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a Libra New Moon:  September 27, 2000 20:54 GMT 13:54 MDT 15:54 EDT 12:54 PDT 14:54 CDT 6:54 GST (9/28) August 14/15, 2000

Rituals lift us from mundane concerns and connect us to the greater flow of things.  Our MoonCircles CyberRitual is a monthly experiment in collective attunement -- to each other and the moon.  Across time zones, we collect our creative energies into a healing meditation, as a gift to ourselves and the world. At the New Moon we synchronize in real time "on the astral plane."  At the Full Moon, one by one, we greet Luna at moonrise from our respective spots on earth.  If you can't meet with us at these ritual times, feel free to harmonize at a time of your own convenience, so that our astral voices may continue throughout the moon's waxing and waning cycles, as in a round.

Libra New Moon CyberRitual

You may plan to join us at the hour of the New Moon, but suddenly find yourself surrounded by others, unable to light a candle or set aside a special place.  At such moments, clearing sacred space can be as quiet as breathing, and finding your center yet possible even when all is commotion around you.  If you've familiarized yourself with the flow of imagery ahead of time, you may still be able to add your spirit to our circle.  Otherwise it's perfectly fine to postpone your ceremony for another time.  (It will still work!)

Preparation
Before the exact hour of the CyberRitual, find a quiet place where you can protect yourself from intrusion. Then, as the Sufi teacher Pir Vilayat Inayat Khan recommends, take steps to "surround yourself with a zone of silence." Light candles and incense, or play a piece of contemplative music to help shift attention from the periphery, to the quiet center within. You may wish to recite a prayer or sacred phrase, repeat the New Moon invocation to calm your spirit, or practice the Libra Moon Meditations. Watching the breath - inhaling in, exhaling out - further deepens the energy. 

As you do any of these contemplative techniques, you may begin to feel filled with a mood of sacred expectancy. Like a curtain parting, imagine next that you are walking down a pathway through a forest. As you approach a clearing, you see a beautiful temple that, with its spacious interior and graceful columns, is open to the sky and surrounding nature. Within this temple sits a mooncircle of figures, immersed in meditation. Stepping up to the circle, you join in, finding your place among them.

Raising the Energy
As you join in this meditation, feel linked by the love encircling the group. Within the center sits a wise teacher - Aphrodite herself - guiding the circle in a meditation.  Recall sensations you may have felt during the meditations on the goddess Aphrodite, and the qualities of beauty and harmony that she embodies.  Today's New Moon meditation is on the practice of coming into balance with another -- the Aphrodite way.  Aphrodite smiles and takes a graceful turn through the circle, saying "Keeping your balance while dancing requires an awareness in the inner ear."  Then she stops and looks deeply into your eyes. "Keeping your balance with another," she says, " requires an awareness in the heart." 

She asks everyone in the circle to bring to mind the image of someone that they very much love.  As you do this, you notice a corresponding warmth building in your heart.  Over the next few minutes, strengthen this feeling by breathing into that space. 

The Heart of the Ritual
Aphrodite asks everyone to turn to someone else in the circle.  Allow the image of someone to appear to you.  You feel that your heart has been alchemically transformed:  feelings of empathy stream between you and your partner.   Aphrodite appears to be holding each of your hearts on either end of a scale.  Ever so gently, she tips the scales now one way, now another, as if pouring and measuring love between two cups. After a few minutes of this concentration, the scales come to a point of stillness.  You notice that the entire mooncircle is filled with love -- the love that comes from true understanding of another individual. 

You feel a new peace inside you.  You feel centered into the harmony of the universe.  Aphrodite stands before you and sends an imaginary pearl into your heart, saying "You need only to remember this pearl to return to this feeling."   Breathe into the pearl in your heart.  Continue this concentration for several minutes. 

Closing
Aphrodite raises her hands, signaling that the circle should rise.  Everyone bows to the center of the circle, then turns and bows to the person on either side.  Turning completely around, the circle bows to the world beyond the circle, vowing to offer this empathy to humanity.  Aphrodite sings a closing prayer.  Rising, give thanks for your participation in this ritual, then walk back down the path through the woods, come back to yourself in contemplation, and, finally, come back to your home and life.