Beltane 2025

Beltane (AKA May Day; derived from the Irish Gaelic Bealtaine or the Scottish Gaelic Bealtuinn, among a variety of other spellings I've come across) is the cross-quarter between Ostara (Spring Equinox) and Litha (Summer Solstice; new articles coming soon!).

As has been a theme for me these last couple of Sabbats, I found myself looking for Beltane's roots - where did it originate? Initial signs seemed to point to the Celts, as it is the most common cultural association. In my reading, though, I kept finding connects between the Celtic celebration and other Spring rites from the Greco-Roman Hellenistic period. As Mike Nichols writes in his article Beltane: A Celebration of May Day, "Some of these [Celtic] customs seem virtually identical to the old Roman feast of flowers, the Floralia, three days of unrestrained sexuality that began at sundown April 28th and reached a crescendo on May 1st."

I traced this connection back even further to its deeper roots in Ancient Greek culture, the Anthesteria/Protomagia flower celebrations. "These festivals and others herald...the apex of spring – a time of merriment, awakening, and bounty; a liminal time when the barriers between our world and the other world are thinned. In many traditions and cultures, it is also a time of divine union and fertility," (The Wild Hunt "Pagan Community Notes: Beltaine 2025").

For Wiccans (including Blue Star Wiccans), it is the time the Lady and Lord come together to create new life - both a symbol for the actual life coming to a head during Spring, and for the product of our Will, individual and collective.

For Haven Song this year, we wanted to celebrate and acknowledge both the creative energy and destructive nature associated with creation and growth. This year we called the Goddess Kore (Core-ay) and the God Dionysus to join our May Day celebration.

At Ostara we heralded Kore's return to her mother Demeter - now that She is here and Spring is a riot, we look to the Goddess of Spring's bounty to remember that seeds hold all the potential needed to blossom when placed in the right environment.

Dionysus we will explore more in the next article - to the God of Theater and Ecstatic Madness, we looked to inspire the members of our circle to sing or dance, to play upon the stage or page, or to otherwise create!

Our Work included May Day Games, crowning May Day Royalty, honoring the effort we all put into our projects, and, finally, our guests left with a charm that we spelled to pull attention back to being productive on any important project.

In my next article, I'll explore the themes of sexuality and gender, and how those have made modern Beltane ceremonies difficult for certain members of our community to navigate.

Blessed Be!

By Acorn, 1°