Dark snow-covered evergreen path through winter woods

Category: Festivals And Gatherings

Is the Rainbow Family on a Watch List? What the Evidence Actually Shows

Add subtle government monitoring presence to gathering

While researching the Rainbow Family of Living Light for the previous article, I ran across a question that deserves its own answer:

Is the Rainbow Family on a government watch list?

This is one of those questions where the terminology matters enormously.

The Rainbow Family has certainly attracted the attention of police, land-management agencies and other government authorities. Large Rainbow Gatherings have been monitored, managed as public-safety incidents and involved considerable law-enforcement presence.

But that is not the same thing as saying that the Rainbow Family has been formally designated as a terrorist or extremist organization.

Based on the public government records I can verify, I cannot substantiate that stronger claim.

First, What Does “Watch List” Actually Mean?

People tend to use the words watch list very loosely.

Sometimes they mean that police are aware of a group.

Sometimes they mean that an organization has been investigated.

Sometimes they mean that authorities monitor an event.

And sometimes they mean an actual terrorism watchlist.

Those are very different things.

In the United States, the FBI’s Threat Screening Center maintains the federal terrorism watchlist. Importantly, the FBI describes that watchlist primarily in terms of people reasonably suspected of involvement in terrorism or related activities. The FBI also states that it does not publicly confirm whether a particular individual is on the list.

In other words, asking whether an entire loosely organized community such as the Rainbow Family is “on the watchlist” is already somewhat misleading.

The American government does maintain formal lists of certain designated terrorist organizations, particularly foreign terrorist organizations. Domestic terrorism is treated differently under American law and policy. FBI and Department of Homeland Security materials use definitions and classifications for domestic terrorism and domestic violent extremism, but that should not be confused with a publicly available list declaring every investigated domestic group to be a terrorist organization.

What About Canada?

Canada provides us with a somewhat easier question to answer because Public Safety Canada publishes a formal list of entities designated under the terrorism provisions of the Criminal Code.

The Rainbow Family of Living Light does not appear on Canada’s current list of terrorist entities.

That does not tell us whether an individual participant has ever attracted the attention of police or security agencies. Nor does it tell us what information might exist in files that are not public.

It tells us something much narrower and much more defensible:

The Government of Canada has not publicly listed the Rainbow Family of Living Light as a terrorist entity.

That is the statement I would be comfortable making.

But Governments Definitely Pay Attention to Rainbow Gatherings

This is where the story becomes more interesting.

Government attention to the Rainbow Family is not imaginary.

We have an extremely recent example.

During the 2026 Rainbow Gathering in Pennsylvania’s Allegheny National Forest, the United States Forest Service characterized the event as an unauthorized large gathering. Attendance peaked at an estimated 1,756 people on July 4.

The response was not simply a couple of park rangers stopping by.

The Forest Service mobilized a National Incident Management Team and worked with Tribal, state, county and local authorities. The stated objectives included public safety, law enforcement, reducing environmental impacts and protecting nearby communities.

That is substantial government attention.

But notice what the Forest Service itself calls the incident.

It does not call it a terrorist gathering.

It calls it an unauthorized group use.

That distinction matters.

Why Does the Rainbow Family Attract So Much Attention?

One of the major reasons is something we discussed in the previous article: the Rainbow Family’s deliberately leaderless structure collides rather spectacularly with government bureaucracy.

The Forest Service requires groups of 75 or more people using National Forest System lands to obtain a non-commercial group-use permit.

The Forest Service says the Rainbow Family has historically declined to obtain those permits because participants maintain that there are no leaders authorized to sign on behalf of the group. Courts have upheld the government’s authority to require the permits.

So imagine the situation from both perspectives.

Thousands of people potentially arrive in a forest.

There are questions involving water, sanitation, fire safety, roads, emergency access, environmental damage and the effect on surrounding communities.

The government asks:

Who is responsible?

And Rainbow effectively answers:

Nobody is in charge.

You can probably understand why that produces friction.

It also means that a heavy government presence at a Rainbow Gathering does not automatically tell us anything about terrorism. Authorities may be there because they are dealing with the practical consequences of a very large, decentralized gathering occurring on public land.

Monitoring Is Not Designation

This is probably the most important distinction in this article.

A group can attract police attention without being a terrorist organization.

A festival can have police present without being an extremist gathering.

A government can collect information about a movement without formally designating that movement as a security threat.

Authorities can prepare for an event because thousands of people are expected to arrive without concluding that those people intend political violence.

And an individual connected with a movement could theoretically be investigated without that investigation applying to everyone else associated with the movement.

These distinctions become especially important with something like the Rainbow Family because there is no conventional membership system.

If someone attends one Rainbow Gathering, are they a member?

If someone cooks at a Rainbow kitchen, are they a member?

If a musician performs regularly in the Rainbow community, are they a member?

If someone attended a gathering twenty years ago, are they still Rainbow?

There isn’t necessarily an organization issuing membership cards that can answer those questions.

That makes sweeping claims about “the group” particularly problematic.

What About Claims That the FBI Watches Them?

Here again, careful wording is necessary.

It is entirely reasonable to say that American authorities have devoted significant law-enforcement and administrative resources to Rainbow Gatherings. The 2026 Forest Service response alone establishes that beyond much argument.

It is also reasonable to recognize that a countercultural movement producing large, sometimes unauthorized gatherings over more than fifty years is going to generate government records.

What I would not do is turn the existence of government records, investigations, police involvement or event monitoring into the statement:

“The Rainbow Family is on the terrorist watch list.”

I have not found reliable public evidence supporting that statement.

There is another problem with trying to prove it: the FBI specifically says that it does not publicly confirm individual watchlist status. The agency also emphasizes that inclusion cannot be based merely upon religion, ethnicity, constitutionally protected beliefs or a guess or hunch.

So there are things we simply cannot determine from outside the security system.

That uncertainty should not be filled with speculation.

Why This Matters

This may sound like splitting hairs, but I don’t think it is.

Words such as terrorist, extremist and watch list carry enormous weight.

If we are going to criticize a community, we should criticize it for things we can actually document.

There are legitimate questions surrounding Rainbow Gatherings.

There have been conflicts over permits.

There are environmental and sanitation concerns when large numbers of people occupy public land.

There are legitimate questions about accountability inside a deliberately leaderless community.

There have been conflicts with neighbouring communities and governments.

There are also legitimate criticisms surrounding cultural appropriation and the use of Indigenous traditions that we discussed previously.

We don’t need to exaggerate any of that.

In fact, exaggeration makes legitimate criticism weaker.

So, Is the Rainbow Family a “Watch Group”?

If by that we mean:

Is this a movement that government and law-enforcement agencies are aware of and whose large gatherings have received substantial official scrutiny and monitoring?

Yes. That is well documented. The Forest Service’s response to the 2026 Allegheny National Forest Gathering is a particularly clear contemporary example.

If we mean:

Has the Rainbow Family of Living Light been publicly designated by Canada as a terrorist organization?

No. It does not appear on Canada’s current list of terrorist entities.

And if we mean:

Can we establish from publicly available evidence that the United States has formally placed the Rainbow Family itself on a terrorist watchlist?

I cannot substantiate that claim.

What we can substantiate is government scrutiny, recurring law-enforcement involvement and considerable official preparation surrounding some Rainbow Gatherings.

Those are significant facts.

They simply aren’t the same fact as being designated a terrorist organization.

A Useful Rule for Research

There is actually a broader lesson here that applies well beyond the Rainbow Family.

Investigated does not mean guilty.

Monitored does not mean designated.

Police presence does not mean terrorism.

Association does not mean membership.

And membership, where membership can even be established, does not make one person responsible for everything another person associated with the same community has done.

Those distinctions become especially important when researching alternative religious movements, Pagan communities and countercultural groups, because rumours can very quickly become accepted history simply through repetition.

There are plenty of interesting and sometimes uncomfortable things to investigate about the Rainbow Family.

We don’t need to invent another one.

References

Federal Bureau of Investigation. (n.d.). Threat Screening Center.

Federal Bureau of Investigation & Department of Homeland Security. (2020). Domestic terrorism: Definitions, terminology, and methodology.

Public Safety Canada. (2026). Currently listed terrorist entities.

United States Forest Service. (2026). Unauthorized group use (Rainbow Family Gathering): Incident update. Allegheny National Forest.

Inside the Rainbow Family: Spirituality, Community and Contradiction

Group of people sitting and standing in a circle around a campfire in a forest campground

The Rainbow Family: Peace, Community, Spirituality and the Problems of a Leaderless Utopia

Every once in a while, while researching one part of the Pagan and alternative-spirituality world, I stumble across another community that has apparently been sitting just off to the side all along.

This time it was the Rainbow Family of Living Light.

Not to be confused with The Family International, formerly known as the Children of God. Completely different group.

The Rainbow Family is harder to define because, in a very deliberate way, it does not really want to be defined as an organization at all. There is no conventional membership list, central headquarters, president, governing board or universally recognized leadership. Participants have sometimes jokingly described it as the world’s largest “non-organization” of “non-members.”

Yet for more than fifty years people associated with the Rainbow Family have managed to create enormous temporary communities known as Rainbow Gatherings. Researchers have consequently described the Rainbow Family as an intentional community, countercultural movement and spiritual community rather than a conventional religious denomination or organization (Berger, 2006; Walker, 2008).

And that makes it particularly interesting from a Pagan perspective.

Where Did the Rainbow Family Come From?

The first major Rainbow Gathering took place in Colorado in 1972. Its roots lay squarely in the American counterculture that had developed during the 1960s and early 1970s: communal living, opposition to consumer culture, experimentation with alternative spirituality, environmental consciousness, music festivals and the idea that people might temporarily create a different way of living together.

Cornell University’s archival collection on the Rainbow Family traces the first Gathering to Strawberry Lake, Colorado, and notes the influence of the large communal music festivals of the period. Instead of merely attending a concert and going home, however, the idea was to create a functioning temporary community based around peaceful alternatives to mainstream consumer society.

That first experiment did not disappear.

Gatherings continued. Regional Rainbow communities developed. Eventually Rainbow Gatherings appeared outside the United States as well. Canada has had its own Rainbow activity, including regional Ontario gatherings and the attempted 2013 World Rainbow Gathering on northern Vancouver Island.

So What Do They Believe?

This is where things become wonderfully complicated.

There isn’t a Rainbow catechism.

There isn’t a sacred book telling everyone what a Rainbow must believe.

You can find people influenced by Hinduism, Buddhism, Christianity, Paganism, Indigenous spirituality, New Age traditions, anarchism, environmentalism, yoga, psychedelia, communalism and various combinations of all of the above.

Anthropologist Adam Berger, who conducted doctoral research on the Rainbow Family, described it as an intentional society devoted to the pursuit of world peace through spiritual healing. Other academic research examining Rainbow Gatherings found significant religious characteristics without concluding that Rainbow represents a single conventional religion (Berger, 2006; Walker, 2008).

That distinction is important.

Rainbow is less about believing the same thing and more about temporarily attempting to live according to certain shared ideals.

Peace.

Community.

Sharing.

Non-commercialism.

Connection with the land.

Personal spiritual exploration.

Resistance to hierarchy.

And the idea, perhaps idealistically, that strangers can come together and construct a functioning community without reproducing all of the institutions of the society they temporarily left behind.

Building a Town Without a Government

This is probably the part of Rainbow culture I find most interesting.

A Rainbow Gathering isn’t simply several thousand people pitching tents independently in the woods.

Infrastructure develops.

There are communal kitchens. Water systems have to be established. Sanitation must be dealt with. Food needs to be transported. Medical problems occur. Disputes happen. Lost people need assistance. Camps develop around particular interests or functions. People arrive before the Gathering to establish the site during what is commonly called Seed Camp, and others remain afterward for cleanup and restoration. Academic descriptions of Rainbow infrastructure document kitchens, sanitation, water systems, work crews and numerous other functions required to make the temporary settlement work.

But theoretically there is no mayor.

Instead, people who take responsibility for making something happen are often called focalizers.

Decisions are generally supposed to emerge through councils and consensus rather than through majority rule imposed by an executive authority.

Need something purchased from outside the Gathering?

There is traditionally the Magic Hat, into which people voluntarily contribute money. That money can then be used for communal necessities. Internally, however, Rainbow culture has traditionally discouraged ordinary commercial buying and selling in favour of sharing, gifting and barter.

There is something fascinating about this.

Whether you believe it works perfectly is another question entirely.

But Rainbow Gatherings are effectively repeated experiments in temporary community building.

What Happens When Something Goes Wrong?

Here we encounter another piece of Rainbow terminology: Shanti Sena.

The phrase roughly means “peace army.”

It isn’t supposed to function like a conventional police department. There isn’t necessarily a permanent Shanti Sena force wandering around with badges. Instead, conflict and emergencies can produce a call for Shanti Sena, with capable people responding and attempting to de-escalate the situation.

