Ruth Richardson

Lantern Labyrinth - Ruth Richardson

Come enjoy the creation of a Lantern Labyrinth - 600 candle lanterns will be arranged in an ancient labyrinth pattern known as the Seven Circuit Labyrinth. This labyrinth pattern is more than 4000 years old and dates back to Crete.

At twilight, the Lantern Labyrinth facilitators and dancers will light each of the lanterns and the public are welcome to silently enter and walk the Lantern Labyrinth. People’s experiences with the Labyrinth vary. Some people see the labyrinth as a ritual of spiritual transformation and find it calming, while for others it is an energizing process.

Labyrinths are single (unicursal) pathways that lead physically to the centre of the pattern and then back out by simply reversing directions on the same path. Unlike mazes in which there are riddles to be solved and dead-ends abound, the labyrinth has no physical way to get lost or trapped.

The labyrinth offer a journey of presence by inviting the pilgrim into sacred space, a temporary abandonment of the ordinary world for the realm of the holy, and then a return to the ordinary with a bounce of the sacred still within each step. It is an opportunity to be a complete being: body, mind and soul and to reach out to others on the path.

The joy of a labyrinth is that the destination in not important but the journey is! Labyrinths are not magic, though they are full of mystery, and they offer an avenue for participation in many different levels of the mystery of life.

Many global religions contain teachings that articulate the journey of the spiritual seeker; the path one must walk in order to grow in compassion and respond to the world with clarity and wisdom. Buddhists call this the path to Enlightenment; Hindus call it moksha (freedom); and Christians call it a union with God through self-knowledge.