Ceremony Quotes

“When tea becomes ritual, it takes its place at the heart of our ability to see greatness in small things. Where is beauty to be found? In great things that, like everything else, are doomed to die, or in small things that aspire to nothing, yet know how to set a jewel of infinity in a single moment?”
― Muriel Barbery, The Elegance of the Hedgehog

“Everything is ceremony in the wild garden of childhood.”
― Pablo Neruda

“That, I think, is the power of ceremony. It marries the mundane to the sacred. The water turns to wine; the coffee to a prayer.”
― Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants

“The modern habit of doing ceremonial things unceremoniously is no proof of humility; rather it proves the offender's inability to forget himself in the rite, and his readiness to spoil for every one else the proper pleasure of ritual.”
― C.S. Lewis

“The more death, the more birth. People are entering, others are exiting. The cry of a baby, the mourning of others. When others cry, the other are laughing and making merry. The world is mingled with sadness, joy, happiness, anger, wealth, poverty, etc.”
― Michael Bassey Johnson

“Perhaps the individual is so viable a god because he can actually understand the ceremonial significance of the way he is treated, and quite on his own can respond dramatically to what is proffered him. In contacts between such deities there is no need for middlemen; each of these gods is able to serve as his own priest.”
― Erving Goffman, Interaction Ritual - Essays on Face-to-Face Behavior

“Watching the morning break, I realize again that darkness doesn't kill the light—it defines it.”
― Richard Wagamese, Embers: One Ojibway's Meditations

“That, I think, is the power of ceremony: it marries the mundane to the sacred. The water turns to wine, the coffee to a prayer. The material and the spiritual mingle like grounds mingled with humus, transformed like steam rising from a mug into the morning mist.

What else can you offer the earth, which has everything? What else can you give but something of yourself? A homemade ceremony, a ceremony that makes a home.”
― Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants

“I think it is in grief that we need some reminder of our humanity--and sometimes, someone to say it for us. Poetry steps in at those moments when ordinary words fail: poetry as ceremony, as closure to what cannot be closed.”
― Kevin Young, The Art of Losing: Poems of Grief and Healing

“There is no God in Buddha’s teachings. There is no religious ritual in Buddha’s teachings. All that there is, is simple “Karma” or “Work” – that is the “Dhamma” or “Duty” or “Religion” he preached.”
― Abhijit Naskar

“Ceremony focuses attention so that attention becomes intention. If you stand together and profess a thing before your community, it holds you accountable.”
― Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants

“Memory is tricky-memory for certain facts and or details is probably more imaginative than anything, but the important thing is to keep the feeling the story has. I never forget that: the feeling one has of the story is what you must strive to bring forth faithfully.”
― Leslie Marmon Silko, The Delicacy and Strength of Lace

“Love is the spice of life, sex is the spice of love and ceremony is the spice of sex - Ruala.”
― Jozef Simkovic, How to Kiss the Universe: An Inspirational Spiritual and Metaphysical Narrative about Human Origin, Essence and Destiny

“Every July, when Eli was growing up, his mother would close the cabin and move the family to the Sun Dance. Eli would help the other men set up the tepee, and then he and Norma and Camelot would run with the kids in the camp. They would ride horses and chase each other across the prairies, their freedom interrupted only by the ceremonies. Best of all, Eli liked the men’s dancing. The women would dance for four days, and then there would be a day of rest and the men would begin. Each afternoon, toward evening, the men would dance, and just before the sun set, one of the dancers would pick up a rifle and lead the other men to the edge of the camp, where the children waited. Eli and the rest of the children would stand in a pack and wave pieces of scrap paper at the dancers as the men attacked and fell back, surged forward and retreated, until finally, after several of these mock forays, the lead dancer would breach the fortress of children and fire the rifle, and all the children would fall down in a heap, laughing, full of fear and pleasure, the pieces of paper scattering across the land. Then the dancers would gather up the food that was piled around the flagpole—bread, macaroni, canned soup, sardines, coffee—and pass it out to the people. Later, after the camp settled in, Eli and Norma and Camelot would lie on their backs and watch the stars as they appeared among the tepee poles through the opening in the top of the tent. And each morning, because the sun returned and the people remembered, it would begin again.”
― Thomas King, Green Grass, Running Water

“Humans have historically used the arts in integrative ways, particularly within the contexts of enactment, ceremony, performance, and ritual.”
― Cathy A. Malchiodi, Trauma and Expressive Arts Therapy: Brain, Body, and Imagination in the Healing Process

“How but in custom and in ceremony
Are innocence and beauty born?
Ceremony's a name for the rich horn,
And custom for the spreading laurel tree.”
― W.B. Yeats

“Grandfather Shi must have loved Ita Thao. His relatives were certainly making his last hours there memorable ones. Though the ceremony did not have strippers (at least none that we saw), there was no shortage of other elements designed to produce 'hot noise' that's an indispensable feature of any Taiwanese funeral. Designed to celebrate the life of the deceased and ensure their smooth passing into the next world, Grandfather Shi's hot noise included gongs mixed with rigorous Buddhist chanting, pop music, karaoke, and later, a live band complete with drummers and an accordion. All of this was taking place under a covered tent set up in the alleyway next to the Cherry Feast Resort, where we'd booked a three-day stay in advance.”
― Joshua Samuel Brown

