February 15, 2024January 7, 2024 Mago WorkLeave a comment

(Poem) Fear of Equity by Alshaad Kara

If everything was right and fine,We would not be here to fight for our rights. But the reality is the real twistSince it is indicative of the hopeless hopesThat we Read More …

February 14, 2024February 13, 2024 Mago WorkLeave a comment

(Poem) The Gift by Arlene Bailey

(Meet Mago Contributor) Arlene Bailey

February 13, 2024January 22, 2024 Mago WorkLeave a comment

(S/HE V2 N1 Essay 7) The Ancient Korean Whale-Bell: An Encodement of Magoist Cetacean Soteriology by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

[Editor’s Note: This essay to be posted as sequels is from the second volume of the S/HE journal. See S/HE: An International Journal of Goddess Studies (Volume 2 Number 1, Read More …

February 12, 2024February 12, 2024 Mago WorkLeave a comment

Star Beings? by Sara Wright

The well-known writer LESLIE MARMON SILKO has a very interesting idea – that star beings come to earth crossing over occasionally when the membranes of parallel worlds are more permeable Read More …

February 9, 2024December 10, 2023 Carolyn BoydLeave a comment

(Book Review) Women in Greek Mythography: Pythias, Melissae and Titanides by Max Dashu, Reviewed by Carolyn Lee Boyd

Demeter and Persephone, Hera, Athena, Medusa, Artemis, and their Roman counterparts are often the first, sometimes only, goddesses modern women experience, and they have profoundly influenced our 21st century attitudes Read More …

February 8, 2024January 17, 2024 Mago WorkLeave a comment

(Music 3) Into the Bear Cave by Alison Newvine

A chorus of animal, ancestor and wind voices surround us in the deep sleep of hibernation. From the deep sleep, worlds open up. The bear becomes so much more than Read More …

February 7, 2024January 22, 2024 Mago WorkLeave a comment

(Quilt Art) Kivutar, Pain Maiden by Kaarina Kailo

Life is not all bliss and beauty, but there is a great deal of pain and suffering. The Finnish Goddesses are associated with both healing and the creation of ills Read More …

February 6, 2024January 20, 2024 Mago WorkLeave a comment

(Tribute) Lucia Chiavola Birnbaum by Mary Saracino

On January 7, 2024, Lucia Chiavola Birnbaum, left this Earthly plane, and joined the Ancestors. She had turned 100 just four days before. Her passing is a loss to the Read More …

February 5, 2024December 15, 2023 RTMeditorsKGLeave a comment

Lammas/Late Summer within the Creative Cosmos by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

This essay is an edited excerpt from Chapter 10 of the author’s new book A Poiesis of the Creative Cosmos: Celebrating Her within PaGaian Sacred Ceremony. Southern Hemisphere – Feb. 1st/2nd, Read More …

February 2, 2024January 31, 2024 Mago WorkLeave a comment

(Poem) The language of the serpent by Susan Hawthorne

There’s a serpent in my headgrowing wings. How can I learn the grammarof the serpent? The pronouns, the particles, thecoiling syntax. The language of the imaginaryreading out from the centreof Read More …

February 1, 2024February 1, 2024 Mago WorkLeave a comment

(Essay I and II) Precession of the Umbilical Cords – Brigid and Medusa Entwined by Claire Dorey

Part I When you died you stood at the foot of my bed and suggested I, “Work with the light.” At this point I want to stop this story to Read More …

January 31, 2024January 22, 2024 Mago WorkLeave a comment

Bona Dea: Goddess of Feminism? by Luna Anna

Bona Dea ‘Good Goddess’ was a Goddess of Ancient Rome. She presides over nature, the earth, and fertility, but also virginity and chastity. In Roman times purity and vitality were Read More …

January 30, 2024January 22, 2024 Mago WorkLeave a comment

(S/HE V2 N1 Essay 6) The Ancient Korean Whale-Bell: An Encodement of Magoist Cetacean Soteriology by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

[Editor’s Note: This essay to be posted as sequels is from the second volume of the S/HE journal. See S/HE: An International Journal of Goddess Studies (Volume 2 Number 1, Read More …

(Call for contributions) Warmly welcoming seasonal contributions!

We welcome seasonal contributions, for seasons, feast days and Goddesses we know about, and for ones we don’t. If you have a seasonal offering, whether essay, poetry, video, music or some other genre, we would love to receive it. We will gladly discuss any potential offerings from new and previous contributors. Please send it to us two months beforehand if possible, so we can consider it and schedule it at the right time. Otherwise, we might not be able to include it until next year. Read Basic Submission Guidelines.
(Book Excerpt 3) On the Wings of Isis: Reclaiming the Sovereignty of Auset, ed. by Trista Hendren et al.

Agency in the Face of Adversity Olivia Church Aset is a Goddess (a Netjeret in ancient Egyptian)with an extraordinary history, reaching back to at least the 5th Dynasty of Egypt’s Old Kingdom over 4400 years ago, so far as written words can tell.25 Aset wove her magic through ancient Egyptian culture for millennia, before the Greeks and Romans came to adopt her into their own religious systems, naming her “Isis”. The image we have of her today is highly influenced by this Graeco-Roman form, which is in part because this period of time (332 BCE – 395 CE) was when her cults were at their most widespread both within and beyond Egypt. On the other hand, however, such reinterpretations have perpetuated a Mediterranean portrait of Aset, following the antiquarian trend of claiming Egyptian heritage for Eurocentric narratives of history. It is therefore essential that we collectively reclaim Aset’s North African Egyptian origins in order to restore both her sovereignty as a Goddess and the sovereignty of North African cultural heritage. For this reason, I will refer to her as Aset for the remainder of this article, rather than Isis. Aset is a Goddess who has endured through literally thousands of years’ worth of cultural exchanges. She has survived beyond the closure of her ancient temples and proves to be one of the most beloved Goddesses revived from the ancient world today. Aset’s popularity stems not only from her magical allure, exotic beauty, or shining regalia. She remains popular today due to her ability to empathise with the human condition, as well as her indominable sense of autonomy and personal agency. According to her ancient mythology, Aset was not a Goddess who surrendered to the great woes thrown her way: To modern readers at least, it is clear that Aset takes control of her situation and demonstrates how to handle challenges like a queen! It is often said that knowledge is power, and this is certainly true according to ancient Egyptian religion and mythology. Aset was destined to become the divine queen of Egypt through her marriage to the God Wesir (known to the Greeks as Osiris), which conferred upon her significant authority and power;26 however, though a modern feminist reading one could suggest that Aset was not content to possess power which was reliant upon her marriage to a king. Instead she sought sovereignty in her own right by becoming skilled in magic and rich in wisdom. As a result, according to the Coffin Texts, Aset became renowned as a Goddess who knew everything “in the sky and on the earth.”27 The one thing that she did not know, however, was the true name of the Creator God Ra, a fact of which she was considerably aware. The myth of Ra’s Secret Name describes how the God kept his true name hidden from all other creations in existence, to prevent any from causing him harm.28 The Egyptians believed that written and spoken words held great power and could be used to manipulate things in real life; this extended to someone’s name, their ren, which was considered a living part of them, as much as their physical or spiritual bodies.29 This meant that the possessor of Ra’s true name would have the power to manipulate the Creator God himself, for good or for ill. Without possession of his true name, no creature could harm him, except from himself. Aset’s intentions were not to cause the Creator harm, but to acquire his name, and the power it provided. A spell recorded in the Turin Magical Papyrus tells us how Aset, intent on obtaining this secret name, concocted a plan to trick Ra into revealing it willingly to her.30 Her plan was thus: To covertly collect some of Ra’s spittle as he slept and magically form a serpent with it. The serpent would then bite Ra necessitating that Aset come to his aid offering to heal him. In turn, she would cry out, if only she knew the name of the being which had harmed him! Inevitably Aset’s plan succeeded. Ra screamed in agonising pain following the serpent’s bite, whereupon the Goddess ran to his side offering to help him. Ra provided numerous alternative epithets to no avail. It became clear to him that he had no other option but to concede to Aset’s request.31 The tale ends with Aset learning his secret name, obtaining its power, and restoring Ra to health. Hereafter, she is known by the title, ‘weret hekau’ or ‘Great of Magic’.32 This myth demonstrates how, from the very beginning, Aset sought power for herself through the pursuit of knowledge. She fixed her attention upon her goal and set to achieve it by any means necessary. Her prioritisation of knowledge, above other forms of power, would prove to be invaluable to her throughout the rest of her mythology. She chose to empower herself, not only by her regal title, but in her embodied choices. The story of Aset and Wesir is a famous one, which cannot be explored in full detail here; however, a summary of key moments serve to provide a portrait of Aset’s sense of agency. The first section of stories belonging to this mythic cycle survive through the combination of the Egyptian Stela of Amenmose and the retellings of the Greek authors, Plutarch and Diodorus Siculus.33 The myth unfolds with Aset and Wesir ruling as successful divine monarchs over Egypt. Their brother Sutekh (Greek Seth), God of the desert and thunderstorms,34 was jealous of Wesir’s good fortune, and from the Middle Kingdom onwards, Egyptian sources assert that Sutekh was responsible for the death of Wesir.35 The most common method recorded is that Sutekh tricked Wesir into entering a coffin whereupon he sealed the lid and cast him into the Nile to drown.36 Aset was stricken with grief. She had just lost her beloved in a devastating act of violence at the hands of her own family. The story goes on to describe how Aset fled in search for …
(Commemorating Mary Daly 5) My Memoirs of Mary Daly (1928-2010) by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

