Circle of the Year

As the wheel of the year turns, some things we count on every year- the chill air at night as the days grow shorter, the changing of the leaves on the trees. In these things we are connected with all the beings in our ecosystem- with the squirrels now frantically burying nuts all over my yard, the geese honking in the air, plants coming to fruition each in their own time, all preparing for what we in this northeast bio-region know will be a cold winter ahead.

Other things we can count on are peculiarly human, and link us to our human community- the bustle as families start the school year, preparing for an election in November.

The cyclical nature of the seasons give us guideposts for our journey through life, and remind us that things end and begin again. It’s normal and natural for things to grow in one season, and rest in another. It’s natural that not everything grows at once -- thank goodness, if all plants fruited at once, how would we eat the rest of the year? If all plants flowered at once, how would the bees sustain themselves?

Over hundreds and thousands of years humans have noticed these cycles, and built their lives, built their societies around them.

When we plan our year together as a congregation, we think about not only the biological cycles, but also the human ones- We know that from Thanksgiving to New Year our calendars will inevitably fill up with special activities- parties, choir concerts, shopping. We try not to plan congregational meetings during that time. So a lot of business meetings happen in October- I swear to you I was siting on the porch reading a book and some familiar fall smell made me think “almost time for TPUC.” Like the squirrels busily burying nuts, and the farmers in the busy work of fall harvest, we tend to spend this time of year preparing for the cold still months of winter when light is less and travel is unpredictable.

Faith traditions have an important role in this cycle of the year. Part of the job of a tradition is to remember. You don’t have to wait until you are driving home from work in the dark and cold anticipating the long winter ahead to plan a big community gathering, We have known for thousands of years that it was important to mark the change of seasons, and we have learned through thousands of years of trial and error what reliably feeds body and spirit in each season. The smells and sounds, the light and temperature of the seasons remind us, and all living things, what comes next in the cycle of the year as a matter of evolutionary survival. Religious traditions help us remember some practical things, like it's good to feast and share at connect with community at the beginning of winter, our traditions also remind us of the wisdom of the spirit- the seasons of the soul- of death and rebirth, struggle and hope, and our journey together as a people.

This is the pagan cycle of the year. It’s based on our solar calendar, neatly dividing the year into 8 sections based on the solstices and equinoxes, and the cross quarters between. The holidays of each quarter and cross quarter are based on the natural world around us- I see the artist who drew this saw things outside her window similar to what I see out mine around the year. The holidays notice the seasons of the earth, but also over the course of the year notice death and rebirth, growth and harvest in our own human experience, taking lessons from the natural world. You can see right now we have just crossed the Fall equinox, Mabon, this past week.


The Christian calendar also follows a regular cycle of the solar year. It’s has 2 major seasons, the season of advent, preparing for Christmas and telling the story of Jesus birth, and Lent, which prepares for Easter, telling the story of Jesus’ death and resurrection. The rest of the year is “ordinary time” you can see we are in that big swath of green right now. Because Christianity was standardized by the roman empire, there are many ways in which it borrows from and overlaps with the older pagan calendar, so that the Easter season overlaps with OESTARA in the pagan tradition- and kind of make one big springtime mashup of rebirth. Or, for example, Samhain and “All hollows eve, and all souls day” or “day of the dead all are about remembering the departed, though with different theological messages. It was Pope Gregory XVIII who standardized the Gregorian calendar, which is the calendar most governments in the world use today.


Here is the Jewish cycle of the year. It is a luni-solar calendar, it follows the cycles of the moon, so things move around a bit more, but it resets the first day of “Nisan” so that Passover always happens in spring, and the high holidays always happens in the fall. Today is the new moon, and so also the first night of Rosh Hashana, beginning the 10 days of awe, the most important holidays in the Jewish tradition, and followed by Sukkot, a weekly long harvest festival that starts on the full moon.

These cycles include the very old and the new. Consider the Holocaust memorial holiday added to the Jewish calendar in the 1950s.
 

Nations also keeps their own calendars. One way they mark the year is with official days off work. These holidays help us remember important parts of our nation’s history- Thanksgiving, Fourth of July, Memorial Day. We add or change holidays to honor new events, like the addition of MLK day in 1983,  or as a result of changes to our cultural values and priorities, like finally acknowledging Juneteenth by making it a federal holiday just last year. In 2 weeks we come to Columbus day which many celebrate as Indigenous People’s day, an active part of our struggle and effort to make our holidays align with the important things we want to remember, the story we want our calendar to tell about the history of our people and our journey together.

Much of our calendar is reinforced by consumerism- you can see when you go to the store that Independence Day is the time to buy red white and blue things, October is the time to buy candy and pumpkin spice everything, and the end of the calendar year is the time to buy EVERYTHING to boost 4th quarter profits.

We Unitarian Universalists are also a religious tradition, and have our own markers. We start our year together with our water in-gathering, and this spring we celebrate the 100th anniversary of the flower ceremony. We honor the sources of our tradition as we celebrate the longest night, and Christmas eve. We have practical and institutional things on our circle as well- and in the winter we get serious about adult RE, as we think about life’s questions in the cold contemplative season, and we have our annual meeting in June, and a break in the summer. Not every UU church does it this way, Each congregation decides for ourselves what to celebrate; we make our own circle of the year together.

 

Our UU liturgical calendar is less formal and more fluid than the predictable green and purple and white of the Christian tradition, or the ancient cycles of the Jewish tradition. This helps us be responsive what is happening in our community and in the world, but the shadow side of this power is that if we are not careful we could fall into observing only things that are easy and familiar. Because we create our liturgical calendar by planning or whim or convenience, it is also in our power to forget if we are not intentional. For example, each year during the high holidays observant Jewish people reflect on and actively practice atonement and forgiveness. Those are hard topics- and it would be easy for our congregation to go many years without practicing in these basic needs of the human spirit. In the spring our Christian siblings celebrate Easter at the end of the long season of Lent, Rebirth coming after the hardship of Good Friday.


So we come to the heart of our inquiry today- what is important for our community, rooted in your faith tradition and in our eco system, to mark over the cycle of the year? What do we need to remember and why?

I’d like to invite us all into a time of reflection now- I have provided a blank wheel for you to consider- what are important landmarks on the wheel of the year for you personally- both happy and sad, easy and hard. What do you observe most years?

Take a few moments silently to think and write…. 
Holidays you celebrated with your family as a child
Holidays you celebrate now,
Days when you remember loss
Times when you come together with your various communities
Times when you start fresh
When that feels complete, I invite you to look at your wheel, and ask, what the wheel needs for balance?