“Love is the spice of life, sex is the spice of love and ceremony is the spice of sex.”
― Jozef Simkovic, How to Kiss the Universe: An Inspirational Spiritual and Metaphysical Narrative about Human Origin, Essence and Destiny

“Love is the spice of life, sex is the spice of love and ceremony is the spice of sex, by Ruala.”
― Jozef Simkovic, How to Kiss the Universe: An Inspirational Spiritual and Metaphysical Narrative about Human Origin, Essence and Destiny

“I am looking forward to attending the bulldozing ceremony for the removal of all very high altitude manned facilities atop the known biologically toxic summit of Mauna Kea.”
― Steven Magee

“A rich marriage ceremony is a buffer for a bad coupling.”
― Mantaranjot Mangat, Plotless

“Dave had carried the Zen bell, and rang it every few minutes with the tap of a small hammer. The sound was clear and beautiful. The tone was harmonious and rung out as the sun rose over the water. Some thought the sacred arose when a local action mirrored a more universal rhythm—like that morning. The sun rose. The bell rang out. The druids walked a pattern which resembled the sun’s movement. All one event.”
― Ruth Ann Oskolkoff, Zin

“On one occasion, an ancient great-aunt of mine, hieratically assuming a head-dress of feather and globules of jet, required me to accompany her to the beehives. ‘But you surely don't need a hat, Aunt Jane! They're only at the end of the garden.’ ‘It is the custom,’ she said, grandly. ‘Put a scarf over your head.’ Arrived, she stood in silence for a moment. Then — ‘I have to tell you,’ she said, formally, ‘that King George V is dead. You may be sorry, but I am not. He was not an interesting man. Besides,’ she added — as though the bees needed the telling! — ‘everyone has to die’.”
― P.L. Travers, What the Bee Knows: Reflections on Myth, Symbol and Story

“We make ceremony with words even as our words can lead us to the hells of destruction.”
― Joy Harjo, Catching the Light

“Tonight, Tam will allow... great and terrible magic to enter his body,' Lucien said, staring at the distant fires. 'The magic will seize control of his mind, his body, his soul, and turn him into the Hunter. It will fill him with his sole purpose; to find the Maiden. From their coupling, magic will be released and spread to the earth, where it will regenerate life for the year to come.'

My face became hot, and I fought the urge to fidget.

'Tonight, Tam won't be the faerie you know,' Lucien said. 'He won't even know his name. The magic will consume everything in him but that one basic command- and need.'

'Who... who's the Maiden?' I got out.

Lucien snorted. 'No one knows until it's time. After Tam hunts down the white stag and kills it for the sacrificial offering, he'll make his way to that sacred cave, where he'll find the path lined with faerie females waiting to be chosen as his mate for tonight.'

'What?'

Lucien laughed. 'Yes- all those female faeries around you were females for Tamlin to pick. It's an honour to be chosen, but it's his instincts that select her.'

'But you were there- and other male faeries.' My face burned so hot that I began sweating. That was why those three horrible faeries had been there- and they'd thought that just by my presence, I was happy to comply with their plans.

'Ah,' Lucien chuckled. 'Well, Tam's not the only one who gets to perform the rite tonight. Once he makes his choice, we're free to mingle. Though it's not the Great Rite, our own dalliances tonight will help the land, too.' He shrugged off that invisible hand a second time, and his eyes fell upon the hills. 'You're lucky I found you when I did, though,' he said. 'Because he would have smelled you, and claimed you, but it wouldn't have been Tamlin who brought you into that cave.' His eyes met mine, and a chill went over me. 'And I don't think you would have liked it. Tonight is not for lovemaking.'

I swallowed my nausea.

'I should go,' Lucien said, gazing at the hills. 'I need to return before he arrives at the cave- at least to try to control him when he smells you and can't find you in the crowd.'

It made me sick- the thought of Tamlin forcing me, that magic could strip away any sense of self, of right or wrong. But hearing that... that some feral part of him wanted me... My breath was painful.

'Stay in your room tonight, Feyre,' Lucien said. , walking to the garden doors. 'No matter who comes knocking, keep the door locked. Don't come out until morning.”
― Sarah J. Maas, A Court of Thorns and Roses

“Not every ceremony has to be a giant festival.”
― Jessica Marie Baumgartner, The Magic of Trees

“Spring came and finally everything was ready for the official signature ceremony that I had managed to organize with the help of the brilliant Olec and his kind colleagues. The rumor that Mr. Delikatny would be forced to step down was spreading fast. I hoped for the best. Slowly, the large conference room at the Ministry filled up with the oblast directors. All of a sudden, someone came running to Olec and shouted ‘Minister ni pisal’ (the Minister will not sign). My Russian was still very poor, but I did understand ‘ni pisal’ immediately and also the consequences, if that really was the case. We would have to start again and redraft the Shareholders Agreement. I had to see the Minister at once, as every action we had scheduled following this signature session would be at risk. After hours of nervous running around by many civil servants, the Minister signed.”
― Ineke Botter, Your phone, my life: Or, how did that phone land in your hand?

“Did you hear that, Daddy? Ms. Rothschild wants to go to city hall. Please disabuse her of this notion.”
― Jenny Han, Always and Forever, Lara Jean

“Rites and rituals open hearts and clear minds. They help us embody reverence and allow us to get in touch with our emotions and desires. They provide safe ways to make change.”
― Ahriana Platten

“His whole life had been swamped with ceremony, and his happiest moments were when he was alone.”
― Mervyn Peake, Boy in Darkness