Sacred Harvest Festival 2013

“As Above,

…So Below”

Monday August 5th – Sunday August 11th

Join us in our sixteenth year for an intimate tribal experience to explore the world of magical cause and effect. What happens on any plane of existence is mirrored in every other level.  Within each lies the other, and through understanding each level we can understand the cosmos. Three national guests will provide a launching pad for insight into the relationship between our actions and results, our spiritual practice and our daily experience!

Presenting THREE nationally known special guests!   

Teo Bishop, who organized the Solitary Druid Fellowship,  is deeply exploring the creative process and where spiritual practice takes us, and how we get there.   

Szmeralda Shanel is a High Priestess of Sacred Arts ; Trickster, Healer, Story keeper, Bawdy Wild Woman Warrior, Ecstatic Shamanic DreamWalker. She who casts the Bones will take us higher!     

Kenny Klein  a Pagan-bard laureate, author, poet, and a Blue Star High Priest returns for a full week and a mid-week concert and jam, and workshop series.

Plan to attend a full week of masterful rituals, thought provoking and hands on workshops,  rocking music. 

Check out and print our daily schedule!  

…. and again return to the tribal community home you love! 

Read about the festival and it’s History!

We are your People, … Join Us ! 

Need information about the Sacred Harvest Festival site? Click here!

Festival Theme Art
by Marvin Hill

Teo Bishop

Teo Bishop is the author of the blog, Bishop In The Grove , and an emerging voice in the Pagan Community.  Teo sees the writing he does online as a kind of ministry, in that it encourages us to look inward, and to be contemplative. His writing is a means of processing through the complicated geography of modern Paganism, and it is also an invitation for others to express their voices, their ideas, and their experiences of what it means to be Pagan, polytheist, or something altogether different from our currently defined identities. Teo’s work centers on the meaning and enactment of ritual in personal and public ceremony, on the place of creativity and personal expression in Pagan traditions, and on the integration of mind (critical thinking) with heart (intuitive knowing).

Teo founded the Solitary Druid Fellowship service extension of ADF. The Fellowship creates “congregation in solitude” by providing liturgies for the eight high days of the Pagan calendar.

Szmeralda Shanel

Szmeralda Shanel MA is a ritual, visual and performance artist. She is certified in the Fellowship of Isis as Adept, Priestess and Hierophant and is legally ordained through the Temple of Isis in Geyserville ,CA.

As an expressive arts therapist, facilitator and educator, Szmeralda is dedicated to sharing the healing, therapeutic and growth promoting values of the creative process. She is the founder of The Iseum of Black Isis, a Temple dedicated to Goddess Spirituality and Sacred Arts

High Priestess of Sacred Arts. Mami Wata child. Hoodoo. Witch. Songstress. Dancer. Magic Mistress. Music Maker. Vision Weaver. Daughter of the North Star. Artist. Seer. Seeker. Poet. Teacher. Student. Trickster. Healer. Fool. Lover. Story keeper. Storyteller. Sensualist. Bawdy Wild Woman Warrior. She who casts the Bones . Tarot. Ecstatic Shamanic DreamWalker. Priestess of Pleasure. Rainbow. Kaleidoscope. Changing. Feri

Kenny Klein

Kenny Klein is a well known musician, author, and lecturer in the Pagan community. As a musician, Kenny has performed at dozens of festivals, including Pagan Spirit Gathering, Free Spirit Gathering, Heartland festival, Starwood, PantheaCon, Ancient Ways, Florida Pagan Fest, Arizona Faerie Festival, and has recorded numerous CDs geared toward Pagan and Renaissance Festival audiences.

Kenny is the author of Fairy Tale Rituals: Engage The Dark, Eerie And Erotic Power Of Familiar Stories (Llewellyn, 2011), Through the Faerie Glass: A Look at the Realm of Unseen and Enchanted Beings (Llewellyn, 2010) and The Flowering Rod, Men, Sex and Spirituality, (Immanion, 2009), a book about men in Paganism and Wicca. Kenny is also a regular contributor to publications like The Green Egg e-zine (http://www.greeneggzine.com/), and has contributed to various poetry and prose journals.

Kenny will be appearing at SHF mid-week, Monday – Friday!  Wait! Kenny will be at SHF the whole week through Sunday!

Visit  Kenny’s website , on facebook and follow Kenny’s Blog .