What do you hope we will observe, mark, celebrate  this year?

Finally, part of what is important as we spiral through this cycle, year after year, the changing and the stable, is that it helps us notice who we are right now, and what this very season is like. This fall will be like no other, it will have some of the same things, chill air, changing leaves, new semesters, elections. But in observing the circle of the year we notice how we are changing, and how the world is changing. Let’s take a moment now for reflection- what are you noticing about this early fall? How does it remind you of other years? And what is different and surprising?

So we create our intentions for the circle of the year, we plan and prepare, and then we noticed what it’s like to live inside that cycle. We talk about observing the holiday- and I like that way of putting it -- noticing, this season, exactly as it is, how it is for you and for your ecosystem, for your community.
I wish you all a happy fall- a fruitful harvest of our growing season.

Let us observe together this new circle of the year, deeply rooted in the past we share with our human communities and all the beings in our ecosystem. Yet each turn of the circle unique and precious.

"When love is felt, or fear is known,
When holidays and holy days and such times come,
When anniversaries arrive by calendar or consciousness,
When seasons come, as seasons do, old and known, but somehow new,
When lives are born or people die,
When something sacred’ s sensed in soil or sky,
Mark the time.
Respond with thought or prayer, or smile, or grief.
Let nothing living, life or leaf, slip between the fingers of the mind,
For all of these are holy things we will not, cannot, find again"

- Rev. Max Coots

Cherish the Time

"Look, the trees are turning their own bodies into pillars of light" - Mary Oliver

 Lately, when I make a plan, I use conditional forms: “probably we will go on vacation next spring”. “Hopefully we can come to dinner on Sunday.” And when I sent out last week’s service email I announced that we would be gathering in person in 2 sanctuaries and on zoom. But that’s not what happened- the door to the Cortland church broke as the team was arriving, and no one could enter the church. [sigh] It was not the return to “normal” we were hoping for.

Even so it was lovely to be in the Athens Sanctuary and on zoom last week with so many old and new friends. And to be with you all here in all our different places this week. And, knock wood, our multi platform services will continue. But I have certainly come to understand over these past 2 ½ years that any sense of certainty in the future was misplaced. It was always true that the future was unknown, but I feel this in a really deep way these days.

In her poem "In Blackwater Woods" Mary Oliver writes,

“To live in this world you must be able to do three things:
to love what is mortal;
to hold it against your bones knowing
your own life depends on it;
and, when the time comes to let it go, to let it go.”

Oh, we have had to do so much letting go these past years. so many parts of our lives have been disrupted or lost- businesses closed, celebrations cancelled, beloved members and friends in our congregations have died, dear friends and members of our families departed.

But on this day, this joyful day when we are finally gathered together again in this moment, in this hour, I ask us to take up the practice in Oliver’s poem that comes before letting go, the other things she suggests we must do to live in this world:

“to love what is mortal;
to hold it against your bones knowing your own life depends on it;”

Hopefully we will have many other hours together, just like this one, but let us not take that for granted. We have been hungry for so long for things to get “back to normal” and I offer that this moment, today, is something like the normal we have been so hungry for -- the ordinary blessings we often took for granted until that strange week in March of 2020 when normal was not possible.

Hopefully part of what we have learned over these past 2 ½ years is to cherish those things we used to call normal, to cherish this time, right now, even though it’s still a bit odd and full of technical glitches, to appreciate it and cherish it just as it is.

It’s not easy, is it, to love this life, knowing it is temporary? Oliver names a fundamental paradox that I have struggled with over the years- How can we enjoy what is wonderful and beautiful knowing it will come to an end? In ordinary times It’s easy to put knowledge of our impermanence aside, to act as if there is plenty of time, as if things will always be this boring, ordinary way. On the other hand, when our impermanence is right up in our face like it has been lately, it’s easy to detach, to disengage, so that we wont’ be hurt by endings and departures. It is not easy to love what is mortal, and it is not easy to let go.

The story of the tiger and the strawberry can be found in many versions and variations over centuries and different parts of the world. It is often said that Zen teacher DT Suzuki told this story in this brief version:

“A man walking alone in the wild suddenly finds himself chased by a tiger. he starts to run but soon arrives at the edge of a cliff. with no way out, he jumps and, luckily, manages to grasp a vine. the abyss yawns under him, the tiger threatens him from above. two mice, one white, one black, appear from a crevice and start gnawing at the vine. as the vine grows thinner and thinner, the man notices a plump fresh strawberry. he plucks it. how delicious it tastes!” [i]

Like any good parable or Koan, there are many possible interpretations. Right now I am inspired to ask- can we be clear enough, brave enough, present enough, to pluck the strawberries right in front of us, despite the yawning abyss and hungry tigers? Maybe…

seizing a juniper berry

This year, instead of worrying about our future, or striving to “get back to normal” I encourage us to cherish our time together, exactly as it is. To cherish the unique beauty of each member and friend and visitor, to cherish that feeling of connection and warmth we seek when we come together. We have just welcomed brand new members into both the Athens and Cortland congregations, and they joined us not because of who we used to be, but because they found something valuable, something worth cherishing as they experienced this weird in between time with us. How can we make this a special and inspiring time for them, and honor the fresh newness of their time with us?

At the same time, I know that even now a number of our dear friends are are making plans move so they can be closer to family. Just knowing about such plans invites us into a kind of in between time, preparing in spirit and heart for the anticipated separation. Transition times are uncomfortable, and we can often race to the finish, race to the “new normal” we hope is ahead. But these past 2 years have taught me that there is no promise of normal somewhere in the future, there is only now in this very fluid, quixotic life. Can we challenge ourselves to taste this moment, this precious time together like a juicy red strawberry?

