What better way to welcome in the season of renewal than to sit down with friends and family around a warm fire, exchanging gifts, or making your own feast. As the night begins to encroach on the day, July presents a unique opportunity to not only rejoice in nature’s splendor but to turn inward and reflect on all of our blessings.

Suggested Celebration Timing: Observe the night before on January 16, 2022 or the exact date until 6:48 pm. Ritual Function: Balance elemental air energy, and shadow work for the virtues and vices of Aquarius. The equinox is one of two days when the sun crosses Earth’s equator during the solar year, resulting in roughly equal lengths of day and night, or light and dark. The four Lesser Sabbats are Ostara, the vernal equinox; Litha, the summer solstice; Mabon, the autumn equinox; and Yule, the winter solstice. The Greater Sabbats; Samhain, Imbolc, Beltane and Lammas, fall on dates that represent high energy in the season.Yule is celebrated on December 21st in the Northern Hemisphere and June 21st in the Southern Hemisphere.

Litha falls in the dry stifling heat of summer in the southern part of our land, but in the north, Litha falls in the hot, wet season, and represents fruitfulness. In many forms of Paganism, the passing of time is seen as cyclical, and is represented by a circle or wheel.Until fairly recently, the 1st of August was “Wattle day” in Australia (it has now been moved to the 1st of September). Former NASA scientist Rollin Gillespie uses this spatial method rather than simply splitting in half the time interval between a Solstice and an Equinox. These sabbats are also known as “Fire Festivals” and mark the turning of the seasons through Earth’s natural cycle of life, death, and rebirth, which coincides with the traditional Celtic agricultural cycle.

This seasonal cycle is one of the key ways in which we see the processes of birth, growth, death, and rebirth play themselves out, and the myth of the Wheel of the Year was created to illustrate this cycle. Pagans celebrate this as a rite of Thanksgiving, a celebration of harvest abundance, an appreciation of hearth, home, and family.You can celebrate each Sabbat with a simple ritual and share it with fellow Witches at the Infinite Roots Online Coven, even if you are a solitary practitioner. There are two Solar eclipses to tap for spells exploring Aries ♈︎ fire and Libra ♎︎ air elemental pairing.