by Saint Brigid in the fifth century, and was reported to still be tended by sisters of her monastery as late as the twelfth century, that’s at least six hundred years of unbroken devotion added to perhaps thousands of years before that. This is where we tend the flame of Brigid, the women of Kildare may have said to those who brought the new religion. Call her goddess or saint or what you will—the flame shall be tended.

How Saint Brigid got the land on which to build her monastery is a story that has several versions, and this is the one I like best, dating back to the early Middle Ages. The king of Leinster had lands and wealth and power, but he had something else too: the ears of an ass. Having heard from many sources of Saint Brigid’s miraculous deeds, he asked her to heal his asslike ears. Brigid agreed, and in return asked the king to give her “a bit of land” for the monastery she was establishing in Kildare. The king was reluctant to give up even a bit of his precious holdings, so Brigid said that she would only ask for as much of his land as her cloak would cover. The king agreed, and Brigid performed a miracle that gave the king perfectly beautiful human ears. He then visited her at Kildare to complete the bargain and plot out the amount of land as measured by her cloak. Brigid smiled, took off her emerald green cloak, and laid it on the earth. The cloak magically expanded, spreading wider and wider over the land, until the king begged her to stop, which she willingly did, having attained what she needed for her purpose—and taught the king a thing or two about generosity in the bargain.

Brigid’s monastery became a center for scholarship. She founded a school for art, particularly illuminations and metalwork of surpassing excellence, so fine that some viewers declared them to be the work of angels, not humans. By the time of Saint Brigid’s death, the community she established among the oaks was a mighty cathedral city, renowned throughout Europe.

Today, Kildare is Brigid Central, the heart of worship for devotees of the goddess and the saint. The Cathedral of Saint Brigid dominates the town, built on the same site as Brigid’s monastery. Brigid’s Well is about a mile from the town center. The Brigidine Sisters of Solas Bhríde have a center dedicated to Brigid and on Imbolc 2006, Ireland’s President Mary McAleese lit Brigid’s flame in a permanent sculpture at the center of the town square. The sculpture is a tall column opening into a group of oak leaves, at the center of which is an acorn cup that holds the flame. The design was intended to honor both Saint Brigid and the Druidic worship that long preceded her, in recognition of the fact that Kildare, cill dara, has always been a sacred place.

Dedicating a Well in the Name of Brigid

Mickie Mueller

Mickie Mueller is an artist, illustrator, author, Reiki Master, and Pagan. She works with the spirits of nature and several deities, including Brigid, for the healing of self, loved ones, and the earth.

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When my family moved to our country rural home, for the first time ever we had a well. This was a fascinating idea to me: natural water, filtered through its limestone bed. When I lived in the suburbs I used to gather rainwater to cleanse my stones and crystals and for spellwork, but now I had a natural source at every faucet.

I do a lot of healing work as a Witch and a Reiki practitioner and one of my favorite deities for this work is Brigid. I thought about her sacred wells, especially the one at Kildare, and what made them sacred. I dreamed of ley lines that connect power places on Earth, the concept of oneness, and the scientific fact that all water molecules on Earth have been here since the beginning, evaporating into clouds and falling back to Earth again as rain as the cycle continues endlessly. It occurred to me that the water molecules in my well have been part of the ocean, glaciers, and even Brigid’s sacred wells in Ireland! I decided that on Imbolc I would bless our well and dedicate it to the goddess Brigid, thus awakening that energy and empowering the water with her mighty blessing and healing.

Imbolc in Missouri is often icy, and that day we had freezing rain. Using rosemary and lavender oil, I anointed a white candle and surrounded it with rowanberries. I put my candle in a steel and glass lantern to shield it from the wintry mix falling from the sky. I placed my Brigid statue on the fireplace mantle so she gazed out the window directly at the well but was safe from the elements. The sun set as I bundled up and headed out, my candle in one hand and a written blessing in the other.

I placed my candle on top of the well and lit it. Pulling in all of my thoughts about connections, oneness, and the goddess Brigid herself, I began. I felt her power swirling through the air, in the land, living in the flame and in the water beneath my feet, as I spoke my blessing:

I bless this well in the name of the goddess Brigid on her feast day of Imbolc.

May these waters be filled with her power, light, and grace. As with her holy well of Kildare, so shall it be in the waters of this land.

May all who touch these waters be filled with healing for mind, body, and spirit.

May the waters of this well be filled with the blessings of the goddess Brigid on her feast day of Imbolc.

By the power of earth, air, fire, and water, I name this well Brigid’s Well. May her loving energy bless and preserve us with her healing, protection, and grace.

As I will it, so shall it be!

The candle in its lantern flickered on as the ice fell all around it. I retreated into the warmth of my home, and my family shared a meal of creamy soup and dessert of blackberry cobbler in honor of Brigid.

Now our every shower and bath is filled with sacred energy. Our dishes that serve nurturing food are washed clean with blessed water. Our clothing that shields our bodies from the cold are infused with protective energy of the Goddess. The water we drink fills us with healing energy. I plan to rededicate our well every year on Imbolc.

I wish I’d thought of blessing our water earlier. There’s no reason why you can’t do the same thing if you have city water. Locate the main pipe that leads into your house, and tie a white ribbon around it, knot it three times, and with each knot say, “In the name of the goddess Brigid.” Inside the house, place a white candle in a jar candleholder, then tie another white ribbon from the same spool around the jar, knot it three times, and with each knot say, “In the name of the goddess Brigid.” Now the candle and the incoming pipe are energetically connected. Put the candle in the kitchen sink and perform the same blessing I did for my well. All the pipes that bring water to our homes are the modern equivalent of a well, in the same way that the gas or electric range in the kitchen is the modern equivalent of the hearth. It’s the concept that’s key. Remember that all water molecules have been everywhere: sacred wells, the vast ocean, and floating above us in the clouds. Why not turn all the water that comes into your home into a blessing to all who live there and mindfully share Brigid’s blessings every single day?

For more about Mickie, see the Contributors appendix.

Holy Wells and Springs

Brigid is a water goddess as well as a fire goddess—Celtic spirituality doesn’t shy away from such paradoxes. Water is Brigid’s element of healing. Throughout the Celtic lands, there are thousands of wells that have been honored as sacred and magical for millennia. There may be as many as 3,000 holy wells in Ireland and Britain alone. Some are traditionally associated with Brigid—such as Kildare and Liscannor—but those who seek her have found Brigid at countless other places where fresh waters spring from the earth. As with other ancient pagan places, many wells have been rebranded to honor saints. To me, this merely confirms their power. Sacred is sacred and magic is magic, whatever you call it. As with anything having to do with Brigid, look beyond the religious differences and find the common spiritual roots.

The custom of tying ribbons or strips of cloth to trees near a well is a form of healing magic. These cloths, called clooties, are dipped in the water and touched to the afflicted part of the body. The clootie absorbs the ailment and then is tied to the tree, where it will gradually rot away, taking the ailment with it. Some wells have large stones with carved or natural indentations where in times past seekers could lie down and sleep beside the well to receive additional healing. Women who hoped to get pregnant or faced a difficult delivery could rest there in the arms of Brigid the midwife. One such stone, known as Saint Bridget’s Chair, would forever after protect the sitter from accident or sudden death.

Metal offerings to the well waters are traditional—and appropriate to Brigid as goddess of metalcraft. Metal cups were a favorite offering in the past, as were metal figurines, buttons, and pins. Today people offer coins to “wishing wells” everywhere without realizing they are keeping the ancient sacred tradition alive. The next time you pass by that fountain in the shopping mall, take a moment to connect energetically to the holy wells and offer a bright penny to Brigid.

Given in the proper spirit, the gaily colorful clooties blowing in the breeze are much more than a mere “I was here.” They say that you are surrendering your trust to Brigid. In Celtic lore, sacred and magical wells are openings between the worlds, and as at every such portal, Brigid is there. Thresholds are places of choice—will you cross over? At her holy wells, Brigid asks you whether you choose healing. She will work miracles on your behalf, but you must commit to that choice. It may not come in the form you expect, but Brigid will never leave you unhealed.

In Every Rock and Whisper of the Wind

Mara Freeman

Mara Freeman has been teaching Celtic spiritual and magical traditions for over thirty years, both in person and through her books and distance learning program, the Avalon Mystery School. She leads sacred journeys to ancient sites in the Celtic lands.

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One of my favorite of Brigid’s wells is in the far west of Ireland on the Dingle Peninsula. It’s actually known as Gobnait’s Well: Gobnait was a sixth-century saint whose feast day in early February coincides with Brigid’s, and they share many similar legends. For instance, she was one of three sisters who carried fire in their aprons without getting burned. At the coming of Christianity, so the legend goes, the sisters disappeared into the ground and sprang up as sacred springs. It looks like Gobnait may have been a historical holy woman who became conflated with Brigid. One reason I love this well is that it is halfway down the slope of a steep cliff overlooking the wild blue ocean. A modern sculptor has carved a woman’s face out of stone at the well, which is very beautiful. It’s a stark and elemental little shrine with none of the religious trappings you get at more frequented places—just the cry of the gulls and the boom of the sea against the rocks far below.

