The
Earth and Feminine Spirituality
Another way we acknowledge the
importance of the land comes through the Women's Spirituality Movement. As women leave the Father’s House, we often
return to an ancient way of relating to the Earth by celebrating the old
seasonal holidays. These are times when
the energies of the cosmos rejuvenate the Earth's energy grid, and when people
participate in these rituals, they too share in the renewed energies. By honoring these seasonal gateways, we can
consciously integrate these energies, learning to age gracefully as we are
renewed and supported by the Earth and the Cosmos. Women find great comfort in connecting to the
Earth’s seasons as well as our Moon cycle, so connected as it is to our
menstrual cycles.
That is another reason for
re-connecting to the natural laws here on Earth, for our young women are being
seduced by the pharmaceutical companies into using contraceptives that disrupt
the natural internal rhythms of their menstrual cycles so their feminine
biology won’t get in the way of their very hectic, work life. But what price does the body pay, especially
when later on, these young women find they are not fertile enough to have
children without expensive medical procedures?
The Wheel of the Year
The Wheel of the Year is the cycle
of seasonal gateways which celebrate the changing relationship between the
light and the dark, markers of the year.
On December 20-22, Winter Solstice is the celebration of the rebirth of
the Light in the time of greatest darkness.
We know that the Sun is at its extreme southern declination, so in the
Northern hemisphere we experience the shortest time of daylight and the longest
night. We feel the weight of the darkness and long for the return of longer,
lighter days. (Of course, it is Summer Solstice in the Southern
hemisphere.) So we create religious
holidays to welcome the Divine Child of Light once again into the world. The planetary energies work to unite with the
physical and emotional energies of humanity, awakening the feminine energies of
love and birthing. It is a time to go
within ourselves, so we can give birth to the light within our inner
darkness. We seek to awaken passion and
curiosity and Spirit's gift of new life and love. This is the time to set the stage for the New
Year to come. While the feminine spirit
births the Light, it is the Light that grows now, and so this is the Yang or
masculine part of the cycle.
Six weeks later, we celebrate the
festival of Imbolc, also called by the Catholic Church Candlemas, or St.
Brigid's Day. It is the festival of
Quickening, the time when seeds split open, the light grows stronger and
creativity stirs in our depths.
Celebrated on February 2nd, Ground Hog’s Day, we look to predict the
return of Spring through the strength of the returning sunlight. And we look within for signs of new life and
new creativity for the coming year. We
might be called to learn a language, take up a musical instrument, start to
write, learn to cook or crochet, learn a new sport. Something within us tells us that yes! Life is
still with us. All is not dead, even if
the snow and cold have frozen everything around us.
The next gateway is Spring Equinox
(March 20-22), when life bursts out from the seemingly barren Earth, and the
chains of darkness and winter are broken for another year. There is a balance
of light and darkness, and we breathe in the knowledge that the light is
growing and the days are getting longer and warmer. The Sun has reached the equator and will
begin its travel north. It is at Spring
Equinox that we celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ as well as the
Jewish holiday of Passover. The
symbolism of death and resurrection is played out at this balance of light and
dark, life and death. Now we begin to
express the masculine energy of life as we assert our creativity more
dynamically and bring our creative talents to bear on new projects. The masculine force of Will is released in
the Spring. This force wants to have
greater external expression in our lives to balance the internal feminine
energies of Winter.
At this time, the fertility of the
Easter bunny, named for the great fertility goddess of northern Europe, Oester, captures our imaginations. There is a
story about Oester that exemplifies this balance of feminine being and
masculine doing. A bird came to her one day, and told her that she had fallen in love
with a land animal, a rabbit, and wanted to be changed into a rabbit to be with
her beloved. So Oester blessed her and
changed the bird into a rabbit, and in gratitude the rabbit laid eggs for the
goddess for the rest of her life.
The ancients knew that the great Goddess of Life grants our wishes for
life and love and happiness in Spring. And that the correct response is to
offer our respect back to her through our actions. We feel the truth of this story that
something divine is behind the gift
of life. And that respect is due this mystery.
At Spring Equinox, we move out of our winter hibernation into action.
On May 1st, we celebrate the Feast of
Beltane, when 'sweet desire weds wild delight' (Starhawk) as the colors return to nature and flowers'
perfumes intoxicate our senses. This is
when we experience, each time as if for the first time, how awesome Earth’s
beauty is, seeing and feeling the gift of life that we have been blessed with;
a time to know joy and hope and desire and passion, for these are the gifts of
life that we remember as the Round of the Year circles on. Beltane marks a time
when we celebrate the gift of life's possibilities. We have come from birth into youth and
flowering. On Beltane, we dance around
the May Pole, joining the masculine and feminine energies to create the passion
that sparks new inventions, new creativity and new life in partnership with
each other.
