GAIA
AS DOORWAY TO THE DIVINE FEMININE
A
Personal Reflection
INTRODUCTION
To
encounter Gaia, a symbol of the Divine Feminine, I set out on a personal
pilgrimage by using the spiritual exercise called gazing. Gazing involves bringing your full attention to an image, and presenting yourself to the image in such a way that you allow it to speak to you via your intuition and imagination. Over a period of
seven months, I journaled what happened in my thoughts, and emotions whenever I encountered this feminine energy, seeking a heart-felt relationship
with the Divine Feminine.
Raised in the Christian tradition, I have long been
acquainted with God as Father and Christ as Son. The Holy Spirit had no gender for me. For almost forty years I have
understood that God is equally Mother as Father,[i] yet I have not been able to relate to the feminine as part of the Godhead. I wondered if gazing would change this.
I began this process as a homework assignment in an online class called The Way of the Feminine Mystic with Mirabai Starr. We
were invited to adopt a feminine figure--mythological, spiritual or real—who would
act as an icon,[ii] a
doorway to the Divine Feminine. Because I love gardening, touching the earth,
and because I am always revived and enlivened when doing so, I was drawn to
this mythological figure; and, because I often sit with a small globe of the earth and pray for the world, the Goddess of Earth, Gaia, seemed to be a logical choice for a guide.
In order to more fully encounter her, I searched out several images, most on the internet, that had come up “Gaia” in a Google search. I printed each image on photographic paper, and, one at a time, contemplated each over a period of days.
I set up one image at a time where I would see it throughout the
day and evening. Sometimes I would sit quietly before it, drinking it in. I
kept it in a prominent place so it could “see” me throughout the day. I waited
for impressions to arise, and kept notes as they did. Over the weeks, I had experiences of nature, heard songs on the radio that illuminated my
thoughts about the image, and had many more "encounters" with Gaia. I kept notes as thoughts arose, memories came rushing in, quotes, poems and stories dropped into my mind, and gradually an internal experience of the Divine Feminine emerged.
These experiences and my reflections are shared with you with my encouragement to take your own spiritual journey with a feminine figure.
GAZING AT GAIA
Who was Gaia? Gaia was the first creature to be born from primeval Chaos. Born with her was Tartarus (The Underworld), Nyx (Night), Erebus (Darkness) and Eros (spirit of generative love).[iii] She has been deemed the Goddess of the Earth, a child of Air and Day by some. She was honored as the mother of all who nourishes and gives rich blessing. She was also regarded as an Underworld deity who reclaims her children in the end.[iv] She precedes the pantheon of Greek gods headed by Zeus.
Gaia
as Earth. I am looking at an image of an earth-woman whose nude body is
stretched out across the landscape. She is leaning back on her forearms, her
face and breasts basking in the sunlight. Her hair falls from her head in the
form of a waterfall, forming a lake. Forests and meadows are her clothing.
Above her is an expanse of blue sky and clouds with a great white mountain in
the background.
As I gaze at this image, I notice a
large scar—she is not an innocent. Life has left its mark of pain. The fresh,
naked and unashamed pose speaks to me of her generosity, nurture, beauty. She
is without worry. The primary colors of the image are blues, whites and greens, my favorite colors because they evoke that image of earth taken by the
astronauts from outer space. This image of Gaia as the earth induces joy and a
sense of life-writ-large. Gaia delights in all things. She would have been
dancing when God looked at Creation and saw that it was good.
A memory rushes in. In 1996 I was
sitting on the floor of a large meeting room at Mercy Center in Burlingame,
California, with a group of sixty retreatants. A professional dancer, a member
of our group, dressed in loose fitting, chiffon-like garments, danced among us.
With a small branch of leaves, she enthusiastically, with grace, leaped round
us, sweeping the branch through strategically placed bowls of fresh water,
showering us as she danced. She embodied the
feminine as freedom, celebration and joy.
