Also called full moon release ritual, full moon ceremony at home
A full moon ritual is a simple monthly practice done at home on the night of the full moon to give thanks, release what is finished and charge water or tools in the moonlight. This is a complete solo version for beginners, separate from the Wiccan coven esbat.
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Take care: Burn paper only in a fireproof bowl on a stable surface, away from curtains, with water nearby. Do not drink water left out overnight unless it was in a clean, covered container and you are confident it is safe.
Buddhists keep Uposatha on full and new moon days, and in some places the quarter moons too. Lay followers take the Eight Precepts for a day and night, visit the temple, make offerings, listen to teaching and meditate.
In the Hindu calendar the full moon day, Purnima, is the setting for many festivals and fasts, and some days such as Guru Purnima honor teachers. Practices differ by region and community.
Wiccans hold esbats on the full moon, with a cast circle, invocations and the cakes-and-wine meal. Scott Cunningham's 1988 guide adapted it for solitary practitioners. This page's ritual is simpler and does not require circle-casting or a specific deity.
People have marked the full moon for as long as there are records. In Buddhist countries the full and new moon days are Uposatha, kept since early times with precepts and temple visits. In the Hindu calendar Purnima, the full moon day, carries many festivals and fasts, and some Chinese Buddhists eat vegetarian on new and full moon days. Before electric light, the full moon was also simply the night when people could travel, work and gather after dark.
The modern home full moon ritual comes mostly from 20th-century Wicca, where the full moon esbat was fixed by Doreen Valiente and others in the 1950s, and from the solitary-practice books of the 1980s. Since the 2010s it has spread through wellness and astrology media as a monthly practice of gratitude, release and charging moon water, often done alone in a few minutes.
A modern release rite: write down what you want to let go of and burn the paper in a fireproof bowl, usually at year's end. Popularised by Unity churches in the twentieth century, with older relatives in New Year fire customs.
A new moon ritual is a short monthly practice of setting intentions at the start of the lunar cycle, when the moon is dark. It is a modern practice with old roots in new-moon month beginnings, and this version focuses on writing clear, doable intentions.
A full-moon rite in which a priestess calls the Goddess of the moon into herself and speaks with her voice. Central to Gardnerian and Alexandrian Wicca, named after the old Thessalian witches' boast.
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