At a New Year’s Eve gathering earlier tonight, I led a group ritual of reflection, purification and creation that I designed awhile back for the end of one year and the start of another. For this ritual I use rotting fruit, fresh or dried flowers, a trash bucket, and some plastic bags.

The purification part of the ritual began with a couple of moments of reflection about the year about to end, in particular about what served us well and what didn’t. Then each person took one rotting fruit (tonight it was banana peels, but I’ve used apples too) While holding it, deeper focus is given to a situation, relationship, perspective, emotion that feels to be rotting inside and no longer serving. People then

I recently heard these words, written and sang by John McCutcheon, based on a true story during World War I. Absolutely perfect for today:

‘Twas Christmas in the trenches where the frost so bitter hung,
The frozen fields of France were still, no Christmas song was sung,
Our families back in England were toasting us that day,
Their brave and glorious lads so far away.

I was lying with my messmate on the cold and rocky ground
When across the lines of battle came a most peculiar sound

From an interspiritual perspective, Christmas can be seen as a celebration of birth on two different but interconnected levels. One is the birth of the Christ child, Jesus, in Bethlehem over 2000 years ago, that we all know about. The other birth is happening right...