Words from a hymn I learned in
Children’s Church when I was ten begin to sing themselves in me:
“For
the beauty of the earth, for the glory of the skies, for the love which from
our birth, over and around us lies, Lord of all to Thee we raise this our hymn
of grateful praise./ For the beauty of each hour, of the day and of the night,
hill and vale, and tree, and flower, sun and moon and stars of light, Lord of
all to Thee we raise this our hymn of grateful praise./ For the joy of human
love, brother, sister, parent, child, friends on earth and friends above, for
all gentle thoughts and mild, Lord of all, to Thee we raise this our hymn of
grateful praise.”[v]
Gaia
as Rest. I present myself
to a new image, that of another nude female body, but this time she is
stretched out lengthwise on her side in a meadow, many shades of green soften
the picture. Half of her has sunk into the earth and the other half is covered
with moss. Her hair is a lovely mass of grasses. Her eyes are closed. She is
shielded by a line of young, tender trees.
At first the image reminds me of a
body decaying back into the soil, fertilizing the earth for new life. It is
difficult to know if she has died or is sleeping. I wonder if she could be the
sickening environment of which I am a part since I live with the chronic
illness of Myalgic Encephalomyelitis, more commonly known as Chronic Fatigue
Syndrome (CFS).
A memory whispers in my ear--a
morning when I did Lectio Divina with Jessica Powers poem “The Valley of the
Cat-Tails.”[vi]
Phrases stopped me in my reading-- “a marshy place of grief” and “no mood of
mirth is seen”? And I find myself one with the marshy places on the earth,
places of wounding within me that need to be seen and tended. I take time to
notice and hold my grief over my limitations and liminal state of existence, my
isolation, my loneliness, to hold it all with compassion and weep.
Another image from one of Powers’
poems rushes in—the old bee house where she would run when her heart hurt, to
smell the sweetness of the honey.[vii]
I breathe in the aromas from my own house that comfort me—applesauce simmering
on the stove--and open my heart in gratitude for the love of God which fills me.
I sense the Spirit of God from the book of Genesis “moving upon the face of my
waters.”[viii]
Another memory arises. I am weeping
over the loss of my beloved partner of many years. Too ill to maintain our
relationship, he moved to his son’s for care. He’s asked not to have any
further contact. This is very difficult to accept although I suspect this comes
out of his depression. A painting I have done of the Holy Spirit brooding over
the earth fills my thoughts. In it the Spirit is a golden-winged pelican with a
warm, rosy breast. I embrace Gaia as this maternal, feathery creature and wet
her breast with my tears over the loss of my sweetheart. Her warmth and settledness
comforts me. I know she will be here for me always.
As I continue gazing at the original
image of the mossy, closed-eyed woman, lying in and upon the earth, a new
thought comes—she is not dead but resting. A scripture comes to mind, “God
blessed the seventh day and called it sacred, because on it God rested from all
the work of creation.”[ix]
In her resting, she is one with all
things, not wrestling or anxious or sad, just completely relaxed in a sound,
peaceful sleep knowing “all shall be well, all shall be well and all manner of
things shall be well.”[x]
She is very grounded and earthy, yet
I imagine her dreaming—dreaming the future into being from this place of peace.
Hildegard of Bingen’s words echo in my mind, “There is no creation that does
not have a radiance. Be it greenness or seed, blossom or beauty, it could not
be creation with out it—The world is living, being, spirit, all verdant
greening, all creativity. All creation awakened, called by the resounding
melody, God’s invocation of the word.”[xi]
A memory awakens. I am in my
forties, at my favorite retreat center experiencing thirty days of silence with
the Ignatian Spiritual Exercises. Creation becomes an icon of God, it speaks to
me as I stand still and waiting in the wildness of the grounds. First I notice
a gentle movement of the eucalyptus leaves overhead and breathe in their
pungent fragrance. Then, like another dancer in this garden of life, the
grasses bend and sway. In the next moment, a strand of my hair blows across my
vision and I am transported into oneness with all that is. As I return to the
retreat house, all those I meet are part of this oneness. I jot a poem in my
journal: “A Psalm of Breath” / Ah God,/
The sun is hot./ It touches my face with heat./ The tree is still./ A breeze
stirs the leaves./ The lily grasses are tall./ They quiver in the barely
stirring air./ I stand,/ Apart from creation./ The draft captures a strand of
my hair./ It passes before my eyes./ I disappear in the midst of Creation./ Ah
…./ God….[xii]
In my final contemplation, I notice
a nipple on the woman’s exposed breast. It’s oh so subtle. Images of animal
mothers parade through my mind, mothers as providers of first food for their
newborn young, and the memory of nursing my own children connects me with my
Mother, Gaia, who nourishes me with all of creation.
