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The great god of the Northern Bronze Age was the Sun, and His sign was the Wheel.

Happy were they who saw His sign standing in the sky.

Today, in the winter skies of the North, we see it there still.

“Parahelia,” they say, or “Sun dogs.”

Now these are the Three Births of Yule.

The First Birth of Yule is the Primal Birth.

Long ago, in ages of ages, the fires of the Sun first kindled, since when He has royally burned in self-giving, sacrificial light.

The Second Birth of Yule is the Eternal Birth.

This is the annual birth of the Sun, Who daily and yearly goes down in darkness and rises up again: and unto ages of ages.

The Third Birth of Yule is the Earthly Birth.

On Equinox morning, the light of the rising Sun streams in a golden torrent down the hall.

I stand in worship, bathed in light.

Before such savage beauty, I bow and kiss the ground.

I rise and kiss my hand, adoring.

Did you know that a new Sun was born this year?

Astronomers estimate that, here in our Milky Way galaxy, there's a New Sun born at a frequency of about one a year.

One a year.

On the Thirteenth Day of Yule in the year 1153, Earl Harald Maddarðarson of Orkney was travelling from Stromness to Firth when he was caught in a blizzard. He and his companions took shelter from the storm in the famed Neolithic burial mound Maeshowe, where, interestingly, two of his party went mad. This delayed the travelers for so long, reports the Orkneyinga Saga, that they didn't reach Firth until well after dark.

Dating from around 2500 BCE, Maeshowe was well known to the Vikings, who ruled the Orkneys for more than 300 years. Carved into the stones of the mound's central chamber is one of the largest known collections of runic inscriptions in Europe. According to the longest,

Crusaders broke into Maeshowe. Líf Earl's-Cook carved these runes. To the northwest is a great treasure hidden. It was long ago that a great treasure was hidden here. Happy is he that might find that great treasure. Hákon alone bore treasure from this mound.

Maeshowe is famed for its orientation to the Winter Solstice sunset. For the last few years, on the morning of Midwinter's Eve, I've tuned in to the live on-site webcam to watch. What I saw there amazed me.

The last words of British painter J. M. W. Turner (1775-1851) are reported to have been: The Sun is god.

And him not even a pagan.

Our Sun, our star. Our star, our god. We are sunlight and soil, literally, Earth and Sun our undeniable parents. In this Divine Family that we call the solar system, They are our Mother and our Father.

And what does one take more for granted than one's parents?

When did you last actually think about the Sun? Really see the Sun? Praise the Sun? Offer gratitude to the mighty Being without Whom we would not exist? Say thank you for the incomparable gift of light?

So I'm standing there naked in the kitchen.

Mind you, this isn't something I make a point of doing. It's the end of January, and this is Minnesota. Early in the morning, the kitchen is just as cold as the rest of the house, no place to stand around naked.

You have to understand that at this time of year, the North becomes a desert. Our intense cold wrings every trace of moisture from the air. If you don't slather on moisturizer, you turn into an ice-mummy. Fortunately, there's no need to resort to bear-grease, like in the old days.

So, I'd just toweled off from the shower and rubbed down with body-lotion. Waiting for my skin to absorb it, I ran downstairs to plug in the waffle iron.

That's when it happened.