Ancestor Communion Ritual

This ritual is appropriate for an individual or a group. It will require:

bread, butter and honey or bread, olive oil and salt (for new spirits)
the spirit(s)s favourite meal or foods (for familiar spirits)
a libation (wine, mead, ale, whiskey, vodka, rum, or other beverage)
tobacco, hemp, or offertory incense
an ancestor altar and supplies (including a fetiche)
summoning incense
banishing incense

Create your sacred, protected space however you do so within your tradition or culture, and call any
underworld gods you work with to aid in the rite. Use a stang, staff, ritual center post/pillar, tree, or tree
stump to access the World Tree and call up the ancestors. Burn the summoning incense and call up
those you wish to commune with by name. If you do not know their name, list their lineage. If they are
not of your blood ancestry, be very specific. Once you are sure youve summoned the right spirit(s),
invite them to share a meal with you. They will take sustenance from it and your offering of incense,
smoke, and alcohol as well. Eat and drink with them. If you are with others, have all present share in
the food and offerings. The sharing of the food connects you with one another and with the ancestors
youve summoned physically and spiritually. This communion isnt mean to be a silent or solemn
occasion. Talk, feast, and laugh as if you were at a dinner table with family and friends. This itself is
also an offering, which allows the dead a taste of life again.

Do not ask for anything of the dead the first few times you perform this ritual. If you start having
communion more than once a month, then it would be appropriate to make requests. It is best and most
common to ask for blessings of prosperity, fertility, and luck. After further communion, you or your
ritual group could start asking the spirits to aid in divination. When you are finished, burn your
banishing incense, say a clear farewell, and ask the ancestors to return to the underworld by following
your representation of the World Tree down. If you work with a psychopomp, you can also ask them to
direct the spirits back to their realm and close the door between the worlds. End the rite, close the
Circle or ritual space, take down your wards, and the ritual is done.