Gaia Who Sees. A world-sized eye looks at me from the sphere
that is the earth. It is lidded with beautiful eyelashes. Blues and greens,
along with golds and whites are reflected in the iris. In this image, Gaia is
awake, vigilant, seeing everything, everywhere. And, she sees me.
Gaia sees me ill and straining for
health, and I see her going through the same process. I am aware of her
rejuvenating properties around Chernobyl in the Ukraine where plants and
animals have colonized the nuclear disaster site of 1986. I remember seeing the
devastation from another disaster, but not man-made, the eruption of Mt. St.
Helens in 1980 in the state of Washington, and how it made a comeback, slowly,
bit by bit, with the help of animals, insects and plants. I breathe a prayer
for healing.
I think of my sweetheart, LeRoy, who
struggles with MDS, a blood disorder, and all the suffering inhabitants of
planet earth. Gaia, herself, is groaning with cataclysmic events. A scripture
from the New Testament comes to mind: “We know the whole creation has been
groaning as in the time of child birth right up to the present time.”[xiii]
I cry out to God, “How is joy
possible?” I sense God saying, “There is space between contractions, and I am
there hovering, moving; creation is “multiple” so you and Gaia are not alone. A
time is coming when all will be brought into ‘the glorious freedom of the
Children of God.’[xiv]”
“Gaia, help me heal,” I pray. She
invites me to live, accepting my physical, mental, emotional and spiritual
limitations. She tells me not to strain. Let health emerge she breathes. I have
hope.
Gaia
as Tenacious. I’m looking at the image of a giant woman made of earth
and stone. She is covered with trees, shrubs, cliffs and rivers. Her height
allows her to see great distances—from sea to shining sea. Her gaze can take in
all that is. She is the source of the waters—many rivers coursing down her and
into the ground.
Suddenly I’m nineteen again,
strolling down a beach at Netarts Bay, Oregon, searching for blue-neck clams. I
ask another hunter what to look for, and he tells me to notice small
indentations in the sand. My parents and siblings have given up and returned to
our cabin, but I am determined to get at least one clam. I find a dimple in the
beach near the water and begin digging with my bare hands, my fingernails
breaking, my skin flaking away on the rough stones lying under the sand. Down a
good ways I find my first clam. It is huge and grey and wrinkled. It’s been
here a long time. And it has family members. I fill my burlap bag with the
legal limit not thinking how much work it will be to clean and prepare them and
how the family will have to eat them all. With the salt spray of the bay on my
face, my clothes all damp and drooping, I triumphantly march off to display my
catch to those who gave up too soon. This is a memory I go back to often when I
am feeling shabby and dog-eared. I quietly thank God for bringing it back now.
I return to the image of the giant
earth woman. She is so large and strong. Her hands are the size of whole
states. She can easily lift mountains and shade us from the scorching sun. The
tune “Praise to the Lord, the Almighty”[xv]
starts playing in my head. I go pick up an old hymnal that was being thrown out
by a local church, now on my shelf, and turn to that song. My eyes rest on the
last part of the third verse, “How oft in grief hath not God brought thee
relief, spreading God’s wings for to shade thee.”
I think back to a day, a very hot
day in Janesville, California. My partner, LeRoy, his adult son, David, and I
were visiting a ranch. LeRoy and David had come to help the rancher repair his
threshing machine. While they were busy, I wandered about the barn looking for
barn cats and, finding none that wanted anything to do with me, went on to the
corrals full of black-faced sheep. The sheep would try to find shade in each
other, lowering their head next to their neighbor so their faces were out of
the sun.
