In this series, “No-Nonsense Paganism”, I have been striving to strip Paganism down, take away its ancient or faux-ancient terminology, its mythological and legendary pretensions, its foreign (to wherever you are) folk practices, its superstitious and pseudo-scientific justifications, and its esoteric ritual structures, and get down to the phenomenological core of pagan experience: our interaction with the earth and the other-than-human beings who we share it with. You can check out previous posts in this series here.

In this part, I want to talk about why and how to keep ritual simple.

I recently attended a Unitarian celebration of the summer solstice, led by our minister and a Pagan congregant. Everyone seems to love these seasonal services … except me. I think my hangup (and it is my hangup) is that I need to think of these services more as Unitarian rituals than pagan rituals, because that’s what they really are. This particular service consisted of six hymns/songs, four litanies/responsive readings, two additional readings, one story (which was enacted in a silly spirit with lazily-made props/costumes), and a mini-sermon by our minister, which once again condescendingly explained how ancient pagan peoples believed their rituals made the sun go around the earth. (For more on that, see here.)

All of this was haphazardly tied together with a “sun” theme while we sat inside on one of the most beautiful days of the year so far. The hymns were Paganized versions of familiar tunes like “You Are My Sunshine” and “Morning Has Broken”, which incidentally would have been perfectly suitable to the moment (and in my opinion, better) were they left alone. One responsive reading invoked no less than ten ancient pagan deities, reducing them facilely to some supposed sun-related aspect.

And for another of the responsive readings, we (finally) got out of our pews, put some donated flowers on an altar and read aloud from our paper programs, while the officiants (tried to) light candles (by means of an electric lighter that didn’t work) set on a nifty circular table that spun around like a Lazy Susan. I think that was meant to be the centerpiece of the ritual (literally and symbolically), but it felt like just one part of a string of more or less interchangeable parts, like pearls on a necklace.

That’s all in addition to the usual Unitarian opening and closing elements. In total, it was about 21 parts, almost all of which was either reading something or listening to someone read something. I suppose this makes for a good Unitarian service–but it’s terrible as a pagan ritual. And if I remind myself that it is supposed to be a Unitarian service, and not a pagan ritual, then I might be able to appreciate it more. The reason why I share this here is not to lambast Unitarian services or to criticize the people who created this particular service. (Anybody that puts themselves out there to organize a Sunday service deserves praise.) As far as Unitarian services go, this one was not bad. Rather, I offer it as an extreme example of what a bad pagan ritual can look like. And I’ve attended versions of Pagan rituals which were like this, and maybe you have as well.

Again, the other Unitarian congregants seemed to enjoy this format, and that’s fine. But as a pagan ritual, it was a mess–a big, unwieldy mess. As the service progressed, I found myself longing to go outside and feel the sun on my skin. I felt like the Unitarian minister John Trevor, writing in 1897, “One brilliant Sunday morning, my wife and boys went to the Unitarian Chapel in Macclesfield. I felt it impossible to accompany them—as though to leave the sunshine on the hills, and go down there to the chapel, would be for the time an act of spiritual suicide.” And sitting there in the pew listening to a litany of thanks to the sun, which included thanks for ferris wheels and cotton candy, while the sun beckoned me through the stained glass windows, did in fact feel a little like spiritual suicide.

One of the radical (at least I think it is radical) ideas running through this series is the notion that a pagan ritual can be–and should be–simple. There seems to be an unexamined and unspoken notion circulating in the Pagan community that the multiplication of elements in a ritual–its complexification–is an improvement of the ritual. In my experience, however, the opposite is true. The complexification of a ritual does not deepen the experience of the ritual, and in fact has the tendency to make it more spiritually shallow.

A pagan ritual can consist of a single gesture or a single phrase or even a single word, made or spoken with special attention to the physical world around us. That’s it. It can just be one thing. (For more on ritualized words and gestures, see here.)

You can multiply elements, but you should do so carefully and conscientiously. For example, you can combine a gesture (like raising your arms or touching the ground) with some words, preferably recited, rather than read (it uses a different part of the brain). You can also use a sound (like a tone from a chime or your voice), or even a taste or a physical sensation on your skin. But try limiting it to just one saying (short enough to memorize easily), one gesture, one sound, etc.–at least at first. Doing this will give you the time and space to deepen the experience of each element.