[Author’s Note: My personal encounter with Mary Daly, a U.S. post-Christian feminist thinker, goes back to 1994, if not earlier. I stayed in Korea from 1994-1997 during which I translated two of Mary Daly’s early books, Beyond God the Father: Toward a Philosophy of Women’s Liberation 하나님 아버지를 넘어서 (Seoul: Ewha Women’s University Press, 1996) and Church and the Second Sex 교회와 제 2의 성 (Seoul: Women’s News Press, 1997) in Korean. I carried with me to the U.S.A. our correspondences in the form of letters and documents mostly faxed to each other for the period of more than two decades. Later at one point I digitized them in images. Through these memoir series, I share some highlights of my memories with Mary Daly, her influence on my feminist thinking, and my own radical feminist journey to Magoist Cetaceanism.] I am back-tracking her letters earlier than the one (September 23, 1996) that I previously shared (see Part 4). Below is Mary’s FAXed letter on September 10, 1996. In the first paragraph, she says that she was sending along the German contract that she used for her book, Outercourse, to give me an idea about the contract that I or the publisher (Ewha Women’s University Press) would be using. However, she did not know that I had already mailed my own contract to her. Apparently, she did not receive it yet. The following day, September 11, Mary FAXed me her brief letter acknowledging not only that she received it but also that she had sent her German contract without knowing, which I shared at the end. This indicates that Mary and I exchanged accurate and comprehensive communications. The next paragraph of her letter is a response to my questions concerning my translation of Beyond God the Father (BGTF). I had asked her about two terms, Redstockings and entelechy. As I reread this letter shown below, I re-realize the depth of our connections. We both knew making money was no primary concern for my translation projects. And she says: I don’t think it would be realistic to be too concerned about making money in this case. The point would be to get the word out in Korea. For me, there were other reasons why I chose to translate her books. Getting the word out to Korean women was one reason. I wanted to introduce Mary Daly’s Radical Feminist Thought to Korean feminists. Because I did not have any direct contact with Korean feminists at that time in particular, however, I had no idea who would read and cherish them. Then, what are other reasons for my translation of her books? I did it for myself, for Korean feminists, and for Mary. This tripartite purpose was, like the three legs of a tripod, equally important for me. I wanted to learn more about her feminist thoughts and the English language. I learned the written English language by reading and translating Mary Daly’s books. However it would have been, I trusted that my translation of her books would help her. Our friendship thereafter throughout the years proved so. I wasn’t aware at this point, however, what Mary had gone through in terms of “accusations of racism and scapegoating of Feminists” in the late 1970s and the 1980s [See Gina Messina, “Mary Daly’s Letter to Audre Lorde” in Feminism and Religion (October 5, 2011). https://feminismandreligion.com/2011/10/05/mary-dalys-letter-to-audre-lorde/.] that she mentioned in this letter. She writes: About the horrors of white western society, I agree completely. Within this context, not only racism itself but accusations of racism and scapegoating of Feminists have been used to kill the Feminist movement. Old stuff–divide and conquer! And the women do it to each other. The fact that I was neither a white woman nor a black woman shielded me from the whirl of the racial division in the U.S. and the world as a whole even about 2 decades later. Mary was definitely triggered in her wounds by my arrival to her world. Respectfully, she took my arrival positively and did not drag me into the abyss of feminist patriarchal-behaviors. On a few occasions, I broached up the topic of “Third World Feminism” in our conversations in the forthcoming years. On a couple of phone conversations, Mary reacted so bitterly and strongly that her acute pain flew and landed on my heart (in the late 1990s and the early 2000s). Nonetheless, I kept my neutral position on this topic throughout the years. It was neither my immediate concern nor my direct experience. I came to Mary Daly not because I shared some immediate similarities with her or her friends. I was a Korean native and did not share U.S. identity. She had an understanding that I had a cross-cultural experience of living, studying and working in Korea, the U.S. and the Philippines, which was central in my formation of a (feminist) personhood. Mary emphasized me, when it comes to “the experience of isolation.” My experience was a different one but we both knew what that was like. The more I got to know her on a personal level, the more clearly I sensed the degree of her experience of being isolated. It came from her Western culture and upbringing in my humble opinion. What disillusioned me was not just Christianity, my religion from age 18 to 32, but also white western culture. Mary phrased it as “the horrors of white western society,” but what I meant is white western culture per se. I was so tired of dualism grounded in the very thinking of people in the West. I must have asked Mary that I was seeking a graduate school in the U.S. for me to study post-Christian feminism. At this time, my plan to enroll in a graduate school in Los Angeles, California, proved to be a failure due to the school’s misguidance of my process. So I confided in Mary about my need of finding a school in which I could study radical feminist theology and ultimately East Asian/Korean religions. Mary was mentioning …
(Candlemas essay) Groundhog Medicine by Hearth Moon Rising

Outside the deep recesses of my trance, the voice summoned the animal to me. This was an important day. Though a novice in the Craft, I knew power animals were fundamental to any shamanic tradition. Like a princess dreaming of her prince, I had often wondered what my animal would be. A jaguar or a cougar? I loved cats. A raven or an owl? I courted wisdom and prophesy. A horse or a hawk? I was willing to take risks. What about a bear or an eagle? Majesty, power, yeah! “Your spirit animal is here now,” the voice intoned. “Look to your left. Look!” My mind cleared and in the space ahead I saw….
(Prose) The Story of Changing Woman: Myth and Commentary by Sara Wright

