Winter Solstice*
Holy One of the turning earth,
we watch the daily pilgrimage of the sun
as its journey grows shorter and shorter.
Bears, bats, and hedgehogs rest
while swallows and swifts have
already migrated south again.
Cold air, bare branches, blankets and shawls,
the growing quiet calls us to our own retreat.
Then a bell rings out across the hemisphere,
the diminishment pauses, then slowly shifts
and we imagine our ancestors standing
in the heart of winter’s cold darkness
with faces upward in awe each year
as your brilliance begins
to brighten the sky for longer each day,
gold beams tumbling like treasure.
We know on this day the light will grow again,
a tiny seed at first, then a shy blooming.
Help us to see our own inner seasons
of darkness and light as the necessary gifts
they are of rest and illumination.
May we become this light for others,
to be a promise of radiance emerging
from every place that feels cold and dark.
Dearest dancing monks, artists, and pilgrims,
I love the quiet invitation of this time of year to descend into stillness. I will be leading an event this Friday for the Winter Solstice with my wonderful friends Deirdre Ní Chinnéide and Simon de Voil who are both deeply enriched by the Celtic imagination and spirit.
We will be honoring the ancient invitation to listen for the call in the heart of the fertile darkness. Imagine the ancient Irish – over 5000 years ago – constructing Newgrange and many other stone monuments aligned with the solstices and equinoxes. It is powerful to feel our connection to them by pausing and listening for the gifts this time of year brings.
This reflection is excerpted from our Sacred Seasons online retreat for the Celtic Wheel of the Year:
The Winter Solstice is another profound moment of pause and turning in the great cycle of the year. In Galway our apartment windows face east and south, so one of the great gifts I experience through the seasons is watching the sun make her pilgrimage across the horizon from summer solstice to winter solstice. It is quite a long journey, and on December 21st she will rest at her point furthest south, appearing to stand still for three days before making the return journey again in the long walk toward summer. It is a rhythm of journey, pause, and return, again and again. It reminds me a great deal of walking a labyrinth and the way I follow the path inward, pause and receive the gifts at the center, and then begin to move more fully out into the world carrying the light that is growing.
I love winter, especially Irish winters which are so rainy and grey, so conducive to lighting candles and making a cup of tea. I adore the bare branches that reach up to the sky, their stark beauty, the way they reveal the basics. I love the quietness of winter, fewer people outside.
When we recognize that spring and summer always lead to autumn and winter, in our own lives we will perhaps resist the times of releasing and resting that come to us.
To go in the dark with a light is to know the light.
To know the dark, go dark. Go without sight,
and find that the dark, too, blooms and sings,
and is traveled by dark feet and dark wings.
-Wendell Berry
This poem speaks to me most pointedly about what embracing the darkness means. It does not mean carrying a light into the dark, it means walking right into the darkness and exploring its landscape so that our other senses become heightened and attuned to the sound of seeds jostling deep beneath the black soil, to hear the slow in and out breath of animals in hibernation, to feel our own heartbeats and the heartbeats of those we love, to experience the pulsing of womb-sounds within us just before the water gets ready to break.
Winter invites me to rest and contemplation, to making time for quiet walks in the few hours of light. The God of winter invites me into a healing rhythm of rest and renewal, of deep listening in the midst of stillness, of trusting the seeds sprouting deep within that have been planted. There is a harshness to this winter God as well, winter speaks to me of loss, it is the landscape of my grief in all its beauty and sorrow.
The God of winter is also the God of breaking through into the heart of that dark season with the glorious illumination of the Christ child. We too are invited to ponder what is incubating within us and how we are bringing the holy to birth in our lives.
Join us on Friday for a mini-retreat to honor this sacred threshold moment. On Wednesday Therese Taylor-Stinson will lead Centering Prayer.
With great and growing love,
Christine
Christine Valters Paintner, OblSB, PhD, REACE
P.S. For our dancing monks in the Southern Hemisphere a blessing for the Summer Solstice is available here.
*Blessing written by Christine for a book of blessings (due to be published in spring 2026)
