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December 2010

From Your Minister
BY MEG RILEY SENIOR MINISTER, CHURCH OF THE LARGER FELLOWSHIP

I’d like to invite you to celebrate a new holiday with me this winter, one that I am only now inventing. Let me be the first to wish you Happy Halcyon Days!

Celebrating Halcyon Days could dramatically change the winter season. You can celebrate it anywhere, alone or with others. It requires no advance preparation or special foods, though you can adapt it as you prefer.

Now, like many of you, I already celebrate a lot of winter holidays. The winter solstice is my favorite winter holiday. In Minnesota, during the darkest days, when you can blink and miss the sun, the knowledge that spring will return, that the days are now, imperceptibly at first, growing longer again, is something important to hold onto. And no one is pressuring me to buy solstice gifts or piping solstice music at me everywhere I go.

But I do love Christmas. Trees, lights, stockings, special dishes and tablecloths—I’m there for every bit of it. Crèches, carols, pageants—I love the baby Jesus side of it much more than the Santa Claus and reindeer, but I will sing and celebrate it all.

And I’m always going to say yes when friends ask me to their own parties and celebrations. Kwanzaa, Hanukkah, Gita Jayant—if you invite me to celebrate it, I’m there, in December or any other month.

Yes, there are plenty of good winter holidays, and perhaps you think you don’t need another one. But hear me out!

In Greek mythology, Halcyon, or Alcyone, was the daughter of Aeolus, the Guardian of the Winds. She married Ceyx. The two of them were very happy together, apparently so happy that they thought it was fun to refer to each other as Hera and Zeus. Guess who didn’t think that was funny?

Zeus threw a thunderbolt at Ceyx when he was out at sea, and Ceyx drowned. Alcyone threw herself into the sea in grief. Some merciful god took pity on them and transformed both of them into halcyon birds, which are mythical birds related to the kingfisher.

In her new bird form, Alcyone built a nest on the beach and laid her eggs. When waves threatened to destroy the nest, her father Aeolus stilled the winds for 14 days—the seven days before the solstice and the seven days after—so that she could hatch the eggs in peace. Today, the phrase “halcyon days” is generally used to mean a time of peace and tranquility, creativity and lack of anxiety. There are no storms, no bad weather, nothing to worry about.

Here’s how I envision the celebration of Halcyon Days:

Day 1 (December 14):
Act out the story: “Why, Zeus, you look CHARMING today…” “Thanks, Hera, you are pretty hot yourself!” CRAAAAASSSSHHHH… “Zeus—NOOOO!” etc. until you are building a nest on a beach in guaranteed tranquility, with the Guardian of the Winds protecting you.

Day 2-13 (December 15-27):
Nest. Experience peace, tranquility, lack of anxiety, creativity. Don’t worry about anything. Cuddle up with a long novel, or a cup of tea, or a child or a friend or a nice cat or dog (real or stuffed). Don’t fuss about anything at all. Don’t answer the door or the phone if you don’t want to. Stay in your pajamas. Eat slowly. Keep your eyes soft and unfocussed as much as you can.

Day 14 (December 28):
Close out the celebration by reading “Halcyon Days” from Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass:

Not from successful love alone,
Nor wealth, nor honor’d middle age, nor victories of politics or war;
But as life wanes, and all the turbulent passions calm,
As gorgeous, vapory, silent hues cover the evening sky,
As softness, fullness, rest, suffuse the frame…
Then for the teeming quietest, happiest days of all!
The brooding and blissful halcyon days!

I know—this isn’t realistic for most of us. There is no Aeolus to calm the storms for us. But, as you choose the myths which engage you most in this season of myth and magic, perhaps Alcyone’s story might give you a new perspective, and offer some rest, even if it dwells in the land of the mythical.

On one level, I suggest this holiday as sheer relief from expectations—as a call to blow off the culturally induced pressures that Christmas can bring to buy, eat, and do more than we want to do. But, as religious liberals, we also know that myths, no matter how farfetched they might be, point to cultural understandings of truth. Is anything more farfetched than an old white man climbing down every chimney and giving “good boys and girls” gifts? And yet, is this prosperity gospel not preached to thousands of people—if you are good, you will be rewarded by an old white man? On this level, choosing a new myth of relaxing and trusting the universe to calm the waters is countercultural.

My deepest wish for each of you, in this holiday season, through whatever story or celebration gets you there, is for “the teeming quietest, happiest days of all!” 

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Last updated November 16, 2010