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Prepare for the Third Initiation

The Queen of Heaven
The third initiation into the Mysteries
will be an initiation into the Cosmic Soul, the Anima Mundi,
Sophia, Shekinah
I loved her above health and beauty, and chose to have her instead of light for the light that cometh from her never goeth out Wisdom of Solomon


Prepare for a weekend with a different cadence and routine
as the previous ones.

The colours of Sophia-Shekinah-Eros are white, blue and gold.
This initiation will focus on the Sacred Marriage, the Divine Unity 
which is the Cosmic Soul/Sophia/Shekinah and the Kabbala Tradition.

The indivisibility, ie the inner sacred marriage,
the unity of Shekinah/Sophia
 is an integral part of esoteric Hindu teachings, Gnosticism and
the Kabbalah tradition

On Friday evening we will partake of the sacrament of the sacred grape (wine yes!) to be followed
by the Feast of Eros. 
On Saturday morning the Altar of the Holy Grail will be erected and white flower garlands will be made.  The sacred space will be opened with chanting of the sacred sounds. Please wear white puja clothing for this day.  Please bring a piece of clear quartz and more than one piece if you have.
Meditation of the Ishta Devata, chanting of the sacred sounds, and more mystery to be revealed during the retreat.
On Saturday night we will re-enact the Procession of the Grail and the Awakening Ritual.  I will ask you to bring certain pieces of clothing and/or props – they will all be simple things easily available.
Please bring white, gold and blue pieces of cloth for cloaks, shawls or veils.  You may use this time to contemplate on the focus of the weekend by embroidering gold stars onto your blue cloak or shawl.  (Men and women both).  Read the books of the Apocrypha (they are not in the Protestant Bible, only in the Catholic Bibles, but they are freely available on line) Wisdom, The Song of Songs and Proverbs – these are all available on the website sacred-texts.
Women please also bring a veil that can cover the bottom part of your face.  All shamanic drums, tambourine drums and small drums are welcome
I will send more information and instructions soon.
Prema
Hettienne Bhakty Ma
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The Secret

The Mystery of the Heart is a secret.

Sometimes it is whispered to the moon,
or a crow.
My body holds the secret.
Never is it revealed to ears that cannot hear, or eyes that cannot see.
Behold!
The secret of life is a mystery
only to be understood by the deepest self
It is the mystery that calls me;
It is the secret that takes me ever deeper
into the heart of love.
In my most vulnerable moments
I am totally free.
In my mystery I am most known.
In my deepest pain I am most whole.
In my aloneness
I am with it all
Living the mystery
is the greatest secret of all

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Sancta Maria : Mother Mary, Mary Magdalene and the Mysteries

As you know I am putting together a pilgrimage to the sacred sites of Mary/Mary Magdalene, Lady of the Mysteries in France.  I have undertaken sacred pilgrimages to a number of sacred sites across the world.  You can read more about my many trips to Glastonbury, Walking the Mary and Michael ley lines, visiting the sacred sites of Archangel Michael in Italy and the pilgrimage of Sante Sarah-la-Kali and the Magdalene in France on my blog http://www.path-of-divine-love.com.  I share with you extracts of an article written by Ani Williams and which was published in the Four Corners Magazine.  Ani Williams has recorded many cd’s containing songs dedicated to Mary, Mary Magdalene and Sophia and you can order her work on her website :  www.aniwilliams.com

“And all shall be well and
All manner of thing shall be well
When the tongues of flame are infolded
Into the crowned knot of fire
And the fire and the rose are one.”
 — T.S. Elliot


‘Scarlet Woman, penitent sinner, Sister-Bride, whore, Black Madonna, high Priestess of Isis, Mistress of the Elements, Beloved wife of Jesus, favored disciple, Mary of Bethany, Miriam of Magdala, Magdal-eder, the tower-stronghold, Daughter of Sion’, Maria-Sophia, are just some of the titles and attributes accorded to me. I have been described as ‘beauty consuming itself like incense, far from the eyes of men’, troubadours have sung of the fruit of my womb, the Sangraal, the living Grail mysteries and the bloodline of Jesus. Yet do they have any idea of the endless years of my intense spiritual grooming and my ensuing ministry? I am calling out now, for my true essence to come forth… for beauty and truth shall save the world.’