Researchers have studied this as an unusual form of internal social control within an intentionally decentralized community. The system has sometimes worked cooperatively with authorities, while at other Gatherings the relationship between Rainbow participants, informal peacekeepers and law enforcement has been much more confrontational.

And this begins exposing the central contradiction of Rainbow culture.

If nobody is in charge, who is responsible?

That question follows the Rainbow Family almost everywhere it goes.

The Permit Problem

The Rainbow principle of having no official leaders creates a fascinating philosophical problem when it encounters the modern administrative state.

Someone has to sign the permit.

The United States Forest Service requires permits for large non-commercial groups using National Forest lands. Rainbow Gatherings have historically resisted that requirement, in part because participants maintain that there is no authorized leader who can sign a permit on behalf of everyone else.

The Forest Service does not accept that as an exemption. As recently as 2026 it reiterated that large gatherings require permits and that courts have upheld the government’s authority to enforce those requirements.

This has produced decades of tension.

From the Rainbow perspective, forcing someone to become the legally responsible representative of a leaderless gathering arguably destroys the very structure the gathering is attempting to create.

From the government’s perspective, thousands of people cannot simply arrive on public land and declare that nobody is accountable for sanitation, environmental protection, emergency access or damage because the group doesn’t believe in leaders.

I can understand both arguments.

Canada Has Seen This Problem Too

Canada isn’t outside this story.

In 2013 a World Rainbow Gathering was proposed for Raft Cove Provincial Park on northern Vancouver Island. Thousands of people were reportedly expected or invited to attend the remote location.

Local residents and provincial authorities raised concerns about environmental protection, sanitation, emergency response and the sheer difficulty of accommodating a large population in an isolated provincial park.

B.C. Parks ultimately closed the park. Authorities stated that rapidly increasing visitor numbers created risks involving public health, safety, environmental protection and preservation of park values. The Gathering at that particular location consequently broke apart.

Ontario, meanwhile, has developed its own regional Rainbow community. Public Ontario Rainbow Family material discusses recurring gatherings and the practical work involved in organizing them.

So this isn’t merely an American historical curiosity.

Where Paganism Enters the Picture

Now we get to the reason the Rainbow Family is interesting to me.

The Rainbow Family itself is not a Pagan organization.

But spend enough time looking around Pagan festivals, alternative spirituality gatherings, yoga communities, ecstatic dance, kirtan, transformational festivals, intentional communities and environmental spirituality and eventually some of the circles begin overlapping.

That isn’t especially mysterious.

They share cultural territory.

Nature as spiritually meaningful.

Community outside conventional religious institutions.

Ritual created through participation rather than clergy.

Drumming.

Fire.

Song.

Shared meals.

Circles.

Alternative healing practices.

Personal religious experience.

An often eclectic willingness to borrow concepts from several spiritual traditions.

Academic research into Rainbow spirituality describes precisely this kind of loose association of spiritual seekers rather than a unified creed (Berger, 2006).

That makes Rainbow culture familiar territory to anyone who has spent enough time around modern Pagan festivals.

Familiar, however, does not mean identical.

And Here We Need to Talk About Cultural Appropriation

This is one of the less comfortable parts of Rainbow history, but ignoring it wouldn’t produce an honest article.

Rainbow culture has sometimes incorporated supposed Indigenous prophecies, ceremonial language, talking circles, feathers, sacred fires and other practices presented as Indigenous traditions.

Some Indigenous people have strongly objected.

In 2015 Indigenous academics, writers and activists protesting a Rainbow Gathering in the Black Hills argued that participants were engaging in cultural exploitation and performing faux Native ceremonies on lands sacred to Indigenous peoples.

One particularly persistent Rainbow story concerns a supposed Indigenous prophecy concerning “Rainbow Warriors” who would someday unite humanity.

The problem is that research into the story has found that versions circulated as ancient Hopi prophecy do not have the Indigenous origin frequently claimed for them. Researcher Michael Niman traced a major source of the modern story to a 1962 publication by non-Indigenous Christian authors rather than an ancient Hopi teaching.

That is worth remembering within Paganism as well.

Something does not become authentic simply because it sounds old, mystical and Indigenous.

Respecting another people’s spirituality also means respecting their right to tell us when something isn’t theirs.

The Beautiful Idea and the Messy Human Reality

I think this is ultimately what makes the Rainbow Family worth studying.

It is very easy to romanticize it.

Thousands of people enter the woods.

They create kitchens.

They feed strangers.

People make music.

Money becomes less important.

Decisions are made through councils.

People meditate, pray, dance, sing, argue, fall in love, fall out with each other, make friendships and attempt to build community.

Then they dismantle the community and return to ordinary society.

There is something almost archetypal about that.

But human beings do not cease being human because they walk into the forest.

Leaderlessness does not eliminate power.

Consensus does not eliminate conflict.

Spiritual intention does not eliminate irresponsible behaviour.

Calling everyone family does not guarantee that everyone will behave like good family.

And believing that the Earth is sacred does not automatically resolve the very practical environmental consequences of putting thousands of people onto a piece of land.

Those contradictions have followed Rainbow Gatherings throughout their history and remain part of the relationship between the movement, public authorities and surrounding communities.

Perhaps That Is the Real Lesson

I don’t think the most interesting question is whether the Rainbow Family is good or bad.

That’s much too easy.

The more interesting question is what happens when people sincerely attempt to build a community around ideals of peace, equality, spirituality, generosity and freedom while deliberately removing many of the structures normally used to enforce responsibility.

Sometimes you apparently get something remarkable.

Sometimes you get chaos.

Frequently you get both.

And maybe that is why the Rainbow Family has survived for more than half a century.

It isn’t simply a festival.

It isn’t quite a religion.

It isn’t really an organization.

It is an ongoing experiment.

An attempt, repeated again and again, to step outside what Rainbow culture sometimes calls “Babylon,” enter the woods and ask:

Can we live differently?

The answer after more than fifty years appears to be:

Yes.

But living differently does not make the difficult parts of being human disappear.

And that, perhaps more than all the colourful clothing, drums, campfires and talk of peace and love, is what makes the Rainbow Family worth understanding.

References

Berger, A. (2006). The Rainbow Family: An ethnography of spiritual postmodernism [Doctoral dissertation, University of St Andrews].

Cornell University Library. (n.d.). The Rainbow Family of Living Light & Rainbow Gathering collection. Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections.

Falcon-Freeman, J. (2010). The Rainbow Family of Living Light: Anarchy, individuality, and community in a utopian experiment [Honors thesis, Louisiana State University].

Times Colonist. (2013, August 9). Editorial: A rainbow at Cape Scott.

United States Forest Service. (2026). Unauthorized group use: Rainbow Family Gathering incident update.

Walker, S. M. (2008). Broadening the spectrum: The religious dimensions of the Rainbow Gatherings [Master’s thesis, University of South Florida].

Suggested category: Pagan Community

Suggested tags: Rainbow Family, Rainbow Gathering, Pagan Community, Alternative Spirituality, Intentional Community, Counterculture, Spiritual Community, Festivals, Cultural Appropriation, Community, Nature Spirituality, Ontario Rainbow Family

Missed Kaleidoscope Gathering? Firelight Gathering Is Still Waiting Beneath the Pines

Group of people in medieval-style cloaks sitting around a campfire in a forest at night, playing instruments and holding drinks

So, you were not able to attend Kaleidoscope Gathering this year.

No worries. The Ontario Pagan festival season is not quite finished yet.

Perhaps you could not get the full week away from work. Perhaps the travel, preparation or cost did not fit your life this year. Perhaps a large festival simply feels like a little too much when you are new to Pagan gatherings or returning after some time away.

Whatever the reason, missing KG does not mean that you have missed every opportunity to gather beneath the trees, sit beside a communal fire, attend a workshop, meet other Pagans and spend a few days away from ordinary life.

There is another gathering coming soon, and its history is directly connected to an earlier chapter of Kaleidoscope Gathering.

Firelight Gathering will take place from August 13 to 16, 2026, at Whispering Pines Campground near Curran, Ontario. It is a smaller, quieter and more relaxed Pagan camping festival that may be particularly appealing to people who find the size and activity of KG intimidating.

What Is Firelight Gathering?

Firelight Gathering describes itself as a small and intimate Pagan gathering centred around camping, community, workshops, vendors, shared food and evenings around the fire.

The festival’s established traditions include:

  • A central sacred fire
  • Drumming, dancing and music
  • Workshops presented by community members
  • Local vendors and artisans
  • A Saturday community potluck
  • Vegetarian Stone Soup
  • A Saturday evening Bardic
  • The Fairy Tea Garden
  • Swimming and time beside the campground pond

The official festival description emphasizes that Firelight developed organically through the people who returned year after year. It is not built primarily around famous presenters, expensive performances or a schedule packed from morning until night. The gathering is organized around participation, conversation and the simple experience of being together in a natural setting (Firelight Gathering, n.d.-c).

That does not mean there is nothing to do. The 2024 program included rituals, yoga, archery, poi, meditation, poetry, craft workshops, a murder mystery, discussions about science and magic, the Fairy Tea Garden, Stone Soup, the community potluck and a noncompetitive Bardic. The schedule was varied, but it still left people time to camp, visit and relax (Firelight Gathering, 2024).

Firelight’s Connection to Kaleidoscope Gathering

Firelight Gathering is not an official department or subsidiary of Kaleidoscope Gathering. It has its own organizers, identity and traditions.

However, its origin is closely connected to KG.

Before Kaleidoscope Gathering established its home at Raven’s Knoll, KG was held at several different locations. One of those locations was Whispering Pines Campground.

When KG became too large for Whispering Pines and moved elsewhere, some members of the community missed both the campground and the smaller atmosphere associated with the earlier festival.

Firelight founder David “Hobbes” Hickey had regularly attended Kaleidoscope Gathering. In a 2022 interview with local journalist Gregg Chamberlain, Hickey explained that, after KG moved to a larger location, he and some friends began discussing what would happen next at Whispering Pines. Hickey decided to organize a new and smaller festival. He originally expected it to happen only once, but the event was successful enough that he continued organizing it (Chamberlain, 2022).

Firelight’s own account describes its beginning as a desire to return to Whispering Pines and camp with a spiritual community. From that beginning, the gathering gradually developed its own customs and personality (Firelight Gathering, n.d.-c).

A commenter responding to a 2014 article in The Wild Hunt described Firelight as being held on one of KG’s former sites and compared it to returning to KG’s earlier roots, calling it “intimate and warm” (Graham McKay, 2014).

By 2015, Firelight was being advertised as a “Pagan relax-athon” offering minimal programming and maximum relaxation (Morrison, 2015).

That may be the best way to understand its relationship with Kaleidoscope Gathering.

Firelight is not a smaller edition of the current KG. It is an independent community successor that preserved something of KG’s earlier, more intimate campground atmosphere.

From a One-Time Gathering to an Annual Festival

The first Firelight Gathering was held from August 16 to 18, 2013.

It returned annually at Whispering Pines through 2019. The 2020 and 2021 gatherings were cancelled during the COVID pandemic, but Firelight returned in 2022 with an expanded four-day schedule.

The official edition history records the following gatherings:

  • First edition: August 16 to 18, 2013
  • Second edition: August 15 to 17, 2014
  • Third edition: August 14 to 16, 2015
  • Fourth edition: August 19 to 21, 2016
  • Fifth edition: August 18 to 20, 2017
  • Sixth edition: August 17 to 19, 2018
  • Seventh edition: August 16 to 18, 2019
  • 2020 and 2021: Cancelled because of COVID
  • Eighth edition: August 18 to 21, 2022
  • Ninth edition: August 17 to 20, 2023
  • Tenth edition: August 15 to 18, 2024
  • Eleventh edition: August 14 to 17, 2025
  • Twelfth edition: August 13 to 16, 2026

The history shows steady continuity rather than rapid expansion. Firelight survived its pandemic interruption, returned to the same campground and retained the small festival identity that distinguished it from KG in the first place (Firelight Gathering, n.d.-c).

A Festival Built Around the Fire

The communal fire is more than evening entertainment. It is the physical and symbolic centre of Firelight Gathering.

During a normal year, people gather around it to drum, dance, sing, tell stories, perform rituals, reconnect with old friends and introduce themselves to new ones. Designated firekeepers tend the central fire, and the festival publishes specific firepit etiquette explaining how attendees should behave around it.

The importance of the gathering itself became especially visible in 2025, when a regional fire ban meant that Firelight could not have its central bonfire, campsite fires or flame candles. Rather than cancelling the gathering, attendees were encouraged to bring battery-powered lights, illuminated decorations and other safe substitutes.

People still gathered. Stone Soup was still prepared. The community potluck continued. The fire was absent, but the community that had formed around it remained (Firelight Gathering, 2025).

There is something worth remembering in that. A Pagan community may gather around a sacred object, a ritual space or a particular piece of land, but the relationships created there must eventually become strong enough to survive when circumstances change.

