Basics: the Clarene (Offerings)

For the next few weeks, we’ll be delving into the 30 Days of Devotion, a devotional writing project that helps us explore the gods we worship. We will do each of these for each of the Four Gods. If you are an Other Person or exploring the Four Gods, feel free to add your own comments – or join in!

If you have another topic you would like to see written on, you can email me (aine@daoineile.com) or message me on Facebook – but my writing will likely go to one of my other blogs, as we’re focusing on the Otherfaith at this blog for the time being.

This is the final week of my Indiegogo campaign to go to the Polytheist Leadership Conference this summer. Any contributions help, more than I can say! If you don’t want to contribute through Indiegogo, I also have an online shop.

Offerings

During offerings, we praise the Clarene first. We give her an offering of some sort of herb that lays on our shrine (we do not use the term ‘altar’ in the Otherfaith) for an entire week.

the Clarene technically gets the ‘first share’ of any offering, since everything we do must pass through her to reach the other gods. We do not, however, need to call to the Clarene first when giving an offering more fitting to the other gods; indeed, she may find some offerings the others receive to be repugnant. We simply must be aware that she is where we start, she is the gate-keeper, and forgetting her causes us to fall out of step with the Other People.

We will be focusing on concrete offerings rather than devotional activities in this post.

Offerings for the Clarene can be:

• nuts, especially
  • walnuts
  • pecans
  • cashews
• all fruit, but especially
  • peaches
  • apples
  • raspberries (these are a definite favorite of the god)
• milk/cream
• bread, especially homemade
• honey
• meat, preferably red meat
• tobacco (the plant, dried/shredded, and cigarettes)
• soil from a garden
• gemstones, especially
  • onyx
  • jet
  • emerald
• gold jewelry, such as gold necklaces or earrings
• iron pyrite
• black mirrors
• old motherboards
• lanterns (electric or oil)
• candles (any color)
• dragon’s blood
• sage
• peppermint
• chamomile
• wine, especially red
• beer, especially imports
• single malt scotch
• black hearts (paper, carved stone, etc.)
• flowers, especially
  • roses

Offerings you should not give to the Clarene:

• your own blood
• feathers
• poppy flowers
• teeth
• menstrual fluids
• semen

Discovering New Offerings

If you are interested in giving offerings to the Clarene, don’t be afraid to experiment. As long as you stay away from the items mentioned in the ‘do not’ list, you shouldn’t worry about trying new things. One way you can figure out what offerings a god likes, especially a new god, is to try things out. Be respectful as you go about doing so – which means leaving the offering out for the god to rub their energies on and disposing of properly (which, in the Otherfaith, means in the proper trash, recycling, or compost area).

Another way you can figure out what offerings to give is through the myths. There is symbolism there that you can look at, and you can draw inspiration from them. Sometimes they can be confusing, however; the myths may imply that the Clarene would want blood offerings, but it is her son the Laetha (who is drowning in blood symbolism) who receives those.

The best way is to just try. Strike out into the world with a brave heart.

Previous Posts

Basics: Four Gods (Redux) [Patheos]
Basics: Clarene (Origins)
Basics: Clarene (Myths)
Basics: Clarene (Family)
Basics: Clarene (Spirits)
Basics: Clarene (Names)
Basics: Clarene (Variations)
Basics: Clarene (Mistakes)

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Want to participate in the 30 Days of Devotion? Here’s a great link with all the prompts.

We are holding an Otherfaith discussion group every first Sunday of the month. Click here for more details, and send me a message or leave a comment if you would like to join!

New visitor and a little confused where to start? Head over to our About and Otherfaith pages, and then meander over to the beginning of our ‘basics‘ series. Any questions can be directed to my email aine@daoineile.com.

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