Opening Ceremony Readings with the Feast Faculty:
Sue: Divine Mother – Love Within by Tina Turner
Lauri: Indigenous/Earth Wisdom – Hawaiian Prayer
Sarah: Christian – Prayer of St. Francis
Allaire: Quaker – While Waiting by Mary Ann Peterson
Shey: Tibetan Buddhist – Mirror of My Being by Shey Khandro
Suzi: Celtic Tradition – John O’Donohue
Stacie: Sufi/Mystic – Rumi – I am not this body
Anne: Jewish – Rabbi Rami Shapiro – Peace Prayer
Donita: Vedanta – Radiance Sutras
Link to the Opening Ceremony Recording
Divine Mother: Love Within by Tina Turner
In the beginning, we all depend on the attention and affection of our mother and other caring people.
Without loving care, we cannot survive, without loving action, we miss the meaning of life.
A disposition towards love and compassion is part of our biology and how we develop.
Believing after all I have lived that love is within me and has never left me.
I go beyond my history, beyond my life experience, my worlds and my sufferings,
I go beyond, beyond, beyond, beyond.
This music is in praise towards all divine mothers, goddesses and saints.
To the female power within all of us.
It will help you to nourish values like love, kindness and compassion, forgiveness and tolerance.
Go to the Mother within you, go inside of you.
True values you will find, beyond, beyond, beyond, beyond.
The mother is inside all of us, female or male, unconditional love is so powerfully shown in the symbols of divine mother of all faiths and cultures, religious and non-religious.
She is the inspiration and the embodiment of unconditional love.
I invite you with all my heart to seek for the mother inside of you.
That all embracing sound of the heart, which unites us all.
Listen deeply.
When words fail, music speaks.
Beyond, beyond, beyond, beyond.
Earth Wisdom: Hawaiian Prayer for our Planet
Let us give thanks for the world around us.
Thanks for all the creatures, stones and plants
Let us learn their lessons and seek their truths,
So that their path might be ours,
And we might live in harmony, a better life.
May the Earth continue to live,
May the heavens above continue to live,
May the rains continue to dampen the land,
May the wet forests continue to grow,
Then the flowers shall bloom
And we people shall live again.
Christianity: Prayer of St. Francis
Lord, make me an instrument of your peace;
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
Where there is injury, pardon;
Where there is doubt, faith;
Where there is despair, hope;
Where there is darkness, light;
And where there is sadness, joy.
O Divine Master,
Grant that I may not so much seek
To be consoled, as to console;
To be understood, as to understand;
To be loved, as to love;
For it is in giving that we receive,
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
And it is in dying that we are born to Eternal Life.
Amen.
Quaker: While Waiting by Mary Ann Petersen
Things to do While Waiting
Interview your walls, doors, circulation, and power source
Plane down resentments
Drain sorrows
Sweep out excuses
Hang injuries on the line to blow away
Restructure internal combustion
While waiting, there are things to do
Arrange for pick-up of unfinished business dating back from 1 to 100 years
Discontinue delivery of negativity
Review user agreements and delete outdated engagements
Weed out clumps of resistance to life as movement
Release fermented ruminations
Forgive blocked paths and start new ones
Adopt several life tonics
Switch out inner tension belts for softer flexible bio bands
If you’re still waiting for
A season
Someone else to do something
All to be revealed
A feeling
A sign
The weather
Stars to align
Resolution
Validation, recognition, evolution,
Stop waiting.
Tibetan Buddhist: Mirror of My Being by Shey Khandro
I call to you as mirror of my being
Abandon false beliefs of separation
Know that as I am you are
False story of world as solid and real
Transitory, movement of mind
I am you, look deeply, breathe
A call to the savioress within
Deep reflection, inner knowing
Heed the call, rise to action
Mother of all life
The time is now Warrior Goddess
We call you to action
No matter your way
Peaceful or bold, we need you
Bring your light, your glory, your knowing
And yes, even your doubt
Sisters of Light streaming
Abandon ways of folly
Yours is the birthright of all beings
Yours is a knowing on the edge of revelation
You see differences, separation
Illusion of the senses
Look deeper
Stand, we need you
Light of the world
Knower of Truth
Step through the veil
If tangled, breathe
Relax, know I am you
You are Goddess
We are hope of the world
Stand tall in this body
Gift for this life
Own your strength of presence
You are here
You are now
Glory on high, you put me there
Holding space for your knowledge of truth
I as reflection of you
Divinity no less
Warm is my breath as is yours
Breathe me, I breathe you
Light shining bright, my light is your light
One substance, no separation
Taste, knowing revealed
I am you
You are Love
The time is now.