Kurt Vonnegut writes:

“… I had a good uncle, my late Uncle Alex. He was my father's kid brother, a childless graduate of Harvard who was an honest life-insurance salesman in Indianapolis. He was well- read and wise. And his principal complaint about other human beings was that they so seldom noticed it when they were happy. So when we were drinking lemonade under an apple tree in the summer, say, and talking lazily about this and that, almost buzzing like honeybees, Uncle Alex would suddenly interrupt the agreeable blather to exclaim, "If this isn't nice, I don't know what is."
So I do the same now, and so do my kids and grandkids. And I urge you to please notice when you are happy, and exclaim or murmur or think at some point, "if this isn't nice, I don't know what is."  [Vonnegut A Man Without a Country" p. 132]

If that story about tigers and strawberries feels a bit too high stakes, Uncle Alex’s spiritual practice feels quite achievable. I have adopted this practice myself in recent years. Just noticing and naming those ordinary moments that feel, well, nice. I remember the first time I tried it -- I was visiting my sister after a long time apart. There was the usual hubbub of traveling and arriving and the noise of our teens and preparations of dinner, and we found ourselves standing outside – just a quiet ordinary moment in the temperate night air, “If this isn’t nice, what is?” I offered and she started- “what is?” she asked. “Just this moment of finally being together- a quiet moment under the stars” She paused and looked around. That was all, no tigers, no fireworks, just a noticing and arriving in a moment we had waited for so long, and that was all too quickly over.

Who knows what the future will bring? Probably some joyful things, probably some hard things. New people will come into our lives, people we care for will depart. There is, in truth, no such thing as permanence in our mortal world, so let us cherish this time, this unique, unrepeatable time. This is a challenging spiritual practice- it is not easy to love what is mortal, it is not easy to let it go when the time comes. That is one reason we gather in community: to remember how precious life is, even and especially the ordinary moments, and to savor it together. Let us cherish the time.




[i] https://moritherapy.org/article/zen-strawberry-story/

Blessings

Receiving Blessings

“Count your blessings” we tell ourselves, by which we mean “remember to be grateful for each good thing in our lives, each thing that could have been otherwise”. We remember to be grateful for our privileges, for our gifts. We are grateful for those things which came to us, unearned, through inheritance or good luck. We are grateful for those things which resulted from our own work, which doesn’t always guarantee a particular outcome, but this time turned out the way we wanted.

In their book Jewish Ritual: A Brief Introduction for Christians - By: Rabbi Kerry M. Olitzky & Rabbi Daniel Judson, They write:

“There is a blessing for almost everything in Judaism. There is a blessing for getting up in the morning, for going to sleep, for eating, for seeing wondrous things, for experiencing new things, for the occurrence of good things, for the unfortunate occurrence of bad things, for hearing the news of someone's death, for seeing someone you have not seen in a long time, for going to the bathroom, for studying Torah, for going on a journey, for fulfilling almost any religious commandment, and for just about everything else in life.“

Not all of those are occasions which we would consider a blessing, but blessings are not only the good things that happen in our lives, but the sacred which can be present in the ordinary things, and the hard things too. I have often read from the poetry of Jan Richardson during these challenging times - she writes blessings for hard times, confusing times, even in grief and despair and anger. These are what some would call spiritual blessings, that we receive and know or wish for one another. In her beautiful book "Circle of Grace" Richardson writes:

“I found myself enchanted and compelled by the power of a blessing; how in the space of a few lines, the stuff of pain, grief and death becomes the very substance of hope.” [xiii]

“The best blessings awaken our imaginations. In places of difficult, struggle or pain, blessings beckon us to look closely rather than turn away. In such places, they challenge us not to accept how things are but to dream of how they could be transformed. They invite us to discern how God might be calling us to participate in bringing this transformation to pass [xvi-xvii]”

Blessings help us to be open to grace, encourage us to stay open to that which we can’t control, but most deeply wish.

In our congregation, we gave out tiny jars of strawberry preserves, so I invite you now to hold in your hand or in your minds eye a jar of something delicious as you consider...

What blessings do you need?

Blessings for the hard times as well as the good...

What is your hearts deepest wish, your spirit’s hunger?

And when it is time to eat your jelly, imagine your heart and spirit being nourished as well, taste the sweetness of that blessing.

Blessings for the World

"You must answer this question:
What will you do with your gifts?
Choose to bless the world."

 

Rev. Rebecca Parker encourages us to be a blessing to the world. Whatever blessings or privileges or gifts or consolations we receive, these are not for us alone. Our Unitarian Universalist theology calls us not to an ultimate fulfillment of our own peace or hope or healing or joy, but to bless the world with all we receive. In my own practice I have noticed that sometimes my own gifts are actually amplified when I share them, when I understand myself not as a repository of those gifts, but a channel to keep those blessings moving out into the world to whoever else needs those same blessings I have received.

Certainly, if you have been in grief and received comfort, if you have been lonely and been blessed with companionship, you may find you also have an increased sense of calling and capacity to notice others who might need that blessing, and some sensitivity in how to pass it along.

Once you have enjoyed the contents of your jar, I invite you , over the summer, to fill up your jar with water from wherever you find yourself, whether that be the kitchen sink, the garden hose, the water cooler at work, or the lake you visited.

I also invite you to imagine filling up your jar with blessings -- to notice, what blessings you are receiving and how do you want to bless the world? In the fall we will gather for our water in-gathering, and bless one another.
As you hold that jar in your hand, I invite you ask your deepest truest self a question we can live into all summer long:

How is each of us is called to bless the world? 

How are You called to bless the world?

Gold Star!

I want to let you in on an inside joke in our family- it started one day when I proudly explained I had finished some household chore, and my partner replied “what do you want, a gold star?” “Sure!” I replied. We give out imaginary gold stars all the time these days, and sometimes real ones, like the giant gold star he got me for Christmas a few years back that hangs on the kitchen wall where so many chores are done.

I give myself lots of gold stars, now that I know the trick of it. For example, whenever you complete a chore you’ve been dreading, especially if it involves waiting on hold for a long time, or cleaning up something smelly, feel free to give yourself a gold star. When I completed our taxes, I let Eric know I had given myself 4 gold stars. “How many gold stars can you have?” he asked “as many as you need’ I said. “You can just give yourself gold stars any time you want? As many as you want?” “Any time you think you deserve one” I replied.

It doesn’t have to be a chore, I gave myself a lot of gold stars after my father died. I wanted to remember that grieving is hard, that just staying present, just making it through one more day of grief was something I could affirm. In a moment when I needed some encouragement I found a gold pencil and started drawing gold stars in my journal as a reminder that it's okay to encourage myself when the going is hard.

On the day we celebrated graduations in church, I brought  several sheets of gold stars and stars of all colors and shapes and invited the our members and friends, as I invite you now, to think back over this past year...

What things did you accomplish , survive, recover from, grow, achieve that you know in your heart was hard for you?

Perhaps it would help to think of your inner 4 year old- imagine your little 4 year old self-- what would she/ he/ they want to be celebrated and seen from this past year? If that's too much to contemplate, please just give yourself a gold star for waking up this morning, for facing a new day.

