Friends,

For me, when I am offering to The Honored and Beloved Dead, I am usually including not only my own ancestors of blood, but a variety of others.  There are the Ancestors of Spirit including Queer predecessors and Witches whose work has guided, inspired, or made my own journey possible.  There are figures from History and my Culture whose work and lives have also touched upon my journey or made it possible.

I rearely call upon, work with, or make offerings, to specific individuals.  Not sure why just my own choice motivated in part by experience or the lack there of.  I do not usually feel nudges from specific individuals.  Like my work around Spirits, and my more interpersonal work with the Gods I work with, it is often more of making offerings and giving acknowledgment and preparing a place at the metaphorical table of my life and work for Them if they choose to involve themselves.

The general formula will be to make an offering of Wine or Water or Coffee while speaking along the theme of…

“Hail to the Honored and Beloved Dead,
Those to Whom I am tied by the Red Threads of Blood,
The Silver Threads of Witchcraft,
The Pink Threads of Queerdom,
and The Many Colored Skeins of Beloved Friendship and Inspiration,
Be, Be Here, Be Here Now, Hail and Well Met, Bliss and Blessed Be,
Be Welcome in my life and works and rites,
I thank You for the many blessings of Inheritance and Inspiration you have given me,
Even where I sometimes struggle mightily with some of your Legacies.
Bliss and Blessed Be.”

G. Stewart (c) 2021

On some special occasions, birthdays to the relevant dead or Holidays such as Samhain and Memorial Day and Pride, I might pour an offering to a specific individual or group of ‘Ancestors’.

Now i realize this may seem like an odd way of doing it.

For myself, I really don’t have much of a connection to my blood ancestors or much knowledge of them.  Beyond a couple of names and the general themes of Ireland, Scotland, and Sweden.  Then too, as a Queer man who grew up in the 1980’s, I was influenced by both the fact of that Twentieth Century phenomena of The Nuclear Family, and the fact that Queer people have often had to redefine the idea of Family to create their own found family unit.

That’s about all I have for now, having hacked my way through the dense undergrowth of my ADHD executive dysfunction and a seemingly endless To-Do List to try and write something today.

Peace,

Pax/Geoffrey