June 14, 2023June 5, 2023 Mago WorkLeave a comment

Shapeshifting Trauma by Arlene Bailey

The wolf stalks me in my dreams She comes in my waking hours too holding me in her wild ways as trauma threatens to silence me, drowning me in the Read More …

(Bilingual Poetry & Art 2) Coronavirus: An Initiation by Noris Binet

Title: PrayerfulMedia: AcrylicCopyrighted by Noris Binet 3 What Remains of This Body Today we can stop as when we were born with neither goal, nor future We can become naked without any mental clothes to protect us We can be barefoot and stand on the ground without anything separating us from the humid earth Without rings, bracelets or necklaces, with nothing to beautify or decorate our bodies remaining more and more naked as when we are born Today we can stop, stand barefooted without adornment… and discover how to offer to life what remains of this body! 4 Clemency Noris Binet © 4/4/20. Ajijic, Mexico Clemency! We ask clemency for all the countries falling beneath what moves invisibly without us noticing it. Clemency for all peoples that are overwhelmed, and leniency for the Big Golden Apple that is being eaten away from various corners Clemency for New York that can’t stop, For the city that never sleeps where so many have passed through and enjoyed its relentless turning like a Ferris wheel ride that raises us to the clouds, from where we saw its peak … Clemency because right now it still can’t stop! Stop, city of immigrants people from everywhere are inhabiting you … stop for the first time and let death pass … Do not let it stop in your hands and nest in your chest … I ask for mercy for all your people, who are my people, immigrants from all over the world that inhabit you Mercy for New York the golden apple eaten away from many corners. Stop and let death pass. (End of the Poetry) 3 Lo Que Queda de Este Cuerpo Como nacemos Hoy podemos detenernos Sin meta, ni futuro Podemos quedarnos desnudos Sin ropa mental que nos proteja Podemos quedarnos descalzos Y pisar la tierra Sin zapatos aeróbicos, sin nada Que nos separe del húmedo suelo Podemos quedarnos sin anillos, Aretes o collares, sin nada que adorne la belleza que son nuestros cuerpos Y vernos mas y mas desnudos Como cuando nacemos. Hoy podemos detenernos, descalzos Sin joyas…y descubrir como nacemos ofrendando la vida que le queda a este cuerpo! 4 Clemencia Clemencia, Clemencia pedimos para todos los pueblos que van cayendo bajo lo que llega invisible sin que nos demos cuenta Clemencia para todos los pueblos que están avasallados clemencia para la manzana de oro que se va carcomiendo por varios rincones Clemencia para Nueva York que aún no logra detenerse clemencia, clemencia para la ciudad que nunca duerme por donde tantos hemos pasado y disfrutado de su incesante girar como la de un carrusel que nos subió a las nubes desde allí vimos su cúspide… Clemencia porque en este momento Aún no logra detenerse. Detente ciudad de emigrantes donde estamos todos los pueblos Habitándote… Detente por primera vez Y deja que la muerte pase… Que no se detenga en tus manos Y se anide en tu pecho… Clemencia pido por todas tus gentes, que son mis gentes, emigrantes de todos los pueblos que te habitan Clemencia para Nueva York la manzana de oro carcomiéndose por todos Los rincones. ¡Detente! https://www.magoism.net/2019/08/meet-mago-contributor-noris-binet/ (Meet Mago Contributor) Noris Binet
(S/HE V3N2 Book Review) Joanna Kujawa’s The Other Goddess: Mary Magdalene and the Goddesses of Eros and Secret Knowledge by Susanna de Chenonceau

[Editor’s Note: This poem was included in the journal, S/HE: An International Journal of Goddess Studies (Vol 3 No 2, 2024).] Dr. Joanna Kujawa is a scholar, spiritual travel author, and self-described spiritual detective who serves on the board of S/HE: An International Journal of Goddess Studies. Kujawa’s research centers on the intersection of spirituality and sexuality, the significance of Mary Magdalene, and goddess lineage as it is currently resurfacing in the collective. Trained as a Catholic scholar, Kujawa is widely read in Hindu and Vedic traditions, as well as gnostic texts and goddess archetypes, and she has traveled well the areas she writes about. The book is broken into four sections that lead the reader through: an exploration of the personal conception of eros, an archetypal survey of goddesses from the Mediterranean and East, the mythic and mystic journey of Mary Magdalene in France, and a cosmic consideration of patriarchal perceptions. Part 1, The Personal Journey: Exploring the Goddesses of Eros, discusses Kujawa’s personal experiences with eros, love, lust, and desire. She situates these four concepts among one another using a framework set out in Eva Pierrakos’ book The Pathwork of Self Transformation. Using personal narratives as well as goddess archetypes such as Aphrodite, Inanna, Radha, Hathor, Circe, and Sundari, Kujawa theorizes that eros is dangerous, powerful, and spiritual. She situates eros on the tantric path to the divine and recognizes it as a “powerful and intelligent force” that moves independently of us and wants us to be aware of it. Considering sexuality as a powerful means to connect with spirit, Kujawa argues that it can be central to our spiritual evolution, if allowed and given proper respect. In her chapter “Healing the Goddess Gap in Tantra,” Kujawa is particularly strong in her discussion of the fact that the divine feminine used to have a prominent role in ancient folk customs and beliefs given that Shakti was the central deity “to whom all prayers were directed” until the Brahmins arrived, created their caste system, and set Shakti up as the wife of a male deity instead of the universal all-powerful force she had been held to be (pp. 67-68). Kujawa concludes this section with a discussion of the Hindu goddess Sundari as the deepest expression of the union between male and female—and that of the fullest expression of a woman who fully owns her own authentic sensual and spiritual power. Part 2, titled The Mythic Journey: the Mystery of Mary Magdalene and the Goddesses of Secret Knowledge, is the largest section of the text and leads readers through Kujawa’s search for Mary Magdalene as the carrier of esoteric knowledge, depicted holding an egg. To explore her intuition on this topic, Kujawa researched similar representations of goddesses, beginning with Ninmah, Inanna/Ishtar, and Isis, often represented with variants of the Tree of Life and a serpent. Kujawa posits that these goddesses can represent portals between life and death, or possibly even higher states of consciousness. Here Kujawa argues that these goddesses might be a recurring archetype from the collective consciousness, or possibly enlightened beings like avatars or angels, or even possibly alien others from “the liminal parts of our consciousness” (p. 87-88). For each of these goddesses, Kujawa investigates links between the depiction of them and of Mary Magdalene, exploring similarities such as how the Gospel of John mirrors depictions of Ishtar and Isis as High Priestesses, by setting Mary Magdalene alone in the tomb (the Holy of Holies) with the resurrected god (Christ). Kujawa cites Michael Hearns’ book The First Pope (NP: JD McKenzie, 2019), where Hearns concludes that the Gospel of John is an encoded story of Mary Magdalene as high priest. Kujawa then surmises that Mary Magdalene was central to Jesus’s life and work, given her prominent role in several Gnostic texts, including the Gospel of Thomas, the Gospel of Philip, the Dialogue of the Savior, the Questions of Mary, the Pistis Sophia, and the Gospel of Mary. (Note this text is not called the Gospel of Mary Magdalene, as many authors state. It is simply called the Gospel of Mary). Kujawa is likely well aware of this but does not reinforce the point; yet it is important to bear in mind that not all of these texts use the term Magdalene; and Mariam was a very common name at the time, so it is not possible to know if all of these texts are discussing Mary Magdalene, or if they are all even discussing the same Mary. It is of course interesting and convenient and perhaps desirable to approach the gnostic and Nag Hammadi texts as if they were all discussing Mary Magdalene, but this position cannot as of yet be definitive. Perhaps it will become so in future, as more and more texts are discovered and decoded, particularly from the thousands of Oxyrhynchus trash pieces held at Oxford. Similarly, lost and forgotten texts are continually arising from the archives of the Vatican; who knows what might be “discovered” there even tomorrow? I personally like to hope that more such definitive female-affirming texts might finally arise from Mount Athos libraries as well—libraries as old as Christendom itself, and libraries where not even one woman has ever been. Kujawa concludes that one of the most important takeaways from this section is, to her mind, the clear connection between the gnostic Sophia and the New Testament Mary Magdalene. Kujawa sees both figures as representing wisdom and erotic power, and she finds it highly significant that both women are depicted as having intimate male companions: Sophia with Christ, and Mary Magdalene with Jesus (p. 128). She then explores the assertions of Margaret Starbird who claims that Jesus and Mary Magdalene were married and had at least one child; Kujawa doesn’t care whether Mary Magdalene was married to Jesus or whether she was a mother, but she is very interested in the concept of the Magdalene as a favorite or consort of the Christ (p. 129) and especially one who went …
(Essay) The Internet and Research on Goddess History and Culture by Francesca Tronetti, Ph.D.