Sand Painting, Wikimedia Commons I want to begin by recounting the story of how Changing Woman came to be and why she was so important to Navajo mythology. In these dark and tumultuous times I think Changing Woman’s story has a deep resonance for all of humanity. We seem to have forgotten who we are and are in desperate need of guidance that will help shift the present paradigm. The Navajo word Diné means the People (every Indigenous group defines its inhabitants by using the same word in their own language). Navajo mythology begins with the creation of the First World. The Insect People moved through the four lower worlds to the fifth world the place where the Navajo live today. In the first world there was no sun, moon or stars, only the oceans stretched out in 4 directions. A flood came and the Insect people moved to higher ground, the second world. The third world was inhabited by grasshoppers so the Insect people moved again, this time to a fourth world with snow covered mountains and Pueblo people. In the Fourth World the Holy People laid two ears of white corn and two ears of yellow corn on the ground and covered them with buckskin creating First Man and First Woman. Frightened by a flash flood, First Man and First Woman rose up from below from the center of a lake to reach the Fifth World and the place where the Four Sacred Mountains are found today. (One of these sacred mountains may lie to the west of the village of Abiquiu, New Mexico where I presently live. It is said that Changing Woman was found on a flat – topped mesa wrapped in many colors of light. Anyone who has been to the Pedernal can find pieces of rock called chert/flint cast in every color of the rainbow). On a level place below the summit First Man and First Woman laid a turquoise figure on two pieces of buckskin that were spread on the stone from east to west in the sun. Wind and Water Sprinkler were there. When the Holy People began to sing the song the wind flowed under the blankets and a child appeared. The Holy People told the couple her name was Changing Woman and instructed them to take her and raise her as their daughter. By the thirteenth day, Changing Woman had become a young woman, and on that day there was a celebration and the Navajo Night Chant was sung. * Soon after Changing Woman birthed the hero twins. In four days the twins had grown into boys. Talking God and Water Sprinkler tested their strength four times and were pleased. The twins asked Changing Woman who their father was and when they were told they had no father the twins refused to believe her. “We must have a father and we need to know who he is” they responded. Changing Woman was irritated and said “your father is a round cactus then. Be still.” (!) The twins went south to hunt and saw four birds – a woodpecker, vulture, raven and magpie – and when Changing Woman heard their stories she said they must flee because the birds carried a warning: monsters would kill them. Before dawn the twins ran to the West and met an old woman who lived in an underground chamber who told them that she could help them find their father who was the Sun. Because the way was fraught with danger Spider Grandmother gave them a talisman to protect them and a special song that ended in “Walk in Beauty.” The twins continued West on the rainbow bridge overcoming four monsters that threatened to kill them. Eventually they reached the House of the Sun where they overcame two more tests to prove to the Sun that they were his children. Then they told their father that monsters were killing the People and their father replied that could make the passage from boyhood to manhood and save the Navajo people in the process, which they did. After a time, Changing Woman became lonely and went to one of the sacred mountains to sit in the sun. The Sun appeared and tried to embrace her but she refused. He wanted her to come live with him. She said no until the Sun promised to give her a house that shimmered on the water and animals and plants for company while the Sun was away on his daily journey across the sky. Then Changing Woman said: “You are male and I am female. You are of the sky and I am of the earth. You are constant in your brightness, but I must change with the seasons. Remember that I willingly let you enter me and I gave birth to your sons. As different as we are, we are of one spirit. As dissimilar as we are, you and I, we are of equal worth. As different as we are, there must be solidarity between us. There can be no harmony in the universe unless there is harmony between us. If there is to be harmony, my request must matter to you. There is to be no more coming from me to you than there is from you to me.” The Sun balked at first but finally agreed that she was right and granted her requests for a House in the West that shimmered in the golden light that stretched over the waters at sunset when the Sun returned from his journey across the sky. In this place they came to dwell in Harmony… In the myth Changing Woman never dies; she grows old and young again with the seasons. In the East she is Earth Woman, in the South Mountain Woman, in the West she is Water Woman and in the North she is Corn Woman. Changing Woman embodies Nature’s seasons and cycles as a whole and since the Navajo trace their lineage through a matrilineal …
(Poem) the rain falls, i hear songs by Maya Daniel

the forest breathes the fog trees turn into misty shadows of fractured tales, here– we raised our banners woven our common dreams and vows of courage and sacrifice. beyond this cluster of trees naked mountains and fields are turned up by peasants calloused hands like gardens keeping the seeds of hopes to grow in their season. the rain falls i hear songs, freedom songs clear and high– a gathering of wind is coming my spirit learns to dance with the trees the forest is pregnant with more victories. (Meet Mago Contributor) Maya Daniel
Nané Jordan

Read all posts by Nané Jordan. I am a scholar, artist, and mother with a working background in midwifery and birth care. I have a life-long concern for women’s empowerment, in particular during pregnancy, birth, early mothering and beyond. I am inspired to re-weave human/ecology interconnections by awakening my own and others’ sense of the sacred. I have long associated with ecofeminist philosophies, and experience a devotional interconnection with the Earth as Mother. I am passionate about freeing creative expression through the arts and co-creating ritual practices. My doctoral studies were in the field of Education at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada. I completed a Master’s degree in Women’s Spirituality at New College of California in San Francisco. Going back and forth from Vancouver to California over a period of years was an ongoing ‘pilgrimage’ for me, into studies of the divine feminine, and S/he of so many names and places. These travels, as well as attending scholarly conferences, fed wonderful connections with women’s spirituality and goddess studies folk in the Bay area and beyond, and opened and confirmed my own Goddess and earth-based spiritual yearnings. My scholarship explores women’s narratives, storytelling, artistic practices, and life writing in navigating life’s highways and byways. My doctoral dissertation inquired into the transformative, Goddess- and women-centred dynamics of the Women’s Spirituality MA in the lives of students and faculty. I found that this inspirited education is inseparable from the yearnings of women to live authentically and with purpose, where women can self-authorize and awaken into feminist consciousness. Women-centred spirituality and education provides a creative means to express and renew one’s whole self, while navigating the many challenges of these still patriarchal times (see: https://circle.ubc.ca/handle/2429/39810). I am a co-founder of Gestare (http://www.gestareartcollective.com/), an artists’ collective whose name means: to carry in the womb. We are committed to process-based artistic practices, Earth communion/healing, living with/in the divine feminine, and the practice of ritual arts such as labyrinth walking. I have published and collaborated on many essays and book chapters, including in journals and anthologies such as: The Journal for Research on Mothering; She is Everywhere! An Anthology of Womanist / Feminist Spirituality, Vol.3; Reconciling Art and Mothering; A Heart of Wisdom: Life Writing as Empathic Inquiry (some papers available at: https://ubc.academia.edu/NanéJordan). I live with my husband and two daughters in Vancouver, Canada—where nurturing my family life is a great source of meaning, adventure, and love.
(Art Essay 2) The Essence of Round by Lena Bartula

To continue further, the following examples show up in my huipils, as faces, bottle caps, textiles, and neck openings. We’re all longing for something to quench our thirst or hunger. What is it you thirst for and how do you go about finding it? Chicomecoatl, Corn Mother, with corn husks, iron, mazorcas. Ceremonia de Té, tea packets and tea bags, 2016 Circles and round things show up in my photographs of places and things: Hats on a wall at Sergio Castro’s Museo, San Cristobal de Las Casas Circles and stars or butterflies adorn the front door of the church in Chamula, Chiapas. Cans of spray paint on the sidewalk during the Fesitval de Arte Urbano, San Miguel de Allende. Life Cycle of Corn in a shrine by Maria Godoy. Exhibition “Milpa” at Museo de los Artes Populares, Coyoacan, Mx. “Wherever you go for the rest of your life, you’re always in the middle of the universe and the circle is always around you. Everyone who walks up to you has entered that sacred space, and it’s not an accident. Whatever comes into the space is there to teach you.” ― Pema Chödrön, The Wisdom of No Escape: How to Love Yourself and Your World (End of the art essay) https://www.magoism.net/2017/08/meet-mago-contributor-lena-bartula/
(Essay 3) Crack in the Alienated Colonised Mind by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

