July 13, 2018October 2, 2019 Mago Work1 Comment

(Tribute 1) Barbara Mor, “Relentless Love”: Letters 1988-2002 from a Writer’s Best Friend by Jack Dempsey

…& who is jesus what else does he do can he sing can he plant corn i saw a picture of him once on the dome of the sky Read More …

Proserpina by Susan Hawthorne

Proserpina, Proserpina go home to your mother —Kate McGarrigle every mother’s haunting cry every daughter’s loss a carefree afternoon turned bleak because of him they refuse to speak about the crime she’s just a child wails her poor mother come home come home he has her in thrall her money in his hands she tries to please but she cannot leave the child seems safe she likes it here it’s no longer her call no food on the bench come home come home he’s in his locked shed there’s a stench of porn Prosperpina daughter won’t come home mother leave his scorn his hated shed mother come home to me come home come home Wikimedia Commons image Notes on Propserpina Last month I heard an interview with Martha Wainwright on Australian radio. The interview included a recording of Martha Wainwright singing the song on Q&A, an Australian TV show in 2013. The song Prosperpina was written by Martha Wainwright’s mother, Kate McGarrigle whose songs I have listened to for decades. It was Kate McGarrigle’s final song. I was moved not only by the interview, but especially by the song. I have written many poems about Persephone but this song gave me a new perspective in which an unknown figure is calling the child to go home to her mother. I hope you find the song as haunting as I do. Proserpina is the Latin name for Persephone. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Nywk08msOY https://www.magoism.net/2013/12/meet-mago-contributor-susan-hawthone/
(Art) Dryad, Tree Nymph by Pegi Eyers

Art by Pegi Eyers Dryads are Greek or Hindu tree spirits. Bonded to their tree for life, both the nymphs and the gods punished any mortals who dared to harm the trees. “Her soul message and tree spirit blessing encourages your gifts of prophecy.” (This is included in She Rises: What… Goddess Feminism, Activism and Spirituality? Volume 3)(Meet Mago Contributor) Pegi Eyers.
(Book Excerpt 2) For-Giving: A Feminist Criticism of Exchange by Genevieve Vaughan

[Editor’s Note: The following sequels are from For-Giving: A Feminist Criticism of Exchange by Genevieve Vaughan. Footnotes may differ from the original text.] The Gift Paradigm There is a fundamental paradigm, with widespread and far reaching effects, which is not being noticed. It may seem strange, in the time of space travel, computers and genetic engineering, that anything really important could be ignored. However, we may remember the idea of the “elephant in the living room” talked about by Alcoholics Anonymous. People who are in denial of someone’s alcoholism do not mention it. In order to maintain the status quo, they turn their attention to other things. I believe there is a large part of life that is being denied and ignored. Unlike alcoholism, it is the healthy normal way of being, but we are indeed turning our attention away from it in order to maintain a false reality, the patriarchal status quo. I call this unseen part of life ‘the gift paradigm.’ It is a way of constructing and interpreting reality that derives from mothering and is therefore woman-based (at least as long as women are the ones who are doing most of the mothering). The gift paradigm emphasizes the importance of giving to satisfy needs. It is need- oriented rather than profit-oriented. Free giftgiving to needs–what in mothering we would call nurturing or caring work–is often not counted and may remain invisible in our society or seem uninformative because it is qualitatively rather than quantitatively based. However, giving to needs creates bonds between givers and receivers. Recognizing someone’s need, and acting to satisfy it, convinces the giver of the existence of the other, while receiving something from someone else that satisfies a need proves the existence of the other to the receiver. Needs change and are modified by the ways they are satisfied, tastes develop, new needs arise. As they grow, children need to become independent, and mothers can also satisfy that need by refraining from satisfying some of the children’s other needs. Opposed to giftgiving is exchange, which is giving in order to receive. Here calculation and measurement are necessary, and an equation must be established between the products. In exchange there is a logical movement which is ego-oriented rather than other-oriented. The giver uses the satisfaction of the other’s need as a means to the satisfaction of her own need. Ironically, what we call ‘economics’ is based on exchange, while giftgiving is relegated to the home–though the word ‘economics’ itself originally meant ‘care of the household.’ In capitalism, the exchange paradigm reigns unquestioned and is the mainstay of patriarchal reality. Even many of those who wish to challenge capitalism envision only an economy without money–a barter economy–which is of course still based on exchange. I believe they misplace the dividing line between the paradigms, making money the responsible factor rather than exchange, so they cannot clearly see the alternative that giftgiving presents. Aiding the maintenance of the status quo and the exchange economy is a view of ‘human nature’ as egotistical and competitive qualities which are required and enhanced by capitalism. The qualities required and enhanced by mothering are other-orientation, kindness and creativity. Though they are necessary for bringing up young children, these qualities are made difficult, even self-sacrificial, by the scarcity for the many which is often the consequence of the exchange economy. They are considered not ‘human nature,’ not part of reality. I believe that the gift paradigm is present everywhere in our lives, though we have become used to not seeing it. Exchange, with its requirement for measurement, is much more visible. However, even our greeting “How are you?” is a way of asking “What are your needs?” ‘Co-muni-cation’ is giving gifts (from the Latin munus–gift) together. It is how we form the ‘co-muni-ty.’ By satisfying the needs of the infants who are dependent upon them, mothers actually form the bodies of the people who are, and live together in, the community. They also care for and maintain the implements, houses and locations where the community interactions take place. We communicate with each other through our gifts of goods, through co-munication. Each gift carries with it something of the thought process and values of the giver and affirms the value of the receiver. In fact, goods and services that are given freely to satisfy needs give value to the receiver by implication.[1] [1] It would be interesting to look at anorexia as a refusal not only of food but of the value that would have been transmitted to the receiver through the reception of nurturing. Perhaps the anorexic takes on the exchange paradigm too profoundly or too soon. [Editor’s Note: The following sequels are from For-Giving: A Feminist Criticism of Exchange by Genevieve Vaughan. Footnotes may differ from the original text.] (To be Continued) Meet Mago Contributor, Genevieve Vaughan
(Essay) The Disease of Patriarchal Capitalism by Genevieve Vaughan

Women’s Worlds, Ottawa, July 6, 2011 We European/Americans have been infected by the disease of patriarchal capitalism and we have carried it to all the populations where we have settled. For many of them it has been fatal, others have adapted but some have succeeded in defending themselves and their traditions against all odds. This disease hurts us as well as everyone else. It is the cause of wars and oppresssions of all kinds. It magnifies racism, ageism, nationalism, religious prejudice. Let me try to say what I think it is.
(Book Announcement 4) Introduction (part 2) by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