We make a big deal when people graduate, or get a new job, but sometimes it's important to celebrate the ordinary everyday accomplishments. Whenever you need a little encouragement to do what needs to be done, feel free to give yourself a star- as many as you need.

Pride!

Happy LGBTQAI+ everyone! Today we celebrate as a beloved community; we are gay and straight and cis and trans and fluid together. This celebration is a logical and beautiful expression of our affirmation of the “inherent worth and dignity of every person.”

Centering and decentering has been part of this movement since the earliest years. Some of you are old enough to remember when it used to be just called “Gay” pride, but early on Lesbian feminists spoke up, noticing that name erased them, and so we talked about “Gay and Lesbian” liberation. Bisexual and Transgender folks found themselves often at the margins of the community, and so we started talking about the LGBT community beginning in the mid-to-late 1980s. We now say LGBTQAI+ to name more of those folks who we need to name and center in the community, or as some folks call it the “QUILTBAG.” The longer we think about gender and sexual orientation, the longer we live into the fluidity of it, the more complex it becomes. There are a lot of issues we could be looking at, fighting for, a lot of voices we could be hearing today, so how do we choose? Who needs to be at the center of our celebration today? The Transforming Hearts Collective writes that:

“’Centering’ is a concept that speaks to whose worldview is most affirmed and whose voices are loudest; whose perspective is treated as “normal,” and thus at the center, and whose perspective is treated as “different,” and thus at the margins.”[i]

Part of our work in becoming an anti-oppressive faith is to “center” folks who have historically been at the margins. As a cis-bi (or pan) white woman, I don’t need to be at the center of Pride. I’ve been married to a cis white man for almost 30 years, and I have access to all the privileges that entails. Today I want to lift up today all of you who never thought you could be married, who never dreamed marriage would be legal in our lifetimes, who had to create complex legal contracts or get married multiple times in multiple states to protect your partner and your union, folks who had to adopt their own children to make sure they were legally protected. Let’s shine a little pride on those folks shall we?

Today, as we celebrate Pride month, we lift up everyone in our community who has had to chose between coming out and keeping a job, everyone who has been bullied or felt afraid for their own physical safety because of who you are. Who has lost friends or family when you told them how it really is with you.

We lift up all our elders who came out and took big risks that made a different life possible for my generation and the younger generations. Let’s sine some more pride on them.

I’d like to take a moment now and just bring in our hearts and minds what needs to be spoken this year at Pride. What would you or a family member or friend would want to be given voice in the LGBTQAI+ community?

Right now in our country there are folks who are really struggling because of their gender or sexual orientation, especially folks with multiple intersecting identities, There is, for example, a terrible homelessness crisis among trans women of color[ii] and an ongoing tragedy of violence toward trans women. I know members of our congregations have been victims of violence and bigotry in the Valley where the Athens church is located. We hold today in the center of our hearts those of us who are trans and non-binary. Let’s shine some pride there.

Consider too the laws passed charging parents of transgender children with a crime for supporting their children the best they know how[iii] so we hold with love those of us who are parenting trans or non-binary children.

In our Adult Religious Education classes we often have as part of our covenant “step up, step back” which invites people who are usually at the center of the conversation, to step back and give space for others to speak. And for those who are often quiet, or don’t speak their truth because it seems risky or because they were not given the space, to step up and let us hear their voice. [iv]

All of us UUs are invited into this exploration of centering, and a continuous discernment in each space we inhabit- who needs to be centered right now? Maybe it’s you. Maybe you know by the nervous shock of energy through your body that your voice, your truth is needed right now. That by saying what you know, by being who you are you offer an authority, a perspective that no one else in the room can offer. When Harvey Milk called us all to “come out” in 1978, hundreds of thousands of us came out all over the world our society had to come to terms with the facts that our parents, children, co-workers, bosses, neighbors were who they were. There is power in speaking the truth, there is power in your voice, there is power in taking the center when you discern that this is your moment. And there is risk. Harvey Milk was assassinated for being who he was, and there are a million other ways that we take a risk by sharing the truth of who we are. You get to decide when and how you offer your voice to the world. That’s part of the discernment each of us gets to do- we don’t have to come out in this moment if it doesn’t feel right to us.

If you are straight and cis, pride month is a great time to de center yourself, to lift up the voices of LGBTQAI+ folks to make space at the microphone, and let folks discern for themselves if this is a moment they want to speak.

As Mariella Mosthof writes in her article “How Allies Can Participate In Pride Without Making It About Themselves”:

“Straight, cis folks have to put in work to decenter themselves at Pride. This mostly comes down to policing your own identity in the space, so that others don't have to, since that can result in queer-identified but straight-passing folks feeling unwelcome in their own community. In other words, be mindful of where you are, who the space is intended for, and how you can best support that group, even if it disrupts your good time.
You can also do the work of looking out for marginalized people in our own communities. Are you supporting organizations that are accessible to low-income queers, who are disproportionately black, brown, and trans? Are you choosing accessible means for your own parties to be inclusive of disabled queers who may wish to virtually attend? Are you carving out time to do community outreach with queer sex workers, queer homeless youth, or incarcerated queers — as well as celebrating this month?
Even though Pride is a celebration, it's important to keep these things in mind and make more space.[v]”

If you discern today that yours is not the voice that needs to be at the center, you can use our turn at the microphone to amplify those who do. There are an amazing abundance of expressions by folks who have chosen to give interviews or write books or articles. For example, all our readings Jackie read today, and our closing words are by LGBTQAI+ UUs.

I’m still learning how to decenter myself, and whenever we are learning new things we make mistakes, we are awkward and clumsy. That’s what learning looks like. I invite you to join me in that learning. Whenever we discern that it’s not our turn to be in the center, whether that’s pride month when we are straight, or Black history month when we are white, or the high holidays of a tradition that is not our own, decentering is a choiceful action we take in the moment, not an erasure of who we are. We don’t need to deflate ourselves, or ignore our own voices, we only step aside for a moment; “after you” we say.

For example, as a feminist, I feel called to support other women to speak their truth in a society that has often erased women, has often asked women to prioritize the needs of others. It took me a while to understand the distinction between decentering and erasing. The challenges I face as a cis woman are not what we are about this morning. That doesn’t mean they are not important, it just means today I step back, and another time I step forward. Let’s imagine this morning I hear something in this service that challenges, or disturbs me, or delights me, or reminds me of a story from my own life. Perhaps it brings up questions I want to explore. That’s great! Now I need to discern, is this a moment where those questions, concerns, feelings, memories would rightly be at the center? If I discern that this is not the moment, I can also ask, where are those spaces where my concern can rightly be at the center? I could bring it to my therapist , spiritual director, (Ministers love that stuff too) Perhaps there are other bi cis women who could listen or help me think things through. Choosing to decenter yourself doesn't mean you don't process your stuff or have your needs, just that you are offering the central space to those who most need it in the moment.