This essay is part 3 of an edited excerpt from the author’s Introduction to her book PaGaian Cosmology: Re-inventing Earth-based Goddess Religion. The book is based on her doctoral thesis 2002, which this essay is referring to. My method of approach has been informed by my deep personal involvement in the topic, my need to “place” myself here; as feminist philosopher Luce Irigaray suggests that woman needs to do[i], given the patriarchal context that has mis-placed her, or not considered her a place at all. Irigaray said that woman is not situated, “does not situate herself in her place”, that she serves as a thing and is thus nude[ii]. I have intuitively felt the need to “clothe” myself, to find the Place within me, to move from object to sentient subject. It has been a hunger which grew into a holy desire, a passion. The early intuitive sense of this need was fanned by feminist philosophers, primarily Mary Daly[iii], who awakened me particularly to the language that I and others spoke everyday – and how the world was thus shaped: how my very own sacred Land, my bodily presence in the world was alienated from my consciousness by everyday expression and imagery. An ostensibly small but profoundly ubiquitous example is the use of the female pronoun she to designate only females, while the male pronoun he designates all humans as well as males: that is, the scope of maleness includes humanity, while femaleness is restricted to “the Other”. That has generally been overwhelmingly so even in reference to the other-than-human: that is, the pronoun “he” is also used to designate all creatures unless it is known to be female or its femaleness specifically relevant. As Mary Daly states in Gyn/Ecology: Any speaker internalizing such a language unconsciously internalizes the values underlying such a system, thus perpetuating the cultural and social assumptions … [iv] I have not been satisfied to accept this state of affairs, and as Daly indicated, “… the emerging creativity in women is by no means a merely cerebral process”[v]. Thus my quest, and method of approach to this work has involved my whole being, my whole story. And the situation of the female pronoun turned out to become of central – essential – significance in the place-ment of myself, and the authoring of a gynocentric cosmology[vi]. I have been on a ‘quest for the Mother’ – She within me and within Whom I am: this is how I have understood the complete transformation that I sought, such a complete coming home to an indigenous Self, a Place which was as surely within me as it was my actual Earthly and Cosmic habitat – I could not separate these realms of myself. In approaching this search/research – this Search – then, I have been bold in my assumption of deep participation in the Matter of the world, the Matrix. I can identify this “Matter/Matrix” with Merleau-Ponty’s “Flesh”, which has been described as an elemental power that has had no name in the entire history of Western philosophy … (and) the mysterious tissue … that underlies and gives rise to both the perceiver and the perceived …(and) the reciprocal presence of the sentient in the sensible and of the sensible in the sentient[vii]. Such a subjective quest would once have found no carriage in formal academic process, but fortunately for me, by time I came to engaging with the academic and scientific “pursuit of the Mother” things had changed sufficiently at the edges, for me to proceed boldly with “laying claim to the power of Naming”[viii] the sacred sites of my female land – my bodymind, and inhabiting my Place/Self, by means of acceptable academic methods as well. Conventionally, scientifically acceptable discourse has disregarded all subjectivity: that is, reality was in the domain of hard quantifiable matter only; while many spiritual discourses – both conventional and “new age” – have only valued subjectivity, that is, they have said that matter is not of consequence and is to be transcended. So both genres of discourse have perpetuated a notion of this “Flesh”, this Matter, this Subject in Whom we are, as purely passive, without sentience, and available for exploitation. Neither of these viewpoints have challenged the notion that our Habitat – our materia – is inert dead stuff … “just a big dead ball of dirt” as Brian Swimme describes the modern human’s conception of Earth[ix]. Neither viewpoint challenges the notion that it is possible to separate the one who is sensing from what is being sensed: as ecological philosopher David Abram says, “… contemporary discourse easily avoids the possibility that both the perceiving being and the perceived being are of the same stuff, … [x]”. Neither the conventionally scientific nor the conventionally spiritual/religious viewpoint generally supports a sense of our context being essentially relational or a sacred whole – a mutual presence, that we are subjects within a Subject[xi], a sentient Universe. I therefore describe my engagement in my Search, my approach and the writing itself as a “con-course” instead of “dis-course”[xii]. I have been conscious of my relationship with my ‘topic’ – Her intimate involvement and reciprocal presence. The method, the work, has been a process of en-trance-ment and inter-action. It has been a process of changing of mind, not just talking about it or to it. My method has been organic and intuitive. I have allowed myself to be led by inner promptings, below my conscious rational understandings, which I then organised my conscious self around in various modalities; and the universe has come to meet me in these actions as well. Such methods of approach have been named in recent times as “transpersonal” research methods[xiii]. Such methods are defined as allowing identification with an expanded sense of self, a reciprocity, a participative relationship with the perceived. They incorporate intuition, direct knowing, creative expression, alternative states of consciousness, dreamwork, storytelling, meditation, imagery, emotional and bodily cues and other internal events as possible strategies and procedures in …

(Special Post 7) Why Goddess Feminism, Activism, and Spirituality?

[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. Special thanks to Trista Hendren, founder and author of The Girl God, who passionately and painstakingly promotes the message of each contributor via Facebook’s memes. Without Trista’s devotion to the advocacy, this collective effort would not have continued. 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.] Kaalii Cargill: Life emerges from the Feminine: Woman, Nature, Goddess. When we value the life-giving power of the Feminine we are less likely to kill other human beings who have been held in a mother’s arms.
(Special Post Mother Teresa 2) A Role Model for Women? by Mago Circle Members