Firelight Gathering 2026

The twelfth Firelight Gathering is scheduled for:

August 13 to 16, 2026
Whispering Pines Campground
681 Concession Road 10
Curran, Ontario

Whispering Pines is approximately 80 kilometres east of Ottawa. The festival site describes it as roughly one hour from Ottawa and approximately an hour and a half west of Montreal.

As of August 3, 2026, the listed admission prices are:

  • Adult four-day preregistration: $100
  • Adult four-day onsite registration: $110
  • Youth four-day preregistration: $45
  • Youth four-day onsite registration: $55
  • Children under 12: Free

Shorter one, two and three-day admission options are also available. Preregistration is scheduled to remain open until August 10. After preregistration closes, admission may be purchased onsite, but the organizers state that onsite payment must be made in cash (Firelight Gathering, 2026; Firelight Gathering, n.d.-b).

Prices and event arrangements can change, so anyone considering attending should verify the current information directly through the official Firelight Gathering website.

What Should You Expect?

Firelight is a camping festival rather than a hotel conference or commercial music event.

You should expect to bring your own shelter, bedding, food, cooking equipment, drinking water, weather-appropriate clothing and the ordinary supplies needed for several days of camping.

The festival rules also contain several points worth knowing before arriving:

  • Attendees are expected to take their garbage and recycling home.
  • Children remain the responsibility of their parents or guardians.
  • The swimming area is not supervised.
  • Pets are generally not permitted, with exceptions for service animals or prior permission.
  • People may not be photographed without their consent, including when they appear in the background.
  • Sexually aggressive or inappropriate behaviour is not tolerated.
  • Some designated spaces may be clothing optional.
  • Outside firewood is restricted, and additional firepits may not be created.

Reading the complete rules and etiquette pages before attending is strongly recommended, especially for anyone bringing children or attending a Pagan camping festival for the first time (Firelight Gathering, n.d.-a).

Who Might Enjoy Firelight?

Firelight may be a good option for someone who:

  • Could not attend Kaleidoscope Gathering
  • Cannot take an entire week away from work
  • Prefers smaller gatherings
  • Is attending a Pagan festival for the first time
  • Wants time to talk rather than constantly moving between activities
  • Enjoys camping, shared meals, workshops and communal music
  • Wants to meet people without becoming lost in a very large crowd
  • Misses the atmosphere of smaller Pagan festivals

It will not provide everything KG provides. Firelight does not attempt to create a temporary village on the same scale, and it does not carry the same number of rituals, camps, traditions, presenters or simultaneous activities.

That is not a defect. It is the point.

Firelight offers a different kind of gathering: fewer people, fewer competing demands and more opportunity to sit down long enough to learn someone’s name.

The Fire Is Still Burning

Festivals do not always disappear when they move, change or outgrow a particular piece of land.

Sometimes something is left behind.

When Kaleidoscope Gathering moved away from Whispering Pines, the campground did not simply become an abandoned chapter in KG’s history. People remembered the trees, the paths, the water, the conversations and the feeling of gathering there.

Firelight grew from that memory, but it did not remain trapped in it. Over more than a decade, it developed its own regular attendees, traditions, staff, stories and character.

So, you were not able to attend KG this year.

No worries.

There is another path through the trees, another community preparing its campsites and another circle waiting to form beneath the pines.

The Firelight is still burning.

References

  1. Chamberlain, G. (2022, August 31). Gathering by the fire for a music festival. Tribune Express. https://online.flippingbook.com/view/890425022/
  2. Firelight Gathering. (n.d.-a). Festival rules. Retrieved August 3, 2026, from https://firelightgathering.ca/?page_id=14
  3. Firelight Gathering. (n.d.-b). Registration. Retrieved August 3, 2026, from https://firelightgathering.ca/?page_id=8
  4. Firelight Gathering. (n.d.-c). What’s a Pagan festival? Retrieved August 3, 2026, from https://firelightgathering.ca/?page_id=46
  5. Firelight Gathering. (2024, July 31). Firelight programming 2024! https://firelightgathering.ca/?p=104
  6. Firelight Gathering. (2025, August 14). Firelight Gathering 2025 starts now! https://firelightgathering.ca/?p=137
  7. Firelight Gathering. (2026, July 24). Firelight Gathering 2026 pre-registration now open! https://firelightgathering.ca/?p=142
  8. Graham McKay, D. (2014, June 20). Column: Pagan festival season in Ontario. The Wild Hunt. https://wildhunt.org/2014/06/walking-the-world-pagan-festival-season-in-ontario.html
  9. Morrison, D. (2015, May 28). All the Canadian Pagan festivals! Patheos. https://www.patheos.com/blogs/betweentheshadows/2015/05/all-the-canadian-pagan-festivals/

Before Raven’s Knoll: The Early History of the Kaleidoscope Gathering, 1989–2009

Group of people in medieval costumes holding hands dancing around bonfire at outdoor festival

Before there was a Raven’s Knoll, a permanent village of tents, ritual spaces, workshops, merchants, musicians, and familiar faces, there was a small gathering on Gina Ellis’s land in Lanark County.

This history has been compiled with all publicly available material; no interviews were conducted in its creation process – Kevin/Lugh

It was called MiniFest.

The surviving historical record is incomplete. The official online collection of Kaleidoscope Gathering programs begins with the Raven’s Knoll period, while much of the earlier community history was shared through printed programs, newsletters, email lists, Yahoo Groups, private photographs, and oral storytelling. Many of those materials have disappeared from the publicly searchable internet.

What remains, however, is enough to reconstruct the major outline of how a small Lammas gathering became one of Canada’s most enduring Pagan festivals.

A Lammas Gathering on Gina Ellis’s Land

The strongest available evidence places the founding of the gathering in 1989.

The official 2011 Kaleidoscope Gathering program described the event as having begun 22 years earlier when Gina Ellis hosted what it called a “Lammas meeting of souls” on her own land. Counting back from 2011 places the first gathering in 1989. The 2011 event was also identified as the 22nd annual Kaleidoscope Gathering, reinforcing that date (Kaleidoscope Gathering, 2011).

View the 2011 Kaleidoscope Gathering program.

Martin Lepage’s doctoral research independently gives the same year. Lepage identifies Gina Ellis as the founder, states that the event was originally called Minifest, and places it on Gina’s former land near Perth, Ontario. Lepage also describes Ellis as a significant figure connecting the Pagan communities of Ottawa and Montreal and as the founder of the Silver Wheel coven (Lepage, 2017, pp. 31–34).

Read Martin Lepage’s doctoral dissertation.

A near-contemporary academic reference offers additional confirmation. Religious studies scholar Marion Bowman wrote that MiniFest was in its sixth year in 1995. Depending on whether the first gathering was counted as year one, that also places its beginning in approximately 1989 or 1990. When combined with the official anniversary count and Lepage’s research, 1989 is the best-supported founding date (Bowman, 2000).

Read Marion Bowman’s article.

The original site is usually described as being near Perth. Community histories locate it more specifically near McDonald’s Corners, southwest of Perth, on land associated with Gina Ellis and the Silver Wheel coven.

That land became known within the community as Witch Hollow and was used for coven activities, seasonal observances, initiations, women’s gatherings, a men’s gathering, Hecate’s Web events, and later the smaller InFest gathering (Seccaspina, 2016).

Read “The Witch Hollow of Lanark County”.

This matters because MiniFest did not begin as a commercial festival imposed upon a rented campground. It emerged from an existing spiritual community and a living ritual landscape. The earliest gathering was closely connected to the land, the coven, and the relationships already formed around them.

Why “MiniFest” Was an Accurate Name

Later descriptions consistently characterize the earliest gatherings as intimate and informal.

A history quoted by The Wild Hunt described Kaleidoscope’s development as beginning with something resembling a “kitchen party,” then expanding through a widening circle of friends before becoming a mobile or “roaming” gathering. A longtime attendee responding to the article remembered the earliest form as friends inviting more friends until the gathering became substantially larger (McKay, 2014).

Read The Wild Hunt’s history of Ontario Pagan festivals.

A publicly indexed recollection from an early attendee states that their first gathering was on Gina Ellis’s land in 1995 and that it was still being called MiniFest. Although personal memories cannot carry the same historical weight as dated programs or academic studies, this recollection is consistent with Bowman’s chronology and the documented location.

View the publicly available participant recollection.

MiniFest appears to have been less a miniature version of the later festival than a different kind of event. It was a small gathering rooted in personal relationships, shared ritual, and hospitality. Its identity grew from the people who attended rather than from a permanent venue, formal infrastructure, or public brand.

That intimacy did not survive unchanged because the gathering became far more successful than its original setting could accommodate.

The Gathering That Outgrew Its Home

Lepage reports that, a few years after MiniFest began, approximately 300 unexpected people arrived. The crowd was too large for the original site, forcing the gathering to find a larger location (Lepage, 2017, p. 32).

An entry concerning Gina Ellis in The Encyclopedia of Modern Witchcraft and Neo-Paganism supplies an important additional detail. It states that MiniFest had grown beyond the capacity of Ellis’s acreage and that its manager, Pamela Fletcher, renamed the event Kaleidoscope and moved it to larger camping accommodations (Rabinovitch, 2011, p. 92).

The precise year of the name change has not been established from a surviving dated program. The available evidence indicates that the gathering was still remembered as MiniFest in 1995, while later sources describe the renaming and relocation as part of its expansion during the 1990s.

It would therefore be misleading to assign a specific year without locating an original program, announcement, or organizational record.

What can be stated with reasonable confidence is that four developments were connected:

  1. MiniFest attracted more people than Gina’s land could safely or comfortably hold.
  2. Pamela Fletcher assumed a major management role.
  3. The event was renamed Kaleidoscope Gathering.
  4. It began moving among larger venues.

This was the beginning of the roaming period remembered in later KG histories.

Pamela Fletcher and the Development of Kaleidoscope

Pamela Fletcher, widely known within the community as Lady Pamilla, became one of the central figures in the gathering’s pre-Raven’s Knoll development.

The encyclopedia account associates her directly with the transition from MiniFest to Kaleidoscope and with the move away from Gina Ellis’s land. By July 2006, a public Toronto Pagan community announcement explicitly identified Pamela Fletcher as the director of Kaleidoscope Gathering. She had donated a weekend pass for the August 4–7, 2006 festival to a community fundraiser (Rabinovitch, 2011; Plutopsyche, 2006).

View the 2006 Toronto LiveJournal announcement.

The 2011 KG program states that Pamela had retired before the new Raven’s Knoll organizers assumed responsibility for the gathering. It describes 2011 as Maryanne Pearce and Austin Lawrence’s second year as organizers following Fletcher’s retirement, placing the organizational transition in 2010 (Kaleidoscope Gathering, 2011).

Pamela’s enduring influence is also preserved in the gathering’s stated educational principle. Official KG registration material continues to associate her with the motto:

“Everyone has something to learn and something to teach.”

The present organization identifies that idea as a fundamental principle of KG (Kaleidoscope Gathering, n.d.-a).

View the official KG registration page.

That principle helps explain how Kaleidoscope developed. It was not structured solely around recognized clergy, published authors, or professional presenters. Knowledge could move through the community horizontally.

People came as students, teachers, ritual participants, musicians, performers, merchants, volunteers, and storytellers, often occupying several of those roles during the same gathering.

A Gathering Between Ottawa, Eastern Ontario, and Montreal

Although the gathering began on Ontario land, it was never only a local Lanark County event.

Lepage describes Gina Ellis as one of the best-known figures in a Pagan community extending between Ottawa and Montreal. He later identifies Kaleidoscope as the Pagan festival most popular among Montreal Pagans and as one of the gatherings bringing together the greatest variety of Pagan traditions and individuals (Lepage, 2017, pp. 31–34).

Marisol Charbonneau chose the 2007 Kaleidoscope Gathering as a fieldwork location for her University of Ottawa research because the event was regularly attended by Montreal Pagans. She used the gathering to meet people who were not participating in the Montreal Pagan community’s electronic discussion lists.

This shows how KG functioned as a physical meeting place for networks that otherwise communicated through stores, brunches, newsletters, and early online forums (Charbonneau, 2008, pp. 5–6).

Read Charbonneau’s research.

This cross-regional character helps explain the diversity that became one of KG’s defining features. It brought together English-speaking and French-speaking participants, coven-based Wiccans, solitary practitioners, ceremonial magicians, Druids, Heathens, Goddess worshippers, queer Pagan communities, musicians, and people who did not fit comfortably within a single formal tradition.

A study of diversity in Canadian Paganism records that one of the principal events at the 2006 Kaleidoscope Gathering was a Vodoun ritual. The same source identifies that year’s program theme as “Myths and Legends.”

This is significant because it demonstrates that, by 2006, KG’s programming was already extending beyond a narrowly European or exclusively Wiccan presentation of Pagan religion (Charbonneau, 2007, p. 14).

Read “The Melting Cauldron”.

Later retrospectives describe KG traditions including the Bardic Competition, nightly music and drumming, Pride activities, gender-specific and third-gender rituals, the Stag King, and the Trials of Artemis.