In the West of Scotland, Brigid was often called “Bride of the Isles” and was particularly associated with the sacred isle of Iona. The energy of Brigid is surprisingly strong on this little island, despite the fact that both the modern restored abbey and the medieval ruins are not associated with her but with a male saint, Columba. When I take groups there, we make Brigid’s crosses from the reeds and take them up to the top of an old Celtic hill fort called Dun I, a very pure and powerful place that commands a spectacular view of the whole island and surrounding sea. Here we bless the crosses in a sacred spring known as the Well of Youth. Legend tells how the old goddess called the Cailleach flies over mountains and sea to visit the spring at the end of each winter. When she drinks the waters, she turns into her youthful aspect of Bride, the maiden of spring. I’ve also spent time alone up there and have particularly fond memories of one early June when I sat dabbling my bare feet in the shockingly cold water, which was surrounded by the most beautiful wild purple orchids. It’s a truly magical place, and the power of the Sacred Feminine is in every rock and whisper of the wind.

For more about Mara, see the Contributors appendix.

Worship, Devotions, and Prayer

In the writing of this book, I found myself hesitating over using the word worship. Worship has a lot of connotations overlaying it in the context of mainstream religion. At worst, it has nuances of subservience or a giving-over of power. Sometimes looking at the root meanings of words can help us reclaim them in a way that is healing and empowering. Worship is a good word, a strong word, with its root meanings of “worthiness” and “respect.” When you offer your worship to Brigid, you are respecting her as worthy of praise and trust—and also proclaiming your own worthiness as her worshiper. The love flows both ways.

A word I tend to use more than worship is devotion. Worship seems to me to be the feeling that motivates devotions. Devotions are active ways of offering worship, and they are limited only by your imagination. When you create an altar to your goddess, that is an act of devotion. When you light some incense there, that is another act of devotion. When you say a blessing over your morning porridge or put on a piece of jewelry you’ve dedicated to Brigid or immerse yourself in a lustral bath—these are all devotions. You can live your life every day as a devotee simply by shifting your consciousness toward the sacred.

Léitheoireacht Diaga: Divine Reading

Reading for illumination is a simple devotional practice that has four parts. It can be your entire daily practice, especially in hectic times, and provides a welcome oasis of quietness when you are busy. It also has the advantage of mobility: you can do it anywhere you happen to be. This is a practice borrowed from the Benedictines, who call it lectio divina, divine reading—in Irish, léitheoireacht diaga (LAY-hee-racht JEEAH-gah).38 It’s well suited to devotees of Brigid, as it is all about drawing forth deeper meaning from the written word.

The first part is léitheoireacht, reading. Simply open a book and read for a paragraph or two. The book can be anything, really. You may want to keep a small stack of books near your altar or in another place where you do this practice, or you could just go to a bookcase and pull one at random. I don’t recommend that you use one of the many excellent books that offer a reading for each day. Use a more random and varied selection for your léitheoireacht practice, so that Brigid can work with you to provide what is needed for that moment.

So … you open your book and read, with full attention, for a couple of paragraphs. Maybe you read a whole page. Or maybe you only read one line. Be present with the words; let them reach you.

Then comes the second part: smaointeach (SMIHN-tyach), which means thoughtful. Set the book aside and move peacefully into reflection. Your own heart and Brigid have drawn you to these words today. Why? Let your soul soar on the words you just read. Let them take you as far as they will.

You will know when it is time to move on to the third part: urnaí (UHR-nih), the prayer of the heart. Speak your own words now, to Brigid or whomever you are moved to address.

The last part is rinnfheitheamh (RIHN-neh-ehv), contemplation. Here you could write in your journal or just simply sit with your thoughts for a few moments. Feel your wholeness of spirit, mind, and being. Give thanks. Return to the day.

A Book of Devotions

Sacred reading is a great way to ground yourself in a daily practice and open your spirit to a deeper connection with Brigid. Taking it to the next step, creating your own book of devotions is itself an act of loving devotion—and it’s fun too! Don’t be daunted if this seems like a lot of work. It may not appeal to everyone, and even if it does appeal to you, consider it a multi-year project, something you add to when you feel moved to do so.

Start by buying a blank book, or two, or four—for example, four seasonal books to begin on Imbolc, Beltane, Lughnasadh, and Samhain. Unlike a journal, where you want to feel free to scribble and make a mess, a devotional book that is intended to last a lifetime can be a bit more fancy. Blank journals come in a gorgeous array of sizes, papers, and covers. Do you want lined or unlined sheets? A small, thick book, like an medieval breviary, or a leather-bound notebook stamped with a Celtic design? If you know a bookbinder, you could have a special book made for you, perhaps using the gilded cover of an antique book whose pages are crumbling. Or take a bookbinding class and make it yourself! (I took a Coptic stitch workshop and loved the process, which is easy to learn and has a satisfyingly ancient feel, both in the making and in the finished book.)

Add dates to the top of the pages—just the month and day, not the year. You might want to also include pages for days that change dates, such as the solstices and equinoxes or full moons and new moons. These dates make it easy to find your place, in case you skip a day when reading from your devotional (trust me, you will). Create a framework that suits your own devotional practices or what you would like them to be. Within this loose framework, your imagination can take flight. Here are some things you might include:

• A reading, prayer, or poem that inspires you and prepares you for your day. Even though the inspiration for your devotions is Brigid, the readings don’t have to be Celtic. Brigid loves all language, all poetry, all the ways word-weavers create their offerings of beauty. Any words that speak of spirit to you will do. Write these in by hand or paste in a printed version.

• A guardian or an ally for the day. This could be an ancestor, a role model or soul teacher, an animal ally (or tree or stone), a nature spirit, or perhaps one of Brigid’s sister goddesses. For me, these change with the seasons. For example, on a day deep into autumn, I might call upon the golden ripe energy of pumpkin to surround me with fruitfulness.

• Something for which you are grateful. Be sure to make it something you will always be grateful for, such as the beauty of the rising moon, the simple goodness of bread, or the recognition of your talents by others. Think in terms of coming across that entry year after year and saying, “Yes, I am still grateful.” (Giving thanks for your boyfriend might not have such lasting meaning!)

• A challenge or a task. In many religious traditions, holy days and seasonal cycles offer opportunities for spiritual growth through such activities as fasting, observing a day of silence, making specific offerings, making amends and atonement, and stretching the mind in a new direction. Draw upon the qualities of Brigid to include such things in your devotional book—not every day, perhaps, but here and there: a day to offer charity, a day to learn a new craft, a day to find a new poem to love, and so on.

• Suggestions for other resources. There will be days when you are feeling inspired and days when you will need an extra boost of inspiration. Make notes of books, music, artwork, and activities that fit the seasons and cycles of your devotional year.

You can include just one of these on a page or more than one, as you’re inspired to do. Remember that you can (and will) add to this book over the years. Here is an example of a daily page that includes several of these suggestions:

The Pleasure of Prayer

Through daily practice, in ritual, in holiday celebrations, and in the spontaneous reaching out to Brigid in moments of joy and pain, we offer our prayer. Like worship, the word prayer can be a hot button, and some Pagans prefer not to use the word at all, associating it with power-over, dogma, and authoritarian control. This is unfortunate, as prayer is one of the most beautiful creations of humankind. It can be as simple as a whispered “thank you” or as elaborate as a high mass. It can be silent or spoken, sung or danced, written or improvised. Prayer comes from the depths of despair and the heights of ecstasy.

I differentiate between “prayer” and “prayers,” as I’ve found that the objection some people feel toward prayer has to do with established prayers that are spoken by rote, rather than an act of spontaneous prayer that comes from the heart. It’s true that simply rattling off a composed prayer can be meaningless, but that doesn’t devalue such prayers in and of themselves. Brigid is the goddess of poetry, after all, and she loves the written word. Reading and (especially) writing prayers is a powerful component of Celtic spirituality. The beauty of language sings through the spirit when prayers are spoken aloud.

Thou art the light of the beam of the sun,

Thou art the surpassing star of guidance,

Thou art the step of the deer of the hill,

Thou art the step of the steed of the plain,

Thou art the grace of the swan of swimming,

Thou art the loveliness of all lovely desires.40

It’s all about your intention. If you truly hear every word, comprehend the prayer with your full mind and seek to understand its wisdom, you need not fear that it will be humdrum. You bring the words alive with the fire of your love.

As I mentioned in the section “Brigid’s Sisters” early in this chapter, prayers to Mary often work well for Brigid, as the qualities and gifts invoked run strongly through them both. Here is my adaptation of a prayer in praise of Mary:

Brigid, thou shining woman of gentleness,

Thou glorious woman of kindness,

Shield of every dwelling, shield of every people

Who call upon you for courage.

Thou art the well of compassion,

Thou art the root of consolation,

Thou art the living stream of the maidens,

And of them who bear child,

And of women of aged years.

