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ADVENT
Our lives flow and grow through rhythms: Day and Night, Monday to Friday, new moon to new moon, summer and winter, life and death. These alternations are the weaving tapestry in which we come to know ourselves, each other, and the world around us.
The four weeks of Advent leading up to Christmas, and then the twelve holy nights (up to the 6th January) are an important part in our experiencing the rhythms of the year. We move through the mid-winter time into a new year and the rhythms support us in linking Christmas past to Christmas present and future.
"Night is the mother of all wisdom" is a Russian saying. Think of the refreshment and healing that are born out of sleep, the way problems can be solved in the night time, the magic of letting go of one self and finding oneself again. The midwinter experience is a parallel experience to the night-time one and on a deeper level. Notice how we sleep differently at the end of the year and for good astronomical reasons!
At Christmas we celebrate the birth of Jesus in Bethlehem. This birth on the stage of history has meaning for us only if it is accompanied by a birth within us. What happened 2000 years ago in Palestine was the beginning of the redemption of human spiritual forces in each of us. And each of us, Christian or non-Christian, child or adult, can experience around Christmas time a part of our spiritual nature, the part of us joined most deeply with world-wide humanity, with the divine and human spirit.
Look back over your memories of Christmas past, and that special time over the holy nights into New Year. You can gain an impression of this touching, or meeting with the more-connected part of our humanity. This connected part of us Rudolf Steiner calls the Life Spirit, and it is only beginning its evolution in us. We touch the life spirit, individually in our own life’s stream every year at Christmas time. It may not happen for everyone on 24th December: it could be in the following nights. It might be a dream-like experience; we may be completely unconscious of it. It happens anyway, just as sleep does.
The festival of Advent is meant to anticipate and prepare us for what will come over the holy nights. As we prepare gifts for our families and friends, as we look forward to the cheerful festivities, conscious of the incredible neediness of the human race right now, we begin to prepare the ground for the higher and better forces which are coming to meet us, and which will strengthen us for the year ahead.
Having four weeks of preparation time, and realizing that the festival is by no means over by Boxing Day helps put the feverish commercialism of Christmas in perspective. Our children need that too.
Alexander Murrell
The Festival of St. Martin
(Martinmas)
You might imagine that St. Martin’s is one of the minor Christian festivals. It is celebrated with lantern processions in Catholic village communities in southern Germany and France.
At Wynstones, the younger classes follow this old tradition, making their own lanterns, and singing the story of the saint.
The position of St. Martin’s day – 40 days before Midwinter, and mirrored by Candlemas 40 days the other side of Christmas – is one of the reasons this festival is so well anchored in the cycle of the year.
A fourth-century Roman soldier in southern France, Martin made one spontaneous charitable gesture when he shared his cloak with a beggar outside the city of Tours. His subsequent dream in which the beggar appeared to him as Christ on high was the decisive event in his life. We would say nowadays that this was a conversion, a change in his moral orientation as well as a revelation out of his own conscience.
Afterwards Martin tried to make peace instead of war and was granted a discharge from the army. After a period of solitary contemplation Martin founded a monastery in France – one of the first Christian monasteries – which included a library of the very best of Greek and Roman philosophical texts. At his death, his popularity was so large that as his coffin was carried by the river for the funeral, people flocked to the banks carrying lanterns. I suppose this was the origin of our November lantern festival which has truly stood the test of time. Our own individual reflections on sharing and giving can be a worthy preparation for Advent and Christmas, the festival of light in the darkness.
Michaelmas/Harvest Festival
We celebrated this festival on Tuesday 29th September. As well as a festival of thanks for the harvest, it is also an opportunity to look at the theme of 'taking up a new task'. How can we find the strength of will to 'come alive' while nature around us is preparing to sleep? If we think of the meteor showers often visible at this time of year and imagine the iron of Michael's sword, we can hope to find the 'iron' within to help us with our resolve, our strength of will.
To help us with this celebration all pupils and staff wore reds or purples for this day and brought a harvest gift the day before, on Monday - so that it could become a part of our harvest display and then go on to be used for the good of all.
Michaelmas
A Russian cosmonaut, one of the most modern of world explorers, once described the experience of looking down on the earth as his satellite went around in orbit: 'The first time we looked down and we could see Russia, the mother country. On the second orbit we pointed to the whole of the European continent, Australia and America as well. On the third time round we saw the whole planet, our Earth, our home'.
The unfolding of global awareness, a more universal and cosmopolitan consciousness, is a signature of our age. It is one of the characteristics of the leading Time Spirit for humanity today. Linking on to a much older tradition we call this spirit-of-the-age: Michael, and we celebrate his festival at Michaelmas on 29th September.
Events at the beginning of the previous Michael age are described in the Old Testament Book of Daniel. There Michael is introduced as the 'Great Prince who stands for the children of thy people'. We could express this differently nowadays, but confidence in and support for the human future through the capacities of the younger generation is also a characteristic of Michael!
Humanity faces huge global challenges at the moment. The solutions are going to require imagination, moral courage, ingenuity and practical skill. These are the spiritual qualities we aim for at Wynstones through our Rudolf Steiner Waldorf curriculum. They are the abilities which Michael, the dragon tamer, can support. We want the children and young people to be able to rise up and meet the challenge of the times.
Despite humankind’s difficulties, and the threats of tragedy and catastrophe all over the world, the growth of true and spiritually-orientated individual personalities is more than ever possible today. The younger generation can continually inspire us with confidence in a brighter and a more wholesome future for our planet! Alex Murrell
Michaelmas
What a joy to celebrate the opening of Michaelmas Day in our New Hall. Singing, eurythmy, and poetry were centred by a talk by Charles Crittal. Charles spoke with clarity, humour and in his gentle unassuming manner as he led us through the development and building of the Hall. Warm applause and a bouquet of flowers presented by a class I pupil followed. The day was sunny and bright and each class set about their many tasks from pond clearing to preparing the lunch. The day finished with kite flying, greatly enjoyed tugs-of-war and singing. Thanks to all participants, parents, pupils and staff. Ken Power
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