[Editor’s Note: This Introduction is from She Rises: How Goddess Feminism, Activism, and Spirituality? Volume 2.] Pre-order available now! The Text of the Primordial Mother/the Creatrix/Mago She Rises Volume 2, like her predecessor, is born out of the Magoist vision.[i] It intends to raise the collective consciousness of WE, a cognitive symbolic system derived from the knowing of the Primordial Mother or the Creatrix. One may call it an embodied knowing or gynocentric epistemology. Our stories shed light on the holistic view in which all parts are revered as a microcosm of the Creatrix. The She Rises book is an emblem of gynocentric cosmology: All contributions are interconnected and the book is enriched by each and all contributions. This book is NOT just about what we have discovered and what we have experienced about Goddess feminism, activism, and spirituality but what and how we do with our discoveries and experiences. Where are we heading to with our knowing of S/HE? The collective consciousness of WE summons a gynocentric reality. This book is designed to show our togetherness in our uniqueness. It stands for unity that is enhanced by the diversity of individuals. The key phrase in the subtitle, “Goddess feminism, activism, and spirituality,” is a reminder of the all-embracing gynocentric way of our becoming. We ARE committed to the making of the book to reflect the gynocentric principle of unity in diversity. We allow our differences to lead us to a new (read gynocentric) territory without making ourselves fall into factionalism. Competition in a constructive manner helps us grow. But factionalism destroys us. We speak our truths not to argue or win. We speak our truths because they are true to us. Truth speaks, even when we can’t hear. And we trust ourselves to speak our truths in HER. And S/HE shall bring us together in WE. To trust in our contributors is the map that we editors have followed in She Rises collective books. In the process, we have learned that what we really need to be careful of, not the other camp of Goddessians, but what really divides us among Goddessians/Magoists. In my Introduction to She Rises Volume 1, I drew attention to the word “Goddess,” concerning our need to reclaim it despite its linguistic drawback. Summarily, we strategically adopt the word, “Goddess,” knowing its derivative and subsequently dualistic nature from the word “God” in the English language.[ii] We are aware of the functional nature of language, a means for the meaning that we intend to convey. We choose one word over another for our political and utilitarian reasons. Our use of the word “Goddess” has given us a common ground to come together and interweave the She Rises books. The Magoist vision of the book merits the stance that the Goddess is not just the female divine or a sum of female deities but the Great Goddess, the Primordial Mother. It is S/HE who allows us the holistic view of WE/HERE/NOW, the ultimate reality. We who are awakened in S/HE know that we ARE this S/HE reality. In writing my Introduction to the second book, another term has come to my attention, “feminine.” As seen in this book, some of our authors have favorably chosen the word, “feminine” in support of Goddess feminism, activism, and spirituality for reliable reasons. The context wherein the term is used is complex and highly suggestive of the female divine power. In their uses, some make it clear that the feminine refers to the female divine nature/power of women. Others use it in redefining and deconstructing patriarchal definitions of “the feminine.” It is true that “the divine feminine” or “the sacred feminine” has taken on popularity so much so that it appears almost indispensable in the Goddess Talk. Nonetheless, I hold that there is a point that we need to think and explore together the meaning of “feminine.” Linguistically speaking, referring to the gender quality of women, the meaning of “feminine” fluctuates. I find it worth broaching these questions to us: Is the term “feminine” empowering Goddess feminism? Why yes? Why no? These questions can only be answered by our authors and readers. We editors by no means advocate the purge of the term, feminine, from this book. Forcing unity is not gynocentric. We propose the question as an ongoing conversation among Goddessians. Here is my stance to the question, which is yes and no. When the context indicates an ancient (read gynocentric) or feminist meaning, the word “feminine” certainly empowers women. When “the divine feminine” indicates the Primordial Mother within an environment like this book, the word is empowering. Put differently, the meaning of “feminine” can be conveyed as gynocentric, that is, women-empowering, when “the divine feminine” refers to the Creatrix, the Great Goddess. In this case, the gender quality of “feminine” is coherent with the biological quality of “female.” The meaning of “feminine” in such context does NOT reflect the patriarchally-imposed qualities of women; the feminine is gynocentric and sacred. However, when the word “feminine” is used outside the gynocentric context, it becomes dubious in meaning, if not self-defeating, obstructing the impetus of women’s empowerment. Referring to the gender quality (read a social/patriarchal construct), of women, the meaning of “feminine” changes in different times and cultures. It is not free from socio-cultural settings. Being feminine today in the U.S. would be very different from being feminine two centuries ago. Also, being feminine today in one country would be very different from being feminine today in another country. On the other hand, the word, “female,” conveying the biological and biologically-derived quality of women, remains coherent in meaning across times and cultures. “Female” offers us a solid ground to build our feminist activism and feminist spirituality. Thus far, we women still hold the power of female biological and biologically-derived traits. The word, “feminine” alone risks a powerful conceptual ground for Goddess feminism. Precisely, it falls short in capturing the divine power of the Primordial Mother, the Creatrix. For example, I …
Cybele and Attis by Deanne Quarrie, D. Min.

I first “discovered” Cybele in my research for Bendis (my Priestess name). It appears that the two are very closely related with evidence found of both in Thrace (modern day Bulgaria). There is a temple in Bulgaria to this day that was for Cybele. She came up again for me in my research of drumming and priestesses. You see many images of her with her frame drum. She can be described as … “A mountain-dwelling goddess of holy madness … a full-breasted mature woman, crowned and carrying corn and keys, arrayed in a robe containing all the flower colors of the Earth.” [i] Ah – and how Zeus could not penetrate her but spilled his seed upon the Earth, which was of course, also her, as her body! (Could it be that he could not penetrate her because she chose to be made love to without penetration, that, for Cybele, there was more to the act than procreation? That Cybele, herself, preferred the love of a woman?) The child of this fertilization being Agdistis, was born of both sexes, and when he was grown, Dionysis, in an attempt to make his life easier, castrated him. From his blood, sprang the almond tree. Nana picked up this fruit of the almond and in placing in next to her skin, became pregnant and birthed Attis. Attis was beautiful and adored by Cybele but I suppose like all beautiful males, chose to turn his affections to another. Being the Great Mother, Cybele knew of this unfaithfulness and when caught, he castrated himself in contrition. It has only been recently that I have been able to look at this part of the myth with any comfort. If I look at what Dionysis did to Agdistis and then look at what parents and physicians do to children born today who are hermaphrodites, their intent being to make their lives easier by removing one sex, I completely understand the story. The sad thing today is that parents and physicians often make this choice for the child while still in infancy instead of waiting to see how the child matures. If I look at Attis, as feeling as though he were a woman, trapped in a man’s body and who loved Cybele as a woman loves a woman, then I understand his desire to change his body to not only love her as a woman, but to be in her image – to be a woman. In today’s world when men have sex change operations, to surgically remove the penis and create a vagina, I have heard that the majority continue to love women in lesbian relationships, rather than partner with men, as one might think. We hear a lot today of the plight of the transgender, the man trapped in a woman’s body and a woman trapped in a man’s body. Because I know how life begins in the woman with all fetuses beginning as female and the propensity to be either, it seems such a simple thing to see how this can happen. I also know that this is nothing new. This is something that has been for as long as there have been humans. If it has happened since the beginning of the human race, how can it be “unnatural?” I know that this myth of Cybele and Attis was celebrated as a springtime festival – with the blood of Attis lives resurrected once more in the Spring. However, in my reading, years ago (I did not save my references), I also saw stories in which Cybele made the promise that when Attis was reborn after he bled to death, he would be reborn as a woman. And so, the significance of this seems to me more relevant. Were I to wish to honor Cybele in ritual, the symbols I would choose would be a frame drum, corn, rainbow colors, a pine branch, and a large black rock. I would have the frame drum, because I know that the priestesses of Cybele played the frame drum in their rituals. The corn would represent her as the nourishing mother who provides with abundance. I would use ribbons of many colors for her rainbow-colored robe. The pine branch would honor Attis and his love for her. Finally, the large black rock would represent the huge mountainous presence of her body as the Mountain Mother. In ancient times, this stone was thought to be a meteorite and the stone that Zeus was thought to have raped. Such was her power! I would love to think that acceptance and yes, even embracing differences could be accomplished without violence. I see the violence happening and know in my heart it is not the way, for with the violence comes an even greater resistance. Let us call on Cybele and ask for ways to be more loving and compassionate on both sides of this divisive behavior. She has that power! (Meet Mago Contributor) Deanne Quarrie. [i] Monaghan, Patricia, The New Book of Goddesses & Heroines, Llewellyn Publications, St. Paul, MN 1997
(Essay) Ecology vs. Misogyny by Francesca Tronetti, Ph.D.

