Cultural Events & Festivals

What is an Anthroposophical Festival?

“To celebrate a festival really means to unite oneself in spirit with the cosmic spirit”.
-Rudolf Steiner

Understanding Anthroposophy
Through the Rhythms of the Year

The Greek meaning of the word festival is “Shining Day”.

The festivals not only commemorate great historical events, cosmic truths and traditions; they are in themselves spiritual events that manifest in seasonal rhythms, and carry a significance that grows and deepens with the development of human evolution. The celebration of the Festivals let us practice what Steiner calls ‘the Reverse-Ritual’ – The idea of ‘Openness to Above’. Instead of invoking Spirit down, as in days of old, we rise to the spirit, in our thinking.

We study and celebrate these ‘Shining Days’ to sustain and renew ourselves and the world. A Festival has the quality of lifting us out of the ordinary and into the mysteries and magic of the rhythm of the seasons. Throughout history, festivals have emerged from people’s connection with their spiritual life and their search for the meaning of human existence.


Festivals at Rudolf Steiner Branch

Our festival life at the Branch is structured to include activities that stimulate head, hands and heart. We engage our thinking through studying Spiritual Science, learning, as Goethe did, what lives behind the laws of nature, engaging in creative thinking outside the box, like Einstein demonstrated, and opening to insight and intuition to better solve the problems of the world. Movement and artistic endeavors motivate our will forces, creating balance and beauty, channeling creativity in a purposeful way that deepens our thoughts through action. Activities like storytelling, biography sharing, and singing consciously involve our feeling life, reducing stress, stimulating our imagination, creating connections and goodwill.

By strengthening our thinking, feeling and willing we lead more conscious lives, better able to serve the greater community -involved parents, good neighbors, mindful citizens, purposeful workers in our chosen fields of work in the world.

“The great festivals exist to bear witness to our connection with the whole universe…”~ Rudolf Steiner, lecture in Berlin 1905

Please see our Calendar to join us at one of our upcoming festivals.

For more information, email our Cultural Events and Festivals Coordinator at festivals-committee@rschicago.org


Hazel Archer-Ginsberg – Founder of Reverse Ritual: Understanding Anthroposophy through the Rhythms of the Year & theI Think Speech’ Podcast. Trans-denominational Minister, Essayist, Lecturer, Poet, Anthroposopher - working as the Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator of the Chicago Rudolf Steiner Branch. Veiw Past Video Recordings


Find a collection of recordings from festivals and presentations here.

Read about the Cycle of the Year as seen through the Seasons below:

Spring Festivals
Summer Festivals
Autumn Festivals
Winter Festivals
Cross Quarter Days

Besides living into the Festivals we are also dedicated to creating Events and Programs that work from an impulse centered in the Cultural - Educational - Spiritual Realm, where the ideal is Freedom. (see the calendar under happenings)