Harvest Festival

Harvest Festival is our joyous annual celebration and community gathering that occurs around the time of the harvest and Michaelmas. We celebrate the change of season in community. Our Harvest Festival activities are related to the Story of St. George and the Dragon – overcoming the dragon to revitalize our confidence through courage, strength and determination. Harvests festivals typically feature feasting, both family and public, with foods that are drawn from crops that come to maturity around the time of the festival. Harvest Festival includes a shared meal including hot dishes, bread, pies & apple cider and performances, crafts and activities (examples below):

  • shooting stars
  • shield making
  • apple pressing
  • music
  • games of courage
  • face painting

A table full of homemade chili.

Children roasting marshmallows.

The Season of Autumn at MPCS

Each year, as we return to school in August, we know that summer is soon coming to an end and the fruits of nature ripen in this harvest season. The sunlight decreases, the nights lengthen, and we endeavor to keep our inner light burning, moving toward the darkness of winter. During this season, a picture of the archangel Michael who battles the evil dragon arises. This archetype has appeared in mythology for many years. Ancient Hindu texts describe Indra slaying a dragon while ancient Babylonians told of Marduk who slayed Tiamat. The archetype is of one who overcomes or transforms evil through moral courage in action.

We, as human beings, have the opportunity to rise to this call in our current times to overcome our own inner dragons that may manifest at this time of year as fear, anxiety, or a loss of ease. With this Michaelic impulse, we can move forward with this inner strength and initiative to bring about new and courageous ways of thinking and living in our communities.

In this season of autumn, we are reminded of this task, large and small. We not only can overcome our own fear and inactivity
as human beings, but we can seek to honor the courage and initiative that we see every day in individuals; to have interest in what others bring as gifts into the world and to encourage each other to move toward our full potential as human beings. In so doing, we can bring transformation in the world. In our current time, this becomes not only a celebration of a season, but an urgent call, seeking from each of us to find the good and the true in all of us, encouraging it to grow and flourish.

In our school, we carry this impulse and mood into the classroom in the season of autumn. The children may sing songs of ones who overcome the dragon. They may hear biographical stories of Michaelic Figures from history or mythology. They may engage in physical work of the will that helps to bring good to our campus and community. We strive to inspire the students with stories, old and new, of human courage, initiative, and responsible action.

We carry this mood forward and come together in celebration of autumn at our Harvest Festival, which, in turn, inspires us to move out into the world beyond our community with this initiative.

by Kelly Morrow

Questions?

Please email the Family Council at familycouncil@mountainphoenix.org.