In 1989 law professor and civil rights activist Kimberle Williams Crenshaw introduced the term intersectionality to help explain the oppression African American women faced. She argued that race and sex govern African American women’s experiences.[1] Later, scholars expanded her theory of intersectionality to include socioeconomic class, language skills, education level, and gender presentation as aspects that can have an impact on how individuals are perceived and how society views and deals with them. AOC Dunks On Right-Wing Ad from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=znsk0_XoJzc&t=199s Now female scientists studying climate change and activists advocating a green revolution are facing a different kind of intersectional experience. It is not only what they are saying which garners an adverse reaction, but it is their gender, which is the basis for the attacks. Climate science itself has become feminized and as being “oppositional to assumed entitlements of masculine primacy.”[2] One writer noted that “critics rely on stereotypes painting women, especially young women, as infantile and idiotic. Without this kind of misogyny, they’d have nothing.”[3] A study that analyzed the language used by climate skeptics found that climate skepticism was intertwined with ideas of masculinity and industrial society.[4] Men view environmentally conscious behavior as inherently feminine and avoid recycling and reusable shopping bags as a way to preserve their masculinity and macho image.[5] Climate skeptics feel that their group identity is under threat due to groups pursuing gender equality and climate activism. These climate skeptics are, in fact, “male reactionaries motivated by right-wing nationalism, anti-feminism, and climate denialism … the three reactions feeding off of one another.”[6] Let us quickly examine some of the well-publicized attacks women have endured in the name of climate skepticism. In 2017 Catherine McKenna, then Canadian Minister of Environment and Climate Change was labeled “Climate Barbie” by The Rebel Media, a right-wing political blog.[7] Gerry Ritz, a conservative MP, then used the term on Twitter when discussing her. Ritz quickly removed the tweet and apologized, but by then, #ClimateBarbie was being used on Twitter to call McKenna a hypocrite and drunk. This hatred moved into the real world when McKenna and her children were leaving a theater, and a man slowed his car, rolled down his windows, and shouted, “F*** you Climate Barbie.” Because of the threats of violence and rape made on Twitter McKenna has now been assigned a security detail for public events; security protection at this level is usually only offered to cabinet ministers.[8] After making a clear and thoughtful explanation of the science behind climate change atmospheric scientist Kate Parker, who works for the Weather Channel, was attacked by Breitbart News, who called her “a pretty girl.” The New Republic writer Emily Atkin, who writes about climate change, was called an “infobabe” by Rush Limbaugh, and a writer from Breitbart said she has “kitty claws.”[9] Women who are more vocal about the importance of climate research garner even more negative attention from climate deniers. The United States Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has garnered obsessive coverage and attention from right-wing news sources and climate deniers in part due to her proposal of a Green New Deal, which would encourage the development of greener technology. The Fox News Channel mentioned Ocasio-Cortez an average of 76 times a day through her first month in Congress.[10] The attacks on her ranged from a Twitter user putting music behind a video she did on decarbonization and renaming it “Shallow Thoughts” to mocking her for recreating a scene from the movie The Breakfast Club for a Boston College promotional video. I had a friend tell me that Ocasio-Cortez is a pretty actress and a mouthpiece for environmentalists and that she can’t be thinking up all these speeches and videos herself. The idea is that because Ocasio-Cortez is pretty and worked as a bartender for a few years after college, there is no way she is smart enough to make these points. Sixteen-year-old Swedish environmental activist Greta Thunberg has faced even more criticism as a young woman and as someone who has autism and thus is too mentally ill to be taken seriously. A writer for the conservative Washington Examiner wrote that Greta’s mother, a former opera singer, is “pimping her kid out, not to Penthouse, but to the cause of climate apocalypse.”[11] Greta is not a young woman who is passionate about climate change and urging world leaders to take seriously what 97% of the world’s scientists are saying. No, instead, she is just another whore, like all young women. Too stupid to have independent ideas and existing only to be used by adults. There are many more sexist attacks against Thunberg, Ocasio-Cortez, and female scientists that I could mention. But all these attacks have the same basic formula. The woman is pretty, stupid, crazy, shrill, should shut up, and if she doesn’t, she is asking for physical or sexual violence or death. The attacks against scientists and activists aren’t new; however, they are becoming more and more sexist as there is less debate about actual science. Director of the Climate Science Center at Texas Tech University Katharine Hayhoe links the increase in sexist attacks against scientists with the rise of white nationalism and the Make America Great Again slogan of Pres. Donald Trump. She said, “When was America great? Back when women were in the kitchen, and others knew their place…that’s what underlies all this, and that’s why there is such a mix between gender and climate denial because it’s all coming from the same perceived threat to identity, and position and power and rights.”[12] So, does climate denial, and sexism go hand in hand? According to one article, social scientists advise against drawing that conclusion. These scientists believe that it is not just a matter of sexism that drive climate denial and harassment of women who speak out. Instead, these men are ones who hold a hierarchical worldview that is threatened by the climate change movement. These men view increased regulation as upsetting a system that benefits them. The researchers believe that while climate …
Reclaiming Our Place in the Cosmos with the Carmina Gadelica by Carolyn Lee Boyd

Highland Cattle photo by Dg-505, CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=54159707 Not so long ago, in the living memory of my great-grandparents in fact, people of the Highlands and Islands of Scotland revered the spirits of land, sea, and sky, blessed and communicated with animals and birds as friends, and knew their essential place in the cosmos and re-affirmed it daily. The people uttered “Charms of the Gaels, Hymns and Incantations” to give voice to harmony between themselves and non-humans and often centered female divinity in the form of Christian saints or vestiges of much older goddesses. These poems, prayers, and songs were collected in the latter half of the 19th century by Alexander Carmichael who gathered them into a nearly 700-page book titled Carmina Gadelica published in 1900. As I was recently rereading it, I realized that, scattered throughout the book were expressions that, taken together, offer a spiritually vibrant, awe-inspired, deeply caring worldview that is very different from our 21st century western paradigm of exploitation of non-human beings and the rest of the natural world. While obviously not exactly the same as what might have been pronounced in ancient times, perhaps we can find within the lyrical beauty of these words a hint of the spirit of what once was for us to bring into our own time. In this worldview, singing to the spirits of the cosmos was essential to being human. One younger person told Carmichael: “The old people had runes which they sang to the spirits dwelling in the sea and in the mountain, in the wind and in the whirlwind, in the lightning and in the thunder, in the sun and in the moon and in the stars of heaven” (281) (here “rune” means a prayer or invocation). This same sense of deep connection also extended to individual animals, plants, and other living beings. The Scottish Highlanders and Islanders were highly dependent on cattle as a food source. But, to them, their cattle were not objects to be exploited, but were instead beloved. Carmichael relates that on the night of the new moon, the people would gather on the highest hill shouting “See! See! See!” when they first spotted the moon on the horizon. Then, “herdboys and herdgirls were wont to whisper softly in the ears of the cows: ‘There is the new moon, thou beloved one among cows!’” (283). Similarly, when a farmer had taken his cows to pasture in the morning, he would say farewell to them for the day with this “herding rune,” which also connected the cows to the sacred world ( 598). The herding of Bride to the kineWhole and well may you return. The prosperity of Mary Mother be yours,Active and full may you return.The safeguard of Columba round your feet,Whole be your return home. Be the bright Michael king of AngelsProtecting, and keeping, and saving you.The guarding of God and the Lord be yours Till I or mine shall see you again. The help of Coivi (an Archdruid) to you.Traveling coire (hollows in hills), traveling copse (trees),Traveling meads (meadows) long and grassy,The herding of the fair MaryBe about your head, your body, and aiding you. It was also common for people to sing to their cows as they were milked and for cows to express a preference for some songs over others. Even these songs were full of affection and lyricism. One song is called My Brown Cow: Ho my little cow, ho my brown cow!Hi my little cow, ho my brown cow!Little cow of my heart, dear, belovedJewel of the white cows art thou (379) The Scottish Highlanders and Islanders depended on hunting for their sustenance, which became a sacred act with traditional protections for the animals. Young men were required to be “consecrated” before going out on their first hunt. First, they were to connect with the Earth by standing barefoot on ground which had no grass. Then they were required to abide by ethical and moral guidelines including: “He was not to take life wantonly. He was not to kill a bird sitting, nor a beast lying down, and he was not to kill the mother of a brood, nor the mother of a suckling. Now was he to kill an unfledged bird nor a suckling beast, unless it might be the young of a bird or beast of prey.” (601). Patricia Monaghan noted that this protection of wildlife echoes ancient Celtic goddesses. For example, the Scottish goddess Glaistig would hide wildlife from hunters who killed does while the Cailleach killed hunters who harmed pregnant deer. Some of the hymns and incantations imitated the songs of birds. According to Nigel Pennick, Celtic bards were able to understand the language of the birds and the trees. Voice of the Swan Gu vi gi,Gu vi go,Gu vi gi,Loud “guile”!The swans! (359) Carmichael also gathered many “runes” honoring plants as they were gathered including this one. The Pearlwort I will cull the pearlwortBeneath the fair sun of SundayBeneath the gentle hand of the Virgin.She who will defend me,In the might of the TrinityWho granted it to grow (370) Carmina Gadelica also speaks of the loss of these traditions. The same person who told of his elders singing to the spirits of the cosmos said “Then came notice of eviction, and burning, and emigration, and the people were scattered and sundered over the world, and the old ways disappeared with the old people” (281). And so, 60 years after the publication of Carmina Gadelica, I was born and, until later in life, never knew that the profound love and connection I felt for the wildflowers, the squirrels and chipmunks, the turquoise sky, and aquamarine water was not strange and childish, but ancient and wise. Now, in our own generation, it is our task to bring the traditions of our ancestors, whomever they may be, that honored all non-human beings and strove to remain in proper relationship to them into the 21st century in our own way. Sources: Carmichael, Alexander. …
Women and Owls Unnatural ‘History’: Forecasting the Future? by Sara Wright

