Sophia is the Greek word for Wisdom. This week we celebrate the feast is to mark the eternal moment in which Wisdom, lost in the world, is redeemed, returned and assumed into the heavenly realm.
In this part of the year, we celebrate the Assumption of Sophia, the Descent of Sophia (Sep 8) and also the Restoration of Sophia (Sep 22), all in quick succession. In the southern hemisphere, as we enter into the bountiful season of spring, our feasts and festivals in Her honour are blessed with the heightened sensory awareness of spring's riches, the exterior call to realise Her offering of interior grace and truth.
Wisdom is our primordial mother. Ever-present, yet not always seen, she is the compassionate ground of our awareness steady in the face of our constant flickering, flittering dance among many suitors, she waits – the patient bride for the bridegroom.
In stillness, when we take time to rest and to see, she stands forth and is triumphant. Soon the bridegroom comes and she returns to the house of her Father.
Reunited, Wisdom I think becomes our awareness. We see in the heady sensations of the manifest world the ever-presence of the Great Mother, and notice in ourselves and each other the unspotted mirror of Her power and the image of Her goodness.
Sister Trish Nowland
The service this Sunday will be a "Sophianic Eucharist". The service praises Sophia as the immanent, feminine face of the Divine and celebrates the sacred marriage between the immanent and transcendent aspects of Spirit. The service features prayer and chant and the sharing of the Body and the Blood in the form of bread and wine.