[Editorial Note: The following is an edited version of the discussion that took place spontaneously on Mago Circle from March 1, 2013 for about two weeks. It was an extensive, heated, yet reflective discussion, now broken into four parts to fit the format of the blog. We thank each and all of the participants for your openness, generosity, and courage to stand up for what you believe and think! Some are marked as anonymous. As someone stated, something may have been “written in the heat of the moment” and some might like to change it at a later time. So we inform our readers that nothing is written in stone. As a matter of fact, the discussion is ongoing, now with Magoism Blog readers. Please comment and respond as you wish.] Part II: We Disagree! Stand up for what you believe but be open-minded! Naa Ayele Kumari: I am going to step away from the common responses and say this… Binary is only no in betweens if you choose sides and can’t see the whole. I have been a part of black consciousness movements and women’s movements and both have the capacity for progress as well as extreme viewpoints. Both have the capacity to become so hypercritical that the movement itself transcends common human compassion and understanding. Mother Teresa was a human being with flaws and goodness. She had a public image and private fears and insecurities.. l like all of us. She lived her life the best way she knew how.. Like all of us. She made mistakes.. misjudgments.. Like all of us. But she also DID help and inspire others to help too. It is this dualistic thinking that forces people to feel like they have to assign the label of good or bad and no in between. None of us are all good or all bad.. so it seems to me that to label her has an evil traitor who let people die is no better than labeling her an Angel of god who did no wrong. She was a woman who lived her life and managed to come to worldwide fame and inspire others to love at a time and in an institution that was highly patriarchal and women were not raised up at all. Mother Goddesses in Africa were known for great nurturing and care symbolized by carrying a baby and also carried a machete on the other side for justice. This was the fine balance of wholeness…she was the gentle rain and the storm.. This was binary, but not one or the other but both.. Opposite ends of the same pole. [H]: I’m having a powerful visceral effect from this conversation. I feel as if I’m going to vomit violently. Mother Teresa comes to me in dreams and meditations. Makes me wonder what kind of person I’m seen as if I attract her energy. I have always felt so much love for her. Naa Ayele Kumari: If she comes in your dreams and it has been healing for you… Allow it/ her to continue to be healing for you. Its all about love and anything that is not love… Leave it be.. Vomiting is rejecting something that doesn’t belong with you. Embrace love my sister. Antonia McGuire: I think we may all agree that all belief systems initially began to promote a sense of goodness or fairness to some degree, but over time they are corrupted and produce both advantages and disadvantages. Donna Snyder: Yes, Gandhi, too. Back in the 90’s when I was in a band/performance art troupe called Central Nervous System, I shocked all the guys in the band coming out with an improv in response to a melody played on a banjo tuned like a sitar, called exactly that-Yes, Gandhi. Now make no mistake, he is one of my heroes, devoid of the falsified sentimentality that clings to MT. Gandhi’s work was for the world, for the masses, not for the appropriately humbled. Yet I spoke out about his sexual practices, his use of female bodies. Telling the truth about a hero requires courage. Retreating into a blind defense of a myth is a form of ethical cowardice. Anne Wilkerson Allen: Strangely I had a discussion with someone about the “hero’s journey” moving from metaphorical to physical being part of the problem…..when the “demons” are human instead of our own flaws, there seems to be a tendency to point the finger (and gun barrel) elsewhere. [B]: Fascinating & thought-provoking conversation, all. I think the biggest stumbling block I have with MT is how her acceptance of the dogma of the Catholic church blinded her to seeing and then being moved by the suffering of others enough to do something to alleviate & not vicariously celebrate it. No wonder she “suffered a lack of connection with the Divine”. This crisis with her spirituality seems to have been divorced from her and others’ body wisdom. Self-abnegation (perhaps not the same as “sacrifice”) ultimately backfires because some small part of us insists, “I am worthy!” To which I say, “We are all worthy!” [H]: I do not see or feel that she vicariously celebrated the suffering of others. I feel that she devoted her life to deeply loving and serving the poorest of the poor. I have not been to Calcutta and I have also seen some unimaginable poverty in India that is not like anything that I’ve been exposed to before. I truly believe that she had a very deep way of working with suffering that is not necessarily visible to those more accustomed to modern medical intervention and the resources available for such. I have participated in a very small amount of poverty medicine and the resources that we take for granted are just not readily available to MANY. I learned very powerfully from my experience how blessed and fortunate and often very careless we really are with our precious resources. This discussion has been a learning experience for me. I am trying to not take the critical comments […]
(Special Post 2) "The Oldest Cilivization" and its Agendas by Mago Circle Members

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

(Mago Almanac Excerpt 5) Introducing the Magoist Calendar by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

Mago Almanac: 13 Month 28 Day Calendar (Book A) Free PDF available at Mago Bookstore. THE 28-13-7 INTERPLAY How does the number, 28 (days), for the lunar cycle come about? Why is it 28 days and not 29 or 30, the latter implicated in the traditional lunar calendar of East Asia? It appears that 28 days is a value closer to the moon’s sidereal period (about 27.3 days) than the synodic period (about 29.5 days). Or is it that 28 days points to the median between the synodic lunar cycle and the sidereal lunar cycle? To answer these questions, it is important to note that a value in the Mago Time captures an inter-cosmic biological cusp/juncture derived from the matrix of sonic numerology. Distinguished from the patriarchal measure of time fixated into a solipsistic space, it makes visible the interconnectedness of all bodies. It never stands as an isolated single occasion. The 28 day, 13 month calendar has to do with how we perceive the moon. There are two ways of understanding the lunar cycle; the sidereal period and the synodic period (see Figure 2). The synodic period refers to the time, about 29.5 days, that we on earth see the moon complete one round of revolution, e.g. from the full moon to the full moon. In contrast, the sidereal period refers to the actual time, about 27.3 days, that the moon takes to complete one round of revolution. While the synodic time is measured relative to the Earth (the observer’s position is on earth), the sidereal time is measured relative to the distant “fixed” stars (the observer’s position is far out at the distant stars). Since the distant stars are considered at rest, the sidereal period is taken as a universal value, not affected by the location of the viewer, we on earth. There is, apparently, a discrepancy between the lunar cycle that we on earth see the moon return to the same phase and the lunar cycle that the moon actually completes a revolution. The former is based on our observation of the moon’s phases, whereas the latter is based on the moon’s actual orbital motions. The two differs basically because all celestial bodies, the moon, earth, and sun, in the solar system are in motion. It is not just the moon that we watch revolving but Earth also revolves around the sun. We are watching the movement of the moon on a moving vehicle, earth, so to speak. Therefore, the moon has to travel about 2 more days in order for us on earth to see it in the same phase (see the green portion in Figure 2 part). At the position A of the moon in Figure 2, the moon is in line with the sun and the distant stars, which is a new moon. In the position of B (the new moon), the moon is in line with the sun but not with the distant stars. The right hand line of the green portion in line with the distant stars is where the moon started as a new moon. The moon has traveled about 2 more days to be in line with the sun. That is why the synodic period is about 2 days longer than the sidereal period. When it comes to “the lunar calendar”, moderns tend to think of it as the waxing and waning phases of the moon (29.5 days, the synodic period). The problem lies in that, following the synodic period, people see nothing beyond the moon’s phases. They overlook the fact that the moon rotates and revolves on its own axis and around the earth approximately 13 degrees every day. The synodic lunisolar calendar is a navel-gazing vision. Attending to the moon’s phases may seem benign. However, that is a planned pitfall; the synodic lunisolar calendar with 12 months in a year is here to supersede the 28 day, 13 month gynocentric calendar. Its irregularity with the number of days in a month (29 or 30 days with about 11 extra days for intercalation) is an inherently critical flaw. Its inaccuracy when incorporated within the solar annual calendar (approximately 365.25 days) stands out. Seen below in the table, the synodic lunar track results in as many leap days as a total of 44 days for 4 years, whereas the sidereal lunar track has 2 days for 4 years. The synodic lunisolar calendar undercuts the moon’s given capacity – guiding earthly beings into the intergalactic voyage of WE/HERE/NOW. In it, both the moon and women are, glorified and objectified by the viewer, cast under the male voyeuristic eye. On the contrary, the sidereal lunisolar calendar, based on the cyclic synchrony between the moon and women, offers the lens to the interconnectedness of all bodies in the universe. Synodic Lunar Track (Patriarchal) Sidereal Lunar Track (Magoist) Focus Moon’s phases Moon’s motions Days of month 29 or 30 (irregular) 28 (regular) No. of months in a year 12 13 Women’s menstrual cycle Assumed sync Synced Luni-centric Astolonomy Unknown 28 Constellations Intercalations 11 days annually, a total of 44 days for 4 years 1 day annually & 1 day every 4 years, a total of 2 days for 4 years Sources prove that the sidereal lunation is, albeit esoterically, known across cultures to this day. Through the comparative study of ancient cultures of Babylon, Arabia, India and China, W. B. Yeats (1865-1939) observes the substantive difference in dynamic between the two lunation tracks, the synodic and the sidereal. He notes that the moon’s orbital motion, apart from the sun’s, charts out the celestial sphere as the 28 Mansions. I have learned that the 28 Mansions or 28 Constellations of the Moon is a popular form of the 28 day and 13 month Magoist calendar, widely circulated among East Asians especially Koreans from the ancient time. Yeats’ following insights corroborate the Budoji’s explication of the Magoist Calendar in general and the faulty nature of the patriarchal (ancient Chinese) calendar in …
(Prose & Photography) Equinox Reflection by Sara Wright