Not every one of these traditions can presently be dated to the pre-2010 period, but the list illustrates the broad participatory culture that had grown from the earlier gathering (McKay, 2014).

A published author biography also claims that a work won Kaleidoscope’s Bardic Competition in 1995 and again in 2006. Because this information survives as biographical material rather than an official list of winners, it should be treated cautiously. It nevertheless suggests that the Bardic Competition may have been established by the mid-1990s (Puhvel, 2007).

The Documented Whispering Pines Years

The complete list of pre-Raven’s Knoll locations has not been recovered. Later histories call KG a roaming gathering, but the publicly indexed record does not identify every campground or provide a year-by-year location chronology.

The best-documented later venue was Whispering Pines Campground, near Plantagenet and Curran in eastern Ontario.

Charbonneau’s fieldwork places the August 2007 gathering at Whispering Pines in Plantagenet. She describes KG as a Pagan camping festival held over the Civic Holiday weekend and notes its substantial Montreal attendance (Charbonneau, 2008, pp. 5–6).

A surviving Temple of the Sacred Grove community page independently records the 2007 event as taking place from August 1 to August 6 at Whispering Pines Campground.

The same page records InFest later that summer on Gina’s land near McDonald’s Corners, attended by approximately 35 returning and new friends (Temple of the Sacred Grove, 2008).

Visit the Temple of the Sacred Grove website.

That pairing is historically revealing. By 2007, Kaleidoscope had become large enough to occupy a commercial campground, while InFest continued the smaller, relationship-based gathering at the original site.

In effect, the two events preserved different parts of the original MiniFest experience. Kaleidoscope carried forward the expanding public festival, while InFest retained greater intimacy.

The Temple page also preserves unusually detailed information about the 2008 gathering. KG ran from Wednesday, July 30, through Monday, August 4, with the theme “Fairies and Elves and Gnomes! Oh My!”

Whispering Pines was closed for the gathering’s exclusive use. The site offered a beach, an in-ground swimming pool, drive-up campsites, two showers, and relatively level, rock-free camping areas. The notice also reminded participants to respect the resident campground owners and prohibited pets other than guide dogs (Temple of the Sacred Grove, 2008).

These practical details show how far the gathering had travelled from its kitchen-party beginnings. Registration procedures, campground agreements, accessibility rules, themed programming, and several days of scheduled activity required an established organizing structure and a substantial volunteer base.

A later participant remembered Whispering Pines as one of KG’s former homes and described it as evoking the intimacy of the earlier gathering. That recollection is consistent with the dated 2007 and 2008 notices, although it does not establish the first or final year KG used the campground (McKay, 2014).

The Fragmentary Early Internet Record

Kaleidoscope existed before social media centralized community communication. Its online presence was spread among personal webpages, email lists, Yahoo Groups, LiveJournal, newsgroup signatures, and successive domain names.

The Temple of the Sacred Grove page links to the old Kaleidoscope-Gathering.com address and to numerous Yahoo Groups serving Ottawa-area Pagans. The page also mentions a Facebook group, a Yahoo group, and Yahoo email distributions, illustrating the mixture of old and emerging platforms being used during the late 2000s (Temple of the Sacred Grove, 2008).

A 2001 Usenet post contains an email signature promoting “Kaleidoscope 2002” and the old Kaleidoscope-Gathering.com domain. However, the signature also contains a reference to Lawrencetown, Nova Scotia, and provides no reliable context about KG’s Ontario venue or organization.

It is evidence that the name and domain were circulating online by 2001, but it should not be used to establish a festival location (Pearce, 2001).

View the surviving 2001 Google Groups post.

The Toronto LiveJournal notice from 2006 is more useful. It supplies dates for that year’s gathering and identifies Pamela Fletcher as director. Together with the Temple pages, it shows that Pagan community blogs and event boards were important parts of KG’s publicity network before Facebook became dominant (Plutopsyche, 2006).

Most Yahoo Groups material is no longer publicly searchable, and the original KG domain has since been repurposed for unrelated content. The disappearance of these platforms is one reason the pre-2010 history now appears thinner than the gathering’s age and importance would suggest.

2009: The Twentieth Anniversary

The strongest surviving audiovisual record of the pre-Raven’s Knoll era was created in 2009.

Francis Perron produced the documentary Merry Meet: The Story of the Kaleidoscope Gathering for KG’s twentieth anniversary. The film contains interviews with participants and organizers, music, storytelling, and sections devoted to the gathering’s beginnings, Lady Pamelia, and memorable festival anecdotes.

Perron described it as an independently produced film created while he learned the necessary equipment and editing tools (Perron, 2009).

Watch the documentary:
Merry Meet: The Story of the Kaleidoscope Gathering

A separate publicly available video connected with Gina Ellis also remains online.

Watch the Gina Ellis video:
Gina Ellis video on YouTube

Research note: Dependable title, creator, and upload-date metadata were not available during the original research. The video is therefore linked without assigning uncertain bibliographic details.

The twentieth-anniversary year also brought a visual marker of change. The official KG history states that the Rainbow Dragonfly logo was unveiled at the 2009 gathering. The dragonfly subsequently became closely associated with the festival’s identity (Kaleidoscope Gathering, n.d.-b).

Read the official history of the Rainbow Dragonfly.

The Road to Permanent Land

For roughly two decades, the gathering’s continuity came from its people rather than from ownership of a particular site.

The official KG history describes the event’s evolution from a small gathering among friends into a roaming spiritual community. That movement could accommodate growth, but it also meant negotiating repeatedly with campgrounds, adapting ritual and workshop spaces, transporting infrastructure, and relying upon venues whose long-term availability was never guaranteed (McKay, 2014).

In 2009, the incoming organizers purchased land intended to provide a permanent Pagan gathering place. The first Kaleidoscope Gathering at Raven’s Knoll was held in 2010.

The 2011 program confirms that 2011 was KG’s second year there and the second year of the new organizing leadership following Pamela Fletcher’s retirement (Kaleidoscope Gathering, n.d.-c; Kaleidoscope Gathering, 2011).

Read the official Kaleidoscope Gathering FAQ.

That move did not create Kaleidoscope Gathering. It gave an already mature gathering a permanent home.

By the time KG reached Raven’s Knoll, it had already existed for approximately 20 years. It had begun on Gina Ellis’s land, outgrown that land, acquired a new name, survived multiple moves, developed a cross-regional community, established recurring traditions, and built an identity strong enough to remain recognizable without being tied to one campground.

What Can Be Documented and What Remains Missing

The surviving public record supports the following historical outline:

  • 1989: Gina Ellis establishes MiniFest as a Lammas gathering on her land near McDonald’s Corners and Perth.
  • 1995: Academic evidence places MiniFest in approximately its sixth year, while attendee memory still associates the MiniFest name with the gathering on Gina’s land.
  • Later 1990s: The gathering outgrows the original site after a crowd reported at approximately 300 people. Pamela Fletcher manages the transition, and MiniFest becomes Kaleidoscope Gathering.
  • By 2001: The Kaleidoscope name and an early festival domain are being circulated online.
  • By 2006: Pamela Fletcher is publicly identified as KG’s director. That year’s program theme is documented as “Myths and Legends,” and a major Vodoun ritual forms part of the programming.
  • 2007–2008: KG is securely documented at Whispering Pines Campground near Plantagenet.
  • 2009: KG observes its twentieth anniversary, Francis Perron releases Merry Meet, and the Rainbow Dragonfly logo is unveiled.
  • 2010: The first Kaleidoscope Gathering is held at Raven’s Knoll.

Several important questions remain unanswered by the publicly accessible record. The exact year in which MiniFest was formally renamed has not been located. No complete list of the gathering’s roaming venues has surfaced. Programs from most pre-2010 years are not included in the official online archive.

Nor is there a publicly available master list of early organizers, workshop presenters, ritual leaders, musicians, Bardic winners, or annual attendance.

Those records may still exist in private collections, old printed programs, photographs, newsletters, hard drives, or the memories of longtime participants. Their absence online should not be mistaken for an absence of history.

Remembering the Gathering Before the Land

The history of Kaleidoscope Gathering did not begin when a sign was placed at Raven’s Knoll.

It began when Gina Ellis opened her land for a Lammas gathering. It continued as more friends arrived, then more friends of friends, until a gathering intended to be small became too large for its birthplace.

Pamela Fletcher helped carry it through the difficult transformation from MiniFest into a larger, mobile festival. Participants and volunteers then preserved it across different locations until permanent land became possible.

The pre-Raven’s Knoll history is therefore not merely an introductory chapter. It explains what Kaleidoscope originally was:

A community that existed before it possessed a permanent home.

The land eventually gave that community stability.

The community, however, came first.

Publicly Available Historical Record

The following materials remain among the most useful publicly accessible sources for researching KG’s pre-Raven’s Knoll history:

  • The 2000 article by Marion Bowman, containing the near-contemporary statement that MiniFest was in its sixth year in 1995.
  • Shelley Rabinovitch’s encyclopedia entry concerning Gina Ellis, MiniFest, Pamela Fletcher, the renaming, and the relocation.
  • Marisol Charbonneau’s 2007 article documenting KG’s 2006 “Myths and Legends” program and Vodoun ritual.
  • Charbonneau’s 2008 master’s thesis documenting the 2007 gathering at Whispering Pines and its importance to Montreal Pagans.
  • The Temple of the Sacred Grove webpage preserving the dates and venue for KG 2007 and detailed information about KG 2008.
  • The 2006 Toronto LiveJournal notice identifying Pamela Fletcher as director.
  • Francis Perron’s 2009 documentary.
  • The official 2011 festival program containing Gina Ellis’s biographical note and the 22-year anniversary calculation.
  • The official KG FAQ, Dragonfly history, and program archive.
  • Dodie Graham McKay’s 2014 retrospective in The Wild Hunt.
  • Linda Seccaspina’s community history of Witch Hollow.
  • Martin Lepage’s 2017 doctoral dissertation.
  • Publicly indexed participant memories concerning MiniFest and Gina Ellis’s land.

References

Bowman, M. (2000). Nature, the natural and Pagan identity. DISKUS, 6. https://jbasr.com/basr/diskus/diskus1-6/bowman6.txt

Charbonneau, M. (2007). The melting cauldron: Ethnicity, diversity, and identity in a contemporary Pagan subculture. The Pomegranate, 9(1), 5–21. https://journal.equinoxpub.com/POM/article/view/2899

Charbonneau, M. (2008). A distinct Paganism: The contemporary Pagan revival in Montreal at the turn of the millennium [Master’s thesis, University of Ottawa]. https://www.academia.edu/9965797/A_Distinct_Paganism_The_Contemporary_Pagan_Revival_in_Montreal_At_the_Turn_of_the_Millennium

Kaleidoscope Gathering. (2011). Voyages: The 22nd annual Kaleidoscope Gathering [Festival program]. https://kg.ravensknoll.ca/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/KG-2011-Program_final_display-3.pdf

Kaleidoscope Gathering. (n.d.-a). Registration. https://kg.ravensknoll.ca/registration/

Kaleidoscope Gathering. (n.d.-b). The dragonfly. https://kg.ravensknoll.ca/information/the-dragonfly/

Kaleidoscope Gathering. (n.d.-c). FAQ. https://kg.ravensknoll.ca/information/faq/

Lepage, M. (2017). “Why be king? I’m already a queen!”: Performances rituelles et négociations queer dans la communauté néo-païenne de Montréal [Doctoral dissertation, Université du Québec à Montréal]. Archipel. https://archipel.uqam.ca/10924/1/D3311.pdf

McKay, D. G. (2014, June 20). Column: Pagan festival season in Ontario. The Wild Hunt. https://wildhunt.org/2014/06/walking-the-world-pagan-festival-season-in-ontario.html

Pearce, R. (2001, November 7). Re: Windows XP and BIOS strange things happen [Newsgroup post]. Google Groups. https://groups.google.com/g/comp.windows.misc/c/EXZMrirC3rQ

Perron, F. (Director). (2009). Merry Meet: The story of the Kaleidoscope Gathering [Documentary film]. https://www.thewicca.ca/culture/video/francis-perron-merry-meet.php

Plutopsyche. (2006, July 19). Tomorrow night: Wine, Dine & Divine @ Mitzi’s Sister [Online community post]. Toronto LiveJournal. https://toronto.livejournal.com/4467634.html

Rabinovitch, S. T. (2011). The encyclopedia of modern witchcraft and neo-paganism (2nd ed.). Kendall Hunt.