You can start doing this with your daily practice. And then you can try doing this with your Wheel of the Year rituals. When in doubt, reduce the number of elements.

When you have gotten comfortable with this simplification, then you can consider adding some complexity. For small rituals, rituals you perform by yourself or with small groups, I suggest you don’t go beyond a tripling. Use this simple format: beginning–middle–end. The beginning consists of creating liminal or sacred space/time. The middle is the core or center of the ritual. The end is the return to normal or mundane space/time.

For each of these three phases, you can use one gesture, one saying, one sound, etc. But limit it to three phases. Any more than that and you risk the ritual taking on a life of its own, separating it from its source–the source again being our interaction with the earth and the other-than-human beings who we share it with.

For group rituals with more than a few people, you can add another layer of complexity by multiplying the phases by five rather than three. I suggest using the structure of classical Greek and Shakespearean drama: five acts consisting of exposition, rising action, climax, falling action, and resolution. It’s slight complexification of the beginning–middle–end format, but basically the same thing.

(Note: I’m using the word “exposition” here, because that’s the term used in the traditional dramatic structure, but pagan ritual should have zero exposition. In place of exposition, use gestures, short recitations, etc. The less talky-talk the better.)

Again, for each of the five phases, you can use one gesture, one saying, etc. But don’t go beyond five phases, or again you risk losing touch with the pagan experience which is (or should be) the point of the ritual.

When conceptualizing these phases, rather than a string of pearls on a necklace, try visualizing the ritual as a (one-dimensional) pyramid or a series of two or three nested circles, like a bullseye. Using the pyramid visualization (above), the first part of the ritual is the climb up one side of the pyramid, the focus of the ritual is at the peak of the pyramid, and the last part of the ritual is the climb down. Using the nested circles visualization (below), the ritual is a progression from outside of the outermost circle to the inside of the innermost circle and out again.

For larger group rituals, you can use up to five phases. But for smaller groups or individual rituals, just use three, in which case, you would remove one of the circles above.

Now, you might be wondering, does this mean that pagan rituals should be short. They can be. But no, simplification does not necessarily mean shortening. The experience can be drawn out in a number of ways. For example, each gesture or each saying can be repeated. For repetitions, I suggest an odd number like three or five. Chanting is another way to draw out the experience. You can also pause to experience the space between the elements. During space between elements, breathe in and out, and again, and be present.

So, for each phase, there is still only one gesture, one saying, one sound etc., but you can combine elements like a sound with a gesture or a saying with a sensation (touch, taste, etc.). And then you can repeat each element. So you may do a gesture and saying three or five times in a row. But what you won’t do is have different gestures or different sayings in the same phase. And then you move on to the next phase, which will have different elements, a different gesture or different saying etc. And then the number of phases will be limited to three or five, depending on the number of participants.

So the final product may look like this:

• Beginning: a sound and a saying, repeated three times
• Pause
• Middle: gesture and a different saying, repeated five times
• Pause
• End: a sound and a different gesture

And if you feel the urge to multiply elements to fill the time … stop. Just stop. It’s the depth of the experience, not the length that matters. Remember, when it comes to pagan ritual, less is more.

JOHN HALSTEAD

John Halstead is a native of the southern Laurentian bioregion and lives in Northwest Indiana, near Chicago. He is one of the founders of 350 Indiana-Calumet, which worked to organize resistance to the fossil fuel industry in the Region. John was the principal facilitator of “A Pagan Community Statement on the Environment”. He strives to live up to the challenge posed by the statement through his writing and activism.  John has written for numerous online platforms, including Patheos, Huffington Post, PrayWithYourFeet.org, Gods & Radicals, now A Beautiful Resistance. He is Editor-at-Large of HumanisticPaganism.com. John also edited the anthology, Godless Paganism: Voices of Non-Theistic Pagans. He is also a Shaper of the Earthseed community which can be found at GodisChange.org.