Sacred Harvest Festival 2013 will have all the great programming you have come to expect;

Several Concerts, the Talent Show, The Friday Rangoli, Nightly Rituals, and some Surprises!
Attend the full week to not miss out!

If you wish to appear as a Presenter or an Entertainer, to offer your gifts to your tribal community,  We welcome you!
Please Contact Harmony Tribe!

Julie will manage The Sacred Hunt Ritual as coordinator this year! It will take place Friday night for no more than eight hunters. If you wish to participate in this popular ritual contact Julie via HT to assure a spot!
This ritual takes advance preparation, and participant supporters as both drummers and villagers. To be a hunter, plan to recruit both a drummer and a villager to support your ritual journey!

David Salisbury

David Salisbury is a queer vegan Witch and writer living in the Washington DC area. He is one of two high priests of Coven of the Spiral Moon, the core coven of initiates who lead The Firefly House, a national Wiccan tradition.

As an activist, David takes a service and justice-based approach to spiritual practice which includes his work as a staff member of the Human Rights Campaign, the nation’s largest LGBT civil rights organization.

As a writer, David leads the DC bureau of the Pagan Newswire Collective and is a regular columnist for Modern Witch magazine and Witches & Pagans. His work has been featured in the anthologies Tastes From the Temple, The Green Lovers, and the forthcoming By Bone, Blood, and Blade: A Tribute to The Morrigan. His first book, The Deep Heart of Witchcraft , was recently released by Moon Books. A lover of continual learning, he is a student of Feri in the Blue Rose line.

David will be offering several workshops including:

“Deepening Our Craft”

Focuses on tools and methods for magick-workers to take their current practices to deeper levels of understanding and connection. We will explore the “pentacle of depth”, a tool to gauge the intimacy of one’s personal practice and advance it into a place of closer connection and power. If you feel stuck in your current practice or have your own thoughts on how to deepen a magick-based spiritual practice, this is the session for you.

“Flying to the Witch Sabbat”

Examining the historical and cultural themes around the notorious sabbat of the witches. The witch sabbat was used frequently throughout the witchcraft persecutions of Europe as a means to indict accused persons as being in league with the “Devil.”  Buried beneath layers of shocking and taboo imagery are themes of ecstatic connection with the ancestors, spirits, and gods of the Old Craft. This session will explore topics such as the Wild Hunt, the pact and initiation, and the famous poison flying ointment.

Laura M. LaVoie

Laura M. LaVoie is a writer living in a 120 square foot house in the mountains of Western North Carolina. Laura has been Pagan her entire adult life following a path of devotional Hellenic polytheism. When she isn’t blogging and podcasting about tiny houses she is drinking local craft beer in Asheville, NC, also known as Beer City USA. Laura has been a contributor to PanGaia Magazine and the Pagan Newswire Collective’s pop-culture blog, The Juggler. She’s served on the International Pagan Coming Out Day committee since its founding. Laura has also worked with the Zulu Orphan Alliance to help vulnerable children in the townships of Durban South Africa. You can read about Laura’s tiny life at her blog Life in 120 Square Feet.

Workshops:

Live Deliberately:
How a Simple Life can Connect You to the Gods
Profoundly altering the way you interact with your entire life will change you in ways you can’t imagine. When I moved into my 120 square foot house I had no idea how living off the grid would affect everything I did. I want to share you my story of downsizing my life, offer insights about how to simplify your own experience, and answer questions about how living deliberately connects us to ourselves, our neighbors, and our Gods.

Beer-ituality
Beer has a rich history deeply rooted in ancient cultures and religions. As a modern craft beer lover and home brewer I use beer to celebrate the seasons and the Gods. There are so many different varieties of beer that they easily fit within our seasonal celebrations. I love this delicious hoppy and malty drink and I bet you do to, even if you don’t know it yet. Explore the 8 beer styles that I recommend for your journey through the year and what the ingredients and symbols mean to us as Pagans. (No beer will be provided for this workshop.)

Roger Williamson

Born in Loughborough England in 1947. Instructed in basic magical techniques including summoning and conversing with spirits astral projection and tarot by his mother prior to and while attending school in Coventry. Walked away from an opportunity to study art to pursue a career playing music. Moved to London in 1963 to expand opportunities in music.