Seccaspina, L. (2016, March 3). The Witch Hollow of Lanark County. Linda Seccaspina’s Blog. https://lindaseccaspina.wordpress.com/2016/03/03/the-witch-hollow-of-lanark-county/

Temple of the Sacred Grove. (2008). Temple events and events upcoming. https://www.templesacredgrove.org/

The Changing Face of Raven’s Knoll

Outdoor historical festival with tents, people, campfire, and lakeside barn

From Permanent Pagan Land to a Multi Event Destination, 2009–2026

Abstract

Raven’s Knoll opened near Eganville, Ontario, in 2009 as both a privately owned campground and a community project connected closely to the Kaleidoscope Gathering. Its early public language described the property as “permanent Pagan land,” a Pagan owned event centre, a community driven space and, eventually, a sacred home shared by people from multiple Pagan and Heathen traditions. However, Raven’s Knoll was never exclusively a communal religious settlement. From its earliest years, it also operated as a private special events campground, charged admission, hosted independent gatherings and established rules governing access and conduct.

Between 2009 and 2026, the most significant change was not a sudden conversion from sacred land into a commercial venue. It was a gradual broadening of the events, audiences, enterprises and identities associated with the property. Pagan festivals, Heathen rites, Witchcraft retreats, live action role playing events and volunteer work weekends were eventually joined by yoga, holistic wellness, ecstatic dance, fire oriented gatherings and a large electronic bass music festival.

The public presence of Howling Acres Homestead at Raven’s Knoll adds another dimension to this development. Howling Acres identifies itself with Raven’s Knoll while promoting eggs, livestock, produce and workshops. Its presence introduces agriculture, animal husbandry, food production and year round homestead activity into a property previously presented primarily through camping, spirituality and seasonal gatherings. Raven’s Knoll is therefore developing not only as a broader event venue, but also as a mixed use rural property where festivals, residence, agriculture and private enterprise operate alongside one another (Howling Acres Homestead, n.d.).

At the same time, the public vocabulary surrounding Raven’s Knoll increasingly shifted from home, family, folk and community toward hosted at, private event, special events campground, passes, ticket upgrades, festival goers and venue amenities.

The changing face of Raven’s Knoll is therefore best understood as a change in emphasis: from a Pagan community whose events helped create the identity of the land toward a privately managed property that now supports spiritual gatherings, independently branded festivals, commercial events, agriculture, residence and year round enterprise.

Scope and Method

This analysis examines publicly available material from the opening of Raven’s Knoll in 2009 through August 2, 2026. Sources include official Raven’s Knoll, Kaleidoscope Gathering and Hail and Horn Gathering pages, archived KG programs, academic research, event websites, public social media listings, independent Pagan reporting, local journalism and surviving promotional material.

The event inventory should be understood as the most complete list that can presently be reconstructed from the indexed public record. It is not proof that no other event occurred. Private weddings, handfastings, memorials, organizational retreats, small rentals and gatherings advertised only within closed groups are unlikely to appear in a public search.

The Opening of Raven’s Knoll: Two Identities From the Beginning

The documented history begins in 2009. The current KG FAQ states that the new Kaleidoscope Gathering organizers purchased what it calls “permanent Pagan land for KG” that year. Independent reporting states that Raven’s Knoll opened its gates in 2009 as a Pagan owned campground and festival site. The first KG held on the property followed in 2010 (Kaleidoscope Gathering, n.d.-a; Graham McKay, 2017).

Academic research provides an important additional detail. Barbara Jane Davy identifies the seventh annual Midgard Festival in 2010 as the first festival held at Raven’s Knoll. The inaugural Raven’s Knoll Procession of Nerthus was conducted during that event. KG was held on the land later in the same season. Raven’s Knoll therefore did not open with KG alone. Its first documented festival was a regional Pagan and Heathen gathering that immediately began creating a ritual relationship between the participating community and the land (Davy, 2025).

The official 2011 KG program shows that the community and venue identities already existed together. It described Raven’s Knoll as:

“a private, Pagan-owned campground and event centre.”

The program also discussed growing Pagan events and nurturing permanent sacred spaces. This is important because it prevents an overly simple historical argument. Raven’s Knoll was not originally described only as a sacred communal home and then reclassified much later as an event business. The terms private, campground and event centre were present almost from the beginning (Kaleidoscope Gathering, 2011).

What differed in the early years was the relationship between those functions. The event centre infrastructure appeared to exist primarily to support a developing Pagan community. Sacred spaces, shrines, rituals, work weekends and recurring gatherings gave Raven’s Knoll a distinct identity that extended beyond providing land and facilities.

Phase One: Establishing Pagan and Heathen Land, 2010–2012

Midgard Festival

Midgard Festival was the first publicly documented festival at Raven’s Knoll in 2010. Its Procession of Nerthus connected the new property to a recurring Heathen ritual cycle. The procession later continued through the Well and Tree Gathering, illustrating how activities originally performed at an established festival became embedded in the identity and sacred geography of Raven’s Knoll itself (Davy, 2022, 2025).

Kaleidoscope Gathering

KG arrived at Raven’s Knoll in 2010. The official archive contains annual programs from 2010 onward, excluding years affected by disruptions to normal programming. KG became the property’s marquee festival and was repeatedly described as Canada’s largest outdoor Pagan gathering. Its programming combined rituals, workshops, performances, children’s activities, Pride events, drumming, dancing, vending and community organized teaching (Kaleidoscope Gathering, n.d.-b; Graham McKay, 2014).

The early KG vision emphasized active participation rather than passive consumption. Lady Pamilla’s principle that “everyone has something to learn and something to teach” remains on the current registration page. The 2011 program shows a schedule largely created through workshops, rituals, tournaments, meet and greets, concerts and events contributed by community members (Kaleidoscope Gathering, 2011, n.d.-c).

Fallen Kingdom LARP

Raven’s Knoll also hosted nonfestival recreational events during its early years. Fallen Kingdom used the property for immersive outdoor live action role playing events by at least 2011. A 2013 account describes a coordinated 36 hour LARP in the woods at Raven’s Knoll, while surviving community posts refer to the campground becoming the outdoor home of the game. This demonstrates that the property began accommodating independently organized events outside the core Pagan festival format early in its history (Fallen Kingdom LARP, 2011; Ottawa Gothic Designs, 2013).

Hail and Horn Gathering

The first Hail and Horn Gathering took place in 2012. During that gathering, participants established the Raven’s Knoll Æsir Vé, described by organizers as the first publicly accessible Canadian place of worship set aside for pre Christian Scandinavian and Germanic holy powers. Hail and Horn developed rituals, communal feasts, workshops, storytelling, gift exchanges and annual god pole raisings. It remains a volunteer supported religious gathering rather than simply a themed entertainment event (Hail and Horn Gathering, n.d.; Harmsworth, 2015).

By the end of 2012, Raven’s Knoll was already functioning in several ways: as KG’s permanent location, a regional Heathen ritual centre, a campground, a private event property and an outdoor LARP venue.

Phase Two: A Dense Community of Pagan Events, 2013–2019

The Witches’ Sabbat

The first Witches’ Sabbat was held at Raven’s Knoll in 2013. Its original promotion described an intensive weekend of Witchcraft, spirit work, cunning arts, land spirits and an ecstatic rite honouring the Horned Lord. By 2016, it was entering its fourth year. The event was deliberately smaller and more specialized than KG, focusing on non Wiccan Witchcraft rather than attempting to represent the entire Pagan spectrum (The Witches’ Sabbat, 2013; Graham McKay, 2016).

KornuKopia Gathering

KornuKopia Gathering was publicly documented at Raven’s Knoll by 2013 and continued through later years as a harvest season Pagan gathering. Surviving recordings show performances at KornuKopia in 2013 and 2017. The 2026 edition is publicly listed as hosted jointly by Christina Graham and Raven’s Knoll, showing that it remains part of the property’s current event cycle.

Work Weekends

Volunteer work weekends became an important part of the Raven’s Knoll model. Participants camped while working on maintenance, cleanup, construction and improvements. In 2014, Raven’s Knoll was described as holding work weekends where volunteers improved the site or cleaned the land after major festivals. Later academic research interpreted these weekends as part of a gift economy that strengthened attachment, stewardship and a feeling of returning “home” (Graham McKay, 2014; Davy, 2025).

This activity complicates any attempt to describe early visitors simply as customers. Many participants contributed labour to land that they did not legally own. Their relationship was based partly on belonging, reciprocity and responsibility rather than solely on purchasing admission.

Seven Festivals, LARP and Spiritual Retreats

By 2014, Raven’s Knoll was already far more than a one festival property. Contemporary reporting called it a “community-driven space” and stated that it would host seven festivals during the season, along with LARP events, spiritual retreats and volunteer work weekends. Although the public calendars supporting every one of those seven events are no longer accessible, the report demonstrates that multi event use was well established by the middle of the Knoll’s first decade (Graham McKay, 2014).

Red Spiral Women’s Retreat

A surviving Canadian Pagan festival directory lists the Red Spiral Women’s Retreat at Raven’s Knoll from August 22 to 24, 2014. Its inclusion demonstrates that the site hosted identity specific or practice specific retreats in addition to large mixed path gatherings.

Feast of Sekhmet

The Feast of Sekhmet was publicly listed at Raven’s Knoll in July 2015 as a Kemetic gathering. The same period’s festival records list Witches’ Sabbat, Hail and Horn and KG at the property. Raven’s Knoll was therefore supporting communities centred on Egyptian reconstructionism, Heathenry, Witchcraft and broader Paganism during the same season (Aradia, 2015).

Weddings, Handfastings and Rites of Passage

The land also became a setting for personal and community rites of passage. A 2017 history records a wedding at Raven’s Knoll and includes reference to rituals involving children and first footing ceremonies. These events strengthened the idea that the Knoll was not merely somewhere people attended festivals. It was becoming a place where members of the community marked relationships, childhood, family formation and spiritual development (Graham McKay, 2017).

Rites of Raven’s Knoll

The 2017 publication of Rites of Raven’s Knoll represented a significant point in the property’s self understanding. The book collected essays, poetry, ritual scripts, songs and memories from 28 contributors. Austin Lawrence described Raven’s Knoll as a place where different traditions and outlooks gathered to create “a single place a sacred home.” Contributors emphasized cooperation among Wiccans, Heathens, Druids, Hellenists and Witchcraft practitioners (Graham McKay, 2017).

The book was not simply advertising for a campground. It was an attempt to record an emerging culture, shared mythology and ritual landscape. Contributors explicitly described it as a baseline against which future changes could be evaluated.

Well and Tree Gathering

Well and Tree Gathering was documented at Raven’s Knoll in 2018 and 2019 through participant observation research. The gathering included the Procession of Nerthus, offerings, ritual use of the Sacred Well and participation by Heathens and people from other traditions. Davy describes approximately 50 participants at one gathering and examines how the event encouraged generosity, ecological responsibility and attachment to place (Davy, 2022, 2025).

Stave and Spindle

Stave and Spindle was held at Raven’s Knoll in September 2019. Its public wording described an annual adults only weekend dedicated to northern European magical practices, including seiðr, spaecraft, galdr, divination, workshops and a culminating ritual. This was another focused gathering built around intensive religious or esoteric practice rather than mass entertainment.

Three Rivers Festival

Raven’s Knoll’s public video archive also identifies Three Rivers Festival as an event connected to the property. Surviving recordings document live performances on the Raven Stage, although the available public evidence does not establish a reliable first or final year. It should therefore be included in the historical inventory but not assigned a precise starting date without additional archival material.

Phase Three: From Interconnected Traditions to Broader Event Markets

By 2017, Raven’s Knoll was being described as a multi faith Pagan community with a unique seasonal cycle produced through the interaction of different religious paths. The events were independent, but participants frequently crossed between them. A Wiccan might help at a Heathen gathering, a Druid might assist at a Witchcraft event and unaffiliated participants might volunteer throughout the season. The collective activity of these overlapping groups created the Raven’s Knoll identity (Graham McKay, 2017).

Academic work from 2018 onward continued to describe Raven’s Knoll as a private campground and spiritual retreat centre. It identified a recognizable “Heathens of Raven’s Knoll” community whose members participated in Hail and Horn, Stave and Spindle and Well and Tree. These studies show that the religious community identity continued well beyond the property’s opening years (Davy, 2023, 2025).

However, the language of the property as an administratively controlled venue also became more explicit. The 2019 Raven’s Knoll policies described attendees as guests of Raven’s Knoll Ltd. at the “Raven’s Knoll Special Events Campground.” This formal wording established the legal relationship clearly: community members might experience the land as home, but they remained guests on privately controlled corporate property (Raven’s Knoll, 2019).

That distinction became increasingly important as the event mix widened beyond communities directly connected to Paganism, Heathenry and Witchcraft.

Phase Four: Wellness, Lifestyle and Independently Branded Festivals

Bhakti Bliss Yoga and Music Festival

Bhakti Bliss represents a wider spiritual and wellness audience. Its programming includes yoga, kirtan, ecstatic dance, holistic workshops, sound healing, family activities and community bonfires. Its language emphasizes devotion, compassion, connection and a substance free environment. The 2026 festival runs from August 7 to 9 (Bhakti Bliss, n.d.-a, n.d.-b).

