John Beckett over at Under the Ancient Oaks asked me recently if my coven held open rituals. My knee-jerk response was “no, of course not, that defeats the purpose of a coven!” However upon thinking about it a little bit I remembered that we do hold open rituals. We don’t do it with any frequency, and attendance requires an invitation, but our open rituals play an important role in the health of our coven.
An open ritual in our coven isn’t quite exactly what we do for most sabbats and esbats, but it’s close. We keep some of our language guarded and a few of our more unique rites under wraps when we have guests over. We’ve got to keep some secrets! But generally what we do is a close approximation of an Oak Court ritual.
We generally open things up at least twice a year, with the Fall and Spring Equinoxes set aside specifically for open rituals. There’s always good energy at the equinoxes and they don’t have quite the level of expectation that sabbats like Beltane or Samhain do. An open ritual every six months allows us to see potential coven-mates with a bit of regularity too. If we only did it once a year I’d probably forget all of the guests who come over.
Open rituals accomplish all sorts of things in our coven, and I think they are a vital part of what we do. I’m glad that we don’t do them too often, but when they come around they are a welcome change to the status quo. There are many reasons my coven lets people come over for “open house,” here are some of them.
Bringing in New Members When you operate a closed coven bringing in new members can be challenging. We generally encourage prospective members to ritualize with us in public settings (our coven has a lot of people involved in large, eclectic groups). It’s an easy way to get to know someone and get attuned to their energies. However, the more eclectic rituals we participated in don’t always match with up with what we do in the circle. The only way to see if someone is a potential good fit is to expose them to how we do ritual.
When our coven was more of a circle all you needed to get in was an invitation from Jason . As we’ve progressed we’ve changed how we bring in members and now give everyone a say. If you want everyone to meet the person you want in the coven, you need to take them to open ritual. Potential coven mates should be compatible both in and out of the circle, meaning you should like them in both magical and mundane situations.
Open ritual provides an effective way to size up a potential coven-member. If they find themselves uncomfortable with our ritual language for instance it’s probably not going to work out. I’d rather realize this kind of stuff before inviting them to join our family.
We Want Our Friends to Participate My coven is a huge part of my life and sometimes I want to share that experience with friends and loved ones who just aren’t a good fit in our group. Not every person I love and respect was made to work British Traditional-Style Wicca, and that’s OK. We have a Christian friend who visits us twice a year for instance, she’s sweet and nice and looks forward to seeing us, and I love seeing her too, but she’s not ready to be a Witch and that’s fine.
Sometimes you just want to show your friends what you do every other Friday night, and it doesn’t need to go any further than that. We have a lot of “friends of the coven” who are comfortable and happy on their own path, but are part of our extended family none the less. Letting them visit a few times a year is good for them and good for us.
As a Courtesy to Others I live in an area with a lot of fantastic Witches and I try very hard not to step on their toes. When someone’s student joins our coven I like to invite that teacher to join us in ritual. I want them to know that their student is in good hands and are free to circle and study with whomever they wish. I also periodically like showing the people I think of as “teachers” how far I’ve come in my own practice by sharing our rituals with them.
I sometimes feel as if a lot of Pagan groups are in competition with one another for members and resources. That’s not the case in our coven at all. People are free to be in other groups and other traditions.
For Our Daughters and Goddess-Daughters There’s a wide range of ages in our coven from 26 to 76 (give or take a year or two), and we have members with children. I’ve always been a bit of uncomfortable with children in a coven setting, they are still members of the extended family. I think it’s important for kids to see what Mom is doing now and again, and to know all of us, and have a chance to participate periodically.
Because We Aren’t a Bunch of Elitists/To Lift the Veil of Secrecy I’ve been surprised over the last three or four years by the amount of hurt feelings having a closed coven has caused in our community. It never would have occurred to me to be upset about not being a part of a coven, but apparently it’s been a bone of contention where I live. Lifting the veil is a way to show people that we don’t take ourselves that seriously and no ill feelings were intended.
I also feel that my coven’s name, “The Oak Court,” is a bit pretentious sounding. I want people to know that’s not truly the case, its simply the name of the street my wife and I live on. People would ask our coven mates where they were going and they would reply “Oak Court,” it wasn’t originally supposed to be a coven name.
“Perfect love and perfect trust” is something I take very seriously. They aren’t words to be carelessly tossed about and they should only be said when one truly means them. I’d love to share them with more people, and open rituals open the door to that becoming a reality. Having a closed coven truly works best for “my family” but I still look forward to our open ritual nights.
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