On Thursday November 2, Joyce Phelps, Linda Webster, and Mike Schultz, from Live Oak Unitarian Universalist Church, journeyed to New Braunfels to attend The Labyrinth Society’s 8th annual conference, also known as The Gathering. It was held in the T Bar M Conference Center, which has baseball and soccer fields, making it perfect for building lots of outdoor labyrinths.
When they arrived, Mike helped a
labyrinth for the Opening Ceremony. He and a group of four others spent an hour
and a half creating the Cretan labyrinth on floor of the sanctuary, using
painter’s tape. The Opening Ceremony was performed by Flordemayo, one of the
Thirteen Indigenous Grandmothers.
She had a couple of metal pods with which she blessed the participants. These
pods, which were about the shape and size of eggs, had metal skins and contained
pieces of meteorite. When she shook them, they make a tinkling sound and when
she tapped them together, they made a humming that could be heard across the
room.
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| TLS President Kimberly Lowelle Saward with Flordemayo's pods. |
Early Friday morning, Joyce awoke and walked the labyrinth in the Sanctuary again. She writes: "The labyrinth in the sanctuary was a powerful one for me and allowed me to receive direction from the grandmothers. It was built with the best intentions and the power from the opening ritual, I expect, has helped many of us to begin our journey towards our truth."
Mike left the second General Session early to meet with Steve Bosbach to help
build a Cretan labyrinth using an unusual material - electro-luminescent (EL)
wire. The wire itself has a phosphor core that is wrapped by a thin pair of
wires. A radio frequency is run through the thin wires and it induces the
phosphor to glow. (It is very energy efficient, as Steve has run his labyrinth
from a car battery all night.)
Meanwhile, Joyce attended a session with Lauren Artress, who started the labyrinth revival in the US. Lauren spoke about Hildegard of Bingen, a Middle Ages spiritualist.
The evening’s keynote speaker was Julia Butterfly Hill who brought
international attention to the plight of the world’s last remaining ancient
forests when she climbed 180 feet into a 1000 year-old redwood tree named Luna.
She stayed there for 738 days until an agreement was negotiated that provided
permanent protection for the tree and a 3 acre buffer zone around it. Julia
spoke a little about that experience, but she concentrated on her work since
then with environmental and social justice issues at her foundation
Circle Of Life.
After Julia spoke, the entire conference moved out to Steven’s Electric
Labyrinth to walk it.
Saturday was a full day of conference workshops. Linda says that her favorite workshops were "Paths into the Deep Heart", "Alchemy in the Middle" (chakra energy on the labyrinth), "From the Maze of Misery to the Path of Joy" (neurolinguistic programming for personal change using the labyrinth). Mike particularly enjoyed a presentation about the week-long labyrinth festival held in Cork, Ireland in 2005, during which over 100 temporary labyrinths were created.
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There were several unusual labyrinths on the grounds, including a Trirune Labyinth (one whose paths cross) and a shamrock labyrinth. The Trirune Labyrinth was created by Austinite Crow Mitchell and it's based on a Celtic knot pattern she found during her pilgrimage to Glastonbury Tor. Of the more common labyrinths, the EL wire labyrinth and the labyrinth made of Christmas tree lights stood out. |
That evening, the conference participants were treated to some gospel music with
rock and roll flair from LZ Love.
In the closing session on Sunday morning, Rebecca Rodriguez told the audience about her own spiritual journey, before the entire group participated in a spiral dance. When the spiral dance completed, those who faced outward where told that their goal for the next year was to continue the outreach of teaching about the labyrinth to others. Those who faced inward were to continue their own spiritual growth using the labyrinth.
Sadly, all things must end. As they drove back to Austin, Linda, Joyce, and Mike discussed their experience over the last three days. Linda and Joyce were already making plans to attend the conference next year.
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| Some of the Austinites attending the conference. |
More pictures from the conference:
Copyright (c) 2006, Mike Schultz. All images remain the property of Mike Schultz. Permission is granted to use the text and images of this website, as long as the text and images are unaltered, and proper credit is given as to their source.