Bhakti Bliss does acknowledge sacred sites and community, but its description of Raven’s Knoll is primarily operational:

“a special events campground”

The accompanying text lists the property’s acreage, activity building, rentals, laundry, showers, playground, bicycles and food truck. Raven’s Knoll is presented as the equipped location in which the Bhakti Bliss community can temporarily gather (Bhakti Bliss, n.d.-c).

This differs from early Raven’s Knoll events. Hail and Horn, KG and Witches’ Sabbat helped create Raven’s Knoll’s sacred sites and internal traditions. Bhakti Bliss imports a distinct spiritual identity into an already developed venue.

Stone and Flame Gathering

A public Raven’s Knoll post identifies a first annual Stone and Flame Gathering, documenting the creation of another specialized gathering in the recent event cycle. It has continued into 2026. Available event listings place the 2026 gathering from August 28 to 30, although one third party listing contains a conflicting September date. The August listing is the more consistently reported date, but direct organizer confirmation would be preferable before publication of a visitor guide.

Fire Mongers

Fire Mongers appears in Raven’s Knoll’s recent seasonal programming and is publicly scheduled for the Labour Day weekend of September 4 to 7, 2026. The event is listed as hosted by Christina Graham and Raven’s Knoll. Its public documentation further illustrates the growth of shorter, independently identifiable gatherings around the larger established festivals.

Phase Five: KN¿WHERE and the Commercial Festival Threshold

The proposed arrival of KN¿WHERE Music Festival in 2025 marked the clearest expansion beyond Raven’s Knoll’s historical event scale and cultural audience. Promotional coverage described Raven’s Knoll as KN¿WHERE’s “upgraded venue” and advertised more than 90 electronic music acts on three stages, extended music hours, expanded camping, a private beach and a large scale immersive bass music experience (Ottawa Festival Network, 2025; Javaheri, 2025).

Local reporting said the proposed event might host as many as 5,000 people. Nearby residents raised concerns about amplified music continuing until 4 a.m., traffic, emergency services and the effect on neighbouring homes and businesses. Whether every concern was ultimately justified is a separate question. The significance for Raven’s Knoll’s public identity is that the property was now being discussed in municipal and local media as the proposed location for a major regional entertainment event rather than primarily as a Pagan campground (Lambert, 2025).

The September 2025 Raven’s Knoll edition did not proceed. Organizers announced a move to Toronto because of wildfire risk and provided ticket holders with access to a future Raven’s Knoll edition (Lisinski, 2025).

KN¿WHERE subsequently operated at Raven’s Knoll from June 5 to 7, 2026. The official festival site called the event the “ultimate evolution” of KN¿WHERE’s indoor Toronto shows and promoted an overnight experience combining bass music, art, wellness and camping. It advertised more than 90 acts performing on three stages “all through the night.” Independent event coverage published set times and a large artist lineup immediately before the gathering, supporting that the 2026 event moved beyond the proposal stage (KN¿WHERE Music Festival, n.d.; Hall, 2026).

KN¿WHERE does use the words community, connection and transformative. However, this community is created by the festival brand rather than by Raven’s Knoll’s Pagan history. On the KN¿WHERE website, Raven’s Knoll supplies the forest, beach, paths, camping areas and physical infrastructure. KN¿WHERE supplies the identity, audience, music and experience.

Publicly Verifiable Raven’s Knoll Event Inventory

Event or Activity Earliest Public Evidence at Raven’s Knoll Primary Character Evidentiary Status
Midgard Festival 2010 Pagan and Heathen festival Identified in academic research as the first festival held at Raven’s Knoll.
Kaleidoscope Gathering 2010 Pan Pagan, Witchcraft, Heathen and occult gathering Confirmed by the official FAQ and continuous program archive.
Fallen Kingdom LARP 2011 Outdoor live action role playing Public forum and 2013 organizer documentation.
Hail and Horn Gathering 2012 Heathen religious gathering Official site identifies 2012 as the first gathering and founding of the Vé.
Witches’ Sabbat 2013 Intensive Witchcraft retreat First annual event publicly advertised in 2013.
KornuKopia Gathering By 2013 Pagan harvest gathering Recordings and public Raven’s Knoll posts; still active in 2026.
Volunteer work weekends Documented by 2014 Maintenance, stewardship and community labour Contemporary reporting and later academic analysis.
Red Spiral Women’s Retreat 2014 Women’s spiritual retreat Listed in a surviving Canadian Pagan event directory.
Feast of Sekhmet 2015 Kemetic religious gathering Listed in contemporary Canadian Pagan festival coverage.
Weddings, handfastings and rites of passage Documented by 2017 Private and community ceremonies Recorded in the history surrounding Rites of Raven’s Knoll.
Rites of Raven’s Knoll launch and associated cultural activity 2017 Literary and community history event Independent Pagan reporting.
Well and Tree Gathering Documented 2018–2019 Heathen led, multi path ritual gathering Peer reviewed and academic participant observation research.
Stave and Spindle 2019 Heathen magic and esoteric practice Official gathering page and event documentation.
Three Rivers Festival Date uncertain Music and festival programming Preserved in Raven’s Knoll’s public video archive.
Bhakti Bliss Yoga and Music Festival Documented in recent annual programming Yoga, kirtan, wellness and music Active, with 2026 dates and ticketing.
Stone and Flame Gathering First annual event publicly documented in the 2020s Specialized spiritual gathering Raven’s Knoll social documentation and 2026 listing.
Fire Mongers Documented by 2025 Themed gathering Active and scheduled for September 2026.
KN¿WHERE Music Festival Planned for 2025; held in 2026 Large electronic bass, art and wellness festival Official festival site, event coverage and local reporting.

The Specific Wording Changes

The evolving public identity can be demonstrated through the language used at different points in the property’s history.

2009: “Permanent Pagan Land for KG”

The official KG account describes the original purchase as:

“permanent Pagan land for KG.”

The central subject is KG and the Pagan community. The property is land acquired to secure that community’s future (Kaleidoscope Gathering, n.d.-a).

2011: “Private, Pagan Owned Campground and Event Centre”

The 2011 program called Raven’s Knoll:

“a private, Pagan-owned campground and event centre.”

This wording contains all the major elements that later become important: private ownership, Pagan identity, campground services and event operations. However, the same material connected the event centre function to growing Pagan events and permanent sacred spaces (Kaleidoscope Gathering, 2011).

2014: “Community Driven Space”

Independent Pagan coverage described Raven’s Knoll as:

“This community-driven space.”

Its seven festivals, LARP events, retreats and work weekends were presented as the activity of an interconnected community caring for a special place (Graham McKay, 2014).

2017: “A Single Place a Sacred Home”

The language surrounding Rites of Raven’s Knoll described traditions gathering to make:

“a single place a sacred home.”

At this point, home referred not merely to affection for the owners or property. It referred to a place jointly sacralized through rituals, labour, relationships, shrines and repeated participation (Graham McKay, 2017).

2019: “Guests of Raven’s Knoll Ltd.”

The 2019 policies stated that participants were:

“a guest of Raven’s Knoll Ltd.”

The location was formally identified as the “Raven’s Knoll Special Events Campground.” The emotional relationship might be home or family, but the legal and administrative relationship was owner and guest (Raven’s Knoll, 2019).

Current KG Wording: “Where Kaleidoscope Gathering Is Hosted”

The current KG website describes Raven’s Knoll as:

“Where Kaleidoscope Gathering is Hosted”

and as:

“a Pagan Campground offering many additional smaller festivals and general camping.”

The word hosted separates the identity of KG from the identity of the property. KG is now grammatically one activity taking place at a campground that serves multiple events and general campers (Kaleidoscope Gathering, n.d.-c).

Current FAQ: “Everyone Is Welcome. However, This Is a Private Event”

The KG FAQ states:

“Everyone is welcome. However, this is a private event.”

That qualification places openness beside ownership and organizational authority. The invitation remains, but access is conditional upon registration, rules and the discretion of the private event’s organizers (Kaleidoscope Gathering, n.d.-a).

The same FAQ retains an older emotional formulation:

“we are all family!”

The language of family therefore has not disappeared. It now appears within a page that also discusses passes, registration, cabin payments, guest responsibilities, private event rules and onsite services.

External Campground Wording: “Specializing in Group Camping and Special Events”

A public tourism listing describes Raven’s Knoll as:

“a campground specializing in group camping and special events.”

This description targets the general camping and tourism market. Paganism is not necessary to understand the service being offered. The property is framed through acreage, camping, rentals, beach access, bicycles, food service and event availability (Ontario By Bike, 2023).

Bhakti Bliss: “A Special Events Campground”

Bhakti Bliss uses the direct label:

“a special events campground.”

The festival then lists the amenities supplied by Raven’s Knoll. Bhakti Bliss creates the spiritual and emotional invitation; Raven’s Knoll provides the venue (Bhakti Bliss, n.d.-c).

KN¿WHERE: “The Ultimate Evolution”

KN¿WHERE describes itself as:

“the ultimate evolution”

of its previous branded shows and promises more than 90 acts across three stages through the night. Raven’s Knoll appears as the destination where that branded evolution takes place (KN¿WHERE Music Festival, n.d.).

This is the clearest reversal of the early relationship. In the foundational language, the community created Raven’s Knoll as its permanent land. In the KN¿WHERE language, an external festival brand selects Raven’s Knoll as the site on which to deliver its own experience.

What Has Actually Changed?

The evidence does not support the claim that Raven’s Knoll began as a noncommercial commune and only recently became an event venue. It was privately owned, charged admission and used the phrase event centre by 2011. Rules, private property rights, registration fees and organized access are not recent inventions.

The evidence does support five more precise conclusions.

  1. The range of event identities has expanded. Early programming overwhelmingly involved Pagan, Heathen, Witchcraft, esoteric or closely related alternative spiritual communities. Current programming also reaches yoga and holistic wellness participants, lifestyle event audiences, fire themed gatherings and the commercial electronic music market.

  2. The scale of the largest proposed events has changed. Early Raven’s Knoll events involved hundreds of attendees and were supported substantially by volunteers. The 2025 KN¿WHERE proposal introduced public discussion of a possible audience of up to 5,000 people, multiple large stages and amplified music extending to 4 a.m.

  3. The community and the venue are increasingly separable. Midgard, KG, Hail and Horn, Witches’ Sabbat and work weekends contributed directly to the rituals, shrines, stories and physical features that became Raven’s Knoll. Newer independent festivals can use those features without becoming part of the same historical or spiritual community.

  4. The participant relationship has become more varied. A person may still arrive as a volunteer, Heathen, Witch, Pagan, ritual participant or member of the extended Knoll community. Another person may arrive solely as a ticket holder attending a yoga festival or bass music event. Both occupy the same land, but they do not necessarily share the same relationship with it.

  5. “Home” has become one layer of the branding rather than a complete description of the operation. For long term participants, Raven’s Knoll may sincerely remain home in an emotional and spiritual sense. For the company and event organizers, it is simultaneously private property, a licensed campground, an equipped event venue and a source of rental and festival infrastructure.

Conclusion

The changing face of Raven’s Knoll is not a story in which one identity vanished overnight. Paganism, Heathenry, ritual practice, sacred sites, volunteer labour and the language of home remain visible. KG and Hail and Horn continue to operate, and current Raven’s Knoll promotion still speaks about sacred circles, community and connection.

The deeper change is structural.

At the beginning, Raven’s Knoll’s events helped create the identity of Raven’s Knoll. Midgard established ritual relationships with the land. KG provided the central community. Hail and Horn established a permanent Vé. Witches’ Sabbat, KornuKopia, Well and Tree, Stave and Spindle, Feast of Sekhmet and volunteer work weekends added sacred spaces, practices, stories and overlapping relationships.

Increasingly, Raven’s Knoll also functions in the opposite direction: the property provides land, facilities and atmosphere to events that arrive with identities of their own.

That is the documented movement from:

permanent Pagan land created for a gathering

to:

a Pagan owned special events campground hosting multiple gatherings

and finally toward:

a multi market event destination whose historical Pagan identity is one part of a broader venue operation.

The public presence of Howling Acres adds another layer to this development. Raven’s Knoll is also becoming a place where agriculture, livestock, produce, workshops and year round homestead activity exist alongside sacred land, seasonal camping and commercial festivals.

The older language has not been erased. It has been layered beneath newer administrative, tourism, agricultural and festival language. Raven’s Knoll can therefore continue to tell established participants that they are coming home while telling independent organizers and new audiences that it is an equipped campground where their event can be hosted.

That coexistence, rather than the complete disappearance of Pagan identity, is the clearest evidence of the changing face of Raven’s Knoll.

