📅 Date: Saturday, September 20, 2025
🕘 Time:

🏞 Location: Taino Woods Sanctuary

Embrace the sacred energy of the Fall Equinox as we come together for a day of prayer, purification, and reconnection. Guided by Taino elder Behike Miguel Sague, this profound ceremony will lead us through the cycles of life, death, and rebirth as we honor Yoka Hu’s descent to the watery underworld, a pivotal moment in the ceremonial cycle of the cemies. Through prayer, dance, and reflection, we create space for healing, gratitude, and renewal in alignment with the seasonal shift.

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🍂 Ceremony Details

🌟 Dress for Ceremony and Lodge:

Participants are encouraged to wear their naguas (traditional white ceremonial attire) for the Taíno teachings and ceremonies led by Miguel Sague. Additionally, please bring separate modest attire for the Purification Lodge.

To learn more about the significance of purification lodges, please visit our Guanara Lodge Protocol.

🌽 Sacred Offerings for the Ceremony:

We invite participants to bring any of the four sacred Taino foods:

Additionally, cornmeal for the Purification Lodge and the traditional honorable gift of tobacco for our Behike and/or Land stewards is encouraged. Participants may also bring personal altar items to be placed during the ceremony. These sacred offerings help amplify our prayers and intentions.

🥘 Potluck Community Meal:

During the ceremony, we will share a communal potluck meal. Participants are invited to bring a prepared dish to contribute. While potluck foods do not need to be from the four sacred Taino foods, we encourage offerings that reflect your love and gratitude for the community.

🔹 Please bring your own drinking water and reusable water bottle to stay hydrated throughout the day.

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• 🔥 Schedule Overview:
• 9:00 AM – Arrival and preparation (dress in layers for varying weather conditions)
• 10:00 AM – Opening directions and Sacred Dances:
• Cibucan Dance – Women weave together ropes hanging from a tree branch
• Boa Constrictor Dance – Women march in a line, holding onto the rope effigy of a snake
• Anointing of Men – A closing ritual before the fire lighting
• 12:00 PM – Fire lighting and Guanara Lodge ceremony begins
• 7:00 PM – Community clean-up
• 8:00 PM – Wrap-up and departure

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🙏🏽 Donations for the Taíno Teachings:

• Day Pass: $75
• Weekend Pass: $125
• Family of 4 Pass: $175

RSVP HERE 👇 RSVP by 9/16 – No exceptions

If you feel called to give more and “pay it forward” for another community member in need, or if the suggested donation amount is a challenge, please email us at events@tainowoods.com to discuss alternative options.

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🌿 Important Notes:

• Timeliness: Please honor the start and end times of the ceremony by arriving promptly at 9:00 AM and leaving the Land by 8:00 PM, or when the ceremony leader closes the circle.
• Dress Appropriately: The ceremony will take place outdoors—please dress in layers and prepare for varying weather conditions.
• Sacred Practice: The clean-up and wrap-up times are an integral part of the ceremony and community practice. This collective care ensures that the Land remains ready to support future gatherings.
• Ceremony Updates: Any adjustments to the ceremony details or location will be communicated in advance to align with the Land’s readiness.

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Let us come together to embrace the balance of the Fall Equinox, honoring the cycles of transformation that guide us all.

With love and gratitude,
🌿 Taino Woods Sanctuary

This season calls us to release what no longer serves, so we may welcome what is waiting to be born.
We invite you to sit with sacred teachers—Los Ninos, to be guided into deeper alignment with yourself, with nature, and with the present moment.

Together, we will honor the wisdom of letting go, so that new life, clarity, and possibility can enter.

Come with an open heart. Leave with renewed presence.
🌿 In the stillness, the teachings arise. 🌿

1.⁠ ⁠Become a paid member
2.⁠ ⁠⁠Go to menu upper left Taino Social- Groups, “Plant Medicine” request to join.
3.⁠ ⁠⁠ Introduce yourself.

🙌🏾REMINDER🙌🏾
The Sacred Teachers are our Sacrament.
As a church, we walk with deep respect and honor for these gifts of Creation. They are not taken lightly—they are approached with prayer, humility, and gratitude.
May we always remember to treat the Sacred Teachers as holy,
for they guide us on the path of healing, alignment, and truth.
Contribution -$222 for overnight.
Questions: email Events@Tainowoods.com

Last day to register 9/24

RSVP HERE 👇 Fill out this form out before attending.

