Ceremony of the Cancer Solstice

Festival of St. John the Baptist ~ ¶ (veiling À) À À

Masons have long held St. John the Baptist as their patron saint as an example of the way to follow.  He prepared the lighted way for the Christ.  There is a deep symbolism in this and especially as it pertains to the sign Cancer and the Solstice.  The two Saints John have significance to Masons, and especially in relation to their degree work of the Three Degrees.  One came before and the other came after the Christ, and in between them is the living example of the Christ life upon the earth.  This ceremony marks that point upon the Cardinal Cross when the sun is at the meridian of its annual cycle in the northern hemisphere.  It is inspired with the energies embodying the truer purposes of incarnating souls as bearers of the Light, and of humanity’s emergence upon the earth and its destiny as builders of a Lighted House, the Temple of the Soul.  The sign Cancer conveys the mystery of incarnation (and reincarnation) as the soul taking form and as it pertains to humanity, for all souls incarnate under the laws of sacrifice and service, and every incarnation is taken with a view to spiritual progress, no matter what the life may appear to be on the outer planes.  Cancer veils and reveals the secret of the purpose of the door into incarnation as it pertains to the soul; and it must be understood that no ‘vengeful or wrathful’ God exists.  All is dependent on one’s karma which one has woven for oneself and viewed from the standpoint of opportunity to the incarnating soul pertaining to its ultimate spiritual destiny, which is to manifest divinity, or the Christ Life, upon the earth, and which is won and achieved by one’s own efforts at self-perfection.  This ceremony is invocative of the energies of sacrifice and service and of an emergence of a pre-existent revelation of the inner Light abiding within each and every one of us of an essential Brotherhood of Light.  This ceremony invokes the energies of the Ray-line, two-four-six, invoking the deeper spiritual and religious significances of the sixth and second rays.