This month as we celebrate Pride, I invite us to step up and step back. When you feel called to share your truth as an LGBTQAI+ person, in invite you to step up and take the risk, to share your voice, to share your stories of struggle and celebration. When you discern that this is a time to decenter yourself, I invite you to step back and leave space for other voices, then to listen deeply and support and amplify those voices that need centering. As a community committed to the work of anti-oppression, we are all invited to this dance, even though sometimes we may trip over each other’s feet. The more we dance together, stepping up and stepping back, the more graceful our dance of centering and decentering will become, until every dancer has a moment to shine as only they can.

---

[i] https://www.transformingheartscollective.org/stories/2019/3/8/tips-for-talking-about-the-uu-world-article

[ii] https://time.com/5601227/two-black-trans-women-murders-in-dallas-anti-trans-violence/

https://yourdream.liveyourdream.org/2021/06/violence-against-transgender-women-a-growing-crisis/

https://www.cohsf.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/The-Crisis-of-Transgender-Homelessness.pdf

[iii] https://www.cnn.com/2022/03/01/us/texas-transgender-family-investigation-lawsuit/index.html

[iv] In our UU Minister's association we have adopted something called the “progressive stack” which invites the people to speak first who have historically marginalized identities. We hear a lot of words from cis white people all day long, it’s good to center folks we don’t hear as often, to hear those voices first.

 [v] https://www.bustle.com/p/how-to-participate-in-pride-without-making-it-about-you-9548726

Like Shadow Puppets

One morning this past week the dogs got me up way too early, and there followed the usual daily conundrum- our rescue dog Rosie is afraid to go downstairs. She wants to go outside with us, she wants help, but also she’s afraid of being picked up or touched. This negotiation is particularly challenging when one is bleary eyed in the early morning. I became frustrated and impatient with the dogs. As I went about my morning chores, I noticed I was also angry at the practitioner who couldn’t fit me into her schedule, the wedding inquiry I was playing phone tag with, and the writers of my TV show that had “ruined” the season with their bad decisions. I have a guideline for myself- if I am angry with one person, maybe it’s about them. If I’m angry with everyone that’s about me. At its simplest level, that’s projection.

Fortunately, on this morning, I noticed the pattern of anger I had projected externally around me, and then traced it backwards to its source inside me. In this case, so you don’t worry, I took an early morning walk to the creek all by myself and found myself standing still watching the sun and the quiet birds on the water. The anger had somehow run its course, or was perhaps had been trying to tell me that I needed a quiet moment to myself to move at my own pace, and when I returned home though nothing had changed- the dogs still get up too early and cannot go downstairs, the practitioner still can’t fit me in, the phone tag continued, but things looked different because something had shifted inside me.

All this year I’ve been taking a class called “Practicing Spiritual Direction in a Time of Deepening Shadow” One of our teachers, Don Bisson, shares his training in Jungian Analysis, and defines projection this way: “Projection is a process where an unconscious characteristic, a fault, or even a talent of one's own is seen as belonging to another person or object. It is normal and natural process and can be positive or negative in character. It is always accompanied by a strong emotional reaction to a person, object or situation.”

Miss Angie at Grass Roots Music Festival

Consider shadow puppets --  we never see the puppets, we only see the shadows of the puppets which were made by casting light on them. It might be fun to play around with shadows and light as we play around with projections today. We had these shadow puppets in our gift bags, but any object will do. If you get a good single light source, like a flashlight, you can see how the image changes depending on the angle and intensity of light. The puppet hasn’t changed at all. In this metaphor the light is coming from us- from our own light with which we view the world.

Is there someone in your life right now who really gets you riled up? I invite you to bring to mind a time when someone did or said something that really pushed your buttons- there was a charge of energy, a reactivity. I encourage you to pick an event that wasn’t too challenging, let’s try an easy one. Here’s an easy one for me. Recently someone in my dream group was talking and talking and just not listening or giving anyone else a change to talk. I felt a charge of anger and distaste for them. Now, because I’ve worked with projection a lot, and because I already know that I have a lifelong habit of pouring out all my ideas in words and sometimes getting carried away and not letting other people get a word in, it took only a fraction of a second to close the loop and notice that I was projecting, and why I was projecting, and to draw that projection back to myself. I don’t like the part of myself that talks without listening, it doesn’t feel good to see that in myself, it feels better to see it in my dream friend, and externalize that distaste onto them.

Sometimes it’s not so easy to trace the projection back to our selves. For example, I had a friend who was making bad choices with money, and hearing about her choices got me really riled up. Why? I wondered. I’m so careful with my money that doesn’t sound like me. I’m practically legendary in my family for being so conservative with our family finances, or “penny pinching” as others would say. It took me a while to return that projection back to myself- I put a lot of energy into being careful with money and even so it’s never perfect- no matter how carefully we try to make decisions there’s always that undisclosed fee or service in the final bill, or the purchase that seemed like a good deal but turns out to be a waste of money. I so strongly identify as someone who is careful with money, that it’s hard for me to be relaxed about the times when I inevitably waste money. It’s easier for me to reject that part of myself and see it in someone else. That extra charge of energy reflects that “push” of externalization.

The same can be true with positive projection. Call to mind now someone you really admire. My seminary professor Jeremy Taylor used to say that if we can notice something in someone else it’s only because it’s also present in ourselves. The trouble comes if we externalize that gift, we may never own or develop those innate talents in ourselves. For example, when my son was little, it was hard to be patient while helping him get ready to go to daycare in the morning while I was getting ready to go to work. I felt like I was the least patient person in the world. I longed to grow in patience. I noticed people who were patient and wished I could be like them. I was actually pretty hard on myself. Recently at the end of a circle discussion, one participant said she appreciated my patience and grace, and her words reached right into my heart. Someone had experienced ME as patient! I was so busy noticing patience happening outside of me, I never noticed it growing inside of me.