Thou art the vessel of fullness,

Thou art the cup of wisdom.

Thou art the well-spring of health,

The wished-for visitant of the homes of the world.41

When you seek out written prayers, don’t limit yourself to just Celtic (or Pagan) sources. Prayers from every faith throughout recorded time can be adapted to your devotions. Many of them need little more than a change of gender, if that. This medieval prayer is one of my favorites—I just changed “God” to “Brigid”:

Brigid is over all things, under all things; outside all;

within but not enclosed; without but not excluded;

above but not raised up; below but not depressed;

wholly above, presiding; wholly beneath, sustaining;

wholly without, embracing; wholly within, filling.42

Isn’t that lovely? When I speak it aloud, I feel Brigid’s pleasure in the words as well as my own.

The language of prayer is purely a matter of personal taste. Sometimes I use what might be called the “high language” (thee, thou, thine) and sometimes not. In the Goddess-spirit community over the years there has been argument about using such language, with the objection being that it is “patriarchal”—a catch-all word that sometimes means that a bruised place from a childhood religion is being poked. I like the high language especially for prayer that moves into very deep places, trance, and visioning. I certainly don’t think Brigid demands it, but it is both an offering of my respect and a portal that takes me out of the mundane and into the otherworldly. I don’t address my fellow humans as “thee” and “thou,” after all. But far from being more formal and distancing, the use of these other terms actually feels more intimate, rather like the difference between vous and tu in French, where only those who are within the closest circle of connection are invited to use the more familiar word. “I am one with thee, Goddess, and thou art one with me” is a different flavor of prayer than “I am one with you …” Not better, not worse, just different. Brigid hears you no matter what language you use.

Prayer can be structured and improvised at the same time. Celtic prayer lends itself especially well to this. Create a basic rhythm structure with a repeated phrase and then let the words flow forth in spontaneous gratefulness:

I arise with inspiration, thanks be to Brigid.

I work with excellence, thanks be to Brigid.

I provide food with joy, thanks be to Brigid.

I face the night with no fear, thanks be to Brigid.

When I find myself in a funk or a wave of pessimism, a prayer like this will help me regain my perspective. It’s a good style of prayer to say out loud in the car—get your kids to join in with a call and response!

Connection with the Goddess can be formal liturgy or as casual as a conversation with a friend. Brigid may offer you revelations as part of a vision quest, or she may caution you to be extra careful going down the stairs. She may tell you to make a major life change, or she may tell you to eat more protein. As the saying goes, “I am the Mother of All Things, and All Things should wear a sweater.” Your life decisions are not trivial to Brigid.

All this is a way of saying, don’t ever worry about doing prayer “right.” Prayer is dialogue, not monologue. It is connection, not performance. Especially if you were raised with a religious upbringing that only used formal prayers, you may feel a little self-conscious about just chatting with Brigid over a cup of tea (or a pint of beer!). Take a deep breath and remember that she always welcomes you.

The Genealogy of Brigid

The poem known as the “Genealogy of Brigid” has become beloved liturgy for many devotees and flamekeepers. This invocation can be used on a daily basis—every day and every night, as the poem says—or it can be recited when you are feeling caught in a fear vortex and need a powerful affirmation of Brigid’s protection:

Every day and every night

That I say the genealogy of Brigid,

I shall not be killed, I shall not be harried,

I shall not be put in cell, I shall not be wounded,

No fire, no sun, no moon shall burn me,

No lake, no water, no sea shall drown me:

For I am child of Poetry;

Poetry, child of Reflection;

Reflection, child of Meditation;

Meditation, child of Lore;

Lore, child of Research;

Research, child of Great Knowledge;

Great Knowledge, child of Intelligence;

Intelligence, child of Comprehension;

Comprehension, child of Wisdom;

Wisdom, child of Brigid.43

I feel a mystical sense of moving inward as I recite this incantation of protection—layer upon layer of mystery pull me deeper. Let’s walk together back through the generations and explore the genealogy of Brigid.

We begin with Brigid herself. She is the source of this lineage of deepening. She is the mother of Wisdom, the innate inner knowing that is in all women, if we will only trust and heed it. For many women, this trust in our own wisdom comes as we age, and it’s no surprise that crones are considered wise. Some wisdom does indeed come with time, but it’s also a matter of coming to accept what you know. You hear the voice of Brigid, and you know it is true.

Wisdom is the mother of Comprehension. Drawing from your deep inner knowing, you come to understand the things you contemplate. The word comprehend means “to grasp,” and from the place of wisdom, you grasp the meaning and pattern of life’s experiences. Wisdom feeds your understanding as a mother feeds her daughter.

Comprehension is the mother of Intelligence. You understand on an intuitive level, and then you begin to analyze it, break it down, and solve the problems of life from a more logical place. The wisdom given you by Brigid has been deepened, expanded, and now it is sharpened and made useful in the ways of the world.

Intelligence is the mother of Great Knowledge. This reminds me of the proverb “The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows One Big Thing.” Intelligence is your fox-mind, seeing many things, taking it all in, strategizing. Then one day you may have an epiphany, a Great Knowledge moment, where something vital is made clear to you, something on which your passion turns.

And this hedgehog moment leads to Great Knowledge’s child, Research. Research isn’t a drudgery but a joy when it is spurred on by passion. Brigid blesses all true scholars, because they pursue excellence according to their heart’s delight. When you delve into topics that beguile, your inner flame of curiosity is fed. The curious mind loves to learn, and Brigid’s daughters have a strong appetite for learning.

Research is the mother of Lore. Along the winding paths of your serendipitous learning, you find the stories that feed your imagination and explain your cosmology—myths, tales, history, all the ways we express and record the great mysteries of life. When you take time to explore Lore thoroughly and with your full awareness of metaphor, symbol, and language, it becomes more than mere words. It leads you to Lore’s child, Meditation.

Meditation releases you from scholarly and intellectual pursuits. Now you simply are, letting thoughts float through your consciousness and away, trusting that what Brigid most wants you to see will linger. The vast, beautiful world of Lore has become part of you now, adding to your dreams both waking and sleeping. In meditation, you accept both what you know and what you will never know.

Meditation is the mother of Reflection. In meditation, you encourage thoughts to come and go. In reflection, you encourage them to stay. You are thoughtful—full of thought—yet your mind is as calm and serene as a reflecting pool. From these deep waters is born Reflection’s child, Poetry.

Poetry, welcome! Child of Reflection, grandchild of Meditation, offspring of all the qualities of ancestral Wisdom going back to the spark herself, Brigid. Poetry, in its fullest sense, is how you express yourself in this lifetime. Some women express their poetry in words, but all women express it in deeds. From your life’s poem is born awareness of your place in the universe, your sacred path, and your relationship to Brigid. No fire, no sun, no moon shall burn you. No lake, no water, no sea shall drown you. The genealogy is complete.

Brigid’s Eternal Flame

As I sit down to write today, I light a candle to invoke Brigid’s blessings and inspiration. I ask her to show me how best to serve her and to help me make my word-offering with love. In the act of flame-lighting and prayer, I am one woman in a long line of women who have performed the same simple act of connection and devotion. Or perhaps “line” isn’t the right word—Brigid whispers in my ear, puts an image in my mind’s eye—it is a spiral, a series of spirals, coming forth from a central flame that has burned since before measured time.

When we feel ourselves connected in this way, it’s as comforting as Brigid’s soft lambs-wool cloak draped over our chilly, lonely shoulders. We are part of a continuum of faith. The things we have in common are far more powerful than our differences. My desk candle burns in a pottery candleholder made in Ireland. Around the base are the words “Saint Brigid’s Cathedral, Kildare.” The flame dances and glows through stylized flame-shaped cutouts edged in deep, warm orange. It is both ancient and modern in feel, as it should be. Kildare, the flame, the flamekeepers, Brigid herself—are all timeless. When we step back and take the long perspective—or come in very close and see only the flame—then small matters like saint and cathedral, goddess and grove, fall away. There are women who worship Brigid as goddess and there are women who revere Brigid as saint, and Brigid clearly wants it this way. From the great flame that is her spirit, women light their individual and community flames and carry them out into the world to inspire and illuminate. Brigid wants only the fire, in whatever container of faith you choose. She blesses and loves all her daughters of devotion. And we are all sisters in her name.

“Brigid’s Fire: The Offering,” by Joanna Powell Colbert, 2014.

Offering the Flame

Joanna Powell Colbert

Joanna Powell Colbert practices creativity as a devotional path, whether expressed through artwork, writing, nature connection, or calling circles of women to gather on retreat.

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As an artist, I know what it’s like to be filled with awen—that mysterious elixir of inspiration that flows through you like a river of fire, pushing everything out of its way until you’ve poured your vision out on paper or canvas with paint or ink.

The initial spark comes in many ways. Sometimes an image or idea comes in meditation, and sometimes a palette of colors captures your imagination. Sometimes you’re moved by words you read or hear, or you want to capture a feeling or experience.

And sometimes, the Muse (the Goddess, the Holy One) wakes you up in the middle of the night with firm, clear instructions.

