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The annual tradition of blessing herbs on the feast of the Assumption

What do you think of it?

  • it is pagan and satanic

    Votes: 1 20.0%

  • it will lead you to hell

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • poor jesus will be very angry about it

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Jesus likes it, for it is in honour of his mother

    Votes: 1 20.0%

  • it is a good example how good pre-Christian traditions can become Christian

    Votes: 1 20.0%

  • other

    Votes: 4 80.0%
  • Total voters
    5
R

Rumpel

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The annual tradition of blessing herbs on the feast of the Assumption

The special blessing seeks to increase the natural powers of healing these plants possess.
During the Middle Ages there developed an annual tradition of blessing herbs on the feast of the Assumption, August 15. It coincided with harvest time and was an opportunity to give thanks to God for the bounty received.

The custom arose primarily from Germanic countries, and the Directory on Popular Piety describes it as “a clear example of the genuine evangelization of pre-Christian rites and beliefs: one must turn to God, through whose word ‘the earth produced vegetation: plants bearing seeds in their several kinds, and trees bearing fruit with their seed inside in their several kinds’ (Gen 1, 12) in order … to stem the damages deriving from poisonous herbs, and benefit from the efficacy of curative herbs.”
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More about it: Blessing of Herbs on the Feast of the Assumption--Aleteia

And what do you think of it?
 

Jesus likes it, for it is in honour of his mother
it is a good example how good pre-Christian traditions can become Christian



So it is, so it is! :)
 
Rumpel said:
The annual tradition of blessing herbs on the feast of the Assumption



More about it: Blessing of Herbs on the Feast of the Assumption--Aleteia

And what do you think of it?
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Freedom of Religion.

I don't have to think one way or the other about a religious practice unless it is illegal (ex. human sacrifice), and/or harms the property of others (like burning a cross in someone else's yard).

So I chose "Other," as this ritual falls into neither category. Thus I could care less. :shrug:
 
OK - now you have. :)
 
Rumpel said:

Jesus likes it, for it is in honour of his mother
it is a good example how good pre-Christian traditions can become Christian



So it is, so it is! :)
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Wrong...Jesus and John both stripped away from the people and their religious leaders the cloak of self-righteousness and of observance of man-made traditions and hypocrisy, exposing the sinful state of the nation.​..Luke 3:7, 8; Matthew 15:1-9; 23:1-39; John 8:31-47; 9:40, 41...
 
Elvira said:
Wrong...Jesus and John both stripped away from the people and their religious leaders the cloak of self-righteousness and of observance of man-made traditions and hypocrisy, exposing the sinful state of the nation.​..Luke 3:7, 8; Matthew 15:1-9; 23:1-39; John 8:31-47; 9:40, 41...
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I'm not sure they'd see praying for the efficacy of their medicines (that's what their herbs were--their only medicines) as self righteous or hypocritical, though. How many people around the world do you guess are praying for a vaccine or a treatment for Covid that will save lives? Is there really any difference?
 
MaryP said:
I'm not sure they'd see praying for the efficacy of their medicines (that's what their herbs were--their only medicines) as self righteous or hypocritical, though. How many people around the world do you guess are praying for a vaccine or a treatment for Covid that will save lives? Is there really any difference?
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A lot of difference...there is no ritual involved...
 
Elvira said:
A lot of difference...there is no ritual involved...
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I see. Well, the Catholics are all about ritual, aren't they? I don't knock anyone else's ways when it comes to religion.
 
MaryP said:
I see. Well, the Catholics are all about ritual, aren't they? I don't knock anyone else's ways when it comes to religion.
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But Jesus did...many people in centuries past felt that they were doing what God wanted, but the record of history in the Bible shows that frequently this was not actually what God wanted them to do, but it was what they themselves wanted or some other organization of men wanted to do...
 
MaryP said:
I'll bet it smells good. Where do they do this? I've never heard of it.
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Especially in South Germany.
In Bavaria - and in the Black Forest in Baden-Württemberg.
 
Elvira said:
But Jesus did...many people in centuries past felt that they were doing what God wanted, but the record of history in the Bible shows that frequently this was not actually what God wanted them to do, but it was what they themselves wanted or some other organization of men wanted to do...
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I thought so .....

That you would find a way to denounce our beautiful old custom as "un-biblical" and therefore as pagan and satanic.

And YOU - YOU always know EXACTLY what God wants?
Maybe you know it better than God himself knows?

:cool:
 
3 voters

And one voter says: it is pagan and satanic
 


Here you can see and hear a video about the Blessing of the Herbs
 


And here you see the Blessing of the Herbs in Gegenbach in the Black Forest.

I have been there as well.
 
Now that you have watched the Videos, what do you think of the ceremony? :)
 
This blessing comes from Germany, and formulas for it are found as early as the tenth century.

The blessing of herbs was reserved only to the feast of the Assumption. Herbs had not our restricted English meaning but included all kinds of cultivated and wild flowers, especially those which in some way had a symbolic relation to our Lady. The people brought herbs to church on her feast not only to secure for themselves another blessed object, but also to make of the occasion a harvest festival of thanksgiving to God for His great bounty manifested in the abundant fruits of the earth. The herbs were placed on the altar, and even beneath the altar-cloths, so that from this close contact with the Eucharist they might receive a special consecration, over and above the ordinary sacramental blessing of the Church.
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Liturgical Year : Prayers : Roman Ritual: Blessing of Fruits and Herbs on the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary | Catholic Culture

So it is a German invention? :cool:
 

116 views
 
It is a wonderful and beautiful old custom.
Christians who dislike it must be terrible narrow-minded fanatics who are a disgrace for the whole Christianity.
They are insulting God's creation.
 
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