Nobody deserves the ‘outsider’ tag more than Roger Williamson. Mysteriously moved in his 40’s to take up the brush, gloriously isolated from mainstream curatorial prerogatives–the founder and proprietor of Magus Books and Herbs paints for no one but himself. Roger strictly depicts images from his own rich inner life, and Williamson, like the universe itself, loathes stasis. Wanderlust and constant self-transformation figure in every aspect of the UK transplant’s life, from his ongoing exploration of ceremonial magic, shamanism, and a few dozen related disciplines to his nine published books–but they’re the driving forces behind the oils and pastels.

Roger is the author of “The Sun at Night”, “Labyrinth: Tales of a Rite of Passage”, “Lucifer’s: A Basic Handbook of Luciferian Sorcery”, “The Black Book of the Jackal”, “On The Arrival of the Machine”, “Calling up the Spirits”, “Howling at the Sky”, “Lucifer Diaries”, and “The Tarot of the Morning Star” 22 card deck and book.

Liz Johnson

Liz Johnson was inspired to become an Alternative Healthcare Practitioner by seeing people around her deal with illness. She became interested in the healing qualities of herbs and their effects on the body when modern medicine was not enough for some.           She has since studied the art of herbalism along with other alternative healing and has apprenticed under Matthew Wood. Liz continues to seek out teachers, schools, and conferences to enhance her knowledge. She has been in private practice since 1995.

Lamyka

Lāhela is a Hawaiian woman from the North Shore of O’ahu. She has lived in various countries and made friends with people literally from all over the World. She is better known as Lamyka, the Host of Lamyka’s Wiccan Podcast, Pagan Women’s Podcast, & Pagan Bed Time Stories Podcast. Lamyka is also the author of Pagan Bed Time Stories: How Maui Slowed the Sun Activity Book. She currently lives on O’ahu and runs her own Pagan body products business, Haumea Botanicals, while she works on writing more children’s books.

It’s not very often that Lamyka has the opportunity to share her Hawaiian Heritage with so many people but she is taking on this challenge by hosting 2 Workshops for anyone to attend who’s curious to learn more about Hawaiian & Hawaiian Spirituality.

Workshop 1: Makawalu, 8 Eyes Hawaiian History from Pre-contact to Modern Times, Hawaiian Beliefs & Practices, God(s), Legends/Stories, etc. and generous Q + A time!

Workshop 2: Mea Mana, Things of Power Focusing on specific Hawaiians concepts of Mana, Aloha, Kaona, etc. and more. Also Q + A time!

Music is an important part of Hawaiian culture so BOTH workshops will feature Hawaiian Music and, if the mood strikes, some Hula as well!

Teri Parsley Starnes

Teri’s interest with astrology lies with helping people see how following a practice of intention and self-awareness leads to a fuller relationship with Mystery. Astrology is a wonderful tool for this. Her weekly column, Follow the Moon, found in the Minnesota Pagan Newswire Collective, orients readers to the seasonal energy of each month’s Sun sign in order to set magical/mindful intention for the lunar month beginning at the New Moon. Teri has been a consulting astrologer for 17 years. And has been on the spiritual path of witchcraft since the 80’s. She a member of the Reclaiming Tradition. For more about Teri, see her website.

Workshops:
Signs and Seasons: Astrology
As above, so below. The sky is a brilliant reflection of patterns found on earth. Many of these patterns form the basis of much of our Pagan spirituality. In this workshop, we will walk through astrology’s basic pattern, the twelve signs and seasons, to learn more about the magic of this fascinating pattern.
Follow the Moon
From archeological evidence, we know the Moon was incredibly important to first humans.  In this workshop, we will explore the phases of the Moon. If you have a birthchart, bring it and learn what the Moon phase at your birth says about you.

Ellie Bryan

Ellie Bryan attended SHF in 2011 for the first time. She appeared in our talent show and her rich heartfelt voice and mouth bow entranced the audience. We are honored to have her perform again this year!

Ellie Bryan performs traditional folk music using a hand made instrument called a mouth bow. This instrument resembles a hunting bow, it consists of a stick with a string under tension. The bow is leaned against the jaw and the cavity of the mouth is used to create a resonance chamber.

Throughout history, the mouth bow has been found in several indigenous cultures around the world, and today it is found mainly in some areas of Africa and the Southern Appalachian Mountains. Ellie Bryan sings traditional songs while playing the mouth bow, Appalachian mountain dulcimer, and banjo.