References

Aradia, S. (2015, May 28). All the Canadian Pagan festivals! Patheos. https://www.patheos.com/blogs/betweentheshadows/2015/05/all-the-canadian-pagan-festivals/

Bhakti Bliss. (n.d.-a). Bhakti Bliss Yoga & Music Festival. Retrieved August 2, 2026, from https://www.bhaktibliss.ca/

Bhakti Bliss. (n.d.-b). Get tickets: Bhakti Bliss 2026. Retrieved August 2, 2026, from https://www.bhaktibliss.ca/gettickets

Bhakti Bliss. (n.d.-c). About the festival. Retrieved August 2, 2026, from https://www.bhaktibliss.ca/lineup

Davy, B. J. (2022). Reconstructing the Procession of Nerthus: A contemporary Heathen ritual offering of sacrifice. The Pomegranate. https://journal.equinoxpub.com/POM/article/view/24259

Davy, B. J. (2023). Inclusive Heathens practice ancestor veneration, but not pride in ancestry. Nova Religio, 26(3), 30–51. https://doi.org/10.1525/nr.2023.26.3.30

Davy, B. J. (2025). Wyrd ecology: Heathen ritual and gifting relations. Oxford University Press. https://academic.oup.com/book/59759/chapter/508287541

Fallen Kingdom LARP. (2011, June 30). Welcome to Fallen Kingdom LARP. https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/fallenkingdom/welcome-to-fallen-kingdom-larp-t41.html

Graham McKay, D. (2014, June 20). Column: Pagan festival season in Ontario. The Wild Hunt. https://wildhunt.org/2014/06/walking-the-world-pagan-festival-season-in-ontario.html

Graham McKay, D. (2016, March 16). Preparing for Ontario’s Witches’ Sabbat Festival 2016. The Wild Hunt.

Graham McKay, D. (2017, April 25). Community experience at Raven’s Knoll documented in new book. The Wild Hunt. https://wildhunt.org/2017/04/the-community-experience-at-ravens-knoll-documented-in-new-book.html

Hail and Horn Gathering. (n.d.). Information. Retrieved August 2, 2026, from https://hhg.ravensknoll.ca/information/

Hall, J. (2026, June 2). KN¿WHERE Music Festival 2026. The Daily Frequency. https://thedailyfrequency.com/edm-event/knwhere-music-festival-2026/

Harmsworth, J. J. (2015). Canadian Heathens and their quest for a “virtuous” self: An ethnographic study of the construction of identity and community [Doctoral dissertation, University of Edinburgh]. Edinburgh Research Archive. https://era.ed.ac.uk/handle/1842/16458

Howling Acres Homestead. (n.d.). Howling Acres Homestead [Instagram profile]. Instagram. Retrieved August 2, 2026, from https://www.instagram.com/howlingacreshomestead/

Javaheri, A. (2025, June 13). KN¿WHERE Festival reveals upgraded venue: Raven’s Knoll in North Algona Wilberforce, Ontario. Stage Hoppers. https://stagehoppers.com/knwhere-festival-reveals-upgraded-venue-ravens-knoll-in-north-algona-wilberforce-ontario-canada/

Kaleidoscope Gathering. (2011). The 22nd annual Kaleidoscope Gathering program [Festival program]. https://kg.ravensknoll.ca/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/KG-2011-Program_final_display-3.pdf

Kaleidoscope Gathering. (n.d.-a). Frequently asked questions. Retrieved August 2, 2026, from https://kg.ravensknoll.ca/information/faq/

Kaleidoscope Gathering. (n.d.-b). Previous programs. Retrieved August 2, 2026, from https://kg.ravensknoll.ca/previous-programs/

Kaleidoscope Gathering. (n.d.-c). Registration. Retrieved August 2, 2026, from https://kg.ravensknoll.ca/registration/

KN¿WHERE Music Festival. (n.d.). About KN¿WHERE Music Festival. Retrieved August 2, 2026, from https://knwherefest.ca/about/

Lambert, A. (2025, July 3). “You have no idea what you’re asking for”: NAW residents urge council to reconsider hosting thousands for “rave” music festival. The Eganville Leader. https://www.eganvilleleader.ca/news/you-have-no-idea-what-youre-asking-for-naw-residents-urge-council-to-reconsider-hosting-thousands-for-rave-music-festival/

Lisinski, M. (2025, August 28). KN¿WHERE Music Festival moves from Raven’s Knoll to Toronto due to wildfire risk. Ottawa Festival Network. https://www.ottawafestivals.ca/post/kn-where-music-festival-moves-from-raven-s-knoll-to-toronto-due-to-wildfire-risk

Ontario By Bike. (2023, April 20). Raven’s Knoll Campground. https://www.ontariobybike.ca/business-directory/listing/campgrounds/

Ottawa Festival Network. (2025, July 17). Introducing KN¿WHERE Music Festival at Raven’s Knoll. https://www.ottawafestivals.ca/post/introducing-nw-where-music-festival-at-raven-s-knoll

Ottawa Gothic Designs. (2013). Fallen Kingdom LARP 2013. https://ottawagothicdesigns.wordpress.com/events/fallen-kingdom-larp-2013/

Raven’s Knoll. (2019). Raven’s Knoll policies, rules and terms of registration. https://kg.ravensknoll.ca/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/Ravensknoll-Policies-2019.pdf

Stave and Spindle. (2019). Stave and Spindle: A weekend of Heathen sorcery. https://staveandspindle.weebly.com/

The Witches’ Sabbat. (2013). The first annual Witches’ Sabbat at Raven’s Knoll. https://www.mysticwicks.com/showthread_266001-the-witches-sabbat-at-raven-s-knoll-ontario_s_7941bc6205b6a2cd849b5b4915ddec4f/

After the Rave.

People protesting at a town hall meeting holding signs saying Our voices matter and No to developer greed community first
NAW RESIDENTS OPPOSED TO KN?WHERE FESTIVAL WERE THEY RIGHT… ONE YEAR LATER?
byu/Hour-Blackberry1877 inOttawaValleyNature

you be the judge, read between the lines i find often the downplayed snippets are far more significant than they are made to be, what is mentioned as not an issue… really was an issue. From what I know the issues are far greater than portrayed. The residents of multiple municipalities are not pleased, the fact that the two hosts no showed at the meeting speaks volumes.

for the expense put in by DNR, vs attendance this was a major financial FLOP.

NAW is reviewing it’s noise bylaws to address this and other issues surrounding the festival (first hand knowledge) this is not speculative. This has become an election issue.

No Gift Binds me to Silence

Two bearded Viking men exchanging a carved wooden box in a hall with onlookers

A gift given in friendship carries honour. In the Hávamál, friendship is tied to reciprocity: friends gladden one another with gifts, and gift-givers’ friendships endure when things go well.1

But when the giver betrays the receiver, the giver breaks the gift-bond. The Hávamál also teaches that a person should be a friend to a friend, exchange gifts with one who is trusted, and treat the untrustworthy differently from the trusted friend.2

I return the obligation, end the exchange, and withdraw frith. In modern Heathen understanding, frith refers to the maintenance of peace and friendship within a social group, while gift-giving and hospitality are bounded by reciprocity.3

No gift binds me to silence in the face of betrayal.

Sources

  1. Hávamál, Larrington translation, stanzas on friendship and gift exchange.
  2. Hávamál, Bellows translation, stanzas 42–46.
  3. Asatru UK, “Wyrd & Ethics,” on frith, hospitality, gift-giving, and reciprocity.

When the Rave Comes to the Knoll

People standing in a ritual circle around a campfire with tents and festival decorations in a forest clearing at dusk

Author’s note: I have not had direct conversations with the owners, stewards, or current administration of Raven’s Knoll about KN¿WHERE Festival. I am not speaking for Raven’s Knoll, Kaleidoscope Gathering, Hail and Horn Gathering, KN¿WHERE, or the wider Pagan community. These are my own personal reflections, and mine alone, based on public information, memory, history, and concern for land that has meant a great deal to many of us.

There is a strange spell moving over Raven’s Knoll this year.

KN¿WHERE Festival is scheduled for early June at Raven’s Knoll, bringing a large electronic music and camping festival onto land that many Pagans and Heathens do not see as just a campground.

That distinction matters.

Raven’s Knoll has been many things over the years. It has been a campground. It has been a festival site. It has been a work site. It has been a business. It has been a gathering place. It has been, for some of us, home.

But it has also been sacred land.

That is the part I keep coming back to.

The Knoll was never just land

For many Pagans in Ontario and beyond, Raven’s Knoll became a home space around 2010, 2011, when Kaleidoscope Gathering found a permanent site there. Before that, Kaleidoscope Gathering had a more transient nature. It moved. It lived where it could live. Bob’s land. Gina’s land. Whispering Pines. Other places. It was carried by volunteers, by people showing up, by folk doing the work because the festival mattered enough to keep alive.

In those earlier days, my memory of KG is that the goal was simple: make enough money to run again next year.

That was the business model, if we can even call it that.

Survive. Gather. Feed the thing. Keep the doors open for next year.

Over time, that changed.

Kaleidoscope Gathering became tied to Raven’s Knoll as a permanent home. Raven’s Knoll itself became more established. The land developed. Sacred spaces were created. Structures changed. Policies changed. Leadership changed. The feel of things changed.

And somewhere along the way, at least from my own perspective, KG moved from being a festival shaped heavily by the people who attended it toward being a festival shaped more clearly by the people who run it.

That is not automatically evil.

Large events need structure. Land needs maintenance. Insurance exists. Hydro exists. Roads, toilets, wells, equipment, staffing, emergency plans, vendor systems, ticketing, food safety, fire rules, and municipal expectations do not magically take care of themselves.

But something changes when a folk gathering becomes a managed entity.

Something changes when a community space becomes a venue.

Something changes when sacred land also has to function as a business property.

And I think we need to be honest enough to sit with that tension.

Hail and Horn has changed too

The Heathen festival I was referring to was Hail and Horn Gathering.

That matters because Hail and Horn is not just another event on the calendar. It is tied directly to the Vé, to god-poles, to blót, húsel, symbel, the raising of sacred structures, and the maintenance of a Heathen sacred enclosure.

Looking at recent public materials, Hail and Horn itself appears to have gone through visible changes over the last few years. There have been changes in scheduling, volunteer structure, feast logistics, recognition practices, accessibility, non-alcoholic participation, and the way community decision-making is handled.

Again, change is not automatically bad.

Sometimes change is needed because a thing has grown.

Sometimes change is needed because the old structure can no longer carry the weight.

Sometimes change is a sign of health.

But sometimes change also leaves people wondering where the centre is now.

Who is the land for?

Who gets heard?

Who is considered part of the folk?

Who is a volunteer?

Who is staff?

Who is family?

Who is a customer?

And who gets called “not a team player” when they no longer fit the direction things are going?

My own sore spot

I need to name my own baggage here.

I volunteered at Kaleidoscope Gathering for roughly eight years. I volunteered at Raven’s Knoll. I lived there for a time. I worked. I helped. I cared about the place.

Then it became time for me to move on.

About a year after that, I was deemed by the owners to be “not a team player” and removed from staff at Raven’s Knoll and from staff at Kaleidoscope Gathering.

That is a sore spot for me.

I would be lying if I pretended otherwise.

And because it is a sore spot, I have to be careful. My hurt is not evidence of current wrongdoing. My personal history is not proof of anyone’s present motives. My experience does not give me the right to turn this into a revenge piece.

But it does shape the question I keep asking:

What does “team player” mean in the current Raven’s Knoll structure?

Does it mean someone who serves the land?

Does it mean someone who serves the community?

Does it mean someone who supports the owners?

Does it mean someone who does not question the direction?

Does it mean someone who helps keep the machine running?

I do not know the answer.

But when sacred land is also a business, the meaning of loyalty can get complicated very quickly.

Now KN¿WHERE enters the picture

This is where KN¿WHERE Festival becomes more than just another booking.

A rave-style bass music festival at Raven’s Knoll is not automatically a disaster. I want to be clear about that.

Rave culture, at its best, carries its own forms of community, embodiment, music, movement, release, care, chosen family, and ecstatic experience. Pagans should not be too quick to sneer at dancing, altered states, night music, drums, lights, or people seeking freedom in a field.

We have our own versions of that.

So this is not “ravers bad, Pagans good.”

That would be lazy.

The issue is not the music.

The issue is not the dancing.

The issue is not outsiders coming onto the land.

The issue is whether sacred land can host a large non-Pagan festival without having its sacredness reduced to atmosphere.

That is the line.

Sacred space is not scenery

Raven’s Knoll contains sacred gardens, art, ritual spaces, installations, shrines, the Vé, the Sacred Well, and places that have meaning because people have returned to them again and again with devotion.

Those spaces are not decorations.

They are not photo backdrops.

They are not “cool forest features.”

They are not interactive art unless they were created to be interacted with.

They are not rave infrastructure.

They are not there to add mystical branding to someone else’s weekend.

Most damage to sacred things does not begin with malice.

Often, it begins with ignorance.

Someone wanders somewhere they should not. Someone takes a picture they should not. Someone climbs something they do not understand. Someone leaves garbage. Someone thinks a shrine is an art piece. Someone thinks a god-pole is a prop. Someone thinks a sacred boundary is just rope.

And by the time everyone agrees that it mattered, the damage is already done.