“Mirror of My Being, I Call to You” is a heartfelt invocation written by Sherab Shey Khandro, drawing from her years of devotion as a Tibetan Buddhist nun in the Mahayana tradition of Vajrayana Buddhism, within the Nyingma school. In this tradition, the Guru embodies the enlightened mind, inseparable from deities like Mother Tara, who represents wisdom, compassion, and the boundless potential within all beings. This invocation reflects Shey Khandro’s profound connection to her Guru, whose presence awakened her heart to the suffering of all beings and inspired her Bodhisattva vow—a commitment to awakening for the benefit of all. The piece serves as both a prayer and a call to action, inviting us to recognize our shared truth, to step into our innate wisdom, and to act with love and courage in service to the world.
Sherab Khandro is a contemplative artist, writer, and speaker devoted to creating works reflecting the timeless wisdom of compassion and interconnectedness. Formerly a Tibetan Buddhist nun, she now shares teachings and inspiration drawn from her spiritual path to foster greater understanding, love, and transformation in the world.
Celtic Tradition: Courage by John O’Donohue
This is the time to be slow,
Lie low to the wall
Until the bitter weather passes.
Try, as best you can, not to let
The wire brush of doubt|
Scrape from your heart
All sense of yourself
And your hesitant light.
If you remain generous,
Time will come good;
And you will find your feet
Again on fresh pastures of promise,
Where the air will be kind
And blushed with beginning.
May I have the courage today
To live the life that I would love,
To postpone my dream no longer
But do at last what I came here for
And waste my heart on fear no more.
From To Bless the Space Between Us: A Book of Blessings
Sufi Tradition: I Am Not This Body by Rumi
I am not this body,
but the soul that dwells within,
unseen, untouched,
and free of the confines of flesh.
I am the spark of divinity,
the flame that dances in the heart of all things,
not bound by time or space,
but infinite, eternal, and whole.
This body—
it is but a house I reside in,
a vessel that carries me through the world,
but it is not who I am.
I am the breath that moves within it,
the pulse of life that fills its veins,
and yet I am beyond it.
Do not mistake the outward form
for the essence that animates it.
The body is the shell,
the soul is the pearl within.
The form may fade,
but the light of the soul
shines ever bright,
radiating the truth of our divine nature.
The body will return to the earth,
but the soul,
the soul is beyond birth and death.
It is a river flowing
from the heart of the divine,
carrying with it the eternal song of love.
It is not bound by the flesh,
for it was never of this world,
but a fragment of the divine,
waiting to return home.
Jewish: Peace Prayer by Rabbi Rami Shapiro
We call upon the Source and Substance of all reality,
to open our bodies, hearts, and minds to the divine manifest in and as all beings.
We pray for peace: peace in our hearts, peace in our homes, peace in our communities,
for only in this way can we make peace in the world.
We pray for spaciousness of mind
to know that diversity is divinity manifest in time and space.
We pray for spaciousness of heart
to know that love is greater than fear.
We pray for the humility
to know we do not know.
We pray for the courage to question our certainties.
We pray for the strength to put down our prejudices.
We pray for the clarity to see in the other
the infinitely faceted Face of God.
We pray for the grace to awaken to the truth of One God,
One Humanity, One World, and One Moral Code:
justice and compassion for all.
May each of us attend to the deepest and best within us
that we might weave the diverse and unique threads of our lives
into a universal tapestry of wisdom, kindness and peace.
We ask for this in all Your Names:
those we know and those we do not;
those we can speak and those we cannot;
those we remember and those we have forgotten;
those we are taught and those we have yet to learn;
and in that Great name beyond naming:
the silence that embraces all things in wonder.
Vedanta: The Radiance Sutras: The yoga of wonder & delight by Lorin Roche
Wherever, whenever you feel carried away,
Rejoicing in every breath,
There, there is your meditation hall.
Cherish these times of absorption-
Rocking the baby in the silence of night,
Pouring water into a crystal glass,
Tending the logs in a crackling fire,
Sharing a meal with a circle of friends.
Embrace these pleasures and know,
“This is my true body”.
Nowhere is more holy than this.
Right here is the sacred pilgrimage.
Live in alertness for such a moment, my Beloved,
As if it were your one meeting with the Creator.