Photography by Sara Wright I gaze out my bedroom window and hear yet another golden apple hit the ground. The vines that hug the cabin and climb up the screens are heavy with unripe grapes and the light that is filtered through the trees in front of the brook is luminous – lime green tipped in gold – My too sensitive eyes are blessedly well protected by this canopy of late summer leaves. The maples on the hill are losing chlorophyll and are painting the hollow with splashes of bittersweet orange and red. The dead spruces by the brook will probably collapse this winter providing Black bears with even more precious ants and larvae to eat in early spring. I only hope that some bears will survive the fall slaughter to return to this black bear sanctuary; in particular two beloved young ones… Mushrooms abound, amanitas, boletes morels, puff balls, the latter two finding their way into my salads. The forest around my house is in an active state of becoming with downed limbs and sprouting fungi becoming next year’s soil. The forest floor smells so sweet that all I can imagine is laying myself down on a bed of mosses to sleep and dream. The garden looks as tired as I am; lily fronds droop, yellowing leaves betraying the season at hand. Bright green pods provide a startling contrast to fading scarlet bee balm. Wild asters are abundant and goldenrod covers the fields with a bright yellow garment. Every wild bush has sprays of berries. My crabapple trees are bowed, each twig heavy with winter fruit. Most of the birds have absconded to the fields that are ripe with the seeds of wild grasses. The mourning doves are an exception – they gather together each dawn waiting patiently for me to fill the feeder. In the evening I am serenaded by soft cooing. One chicken hawk hides in the pine, lying in wait for the unwary…Just a few hummingbirds remain…whirring wings and twittering alert me to continued presence as they settle into the cherry tree to sleep, slipping into a light torpor with these cool September nights… Spiders are spinning their egg cases, even as they prepare to die. I can still find toads hopping around the house during the warmest hours of the day. Although the grass is long I will not mow it for fear of killing these most precious and threatened of species. I am heavily invested in seeing these toads burrow in to see another spring. My little frogs sit on their lily pads seeking the warmth of a dimming afternoon sun. Soon they too will slumber below fallen leaves or mud. I am surrounded by such beauty, and so much harvest bounty that even though I am exhausted I take deep pleasure out of each passing day of this glorious month of September, the month of my birth. Unlike many folks, for me, moving into the dark of the year feels like a blessing. Another leave -taking is almost upon me, and I am having trouble letting go of this small oasis that I have tended with such care for more than thirty years… I don’t know what this winter will bring to my modest cabin whose foundation is crumbling under too much moisture and too many years of heavy snow. In the spring extensive excavation will begin. A new foundation must be poured and this work will destroy the gardens I have loved, the mossy grounds around the south end of the house that I have nurtured for so long. In this season of letting go I must find a way to lay down my fears, and release that which I am powerless to change. Somehow… I have no idea what I will return to except that I have made it clear that none of my beloved trees be harmed. I am grateful that Nature is mirroring back to me so poignantly that letting go is the way through: That this dying can provide a bedrock foundation for another spring birth. As a Daughter of the Earth I lean into ancient wisdom, praying that this exhausted mind and body will be able to follow suit. (Meet Mago Contributor) Sara Wright.
(Essay) The Emergence celebrated at Spring Equinox by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

The Spring Equinox Moment occurs September 21-23 Southern Hemisphere, March 21-23 Northern Hemisphere. The full story of Spring Equinox is expressed in the full flower connected to the seed fresh from the earth; that is, it is a story of emergence from the dark, from a journey, perhaps long, perhaps short, through challenging places. The joy of the blossoming is rooted in the journey through the dark, and an acknowledgement of the dark’s fertile gift, as well as of great achievement in having made it, of having returned. Both Equinoxes, Spring and Autumn, celebrate this sacred balance of grief and joy, light and dark, and they are both celebrations of the mystery of the seed. The seed is essentially the deep Creativity within – that manifests in the Spring as flower, or green emerged One. the full story: the root and the flower As the new young light continues to grow at this time of Spring, it comes into balance with the dark at Spring Equinox, or ‘Eostar’ as it may be named; about to tip further into light when light will dominate the day. The trend at this Equinox is toward increasing hours of light: and thus it is about the power of being – life is stepping into it. Earth in this region is tilting further toward the Sun. Traditionally it may be storied as the joyful celebration of a Lost Beloved One, who may be represented by the Persephone story: She is a shamanic figure who is known for Her journey to the Underworld, and who at this time of Spring Equinox returns. Her Mother Demeter who has waited and longed for Her in deep grief, rejoices and so do all: warmth and growth return to the land. Persephone, the Beloved Daughter, the Seed, has navigated the darkness successfully, has enriched it with Her presence and also gained its riches. Eostar/Spring Equinox is the magic of the unexpected, yet long awaited, green emergence from under the ground, and then the flower: this emergence is especially profound as it is from a seed that has lain dormant for months or longer – much like the magic of desert blooms after long periods of drought. The name of “Eostar” comes from the Saxon Goddess Eostre/Ostara, the northern form of the Sumerian Astarte[i]. The Christian festival in the Spring, was named “Easter” as of the Middle Ages, appropriating Goddess/Earth tradition. The date of Easter, which is set for Northern Hemispheric seasons, is still based on the lunar/menstrual calendar; that is, the 1st Sunday after the first full Moon after Spring Equinox. In Australia where I am, “Easter” is celebrated in Autumn (!) by mainstream culture, so we have the spectacle of fluffy chickens, chocolate eggs and rabbits in the shops at that time. There are other names for “Eostar” in other places …the Welsh name for the Spring Equinox celebration is Eilir, meaning ‘regeneration’ or ‘spring’ – or ‘earth’[ii]. In my own PaGaian tradition, the Spring Equinox celebration is based on the Demeter and Persephone story, the version that is understand as pre-patriarchal, from Old Europe. In the oldest stories, Persephone has agency in Her descent: She descends to the underworld voluntarily as a courageous seeker of wisdom, and a compassionate receiver of the dead. She represents, and IS, the Seed of Life that never fades away. Spring Equinox is a celebration of Her return, Life’s continual return, and thus also our personal and collective emergences/returns.We may contemplate the collective emergence/returns especially in our times. I describe Persephone as a “hera”, which of old was a term for any courageous One. “Hera” was a pre-Hellenic name for the Goddess in general[iii]. “Hera” was the indigenous Queen Goddess of pre-Olympic Greece, before She was married off to Zeus. “Hero” was a term for the brave male Heracles who carried out tasks for his Goddess Hera: “The derivative form ‘heroine’ is therefore completely unnecessary”[iv]. “Hera” may be used as a term for any courageous individual: and participants in PaGaian Spring Equinox ceremony have named themselves this way. The pre-“Olympic” games of Greece were Hera’s games, held at Her Heraion/temple[v]. The winners were “heras” – gaining the status of being like Her[vi]. At the time of Spring Equinox, we may celebrate the Persephone, the Hera, the Courageous One, who steps with new wisdom, into power of being: the organic power that all beings must have, Gaian power, the power of the Cosmos. This Seasonal ceremony may be a rejoicing in how we have made it through great challenges and loss, faced our fears and our demise (in its various forms), had ‘close shaves’ – perhaps physically as well as psychicly and emotionally. It is a time to welcome back that which was lost, and step into the strength of being. Spring Equinox/Eostar is the time for enjoying the fruits of the descent, of the journey taken into the darkness: return is now certain, not tentative as it was in the Early Spring/Imbolc. Demeter, the Mother, receives the Persephones, Lost Beloved Ones, joyously. This may be understood as an individual experience, but also as a collective experience – as we emerge into a new Era as a species. Thomas Berry and Brian Swimme speak of the ending of the sixty-five million year geological Era – the Cenozoic Era – in our times, and our possible emergence into an Ecozoic Era. They describe the Ecozoic Era as a time when “the curvature of the universe, the curvature of the earth, and the curvature of the human are once more in their proper relation”[vii]. Joanna Macy speaks of the “Great Turning” of our times[viii]. Collectively we have been away from the Mother for some time and there is a lot of pain. At this time we may contemplate not only our own individual lost wanderings, but also that of the human species. We are part of a much bigger Return that is happening. The Beloved One may be understood as returning on a collective level: …
(Video) An Autumn Equinox Ceremony by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

