Daily Devotional: December 31st
Prayer for Calends Eve
O Juno, Queen of Heaven’s bright expanse,
Majestic Goddess, with your regal glance,
On this eve of Calends, we raise our song,
To thee, whose power and might have ruled so long.
O wife of Jove, whose voice the skies obey,
In golden chariot, thou dost lead the day,
With peacock plumes that trail in splendor bright,
And eyes that glitter with celestial light.
On this sacred eve, we humbly pray,
With offerings pure, we seek thy favor's ray,
Bestow thy blessings, keep us in thy care,
O Queen of Heaven, hear our solemn prayer.
Thy power is boundless, thy wisdom vast,
In every age, through eons that have passed,
With reverence, we honor thee tonight,
O Juno, Goddess, in thy radiance bright.
Daily Meditation
"The authors of the Orphic hymns supposed Jove to be the mind of the world, and that he created all things therein, containing the world in himself. ... Jove, therefore, is the whole world, animal of animals, and god of gods; but Jove, that is, inasmuch as he is the mind from which he brings forth all things, and by his thoughts creates them.”
—Porphyry
On Cult Images fr. 3
Jove is the Nous, Mind, or Intellect itself. By his thought, He creates all things. All things exist within Him, and He is not separate from what He creates. The immanent God that pervades all, knows all, and sees all. Each of us shares a fragment of His divine nature, and through this, we can return to Him.
Monthly Ascesis: Repentance
"Repentance is the beginning of philosophy"
—Hierocles
“Repentance is often seen as a particularly Christian idea, but philosophers were quite fond of reminding people to repent. Pythagoras, in particular, suggests two ways that we can begin to repent and take a better inventory of who we are. The word ‘repent’ is related to the Latin word for regret. The idea is that we should look over our actions and judge them if they are unworthy. However, the Greek word for repentance is metanoia, which means the transformation of the mind. Platonic repentance is about creating an inner change that leads us back to a life of holiness in harmony with the divine.
Pythagoras says we should “do nothing shameful, neither in the presence of others nor privately; Thus, above all things, sit as a judge over [ourself].” This suggests we should watch our actions, and when we do something wrong or shameful, we should repent, that is, regret that action. If we never do this or shun it as a practice, we effectively say we have no reason to regret our actions. However, regretting an action is recognizing an area where we fell short of our ideals. If we never regret or repent, we make any spiritual or ethical growth impossible. This is why Hierocles, commenting on Pythagoras, says, “repentance is the beginning of philosophy.””
Excerpt from Ascesis: The Handbook of Platonic Practice
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