I flash back to some moments when I
felt God “shading” me—times when just the right song on the radio was playing
when I needed some hope, times when just the right teacher appeared to give
reassurance, guidance and challenge, when a friend called just as I needed a
ride to the doctor, when a red African bird[xvi]
in breeding plumage appeared in my Reno backyard after I was told my CFS was
out of remission, when I came across a photo taken 30 years before of a white
wild flower among brambles in the Mojave desert and on the back the scripture:
“Like a lily among thorns is my darling among the maidens.”[xvii];
when I heard the words of Mary Magdalene after crying out for guidance as to
how to serve God while ill—“Turn your face to the Beloved throughout the day,
even as a sun flower follows the sun.”
Again I return to the giant woman.
Beauty is not emphasized here, but rather endurance, strength and power. Life
itself is tenacious.
A memory surfaces of my coping
strategy as a child in an alcoholic home. I’m about ten years old. I walk out
behind my house in Minden, Nevada, across a vacant lot; look both ways on
highway 395 to see if any cars are coming, and dash across. I’ve been told not
to go this way. “Tramps will get you.” I go anyway. I walk through sage brush and
dry grasses to some barbed wire. The wire has been stretched for others to pass so many times it
is easy for me to crawl through, although I do take care not to tear my clothes
which would be a sure sign of disobedience. I part some willows and climb up on
an old railroad bridge which spans a reedy pool. The decaying muddy smell of
the swamp is familiar. Bird songs of red-winged blackbirds and meadow larks
thrill my ears. All the sounds and smells commune with my heart and gift me
with safety, solitude and a sense of well being. I realize Gaia has been with
me, nurturing me for a very long time, and I knew her not.
Gaia as Creation.
I’m looking at an image of the universe being born. Flashing
stars and galaxies, gas giants and the fiery earth itself appear against the
black background of space. Hovering near the earth, with her left arm resting
on it, a Venus-like woman appears to be praying and to be the source of this
newly forming planet.
It is Oneness becoming many forms,
yet retaining Oneness. Gaia is at the heart of this as life force. While I’m
looking at an old Super Soul Sunday TV show, the words of Llewellyn Vaughn Lee
help me with this, “Oneness is not an idea. Oneness is a life force, a life
force of the planet….”[xviii]
This image of Gaia praying makes her
the sculptor, the shaper, the visionary of what the earth can and will be. She
is confident in her abilities to bring her vision forth.
Her Venus-like quality makes me
think of “Beauty” creating the earth, of the feminine creating her ground.
Artistry at its most significant. I remember going out into my garden, feeling
exhausted from grief, and noticing a Peace rose unfolding. The outer petals
were worn and faded. A nibble on the edge of one petal betrayed a tiny thrip;
but the inner core still had many perfect petals left to unfurl. I instantly
saw that there was a future for me yet to unfold and it could hold treasures.
My whole mood shifted from grief to hope in a moment.
Gaia
Pregnant. The image now before me is of a lovely, green, highly
tattooed Polynesian woman. She sits with her legs crossed and her hands rest under
her pregnant earth-belly. Her eyes are half closed in the way of Eastern
meditators. Ferns, flowers and butterflies form her hair.
I can’t relate to her at first. Then
I attend my friend Katy’s baby shower. It is her first. I remember the labor,
the pain, the sense of helplessness, the exhaustion of my labors, something
Katy can’t even imagine. This leads me to understand that there is a deep
knowing in Gaia, that under the great upheavals of destruction and creation
there is the Voice singing, “All shall be well.” Even though her offspring will
wound and damage her, she is not afraid. She embodies the Christ spirit of
“Forgive them; they know not what they do.”[xix]
Life itself must be birthed. Nothing can stop it from coming, and as messy and
painful as it is, it is Creation.