Autumn Equinox/Mabon Northern Hemisphere – September 21-23 Southern Hemisphere – March 21-23 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lRJNY1LSvIs&t=1175s …oOo… The purpose of this video is for ceremony, and I suggest pausing the video where it suits you, to add your own processing, embellishments and/or your own drum, percussion and voice wherever you please. I have made short spaces in the video where it could be paused. The script for this Autumn Equinox/Mabon ceremony is offered in Chapter 11 of my book A Poiesis of the Creative Cosmos: Celebrating Her within PaGaian Sacred Ceremony, with all acknowledgements and references there. In particular I mention here, credit for the story of Demeter and Persephone as told by Charlene Spretnak in her book Lost Goddesses of Early Greece. For more full participation in the ceremony, you could have one or more stalks of wheat or native grain tied with a red thread/ribbon, a garden pot with soil, a small garden trowel, a flower bulb (daffodil type), food and drink, that may represent your “harvest” – ready for eating and drinking. The elements of Water, Fire, Earth and Air on the altar in this video are placed in directions that are appropriate to my region in the Southern Hemisphere, and East Coast Australia: you may place yours differently, and transliterate when I mention the direction (which I do minimally). The images used are a collage of footage and photos from the 2024 Autumn Equinox ceremony at my place in Wakka Wakka country, South East Queensland Australia, and from previous Autumn Equinox ceremonies I facilitated over the decades in MoonCourt, Goddess ceremonial space in NSW Australia, Darug and Gundungurra country. My partner Robert (Taffy) Seaborne who has participated in all the Seasonal ceremonies since Samhain 2000, adds his voice to this video. Image credits: Demeter and Persephone (500 B.C.E. Greece). Hallie Iglehart Austen, The Heart of the Goddess, p.72. Art of Demeter and Persephone on MoonCourt wall: Cernak Herself Music credit: “Gentle Sorrow” by Sky: which he has previously allowed me to use in my work. This piece of music is also used in the Autumn Equinox meditation on my PaGaian Cosmology Meditations published 2015.
A Southern Hemisphere Perspective on Place by Glenys Livingstone Ph.D.

This essay is an edited excerpt from the Introduction to the author’s book PaGaian Cosmology: Re-inventing Earth-based Goddess Religion, which was an outcome of her doctoral research/thesis entitled The Female Metaphor – Virgin, Mother, Crone – of the Dynamic Cosmological Unfolding: Her Embodiment in Seasonal Ritual as Catalyst for Personal and Cultural Change. This doctoral work was in turn a documentation and deeper research of the Seasonal ceremonial celebrations that the author was already engaged in for over a decade. The whole of the process is here named as her “Search”. photo credit: David Widdowson, Astrovisuals. The site of seasonal ceremonial celebrations will always be significant. In my case, the place in which I have created them has been notably in the Southern Hemisphere of out Planet Earth. The fact of my context being thus – the Southern Hemisphere – had contributed in the past to my deep internalized sense of being “other”, and dissociated from my senses, since almost all stories told were based in Northern Hemisphere perspective. Yet at the same time this context of inhabiting the Southern Hemisphere contributed to my deep awareness of Gaia’s Northern Hemisphere and Her reciprocal Seasonal Moment: thus, awareness of the whole Planet. My initial confusion about the sensed Cosmos – as a Place, became a clarity about the actual Cosmos – which remained inclusive of my sensed Cosmos. PaGaian reality – the reality of our Gaian “country” – is that the whole Creative Dynamic happens all the time, all at once. The “other”, the opposite, is always present – underneath and within the Moment. This has affected my comprehension of each Sabbat/Seasonal Moment, its particular beauty but also a fullness of its transitory nature. Many in the Northern Hemisphere – even today – have no idea that the Southern Hemisphere has a ‘different’ lunar, diurnal, seasonal perspective; and because of this there often is a rigidity of frame of reference for place, language, metaphor and hence cosmology[i]. Indeed over the years of industrialized culture it has appeared to matter less to many of both hemispheres, including the ‘author-ities’, the writers of culture and cosmos. And such ‘author-ity’ and northern-hemispheric rigidity is also assumed by many more Earth-oriented writers as well[ii]. There has been consistent failure to take into account a whole Earth perspective: for example, the North Star does not need to be the point of sacred reference – there is great Poetry to be made of the void of the South Celestial Pole. Nor need the North be rigidly associated with the Earth element and darkness, nor is there really an “up” and a “down” cosmologically speaking. A sense and accountof the Southern Hemisphere perspective with all that that implies metaphorically as well as sens-ibly, seems vitally important to comprehending and sensing a whole perspective and globe – a flexibility of mind, and coming to inhabit the real Cosmos, hence enabling what I have named as a ‘PaGaian’ cosmological perspective, a whole Earth perspective. It has also been of particular significance that my Search has been birthed in the ancient continent of Australia. It is the age of the exposed rock in this Land, present to her inhabitants in an untarnished, primal mode that is significant. This Land Herself has for millennia been largely untouched by human war, conquest and concentrated human agriculture and disturbance. The inhabitants of this Land dwelt here in a manner that was largely peaceful and harmonious, for tens of thousands of years. Therefore the Land Herself may speak more clearly I feel; one may be the recipient of direct transmission of Earth in one of her most primordial modes. Her knowledge may be felt more clearly – one may be taught by Her. I think that the purity of this transmission is a significant factor in the development of the formal research I undertook – in my chosen methodology and in what I perceived in the process, and documented; from my beginnings as a country girl, albeit below my conscious mind in the subtle realms of which I knew little, to the more conscious times of entering into the process of the Search. In this Land that birthed me, ‘spirit’ is not remote and abstract, it is felt in Her red earth[iii]. Aboriginal elder David Mowaljarlai described, “This is a spirit country”[iv], and all of Her inhabitants, including non-Indigenous, may be affected by the strength of Her organic communication. It took me until the later stages of my research to realize the need to state the importance of this particular place for the advent of the research: the significance of both the land of Australia, and the specific region of the Blue Mountains in which I was now dwelling, as well as the community of this particular region, which all lent itself to the whole process. The lateness of this perception on my part, has to do with the extent of my previous alienation; but the fact that it did occur, is perhaps at least in part attributable to the unfolding awakening to my habitat that was part of the project/process. The specific region of the “Blue Mountains” – as Europeans have named them – is significant in that I don’t think that this project/process could have happened as it did in just any region. David Abram says, “The singular magic of a place is evident from what happens there, from what befalls oneself or others when in its vicinity. To tell of such events is implicitly to tell of the particular power of that site, and indeed to participate in its expressive potency[v]”. Blue Mountains, Australia: Dharug and Gundungurra Country The Blue Mountains are impressive ancient rock formations, an uplifted ancient seabed, whose “range of rock types and topographical situations has given rise to distinct plant communities”[vi]; and the presence of this great variation of plant communities, “especially the swamps, offer an abundance and variety of food sources, as well as habitats for varied fauna”[vii]. I feel that this is the case for …
(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!

