Botanical gardens Photography copyrighted by Barbara Mattio

The Romans had a ritual of lifting nieces and nephews to the rising sun. This image bonded the sisters into the circle of family. These women shared in the fruitfulness of their sisters’ lives and symbolically took responsibility for all the children of the community.

Today, we are not bonded in our communities. There is freedom that few experienced in earlier times. But the price is the loneliness that comes from severed connections. We have lost the responsibility for ourselves and the other people around us.

Celtic woman

“This is the day when dawn
receives our saffron cakes
in her sacred temple.
This is the day which honors
the bond between sisters
and the freedom of all women.
There is no slavery today at the threshold of the temple. Today all women
are joined in the joys of motherhood:
for we hold up, not our own, but our sisters’ children to the sun.” –Ovid, Fasti

One Woman, One World, One Family, unending love.