Gaia welcomes all life, from creepy
crawlies to elephants to human beings, all things that fly and swim and contain
the breath of God, the God who beholds it all as very good.[xx]
She is unafraid although much
tragedy will occur. She has the long view and sees the light triumphing over
the darkness. She has been a part of all things for over three billion years.
A recent experience of being
strengthened by Spirit inserts itself in my mind as I’m gazing on this image. I’m sitting
in silence holding grief over the loss of a great love. I am ill. I am old. I have
an intuition of two great stones, like the great stones carved for the Roman
aqueducts, each weighing tons. I feel this in my heart space. These stones are
alive and bonded together. One is Christ. One is me. As I continue being with
this intuition, I become aware of Christ owning my sorrow, my sickness, my
aging, and making all that Christ is available to me. It reminds me of
watercolor painting. If you place a fresh color next to a color still wet, they
will run together. Christ and I are running together. I am deeply comforted and
made whole again through this merging. The Spirit of Christ as Divine Feminine.
Gaia
as Eternal. In this famous unfinished sketch by Leonardo di Vinci, I
see St. Anne, mother of Mary and grandmother of Jesus. Mary is seated on the
lap of St. Anne. Jesus is on Mary’s lap. I see St. Anne as Gaia and Mary as an
incarnation of Gaia. It gives me a whole new way of viewing Mary—as the Divine
Feminine. But Gaia’s not just imaged in a saint; my daughter and I, we are
offspring, as was my mother and her mother all the way back to the first
mother.
As Jesus is an icon to the Father,
so Mary is an icon to the Divine Feminine, giving birth to that which gives
life, to that which cannot be ultimately destroyed. The child Jesus is a symbol
of the seed of death and resurrection--the indestructibility of life itself.
That life goes on even after this life.
This thought of life after death reminds
me of a story my father told, of when he was in the army during World War II.
He was lying in a hospital bed recovering from rheumatic fever, when suddenly,
at the foot of his bed, he saw his younger brother Earl, standing in full
uniform, saluting him. Then Earl vanished. My father found out later that Earl
had been killed that day fighting in France.
Here is the eternal aspect of Gaia,
birthing into this world and into the next.
Gaia
as Mystery. I’m gazing at an iridescent, blue, woman’s face with the black nose of
a deer, blue eyelids closed. Black circles highlight the eyes. The face appears
through tangles of grape leaves and hanging fruit. On the forehead and each
cheek are written mysteries in a foreign hand.
The face communicates “All shall be
well.” in spite of the twin forces of destruction and creation always at work
in the world.
This face startled me when I noticed
it on my own art room wall. I painted it sixteen years ago from a dream memory.
What I was trying to capture was one woman’s life given so that many lives
would be nourished; and her life given freely, and with joy, even though it
meant death for her. Christ as the Divine Feminine. I had not comprehended
this, even when I painted it, but now through gazing I get it.
Later that day I run across a note
in my journal, John Scotus Eriugene said something about God being the life
force within all things, making every visible and invisible creature a
theophany.[xxi]
And another quote, “To say that light is created on the first day is to say
that light is at the heart of life…as the centre from which life proceeds. At
the heart of all that has life is the light of God…it issues forth in all that
grows from the ground and in the life that shines from the eyes of any living
creature. Still there is darkness but the light is deeper still.”[xxii]
I must be careful not to see tragedy
as triumphant, but to remain open to the light even calamity contains. Perhaps
the only light I can find in the darkness of misfortune is in me as the deeper
compassion of Gaia is kneaded into my heart.
Gaia
Out of Darkness. Against the backdrop of a black, chaotic universe,
aqua and golden light indicate the face of a woman. In her wide cat-like eyes
is reflected knowledge of all things. Her full lips are relaxed.
Even in times of great stress and
conflict, in times of spiritual aridity, Gaia lives in all things as creative
love.