We begin our journey into the Magdalene mysteries, following her trail of legends and shrines throughout France and Britain, as mysterious threads of a woven story — a story whose time has finally come. Her presence is suddenly re-emerging in books, new translations of Gnostic gospels, television specials and film, making her way into our psyches and preparing new ground for healing at least 4000 years of separation of spirit and sensuality. When the primary aspects of one’s true essential nature (Tibetans would term this Ground Luminosity) are fragmented, outside forces (such as relationships, family, church or government) can easily dominate and manipulate one’s life. Magdalene’s legacy calls us to retrieve the fragments of our sensual, passionate natures, and when impregnated with divine love and a spiritual fire, the alchemy of sacred union transforms us. She represents a profound knowledge of the mysteries of the sacred marriage, earthly and heavenly union, embodied spiritual passion and a necessary lost chord in the remnants of the song of the sacred feminine.

“The people shall rejoice and dance within, and all the kingdoms shall rise together as if from the mist of the dreams of humanity, and forge a union with the divine… and man shall join woman in the final dance of alchemy.” ‘I Remember Union—The Story of Maria Magdalena’ by Flo Aeveia Magdalena.

Signs of the Grail in Avalon

The Egg and the Serpent
The Egg and the Serpent
When I made my first journey into the sacred sites of Great Britain in 1987, I had no idea how deeply I would be impacted by the rich layers of Mary’s story that are still palpable and readily accessible to modern pilgrims. In Glastonbury, England, the site of ancient Avalon, I was struck with the ‘presence’ of both Mary’s—Mary Mother of Jesus and Mary Magdalene, in the shrines, cathedral ruins, springs, and even her presence in the land itself. The St. Michael and St. Mary ley lines (dowsed lines of energy) weave back and forth over each other across England, intersecting at the major archeological sites and early Christian cathedrals. Mary’s dragon line moves in a serpentine flow, crossing the straight Michael line in a repeating geomantic hieros-gamos or signs of sacred union in the land. (See The Sun and The Serpent by Hamish Miller and Paul Broadhurst).

The famous Glastonbury Abbey with it’s Mary Chapel was founded in its original humble form of mud and thatch sometime between 41- 63 A.D. by Joseph of Arimathea. In fact, it was the world’s first Christian church above ground. (The earliest Christians were forced to meet underground in both Jerusalem and Rome, to avoid persecution). According to the 1922 publication ‘St. Joseph of Arimathea at Glastonbury’ by Lionel S. Lewis, Joseph came to the Isle of Glas, an older name for Glastonbury, in about 31 A.D. with ten companions to spread Christ’s message. It is said that they were told in a vision by the Archangel Gabriel to build a church in honor of Mary. One legend states that after Mary died, Joseph brought her body to Glastonbury, to be buried in a crypt at the present Mary Chapel of the Abbey. This Mary is normally presumed to be Mary, the ‘Virgin’ Mother, but could it be the other Mary, The Magdalene? (There are other legends that say she is buried in France).

Margaret Starbird, in her book ‘The Woman with the Alabaster Jar’, states, “Some of the later European legends say that Joseph of Arimathea caught the blood of the dying Jesus in a chalice and brought it to Western Europe by boat during the early persecution of the followers of Jesus in Jerusalem (A.D. 42). One chronicler preserves the story that Joseph of Arimathea brought two cruets containing the blood and sweat of Jesus to Glastonbury England, and a staff of hawthorn that sprouted and bloomed when it was planted.”

(Several offspring of that original hawthorn, a species that is only found here and in the Middle-East, are still growing in Glastonbury… within the Abbey grounds, on Wearyall Hill and at Chalice Well Gardens. It blooms during the Christian holy weeks at Easter, and Christmas, or Winter Solstice, and is a powerful symbol of death and birth, as its red fruit and white flowers happen at the same moment.)

Numerous European legends tell of Joseph of Arimathea traveling with Mary Magdalene and several others to Egypt after the crucifixion, later landing on the southern coast of France, at a town now known as Saints-Marie-de-la -Mer. It is not known whether or not Magdalene then accompanied Joseph further north into Britain, however in the 2002 book ‘The Magdalen Manuscript’, by Tom Kenyon and Judi Sion, she is said to have lived in Glastonbury for two periods of time, as well as in Southern France. At Bride’s Mound, on the western edge of Glastonbury, there are a few scattered remains of a stone wall from the old Magdalene Chapel. It is also near Bride’s Mound that the ancient Blue Bowl was uncovered in the early 1900’s and many British mystics claimed it was a Grail bowl (some experts date it from Italy about 700 A.D). It is now being kept at Chalice Well, and on our annual Magdalene pilgrimages to Britain, our groups have had the opportunity to use the bowl in meditations… and there is a powerful remnant of the sacred in the Blue Bowl!