One night in mid-January, I woke up around 3:00 a.m. with this distinct thought: I have to paint a portrait of Brigid, where she is offering us her sacred fire, holding it out in her hands. I got up and made some thumbnail sketches, then fell back asleep. When I woke the next morning and looked at my notes, I felt an electric jolt move through my body. I recognized the dream-thought as a mandate from Brigid. A calling. And I knew it had to be done in time for her holy day of Candlemas/Imbolc on February 1.

I had no choice but to respond.

I hadn’t had any plans to paint a new image of Brigid—in fact, I had no plans to paint at all. My focus and intentions for the year were all around writing.

But when the Lady calls, I answer.

So I cleared my calendar, canceled quite a few projects and appointments, and got to work. The next ten days were in turn exhilarating and exhausting. I felt a bit like I’d been whisked away by the faeries, caught up in a creative vortex as I painted her portrait, experiencing “flow,” where hours slip away like minutes.

I played with new techniques, paints, inks, and colored pencils. I did pencil sketches and color studies. I listened to Celtic music, especially harp music, hour after hour after hour. I took breaks for ecstatic dance, but I barely left my studio for sustenance and sleep.

Then finally she was done.

And I felt Brigid accepting my offering with a slow smile and a twinkle in her eye.

In the image I painted, we see Brigid offering us her sacred fire—the fire of creativity that brings forth poetry, music, and art; the fire in the head that is the hallmark of shamans, seers, and bards; the fire of the forge that symbolizes transformation; the fire of healing in the hands; the fire of medicinal and magical herbs; the fire of the sun emerging from its winter slumber; the fire at the center of the earth waking up once more to spring.

And she asks us:

Will you accept my offering?

And what will you offer me in return?

I do accept the offering of her sacred fire, and in return I offer:

my heart, my skills, my life.

For more about Joanna and a link to her painting in color,
see the Contributors appendix.

Brigidine Sisters

From ancient days, women have gathered to tend Brigid’s perpetual fire and to do good works inspired by her example. First as priestesses, then as nuns, and now again as priestesses, these sisters persevered through many hardships to follow in her footsteps and serve the world through sacred vocation. We’ve already talked about Saint Brigid and the monastery she founded at Kildare. In the twelfth century, the monastery was destroyed, and from then until 1807, we don’t know for sure what happened to the women who worshiped Brigid. In times of oppression, religious communities often go underground, continuing to live and work together in secret. Surely the flame did not go out within the hearts of those who loved Brigid, and when the time was right, she called her daughters forth again.

On Imbolc 1807, in Tullow, County Carlow, six women became the first Sisters of Saint Brigid and took up residence at the house their priest-sponsor had found for them. The sisters declared that this wasn’t a new congregation but a reestablishing of the Order of St. Brigid of Kildare. This is where our thread of continuity picks up. The priestesses who tended the holy flame of Brigid at Kildare and the nuns who took up that flame in the fifth century were now linked in spirit with these first six women who called themselves Brigidines. Let us bless their memories: Eleanor Tallon, Bridget Brien, Judith Whelan, Margaret Kinsella, Eleanor Dawson, and Catherine Doyle.

Though the sisters were nearly illiterate, their enthusiasm was boundless, and they opened a school soon after their founding. An oak sapling was brought from Kildare which the sisters ceremonially planted on the convent grounds. As the tree grew, so did the nuns’ community. The sisters educated themselves as they taught others. It was a life of austerity and discipline, long hours and few comforts, but the women persevered and more joined them.

Over the next decades, the Brigidines branched out with as much vigor as their now well-established oak tree. They founded new convents, took in orphans, started a button factory to earn money to fund their projects, and created two boarding schools. Educated women joined the sisterhood, as did accomplished musicians and artisans. The reputation of the sisters for educational excellence grew, and the congregation was given formal approval by the Vatican as a religious order.

In 1883, six Brigidine sisters set sail for Australia to found a school and convent. They were greeted with cheers and bells, an auspicious beginning, but their life there was hugely challenging and five of the women died young within a few years. Nevertheless, more foundations were made in Australia, then in New Zealand, and then in locations around the world, including the United States. Today, in addition to teaching, the sisters run retreats, do counseling work in prisons, and work with indigenous and special-needs children. The spirit of Brigid is evident in their passionate involvement in human rights activism and environmentalism worldwide. The Brigidine motto, Fortiter et Suaviter, “Strength and Gentleness,” affirms the power of women to change the world.

Solas Bhríde

In 1992, two Brigidine sisters, Mary Minehan and Phil O’Shea, set up the small Centre for Celtic Spirituality in Kildare. They named their new endeavor Solas Bhríde, “Brigid’s light.” The following year, they co-hosted an international conference called “Brigid: Prophetess, Earthwoman, Peacemaker.” At that conference the perpetual flame of Brigid was relit, which the Brigidine sisters at Solas Bhríde have tended ever since. From 1992 to 2005, the flame also burned in Kildare’s town square during the annual Féile Bríde (Brigid’s Festival) celebrations. The sisters were invited to conduct a ritual with the flame to open the 1995 United Nations World Conference on Women, and Celtic singer Nóirín Ní Riain carried the flame to Beijing for the conference itself. Since then, the flame has been carried to peace conferences around the world.

In a wonderful example of how Brigid works to weave the cloth of commonality between faiths, the Brigidine sisters of Solas Bhríde participated in the 2004 Goddess Conference in Glastonbury, England. They brought Brigid’s flame from Kildare to be added to five other sacred flames: the conference flame, lit by the sun; the Hiroshima Peace Flame, lit by a woman survivor from the embers of the nuclear aftermath; Bridie’s Flame from the Isle of Lewis in the Hebrides; and the Children’s Flame and the Madonna Ministry Flame from the United States. The conference attendees were invited to light a seed candle from this flame and take it forth into the world. You can still do this today if you visit Solas Bhríde.

To celebrate the bicentennial of the founding of the Brigidine Order, the Brigidine Congregation purchased a site for a pilgrimage center and hermitage in Kildare. Seven oak trees were planted there on International Pilgrimage Day, July 7, 2007 (7/7/07), and after a fundraising campaign, construction on the center began in 2013.

The Brigidines at Kildare emphasize Brigid’s qualities of hospitality, care for the earth, contemplation, and women’s leadership. Along with their outreach community Cairde Bhríde, “friends of Brigid,” they offer retreats, rituals, and pilgrimages, share the lore of Brigid, do circle dancing, and hold an annual weeklong festival at Féile Bríde, as well as gatherings at Samhain, Beltane, and Lughnasadh. In September 2013, a gathering at Solas Bhríde set an official Guinness World Record for the most Brigid’s crosses made at one time—357!

In their words, the Brigidine sisters “seek to unfold the legacy of Brigid of Kildare and its relevance for our world.” They welcome “people of all faiths and of no faith.” The sisters welcome those who seek Brigid as goddess or as Saint Brigid, and feel that the two are inextricably interwoven. In the words of the Brigidines in Australia, “There is mystery at the heart of what holds us together, expressed in shared faith, symbols, stories, and experiences. We engage with the issues of our time, stand in solidarity with the oppressed, and seek to build a more inclusive community.” 44

Ord Brighideach

Ord Brighideach International is a Brigidine Order of Flamekeepers (not affiliated with the Catholic Brigidine Order). Founded in 2005 by its abbess, Kim Diane, the order now has around 700 flamekeepers worldwide, each of whom vows to faithfully tend a flame in Brigid’s name for a daylong shift. I’ve been a flamekeeper with the order since 2007. Their website says, “Our belief is that Brighid the goddess and Brigit the saint are inseparable.” Abbess Kim explains, “It’s hard not to see her as the same entity morphed by homespun traditions and migrating religious belief systems transcending centuries. Seeing her as one entity gives me a sense of comfort that there has been a continuous thread through the spiritual ebb and flow of a Celtic theological journey. Ord Brighideach is, therefore, an interfaith order.”

You can choose to join as an individual flamekeeper or join a cell. The cells each contain nineteen flamekeepers, in the ancient tradition of nineteen priestesses or nuns tending the flame of Brigid. Each cell is named for a sacred tree or plant, such as Cill Abhaill (Apple), Cill Caorthann (Rowan), and Cill Coll (Hazel). There are both all-female and mixed-gender cells, and at this writing there is also one all-male cell (Cill Drualus, Mistletoe). You can also join as a complete cell, if you have nineteen people committed to tending together.

The order’s website has a calendar that shows the shifts for each month. If, for example, you have the eighth shift in the nineteen-day cycle, you can see what day that shift falls on. The shifts run from sunset to sunset, in the Celtic tradition.