Photo credit: Friend and mentor, bear biologist Lynn Rogers one of the finest naturalists I know The day after the presidential election in 2016 I picked up what I initially thought was a saw whet owl wing while wandering down a red dirt road in Abiquiu NM. Just one wing and one talon. The hair on my arms rose up pricking my skin like needles. I started to shiver. One wing, one Owl. Women and owls have history. It was obvious that the message was an ominous one. A woman without two wings can’t fly. The day went dead as I dragged myself home. When I did some research to confirm identification, I learned that I had found the remains of a boreal owl. I have only glimpsed a boreal owl a few times until this winter, but apparently, I have a resident because one hunts before dawn sitting on the same crabapple branch situated next to the side door. Although I eagerly look for him each dawning, I’ve also been concerned for the weasel that lives under the porch, although this owl is not supposed to eat mustelids but is said to feast on smaller prey like mice or voles and even little birds. Three nights ago, I heard one of his calls, a short series of staccato ‘whoos’. According to the literature this is not a mating call which would last much longer. The boreal owl (Aegolius funereus) historically inhabits northern boreal forests but curiously its range extends as far south as New Mexico in the west and into Northern New England and Minnesota in the east especially during years of food scarcity. With even more aggressive logging on the horizon, I can’t help but wonder about owl habitat, one reason I visit the window each morning before letting my dogs out. I treasure each sighting because I don’t know if I will see this little owl again. He has a squarish head, arched eyebrow markings, and piercing saucer -like eyes that I know are yellow though I can’t see the hue in dim light. Yet even then the white spots on his wings are visible. Although I never move once I have reached the window this bird knows that I am watching him. He periodically raises his head to stare in at me. At other times he disappears into the tangled center of Mother Pine the moment I move to the window. I think this owl is a male because his overall size is so close to that of a saw whet. The females are larger. Boreal owls are not supposed to breed in Maine, so I am mildly surprised that he is still here the last week in February. Is it possible that he could breed here because most of my woodpeckered snags have cavities, and also because have a mass of thick evergreens? After all, everything else is changing. These owls are monogamous for at least one year. Three to six eggs are laid, the male feeds the female during nesting, and after the nestlings are born in the spring the male continues to feed the female and her owlings who remain with her for a few weeks. Papa is an excellent father! Like most of their kind boreal owls have asymmetrical ears located at different heights to facilitate hearing, feathers adapted for silent flight, and eyes that are immobile but compensated for by the owl’s ability to turn his head 270 degrees, an amazing thing to witness. Many aerial predators are threats, most are other hawks and owls. Horned and barred owls along with goshawk and cooper hawks frequent this area, so no wonder my little friend spends his days under thick pine needled cover. One day while snowshoeing through the young pines I came upon small wing prints that probably belonged to this owl. A few drops of blood told the rest of the tale. Owls in general are feared by many Indigenous peoples (the Navajos are one example) perceived as omens of death or predictors of the future. I do not take a position on these ideas except to say that all owls seem to have an aura of mystery around them and that for me their calls alert me to danger of one kind or the other. When I was about forty, I attended a weekend ceremony led by a Navajo medicine woman who was clearly keeping her distance from me. I finally asked her why she was behaving the way she was. At least she was honest. She told me I had owl medicine, but when I asked her what this was and why it was a problem, she refused to answer me. Like other owls the boreal owl is ruthlessly mobbed by crows and other birds while roosting during the day. Whenever I hear a raucous mob, I go out to see if it’s possible to see the poor owl who attempts to escape by taking flight from tree to tree. The remains of one boreal owl dating back to the Pleistocene ( a geological era that ended with the last ice age) were found in a cave in southern New Mexico. Bones were also found in a Pueblo in north central Mexico that has been inhabited from around 12,000 AD. through the present. Although I was unable to pinpoint the exact Pueblo, I suspect it was one that I visited while living in Abiquiu. According to a couple of sources the Tewa translate the word ‘Abiquiu’ as two words, one means ‘timbers – end’, the other ‘the hoot of an owl’. More common is the translation chokecherry way but chokecherries can be found up and down the whole river, so I question the latter interpretation, especially because to live in Abiquiu is to live with owls. I heard or saw them every day. (photo credit: Friend and mentor, bear biologist Lynn Rogers one of the finest naturalists I know) https://www.magoism.net/2014/12/meet-mago-contributor-sara-wright/

(Special Post 4) Why Goddess Feminism, Activism, or Spirituality? A Collective Writing

[Editor’s Note: This was first proposed in The Mago Circle, Facebook Group, on March 6, 2014. We have our voices together below and publish them in sequels. It is an ongoing project and we encourage our reader to join us! Submit yours today to Helen Hwang (magoism@gmail.com). Or visit and contact someone in Return to Mago’s Partner Organizations.] Yvonne Lucia: “Feminism is the radical notion that women are people.” -British suffragist and journalist Rebecca West “When the God is male, the male is God.” -Mary Daly Yvonne Lucia sacredartportal.com Lila Moore: My first piece of performance art was a ritual inspired by Isis. However, as a young artist, my interest in combining art and ritual was devalued by my teachers and critics alike. I felt isolated and persecuted. Only after relocating to London was I able to gradually understand that my personal and creative aspiration was integral part of a collective and global feminine and feminist awakening. I realised that personal experiences of women have political perspectives, and that being a contemporary woman artist positions me in the midst of historical and cultural enterprise. As an artist-film-maker and scholar, I have regarded my work as a spiritual quest, exploring through dance-ritual and art films the interaction of the body and psyche with the natural environment and technology. In the 21st century, my interest in the healing and transforming aspects of images on screen has been combined with a growing sense of activism. It seems inconceivable to take images of nature out of context by ignoring the ecological holocaust which is evident everywhere. I have felt compelled to ask whether the needs of the body and mind can be separated from the needs of the Earth?
(Special Post 2) "The Oldest Cilivization" and its Agendas by Mago Circle Members

[Editor’s Note: The following discussion took place in response to an article listed blow by the members of The Mago Cirlce, Facebook group of Goddessians/Magoists from May 6 to May 10, 2016. Readers are recommended to read the original article linked below that has invoked the converation.] “The Danube Civilization: Oldest in the World” in The Ancient Ones upon the ruins of our ancestors, published April 3, 2016.
(Special Post Mother Teresa 2) A Role Model for Women? by Mago Circle Members

[Editorial Note: The following is an edited version of the discussion that took place spontaneously on Mago Circle from March 1, 2013 for about two weeks. It was an extensive, heated, yet reflective discussion, now broken into four parts to fit the format of the blog. We thank each and all of the participants for your openness, generosity, and courage to stand up for what you believe and think! Some are marked as anonymous. As someone stated, something may have been “written in the heat of the moment” and some might like to change it at a later time. So we inform our readers that nothing is written in stone. As a matter of fact, the discussion is ongoing, now with Magoism Blog readers. Please comment and respond as you wish.] Part II: We Disagree! Stand up for what you believe but be open-minded! Naa Ayele Kumari: I am going to step away from the common responses and say this… Binary is only no in betweens if you choose sides and can’t see the whole. I have been a part of black consciousness movements and women’s movements and both have the capacity for progress as well as extreme viewpoints. Both have the capacity to become so hypercritical that the movement itself transcends common human compassion and understanding. Mother Teresa was a human being with flaws and goodness. She had a public image and private fears and insecurities.. l like all of us. She lived her life the best way she knew how.. Like all of us. She made mistakes.. misjudgments.. Like all of us. But she also DID help and inspire others to help too. It is this dualistic thinking that forces people to feel like they have to assign the label of good or bad and no in between. None of us are all good or all bad.. so it seems to me that to label her has an evil traitor who let people die is no better than labeling her an Angel of god who did no wrong. She was a woman who lived her life and managed to come to worldwide fame and inspire others to love at a time and in an institution that was highly patriarchal and women were not raised up at all. Mother Goddesses in Africa were known for great nurturing and care symbolized by carrying a baby and also carried a machete on the other side for justice. This was the fine balance of wholeness…she was the gentle rain and the storm.. This was binary, but not one or the other but both.. Opposite ends of the same pole. [H]: I’m having a powerful visceral effect from this conversation. I feel as if I’m going to vomit violently. Mother Teresa comes to me in dreams and meditations. Makes me wonder what kind of person I’m seen as if I attract her energy. I have always felt so much love for her. Naa Ayele Kumari: If she comes in your dreams and it has been healing for you… Allow it/ her to continue to be healing for you. Its all about love and anything that is not love… Leave it be.. Vomiting is rejecting something that doesn’t belong with you. Embrace love my sister. Antonia McGuire: I think we may all agree that all belief systems initially began to promote a sense of goodness or fairness to some degree, but over time they are corrupted and produce both advantages and disadvantages. Donna Snyder: Yes, Gandhi, too. Back in the 90’s when I was in a band/performance art troupe called Central Nervous System, I shocked all the guys in the band coming out with an improv in response to a melody played on a banjo tuned like a sitar, called exactly that-Yes, Gandhi. Now make no mistake, he is one of my heroes, devoid of the falsified sentimentality that clings to MT. Gandhi’s work was for the world, for the masses, not for the appropriately humbled. Yet I spoke out about his sexual practices, his use of female bodies. Telling the truth about a hero requires courage. Retreating into a blind defense of a myth is a form of ethical cowardice. Anne Wilkerson Allen: Strangely I had a discussion with someone about the “hero’s journey” moving from metaphorical to physical being part of the problem…..when the “demons” are human instead of our own flaws, there seems to be a tendency to point the finger (and gun barrel) elsewhere. [B]: Fascinating & thought-provoking conversation, all. I think the biggest stumbling block I have with MT is how her acceptance of the dogma of the Catholic church blinded her to seeing and then being moved by the suffering of others enough to do something to alleviate & not vicariously celebrate it. No wonder she “suffered a lack of connection with the Divine”. This crisis with her spirituality seems to have been divorced from her and others’ body wisdom. Self-abnegation (perhaps not the same as “sacrifice”) ultimately backfires because some small part of us insists, “I am worthy!” To which I say, “We are all worthy!” [H]: I do not see or feel that she vicariously celebrated the suffering of others. I feel that she devoted her life to deeply loving and serving the poorest of the poor. I have not been to Calcutta and I have also seen some unimaginable poverty in India that is not like anything that I’ve been exposed to before. I truly believe that she had a very deep way of working with suffering that is not necessarily visible to those more accustomed to modern medical intervention and the resources available for such. I have participated in a very small amount of poverty medicine and the resources that we take for granted are just not readily available to MANY. I learned very powerfully from my experience how blessed and fortunate and often very careless we really are with our precious resources. This discussion has been a learning experience for me. I am trying to not take the critical comments […]

