Hermes rules the Third House—the mind and the intellect.
Individuals with strong Mercury placements often display a great analytical mind.
They are able to make sound decisions, but as their minds are running a million miles an hour, they tend to also be distracted!
Hermes rules communication in all forms. Pray to Hermes to improve your communication skills and wit at times when you need to relay difficult information and impart knowledge.
We are the beloved children of the stars. All you need to have a devotional or magical practice with the planetary gods is a sincere heart.
When I got my Mercury statue, I chose an astrological election to ritually animate it. I had to wake up late at night and I was groggy. I stumbled through the ritual and got a bunch of things wrong.
During a prayer to Mercury, he showed me what this experience looked like through his eyes. How my stumbling and awkwardness was endearing to him. I saw how ritual pleases the gods the way parents delight in watching their children perform in a school play.
I was once given the responsibility of putting on the children's Christmas pageant for a church I worked for. Anyone who has ever run a Christmas pageant knows how impossible it is to control all the necessary conditions. Rehearsals are always a mess, and yet - somehow - the pageant comes together. Kids forget their lines, props go missing at the last minute, and still, in all its glorious imperfections, the pageant is perfect.
The beauty of the final pageant is often in its unpredictable elements. One of the highlights of my pageant was when a small child, dressed as a sheep, fell asleep in her shepherd-costumed father's arms while the angel announced the birth of Christ. At this critical moment in the drama we were blessed by a sincere and unscripted display of love between father and child.
I believe that our rituals can be like a children's pageant. Whether we're demonstrating mastery of a sophisticated skill or struggling to remember our lines and get our candles to light, we are as beloved children before the gods.