Just a few hundred yards from Chalice Well and in the center of the village is the Mary Chapel of the famous Glastonbury Abbey. In one corner of the chapel, a beautiful little well dedicated to St. Joseph still runs with clear Avalon white spring water. And on the southern outside wall there is a most intriguing inscribed stone, perhaps alluding to the sacred marriage of Jesus and Magdalene, Jesus Maria. These are the very same words on a banner carried by Joan of Arc during the crusades, relating to the wedding at Cana and the bloodline of the Holy Grail. Just outside the Mary Chapel, lay the purported graves of King Arthur and Guinevere, continuing this theme of the sacred marriage!

St. Joseph's Well, Glastonbury Abbey
St. Joseph’s Well
Glastonbury Abbey
Jesus Maria Stone
Jesus Maria stone at Abbey Mary Chapel

In tracking the names and remnants of the Grail Mystery, The healing waters of the red and white springs of Avalon give another clue to the alchemy of union, of earth and spirit, female and male. The white (chalk) spring pours liberally from the base of the Tor, the ‘yang’ central high point in the landscape, and the red spring emerges within the ‘yin’ nurturing Chalice Well Gardens just a few feet away… it is also called the blood spring, as it is full of natural iron, causing the well stones’ strong red color. Two very old “bleeding” yew trees stand as a gateway to the lower end of the garden, where the red spring flows into two interlocking pools, a shape well-known in sacred geometry called the Vesica Pisces. This shape is constructed by drawing two equal circles so that the center of each lies on the circumference of the other. This symbol of sacred union is an important symbol in Christian mysticism (sign of the fish, or Pisces) and the geometry of ancient temple design, including the Mary Chapel.

Vesica Pisces
Vesica Pisces pool at Chalice Well


“The Vesica Pisces is a powerful symbol of the creation and regeneration of forms in the natural world, and given the long and successive use of the site of the two springs as a place of death and rebirth, it is not surprising that this generative symbol should appear.” From ‘The Red and White Springs’ by Nicholas Mann.

Signs and remnants of both Mary Magdalene and Mother Mary abound in Britain, as well as the Grail Mysteries and symbols of sacred union, the path of the Beloved.

This theme of the two Mary’s began gestating within me nearly twenty years ago, and continues to unfold my own developing understanding of the sacred feminine. This process is an inner integration of the mythos of both Mother Mary and Mary Magdalene, the embracing of a powerful earthy sensual aliveness of the Magdalene, the path of The Beloved, and the heavenly and transcendent love of the Mother. Even though these two Mary’s have become widely separated in the human psyche, I believe it is time we reconcile these polarities as necessary step of healing our world.


“I am the single radiance by which all is aroused and within which it is vibrant…
For the man who has found me, the door to all things stands open…
I am the magnetic force of the universal presence and the ceaseless ripple of its smile.”

(Excerpts from Hymn To the Eternal Feminine by Teilhard de Chardin)

Unexplained phenomena
‘Unexplained phenomena’ captured by the camera of Dr. Eileen Palmer

What history tells us about Magdalene

Few biographical details about the life of MM can be found in the Biblical and Gnostic texts. However, one of the main sources is found in the writings of Blessed James of Voragine (c.1230-1298), author of ‘The Golden Legend’. According to Voragine, Mary was of royal blood, the daughter of Syrus (Syrian) and Eucharia (from eucharis, gracious, a term applied to Aphrodite). She, her brother, Lazarus and her sister Martha owned seven castles, in addition to the village of Bethany and much of Jerusalem.

Gnostic references refer to her as the favored disciple in the inner circle traveling with Jesus. The following quote spoken by Jesus to Magdalene illustrates her exalted role as a woman among the other disciples:

“Mariham, Mariham, the happy, this whom I shall complete in all the mysteries of the things of the Height. Speak in boldness, because thou art she whose heart straineth toward the Kingdom of the heavens more than all thy brothers… you who will give light upon everything in accuracy and in exactness.” From Pistis Sophia (Askew Codex), quoted in the book‘Mary Magdalen’ by Susan Haskins.

