Returning Light · Our shared life
A place to listen.
A life to share.
Teaching, reflection, shared meals and embodied worship give our community its rhythm.
Community assembly
The house gathers.
The hall brings residents together for teaching and reflection. Shared meals and the work around them give members time to know one another outside formal practice.
Spiritual life continues through the ordinary care of the community: preparing a room, receiving another person and making time to listen.
Compassion
Intimacy as spiritual practice.
Compassion gives sexual expression a place in communal worship. A couple’s intimate act is witnessed by the community as an offering of honesty and embodied recognition.
Women guide the rite and choose their partners. Relationships and monogamy are honored within this practice. Women’s ritual leadership is part of the Order’s understanding of spiritual authority.
Calendar of Light
A rhythm through the year.
The Calendar of Light follows thirty-six ten-day periods, each associated with a quality of light. Teaching and ritual practice give attention to the turning year.
Work, reflection, intimacy and assembly share this rhythm. Each is part of a life in which belief is practiced regularly.
Witness & Return
Presence at the offering.
The Witnessing take part in the Order’s fullest understanding of offering. They witness the Ascension and learn the meaning of a life returned to its source.
Those who continue do so with this knowledge. The Returning have chosen their own Return.