But wait, you might say, what about the other person, maybe they really are patient, or bad with money?” Jeremy used to say “Just because something is a projecting doesn’t mean it isn’t true, and just because it’s true doesn’t mean it isn’t a projection.” The invitation to notice projections doesn’t mean that person who we are angry with WASN'T rude or selfish, and my awe for people who care selflessly for others doesn’t diminish their gifts. This shadow puppet really is shaped like a gingerbread man, but when we work with projections, it’s a cool kind of mirror to help us see the parts of ourselves we can’t usually see, to help us grow in self-knowledge.

Rev. Jeremy Taylor, a UU ministry whose life’s work was spent developing and practicing “group projective dreamwork” grounded his practice in the inevitability of projections, and what they could teach us about ourselves. As soon as someone tells me their dream, and I picture it in your mind, it is no longer their dream, it is now my dream. My subconscious is taking their few words and painting in the details. It’s so natural to say “Your dream about waiting at the airport for your plane to come is about how your life is on hold because of covid” and maybe it is, and maybe it isn’t. But Jeremy suggests we own our projections by saying “In my imagined version of the dream, waiting at the airport is like how I am in this long period of transition waiting to get moving”

I’ve been doing dream work this way for so long, I now use that technique when someone tells me the story from their waking life. Have you ever noticed that on Facebook you can post a sentence or 2 like “Anyone know a service in Ithaca that gives rides to doctor’s appointments? I have a family member who can’t drive themselves and needs help” and the comments will fill up with really strong opinions and suggestions some of which seem to come out of left field- including sometimes harsh judgements about me or my family member, or some comments so far off base you wonder “did you even read my post?” Those are projections based on the pictures the emerged in my Facebook Friend’s minds as they read just those few words, filling in details that have no relationship to the situation in my life.

Knowing this, when a person asks for advice I will say in my mind, or sometimes even out loud, “in my imagined version of this situation, I can imagine myself wanting to call 211 to get more information.” Or “I imagine I would feel very frustrated that there is not more support for people needing to get to the doctors… is that similar to how you feel?” I’m still surprised when my friend says “no, that’s not it” but I’m ready – knowing that their experience of the world is different than mine. When they say “no that’s not it” I realize I am getting a glimpse of the gap between their experience of the world and my projections onto it.

Angeles Arian lays out for us a process by which projections are created, and then reclaimed or integrated.

The first part happens totally unconsciously, that part where we project without even realizing it.

But then, perhaps our hero on whom we projected perfect integrity, is caught in a lie, and we can make excuses “everyone lies sometimes, or “that’s just fake news” but each time the real human person differs from our projection, it weakens the projection’s power. We might get really angry at that person for what feels like a betrayal of who we thought they were.

Often, at this point, we will just find someone new to project that thing onto. But if we are ready to grow in self-knowledge, and on the look out for projections, this might be a chance to notice the gap. Perhaps we are able to recognize that it is a projection, “and we see that it is our own material. As Arian says this “ is the stage of grief: grief for the lost part of ourselves that has been away for so long; and grief from the recognition that we didn't see the other person for who he or she was, and now recognize the intentional harm that we may have done..”.

Finally we may come to “compassion for and integration of the projection. In this stage we have compassion for ourselves and others with similar issues. We model the quality that we once projected rather than continue to place the projection outside of ourselves. We move into a state objectivity and carry no charge one way or the other about what we once had projected.”

Don Bisson notes that integration includes “a conscious search for the sources and origins of the projection. This will also include the sources outside yourself, like collective prejudices and biases which influenced your projections.”

So whenever you are noticing that charge of energy about someone else, you have the choice of redirecting that light back on yourself. Notice any resistance you feel, the more you resist “no this is not about me at all, it’s ALL bout them” be gentle and just keep returning the light to yourself.

As Don says “The general result of projection is impoverishment of the personality.” Who we are is shrunken, constricted by whatever pieces of our full humanity we can’t own and integrate. What Arian calls “the lost part of ourselves that has been away for so long.” When we integrate our projections we get those lost pieces back. We grow in wholeness, freedom and consciousness.

This practice is important right now not only for our own personal and spiritual growth, but because our projections impact others. As Laurie Penny said in her piece about how women are objectified, that is, when the projections of others keep them from being seen in their own wholeness and subjectivity “There are none so emotionally blind as those who look at a person standing right in front of them and see a mirror, not a window.[i] Racism also arises from projections onto other people we may have never met, or know only superficially -- those unconscious implicit biases that lead us to jump to conclusions about people. Our projections directly contribute to the polarization in our country. This polarization where our side is “all good” and the other side is “all bad” is a collective form of projection.

Projections are rampant throughout the liberal conservative divide. Consider the common projection we northerners often make- that racism is a southern problem. – sure the history in the south is filled with terrible racist things that happened and continue to happen there. But did you know that “The most intense school segregation happens in large Northern metropolitan areas surrounded by white suburbs?“[ii] Someone once stated in a community conversation on racism “we have no racism here in Ithaca” and a person of color gently shared experiences of discrimination and racism over her decades living in my home town.

I’m reminded of Jesus’ admonition in the Gospel of Matthew “Why do you see the speck in your neighbor's eye, but do not notice the log in your own eye?” [Matthew 7:3] Projecting onto others it can be a way of avoiding seeing ourselves.

In his book "Where People Fly and Water Runs Uphill" Rev. Jeremy tells the story about how he developed created the group protective dreamwork process during his anti-racism work with white people back in 1969. When the group became stuck, Taylor suggested they begin sharing their dreams which included racial themes. The sharing not only shifted the dynamics among the people within the group, but also made a real difference in their work with communities of color, so noticeable was the change in how they showed up to their interracial work that the minister organizing in the black community said when he heard of Jeremy’s use of dreamwork as a tool for anti-racism “it sounds crazy but look at the results!” Jeremy explains the impact this way: “As the repressed seemingly ‘negative’ emotional energies that wore the masks of nasty people of other races in our dreams were admitted more into consciousness in the simple act of sharing and talking about them, the tendency to suppress and project those same energies out onto others in waking life began to diminish.” [p. 109] People looking at their dreams together realized that their dream figures actually had nothing to do with their neighbors in the world community, but had everything to do with themselves. “These ugly, scary, dark, powerful, sexy , violent, irresponsible, dangerous dream figures are vitally alive parts of my own authentic being and you know what – they aren’t so horrible after all”

My teachers have suggested that taking back our projections is one of the most important spiritual practices of our times, not only because of the polarization that happens when our projections are unacknowledged and unchecked, but also because whenever we lose or reject a part of our own self it makes us smaller and more constricted. So I encourage you, whenever you feel that charge of energy about the Other who fills you with anger, or makes you swoon with admiration, to remember the shadow puppet, and turn your light inward with compassionate awareness for yourself and others. As Jung says, our projections an be a helpful tool for owning and integrating the parts of ourselves we have rejected or neglected. As part of our commitment to spiritual growth and ethical living, may we bring ever more of our own selves into the light of consciousness.