When a new member joins Ord Brighideach, she is asked to swear an oath of her own devising that she will faithfully tend her flame. As each flamekeeper has a personal relationship with Brigid, the terms of that oath are individually determined—it’s between you and your goddess. The order asks that if you find you can’t fulfill your oath and tend your shifts as flamekeeper, you withdraw and let someone else fill that shift, to keep the energy flowing strongly. If you wish, you can ask for a candle that was lit from the flame at Kildare. These candles carry the energy of that flame, and when you relight the candle and use it as a seed candle for other flames you light, you are linking energetically with Kildare. The Ord Brighideach website contains personal stories from flamekeepers, shared prayers and blessings, and Brigid lore.45

Brigit’s Daughter

Mael Brigde

Mael Brigde, cat-lover, plant-lover, and writer of hidden poetry, founded the Daughters of the Flame in 1993, thus helping to initiate the modern Brigidine flame-tending movement.

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In 1993, I did two things that changed my life, giving it a focus and an element of devotion that would strengthen over time. I decided to relight the perpetual flame of Brigit and share that dedication with other women. And I became initiated into her service (my name, Mael Brigde, means servant of Brigit), offering her my life.

That January, I prepared myself and invited women—Neopagan and Christian—to take shifts as Daughters of the Flame. Beginning in Canada, we’ve tended her fire from Indonesia to Italy. As Brigit’s daughters, we are blessed with the charge of keeping her flame alive in ourselves and in the world. We take part in the exuberant awakening that commitment to her brings.

On Imbolc 1993, I lit her candle for the first time, and went with two sisters-in-the-spirit to a glacial mountain stream. There I undressed and plunged beneath the waters of death, leaving my old self behind. When I emerged, amazingly warm after the icy dousing, I dressed in a new garment, and a new consecration. I met the Hag at the far side of the stream:

Mael Brigde: Great Goddess, I am your daughter, contemplating your mystery. Grant me entrance into the River of Death, that it may cleanse me and be the womb of my rebirth.

Hag: In whose name do you ask?

Mael Brigde: I ask in the name of the Goddess of Green and Blue and Gold. I ask in your name, Dark Mother, fire of the sun, water of the moon, warrior, gravedigger, mourner. Tender mother, strong daughter, loving sister. Mediator of disputes. I ask in the name of you, the Unbroken Vessel from whom all life comes and through whom all is unified.

I ask in the name of Brigit the smith and the Morrigan, whose feet are in the River of Death, who cleave flesh from bone, soul from body; in the name of Brigit the nourisher and guide, Danu, Anu, whose fine hands placed the steppingstones across the stream; in the name of Brigit the healer and consoler, liberator and inspirer.

Brigit of the Poets, initiate me. As you loosen the grip of the coldest season, so loosen and liberate me. Breathe life into me this Imbolc as you breathe life into the mouth of the dead winter.

When I was allowed to pass and had been welcomed by the Mother Goddess, I was asked by her to commit myself.

Mother: What do you pledge, Daughter?

Mael Brigde: I pledge myself to the fire of life, to the poetry of the soul, to the forging of our strongest, supplest, most radiant selves, to the healing of my life, ever forward, gently, to the mending of all hurts and conflicts, to the healing of those around me, to the protection and healing of your living planet through word and deed and joy.

If I should break faith with you,

May the skies fall upon me,

May the seas drown me,

May the earth rise up and swallow me.

I was unaware of it then, but on Imbolc 1993, when we Daughters of the Flame kindled Brigit’s fire in Vancouver, Canada, the Catholic Brigidine sisters in Kildare, Ireland, relit her fire as well. Over the years that followed, numerous groups have sprung up to keep Brigit’s flame, and more will follow. One woman who passed through our midst has changed the face of Brigidine worship. Kim Diane joined the Daughters in our fifth year, with the idea of starting an online flame-tending group and an email discussion list available to all followers of Brigit; the next year she initiated Ord Brighideach.

It’s been more than twenty-one years since I kept my first shift with Brigit. In that time I’ve met many who are drawn to her, nourished by what she symbolizes and what we can bring forth in offering to the world on her behalf. We’ve sung songs, written poems, and created jewelry, drawings, and books. In her name we’ve done ritual and performed services of reconciliation, empowerment, and compassion. We’ve sat with the dying, prayed with the suffering, shared our celebrations and our pain, given birth, married, grown discouraged, emerged from heartbreak, endured illness, and died.

My practice has changed a great deal since I began this journey. I have moved from a largely Wiccan approach to a Celtic Reconstructionist worldview, with glimmers of the Catholic still shining through. I am immensely grateful to Brigit for bridging, for myself and others, the Pagan and Christian worlds, for leading me into communion with my ancestors, and closer to myself and my fellow seekers. Within and without our communities, we attend more to our differences than to our similarities, and this has brought great harm. When I prayed with the Brigidine Sisters in Kildare, the sister leading the devotion added “or however we see divinity,” with a glance to me after saying the word “God.” I was moved by the grace and gentleness that Brigit’s flame can bestow on people who have so long been divided from each other. Brigit stands above us all, reconciling Protestant and Catholic, Christian and Pagan, atheist and seeker. Her presence is a never-ending blessing in my life. The long darkness is over. Her blaze is reignited. I give great thanks.46

For more about Mael Brigde, see the Contributors appendix.

Flamekeeping: Time and Timelessness

What does it mean to be a flamekeeper? It means slowing down, stilling your chattering mind, breathing in peace. It means being completely in the moment, a moment that is distilled down to its essence. When you touch the living flame to its waiting fuel—whether that be honeyed beeswax, fragrant oil, or sacred wood—you are enacting a ritual that is both ancient and immediate. There is a mystical aspect to flamekeeping, something indescribable and individual, a shiver that runs through you in the act of making holy fire.

Flamekeeping requires attention, even if your flame burns for only a few moments. Dedicating yourself as a flamekeeper can range from simply lighting a candle to Brigid on a particular day to maintaining a perpetual flame to her. Whichever you choose, your small fire is added to the collective fire. This element of fire has life, energy, movement, power, and yet it calms and quiets the spirit. Within that quiet, Brigid is beckoning. Within that quiet, she hears your call.

Come over the hills, O Brigid bright and fair,

Come over the hills to your daughter,

Kindle the flame that illuminates your name

And I’ll keep that flame bright forever.

For strong grows the oak in Brigid’s ancient grove,

And fair glide her swans on the river,

Clear runs the water within her blessed wells,

And bright burn her fires forever.47

Temporal Flames

The word temporal has to do with earthly time, as opposed to eternity. When you tend a temporal flame, you choose a particular period of time for your flamekeeping. The priestesses (and nuns) who tended the sacred fire of Brigid did so in twenty-day cycles—nineteen women each took her turn to watch over the fire for a day, and on the twentieth day Brigid herself kept the watch. This shift was a time when the woman’s focus was on the flame, on her sacred purpose and her path, a time when prayers were offered and the connection with Brigid was made stronger through dedicated hours spent in her service.

Dedicating a special time to light a flame to Brigid and offer your prayers creates a glow in your soul that lasts long after the temporal flame is extinguished. Many of us light candles on our altars all the time, whether as part of regular devotions or for special purposes or magical workings. But there is something comforting about having a particular flamekeeping time. Brigid is a goddess who likes rhythm, the steadiness that cycles and seasons and patterns bring. Listen and she will guide you to a practice that fulfills and feeds you.

Daily

Lighting a candle every day is a beautiful act of devotion. But let’s be realistic—some of the time you just won’t be able to, and some of the time you just won’t want to. Don’t set yourself up to feel a sense of failure if you drop the ball—or the match, as it were. While it’s good to push your boundaries and deepen your spiritual path, a wise woman will make a practice that fits her real life. If you feel strongly called to tend a daily flame, find a way to make it easy. There are two good ways to do this: make the flame brief, or make it part of your regular daily routine.

A brief flame is just as powerful and meaningful as a flame that burns for hours or days. Giving yourself over to one minute of profound prayer is fine. You don’t even need to use a candle or lamp—in a pinch you can simply light a match and connect to the energy of Brigid’s flame for that ephemeral moment you hold the tiny torch in your hand.

Making flamekeeping part of your regular daily routine requires some creativity. First, think over the things that you do every day, no matter how mundane, beginning when you wake. Then ask yourself if flamekeeping will fit in with those activities and what form it could take. For instance, in my morning routine, one of the first things I do is put water in a kettle for tea. As I wait for the water to boil, instead of checking my email, I could light a dedicated candle that I keep in the kitchen and extinguish it when the kettle whistles. On mornings when I have a bit more time, I could take that first cup of tea and sit with the candle, gathering my dreams from the night and my hopes for the day. A simple daily flamekeeping doesn’t have to happen in the morning, of course. Just run through your day in your mind and make note of the things that happen every day, no matter what. Those are the pockets of time where you can offer a flame to Brigid.

Sabbath

The word sabbath means “rest,” something we need more pressingly today than ever before—not so much a rest from labor as a rest from the pressures of the roaring world. Taking a day once a week to tend Brigid’s flame offers an opportunity to tend your flame within as well. Turn off all electronics and let time expand into slow time. As you watch over your sabbath flame, move thoughtfully through the day with full attention. Let your activities be restful ones that replenish you. Make art, do needlework and other slow crafts, read, cook, write letters (actual paper letters!) to loved ones. Watch the clouds drifting overhead, and listen to the sounds of your environment. Tune in. Breathe deeply. Regain your perspective. Gaze into your flame and feel the approving presence of Brigid as you care for yourself in this quiet way. Rest in her warm embrace.

