Participants are handed candles. A single candle is lit and the light passed along. Participants hold their lighted candles while the poem is read, and then they burn throughout the liturgy.
Reading: “The Burning House” by Emily Brown

The flame is no longer held within the chamber
It burns everywhere
We are on fire
Children everywhere
Seeking water that will heal
The holy water that is clear
Water unpolluted
But everywhere there is dirt and dust that has settled into and poisoned the streams
Deep, deep down in the earth there is the pure water
The way is down
The old sources have become clogged
New wells are sought
And sounding bars, divining rods, of every kind
Are held over the sands of our time in efforts to discern the new watering places
That might be there Deep down For us
I have met her, that one
Who holds a true divining rod that one who is seeking pure water

(“The Burning Bush” by Emily Brown in Well of Living Waters, ed. By Rhoda Head et al. C.G. Jung Institute of Los Angeles, 1977, reprinted with permission in Liberating Liturgies.)

At this time participants — preselected or spontaneous — are asked to share their reflections on the poem. Participants are next invited to name women brought to mind and heart by the poem and reflections.

Taken from Liberating Liturgies, Women’s Ordination Conference, 1989