(Video) Imbolc/Early Spring Goddess Slideshow by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

On February 3rd at 19:45 “Universal Time” (as it is named), Earth our Planet crosses the midpoint of Her orbit between Solstice and Equinox, though the exact time varies each year. In the Northern Hemisphere it is the Season of Imbolc – the welcoming of the Light, post-Winter Solstice, after the fullness of the dark of Winter. Imbolc, and all of the light part of the cycle, is particularly associated with the Young One/Virgin/Maiden aspect of Goddess – or Urge to Be as I have named this aspect. Imbolc may be understood as the quintessential celebration of the Virgin/Young One quality for the year – the rest of the light part of the cycle celebrates Her processes, but this Seasonal Moment is a celebration of Her … identifying with Her. She is the New Young One, the Promise of Life, the Urge to Be. Her purity is Her singularity of purpose. She is spiritual warrior. Her inviolability is Her determination to Be … nothing to do with unbroken hymens of the dualistic and patriarchal mind. The Virgin is the essential “yes” to Being – not the “no” She was turned into. This is some Poetry of the Season: This is the season of the waxing Light … the feast of the Young One – who is the Urge To Be within All. The New One born at the Winter Solstice now grows. This is the time of celebrating the small self – each one’s Gaian uniqueness and beauty. We meet to share the light of inspiration, to be midwifed, by She who tends the Flame of Being, deeply committed to Self, and Who is True. The choice of images is arbitrary … there are so many more, and also, most ancient images of Goddess are multivalent – She was/is One: that is, all Her aspects are not separate from each other. These selected images tell a story of certain qualities that may be contemplated at the Seasonal Moment of Imbolc/Early Spring. Remember that image communicates the unspeakable – that which can only be known in body – below rational mind. You may regard it as a transmission of Herself, insofar as you wish – and particular to you. I offer you these images for you to receive in your own way. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oUPTKMork9s Artemis 4th Century B.C.E. Greece. (p.52 Austen) – a classic “Virgin” image – wild and free, “Lady of the Beasts”, Goddess of untamed nature. As such, in the patriarchal stories She is often associated with harshness, orgiastic rituals but we may re-story “wildness” in our times as something “innocent”: that is, in direct relationship with the Mother. She is a hunter/archer, protector, midwife, nurturing the new and pure essence (the “wild”) – in earlier times these things were not contradictory. The hunter had an intimate relationship with the hunted, and deep reverence. Aphrodite (p.132 Austen) 300 B.C.E. – often diminished to a sex Goddess in patriarchal narrative, but in more ancient times, praised as She who holds all things in form, which may be comprehended as embodying cosmic power of allurement, which may be identified with what has been named as “gravity”. Re-storied as one who admires her own Beauty, and the Beauty of All. Aphrodite (plate 137 Neumann) an earlier image 600 B.C.E. Brigid/Brigantia (p. 38 Durdin-Robertson) 300 C.E. – Her spear may be understood as the spear of Goddess: that is, as spiritual warrior, or Boadicea-like. Brigid – a later image of Christian times … dressed nun-like. Eurynome (Austen p.8) 4000 B.C.E. Africa. This image is named as Bird-Headed Snake Goddess. Austen stories Her as an image of Eurynome, Goddess of All Things who danced upon the waves in the beginning and laid the Universal Egg. She appears very self-expressive: perhaps a great image of a self-expressive Universe. She integrates animal and human, earth and sky, before dualism existed. I choose her as a Virgin image because of this integrity, and her ecstatic expression. Diana (Neumann Plate 161) Rome. She carries the Flame – is classically Her own person. … not so much “independent” as it may be thought of culturally, as “self-knowing”. She came to be associated with the Greek Artemis: they are sister Goddesses. The Horned Goddess (p. 138 Austen) 6000 B.C.E. Africa – associated with dance and healthy life-force – rain and fertility. She is of the ancient Amazon tribes of what is now known as Algeria. Even today amongst these people, Austen says: “the Tauregs, the women are independent, while the men only appear in public veiled”. Vajravarahi (p.124 Austen) 1600’s C.E. Vajravarahi, show me how to be powerful and compassionate at the same time – let me know that these qualities are one force. Teach me to feel the beauty, power and eroticism of my own being. Show me that I am an exquisite part of the life force, dancing with all other forms of life. and OM! Veneration to you, noble Vajravarahi! OM! Veneration to you, noble and unconquered! Mother of the three worlds! Mistress of knowledge!… OM! Veneration to you, Vajravarahi! Great yogini! Mistress of love! She who moves through the air! TIBETAN TEXT Radha (in my ritual space) … seeing Who She really is. REFERENCES: Austen, Hallie Iglehart. The Heart of the Goddess. Berkeley:Wingbow, 1990. Durdin-Robertson, Lawrence. The Year of the Goddess. Wellingborough: Aquarian Press, 1990. Livingstone, Glenys. A Poiesis of the Creative Cosmos: Celebrating Her within PaGaian Sacred Ceremony. Bergen: Girl God Books, 2023. Neumann, Erich. The Great Mother. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1974. The music is “Boadicea” by Enya.
(Prose) Halcyon for the Season by Deanne Quarrie

A bird for this season is the Kingfisher, also known as the Halcyon. The Kingfisher is associated in Greek myth with the Winter Solstice. There were fourteen “halcyon days” in every year, seven of which fell before the winter solstice, seven after; peaceful days when the sea was smooth as a pond and the hen-halcyon built a floating nest and hatched out her young. She also had another habit, that of carrying her dead mate on her back over the sea and mourning him with a plaintive cry. Pliny reported that the halcyon was rarely seen and then only at the winter and summer solstices and at the setting of the Pleiades. She was therefore, a manifestation of the Moon-Goddess who was worshiped at the two solstices as the Goddess of Life in Death and Death in Life and, when the Pleiades set, she sent the sacred king his summons for death. Kingfishers are typically stocky, short-legged birds with large heads and large, heron-like beaks. They feed primarily on fish, hovering over the water or watching intently from perches and they plunge headlong into the water to catch their prey. Their name, Alcedinidae, stems from classical Greek mythology. Alcyone, Daughter of the Wind, was so distraught when her husband perished in a shipwreck that she threw herself into the sea. Both were then transformed into kingfishers and roamed the waves together. When they nested on the open sea, the winds remained calm and the weather balmy. Still another Alcyone, Queen of Sailing, was the mystical leader of the seven Pleiades. The heliacal rising of the Pleiades in May marked the beginning of the navigational year and their setting marked the end. Alcyone, as Sea Goddess protected sailors from rocks and rough weather. The bird, halcyon continued for centuries to be credited with the magical power of allaying storms. Shakespeare refers to this legend in this passage from Hamlet: Some say that ever ‘gainst that season comes Wherein our Saviour’s birth is celebrated, The bird of dawning singeth all night long; And then, they say, no spirit can walk abroad; The nights are wholesome; then no planets strike, No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm, So hallow’d and so gracious is the time. Hamlet, I, i 157 When I was a young mother, and my children were little, we lived in a house that had a creek in the back yard. There were small trees along the far bank of this creek and every day, a kingfisher would sit in the branches overlooking the creek. Sometimes he sat there very quietly for a very long time. Suddenly he would dive from his perch straight into the creek. Every time he did he came out and up into the air with a fish. It gave me great pleasure to watch him from my kitchen window. I love birds. I love learning about their habits because it teaches me ways of being that are closer to nature. I love drawing birds as well. When I was a young and more able, I was an avid bird watcher, out with my friends hoping for a sight never seen before. I love the story of the kingfisher and her connection to the Halcyon Days of the Winter Solstice. It is for most of us the busiest time of year. Whether it is for the Solstice or Christmas (often both) we are in a frenzy to get things done, making sure everything is just right and perfect. I celebrate the Winter Solstice. As a priestess, my days right now are very busy creating ritual. It is at the Solstice that many passage rites are happening with the women I work with. And of course, I celebrate with my family with our magical Yule Log each year. But I try to honor those seven days before and the seven days after by trying to have the frantic moments before the Halcyon Days begin and then even when busy, hold the peace and calm of that beautiful smooth sea in my mind. Peace and love and joy surrounding the Winter Solstice make it perfect. May the Peace of a Halcyon Sea be yours in this Solstice Season. Do hold the image of that little kingfisher in mind! Meet Mago Contributor, Deanne Quarrie
(Slideshow) Beltaine Goddess by Glenys Livingstone, Ph.D.