Now the Wheel of the Year turns to
its second half and the cycle of maturity and fulfillment open up, followed by
the slow decay and death of autumn and winter. This begins the Yin or feminine
part of the cycle. First comes the
Summer Solstice (June 20-22), the time of the longest day and the shortest
night, the marriage feast of Heaven and Earth when we feel the fullest
potentials of life. At the time, the four planes of life – spiritual, mental,
emotional and etheric – are aligned with the physical to promote greater
spiritual awareness and growth. This is
a time of spiritual opening when we can blend the feminine and masculine
energies within as well as without. All
of Nature is open to us, assisting in this new integration. This is the time when we know what our
purpose is and are fully engaged in it.
The Sun is at its most northern declination and the northern hemisphere
is bathed in light and life. It’s
‘Summertime and the living is easy’! (Of
course, in the Southern hemisphere, they are celebrating the Winter Solstice.)
This is the moment when we celebrate the power of Light. This Light brings new consciousness, new
illumination, new beauty and vision as we consummate our life. But in the very moment of this longest day
of light we know that now the cycle is turning and imperceptibly the darkness
begins to grow and the light lessen.
On August 1st comes the Festival of
Lammas, or Lughnasadh, which marks the ending of summer and the coming of
autumn. Now we begin to notice that the
days are shorter, giving way to cooler days and longer nights. This festival highlights the fading power of
the Sun as well as a celebration of the first fruits of the year’s
harvest. It is the time of year when the
abundance of the harvest is apparent and we begin to see the first fulfillment
of our creativity and hard work. It is a
time to give thanks for our lives and the good things in it. This is the time to dedicate the first
fruits of the harvest to Mother Earth, an offering that reminds us that all
things come from this Divine source. Our
masculine, doing energy begins to take the back seat as we prepare
ourselves for the Fall when the feminine being energy takes over once
again.
Next comes the Fall Equinox
(September 20-22), when once again we hang in the balance between the energies
of the light and the darkness, but a very different balance than we experience
in Spring, for we are moving out of the light and into the darkness. As we accept the decline of the light, we
also accept the gifts of the harvest. These gifts often entail healing,
balancing and greater strength of body, soul and spirit. This harvest is not only of the foods that sustain
our bodies, but the harvest of another creative year of our lives. Hopefully,
we have grown and matured through the year and have something new in our lives
to show for it. This time of harvest is
a time of celebration, but also of purification and preparation. We have to look at our values and determine
which ones center us in our lives. We
have to consider how our harvest went and what new goals we might want to
pursue in the coming year. We are
preparing for the death of the year, for without death there can be no new
life. This time of year teaches us how
to let go of what no longer serves our life.
Now life demands that we recognize that we are growing older and that we
must learn how to accept the inevitable death of our youth, of our middle age
and ultimately of our lives.
This
death is celebrated on Samhain, our Halloween night, on October 31-November
1. It is not a time of evil forces, but
rather the night when the veils between the worlds are thin, and the spirits of
the dead may once more walk among the living, so that we remember and honor
what has gone before us. This night
celebrates the opening of the gate between life and death; when in accepting
the fact of death, we allow ourselves to open to the birth that will come once
again on Winter Solstice. This is the
time to let go of our fears, our failures and our unfulfilled goals so that
they can go back into the darkness for rebirth at Winter Solstice. As we experience the withdrawal of life force
into the depths of the Earth for renewal, we learn that we too can let go of
those parts of ourselves which no longer serve us, because as Earth’s children,
we are assured of new life to come.
So
the Wheel of Life continues its round.
In celebrating these sacred times, women and men are once again
acknowledging that ancient wisdom which the Earth offers to Her children:
first, that human beings live in cyclical time as well as linear time; second,
that our human lives are regulated by the cycles of birth, growth, decay and
death that the Earth Herself is subject to, and third, that we have an
opportunity at these times to direct and influence how we use and store this
energy of life to use for our spiritual growth.
Because of our one-sided emphasis on
directed, masculine consciousness and the rejection and repression of the feminine
in all its manifestations, the problem of really internalizing the Earth as
Mother and Divinity needs to be met on many levels. At the same time as we reconnect with the
outer Earth, we must also make contact with the inner earth, or foundation, of
our being. Since our psychic life is
based on primordial images, we have to listen to those images just as we have
to listen to our bodies and to the Earth to find the wisdom to make the right
choices about our lives. Just as the
Earth was a divinity to ancient peoples, She must become a psychic reality for
us, for both our bodies and our souls need her nourishment. We need to be grounded in the reality of the
Earth’s laws to balance out the superficial reality of our modern culture. If our society is ever to connect to the
Earth in a new way, it will be through the gift of feminine consciousness.
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