NYC Public Library Research Room”Not everyone has access to large research libraries, instead the internet has become their information source.” Francesca Tronetti Scholars are consistently engaged in research of one type or another. Whether they are looking for primary sources, reevaluating established works, or considering new findings, there is always something new to discover. Academic scholars are fortunate enough to have credentials which allow them access to libraries and museum collections that laypeople cannot access. Laypeople which include pagan individuals who wish to research and revive ancient traditions but may not have the background in history, anthropology, classical studies, or religious studies. Instead, they spend hours trolling through libraries, used bookstores, and online archives. They find and bring together multiple sources to create a better understanding of an ancient religious practice. When Cathryn Platine began researching the worship of Cybele in the ancient world in the 1990s the internet personal webpages were being posted, online bookstores were reprinting ancient texts, and the forum boards allowed people to connect with other like-minded researchers. Cathryn remembers finding niche publishing houses which often were the only source for some documents. She remembers “Llewellyn Press started by publishing great arcane books you could not get anywhere else, they republished antique books of ceremonial magic.”[1] Today Llewellyn does not offer these arcane books, most of which were primary source material. The rare books Cathryn bought from Llewellyn are now mainly produced by reprint publishers such as Kessinger Publishing and can be ordered through their website[2]or found on Amazon.com. The internet also played a vital role in Cathryn’s research on the worship of Cybele in Phrygian and Rome. She did most of her research during the 1990s in the early days of the internet. During this time, educational institutions and museums across the globe were beginning to digitize their collections and make them available online. Maps of archaeological excavations, pictures of the artifacts, and site reports were also starting to appear online. Tufts University began the creation of the Perseus Digital Library,[3] an online collection of ancient texts and stories with translations and complete publishing information. Additionally, individuals were making out-of-print material available for free online. One book was vital to Cathryn’s research and my dissertation, and its story demonstrates how crucial it was to have documents available online. Much of the history of Cybele’s worship which Cathryn told me, and which she wrote in her book The Cybeline Revival,[4] was without citation. She told me, “When we started this, we weren’t paying attention to citing things, we wanted to get [the information is written] down and share it.” Over Yule of 2016, when I had returned to the Maetreum to pick up books and talk to Cathryn and Viktoria, I asked Cathryn where she had gotten some of her quotes. Specifically, I was interested the phrase “I have drunk from the cymbal,” a quote which I had spent a year looking. Cathryn’s book was the only source I had for the phrase, and in all my research I had never found it in any other writing. This time, while sitting in her office, she directed me to her bookshelves and told me that she might have the source for that phrase. Cathryn told me to pull out a blue binder and inside was the title page to a book, printed off the internet, Pagan Regeneration: A Study of Mystery Initiations and Secret Rites in the Graeco-Roman World by Harold R. Willoughby.[5] I looked through the text, and there was the quote, twice with two different cited sources. I was elated, for a year I had been searching for this reference and here it was. Cathryn told me that I could borrow the binder to look at, but I could not take it out of the house. Willoughby’s book had been out of print for decades, and she was not going to lose her only hard copy.[6] She found the PDF copy online in the late 1990s or early 2000s and had printed it out, which she said was good because the website she found it on no longer existed. Curious to see if I could find a print copy, I did a Google search. Sure enough, it had been republished and was now available on Amazon. Pagan Regeneration was first published in 1929, and the next publishing date I found was 2009. Aside from the online copy, Cathryn had found, Willoughby’s book had not been reprinted for almost eighty years. This experience, and other stories she told me demonstrated the amount of work that went into her research on Cybele. Some of the older texts had, in the 1990s, been out of print for between twenty and seventy years[7] if not longer. The availability of out of print material, whether through an online archive, a reprinting publisher or the sale of a book on eBay or Amazon, is of immense advantage to professional and lay scholars. Cybele and Attis: The Myth and the Cult has never been republished after its translation into English in 1977, even though it is referenced in any book or project dealing with the worship of Cybele or her cult. Having the primary source in your hands, rather than using a quote of a quote of a paraphrase, is vital to gathering factual data and researching reliable conclusions. Online publishing scholarly and out-of-print material gave Cathryn, and the other priestesses access to the information they needed to revive the worship of Cybele. It is true that the internet is now home to conspiracy websites and sometimes the ravings of people claiming to be experts. However, we cannot forget that it was the first place where people could access material that had previously been available to academics. And, the internet continues to be a place where researchers of all backgrounds can share information and sources to enhance our understanding of the material and spiritual world. (Meet Mago Contributor) Rev. Francesca Tronetti. [1] Platine, in interview with author, October 28, 2015. [2] Kessinger …
(Poems) Old Selves I Have Been by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