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1lkjs7DeYKkw1xcJAi0TUnz0QPc3RlIBVQwOxQ-1UyTs/preview

🗓️ September 27th | 10:00 AM – 1:00 PM

💫 Investment: $33

🧘 Bring Yoga Mat

📍 Location Taino Woods Sanctuary    

Awaken your inner energy and reconnect with your true self through the sacred and transformative practice of Kundalini Yoga, often called the Yoga of Awareness.

This powerful 3-hour experience blends:

✨ Breathwork (Pranayama)

✨ Dynamic Movement & Kriya

✨ Mantra & Meditation

✨ Mudra (hand gestures)

These ancient tools work together to balance your body, elevate your spirit, and expand your consciousness.

We’ll close with a deeply restorative Sound Journey, allowing the healing vibrations of gongs, crystal singing bowls, and chimes to wash over you—integrating the practice on a cellular level.

🌟 Benefits of this experience include:

    •    Reduced stress & anxiety

    •    Strengthened nervous and immune systems

    •    Enhanced clarity, focus, and creativity

    •    Emotional balance and resilience

    •    A deeper connection to Self and Spirit

🧘‍♀️ All levels welcome—no previous yoga or meditation experience needed.

Wear comfortable clothing, bring water, and arrive with an open heart and a willingness to explore your inner landscape.

🌞🕉️ Join us to awaken, align, and ignite the light within. Visit tainowoods.com to register.

RSVP HERE

📅 Saturday, October 4th | 🕛 Starts at Noon – 10 PM | 🏕️ Overnight available

All land stewards, board members, apprentices, and community volunteers are warmly invited to a day of joy, storytelling, music, and reflection. Bring your voice, your drum, and your dancing feet.

• 🎤 Open Mic & Spoken Word
• 🔥 Fire Circle & Drum
• 🍲 Shared Meal
• 🕺🏽 Dance, Laughter & Good Medicine
• 🥗Pot Luck 

Want to share on the mic? Email: events@tainowoods.com
Han Han Katu. Seneko Kakona. You are the rhythm of this sanctuary.

Ages 7–12 | Saturday | 9:00 AM–7:30 PM
A nature-based retreat to reconnect children with Atabeyra (Mother Earth), their bodies, and their inner light. Includes nature walks, mindfulness, yoga, storytelling, art, nourishing meals, and songs by the fire. Deadline to register by 10/18/2025.

📧 Register Here

Parents are welcome to stay or return for closing campfire & s’mores!

📅 Date: Saturday, November 1, 2025
🕘 Time: 9:00 AM arrival | 10:00 AM fire 🔥 lighting & ceremony begins | 7:00 PM clean-up | 8:00 PM wrap-up
🏞 Location: Taíno Woods Sanctuary, Harris, NY

As the veil between worlds grows thin, we enter the sacred warmth of the Purification Lodge to honor our ancestors, release grief, and call in guidance.

This Día de los Muertos ceremony is a time to remember those who came before, to feel their presence, and to offer our prayers through steam, sweat, song, and silence.

We gather in reverence to cleanse the spirit, nourish the soul, and walk with our ancestors through the doorway of fire and water.

🧺 What to Bring – Día de los Muertos Lodge

• Modest, lightweight ceremonial clothing (see our Guanara Lodge Protocol)
• Two towels (one for sitting, one for drying)
• A change of clothes for after the ceremony; weather-appropriate
• A reusable water bottle and plenty of drinking water
• A sacred altar offering (photo, flower, fruit, candle, stone, etc.)
• A dish to share for our post-ceremony potluck
• Invitation: Bring the memory of your loved ones with you: photos, names, offerings for the altar, or simply the presence of your heart
• Encouraged: Gifts for ceremony leaders (e.g., tobacco, sage, cedar, copal)

💚 We welcome a sliding scale donation of $50, $75, or $100 to support this sacred work.

RSVP HERE 👇

Let us gather in remembrance, in gratitude, and in love—tending to the spirits who walk with us, the land that holds us, and the waters that carry our prayers across generations. 🕯️🌀