New Moon and Full Moon

Women are strongly connected to and influenced by the moon. Our cycles mirror her waxing and waning, physically and emotionally, long after our bleeding years are over. Making a special time of flamekeeping in accordance with the moon is an act of woman-power. You might choose to do this at new moon, at full moon, or both. The energies are quite different at new and full moons, and you will experience these energies in ways that are unique to you.

New moon could be considered the time when the moon is completely dark (not visible). This is how it’s marked on calendars, and modern Pagan practice usually calls this the beginning of the lunar cycle. Personally, I like to call this “dark moon” rather than new moon. To me, it feels crone-like, a time of dissolution and ending rather than newness and beginning. In the moonless night’s darkness, tending Brigid’s flame offers a time of deepening. This is a good time for inward journeying, journal writing, divination, and connecting with Brigid for advice and guidance.

What the Celts called new moon was almost certainly the sight of the first slender crescent in the early evening sky, perhaps two days past what we call new moon today. Traditional prayers to the new moon praise her appearance, not her absence:

I am raising to thee mine eye,

I am bending to thee my head,

I am offering thee my love,

Thou new moon of all the ages! 48

Tending a flame that you light when you see the first crescent connects you to those ancient Celts, to the priestesses of Brigid who gazed up at that same moon and felt the stirrings of the waxing light. That quality of Brigid—light-bringer—can be evoked with a simple ceremony in which you light a flame and spend devotional time with it until the moon slips below the western horizon. Bid her goodnight as you extinguish your flame.

Full moon was the beginning of the Celts’ month, and I like the idea of the extra energy and oomph that the full moon brings in the context of starting a new monthly cycle. Tending a flame to Brigid at full moon, from moonrise to moonset, can be a time when you offer prayers for projects, intentions, positive outcomes, and other ways you ask Brigid for her practical help. As you light your flame, hold its container in your hands and make a ritual gesture of offering the flame to the moon, feeling the connection between the two lights, and envisioning Brigid in that stream of brilliance. You needn’t be awake all night during your flamekeeping, as long as the flame is in a safe place. If you awaken early enough to see the moonset, extinguish your flame then; otherwise, just extinguish it when you wake.

Brigidine Cycle

We don’t know why the number nineteen was chosen for the priestesses who tended Brigid’s fire. It may have been as simple as there were only nineteen women in the initial group, and from there it became a tradition. I like the symbolism of nineteen being a prime number—it can’t be divided. An auspicious number for a dedicated sisterhood! Modern flamekeepers also form groups of nineteen to take the flamekeeping duties in turn. For a period of twenty-four hours, each person holds the intention of being the flamekeeper for that shift. Being part of a flamekeeping circle can be greatly rewarding, but you can also observe a nineteen-day cycle on your own.

1. Using your regular calendar, choose a beginning date within the calendar month (the simplest choice would be the first of the month) and mark a period of nineteen days.

2. On the first day, light your devotional flame and ask Brigid to bless you over those next nineteen days. Take your time and have a good talk with her, telling her your concerns, your hopes, and your intentions for that time period. Feel her closeness and her love, and know that she will continue to be with you in the days to come. When you are ready, extinguish the flame and set it aside. Leave the flame unlit.

3. On the nineteenth day, relight the flame. Again, spend some time with Brigid, looking back over the days past, giving thanks, asking for clarity, coming to a greater understanding of the lessons learned. When you extinguish the flame, do it with the awareness that Brigid herself will be tending it for the twentieth day. The flame is no longer alight in your presence, but it burns steadily in Brigid’s heart, and you are a precious part of that flame.

4. You can repeat this nineteen-day cycle throughout the year, which would amount to about thirty-six flamekeeping days in a calendar year (always counting the twentieth day as Brigid’s day).

Another way to observe the Brigidine cycle is to perform a ritual in which you tend a flame for nineteen consecutive days, lighting a new candle every night. (Remember, the Celtic day starts at sunset.) Tealights are perfect for this. They burn for about three hours, so they will be safely out by the time you go to bed. Each day can be dedicated to a particular quality of Brigid or a focus for her blessing. I’ve offered an example of this, using a simple invocation for each day’s lighting, on page 242. I’m sure Brigid will inspire you to create others! Even though this is a ritual that takes nineteen days, each day’s devotions can take just as much time as you wish—and that may vary from day to day. You may take just a moment or two to light your flame and invoke Brigid, or you may end up spending hours in contemplation, inner journeying, journaling, art-making, or whatever Brigid inspires you to do in her honor.

If you wish (and if you have the space), you can lay out nineteen tealights in this pattern and light them in the order shown (follow the dot-to-dot!). This pattern moves you around the triangle several times, moving toward the center. Such shapes and movements have magical power, which can add to your flamekeeping meditations. At the end of your nineteenth day, as you extinguish your flame, offer the fire to Brigid and envision her taking it from you, to keep it burning bright forever.

Vigil

Tending a flame for a full night can carry you to unexpected places. In the wee hours, when the world is quiet, every subtle and symbolic nuance can be seen and contemplated in depth. Time passes slowly, with no electronic interruptions. Your body is experienced in unfamiliar ways through its cycle of weariness and wakefulness and perhaps euphoria. The mystical becomes probable. Watching your flame burn low, then lighting a new candle or replenishing your lamp’s oil, you may feel a particularly intimate sense of devotion. If you have been going through a time of feeling scattered or ungrounded in your faith, setting aside a full night with your flame can put things in brilliant perspective.

Start your vigil at sunset, having made all preparations ahead of time for solitude, sustenance, and security. Release all expectations and goals—don’t set yourself a bunch of tasks, such as divination or journal writing. Follow your impulses of the moment, as Brigid guides you. At sunrise, bless and thank your flame, extinguish it if you wish, and spend the day in peaceful contemplation and rest.

Perpetual Flames

Temporal flames are lit and extinguished according to earthly time, in honor of Brigid’s connection to our daily lives. Perpetual flames burn without ceasing, honoring Brigid’s eternal presence, such as the flame that burns in the town square in Kildare. I’ve been a perpetual flamekeeper for many years. Wherever I’ve lived, I’ve had a candle that is always lit, unless I’m away from home overnight. Because it’s at the center of my house, I see it when I pass from room to room, and I can see it from my desk as I work every day. As one candle burns down, I ceremonially light the next one. My Brigid flame has become a beloved part of my everyday life, a little beacon of blessing glowing in my shadowy dining room.

I use tall jar candles for my perpetual flame, which burn for about three days. When the wick gets close to the bottom of the jar, I light the next one, saying the same prayer I always use for this purpose. I bless the new candle, then thank and bless the old candle and extinguish its flame. As I do this, I envision the energy of the flame passing from one container to the next with no interruption. I reach out to sense a connection between my flame and all other devotional flames around the world.

There is great power in perpetual flames, just as there is power in tending a temporal flame. I experience these in different ways. My perpetual flame feels protective and serves as a visible affirmation that my faith is strong, no matter what. I light daily candles on my workspace altar to Brigid, to bless my day and ask for her help as I do my work. I also light a devotional candle at my desk if I am working on something that has to do with spirituality (such as this book). These temporal flames call my mind to attention much more than the perpetual flame. They need to be lit more often and watched more closely. There is an opportunity to note the passage of time and what has happened in the time since I lit the candle and the time it has extinguished itself. If I’m using a bigger candle or lamp that needs to be extinguished by hand, it’s an opportunity to thank Brigid, to bring my mind back to her gifts and blessings in my life.

Invoking the Fire

There is a moment when you have an unlit candle and a moment when your candle burns bright—and a moment in between, when you pause at the edge of time and are one with eternity. Take that moment.

Saying a prayer to bless the lighting of your flame focuses your attention and dedicates the flame to Brigid as it burns. By invoking her with the action of creating fire, you are acknowledging that she is present in that flame. She has been made welcome to your sacred space and to the sacred center of your being. The Celtic style of rhythmic triads works well for flame lighting (see page 172). You might start with the symbolism of the flame and how it represents Brigid for you, and then just improvise:

Brigid of the spark,

Brigid of the flame,

Brigid of the embers,

I call you in.

Brigid of inspiration,

Brigid of shielding,

Brigid of comfort,

I call you in.

Be in my flame, O Brigid of courage.

Be in my flame, O Brigid of grace.

Be in my flame, O Brigid of beauty.

This night and every night, this day and every day.

You may prefer to have a regular prayer you say with every lighting, establishing your own tradition, such as:

From the fire of Kildare to my altar fire,

The flame is eternal, the flame is one.

Ending your prayers with a closing phrase or word is a nice touch that signifies you are turning to other tasks now, with respect for Brigid and for the conclusion of your devotions. I usually end my prayers with “Blessed be,” in the Pagan/Wiccan way. The word amen could also be used—an Irish translation of amen is áiméan (pronounced awe-mayn). Find the closing words that feel right for you—you could even use “hey-hey!” in a merry Irish style. Spirituality is always respectful, but it doesn’t always have to be solemn.