Poem 1, May 26th 1980 Planets away I’ve travelled light years from my mother’s womb Where are you my mother? I need your love – I want to return to you But oh I don’t. I don’t. … I have travelled into myself into the depths into the universe into the stars to that heart to that black hole my own home your home is somewhere near. … “I am the mirror – blastula reflected in the newest nova.”[1] … My home – I am coming. I am coming unto you. oOo Poem 2, May 26th, 1980 My life – … I hold it to the light I feel it its shape its corners its smooth surfaces its colour … what is it how is it this gem … who can cut it? only me … I hold it in my hands I feel it in the dark as a blind person I sense it. … Discovering, seeking remembering(?) … My skin absorbs it and is it. oOo Poem 3, May 30th, 1980 This is a profound time my friend a stopping point a period of life complete a road we’ve shared seen through a time of passing, of death A process, an era turning its last turns A winter, a death the last leaves falling. … We cry we feel pain we sense deeply the ebb and the flow Each soul bared and touched sensing itself. Lonely yes, but pure and free. … So long have I longed not knowing. … Now I am doing it sailing to be free. … I am doing it See how I spread my wings See how I glide See how I turn … Rising Rising I am flying. … This life how much is it worth? … what can it? how can it? … I sense it small. against the greatness of the sky. oOo References: Morgan, Robin. Going Too Far: The Personal Chronicle of a Feminist. NY: Vintage Books, 1978. NOTES: [1] Robin Morgan, Going Too Far, p.314.
(Prose & Poetry) Eurydice by Susan Hawthrone

When you subsume yourself in mythic figures, they often return under different guises. In the early 1990s I wrote this poem. EURYDICE Orpheus sings as he returns from the dead. Eurydice cried out, Don’t leave me here like this. Eurydice’s eyes are dry with fear and anger As darkness closes in on her once again. This poem is from my collection Bird and Other Writings on Epilepsy (1993). In the poem I am trying to find a way to convey the experience of loss of consciousness. Orpheus, because of his talent for music, is told that Eurydice can accompany him out of the Underworld, but the condition is that he does not look back until they are both in the upper world. Yes, Orpheus looks back, thinking he has been tricked. And so Eurydice disappears once again. The figure of Eurydice is very dear to me. In one version of the story, she died when Aristaeus pursued her (I assume with intentions of raping her, as so many did). She stepped on a viper and died. Ovid, however, says that Aristaeus was not the cause, but rather that Eurydice was dancing with naiads on her wedding day when she trod on the snake. There are so many stories hidden in here about assault, about the power of music, about men’s fallibility, about the importance of snakes (sacred to Persephone, Queen of the Underworld) and perhaps about the patriarchal desire to eradicate the practice of women’s rituals passed down through the generations. In 2017, when my novel Dark Matters was published, I returned to the story of Eurydice. In this book, Eurydice is the great aunt of Kate (Ekaterina) and one of seven sisters in the generation of Kate’s grandmother, Maia. And finally, Aunt Eurydice, she was always disappearing with her girlfriends. Eventually she went so far away, her sisters never saw her again. There are three photos of her. In one she is standing alone. It is such a small photograph I can’t see the features of her face. In the second photo, because I don’t know her, I cannot pick her out in the one taken with so many of the sisters in Paris in the early 1920s. What were you doing there? Living it up? Finding love or a companion?The last photo is of Eudy standing on the moors or some other wind-blasted place with another woman. Who is she?Ruby. You are the mystery woman in the photo with Eurydice. I found your name in a letter which was signed, Eudy and Ruby. Here, the reference is twofold. The disappearance of lesbians from history and, in this case, from family history. Like many lesbians, Eudy, felt the need to go into exile, because remaining in one’s home country would bring too much shame. Eudy’s life period is that of the late nineteenth century to mid-twentieth century and she goes into exile from Australia around 1919 to Britain. The other reference is to the disappearances of those who resisted the Pinochet regime in Chile, some of whom were lesbians. This is another narrative strand in the novel. Rewritings of our history in myth is a way of excavating the unknown and the erased. So much of women’s history has been disappeared and when you dig into the furrows, you can find those other disappearances that are due to disability, sexuality, race and ethnicity. Bird and Other Writings on Epilepsy is available here and from online retailers: http://www.spinifexpress.com.au/Bookstore/book/id=48/ Dark Matters is available here and from online retailers: http://www.spinifexpress.com.au/Bookstore/book/id=297/ (Meet Mago Contributor) Susan Hawthorne.
(She Rises Vol 3 Excerpt) Guidance and Calling for Healing Justice by Tina Minkowitz

[Editor’s Note: This essay was first published in She Rises: What Goddess Feminist Activist Spirituality? Volume 3 (Mago Books 2018).] I listen to inner guidance that also comes from the earth. The earth speaks within me. I touch and see and I know. Touching a tree, touching water, I know what I can’t put into words. Sometimes words come, or a sense of peace and intense love. Lately I’ve noticed the voice at my home, the hill on which we live centering on a beaver pond, belongs to the beavers, their presence and wisdom. I listen and learn. Centering in this wisdom has guided me throughout my adult life after I was broken up and opened by a kind of violence that is not readily sayable, and that feels still shameful. I was taken into a psychiatric institution where I was confined and forced to ingest a neuroleptic drug that completed a process of dissolution of self and dissociation from what and who I was. I became a ghost in myself and had to remake my life after it was over. Life gave me the chance to repair the harm that I suffered, to grow and build beyond my suffering with the wounded healer archetype. I was guided to attend law school and my process there with its interruptions and repetitions put me in place to develop a skeleton of doctrine based on disability non-discrimination to require the abolition of forced psychiatry. I graduated shortly before the UN began work on a disability anti-discrimination treaty, and I was empowered by a new global organization of users and survivors of psychiatry to speak on its behalf. I steered by the guidance I kept checking in with, listening for my responsibility. In upending a system of practice and law that was abusive, I wanted to be sure to do no harm myself. I became sure as it continued to take shape that it was good and not harmful in any way. My work was foundational to what became a true shift in international human rights norms, an innovation in legal doctrine that is working its way into domestic law and the practice of mental health services. It could not take place by any one person alone, there were many other survivors both grassroots and more professional, who contributed, and probably hundreds of participants in the UN process from government delegations and the worldwide disability community. This opened up a world for me and a gift of service. While the intensity has diminished since the completion of the treaty and its interpretation by the official UN monitoring body in accordance with our intentions, this calling remains a source of beauty and growth in my life. I am teaching a course based on my work that is currently a great source of satisfaction. Like the work itself, the course is grassroots, without institutional academic support or funding. Beyond the work, I have been able to return attention to myself again, my life, my marriage and home, where do I want to be, where do we want to be and what do we want to be and do beyond our separate work? I have come full circle to finding myself again needing to allow guidance to come without pushing it. I have doubted myself and at times treated myself and others less than lovingly, at times the urgency of the work led me to prioritize a goal over people and relationships. This then led me to feel guilt and try to establish stability through conventional means, seeking conventional forms of power and esteem that always eluded me. I want to regain the equilibrium that comes with inner guidance and connection with earth, her beings and those I love. There has been suffering in this part of the process but it is the kind that leads to joy. About the author: Tina Minkowitz is founder and president of the Center for the Human Rights of Users and Survivors of Psychiatry. She lives with her wife Diana Signe Kline in the Adirondacks region of New York.
(Video 15) Genevieve Vaughan & Chiquie Estrada in Maternal Gift Economy: Breaking Through by Genevieve Vaughan