(Photo Essay 4) ‘Gaeyang Halmi, the Sea Goddess of Korea’ by Helen Hwang

Part IV: Revival of the Gurang (Nine Maidens) Gaeyang Halmi There is more to reveal. As I write this part of the photo essay, I have encountered new information, previously made available online by individuals and organizations. It is reported that the “Suseong-dang” (水聖堂, Sea Saint Shrine) was once called the “Gurang-sa” (九娘祠, Nine Maidens Shine), of which I never heard before.[i] That Suseong-dang is a fake name blew my mind! Note the difference of gender between “the Nine Maidens Shrine” and “the Sea Saint Shrine”! The female-connoted term was stolen just like that! “Gurang-sa,” a female-referenced term as the character “rang” means a maiden, had to go due to its overt female representation. It is not without grounds that I was taken aback to see its present logography, “the Sea Saint Shrine,” on the information board.[ii] I almost heard a voice warning me, “This is not the place that you think it is!” That voice attempted to force me to leave the place without further investigation. However, I intuitively took a mental note, “Something is not correct here.” And I was right! Its name change sheds a consistent light on the meddling of patriarchal distortion/deception done to the tradition of Gaeyang Halmi. Readers are reminded of the lost painting of Gaeyang Halmi, which was replaced by that of the Sea God explicated in Part 2 of this photo essay (also Part 3). Like “the Sea God,” “the Suseong-dang” constitutes no reality. It is not only a conceptual deception but also a theft of the intangible cultural heritage, righteously committed by faceless patriarchal men disappeared into the lapse of time. It is clear that systematic erasure of the Female/Goddess has been in operation. Female power embodied whether in the name of the shrine or in the iconography was stripped away. However, it is proven once again that the Female is immortal because it constitutes the root of patriarchy. People smuggled the forbidden knowledge of the Female to later generations through oral stories. Thus, we find the folklore of the Female subversive.
(Book Excerpt 6) The Mago Way by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang, Ph.D.

[Author’s Note] The following is from Chapter One, “What Is Mago and Magoism and How Did I Study HER?” from The Mago Way: Re-discovering Mago, the Great Goddess from East Asia, Volume 1. Footnotes below would be different from the monograph version. PDF book of The Mago Way Volume 1 download is available for free here.] Magoism, East Asian Religions, and Magoist Mudangs As mentioned above, Magoism refers to the totality of human civilization that is ultimately gynocentric. Speaking from a narrow perspective, Magoism is the primordial matrix from which such East Asian religions as Daoism, Buddhism, and Confucianism were derived. In the light of Magoism, a patriarchal religion is redefined as a pseudo-Magoism that which has co-opted the Way of the Great Goddess (Magoism) with the androcentric reversal of the female
(K-Drama Review 1) Liminal Space/Time into WE: What Hotel del Luna Displays by Helen Hye-Sook Hwang

[Author’s Note: Hotel del Luna is a 16-episode Korean television drama aired in 2919. Caution is required for the spoiler. This essay is prompted by this drama, which was discussed in a new class, Experience Korean Culture through Film (EKCF) offered by Mago Academy. I am ever grateful for this opportunity to assess matriversal (read Magoist) soteriology, eschatology, and cosmology implicated in this drama. This drama takes viewers to a liminal time/space. At the liminal timespace, we see how one meets the other. Almost all objects of the drama remind viewers of their liminal property. The female main character, neither living nor dead, stands between the living and the dead. The ghost-serving moon lodge she operates is visible to both ghosts and people. So is the tree of the moon spirit, a symbol for the tree of life or the world tree, which summons the moon lodge to take place. And so are all beings with physical forms. The liminal timespace is where we find ourselves in the Reality of WE/HERE/NOW.] Copyright origin unknown. Part I: Introduction with Synopsis Jang Manwol, the female protagonist, is fixated to the tree of the moon spirit (wolryeongsu 월령수) and entrusted as the representative of the moon lodge, which serves ghosts charged with unrelenting resentments, by the Mago Divine. Mago Halmi (Great Mother, Creatrix), by providing new opportunities, awaits Manwol until she takes actions to relieve her unyielding grudge, caused by the complex socio-political misfortunes in the 7th century. Manwol is, currently neither living nor dead, expected to die and take a ride to the realm of after-life (returning to the origin) just like other ghosts in her lodge. Together with her ghost employees, she operates a large luxurious hotel, Hotel del Luna, the latest name of the moon lodge. Standing in the liminal time/space, the hotel is equipped with an elegantly decorated spacious lobby, a sky-viewing terrace, a horizon-surrounded beach, and an amusement park as well as a multiple number of rooms, each of which is catered to serve the special needs of a ghost guest. At the heart of the lodge is the tree of the moon spirit. The hoteliers welcome ghosts, diagnose the story of han (unresolved resentments) that they carry in themselves and its remedy, and execute plots to resolve resentments in a peaceful manner, to be beneficial to ALL. Upon being healed and rejuvenated with a new perspective on their past lives and the Reality of Intercosmic Life, the ghosts leave the lodge to take the ride to the realm of after-life (jeoseung 저승). The dead are supposed to take this ride to the Origin. Ghosts with unrelenting resentments escapes this route and lingers in the in-between reality of the living and the dead. Until accepting the help of the male protagonist, Gu Chanseong, sent by the Mago Divine, Manwol stubbornly continues to roam around her inbetween space/time. Insofar as she holds onto her own oath to avenge, the tree of the moon spirit remains dormant, seemingly dead. The tree, a visual locus reflecting the inner landscape of Manwol (her predecessors and successors alike), connects ghosts and people and reveals the reality of Life to them. The young man, Chanseong, misses no opportunity to choose the good and to right the wrong in ghosts and people, which is the key to straightening up the entangled karmic consequences. He prompts Manwol to heal herself: She realizes the truth about her betrayer (she was consumed by her anger against him so much so that she could not know the truth; he did not betray her but saved her) and let go of her over-1,300 year-long desire to destroy him. Affected by the grudge-releasing actions of Chanseong, she gradually chooses the path to reconcile with her past, as the Mago Divine wishes for her. The tree of the moon spirit, showing a sign of life again by putting out leaves and flowers, harbingers the end of the moon lodge. Manwol and her ghost employees as well as Chanseong reach the timespace of saying good-bye to move on to the next stage of Life’s cycle. Mawol becomes the last ghost who get helped in her lodge. The Mago Divine is seeking a new owner for the lodge so that ghosts with resentments can continue to be served. The drama is potentially transforming the human psyche from within. Tantalizing, heart-breaking, and frightening stories of the dead and the living stretch the horizon to the whole — the realm of physical life (iseung 이승), the realm of afterlife (jeoseung 저승), and the in-between realm of ghosts. In the sense that its narrative structure is built on the Korean folk belief of Mago Halmi (Great Mother, Crone, and Creatrix), and Magoism, the Way of the Creatrix, I find this drama a composite text of Magoist thealogy (a systematic understanding of Mago, the Creatrix) at the core. What the hoteliers are doing is in fact the role of Mudangs (Korean Shamans). Although Mudangs and Muism (Korean Shamanism) are strikingly absent, the drama resonates with the Muist worldview. The core message is to release unrelenting resentments of the dead on the part of the living. Intriguingly, this drama does not speak directly to humans, “Humans, do not create cheok (hatred or suffering in other beings).” Perhaps, such is too clear a message to articulate. At any rate, we are supposed to gain the lesson by listening to the stories of ghosts. What we see is that troubled ghosts with resentment are helped and guided to the journey of afterlife. The dead are expected to take the ride to the realm of after-life immediately. Ghosts are those who would not follow the path of the dead. Viewers are told why some people become haunting ghosts upon death, why ghosts seek to interfere with humans, and why ghosts are tempted to take revenge upon humans. We may say that ghosts are the confused or disrupted souls. Ghosts face extermination by the Mago Divine if they harm humans or assist an evil ghost. Consequently, evil ghosts are precluded from the cycle of rebirth. That is …

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