St. Mary Magdalene's Day - July 22

Really Gorgeous Playing Card Decks from Bicycle Cards! An appreciation

Since I've been reading normal playing cards in my folk practice, I didn't want to limit myself to any ordinary deck I'd find in Dollarama or in a cupboard. Like Tarot cards, I want my deck to be gorgeous and evocative! So, here are my favourites, and you all might love looking at these!

Aviary (I own this one and use it for my practice)

Marquis

Jubilee

The Sea King (I lost my ace of spades in this one)

Odyssey

Stargazer New Moon

Stargazer

Stargazer Sunspot

Stargazer Observatory

Voyager

Honorable mention: A Ducale Game. I have no idea how to play it, but the cards evoke really old art styles! Not from Bicycle.

Intention Announcement from lesorciercanadien - writing a book for Acadian and Quebecois folk practitioners

Hello to all!

With increased interest in this subject matter, and with more people finding my blog and the blog Courir le Loup Garou by Erik Lacharity and Morrigane Feu, I wanted to announce my intentions to the community at large.

I am working tirelessly through my research to write and someday publish a book about my practice for everyone to enjoy! It's coming, but a book of this magnitude requires time and adequate, responsible research to achieve. As I keep posting my knowledge here, know that something more official is coming in the future.

Crossing my fingers we keep getting good resources for us, and one day, see our spiritual heritage on the New Age shelves.

A cover page to motivate me to keep going!

St. Joseph the worker pray for us 💼 worked for me last week! You got this!!

please pray for me I have a job interview coming up 🙏🏼🩷

after getting rejected a handful of times I’m starting to get a little depressed :(

I decorated a Huckleberry compass this week! The shape is reminiscent of a planchette and it held the perfect opportunity for some stained glass painting.

La Mi-Carême (Mid-Lent)

Mid-Lent, or, La Mi-Carême, falls on the fourth Thursday in the Lenten season. This holiday has its roots in 7th and 8th century Europe, where believers were allowed this day of respite from the fasting and reservations of Lent. It was around the same time as Laetere Sunday, the fourth Sunday of Advent (exactly 21 days before Easter Sunday) where a spirit of joy is celebrated as we get closer to Easter. Having migrated with the French settlers of the 17th century, the Acadians and some Quebec communities, Mi-Carême became a day of carnivalesque mischief and trickery. Participants, mostly men until the twentieth century, disguised themselves with a dizzying array of masks and frocks, and do a tour of their village, challenging interlopers to guess who they were. In exchange, they would receive treats and opportunities to play pranks, sometimes a boozy recompense. In some communities, like in Grand-Étang, Nova Scotia, there is a Mi-Carême Interpretive Centre, where runners of the Mi-Carême gather on this day to do their designated tomfoolery. Lively fiddle music and sweet treats await visitors! Today, the most extensive celebration of this holiday remains in Chéticamp, Cape Breton, where it lasts a whole week. These two communities have celebrated Mi-Carême since 1785! 

Today in Québec, you can see Mi-Carême celebrations notably where Acadians migrated, namely Fatima, the Magdalen Islands, Natashquan, and L’Isle-aux-Grues. In parts of Newfoundland, Acadians would pair Mi-Carême traditions with the mummers tradition of anglophone communities, however, it occurred between Christmas and the Feast of Kings. 

Costumes would prioritize the grotesque, bizarre, and outlandish. The more ludicrous and hideous the masquerade, the better! Most costumes were improvised and very cost-effective. The point was to have no one recognize you! Old rags, hand-me-downs from distant cousins living in the United States (and unknown to the community, so no one would know whose family the clothes belonged to), and especially, clothing yourself in the clothes of your opposite gender, were sure-fire ways to be incognito on this festival day. Changing your body shape was also a notable technique, using hay to bulk out your limbs, or cushions to give yourself a hunched back. Some folks would go as industrious as using animal skins, like the hide of a bull, preserving the horns for a truly otherworldly effect! 

Disguised parties, led by a chief, would enter homes, and entertain the family with brief songs and improvised plays. Unlike the eve of All Saint’s Day (October 31), the aim was not to pull tricks. The chief of the party-goers had to see that his troupe would behave in others’ homes. However, that can change if the house they wanted to enter would not let them enter! 