(Words of Invitation) Drawing on Maternal Gift Economy theory, the suppressed wisdom of women, and the traditions and ethics of Indigenous societies, this integrated programme of presentations sponsored by the International Feminists for a Gift Economy Network will offer new insights, perspectives, and challenges to the underlying market-based mentality of the dominant world order. In this time of crisis and systemic upheaval, the model of the Maternal Gift Economy on which our survival depends at the beginning of life, is being revealed and celebrated. The interdependence of all living beings can now be made visible and honored. Mother Earth provides the model of an economy based on gifting that we receive as young children from our nurturers—before we are alienated into market exchange. We must make the transition from the exploitive Euro-American patriarchal/dominating and capitalistic ideology to a gift-based economy and culture grounded in the values of nurturing and care rather than competition and greed. We invite you to join us in exploring the possibilities in this series of presentations and dialogues that bring together those who have been laboring to articulate the principles of the Maternal Gift Economy, protect Indigenous values, and practice peaceful and just community building. The time is now for all humans to cooperate rather than compete. Please join us! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=37P5JsIocpg Endless Economic Colonisation or Return to the Maternal Gift. Presented by Genevieve Vaughan International Feminists for a Gift Economy. June 19, 2021 For more information on the Maternal Gift Economy, see here. https://www.magoism.net/2014/06/meet-mago-contributor-genevieve-vaughan/
(Essay 2) On the Other Foot: Pentecostal Music versus Traditional Silence by Francesca Tronetti, Ph.D.

[Author’s Note: This essay in two parts on sacred music vs sacred silence also deals with colonialism and Christianization in Ghana.] The Ghanaian Pentecostal church’s opposition to the month of silence is not about them asserting the importance of freedom of religion. Instead, the church’s stance seems to be one of pure colonial imposition. Beginning in the 1970’s different Christian denominations, such as the Roman Catholic Church, started a process of “African enculturation” whereby the traditional songs and drumming rhythms used by the people were incorporated into the liturgy and service. The prophetic and spirit-healing churches embraced whole-heartedly the use of drums, singing traditional songs, and performing traditional dances which “…maintained a continuation with a perceived cultural past of ancestral and healing traditions…”[1] Conversely, the Pentecostal church refused to engage in this “African enculturation” and preferred to develop a hybridized music style of Western, Black American, and West African for their worship services. There was a fear that religious-cultural traditions would serve as an avenue for Satan, and the only way to combat him was through the Christianizing of Ghana.[2] The hatred of Ghana’s cultural past includes not only the traditional religious beliefs of the people but also the traditional musical instruments of the people. The Pentecostal churches prefer to use Western-made electric guitars and other instruments. As Dijk explains: To safeguard a disconnection from the cultural past, in Pentecostal ideology, neither musical styles nor musical instruments should be of local origin, and they should not refer to local traditions of veneration of ancestors. Acquiring instruments from the West … precludes such ‘contamination’ by past traditions and influences.[3] But, even purchasing musical instruments from the West may not entirely be free of consequence. Pentecostals believe that to have money to buy such expensive luxury items, the buyer may have to make a blood covenant with Satan in which they sacrifice a close relative. To avoid this possible contamination, the leaders of the church will pray over the instruments before they are shipped and when they arrive to ensure that no evil or harmful influences follow the instruments from Europe to Ghana.[4] To Pentecostals, the power of Satan can come not only from the traditional religious festivals which they oppose but also from the expensive instruments which they seek to use and own. Is this Music Sacred? When I attend circle or celebrate any of the Pagan festivals drumming, and singing is central features. If you were to do a YouTube search for pagan/Goddess music, you would find that drums figure prominently, and songs are sung at the alto level, which most people can reach. The reason for a low steady thrum is to induce a trance-like state in the listener, to move them onto another plane of existence. Pagan/Goddess music in America cannot be found in the spiritual/religious sections of most music stores. Instead, they are listed under “New Age,” an ironic heading since most of the “New Age” music consists of ancient Buddhist and Tibetan chants, Native American songs, and drumming done on traditional instruments. Most of this music is used for meditation and ritual by non-Christians. Unfortunately, some Christians believe that Christianity is the oldest and only true faith; therefore, and every other religion came later and was influenced by demonic forces.[5] Western churches in Africa and South America continue to demean traditional practices and music as “primitive, heathen, and uncivilized.” In these instances, traditional music and ritual become more than merely religious observances. They have become a symbol of the people’s rejection of colonial power and their determination to regain control of their country, culture, history, and traditions. In Africa and the United States, there is a resurgence of African religious practices being incorporated into mainstream church services because the leaders realize that these practices fill a need within the people to connect with their culture and ancestry. Even if the practices are not the same as those their ancestors observed before they were slaves, they still provide a connection to the original home of all humanity. The position of the Pentecostal church is one of disrespect both to the Ghanaian people Ghana and sacredness of their music. Music, hymns, and songs are essential to worship and praise. The fact that the Pentecostal church in Ghana is using their music as a weapon is shameful. Those who live around the churches have filed complaints with the police and city officials because of the nightly noise that accompany church services. Instead of addressing the charges, the church officials raise the cry of religious discrimination and refuse to compromise by keeping the music down or not playing after a specific time. This cry of religious discrimination is raised when another religious and culturally significant festival is taking place, which requires quiet. Instead of being considerate of the beliefs of their neighbors, the Pentecostal churches make noise and play music throughout the festival. They insist that their modern, Christian way is the only path to salvation and that the cultural festival of Homowo is an “animalistic” outdated ritual that will not allow Ghana to enter into the civilized world. This belief carries over into the instruments used in the Pentecostal churches. No traditional instruments, no instruments made in Ghana; instead, the church leaders insist on purchasing expensive, new Western instruments made in Europe. In Ghana, the debate on religious freedom versus religious tolerance is still not settled. While one church leader will release a statement claiming that the instruments are stored away during Homowo, another will mock the Homowo and ask why the churches should respect the call for less noise during one month out of the year. A statement from the Christian and Pentecostal Counsels of Ghana acknowledged that the ban on drumming levied against the Pentecostal churches is probably based on: …the fact that there is indeed an increase in undue noise-making and drumming which go on in certain places till well in the night, if not starting too early in the morning. Or they could also …
(Video) Autumn Equinox/Mabon Poetry by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