The Witches’ Sabbat memory

Some of us remember Witches’ Sabbat at Raven’s Knoll.

Some remember it fondly. Some remember the way it ended. Some remember the spiral. Some remember the spitting incident. Some remember the rupture that followed.

I am not going to re-litigate that here. I was not in every room. I do not know every side. I am not turning memory into courtroom testimony.

But I will say this: Raven’s Knoll has already seen what happens when sacred space, conflict, public festival culture, and community trust collide.

You can repair a physical object.

You can clean stone.

You can rebuild a path.

You can replace rope.

You can replant a garden.

Trust is harder.

Trust is the real sacred infrastructure.

What happens if something is defaced?

This remains the question I cannot shake.

What happens if one of the sacred spaces is defaced?

What happens if multiple sacred spaces are disturbed?

What happens if someone wanders into the Vé?

What happens if someone messes with the Sacred Well?

What happens if someone treats a shrine as festival décor?

What happens if there is spray paint, stickers, carving, broken glass, garbage, bodily fluids, or some “funny” social media moment that is not funny to the people who hold the land sacred?

And more importantly:

Is there a clear plan before anything happens?

Because if there is a plan, then this is a managed risk.

If there is no plan, then this is a test of luck.

Sacred land should not be protected by luck.

What I would hope is in place

I do not know what has been arranged between Raven’s Knoll and KN¿WHERE. There may be strong protections already in place. There may be maps, signage, security, restricted areas, and staff briefings I know nothing about.

I hope there are.

If I were looking at this as someone who cares about the land, I would hope for at least the following:

  • Clear maps showing which sacred spaces are fully off-limits.
  • Physical barriers around sensitive areas, not just vague instructions.
  • Visible signs explaining that these are sacred sites, not decorations.
  • Security or land stewards assigned specifically to sacred-space protection.
  • A sacred-site orientation for KN¿WHERE staff, volunteers, and security.
  • A written removal policy for anyone crossing those boundaries.
  • A post-event inspection of all sacred spaces.
  • A restoration protocol if anything is damaged.
  • Transparent communication with the Pagan and Heathen community if something goes wrong.

That last one matters.

If something happens and the response is silence, minimization, or “it was just a festival,” the wound will be larger than the damage itself.

What does the Pagan community think?

That is harder to answer.

From what I can find publicly, much of the visible discussion around KN¿WHERE is not coming from Pagan spaces. It is coming from local residents, municipal concerns, rave communities, and festivalgoers trying to decide whether they trust the event after previous issues.

Some people seem excited.

Some people seem skeptical.

Some people want Ontario to have a strong bass music festival.

Some people are worried about logistics, trust, noise, safety, fire, refunds, and whether the event is ready.

But I have not seen enough public Pagan commentary to say, “the Pagan community thinks this.”

And maybe we will not really know until after the event happens.

That may be the uncomfortable truth.

The deeper concern

My concern is not only KN¿WHERE.

My concern is the direction of the land.

Over the last five years, Raven’s Knoll has changed. Kaleidoscope Gathering has changed. Hail and Horn Gathering has changed. The land itself has changed. The language around events has changed. The structure has changed.

Some of those changes may be necessary.

Some may be good.

Some may be overdue.

But change always raises a stewardship question:

What is being preserved while the structure evolves?

If Raven’s Knoll becomes more financially stable but less spiritually rooted, is that a win?

If more people come to the land but fewer understand what the land is, is that growth?

If sacred spaces remain physically intact but become background scenery for non-Pagan branding, have they really been protected?

If the land survives as a venue but weakens as a home space, what exactly has been saved?

Hospitality without surrender

I do not believe the answer is to close the gates forever.

I do not believe every non-Pagan event is a threat.

I do not believe Pagans should respond with panic, purity politics, or mob behaviour.

Hospitality matters.

Shared space matters.

Financial survival matters.

But hospitality without boundaries is not hospitality.

It is surrender.

If Raven’s Knoll is going to welcome large non-Pagan events, then the sacred identity of the land has to be made plain. Not hidden. Not assumed. Not whispered among those who already know.

Plain.

This land has sacred spaces.

This land has gods and spirits honoured on it.

This land has community memory embedded in it.

This land is not blank.

Come dance here if you are invited.

Come camp here if you are invited.

Come celebrate here if you are invited.

But do not mistake welcome for ownership.

Do not mistake beauty for permission.

Do not mistake sacred space for scenery.

What questions should be asked?

I think respectful questions are fair.

  • Which sacred spaces will be off-limits during KN¿WHERE?
  • How will those boundaries be marked?
  • Will attendees be told Raven’s Knoll is Pagan and Heathen sacred land?
  • Who will monitor the Vé, sacred gardens, ritual spaces, and Sacred Well?
  • Are KN¿WHERE staff and volunteers being briefed on the sacred nature of the site?
  • What happens if someone crosses a boundary?
  • Will Raven’s Knoll inspect and publicly report on the condition of sacred spaces afterward?

Those are not hostile questions.

Those are stewardship questions.

If a place is sacred to a community, the community is allowed to care how it is protected.

My hope

My hope is simple.

I hope nothing bad happens.

I hope KN¿WHERE comes and goes cleanly.

I hope people dance, camp, listen to music, respect the land, respect the rules, and leave Raven’s Knoll no worse than they found it.

I hope the organizers understand they are not just renting a field.

They are stepping onto land with history.

Land with memory.

Land with devotion.

Land with wounds.

Land with gods.

Land with community ghosts, living and dead.

I hope Raven’s Knoll remains Raven’s Knoll.

Not just a venue.

Not just a brand.

Not just “a cool place for a festival.”

A Pagan home space.

A Heathen home space.

A place where sacred things still mean something.

Final thought

The real test is not whether Raven’s Knoll can host a rave.

The real test is whether Raven’s Knoll can host a rave and still be recognized afterward as sacred land.

That is the spell being cast.

And like all spells, the result will depend on preparation, intention, boundaries, and what people are willing to protect.

Godspeed.

Hail and Horn Gathering

The following information is gathered from multiple posts sourced on the website for Ravens Knoll.  

More commonly referred to as HHG, Hail and Horn is an annual gathering organized by Canadian Heathens to express in fullness an ancient religious custom. The gathering is anchored by three intertwined rituals – blót, húsel and symbel – and a deep reverence for the Gods.
HHG seeks to appeal to as many interests our varied participants enjoy. It is hoped that those who come will be able to express their relationships to the Gods, Ancestors and community however they feel most comfortable. That said, a happy medium between boisterous and introspective behaviour is the goal, so that everyone respects each other’s sensibilities at the proper times and places.

Why is the festival called the Hail and Horn Gathering?

The festival is named for the values that are embodied each year in the actions of the people who attend.

“Hail” is about the worship of the Gods. The word “hail” means something which is healthy, holy, and wholesome. The whole of the HHG experience is orchestrated around the worship of the various holy powers (Gods, Ancestors, and land-spirits). Each year a new Goddess or God is selected to be given a central place in the community’s worship and a god-pole is raised by the folk to their honour, constituting a blót. The central theme of the weekend event is constructed around the mythos and esthetics of that deity so that a right ritual experience is the result.

“Horn” is about sacred social communion. The use of the “horn” is both symbolic and physical, as we not only share good words with each other in the hall, but also ever bear in mind the social bonds that rallying around the horn entails. At the ritual of symbel (sumbel) we sit within a metaphoric hall, upon benches pressed shoulder-to-shoulder, speaking boldly of our successes and gratitude to friends, family, and Ancestors.

A “gathering” is a time and place where community is built through the work of frið. HHG encourages kindreds, circle, study groups, groves, banners, hearths, and individuals to be together with other Heathen folk. We all recognize each group and person’s individuality, but also that we share common bonds and can work side-by-side with one another to accomplish shared goals, shared laughs by the hearth fire, or share a relationship with the holy powers. Gatherings of friends, kinships, and individuals was an important historic activity, as it is today. At HHG community building is a principle focus.

HHG is constructed to be a holistic, immersive experience. All of the rituals are connected to one another. It is hoped that those coming to the festival will feel drawn to a high degree of participation and engagement. It is an event of the folk, for the folk. It is not an event for tourists. The registration fees are structured to reflect this philosophy. (See “Are gifts required?” for more context on this second point.)

That said, it is understood that people can find the weekend to be a demanding one, physically, mentally, and emotionally. Also, some people simply do not have the time off work or have child-care responsibilities to which they must see. Therefore, any level of participation must be determined on a personal basis.

Many do find volunteering “behind the scenes”, prepping food or setting tables, to be an important act of devotion to the Gods as well as folk. This is always appreciated by all.

So, yes, it is possible, but it is not encouraged and doing so is less cost effective.

What are the rituals like?

It is difficult to fully describe the feel of the rituals, but we will do our best.

Some have commented that the rituals are both powerful and introspective. Others find greater happiness in the sharing of food with friends, than the raising of a god-pole. As there are many different people coming to HHG, the “feels” of each are manifold. Many will tell you that at least one of the rituals has been incredibly meaningful and transformative.

The rituals are, in reality, not truly separate from one another. They are threads woven together to create a grander ceremony that is the tapestry of the whole festival. Each ritual relates to the others of the weekend, which is why people are encouraged to attend for the entire weekend. The esoteric rite often stands most apart from the other rituals, but it can provide a keystone of understanding linking the entire weekend’s experience for some people.

What is a blót?

Ask a hundred Heathens, you will get a hundred answers. Therefore, we will describe blót in the context of HHG. Each year, a God or Goddess aligned with the ætt (tribe or clan) of the Æsir is carved into a pole which is raised in the Æsir Vé by the folk. Many offerings are given to the Gods, foremost of which are some of the raw ingredients which will be used to prepare the húsel feast on the next day. Once the god-pole (an idol) is raised, the folk are welcome to return throughout the weekend (and in the future) to give further offerings, building upon the gift cycle. This is the ritual where the most personal interactions with the Gods takes place.

What is a suitable offering at blót?

Most anything can be a suitable offering. Many folk give mead (or other alcoholic strong drink), coins, jewelry, fruit, etc. Whatever is of importance to the giver is believed to be well-received in the Vé. Some give in relation to the nature of their request or as a thank you for favours already received. Offerings are usually symbolic and/or personal. For the most part, offerings that are considered to contravene the rules of the Vé are forbidden (such as items containing human body fluids).

Offerings are removed periodically from the Vé to be sunk in the Raven’s Knool Sacred Well or burnt in a sacred fire if it is not possible to sink them in the Well. Thus, please refrain from offering plastics or polluting items. Also, food items are much more likely to be quickly removed from the Vé and ritually transformed and sent on their way, in order to protect the lives of local wildlife that could become problematic visitors (such as bears and coy-wolves).

What is an esoteric ritual and do I need to attend?

An esoteric ritual at HHG is a ritual containing mainly sorcerous or mystical elements. Long after nightfall on the night of the blót, a ritual is held to honour of Holy Power of the year. The ritual may include elements of divination, trance-work, possession, or performance. These rituals tend to by heavily influenced by personal or collective gnosis and may have more syncretic elements than other rituals at the gathering. It is important to note that not everyone is expected to participate. Some HHG participants prefer to relax after a long day by the hearth fire and reflect upon moments experienced at the blót. This is the ritual where the mystical and otherworldly experiences tend to occur (or, in reflection, afterwards).

What is húsel?

The húsel is a sacred feast. The feast consists of a multi-course menu, thematically connected to the nature of the God or Goddess honoured in the given year. The menu is balanced and is inspired by the historic foodways of Heathen peoples and those they encountered. The meal is considered a sacral feast and is not just a meal with entertainment. The húsel is the link between the blót and symbel. The blót is for the Gods, the húsel is where the folk eat with one another, with the Gods, and with the Ancestors. We eat the same foods at húsel that are offered to the Gods in blót, húsel is an extension of blót. Many attendees volunteer to prepare the feast, others selflessly offering to provide table service to the majority and all enjoying the privilege of soulful eating in pleasant company. We serve each other and the Gods at húsel. This is the ritual where less formal relations are developed between people, the Gods, and the Ancestors.

What is symbel?

The symbel (sumbel) is a form of communal ritual where words are spoken over a horn from which one drinks. At HHG, we use a more historically-inspired form of symbel than most. We sit in hall-like tents, side-by-side at the bench. An alcoholic beverage is used to fill the ceremonial drinking horn, Friðdrífa. The drink is made sacred through a blessing (i.e., hammer hallowed). A Byrele (Hornbearer) carries the drinking vessel to those who would speak. They may give toasts to whomever they wish and boast how they will. At a point, gifts are exchanged by those who would do so, during a part of the symbel called the “Giftstool” (the gifting round). At HHG, we do not oath at symbel as, understanding the sacral mechanics of the ritual, we cannot hold each other to follow-through as vast distances may separate us. It should be noted that boasting about something that is going to happen in the future gets into the realm of an oath, so the wording for such an utterance must be chosen carefully or avoided. This is the ritual were the most personal interactions between people takes place.