Honoring the Ancestors
Maintaining connection with those who have gone before through memory and ritual.
Celtic spirituality maintains strong connection with ancestors. At Samhain and throughout the year, ancestors are honored with offerings, remembered in story, and consulted for wisdom. The dead are not gone but continue as part of the living community.
The ancestors walk beside us; their wisdom is in our blood.
Ancestor veneration shows Celtic belief in continuing community between living and dead.
Ancestor Traditions
Written about in
- What Celtic tradition says about grief
The dead stay on as consultable members of the community — named in genealogy, addressed at offerings, asked for advice. This gives a mourner a job, which is more use than a doctrine.