---

[i] From <https://longreads.com/2017/11/07/the-unforgiving-minute/>

 [ii] https://publish.illinois.edu/halbaronproject/2020/06/25/northern-segregation-as-a-system-the-chicago-schools-harold-baron-1965/

https://www.colorlines.com/articles/just-facts-racial-resegregation-and-inequality-public-schools

Cycles of Sun and Moon

Years ago a member of my congregation asked “why do we still take summers off -- we’re no longer an agrarian society.” By which I think he meant, we no longer need all the kids to be home in the summers to help their parents harvest the crops. And certainly when I lived and worked in Silicon Valley the seasons were milder than here in the North East. If you lived in the south bay the summers could get hot a few weeks a year, but if you were working 12 hour days in climate controlled building, it seems like a valid question- why does it matter what season it is?

Here in the twin tiers where I live now it’s hard to ignore the freezing cold of winter, that creeps into our houses even if we have a robust heating system. Some snow storms are impossible to push through. And of course with our quick growing season, anyone who has a garden or a farm is like a sprinter at the starting block this time of year.

By being mindful of passing of the seasons of the year, by making an intentional practice of it, I’ve also come to notice the impacts of these cycles on my body mind and heart. If I find myself holed up in January wanting nothing more than to read a good book and go to bed early, I have seen that cycle enough to know “that’s just January.” Because I observe these cycles year after year I don’t take it personally when attendance at zoom events drops off the first beautiful days of spring. It feels good when we harmonize our goals and our activities with the cycles of nature, with the realities of the seasons that we share with all the living creatures in our eco-systems. And it’s better for our eco-system too when we don’t use extra energy to fight the natural cycles and seasons. This culture that pretends we can always produce at maximum capacity ignores the ancient wisdom of living in a body on earth, that there are times to produce, and times to pause and let ourselves and the earth recover, to enjoy the fruits of our labor, and to prepare for seasons which might not be quite so abundant.

The calendar we all use in the US at work and at school, is a form of solar calendar. It is calculated without any acknowledgement of the moon. For the most part the Christian liturgical calendar is the same way- in fact at the time when this calendar was implemented the church and government were very intertwined. Because this is the only calendar I’ve ever lived with, I didn’t understand until quite recently that our calendar, while culturally normative for us, is not universal, and could be otherwise.

The Jewish Calendar, for example, includes the cycles of the moon. A Jewish month always starts on the new moon- historically the day that the first little sliver of moon is sighted in the sky by 2 witnesses, and validated by the trained astronomer Rabbis. It blew my mind when I realized that a Jewish holidays always, by definition, take place in the same phase of the moon. Many of the feast days are on the 14th o4 15th of the month, and so will be celebrated with a bright full moon. But Hanukkah is celebrated on the 25 Kislev, and will always start near dark of the moon, and continue through the sighting of the new moon and the head of the month. [mind blown]

The solar year takes 365 days, which is how long it takes the earth go around the sun. The lunar year is about 11 days shorter. So the Jewish calendar has a little leap month “adar” every 2-3 years so that generally Hanukkah is always in the winter, and Rosh Hashanah in the fall. The fancy word for a calendar that is lunar but keeps the solar seasons is a “lunisolar” calendar. Many traditions use this combined approach, [i]Hindu festivals can be linked either to the solar calendar or to a lunisolar calendar, such that certain festivals always fall on a full moon or so many days after the new moon.

But the Islamic calendar is purely lunar, “based on the appearance and disappearance of the moon at the beginning and end of the month… It is for this reason that the beginning of Ramadan every year differs in relation to the Gregorian calendar, and as a result of that it moves through the four seasons.”

Many Wiccan, neopagan, eco-spirituality practitioners follow the cycles of both the sun and moon, without any attempt to reconcile them into a single system. There’s a cool feminist calendar We'Moon that tracks moon, sun and stars all within the Gregorian calendar. Musawa explains that “We experience each of these cycles in the alternating rhythms of day and night, waxing and waning, summer and winter. The Earth/Sun/Moon are our inner circle of kin in the universe. We know where we are in relation to them at all times by the dance of light and shadow as they circle one another. The Eyes of Heaven as seen from Earth, the moon and the sun are equal in size: “The left and right eyes of heaven,” according to Hindy (eastern) astrology. Unlike the solar dominated calendars of Christian (western) patriarchy, We’Moon looks at our experience through both eyes at once.”[ii] [iii]

I thought for a while I hoped to be part of a full moon ritual group, many pagans are, but it hops around all over our solar calendar, and bumps up against our “Third Thursday” way of scheduling. It’s challenging to observe a lunar calendar when you live in a culture whose official government function (like schools and government offices) all follow an exclusively solar calendar. Our Gregorian calendar was introduced by pope Gregory in 1582, and adopted by the British empire on behalf of its colonies in 1752 as part of the cultural hegemony of empire, erasing local and cultural difference to increase centralized control.

Because so many traditions around the world use a lunar calendar, or some combination of lunar and solar, it is actually quite curious that we mostly ignore the moon here in our culture. Because the moon is often associated with the female aspects, and because the cycles of the moon are traditionally linked to the menstrual cycle of women in the middle of life, many feminists and pagans feel this is part of the patriarchal hegemony, erasing the feminine, and so honor the cycles of the moon as a way of remembering the feminine. There is a common noticing in feminist and eco-spirituality and in Jungian thought that there is a symbolic linking of women with the earth and her cycles, that our western culture has for the past millennia have relegated both women and nature in the “shadow” -the unseen rejected part of our culture. It follows logically that a culture that de-centers non-male bodies and nature would culturally ignore the cycles of the moon.