The Autumnal Equinox occurs each year in the range of March 20-23 in the Southern Hemisphere, and in the range of September 20 -23 in the Northern Hemisphere. Autumn Equinox is a point of sacred balance: it is the point of balance in the dark part of Earth’s annual cycle. Sun is equidistant between North and South as it was/is at Spring Equinox, but in this dark phase of the cycle, the trend is toward increasing dark. Henceforth the dark part of the day will exceed the light part: thus it is a Moment of certain descent … and a sacred Moment for feeling and contemplating the grief and power of loss, for ceremoniously joining personal and collective grief and loss with the larger Self in whom we are. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vcZflKLkvP8 Below is the text of the video. It is based on the traditional poetry for PaGaian Autumn Equinox/Mabon ceremony[i]. This is the Moment of the Autumnal Equinox in our Hemisphere – the moment of balance of light and dark in the dark part of the cycle. The light and dark parts of the day in the South and in the North of our planet, are of equal length at this time. We feel for the balance in this moment – Earth as She is poised in relationship with the Sun … breathing in the light, swelling with it, letting our breath go to the dark, staying with it. In our part of Earth, the balance is tipping into the dark. We remember the coolness of it. This is the time when we give thanks for our harvests – all that we have gained. And we remember too the sorrows, losses involved. The story of Old tells us that Persephone, Beloved Daughter, is given the wheat from Her Mother – the Mystery, knowledge of life and death. She receives it graciously. But she sets forth into the darkness – both Mother and Daughter grieve that it is so. Demeter, the Mother, says: “You are offered the wheat in every moment … I let you go as Child, most loved of Mine: you descend to Wisdom, to Sovereignty. You will return as Mother, co-Creator with me. You are the Seed in the Fruit, becoming the Fruit in the Seed. Inner Wisdom guides your path.” We give thanks for our harvests – our lives they are blessed. We are Daughters and Sons of the Mother. Yet we take our Wisdom and all that we have gained, and remember the sorrows – the losses involved. We remember the grief of the Mother, of mothers and lovers everywhere, our grief. Persephone descends. The Beloved One is lost. Persephone goes forth into the darkness to become Queen of that world. She tends the sorrows. The Seed represents our Persephones, who tends the sorrows – we are the Persephones, who may tend the sorrows. We go out into the night with Her and plant our seeds. Persephone blesses us with her fertile promise: “You have waxed into the fullness of life, And waned into darkness; May you be renewed in tranquility and wisdom[ii].” These represent our hope. The Seed of life never fades away. She is always present. Blessed be the Mother of all life. Blessed be the life that comes from Her and returns to Her. We tie red threads on each other: we participate in the Vision of the Seed – of the continuity of Life, that continues beneath the visible. The Mother knowledge grows within us. Our hope is in the Sacred Balance of the Cosmos – the Thread of Life, the Seed that never fades away: it is the Balance of Grief and Joy, the Care that we may feel in our Hearts. NOTES: [i] Glenys Livingstone, PaGaian Cosmology, p. 239-247. [ii] Charlene Spretrnak, Lost Goddesses of Early Greece, p. 116. REFERENCES: Livingstone, Glenys. PaGaian Cosmology: Re-inventing Earth-based Goddess Religion. NE: iUniverse, 2005. Spretnak, Charlene. Lost Goddesses of Early Greece: a Collection of Pre-Hellenic Myths. Boston: Beacon Press, 1992/1978.

(Special Post 5) 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.] Annie Finch For me, Goddess is completely different from God–Goddess means acceptance of the sacred WITHIN the physical instead of transcending the physical; acceptance of death and life as equally sacred; and the holiness of changing cycles…. Annie Finch, Maine anniefinch.com Marie de Kock Why Goddess spirituality? Goddess spirituality is crucial for our survival and the survival of our planet. I’m referring to every woman’s connection and relationship with her own Spirit which resides in her heart, and her own divine ability to create, which springs from her womb. The womb is infinitely more than a reproductive organ; it is a replica of the Cosmic Womb or Mago. From that profound pool of infinite silent knowledge, women can access the solutions so urgently needed to recover the equilibrium the world with its God spirituality has lost, and women can dream the solutions into being. It is the intelligence of the heart and intelligence of the womb that humanity needs in order to balance out the ill effects of our noisy ‘rational’ left brained society. Women carry the keys to the wisdom within them. Female spirituality is the door. Marie is in Chile for now http://ninenormalwomenwithwings.com Leslene Della-Madre Goddess among many things to me is a verb–Goddessing. “Goding” isn’t the same. She is Love in action in all things–she is the cosmic gen-Her-ator bringing life into form from primordial chaos, the twin serpents of coming and going. She is the plasMA of the YoniVerse filling space with her divine essence creating great beaded necklaces of galaxies all connected to each other by electric pathways. She is the All and Eternal. Leslene Della Madre, California USA midwifingdeath.com Diane Horton Sacred Goddess Sisterhood Each of our stories as women who have come to embrace the Goddess are varied and interesting. Certainly interesting to each other, as our spirits long to resonate with another who has had a similar journey. Mine began while I was still a member of the Episcopal Church and a Christian. But relative to many, it was not that long ago, just 18 years. Some women have been knowing and worshiping the Goddess for more than 30 years, some have only just come to the reawakening and re-membering recently. Some of us call ourselves witches, some priestesses, or both. Some do not identify with either of those words and simply say they have immersed themselves in the Divine Feminine, or that they worship the Goddess. Some will say they are Pagan or Wiccan or Dianic Wiccan. Whatever we call ourselves, or do not call ourselves, we are all Sisters in Goddess, those who worship the Great Mother. And though our numbers are growing, seemingly almost daily, we are still in a minority. We need those who are articulate to voice our views and we need wise teachers who can share practices, philosophy and knowledge with those who are eager for such spiritual food. One of the great things about this Goddess Path is that, although there is much written and oral knowledge to be had for those who seek it, the deepest part of this path is experiential. Personal experience with Goddess, deep within ourselves, and having our eyes opened to Her all around us all the time, seeing and feeling Her magic in our lives, knowing Her love and nurturance in our hearts. We have no dogma, no set of rules or commandments, no rigid ideology. We have our own hearts to guide us into all acts of love and pleasure, compassion, humility and reverence which are Her rituals. When we express strength, hold our power and honor life, as well as giggle and laugh, those are Her rituals, too. There are the Women’s Blood Mysteries, which set women apart from men who worship the Goddess, but that should serve to unite women in a strong eternal bond, not alienate men. There is no place for hierarchy. We are all women equal to each other as daughters of the Goddess. We cannot, we must not, allow the patriarchal mindset to contaminate Feminine Spirituality. No hierarchy, no duality, no controlling others. If we want to see a world in which the Divine Feminine is prominent, the world that many of us believe is coming, we need to take a good, hard look at ourselves in the mirror of our Sisters’ eyes and all of us individually commit ourselves to Unity, Sisterhood and Unconditional Love. That does not mean we will never disagree, and sometimes disagree vehemently, but it does mean we do not allow those disagreements to fracture us as a body of women or to damage or destroy our Sisterhood. There are many teachers who have their own followings of students, their own coursework, their own publications and newsletters, their own festivals they work all year to organize and make manifest. This is a good thing! Especially with the national economy the way it is now many, many women cannot afford to travel very far from their homes, so the fact that there are festivals in diverse parts of the country is no doubt just as the Goddess desires. Those who know of Her and hear Her call are greatly benefited by all of these in mind, heart and spirit. We all need each other. We who can spread this information far and wide need to do so, not just think of and promote the one group or project we are involved in ourselves individually. This is the BIG PICTURE. This is how the movement moves forward. This is how the Goddess gathers Her women (and men). Unification of purpose. Standing together. Supporting each other in concrete ways. We are Women of Goddess. Her spirit […]
(Special Post) Why I choose to be an RTM contributor by Glenys Livingstone

The contribution of my writing to Return to Mago E-Magazine has evolved since it began four years ago, into a deeply mutually enhancing relationship. The time and effort taken to write carefully and in alignment with my heartfelt passions and insights, and then to be able to publish to a receptive audience, has always been rewarding – for me personally and apparently for many who received it.
(Special post) Laurie Baymarrwangga, Senior Australian of the Year 2012

Posted with permission in Return to Mago on ‘Australia Day’, 26 January 2014 (Australian time), in recognition of the ill-treatment and misunderstanding of Aboriginal people that was set in train when, in 1788, white people first settled in the land now known as Australia.

