Celebration & Ceremony
Every being deserves sacred ceremony as a way to celebrate life. From the beginning, humanity has infused ritual into ways of being from the most ordinary of daily activities (like expressing gratitude before a meal) to large life events like birth, marriage, and death. Religious institutions historically have offered rites of passage, using ceremony and ritual as ways to make meaning and mark important milestones.
But we live in a time where spirituality is evolving beyond religion. The Spiritual but not Religious (SBNR) movement is a rapidly growing segment of our population. For many, abandoning their religion of origin leaves a void. There is still a desire for spirituality, ritual, ceremony, and remembrance. And while some families practice no religion, other families merge in marriage and bring multiple religious backgrounds into a home.
My heart has been called to create authentic ceremony, ritual, and celebration. Every ceremony or ritual is written specifically for the celebrants. Through interview and conversation, I craft an event that is intended to tribute a sacred moment in life. I carefully choose words that honor your spirituality, culture, and tradition. We all deserve to mark these moments of transition with thoughtfulness. We deserve to treat them as sacred as they are.
Blessings
Blessing-Way for Mother-to-be
The Blessing-Way is a ritual which honors the transition to motherhood and celebrates the expectant mother as she prepares to bring her child into the world. It can serve as sacred moment for the new mother to reflect and consider her aspirations, and for her to feel the support and love of friends and family in a deep and profound way. It gives an opportunity to celebrate all that has come before and to move into motherhood with love and intention.
Baby Blessing
In most faiths and traditions, it’s customary to have some sort of rite or ritual with the birth of a child. From bris to baptism, families come together to express gratitude for this new life and to state religious intentions. Baby Blessings serve as a meaningful moment between the parents, family, and friends to formally speak their gratitude and aspirations, to consider what’s most important to them in raising this new life, to contemplate what they wish to teach this child and their aspirations for familial growth. The ceremony gives an opportunity for the parents to speak their commitment and for those they love to hear their heart’s desire and to give support to them.
Seven Year Blessing
Somewhere in their seventh year, children grow from their baby bodies to a sturdier, more solid version of themselves. Around this time in development, their frames shift, the adult teeth begin to emerge, and they become ready for another level of understanding. Many religions around the world mark this transition with their own ritual like 1st Communion in the Catholic faith. In Anthroposophy, at 7, a child enters the next 7-year cycle of development. In the Seven Year Blessing for your child, you are given an opportunity to honor them, their growth, and their achievements. It can serve as an opportunity for parents and children to recalibrate the family and their intentions. This Blessing is intended to celebrate your child and to bless them as they continue in their growth and life.
Home Blessing
A blessing of the home is a way to clear out the old energies of a house and to invite happiness, good fortune, love and harmony into the new space.
Weddings
The Wedding Ceremony can set the tone for an entire wedding celebration. It will be a lifelong memory for a couple as a reminder of their love. My work is to create a ceremony that captures the essence of the couple and that speaks to love and marriage in a way that is genuine and meaningful to them. I believe in the right for all people to marry regardless of gender, sexual orientation, or religion, and I strive to offer the couple an opportunity to think about what it is that could make their wedding most meaningful. I look forward to creating that for them with great joy.
Photo: Spagnolo Photography
End of Life
End of Life Ceremony
A most sacred ritual, the End of Life Ceremony gives all of us an opportunity to gather and offer love and gratitude to one who is near death. This type of acknowledgement is often only done at funerals or memorials. But the End of Life Ceremony includes the one who is transitioning and asks loved ones to give support. It gives the dying a chance to gather beloveds near. As an Interfaith Minister, my role is to call upon traditions that are meaningful to you, and to hold space for the family through ceremony and ritual to celebrate love and life.
Funerals, Memorials, & Burials
In this final rite of passage, we celebrate and honor the life that has ended. My role is to help you create a ceremony that is meaningful and authentic, and to lovingly hold space for the bereaved.