The Gnostic Gospel of Philip describes Magdalene as “… the companion of the Saviour. But Christ loved her more than all the disciples and used to kiss her often on the mouth. The rest of the disciples were offended by it and expressed disapproval. They asked, ‘why do you love her more than all of us?’ The Saviour answered and said to them, ‘Why do I not love you like her: When a blind man and one who sees are both together in darkness, they are no different from one another. When the light comes then he who sees will see the light, and he who is blind will remain in darkness…”

She anointed Jesus twice with her alabaster jar of Nard, once upon his head, and another time at his feet, wiping them afterwards with her long hair. This fragrant, sweet-smelling ointment is known as Spikenard, which in those days grew high in the Himalayan Mountains. This would have been part of the sacred marriage ritual known to the high priestesses of that time. However, for two millennia, Magdalene has been portrayed by the church as a sinner and prostitute, not as Bride. Yet, in the Old Testament’s Song of Solomon, a series of beautiful love canticles between a bridegroom and his bride, this act of anointing is identified as symbolic of espousal.

“You spread a banquet before me, you anoint my head with oil”.

In ancient Hebrew, Sumerian and Egyptian times, priestesses were trained in music, healing arts, and high magic, using chant, sacred dance and herbal unguents as medicine. During the third and fourth centuries A.D., Emperor Constantine and the council at Nicea decreed that women were forbidden to speak or sing in church and the healing traditions of women across the Mediterranean and Europe were suppressed.

The following quote from ‘The Gospel of Mary Magdalene’, a translation from the Coptic text with commentary by Lean-Yves Leloup, reveals more:

“Mary’s identity as a prostitute stems from Homily 33 of Pope Gregory I, delivered in the year 591… Only in 1969 did the Catholic Church officially repeal Gregory’s labeling of Mary Magdalene as a whore, thereby admitting their error—though the image of Magdalene as the penitent whore has remained in the public teachings of all Christian denominations. Like a small erratum buried in the back pages of a newspaper, the Church’s correction goes unnoticed, while the initial and incorrect article continues to influence readers.”

In his book ‘Genesis of the Grail Kings’, Lawrence Gardner follows the influence of Lilith, a Goddess of extreme light and dark, ‘black but beautiful’, an unusually free spirit, and the original femme fatal. “It was in its dealings with the heritage of Lilith that the Jewish Church of the Middle-Ages came to shadow the Christian Church’s denigration of Mary Magdalene—and it was for the very same reason that she was proclaimed a wicked harlot and a sorceress. Whereas Mary Magdalene was the wife of Jesus and the mother of the sacred Bloodline (the Sangreal) from the 1st century, it was with Lilith that it al began, about 4000 years before.”

Mary Magdalene was one of the women, along with Jesus’ mother Mary, at the foot of the crucifixion cross, and according to the Gospel of John, the first woman to arrive at the garden and see the Risen Christ. Her presence with Jesus in the garden not only reveals her key position with Him, but places Magdalene at the center of the Resurrection Mysteries.

The Pentagram and Venus in Magdalene’s Land:

Legends abound regarding Magdalene’s tenure in southern France, arriving with her small entourage under the protective guidance of Joseph of Arimathea in about 42 A.D. (following the crucifixion). And now, every year on the twenty-fifth of May, throngs crowd into the seaport village of Saints-Marie-de-la-Mer to carry her effigy through the streets, with the music of the many gypsies and their horse-drawn carts, who have gathered from all over Europe to celebrate Magdalene’s arrival.

In about 1971, a British writer and scholar named Henry Lincoln arrived in nearby Rennes le Chateau (Queen of the House) to research his theories on the royal bloodline of the House of David, the lineage of Magdalene and Jesus. (He is known for his book Holy Blood, Holy Grail, co-authored with Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh). Rennes is perched on a steep mountaintop, about twenty-five miles from Carcassonne, an impressive medieval walled city. For centuries, it has been on the ancient Christian pilgrimage route, which stretched from northern Europe to Santiago de Compostela, Spain (translating as land of stars). Paulo Coelho (Diary of a Magus) and Shirley MacLaine (The Camino) have both written of the mystery and magic of their own long walks along this sacred path.

The Sacred Pattern
Magdalene’s Pentagram at Rennes
From Key To The Sacred Pattern
by Henry Lincoln
A: Bezu summit, (maps name the spot as Chateau Templier Ruines).

B: High mountain point aligned with two Templar churches, Antugnac and Granes.