Faithfulness and Compassion

Being a flamekeeper is a sacred task, and one that you will take seriously. Your faithfulness to that task will feed your spirit and enhance your sense of self-worth. You are honoring the Goddess and honoring yourself in her service. Be sure to extend compassion to yourself if, as will certainly happen, you don’t meet your intentions perfectly. A candle will gutter out because of a faulty wick, or you will forget to notice when a jar candle is getting low, or the day of your flamekeeping shift will slip by you. Remember that you are aspiring to excellence, not impeccability. (If you are aspiring to impeccability, you will need an extra helping of compassion!) Do the best you can. The other day as I was lighting the daily candle on my Brigid altar, I silently apologized for not lighting it first thing that morning, and instantly heard clear as a bell: “You have too many rules.” The thought was so antithetical to my usual Virgo mindset that I knew I’d been lovingly cuffed upside the head by Brigid.

If you find that in time you no longer feel called to be a flamekeeper, stop—with respect and in a conscious manner. Thank Brigid for the opportunity to have tended her fire, and envision the many others who will continue to keep the flame burning bright. There is no shame in stopping and no danger that you have failed. Trust that Brigid understands.

Circle or Solitary?

Joining or creating a flamekeeping circle can provide encouragement and accountability—both helpful especially when you are first starting out as a flamekeeper. As Mael Brigde says on page 129, true sisterhood can develop among women who have a common devotion to Brigid. If you are creating your own circle, you certainly don’t need to have the traditional nineteen women! Be creative in the way you work together. A circle of just three women, for instance, might meet at the full moon to bless the new lunar cycle and kindle their seed candles from a common flame. You could also come together to do a flamekeeping vigil for a special purpose, such as a crisis of healing, an upcoming journey, or a national or international incident. The more you work together, the more you develop a sort of spiritual shorthand that lets you create ritual and prayer on the fly, drawing from the store of material you share with each other throughout the year or extemporizing and just speaking from the heart. Doing devotions in the presence of others solidifies them, and if you feel sometimes that you are not doing it “right,” having others to practice with can take away that feeling of doubt.

Tending a solitary flame requires strength of spirit, but it gives great rewards. It’s just you and Brigid, so close, so connected. It’s not less-than. The tradition of hermits and anchorites is strong in the Celtic tradition. Religious folk have always practiced their faith apart from community, whether literally dwelling in a little stone hut on an island or just keeping their devotions to themselves while living in the midst of the busy world.

Let’s talk a moment about online communities. At its best, the World Wide Web lives up to its name—it weaves strands of connection that vibrate and sing. It helps us find like-minded souls who may become true friends. At its worst, it creates the illusion of connectedness without truly feeding the spirit, and the result can be a hollow bewilderment, a lonely wandering in the fog of the etheric realm. For the solitary flamekeeper, the desire to connect with others through the Internet is perhaps especially strong. It can be comforting to know that there are so many out there who are also tending their fires of devotion. But this can become a distraction, or even an addiction, insidious as any other. If you find that you can’t focus on your real-world devotions, or you are reluctant to meet with or talk on the phone with people in your immediate circle, or you can’t go a day without checking in online, it’s time to get back in balance.

Remember that the practices of spirituality that deepen require the willingness to go deep. Clicking to light a digital flame can’t compare to touching living fire to a candle wick. Watching the digital flicker onscreen won’t carry you to the profound places found by candlelight. By all means, feed your mind and soul with the words of others, but keep it in proportion. Stay in the real world.

Practical Flamekeeping

The type of flame you choose will depend on your style of flamekeeping. Here are some suggestions to get you started.

Candles

Tealights are good choices for flamekeeping sessions of two to five hours, and they self-extinguish, so you can light one, perform your devotions and prayers, and then safely leave it to burn out on its own (as long as it’s in a container). Tealights are available with the usual paraffin as well as with beeswax and vegetable-based waxes such as soy. Soy-based candles have a lower melting point than other waxes and therefore don’t burn as long. Beeswax burns hotter and faster, and the flame can be a little higher. Beeswax is a magical golden substance that is perfect for special-occasion flamekeeping. It holds the essence of ancient wisdom—there is an old saying: “Ask the wild bees what the Druids knew.”

Small votive candles that are placed in glasses have been overcome in popularity by tealights, which are tidier and don’t require scraping out the old wax as with votives. But there is something very cozy and comforting about an old-fashioned votive candle. It melts to fit the shape of its container before it is consumed in the burning, so it lasts much longer than a tealight. Tiered racks that hold multiple votive glasses, traditionally used in churches, can be used to light candles for various intentions at the same time, such as prayers for friends in need, for your own needs, and for the world.

Jar candles come in several shapes and sizes. The most stable is a bulbous-shaped candle sometimes called “Victorian,” such as are seen at restaurants or bars. These have a broad base, so they are unlikely to tip over (you really have to try hard), and the flame is sheltered well inside the jar. They burn for about five hours. Tall, narrow jar candles burn for seventy-two hours. One of the nice things about the tall jars is that you can easily add images to them. Just print out or photocopy artwork that inspires you, trim it to fit the dimensions of the jar, and glue it with a regular glue stick. If you want to add glitter, just keep it on the body of the jar, not around the lip, as glitter can pop and fizzle if it gets too close to a flame.

Wood-wick candles are a delightful addition to flamekeeping, with their gentle crackling sound that invokes a tiny cozy hearth. Burning times vary depending on the candle size. Floating candles can last from eight to ten hours, and they burn well in groups. The combination of fire and water is evocative of Brigid’s sacred wells. And here’s a good place for that glitter—sprinkle it across the surface of the water and watch it sparkle in the dancing candlelight. Tapers are such lovely candles, with their open flame that seems to aspire toward the heavens. Depending on their length, they can last quite a long time and are a good choice for vigil candles, as they require, well, vigilance! Any open flame (that is, a flame that is not housed within a container) should be burned with full attentiveness and thus can be a compelling focus for longer meditational devotions.

Oil

Oil lamps have a sacred lineage in many religions. Ceremonial pottery lamps have been found that date back thousands of years. We don’t know what kind of flame was tended by the Celtic priestesses and nuns of Brigid, but it wouldn’t surprise me if it was oil. It may be more practical to use candles for your regular flamekeeping, but the ambiance of an oil-fueled flame has a magical energy all its own. Small oil lamps may burn only an hour or two, and others can be fed with more oil and kept alight. Larger lamps can hold enough oil for many hours or days. You can find beautiful ceramic and hand-blown glass oil lamps on websites such as Etsy, and instructions for making your own lamp can easily be found. Most food-grade oils can be used as fuel, so don’t feel that you need to use chemical-heavy and artificially scented lamp oils. Consider the symbolism of the oils you use, such as olive for peace or sunflower for strength. Burning clarified butter (ghee) is especially auspicious for Brigid, goddess of the dairy!

Camphor

Burning camphor is a Hindu devotional custom, one of several ways of blessing by fire, collectively called aarti. The small aromatic pellets are held with metal tongs or tweezers and lit, then placed on a plate and waved through the air, or set gently in a bowl of water, which is my preference as a flame offered to Brigid. The floating flames skitter across the surface of the water in a mesmerizing dance, lasting only a few minutes. The essence of the camphor is purifying, dispelling negative energy and opening the spirit to the sacred. The first time I used the floating camphor, I was moved to tears. As with floating candles, the energies of fire and water evoke Brigid’s presence in a mystical and beautiful way. The water from either of these offerings can be used to bless and purify; sacred water created in combination with fire is called lustral water.

Alcohol

Alcohol offers a fleeting but dramatic and inspiring ceremonial flame. You will need a fireproof metal bowl or chalice. If this container has feet or a stem, make sure it is all one piece, not soldered, as the heat of the flame can cause these to come apart. (I learned this the hard way, as my charming little three-footed cauldron suddenly plopped down on its tummy.) Even a very small container will work, and I recommend that you don’t use anything wider than about three inches, especially your first time when you are getting to know this type of flame. The curved interior of the bowl is what creates the graceful shape of the rising flame. Put about half an inch of Epsom salts in the bottom of the bowl, and place the bowl on a heatproof surface, such as a trivet or brick. Add a tablespoon or two of 91 percent isopropyl alcohol. (Lesser percentages of alcohol will not burn well, if at all. You can get this alcohol at any drugstore, though some may keep it behind the counter in the pharmacy department.) Light a wooden match and carefully drop it into the bowl. Do not use a lighter! Depending on the size of your bowl, the flame may reach as high as eight inches or so, and it will burn for several minutes, until the alcohol is consumed. There is no need to extinguish the flame; it will go out on its own.

