Dear Friends,

Daily Offerings have become a part of my daily routine the last month or two, I’ve flirted with the practice before but a lot depends on your living situation and local laws.  For example in Orlando you can’t have a bbq grill on your apartment patio (fire code), so I make mostly offerings of Water and coffee and wine, otherwise I might be sharing small portions of our prepared meals with Them… someday when we have a yard I’ll also set aside a portion of the compost pile for Hecate.

Outside of the monthly and seasonal special occasions, I’ve been making offerings of Holy Water to the Ancestral and Honored Dead, and Coffee to Herne and Hecate.   With some variations as inspiration or the state of the pantry/larder dictates….

So Today I cleared the demitasse cups for Herne and Hecate, and the glass tumbler for the Ancestral and Honored Dead, of their Christengel Glühwein (a pre-spiced Mulled Wine product from Germany, tasty too!)  which along with a turkey sandwich for lunch was my only real nod to U.S. Thanksgiving yesterday.(1)   I poured the mulled wine into one of the small collection of bottles set aside for such things to be poured out at a Cross-roads, ideally tonight but at least in the next couple of nights, for the remains of offerings are also offerings unto Hecate.

I up-ended the usual order of things, which is to go from by bookshelf-top altar to the kitchen with the two demitasse and empty them and wash them and refill them and THEN take the tumbler glass empty it and wash it and refill it; I also usually give Herne the first offering, he is the first of the Gods to touch my life and heart and our relationship has bolstered me many times over the years.  Then Hecate, then the Ancestral and Honored Dead.  Then a daily prayer or two, and sometimes some incense.

Today, being the dark-of-the-moon or the Astronomical New Moon, a day sacred and especial to Hecate, things were done a little differently.  I took down her demitasse and emptied it into the empty offering bottle for later disposal, I cleaned it and washed it.  I unsealed and opened the Jack Daniels Green Label, letting the scent of the Bourbon Whiskey waft its way around me, and intoxicating cloud for the Queen of Phantoms; I poured the offering and carried it, washed in the heavy perfume of the offering, to the bookshelf/altar and laid it before her symbols.  Then I took the Tumbler and Herne’s demitasse.  I emptied them and washed them and took the Tumble with Coffee and Milk and made offering unto the dead, who are closer to us in the dark half of the year according to European folklore.  Then Herne received his portion and prayers.

This practice has been an interesting process, enlightened by posts from Veles and from Cat, as I offer myself and what I can to my Gods and try to dig my spiritual well.

These practices may seem quaint or unusual to some of my non-Pagan and Humanist readers, but in addition to building my relationship with my Gods, I can also see with the previously mentioned Acrostic Eye that I am approaching the Sacred and some of my highest ideals and deeply held values each day.

What are your offerings?  What are your daily approaches to your highest ideals, to the sacred?

Peace, and curiosity,

Pax / Geoffrey Stewart

(1) – The fabulous Jonathan an I are doing our feast sometime in the next few days as our work schedules were a little too juxtaposed to make any other option practical.