(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
(Essay) Conceiving, Imagining the New at Samhain by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

It is the Season of Samhain/Deep Autumn in the Southern Hemisphere at this time. In the PaGaian version of Samhain/Deep Autumn ceremony participants journey to the “Luminous World Egg” … a term taken from Starhawk in her book The Spiral Dance[i], where she also names that place as the “Shining Isle”, which is of course, the Seed of conception, a metaphor for the origins of all and/or the female egg: it is the place for rebirth. Artist: Bundeluk, Blue Mountains, Australia. The “luminous world egg” is a numinous place within, the MotherStar of conception: that is, a place of unfolding/becoming. The journey to this numinous place within requires first a journey back, through some of each one’s transformations, however each may wish to name those transformations at this time. The transformations for each and every being are infinite in their number, for there is “nothing we have not been” as has been told by Celts and others of Old, and also by Western science in the evolutionary story (a story told so well by evolutionary biologist Elisabet Sahtouris, particularly in her video Journey of a Silica Atom.) Ceremonial participants may choose selves from biological, present historical self, or may choose selves from the mythic with whom they feel connection; from any lineage – biological or otherwise. Selves may also be chosen from Gaia’s evolutionary story – earlier creatures, winged or scaled ones … with whom one wishes to identify at this time. Each participant is praised for their “becoming” for each self they share. When all have completed these journeys/stories of transformation, the circle is lauded dramatically by the celebrant for their courage to transform; and she likens them all to Gaia Herself who has made such transitions for eons. The celebrant awards each with a gingerbread snake, “Gaian totems of life renewed”[ii]. gingerbread snakes Participants sit and consume these gingerbread snakes in three parts: (i) as all the “old shapes” of self that were named; and (ii) remembering the ancestors, those whose lives have been harvested, whose lives have fed our own, remembering that we too are the ancestors, that we will be consumed; and (iii) remembering and consuming the stories of our world that they desire to change, the stories that fire their wrath or sympathy: in the consuming, absorbing them (as we do), each may transform them by thoughts and actions – “in our own bodyminds”. When all that is consumed “wasting no part”, it is said that “we are then free to radiate whatever we conceive”, to “exclaim the strongest natural fibre known” – our creative selves, “into such art, such architecture, as can house a world made sacred” by our building[iii]. This “natural fibre” is a reference to the spider’s thread from within her own body, with which she weaves her web, her home; and Spider has frequently been felt in indigenous cultures around the globe as Weaver and Creator of the Cosmos. Spider the Creatrix, North America, C. 1300 C.E., Hallie Iglehart Austen, The Heart of the Goddess, p.13 In the ceremony, participants linked with a thread that they weave around the circle, may sail together for a new world “across the vast sunless sea between endings and beginnings, across the Womb of magic and transformation, to the “Not-Yet” who beckons”[iv]: to the Luminous World Egg whereupon the new may be conceived and dreamed up. Samhain/Deep Autumn ceremony is an excellent place for co-creating ourselves, for imaginingthe More that we may become, and wish to become. This is where creation and co-creation happens … in the Womb of Space[v], in which we are immersed – at all times: and Samhain is a good season for feeling it. References: Livingstone, Glenys. PaGaian Cosmology: Re-inventing Earth-based Goddess Religion. NE: iUniverse, 2005 Sahtouris, Elisabet. Earthdance: Living Systems in Evolution. Lincoln NE:iUniversity Press, 2000. Starhawk, The Spiral Dance: A Rebirth of the Ancient Religion of the Great Goddess. NY: Harper and Row, 1999. Swimme, Brian. The Earth’s Imagination.DVD series 1998. NOTES: [i]p.210 [ii]a version of this Samhain script is offered in Chapter 7 PaGaian Cosmology [iii]These quoted phrases are from Robin Morgan, “The Network of the Imaginary Mother”, in Lady of the Beasts, p.84. This poem is a core inspiration of the ceremony. [iv]“Not-Yet” is a term used by Brian Swimme, The Earth’s Imagination, video 8 “The Surprise of Cosmogenesis”. [v]note that creation does not happen at the point of some god’s index finger, as imagined in the Sistine Chapel – what a takeover that is!
(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.
(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: …
(Book Excerpt) Imbolc/Early Spring within the Creative Cosmos by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