La Mi-Carême, Mère Mi-Carême (Mother Mid-Lent)

Folklore traveled from Normandy and Brittany to Acadie, and transplanted itself into the maritime spirit of the people. In parts of Brittany, La Mi-Carême (Lady Mid-Lent) would be a beautiful woman who would traverse the skies on horseback, distributing sweets and treats from a magical golden cornucopia to the village cross, where children were led to for holy prayer. The treats would appear to fall from Heaven, and the children would leave behind offerings of hay for her horse at the foot of the cross as a thank you. In Quebec, this kind of figure appears in Pierre-Joseph-Olivier Chauveau’s novel Charles Guerin (published in 1852), featuring a Mère Mi-Carême (Mother Mid-Lent). She is a woman, bent forward by old age, who would hobble from home to home with a big bag on her back, and supporting herself with a thick cane. Peering through her small glasses, she was draped in old, tattered rags, adorned with fish bones and tails. Sometimes, she just appears as a hunched over figure covered by a white sheet, evoking a sense of mystery and apprehension for children. This figure also appears in Acadian communities, and almost in the habit of a traditional Santa Claus, would leave behind treats for obedient children, while chastising the mischievous ones. This figure would feature in the mythos of this holiday from the 19th century into the mid-twentieth century. When she would visit a house, children were told to not look at her leaving the house, for fear of knowing where she was headed to next. This could prevent her from coming next year. This tradition expanded to Irish immigrant communities, particularly in Tignish, PEI, where she was known as ‘mickram’ (anglicized verbiage of Mi-Carême). In some Acadian communities, especially in north-eastern New Brunswick, in Gaspésie, in the Magdalen Islands, and on the Côte-Nord of Quebec, it was known that La Mi-Carême would bring newborns to their families. When mothers would be in labour, children were told that La Mi-Carême was coming to see their mom. Given that this character gave a fright to children, they would instinctively go seek refuge at a neighbour’s house for the entire duration of their mother’s labour. She was also known to bring baby animals to the farms as well. What a busy woman! 

Celebrating Mi-Carême in a Folk Practice

-if you're in the area and wish to experience the culture and the wondrous display of colours and lively music, visit the Centre de la Mi-Carême in Grand-Étang, Nova Scotia, just off the Cabot Trail.

-it’s a time of masquerades and journeys! If you can make yourself an outfit to be completely unrecognizable, even a mask, just to take your spirit out of yourself, it can lead to some exciting astral journeys! 

-leaving an offering to La Mi-Carême, such as hay, or little quarters, might be wise, especially if you want to avoid getting a good scare from her. 

-exploring the archives for songs attached to this festival, and listening to some examples would be fun! 

-host a masquerade party and have people try to guess each other’s identities! Bringing back these celebrations means having fun in the ways we used to, so put your phones down! 

Sources

Georges Arsenault. La Mi-Carême en Acadie. Editions La Grande Marée. 2007.

Le Centre de la Mi-Carême. https://www.micareme.com

Encyclopedia of French Cultural Heritage in North America. Mid-Lent Traditions in Acadia. http://www.ameriquefrancaise.org/en/article-310/Mid-Lent%20Traditions%20in%20Acadia

Photos

Mid-Lent Revellers, NS, circa 1953. Collection Centre Acadien, Université Sainte-Anne.

Mi-Careme distributing cookies to children, charcoal drawing by Denise Paquette, Collection Georges Arseneault.

Tourism Nova Scotia

Centre de la Mi-Carême - Tourism Nova Scotia

JEANMAIRE ÉDOUARD - Le Soleil

La Chandeleur

Candlemas, or La Chandeleur as it is known in French-speaking Catholic communities, starts on the evening of February 1st into February 2nd. It commemorates Jesus's presentation at the Temple (Luke 2:22-40) as the Light of the World.

The Blessed Candle

This time of year is full of light festivals all over the world. For Acadians, la Chandeleur is celebrated with the blessing of a candle at church at 8am, and bringing it home to in turn bless the home.

The blessed candle is kept at the parents' bedside, or on a tiny shelf in the kitchen. It would be lit during big storms, as a foil to lightning, during periods of illness, a hard childbirth, and when a death occurs in the house. When a priest would visit the house to provide communion to a sick parishioner, the candle would be lit and carried to guide the priest to the ailing person's bedside, and the same rite would apply to the final rites of a dying person. The flame remains lit during the wake. The candle is also lit during Marial devotions during the month of May. If healing is prayed for during a novena, it also doesn't hurt to light this candle.