Even during my greatest life crisis,
I became aware of a force within holding me together—a life force that was
tangible, strong and available at all times. I think of this now as the love
energy of Gaia, of the Divine Feminine, and a quote of William Butler Yeats
comes to mind, “An aged man is but a paltry thing. A tattered coat upon a
stick, unless. Soul clap its hands and sing, and louder sing. For every tatter
in its mortal dress.”[xxiii]
On that dark day just a few years ago, I was that paltry thing walking in my
garden trying to find solace, and that love energy of the Divine Feminine was
that thing within me clapping its hands and singing, helping me put one foot in
front of the other until the fullness of life returned.
This image of Gaia, her face in the
midst of universal chaos, seems to say, “Don’t forget me when you go through
dark times. Remember that I have seen everything . Nothing disturbs me. All
things are cycling. My breath sustains the movement of all things until their
completion. My womb births new life even as destruction breaks down and
annihilates. All shall be well, all shall be well, and all manner of things
shall be well. Hush.”
Gaia
as Compassion. Viewing the next image, a woman’s head is seen from the
side, silhouetted against images of our universe—planets, asteroids, brightly
swirling green and red gasses in a dark space. Green trees are her hair through which light
breaks and surrounds her head.
A tear is falling from her left eye
as she holds the apple-sized ball of the earth in her hands. The tear speaks to
me of her compassion for our planet. Her heart for abundance and prosperity
for all of us is heavy with so much suffering, so much damaging.
The fact that she weeps over the
earth says she desires more and better for it, that she intends a positive
evolution. Nevertheless, she is in pain with the pain of the earth and giving
what she can to sustain it.
I remember a startling dream. I find
myself alone, barefoot, without identification and money in a rural area of
Cuba to which I’ve never been. I don’t speak Spanish. I am surrounded by the
poor in a wide circle. At first I want to ask them for money, but then realize
they have none to give. I’m ashamed of myself for even thinking of asking. As I
gaze at them and them at me, a great joy rises as I see them as “bone of my
bone, flesh of my flesh,”[xxiv]
with faces like my face, with human bodies like mine, hearts that love and
weep, eyes that see birth and death. I look into their eyes as they into mine
and I am one with them.
Gaia’s compassion is felt each time
we look into the eyes of another and see our own suffering.
Gaia
as Life. A nude woman is lying on the bottom of a lake. She takes up
the whole lake, her face, breasts and knees touching the surface from below.
From her heart bursts light causing a tree to grow and flourish above the water.
Light is flaming the sky above and darkness is under her.
She is the energy that causes a
seed, deep in the dark, wet ground, to open, then causes its contents to unfold
and thrust up to the light. She turns the cold, hard darkness into fertility
that greets the sun and nourishes the creatures of the earth with the
generosity of life.
As I reflect on a seed in the dark,
not knowing the sun will warm it in the spring; I remember making a collage
after five years of living with CFS. I felt like a seed in that cold ground, my
mind cloudy, my body heavy with exhaustion, my emotions dull. Doctors had
no suggestions on what to do to get well, although I’d tried any number of
natural means. I wondered will my spring
ever come? Then, while on retreat and working with a spiritual director
proficient with dreams, I had a dream from which I woke up well after nine and
a half years of severe, debilitation from CFS.
It was clear that Gaia had been
sleeping within me and through the dream burst my bonds and set me free.
Gaia
as Sexuality. A mammoth, nude, pregnant woman is lying down atop a
green cliff. Her open, streaked granite legs face me as if she is ready for a
gynecological exam and I am the doctor. Her pregnant belly is the earth. From
between her legs there is a white milky liquid flowing. It becomes a waterfall
filling all the rivers and watery places on earth.
As I make myself present with open
heart to this image, I experience my senses opening. There is sacredness to
this sensuality and to what is most private—the milk of the vagina, the
birthing waters for the infant, the lubricant of sexual ecstasy. I can feel the
warmth of arousal just beneath the surface, but, another awareness steps in to
block it, the old embarrassment I felt as a developing adolescent.