This essay is an excerpt from Chapter 6 of the author’s new book A Poiesis of the Creative Cosmos: Celebrating Her within PaGaian Sacred Ceremony. Traditionally the dates for Imbolc/Early Spring are: Southern Hemisphere – August 1st/2nd Northern Hemisphere – February 1st/2nd though the actual astronomical date varies. It is the meridian point or cross-quarter day between Winter Solstice and Spring Equinox, thus actually a little later in early August for S.H., and early February for N.H., respectively. Some Imbolc Motifs In this cosmology Imbolc/Early Spring is the quintessential celebration of She Who is the Urge to Be. This aspect of the Creative Triplicity is associated with the differentiation quality of Cosmogenesis,[i] and with the Virgin/Young One aspect of the Triple Goddess, who is ever-new, unique, and singular in Her beauty – as each being is. This Seasonal Moment celebrates an identification with the Virgin/Young One – the rest of the light part of the cycle celebrates Her processes. At this Moment She is the Promise of Life, a spiritual warrior, determined to Be. Her purity is Her singularity of purpose. Her inviolability is Her determination to be … nothing to do with unbroken hymens of the dualistic and patriarchal mind. The Virgin quality is the essential “yes” to Being – not the “no” She was turned into. In the poietic process of the Seasonal Moments of Samhain/Deep Autumn, Winter Solstice and Imbolc/Early Spring, one may get a sense of these three in a movement towards manifest form – syntropy: from the autopoietic fertile sentient space of Samhain, through the gateway and communion of Winter Solstice to differentiated being, constant novelty, infinite particularity of Imbolc/Early Spring. The three are a kaleidoscope, seamlessly connected. The ceremonial breath meditations for all three of these Seasonal Moments focus attention on the Space between the breaths – each with slightly different emphasis: it is from this manifesting Space that form/manifestation arises. If one may observe Sun’s position on the horizon as She rises, the connection of the three can be noted there also: that is, Sun at Samhain/Deep Autumn and Imbolc/Early Spring rises at the same position, halfway between Winter Solstice and Equinox, but the movement is just different in direction.[ii] And these three Seasonal Moments are not clearly distinguishable – they are “fuzzy,”[iii] not simply linear and all three are in each other … this is something recognised of Old, thus the Nine Muses, or the numinosity of any multiple of three. Some Imbolc/early Spring Story This is the Season of the new waxing light. Earth’s tilt has begun taking us in this region back towards the Sun. Traditionally this Seasonal Point has been a time of nurturing the new life that is beginning to show itself – around us in flora and fauna, and within. It is a time of committing one’s self to the new life and to inspiration – in the garden, in the soul, and in the Cosmos. We may celebrate the new young Cosmos – that time in our Cosmic story when She was only a billion years old and galaxies were forming, as well as the new that is ever coming forth. This first Seasonal transition of the light part of the cycle has been named “Imbolc” – Imbolc is thought to mean “ewe’s milk” from the word “Oimelc,” as it is the time when lambs were/are born, and milk was in plentiful supply. It is also known as “the Feast of Brigid,” Brigid being the Great Goddess of the Celtic (and likely pre-Celtic) peoples, who in Christian times was made into a saint. The Great Goddess Brigid is classically associated with early Spring since the earliest of times, but her symbology has evolved with the changing eras – sea, grain, cow. In our times we could associate Her also with the Milky Way, our own galaxy that nurtures our life – Brigid’s jurisdiction has been extended. Some sources say that Imbolc means “in the belly of the Mother.” In either case of its meaning, this celebration is in direct relation to, and an extension of, the Winter Solstice – when the Birth of all is celebrated. Imbolc may be a dwelling upon the “originating power,” and that it is in us: a celebration of each being’s particular participation in this power that permeates the Universe, and is present in the condition of every moment.[iv] This Seasonal Moment focuses on the Urge to Be, the One/Energy deeply resolute about Being. She is wilful in that way – and Self-centred. In the ancient Celtic tradition Great Goddess Brigid has been identified with the role of tending the Flame of Being, and with the Flame itself. Brigid has been described as: “… Great Moon Mother, patroness (sic … why not “matron”) of poetry and of all ‘making’ and of the arts of healing.”[v] Brigid’s name means “the Great or Sublime One,” from the root brig, “power, strength, vigor, force, efficiency, substance, essence, and meaning.”[vi] She is poet, physician/healer, smith-artisan: qualities that resonate with the virgin-mother-crone but are not chronologically or biologically bound – thus are clearly ever present Creative Dynamic. Brigid’s priestesses in Kildare tended a flame, which was extinguished by Papal edict in 1100 C.E., and was re-lit in 1998 C.E.. In the Christian era, these Early Spring/Imbolc celebrations of the Virgin quality, the New Young One – became “Candlemas,” a time for purifying the “polluted” mother – forty days after Solstice birthing. Many nuns took their vows of celibacy at this time, invoking the asexual virgin bride.[vii] This is in contrast to its original meaning, and a great example of what happened to this Earth-based tradition in the period of colonization of indigenous peoples. An Imbolc/Early Spring Ceremonial Altar The flame of being within is to be protected and nurtured: the new Being requires dedication and attention. At this early stage of its advent, there is nothing certain about its staying power and growth: there may be uncertainties of various kinds. So there is traditionally a “dedication” in the ceremonies, which may be considered a “Brigid-ine” dedication, or known as a “Bridal” dedication, since “Bride” is a derivative of …
(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 Stronghold Essay 3) The Forgotten Primordial Paradise by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang, Ph.D.

Part 3: Indelible Old Magoism Encrypted in China’s “Mago Stronghold” The Mago word “Mago Stronghold” has narrowly survived patriarchal linguistic censorships. Sometimes it is preferably or deliberately employed as a euphemism. Other times, it is replaced with random words. But it has never been completely wiped out from written and oral texts. The Mago term, constituting the very foundation of patriarchy, is indestructible. Having survived, the term “Mago Stronghold” debunks the plot intent to magna-matricide. It unearths the buried and re-members the severed. Extant Mago Strongholds in Korea and in China differ not only in number but also in implication. Just like Magoist data in general, Korea surpasses China by a large number of extant Mago Strongholds. It is a corollary that China does not have much to do with Mago words in that ancient China “entered the stage of the patriarchal society around 5,000 years ago”.[1] Magoist materials are systematically dismissed as dubious or apocryphal data, as pre-Chinese Old Magoist Korea remains uncharted in Sinocentric East Asian historiography. Readers are reminded of the meaning of Old Magoist Korea, the socio-political-religious conglomeration of the People of the Great Goddess originated from pre-Chinese times. It is by definition non-ethnocentric and pre-nationalist.[2] Magoism substantiates the derivative nature of ancient Chinese history from Old Magoist Korea. It unveils that Old Korea was there long before the establishment of the Chinese patriarchal rule. The Mago Stronghold talk debunks the fantasy of ancient China as the forerunner rule. It is unknown how many Mago Stronghold places may have existed before or survived today in present China. One I found is located in Cangzhou, Hebei Province, according to the Atlas of Heavenly Harbor Government (天津府總圖, Tianjinfuzongtu) published in 1805. The historical accuracy of this place is backed by an earlier account in the Records of the United Great Ming (Damingyitongzhi 大明一統志), a fifteenth century geography book from the Ming dynasty. Its brief record concerns the visit of Emperor Wu of the Han dynasty (206 BCE-220 CE) to Mago Stronghold, as it reads: Mago Stronghold is located in Cangzhou on the border of old Qingchi-xian (Clear Lake County). Emperor Wu of Han took an administrative tour to this place and offered rites. Thus came the place-name, Mago Stronghold.[3] The Cangzhou Mago Stronghold, noted for the second century BCE anecdote, makes its history two millennia old at the least. When Magoism is made invisible, however, the long history or the royal association of Mago Stronghold is systematically censored as non-data in official historiography of China, which is the norm for East Asian historiographies. Given that Emperor Wu (141-87 BCE) of Han is known as one of the most accomplished rulers in Chinese history, it may appear odd that he is associated with the Mago term, “Mago Stronghold.” Indeed, the account may seem to mismatch Emperor Wu of ancient China with Mago Stronghold. And Chinese scribes would not have fabricated the anecdote. It is indeed a rare case that the Mago term has survived in Chinese official documents. That said, we want to ask if the two terms, Emperor Wu of Han and Mago Stronghold, are irreconcilable per se? My answer is no. They appear to be at odds only to the modern Sinocentric mind. In fact, the above anecdote is highly evocative of the concept of Heaven (天 Tian) worshipped by ancient Chinese rulers. Emperor Wu’s visitation and officiation at Mago Stronghold, which may have been known as Heavenly Stronghold (天城 Tiancheng),[4] account for the ancient ruler’s worship of Heaven. It is of utmost importance for Chinese rulers to observe rites and customs that venerate Heaven, for it is deemed that Heaven selects rulers and endows them with the right to rule. Accordingly, ancient Chinese rulers are known to have taken the title of “the Son of Heaven 天子” and ruled with “the Mandate of Heaven 天命.” Nonetheless, the problem with the Chinese thought of Heaven lies in the fact that Heaven is equated with the supreme god (上帝, Supreme Emperor) or an impersonal quality of the divine. That Heaven is a euphemism for “Mago” was known to the populace. In various sources, Mago is referred to as “Heavenly Deity.”[5] S/HE and Magoism are sometimes equated with the impersonal term, “Heaven.” For example, Mago Lake (Maguji in Chinese) is also called Heavenly Lake (天池 Tianchi in Chinese) in oral tradition.[6] The fact that, according to the Budoji, Heavenly Mountain is known as the residence of the Hwanggung, the eldest clan community in the post-paradise world, is no accident. When its semantic tie to “Mago” is lost, “Heaven” is stripped of the Magoist implication. The surviving term, “Mago Stronghold,” however, debunks magna-matricide in the modern mind. It is inferred that Emperor Wu officiated the Magoist rite at Mago Stronghold as the Son of Heaven according to the Mandate of Heaven. The scheme of Old Magoism puts the above anecdote into a context: Emperor Wu emulated the royal tradition of ancient Magoist shaman queens, the representative of the Great Goddess who is the ultimate sovereign of the Earth, Mago Stronghold. Emperor Wu and Mago Stronghold were not at odds with each other in an earlier time of ancient Chinese history. Written together, they indicate that Magoism was acknowledged by Emperor Wu of Han. Put differently, magna-matricide was not committed or completed in the second century BCE China. Were ancient Chinese rulers including Emperor Wu of Han Magoist? This question is difficult to answer, for each ruler of ancient China may have taken an ambivalent attitude toward Magoism to a varying degree. Some may have been pseudo-Magoists. Ancient Chinese rulers, representing the establishment of Chinese monarchy, which marked the onset of patriarchal history in East Asia, are distinguished from traditional Magoist shaman queens who defended the Magoist confederal system of Old Korea. Nonetheless, they needed the Oracle of the Great Goddess to legitimize themselves as rulers. In pre-patriarchal East Asia, Old Magoist Korea was the source of power, technology, and civilization for any ruler to draw from. Evidence shows that …
(Bell Essay 8) The Magoist Whale Bell: Decoding the Cetacean Code of Korean Temple Bells by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang, Ph.D.