If you wish, you can create this type of flame without the Epsom salts, which have a purifying effect similar to camphor but aren’t necessary. Resin incense can also be used, such as copal or frankincense, and it will release its fragrance upon the air when the flame dies out. This kind of flame is wonderful for blessing an altar space and invoking Brigid’s presence in ritual. If you wish, have prayers and invocations on hand to speak as the fire burns, or just gaze into its depths and listen for the voice of the Goddess. The bowl will remain hot for some time after the flame is finished, so use an oven mitt if you need to move it. And always keep a damp towel nearby in case you need to smother the flames. I’ve performed this kind of fire ceremony many times with no mishaps, but it’s wise to take precautions.

Flameless Candles

Nothing will ever take the place of living fire, but I’m including flameless (battery-operated) candles as an option for your flamekeeping for several reasons. You may want to keep a flame dedicated to Brigid at your place of work, where an actual candle might not be allowed. Or you might want to offer a flame to Brigid in a place where fire is not only prohibited but dangerous, such as a hospital room. Personally, I always go ahead and light candles in hotel rooms, but if you are better about following rules than I am, that’s another place where a flameless candle could be handy. If you are not comfortable leaving a flame burning when you aren’t there to watch over it, a flameless candle could be used to hold energy for a special purpose, such as asking Brigid’s protection for a loved one who is traveling.

When you use a flameless candle, it can be more challenging to find the deep sense of connectedness to Brigid’s eternal fire. Think of it in terms of energy—as you turn on the switch, you are initiating the energy of light. Be sure to do all the prayers and invocations you would do with a living flame. When you turn off the switch, bless and thank the candle as you would with a traditional one. For normal usage, I advise against using the timer that comes on some flameless candles, as your presence and intention are important. But if you do want to use the timer, be mindful of the time so you can be present on the etheric plane with the flame as it goes on and off, holding it clearly in your mind and asking Brigid to be present as well.

Matches vs. Lighters

Pay attention to the act of creating your flame. I prefer wooden matches rather than a lighter. Each flame is born anew, unique, for a match is only used once. The act of striking it against the box or another surface requires a bit of force—just a bit!—so my energy is involved in the flame-making in a more personal way than when just clicking a lighter. A wooden match makes a satisfyingly dramatic hiss and sizzle as it flares to life, and as it burns there is a tiny crackle like an infinitesimal hearthfire. Unlike a lighter, which will keep on burning as long as you hold down the switch, a match flame has a limited lifespan, so your full attention must be brought to its application. Time both speeds up and slows down as you bring match to wick and transfer the living fire from one to the other. Now blow out or shake your match to extinguish it, and observe the fleeting wisp of smoke, the glow of the dying match head. Thank this tool, so commonplace but so valuable. Thank the people who made your matches and the person who invented them. Send a blessing back through time to all your foremothers who had to make fire in far more difficult ways.

Aesthetics

Flamekeeping is a beautiful practice, both internally and externally. The beauty of the flame itself is never-ending, and even if you just light a humble tealight in its little cup, you have satisfied your soul. But do pay attention to what satisfies your senses as well. You don’t have to spend a lot of money to find lovely candleholders—after-Christmas sales are a great time to stock up on sparkling candles and holders that you can use in your flamekeeping throughout the year. For instance, I recently saw a votive stand that held multiple glass holders, each adorned with three metal oak leaves. What could be more perfect for Brigid?

When you experience beauty in the act of tending your sacred flame, you will be even more drawn to it. You will give your flamekeeping more attention and focus if you vary the aesthetics from time to time, perhaps with the seasons. It’s not trivial or self-indulgent if it gives you pleasure, for delight should always burn at the center of your devotional flame.

Cats and Other Cautionary Considerations

I’m not going to insult you with condescending warnings about never leaving a flame unattended. I know you will keep your wits about you and not set yourself or anything else on fire. Mostly I want to reassure you. With common sense at hand, there is no need to be afraid of fire. It is your friend and ally, and Brigid will be protecting you in your devotions.

An exposed flame such as a taper candle obviously requires more care than a jar candle, where the flame is enclosed by glass. Pillar candles are beautiful, but they are unpredictable in terms of their burning patterns and can easily result in a pool of melted wax that you will spend a lot of time picking out of that nice Irish lace altar cloth. Speaking of cloths, obviously you won’t burn your flame anywhere near curtains or other hangings, but also be aware of the type of cloth you set your candle on. A draft could lift the hem of a wispy cloth and float it over an open flame.

Scented candles should only be used when you are nearby to keep an eye on them, as they contain scent oils that can be more volatile than typical unscented candles. They are generally safe, and I’ve used hundreds of them with no mishaps, but I did have one soy jar candle overly scented with essential oils ignite in a sheet of fire across the surface of the molten wax, with a flame about five inches high. Exciting! Fortunately, no harm was done.

Working safely with fire isn’t so much a matter of being cautious as it is being conscious. Be aware of your surroundings, and take the room’s activities and occupants into account. Perform tests if you are concerned about a container’s safety and stability. When I first started keeping a perpetual flame, I covered the shelf surface in aluminum foil to protect it from melted wax and then shook the bookcase as hard as a rattling earthquake would shake it, to see if the candle would tip over. (It didn’t.) Then I actually did tip the candle over to see what it would do. (It went out.) Even so, I keep my perpetual flame jar candle inside another glass lantern, for two layers of safety.

Keep in mind that if you have several candles burning closely together, they will generate lots of heat and be consumed fast. Groups of glass containers, such as for votive candles, can overheat and crack, and grouped pillar candles will melt all over the place very, very quickly. (They don’t show this part in those romantic movie scenes where the room is lit by hundreds of pillar candles.)

Now, what about those cats? Cats have individual personalities, and only you can predict whether your cat will bother a flame. But don’t just assume it will be a problem without trying. I’ve had many cats and many flames, and they’ve always coexisted peacefully. A tealight that sits deep inside an external container should not be at risk of any feline interference. An open flame will be more problematic if fluffy tails and curious whiskers come close. If your concern is that your cat will knock over a flame, you might consider a hanging lantern or a candle jar inside a larger jar, with water in between. In a pinch, you can always burn your flame in the bathtub!

Extinguishing the Flame

How you extinguish your flame is as important as how you light it. This is the moment for thankfulness. Thank Brigid for the honor of serving her sacred fire. Thank the flame itself for blessing your home. Be fully present with the flame before you extinguish it—things are often most powerfully real to us just before they vanish. Think about how the energy of your prayers and intentions continues even when the visible flame is gone.

The manner in which you extinguish your flame is up to you. Some people believe you should never blow out a spiritual or magical flame; others (including me) feel that the breath is sacred too. You may want to use a special candle extinguisher and dedicate it to your flamekeeping practice.

Take a moment as you blow out your candle to watch the last glow of the wick, the spiraling of the smoke. Listening and watching for auguries at such moments and learning how to interpret them is part of being a flamekeeper. Once when I was preparing to light my next perpetual candle, I noticed that the old candle’s wick had entwined itself into a triple knot—a powerful affirmation of Brigid’s presence in my flame.

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21. Adapted from traditional Irish verse, author unknown.

22. Carmina Gadelica, 245.

23. Cahill, How the Irish Saved Civilization.

24. Carmina Gadelica, 149.

25. Carmina Gadelica, 152.

26. Mackenzie, Wonder Tales from Scottish Myth and Legend.

27. Young, Celtic Wonder Tales.

28. Carmina Gadelica, commentary for verse 70.

29. Lady Wilde, Ancient Cures, Charms, and Usages of Ireland.

30. Carmina Gadelica, 114.

31. Crows and ravens are both corvids, and the names are used interchangeably in Celtic lore. Both are associated with Brigid.

32. Carmina Gadelica, 374.

33. Carmina Gadelica, commentary for verse 70.

34. A “well” in the Celtic sense isn’t a deep humanmade hole in the ground (the kind you don’t want to fall down), but a natural pool of fresh water that is fed by a spring.

35. Lady Wilde, Ancient Legends, Mystic Charms, and Superstitions of Ireland.

36. Cunliffe, The Ancient Celts.

37. Moore, “Oh the Shamrock,” 1868.

38. Thanks to Domi O’Brien for translations and pronunciations.

39. “The Coming of Winter,” Irish, author unknown, ninth century, in Jackson, A Celtic Miscellany.

40. Carmina Gadelica, 3.

41. Carmina Gadelica, 256.

42. Hildebert (1055–1133), Archbishop of Tours.

43. The first part of the prayer appears in Carmina Gadelica, listing the names of Saint Brigid’s father, grandfather, and other generations in her patriarchal line. The last part is a section of the twelfth-century “Colloquy of the Two Sages.” Caitlín Matthews may have been the first to associate the two, in her book The Elements of the Celtic Tradition. Carmina Gadelica, 70, and Stokes, “The Colloquy of the Two Sages.”

44. www.brigidine.org.au.

45. www.ordbrighideach.org.

46. Portions of this essay were previously published in Murphy-Hiscock, Out of the Broom Closet.

47. Sing to the tune of “Red Is the Rose” or “The Bonnie Banks o’ Loch Lomond” (same melody).

48. Carmina Gadelica, 308.