Where
I picked up shame as it relates to the genitals is beyond me. I am surprised to
find this remnant still taking up emotional space in me. I want to hide the
image whenever anyone comes to my house, yet I am fascinated with the total
freedom Gaia has to be naked and unashamed, bearing and bringing new life
through her body. While reading later that day I run across this helpful quote:
“Not only are our senses regarded as essentially good, they are viewed as given
that we may see and taste and touch the manifestation of God in the body of
creation and in our own bodies.”[xxv]
I
have a body like hers, and it has known love and bleeding and bearing. I feel
the plant-like aspect of my being—life emerging in a natural way, all human life
coming through and from the womb and vagina.
There
is a sense of being essential because she is essential to all life, a kind of
celebration of my female body and being that I must stop and savor.
FINAL
REFLECTIONS
Gaia
dances. Exuberant joy overflows wherever she is recognized. I learned to see
this joy singing in me when I had no strength of my own and in deepest grief.
She
rejuvenates. The life force is within; simply acknowledging this truth pours
healing, re-creative energy into me.
She
never gives up. Always and forever she moves in and out among all things,
finding ways up, around and over obstacles to nurture life.
She
shapes and envisions the future. Always moving in an evolutionary direction,
always expanding, she has intention and imagination.
She
is unafraid. She has experienced everything over three billion years.
She
is made manifest in woman. She is ever creating, ever receiving that which is
dying. She holds, she listens, she makes space for life to unfold, she yields, and
she opens.
She
is creative love. Even in times of great stress and conflict, in times of
spiritual aridity, she is present. We are never alone.
She
weeps. She does not keep herself separate and safe from life. She enters into
it with us, always feeling what we feel, knowing what we know. She participates
in our suffering, knowing it is the dough from which the bread of our lives is
made.
She
is energy. In the seed, deep in the cold, wet earth, she is at work bringing
forth that which feeds us all.
She
is sexuality. She blesses the body and its ecstasies and the fertility of all
her creation.
She
is more….
As
this process comes to an end I realize that this has been a thoroughly
satisfying exercise. The end result of my practice has been to relate to the
Holy Spirit as the Divine Feminine. Now that I have encountered her, I find her
throughout the Judeo-Christian scriptures. I especially like “For since the
creation of the world God’s invisible attributes, God’s eternal power and
divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been
made….”[xxvi]
My own sense of self as a manifestation of the Divine Feminine has settled and
enriched my current identity, affirming the feminine in a way our patriarchal
culture cannot do. I feel better equipped to take the world into my arms
through prayer, always accompanied, within and without by the Divine Feminine.
[i]
Of course God is much more than any definition or role or concept.
[ii]
When one spends time with an icon, here defined as a religious work of art such
as Jesus the Teacher, one is present to that figure and the figure is present
to the gazer. If the heart is open and faith applied, an interaction
occurs—Jesus speaks and the gazer listens, then the gazer speaks and Jesus
listens. The result is enrichment to the gazer and joy to the figure.
[iii]
Gods and Mortals in Classical Mythology. Grant, Michael and John Hazel.P.
147
[iv]
The Twentieth Century Classical Handbook
[v]
“For the Beauty of the Earth”. F. S. Pierpoint
[vi]
Selected Poetry of Jessica Powers,
Ed. Regina Siegfried, Robert Morneau, Sheed & Ward, 1996, pg. 161
[vii]
Selected Poetry of Jessica Powers. “The
Old Bee House”. Pg. 171
[x]
Revelations of Divine Love, Julian of Norwich
[xi]
Hildegard of Bingen: A Saint for Our Times, Matthew Fox, Namaste
Publishing, 2012.
[xii]
Nancy Pfaff, unpublished poem, January 1998
[xv]
Author Joachim Neander
[xvi]
A northern red bishop. This bird was introduced into southern California some
years ago.
[xviii]
From
a Super Soul Sunday program with Oprah 9-02-12
[xxi]
The Book of Creation, An introduction to Celtic Spirituality, J. Philip
Newell, Paulist Press 1999, p. 67
[xxiii]
From Sailing to Byzantium by William Butler Yeats
[xxv]
The Book of Creation, p. 72