Tara, Hallie Iglehart Austen, p.122 On November 7th at 22:56 UTC EarthGaia crosses the midpoint in Her orbit between Equinox and Solstice. In the Southern Hemisphere it is the Season of Beltaine – a maturing of the Light, post-Spring Equinox. Beltaine and all of the light part of the cycle, is particularly associated with the Young One/Virgin aspect of Goddess, even as She comes into relationship with Other: She remains Her own agent. Beltaine may be understood as the quintessential annual celebration of Light as it continues to wax towards fullness. It is understood to be the beginning of Summer. Here is some Poetry of the Season: Earth tilts us further towards Mother Sun, the Source of Her pleasure, life and ecstasy You are invited to celebrate BELTAINE the time when sweet Desire For Life is met – when the fruiting begins: the Promise of early Spring exalts in Passion. This is the celebration of Holy Lust, Allurement, Aphrodite … Who holds all things in form, Who unites the cosmos, Who brings forth all things, Who is the Essence of the Dance of Life. Glenys Livingstone, 2005 The choice of images for the Season is arbitrary; there are so many more that may express this quality of Hers. And also for consideration, is the fact that most ancient images of Goddess are multivalent – She was/is One: that is, all Her aspects are not separate from each other. These selected images tell a story of certain qualities that may be contemplated at the Seasonal Moment of Beltaine. As you receive the images, remember that image communicates the unspeakable – that which can only be known in body – below rational mind. So you may open yourself to a transmission of Her, that will be particular to you. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SKGRoVjQQHY Aphrodite 300 B.C.E. (Hallie Iglehart Austen, The Heart of the Goddess). This Greek Goddess is commonly associated with sexuality in a trivial kind of way, but She was said to be older than Time (Barbara Walker p.44). Aphrodite as humans once knew Her, was no mere sex goddess: Aphrodite was once a Virgin-Mother-Crone trinity – the Creative Force itself. The Love that She embodied was a Love deep down in things, an allurement intrinsic to the nature of the Universe. Praised by the Orphics thus: For all things are from You Who unites the cosmos. You will the three-fold fates You bring forth all things Whatever is in the heavens And in the much fruitful earth And in the deep sea. Vajravarahi 1600C.E. Tibetan Tantric Buddhism (Hallie Iglehart Austen, The Heart of the Goddess). A Dakini dancing with life energy – a unity of power, beauty, compassion and eroticism. Praised as Mistress of love and of knowledge at the same time. Tara Contemporary – Green Gulch California ,Tibetan Buddhist. (Hallie Iglehart Austen, The Heart of the Goddess). “Her eroticism is an important part of her bodhisattvahood: the sweetpea represents the yoni, and she is surrounded by the sensual abundance of Nature. One of Tara’s human incarnations was as the Tibetan mystic Yeshe Tsogyal, “who helped many people to enlightenment through sacred sexual union with her”. – Ishtar 1000 B.C.E. Babylon (Hallie Iglehart Austen, The Heart of the Goddess). Associated with passionate sexuality (and with Roman Goddess Venus) – which was not perceived as separate from integrity and intelligence … praised for Her beauty and brains! Her lips are sweet, Life is in Her mouth. When She appears, we are filled with rejoicing. She is glorious beneath Her robes. Her body is complete beauty. Her eyes are total brilliance. Who could be equal to Her greatness, for Her decrees are strong, exalted, perfect. MESOPOTAMIAN TEXT 1600 B.C.E. Artemis 4th Cent.B.C.E. Greece. (Hallie Iglehart Austen, The Heart of the Goddess) – classic “Virgin” image – wild and free, “Lady of the Beasts”, Goddess of untamed nature. As such, in the patriarchal stories She is often associated with harshness, orgiastic rituals but we may re-story “wildness” in our times as something “innocent” – in direct relationship with the Mother. She is a hunter/archer, protector, midwife, nurturing the new and pure essence (the “wild”) – in earlier times these things were not contradictory. The hunter had an intimate relationship with the hunted. Visvatara and Vajrasattva 1800C.E. Tibetan Goddess and God in Union: it could be any Lover and Beloved, of same sex. Image from Mann and Lyle, “Sacred Sexuality” p.74. Sacred Couple –Mesopotamia 2000-1600 BCE “Lovers Embracing on Bed”, Inanna Queen of Heaven and Earth, Diane Wolkstein and Samuael Noah Kramer. Represents the sacred marriage mythic cycle – late 3rd and into 4th millennium B.C.E. (See Starhawk, Truth or Dare). This period is the time of Enheduanna – great poet and priestess of Inanna. Xochiquetzal 8th century C.E. Mayan (Hallie Iglehart Austen, The Heart of the Goddess). Her name means “precious flower” – She is Goddess of pleasure, sexuality beauty and flowers. Sometimes represented by a butterfly who sips the nectar of the flower. “In ancient rituals honouring her, young people made a bower of roses, and, dressed as hummingbirds and butterflies they danced an image of the Goddess of flowers and love.” Her priestesses are depicted with ecstatic faces. (called “laughing Goddesses” !!) She and Her priestesses unashamedly celebrated joyful female sexuality – there is story of decorating pubic hairs to outshine the Goddess’ yoni. https://www.magoism.net/2013/06/meet-mago-contributor-glenys-livingstone/ REFERENCES: Iglehart Austen, Hallie. The Heart of the Goddess. Berkeley: Wingbow, 1990. Mann A.T. and Lyle, Jane. Sacred Sexuality. ELEMENT BOOKS LTD, 1995. Starhawk. Truth or Dare. San Fransisco:Harper and Row, 1990. Walker, Barbara. The Woman’s Encyclopaedia of Myths and Secrets. San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1983. Wolkstein,Diane and Kramer, Samuel Noah. Inanna Queen of Heaven and Earth. NY: Harper and Rowe, 1983. The music for the slideshow is “”Coral Sea Dreaming” by Tania Rose.
(Prose) Desire: the Wheel of Her Creativity by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

