The 12th Day of Christmas, January 6th, is the Feast of the Three Magi, the most celebrated astrologers in Western culture. Traditionally it’s a time to bless our homes for the New Year. Since 2020, I have felt even stronger the need to set good intentions and protections on my home on January 6th. I’ve adapted the traditional Catholic blessing and its Qabalistic roots to work with other symbolism and wanted to share a range of possibilities to help you create a House Blessing that feels right for you.
You’ll need chalk and a way to reach the area above the door frame on the main entrance to your home. Decide what you want to write to represent your intentions for the New Year. You can pray or set your intentional out loud or silently while you mark you symbols on your home. Let’s look at the traditional blessings and then get creative.
For the traditional blessings, write 20 + C M B + 24 while praying some combination of the following phrases. Christus Mansionem Benedicat or May Christ bless this house or May the gifts of Caspar, Melchior and Balthazar bring healing, wisdom and balance to this home. By placing something that represents our blessing inside the dates for the coming year, we are creating bookends that extend the blessing throughout the time represented by those numbers. So I suggest keeping the numbers or finding another way to represent this year.
What do you want to call into your home this year? Think about who or what you are asking to bless your home. You can set intentions that call that energy from the universe without asking a deity or angel or ancestor to help. After you decide what you want, you’ll need to figure out how to represent those hopes, prayers and intentions.
Now let’s get creative by replacing the three letters with common symbols for love, peace or luck or whatever you’ve decided to call into your home this year. Have you made a personal sigil? You may want to claim your space for your own by using that sigil alone or in combination with other symbols. You could put a heart on one side of your sigil and a peace sign on the other or put the heart around your sigil. Maybe you are calling in luck and want to draw a 4 leaf clover.
Put an intention into the crosses or plus signs that surround the blessings you are calling into this year. A cross may represent balance or a peace sign represent the addition of more love, peace and luck. You can change them to other symbols such as a multiplication sign or an equals sign to grow your blessings.
Not feeling artistic? Write the year and tape a Tarot Card like the Lovers or High Priestess that represents what you want in your space for the coming year.
Feeling artistic? I’ve used colored chalk to add power and beauty to what I was creating. Often I’ll get more personal and artistic on the intentions and protections I anchor above the door in my bedroom and more general on the whole house blessings placed above the front door.
However you celebrate the beginnings of the New Year, may you find your home and your ritual space and your sleeping space full of peace. If you want to know more about the Qabalistic qualities of the Three Wisemen, check out this blog. If you need info on how to clean your space before you bless it, check out this post. May the gifts of prophecy, astrology and intention support you in reaching that peace.