Once those candles are blessed, the master of the home is to bring the lit candle to every corner of the house to bless it with its light. They would also bring this light to the barn and the fields for blessings. Many families boast of a special candle holder just for this candle.

On Prince Edward Island, pieces of this candle's wax were also brought aboard on fishing boats along with woven palm fronds, and were meant to keep the fisherman safe during storms at sea.

Acadian Candle Blessing

"Daignez bénir et sanctifier ces cierges pour notre usage, pour la santé des corps et des âmes, sur terre comme sur mer."

"May these candles be blessed and sanctified for our use, for the health of our bodies and souls, on land as on the sea."

Chandeleur Crêpes

It's also a crêpe-making day!!! On the eve of this holiday (Feb.1), families would make crêpes for dinner, often using the last of last year's flour. This stems from medieval France, when peasants would use the previous year's flour (most likely their only flour left) to ensure the next year's harvest would be bountiful. It is tradition in Acadie to have every member of the household flip their own crêpe, to determine if a successful flip would grant them luck for the year. Some families even kept a piece of the crêpe in their cupboard all year long to ward off bad luck.

Crêpe recipe

One cup white flour

1 1/4 cup of milk

1/2 tsp of salt

1 cup of freshly fallen snow, compacted (nowadays, I wouldn't recommend it. Snow falls on the ground polluted. It used to be a common ingredient in Acadian and Quebecois cooking. You can skip it and the recipe would still turn out fine.)

Frying grease or vegetable shortening, or butter for the pan.

Serve with molasses or grated maple sugar.

A Season of Giving

It is also a time in Acadian villages where folks would go around and ask for donations to their local food banks or church soup kitchen service. They would parade with a tall staff with a rooster figure on top (called a chief's cane) and with each donation, a ribbon is added to the stick. In the evening, when the village would gather for a community potluck, people could reclaim their ribbons from the rooster staff. Festivities of fiddle playing, dancing and merriment were in order in most homes and community centres.

Acadian communities like Chéticamp and other small Acadian hamlets still celebrate to this day!

Ideas for Anyone Far from a Community

Seeing as I don't live in an Acadian community sadly, here are some ideas of things I can do, and maybe you can do too, to celebrate today!

Make crêpes and perform the best flip! Your luck depends on it!

Bless your own candle with holy water, parade it to every corner of your home.

Create a chief's cane, and plant it in your front yard. With every donation you accept for a food bank or other charitable effort, add a ribbon, heck, ask your neighbours and friends to participate!

Organize a potluck!

Use the wax from the candle to bless the lintel post of your doors, or other objects you wish to bless.

Bonus photo: Moonshadow blocking my holiday book's Chandeleur page and refusing to move.

Source

Georges Arsenault. La Chandeleur en Acadie. Editions la Grande Marée. 2011.

Painting

La Chandeleur. Painting by Camille Cormier, painted in 1984. Oil on canvas. Coll. Musée Acadien, Moncton University. Acq. 1986-17.

A lovely Quinzou to everyone! I got dressed in my best ritual clothes, packed up my Stella Maris rosary (that Moonshadow loves to munch on..), enjoyed some live Acadian music and had an intimate little ritual for Mary.

Holy Saturday’s vigil was lovely, even as I was visiting my in-laws and I didn’t have my altar cabinet or a church nearby who offered the service.

My paschal candle was prepared with my pocket knife with the Cross, Alpha and Omega and the year’s numbers, blessed with holy water and the ashes from the cut up bits of palm frond. I read from the Old Testament and the Gospel of Luke 24:1-12 (since in 2025, we are in Year C of the Lectionnary), read out the Litany of Saints, and played the Excelsis Deo with the ringing bells at around midnight. It was a simple and moving rite, and one that I love to take, since it has a section in the scripts used to undertake a renewal of baptism and vows.

My mom went to a church in St. Ambroise, in Saguenay for her vigil. She brought back a vigil candle, and Lillie was intrigued!

A Happy Easter to all the faithful, and I hope your day is filled with joy and love among your families and friends!

A drive along the coasts of Cape Breton, in Main-de-Dieu, Louisbourg, and Sydney. Various graveyards, with time-worn statues, and an abandoned church. The first photo of Christ has the Fortress of Louisbourg in the background.

Spending Holy Saturday exploring these lonely, holy places really brought me joy!