The indigenous people of the Americas noticed the cycles of the moon, and though each tribal culture is unique, it seems that most tribes also follow a lunar calendar of 28 days each, adding an extra month every 3 years to keep the moons in their season, because the names of the moons and what they meant were deeply connected to the local seasons. So for example the Ojibwe people (northern plains and Midwest) in their western dialect name their months (starting with the full moon the month  I call January):

• Great Spirit Moon
• Suckerfish Moon
• Snowcrust Moon
• Sugarbushing Moon
• Budding Moon
• Strawberry Moon
• Raspberry Moon
• Ricing Moon
• Leaves Turning Moon
• Falling Leaves Moon
• Freezing Over Moon
• Little Spirit Moon

Whereas in their neighbors in the Cree nation (mostly Canada) [learn more here]

• FROST EXPLODING MOON - Trees crackle from cold temperatures and extreme cold starts
• THE GREAT MOON - Animals do not move around much and trappers have little chance of catching them.
• EAGLE MOON - Month the eagle returns
• GOOSE MOON - Month the geese return and indication of the coming of spring
• FROG MOON - Arrival of warm weather and open water. Frogs begin to become active in ponds and swamps.
• EGG LAYING MOON - Month when the birds and water fowl begin to lay their eggs
• FEATHER MOULTING MOON - Month when young fowl are moulting
• FLYING UP MOON - When the young fowl are ready to fly
• RUTTING MOON - the bull moose scrapes the velvet from antlers as a sign of mating to begin
• MIGRATING MOON - Month when birds begin their flight south
• FREEZE UP MOON -Month when lakes and rivers start to freeze
• FROST MOON - Month when frost sticks to leaves and other things outside

Notice how the one naming tradition names and notices the seasons of the plants, and the other focus on birds and other 4 legged beings. One of the power of calendars is helping us remember important things. I notice that my calendar reminds me when the banks are closed, and some important moments in American history, but our neighbors are sure to remember when ricing season is, or when the birds are laying their eggs. Calendars have power in our collective memory. Religious traditions are often have an important role in tracking cycles because tradition takes the long view, and remembers larger patterns. How helpful it has always been, and still is, to remember that it is a natural part of the cycle for winter in our part of the world to be cold, to be a time of short days crackling ice and scarcity of food. Religious traditions also help us remember that eventually Strawberry season returns, not only in the physical world but also in the seasons of our spirit.

The Haudenosaunee Confederacy, whose lands we in Cortland and Ithaca inhabit, holds 13 ceremonies each year in honor of the 13 full moons, not spread out evenly like in the Neo-Pagan calendar, but honoring important milestones in the seasons- there are a number of them in May including the “Sun and Moon dance – Beginning of May to give thanks to the sun and second week of May to give thanks to the moon in the morning and evening respectively”[iv] How lovely that today’s service coincides to the time of the Moon days in the Haudenosaunee tradition.

That’s a lot of information, and I share it this morning for 3 reasons:
First, because among the sources of our tradition we draw from

·Wisdom from the world's religions which inspires us in our ethical and spiritual life;
·Spiritual teachings of earth-centered traditions which celebrate the sacred circle of life and instruct us to live in harmony with the rhythms of nature

Our living tradition encourages us to seek out and learn from these important sources of wisdom.

Second, because as part of dismantling white supremacy culture, it’s important to notice that while our culture seems normal to us, it is just culture, created by humans over time, and it is just one of many. Looking at the great diversity of calendars in our world gives us a concrete example of how our culture shapes us in ways that are invisible to us unless we can step outside them. Notice how we center the Gregorian calendar, and this makes it hard work for our friends and neighbors and members who have a practice aligned with the lunar calendar. How challenging it is, for example, to celebrate Ramadan in a country that doesn’t include this sacred time in our natural calendar.

Third, I hope to encourage you to notice the impacts of cycles on your own body heart and spirit. I encourage you to take up a practice of noticing natural cycles that are new to you. If you are stuck in a climate conditioned cubical with artificial lighting all day and all year long, noticing the seasonal changes or maybe the moon is something you might notice each day get off work. This time of year can be a great time to watch the sunset. If you are normally in the garden this time of year, perhaps you would like to gaze up at the sky and see what you notice there each time you pause to give your back a break. Noticing natural cycles is a form of contemplative practice- a long loving look at the real. Notice the beauty of each season in turn. Notice when you live in harmony with natural cycles how that feels, and when you have to push against them how that feels.

When I was on sabbatical many years ago at the University of Creation Spirituality, our teacher Larry Edwards encouraged us to notice the cycles of the moon. I explained that the moon was never where I thought it would be, and I was having trouble figuring out where it would be when. He encouraged me to go stand someplace outside each evening at the same time, and just track the moon in the sky. Unfortunately, between the wonderful tree cover, the hills and the fog, I only ever saw the moon a couple of days a month when it appeared in the gap overhead. 20 years later I’m still looking, and though I can’t even remember the basics like “ the new moon rises and sets with the sun, the full moon rises before sunset”, or even what direction to look, the symbolism of waxing and waning has helped me grow in wisdom. Brandi Plaster of MoonCrafted Essentials encourages us to align our own rhythms with the cycle of the moon; there are times to start things, and times to wrap things up. When I have a deep desire to clean out the mud porch, I go with it, and when I am excited to start a new project I start it, and don’t get down on myself for the pile on the mud porch. Sometimes that syncs up with the moon, and sometimes it doesn’t, just as the seasons of our spirits don’t always sync up with the seasons of our eco-system. But I hope each of you will be encouraged to notice what you notice about the cycles and seasons of moon and sun, and those of you who are traveling this spring and summer, I encourage you to notice how those cycles are different in the places and cultures you travel to.

We often mark changes in season here in our Sunday services, -- as a religious tradition do our part in tracking and remembering (or ignoring) larger cycles and patterns. The cycles of the sun show us that there are times of growing and dormancy, of bright warm light and cold delicate light. They remind us that there are shorter cycles and longer cycles that sometimes sync up and sometimes move out of sync. The moon teaches us that things not only grow but become small, that things disappear and return. The cycles of Sun and Moon teach us about impermanence, but also the show us what lasts, helping us imagine the cycles that were repeating long before we were born, and will keep cycling long after our brief and beautiful lives. 

Notes
[i] Notice that it says “appearance” Often if you go to look up the date of a Muslim holiday you get only an estimate on some sources, because some Islamic sects use the actual sighting of the moon, while others use a table to set the dates.
https://islamqa.info/en/answers/170701/the-reason-why-ramadan-changes-every-year-in-relation-to-the-gregorian-calendar

[ii] Musawa c Mother Tongue Ink 2008 [p. 199]

[iii] Modern practitioners and seem to enjoy the mathematical precision of the modern astronomical calendars. We rely not on sighting, but on math and science. (It’s interesting to me that since I don’t do that math myself, I kind of “take it on faith” when the solstices and full moons will be, as opposed to our neighbors who rely on the evidence of their own eyes)

[iv] https://www.haudenosauneeconfederacy.com/ceremonies/