This essay is an edited excerpt from the concluding chapter (Chapter 8) of the author’s book PaGaian Cosmology: Re-inventing Earth-based Goddess Religion. Place of Being is a passionate place, where desire draws forth what is sought, co-creates what is needed[1]; within a con-text – a story – where love of self, other and all-that-is are indistinguishable … they are nested within each other and so is the passion for being. I begin to understand desire afresh: this renewed understanding has been an emergent property of the religious practice of seasonal celebration: that is, the religious practice of the ceremonial celebration of Her Creativity. It has been said She is “that which is attained at the end of desire[2].” Within the context of ceremonial engagement and inner search for Her, I begin to realize how desire turns the Wheel. As the light part of the cycle waxes from Early Spring, form/life builds in desire. At Beltaine/High Spring, desire runs wild, at Summer Solstice, it peaks into creative fullness, union … and breaks open at that interchange into the dark part of the cycle – the dissolution of Lammas/ Late Summer. She becomes the Dark One, who receives us back – the end of desire. It has been a popular notion in the Christian West, that the beautiful virgin lures men (sic) to their destruction, and as I perceive the Wheel, it is indeed Virgin who moves in Her wild delight towards entropy/dissolution; however in a cosmology that is in relationship with the dark, this is not perceived as a negative thing. Also, in this cosmology, there is the balancing factor of the Crone’s movement towards new life, in the conceiving dark space of Samhain/Deep Autumn – a dynamic and story that has not been a popular notion in recent millennia. Desire seems not so much a grasping, as a receiving, an ability or capacity to open and dissolve. I think of an image of an open bowl as a signifier of the Virgin’s gift. The increasing light is received, and causes the opening, which will become a dispersal of form – entropy, if you like: this is Beltaine/High Spring – the Desire[3]that is celebrated is a movement towards dis-solution … that is its direction. In contrast, and in balance, Samhain/Deep Autumn celebrates re-solution, which is a movement towards form – it is a materializing gathering into form, as the increasing darkness is received. It seems it is darkness that creates form, as it gathers into itself – as many ancient stories say, and it is light that creates dispersal. And yet I see that the opposite is true also. I think of how there is desire for this work that I have done, for whatever one does – it is then already being received. Desire is receiving. What if I wrote this, and it was not received or welcomed in some way. But the desire for it is already there, and perhaps the desire made it manifest. Perhaps the desire draws forth manifestation, even at Winter Solstice, even at Imbolc/Early Spring, as we head towards Beltaine – it is desire that is drawing that forth, drawing that process around. Desire is already receiving; it is open. Its receptivity draws forth the manifestation. And then the manifestation climaxes at Summer and dissolves into the manifesting, which is perhaps where the desire is coming from – the desire is in the darkness, in the dark’s receptivity[4]. It becomes very active at the time of Beltaine, it lures the differentiated beings back into Her. So the lure at Beltaine is the luring of differentiated beings into a Holy Lust, into a froth and dance of life, whereupon they dissolve ecstatically back into Her – She is “that which is attained at the end of Desire.” And in the dissolution, we sink deeper into that, and begin again. All the time, it is Desire that is luring the manifest into the manifesting, and the manifesting into the manifest. Passion is the glue, the underlying dynamic that streams through it all – through the light and the dark, through the creative triplicities of Virgin-Mother-Crone, of Differentiation-Communion-Autopoeisis[5]. Passion/Desire then is worthy of much more contemplation. If desire/allurement is the same cosmic dynamic as gravity, as cosmologist Brian Swimme suggests[6], then desire like gravity is the dynamic that links/holds us to our Place, to “that which is”, as philosopher Linda Holler describes the effect of gravity[7]. Held in relationship by desire/allurement we lose abstraction and artificial boundaries, and “become embodied and grow heavy with the weight of the earth[8].” We then know that “being is being-in relation-to”[9]. Holler says that when we think with the weight of Earth, space becomes “thick” as this “relational presence … turns notes into melodies, words into phrases with meaning, and space into vital forms with color and content, (and) also holds the knower in the world[10].”Thus, I at last become a particular, a subject, a felt being in the world – a Place laden with content, sentient: continuous with other and all-that-is. Notes: [1]“…as surely as the chlorophyll molecule was co-created by Earth and Sun, as Earth reached for nourishment; as surely as the ear was co-created by subject and sound, as the subject reached for an unknown signal.” As I have written in PaGaian Cosmology, p. 248. [2]Doreen Valiente, The Charge of the Goddessas referred to in Starhawk, The Spiral Dance, p.102-103. [3]I capitalize here, for it is a holy quality. [4]Perhaps the popular cultural association of the darkness/black lingerie etc. with erotica is an expression/”memory” of this deep truth. [5]These are the three qualities of Cosmogenesis, as referred to in PaGaian Cosmology, Chapter 4, “Cosmogenesis and the Female Metaphor”: https://pagaian.org/book/chapter-4/ [6]Brian Swimme, The Universe is a Green Dragon, p.43. [7]Linda Holler, “Thinking with the Weight of the Earth: Feminist Contributions to an Epistemology of Concreteness”, Hypatia, Vol. 5 No. 1, p.2. [8]Linda Holler, “Thinking with the Weight of the Earth: Feminist Contributions to an Epistemology of Concreteness”,Hypatia, Vol. …
(Mago Almanac Excerpt 7) Introducing the Magoist Calendar by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

Mago Almanac: 13 Month 28 Day Calendar (Book A) at Mago Bookstore. YEARLY LEAP DAY AND EVERY FOURTH YEAR LEAP DAY Each Sa includes a Dan of the big Sa. A Dan is equal to one day. That adds to 365 days. At the half point of the third Sa, there is a Pan of the big Sak (the year of the great dark moon). A Pan comes at a half point of Sa. This is of Beopsu (Lawful Number) 2, 5, 8. A Pan is equal to a day. Therefore, the fourth Sa has 366 days. Each year has a leap day (Dan), which makes a total of 365 days. Every fourth year is a leap year that has a leap day (Pan), which makes a total of 366 days. The Dan day comes before the New Year in the winter solstice month. And the Pan day comes before the first day of the summer solstice month in the fourth year. The above, however, does not indicate when the New Year comes. Logographic characters of Dan and Pan each suggest their meanings. While each year includes the Dan day (the morning), every fourth year has the Pan day. A unit of four years makes the Big Calendar. Dan (旦 Morning) Leap day for every first three years Pan (昄 Big) Leap day for every fourth year I have postulated that the year begins on the Dan day (one leap day), a day before New Year that comes in the month of Winter Solstice in the Norther Hemisphere. And the Pan day comes on the day before the first day of the 7th month that has Summer Solstice in the fourth year in the Norther Hemisphere. Years Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Year 4 Months Dan Dan Dan Dan 1 1 1 1 2 2 2 2 3 3 3 3 4 4 4 4 5 5 5 5 6 6 6 6 Pan 7 7 7 7 8 8 8 8 9 9 9 9 10 10 10 10 11 11 11 11 12 12 12 12 13 13 13 13 Days 365 365 365 366 The Magoist Calendar’s intercalation involves one leap day every year and one leap day every four years. That is, each year has one extra day to make it 365 days. Every fourth year has an extra day to make it 366 days. Four years has a total of 1461 days (365×3+366), which makes the mean of 365.25 days. Considering that the month is following the sidereal period rather than the synodic period, it is inferred that the year also follows the sidereal year rather than the solar year. In fact, Magoist Calendar’s one year is very close to today’s 365.25636 days of the sidereal year compared to 365.24217 days of the solar year or the tropical year. Given that, as seen below, the Budoji mentions the tiniest discrepancy of one leap day for 31,788,900 years, the discrepancy between 365.25 and 365.25636 (0.00636 day) can be explained that the year was actually 365.25 days at the time of Budo circa 2333 BCE, 4440 years ago. In other words, there is a discrepancy of 0.12375936 seconds between 2017 CE and 2333 BCE. Regarding Lawful Numbers 2, 5, 8, it is involved as follows: 365 days (3+6+5=14, 1+4=5) Lawful Numbers 2, 5, 8 refers the unit of 365 days (364 days with one intercalary day). Further dynamics are unknown. The sidereal year refers to the time taken by the Earth to orbit the sun once with respect to the distant stars. In contrast, the solar or tropical year means the time taken by the Earth to orbit the sun once with respect to the sun. The sidereal year, 365.25636 days, is about 20 minutes and 24 seconds longer than the mean tropical year (365.24217 days) and about 19 minutes and 57 seconds longer than the average Gregorian year of 365.2425 days. The difference occurs primarily because the solar system spins on its own axis and around the Milky Way galactic center making the solar year’s observed position relative. Time is no independent concept apart from space and the agent. The very concept of time is preceded by the agent bound in a space. It is always contextualized. In Magoism, both calendar and time are born out of the cosmogonic universe, the universe that is in self-creation. Like calendar, time is to be discovered or measured. It is a numinous concept. The very concept of time testifies to the reality of the Creatrix. Time proves the orderly movement of the universe into which we are born. Calendar patterns time, whereas time undergirds calendar. How can we measure time? We are given the time of the Earth that comes from its rotation, revolution, and precession in sync with the moon and the sun (and its planets). One type of time is the solar time. The solar time is a calculation of time based on the position of the sun. Traditionally, the solar time is measured by the sundial. The solar time is, however, specific to the Earth only. It is valid only for the-same-observed-location. It is not made to be used for the time of another celestial body. For example, Mars’ solar time has to be measured independently based on its own rotation and revolution rates. The solar time is an isolated time. It is static and exclusive, not made for the time of other celestial bodies. By nature, it is unfit for connection and communication across celestial bodies. The second type is the sidereal time. The sidereal time is a time scale based on the rate of Earth’s rotations measured relative to the distant stars.[29] Because the observed position is in the far distant stars beyond the solar system, the sidereal time may as well be called an extrasolar stellar time. We can think of the observer’s position of an imaginary cosmic bird far out there, infinitely far beyond not only the solar system and …
(Book Excerpt) Held in the Womb of the Wheel of the Year by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

