By Rebecca Lindell

OTTAWA — This year's winter solstice — an event that will occur next Tuesday — will coincide with a full lunar eclipse in a union that hasn't been seen in 456 years.

The celestial eccentricity holds special significance for spiritualities that tap into the energy of the winter solstice, the shortest day of the year and a time that is associated with the rebirth of the sun.

"It's a ritual of transformation from darkness into light," says Nicole Cooper, a high priestess at Toronto's Wiccan Church of Canada. "It's the idea that when things seem really bleak, (it) is often our biggest opportunity for personal transformation.

"The idea that the sun and the moon are almost at their darkest at this point in time really only further goes to hammer that home."

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In Washington D.C., America's prince of darkness said "Let me be perfectly clear about this, the solstice-eclipse emergency is not about me. I inherited that mess from the previous administration." He went on to promise that "When I get back from Hawaii, I will personally appoint a celestial czar and allocate funding to study ways to prevent future overlaps of these events. It may require increased taxes on the rich, but we must make the skies safe 'for the children'."