Heathens Break Ground at First Heathen Temple

Big news! Today, the Spring Equinox, in honor of the anceint ways, the Asatruarfelagid broke ground on the new heathen temple that they are building in iceland.

"GROUNDBREAKING FOR HEATHEN TEMPLE Excerpted from mbl.is

Mem­bers of the Ásatrú so­ci­ety [in Iceland] con­ducted a spe­cial so­lar eclipse cer­e­mony this morn­ing com­bined with a ground­break­ing cer­e­mony for the Ásatrú tem­ple set to rise next year. ...

"The good weather is en­tirely due to us," ex­plains [Ásatrú leader Hilmar Örn] Hilmars­son in a hu­mor­ous tone. "We or­dered the weather from the gods es­pe­cially for this event." Ac­cord­ing to Hilmars­son, over 300 peo­ple came to Öskjuhlíð, a wood­land cov­ered hill in cen­tral Reyk­javík, this morn­ing to ob­serve the eclipse.

The Ásatrú cer­e­mony be­gan at 08:38 when the so­lar eclipse be­gan, sym­bolic rit­u­als were per­formed such as the light­ing of can­dles and sac­ri­fices were made to the gods, of beer and wa­ter.

"When the eclipse was at its peak a fire was lit in the place where the tem­ple will rise and the vic­tory of the sun and light was cel­e­brated with po­etry read­ings, song and mu­sic. Drums were beaten and trum­pets sounded," ex­plains Hilmars­son who adds that the Ed­dic po­ems con­tain beau­ti­ful so­lar ref­er­ences. "The tim­ing of this eclipse is ex­tremely im­por­tant and laden with sym­bolic mean­ing."

At the close of the so­lar eclipse cer­e­mony, Mayor Dagur B. Eg­gerts­son took to the shovel for the ground­break­ing for the new tem­ple and the gath­er­ing was sanc­ti­fied by Hilmars­son. "It was a mag­i­cal mo­ment and I still have goose­bumps," he says, adding that the event ex­ceeded all his ex­pec­ta­tions.

Full article: http://www.mbl.is/english/culture_and_living/2015/03/20/pagans_light_fire_during_solar_eclipse/" (1)

This is very exciting! What do you guys think?

1.Norsemythnews

#norse #asatru #pagain #heathen #temple