This essay is an excerpt from the Introduction of the author’s new book A Poiesis of the Creative Cosmos: Celebrating Her within PaGaian Sacred Ceremony. Meditation cushion in circle of decorated stones My ancestors built great circles of stones that represented their perception of real time and space, and enabled them to tell time: the stone circles were cosmic calendars.[i] They went to great lengths and detail to get it right. It was obviously very important to them to have the stones of a particular kind, in the right positions according to position of the Sun at different times of the year, and then to celebrate ceremony within it. I have for decades had a much smaller circle of stones assembled. I have regarded this small circle of stones as a medicine wheel. It is a portable collection, that I can spread out in my living space, or let sit in a small circle on an altar, with a candle/candles in the middle. Each stone (or objects, as some are) represents a particular Seasonal Moment/transition and is placed in the corresponding direction. The small circle of eight stones represents the flow of the Solstices and Equinoxes and the cross-quarter Moments in between: that is, it represents the “Wheel of the Year” as it is commonly known in Pagan traditions. I have found this assembled circle to have been an important presence. It makes the year, my everyday sacred journey of Earth around Sun, tangible and visible as a circle, and has been a method of changing my mind, as I am placed in real space and time. My stone wheel has been a method of bringing me home to my indigenous sense of being. Each stone/object of my small wheel may be understood to represent a “moment of grace,” as Thomas Berry named the seasonal transitions – each is a threshold to the Centre, wherein I may now sit: I sense it as a powerful point. As I sit on the floor in the centre of my small circle of stones, I reflect on its significance as I have come to know the Seasonal transitions that it marks, over decades of celebrating them. I sense the aesthetics and poetry of each. I facilitated and was part of the celebration and contemplation of these Moments in my region for decades. It was always an open group that gathered, and so its participants changed over the years but it remained in form, like a live body which it was: a ceremonial body that conversed with the sacred Cosmos in my place. We spoke a year-long story and poetry of never-ending renewal – of the unfolding self, Earth and Cosmos. We danced and chanted our relationship with the Mother, opened ourselves to Her Creativity, and conversed with Her by this method. All participants in their own way within these ceremonies made meaning of their lives – which is what I understand relationship to be, in this context of Earth and Sun, our Place and Home in the Cosmos: that is, existence is innately meaningful when a being knows Who one is and Where one is. Barbara Walker notes that religions based on the Mother are free of the “neurotic” quest for indefinable meaning in life as such religions “never assumed that life would be required to justify itself.”[ii] I face the North stone, which in my hemisphere is where I place the Summer Solstice. From behind me and to my right is the light part of the cycle – representing manifest form, all that we see and touch. From behind me and to my left is the dark part of the cycle – representing the manifesting, the reality beneath the visible, which includes the non-visible. The Centre wherein I sit, represents the present. The wheel of stones has offered to me a way of experiencing the present as “presence,” as it recalls in an instant that, That which has been and that which is to come are not elsewhere – they are not autonomous dimensions independent of the encompassing present in which we dwell. They are, rather, the very depths of this living place – the hidden depth of its distances and the concealed depth on which we stand.[iii] This wheel of stones, which captures the Wheel of the Year in essence, locates me in the deep present, wherein the past and the future are contained – both always gestating in the dark, through the gateways. And all this has been continually enacted and expressed in the ceremonies of the Wheel of the Year, as the open, yet formal group has done them, mostly in the place of Blue Mountains, Australia. PaGaian Cosmology altar/mandala: a “Womb of Gaia” map Over the years of practice of ritually celebrating these eight Seasonal Moments – Earth’s whole annual journey around Sun, I have been held in this creative story, this Story of Creativity as it may be written – it is a sacred story. Her pattern of Creativity can be identified at all levels of reality – manifesting in seasonal cycles, moon cycles, body cycles – and to be aligned with it aligns a person’s core with the Creative Mother Universe. I have identified the placing of one’s self within this wheel through ceremonial practice of the whole year of creativity, as the placing of one’s self in Her Womb – Gaia’s Womb, a Place of Creativity. All that is necessary for Creativity is present in this Place. All may come forth from here/Here – and so it does, and so it has, and so it will. NOTES: [i] See Martin Brennan, The Stones of Time: Calendars, Sundials, and Stone Chambers of Ancient Ireland (Rochester Vermont, Inner Traditions, 1994). [ii] Barbara Walker, The Woman’s Encyclopaedia of Myths and Secrets (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1983), 693. [iii] David Abram, The Spell of the Sensuous (New York: Vintage Books, 1997), 216. REFERENCES: Abram, David. The Spell of the Sensuous. New York: Vintage Books, 1997. Brennan, Martin. The Stones of Time: Calendars, Sundials, and Stone Chambers of Ancient Ireland.Rochester Vermont: Inner Traditions, 1994. Walker, Barbara. The Woman’s Encyclopaedia of Myths and Secrets. San Francisco: …

(Essay 2) Returning Home with Mago, the Great Goddess, from East Asia by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

[Author’s Note: This essay was first published in Trivia, Voices of Feminism, Issue 6, September 2007. Also to be included in the forthcoming anthology She Rises: Why Goddess Feminism, Activism, and Spirituality?] An Introduction to Magoism Mago is the Great Goddess of East Asia. Nonetheless, she remains barely known to the world. Her equals, Xiwangmu (the Supreme Goddess of Daoism) and Amaterasu (the Sun Goddess of the Japanese imperial family), are said to comprise the pantheon of East Asian cosmic goddesses. Considering that these goddesses are often aligned with the ancient culture of China or Japan, one notices that the pantheon of East Asian Great Goddesses thus omits both Mago and “Korean culture.”
(Essay 2) Why Reenact the Nine-Mago Movement? by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

[Author’s Note: The sequel of this essay is released in preparation for 2015 Nine-Day Solstice Celebration Project.] Part 2 Goddess Goma, the Magoist Shaman Ruler, and Her Nona-Mago Tradition Not until the autumn of 2012 did the pervasive manifestation of the number nine symbolism in Magoism surface in my consciousness. The information that the shrine of Gaeyang Halmi (Gaeyang Grandmother/Goddess), the Sea Goddess of Korea, was once called the Temple of Gurang (Nine Goddesses 九嫏祠) awakened a deep memory in me. It was a revelation to me and I began to connect the dots! That summer, I had joined the field research team of Konkuk University’s Korean Oral Literature graduate program. With them I visited the Shrine of the Sea Saint (Suseong-dang 水聖堂) in Buan, North Jeolla, S. Korea to collect folklore from the locals. Only when I was processing the data that the team gathered to write a report, did I come across the original name of the shrine, the Temple of the Nine Goddesses. And the Nine Goddesses refer to Gaeyang Halmi and her eight daughters. It is unknown how and when it was replaced by the current name, the Shrine of the Sea Saint. It is evident, however, that a linguistic femicide took place; the female-connoted term, the Nine Goddesses, was replaced by the sex/gender neutral term, the Sea Saint.
(Mago Essay 3) Toward the Primordial Knowing of Mago, the Great Goddess by Helen Hwang

[The following sequels including this one are a modified version of my paper presented to Daoist Studies, the American Academy of Religion (AAR) in 2010.] Part 3 Daoist Rendition of Mago, the Great Goddess Being the creatrix, progenitor, and ultimate sovereign, Mago has been addressed by many names. Her derivative names include Samsin Halmeoni (Triad Grandmother/Goddess), Cheonsin (Heavenly Deity), Daejosin (Great Ancestor Deity), Nogo (Crone/Grandmother), Gomo (Goddess Mother), Magui (Devil), Seogo (Auspicious Goddess), Seonnyeo (Female Immortal), Seonja (Immortal Person), and simply Halmi (Grandmother/Crone/Goddess) especially in Korea. To say the least, these names, respectively embedded in a particular cultural and historical background, reflect a complex and enduring feature of Magoism. One may wonder: How is it possible to assess that these goddesses with different names refer to the same goddess, Mago? While such a query is legitimate, its answer entails a prolix explication of inferences based on the comprehensive analysis of a large volume of data, a technique that requires all human faculties, not just rationality. Foremost, the name “Mago” is the primary defining factor to identify Her transnational manifestations in East Asia. This name crisscrosses otherwise seemingly unrelated data including folklore, arts, literature, poetry, and religious and historical records. Such toponyms as Mt. Mago, Rock of Mago, and Cave of Mago presently extant in Korea, China, and/or Japan further substantiate the coherence of Magoism in East Asia. Having established the patterns and styles of Mago stories, the researcher is able to identify a common motif that is shared by the stories and place-names of the goddesses with derivative names. In short, these stories are organically interconnected, reflecting the universality and particularities of Magoist theism. As with Her many names, the researcher or art historian requires the same technique to assess a broad range of Her visual representations. One can begin with a good number of paintings whose colophons designate Mago. Two of the most conspicuous colophons are “Magu gathering medicinal herbs” and “Mago presents longevity.” However, many icons including sculptures and embroideries do not have such an indication. In that case, one can tell the Mago icon by its pictorial themes recurring in the images that are identified as Mago. That said, there is no doubt that the Mago icon stands as the prototype of its numerous variations, which are beyond my documentation at this point. A large portion of Mago visual representations I have documented is casually referred to as “The Immortal Magu (麻姑仙, Magu Xian or Mago Seon)” by moderns. As such, it is assumed that She is a Daoist goddess. Would the Daoist appropriation of Mago’s visual images be accurate? I hold that the Daoist rendition of Mago is a specious stopgap, leaving many issues unattended. When B is derived from A, B alone can explain neither A nor B. Not only Her pre-Daoist origin but also Her supreme divinity as the Great Goddess remains unexplained. Furthermore, Daoism has offered no framework to explain the transnational dissemination of Magoist material culture in Korea, China, and Japan.