[Author’s Note: This and ensuing sequels are excerpts of a new development from the original essay sequels on Korean Temple Bells and Magoism that first published January 11, 2013 in this current magazine. See (Bell Essay 1) Ancient Korean Bells and Magoism by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang.] Singing Humpback Whales, wikimedia commons Whales as the Cosmic Music Maker That whales (Gorae in Korean) are foundational to the Korean temple bell remains subliminal to this day. How do we assess the cetacean code of the Korean temple bell? What is the relationship between these two seemingly unrelated objects? We are given the whale-shaped mallet of the bell to begin with. Intriguingly, two Buddhist temples are noted today for the wooden whale-carved mallet of their bells: Sudeok-sa in Yesan, South Chungcheong, and Seonam-sa in Suncheon, South Jeolla.[1] Other temple bells reportedly have the whale mallet as well, although not as much distinctly carved as the two. The Divine Bell of King Seongdeok the Great is known as such. What is the significance of the Korean temple bell that has a whale as its striker? However, the whale-shaped wooden mallet is only a visible symbol of Sillan cetacean veneration. The whale motif is not just physically present in the mallet but also signified in its name or title. Among many alternative names of the Korean temple bell are cetacean names; Janggyeong (長鯨 Eternal Whale), Gyeongjong (鯨鐘 Whale Bell), Hwagyeong (華鯨 Splendid Whale), and Geogyeong (巨鯨 Gigantic Whale). Here the character “gyeong 鯨” means a whale.[2] These whale names suggest that the bell itself is conceived as a whale. Korean temple bells are the code of Magoist cetaceanism. By the very nature of a temple bell that is to awaken all beings to put it bluntly, we can establish that the sound of a whale is elevated to the purpose of a temple bell. Or vice versa. The sound of a temple bell is identified as that of a whale. At the outset, suffice it to say that whales are admired and revered for their vocal behaviors so much so that they are represented in Sillan temple bells. The cetacean representation of the Korean temple bell comes unexpected to us. Why is the song of a whale not the song of a bird or another animal? And what does it mean that the Korean temple bell employs cetacean names? These are no small questions. Answering them requires digging into the deepest layer of what has gone under the surface about Magoist Korean whale culture. I have discussed elsewhere in detail about how Korean cetaceanism is steeped in linguistics, myths, place-names, and custom.[3] For the immensity and complexity of the topic, this essay leaves out the discussion of such salient features of whales as their pre-human origin, evolution from land to sea, sizes and trans-oceanic migratory journeys. Summarily, whales connect and bridge the human mind beyond anthropocentrism. Here we will focus on how cetacean veneration is encoded in the Korean temple bell, in particular the sound tube. Ancient Korean Magoists deemed whales as the cosmic music makers. The cetacean names of Korean temple bells redefine the bell as the acoustic instrument that conveys the music of whales. Note the plural in bells and whales. Korean temple bells are meant to be recognized as a chorus, like whales in the sea, to respond to the sonic property of all beings. In fact, the Korean temple bell is never an isolated single sound wave, to be discussed below. What is emitted from both is harmonized music. It is noted that the music of whales can travel hundreds of kilometers underwater.[4] That the song of whales travel as far as hundreds of kilometers underwater is juxtaposed with the sound of the Korean temple bells that travel far. The former is transmitted through water waves, while the latter is transmitted through air waves. Humpback Whales Whales compose music. Among cetacean species, known for their vocalizations are the blue whale, the fin whale, the humpback whale, the minke whale, and the killer whale.[5] In particular, such baleen whales as humpback whales and blue whales have been relatively well studied for their vocalizing behaviors. The range of humpback whales’ sound frequencies is known as follows: The range of frequencies that whales use are [sic] from 30 Hertz (Hz) to about 8,000 Hz, (8 kHZ). Humans can only hear part of the whales’s songs. We aren’t able to hear the lowest of the whale frequencies. Humans hear low frequency sounds starting at about 100 Hz.[6] In comparisons, the vocalizations of blue whales are known to range from 10 to 40 Hz at a fundamental frequency (the lowest frequency of a periodic waveform). It is also noted that blue whales off the coast of Sri Lanka make music of “four notes duration lasting about two minutes each, reminiscent of the well-known humpback whale songs.”[7] To be discussed below, the frequencies of the two most noted Korean temple bells range from 65 Hz to 103.02 Hz, which fall within the range of these whales’ vocalizations. A significant volume of scientific research has been harvested on the music of humpback whales. Katy and Roger Payne are, according to an article by Bill McQuay and Alison Richards, the first scientists who identified the calls of male humpback whales as songs.[8] They report that humpback whales do not merely sing but compose music. McQuay and Richards describe the song of humpback whales as follows: Surprisingly researchers have noted that at any given moment all males in a group will sing the same version of a song, even when separated over large distances, while whales in another region or hemisphere will sing a completely different song, but in unison with other whales in their area. These sounds are loud, deep and low-frequency (20Hz – 10 kHz). They can be heard many miles away and may go on for hours or even days. Individual songs can last anywhere from a few minutes up to a half hour at which point they may then be repeated again. …
(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 …