C: Tour Magdala at Rennes

D: Blanchefort, ruin of an ancient watch tower.

E: La Soulane Mountain, visible local high point

Henry Lincoln has dedicated three decades to decoding Mary’s mysteries in the land surrounding Rennes, and his findings are documented in his book ‘Key To The Sacred Pattern’. Lincoln also produced a series of BBC documentaries covering the Rennes mysteries, one of which was ‘Shadow of the Templars’, showing his discoveries of a five-pointed star in the relationship of the mountains and key Templar shrines around Rennes, and the star’s hidden image in the old parchments of the Priory of Sion.

Rennes le Chateau’s village church was consecrated to the Magdalene in 1059 and in 1891, the parish priest, Berenger Sauniere began church restorations, adding new altars honoring the Magdalene. In this process, he discovered old parchments, one dating from 1244, another from 1644, said to contain genealogies of the royal bloodline.

The Priory of Sion was tied with the Knights Templar and claims of the Merovingian kings to be descendents of the Davidic bloodline through the lineage of Mary Magdalene and Jesus. Many of the Parisian elite belonged to this secret society, including the French music composer Claude Debussy, listed as Grand Master of the Priory of Sion. 

Merovingian grail watermark
Merovingian grail watermark with fruit of the vine or royal bloodline of MM
Because of Magdalene’s role in the Crucifixion and Resurrection of Jesus, she was seen by the Gnostics and mystics of the Middle-ages to be ‘The Medium of Secret Revelation.’ These same Gnostics also associated her with the planet Venus. In the cultures of Egypt, China, Babylon, Druids, Mayans and many more, the movements of the stars and planets determined ceremonial cycles and the building patterns of megalithic sites and temples. Lincoln states:

“As they turn, the planets are showing us the mysterious workings of God’s hand, expressed in the harmonious movements of the spheres… each planet, as it revolves in its orbit, reaches positions where Earth, Sun and Planet form distinct alignment patterns… only one planet shows us a perfect geometrical form. This form is pentagonal and the planet is Venus. Creating five equally-spaced alignments over a period of eight years, she draws the perfect, hidden and secret symbol of the five-pointed star in the heavens… as above, so below. The very landscape bears the sign of her secret revelation.”

Sedona’s Pentagram and Madonna Rock

In esoteric mystery schools, the pentagram represents creative power and the potential realized human. The ideal physical proportions are seen by overlaying the human form upon the pentagram, with the reproductive organs at the center. The five-pointed stars appear repeatedly on the Egyptian temple walls, symbolizing Eternity, and in another Egyptian reference, when one both perceives and expresses beauty through all five senses, the possible ‘star’ human is born. To the Pythagoreans, it is the number love because it represents three, the first male number, and two, the first female number. Again, we find references to the sacred marriage and the alchemy of Magdalene’s love and reflections of that sacred harmonic perfection. According to John Anthony West, in ‘Serpent in the Sky’, “Five may also be called the universal number, as from the roots of two, three and five, all harmonic proportions and relationships can be derived. The interplay of these proportions and relations commands the forms of all matter… Five is the key to the vitality of the universe, its creative nature.” And in the alchemy of the elements of creation, the fire, earth, air, water and ether (spirit) work their magic to cleanse, renew and transform all forms of life

In Sedona’s landscape temple, we find the Madonna impressing her healing image, reminding us again of her message of eternal life and love. In Nicholas Mann’s book ‘Sedona Sacred Earth’, he presents his discovery of a natural five-pointed star pattern in the red rocks, with the dominant high points of the landscape falling at each point, amazingly similar to Lincoln’s Rennes-le-Chateau Magdalene pentagram. The naturally occurring star points are Lee Mountain, the Airport Vortex, Cathedral Rock, Courthouse Rock and a butte behind Camel Head, with Madonna Rock at the exact center! (Cathedral Rock also has the image of a man and woman in the central spires, and is a popular backdrop for thousands of marriage ceremonies). The Sacred Pattern
Madonna’s Pentagram in Sedona – See Large Image
Reprinted from Sedona Sacred Earth
by Nicholas R. Mann


Mann notes in Sedona Sacred Earth: “One of the properties of the pentagram is that the lines bisect each other according to the Golden Section (the l.618 or phi ratio of creation and perfect harmony in music as well as matter—author’s note). By its presence in the pentagram, the Golden Section signals that where five’s are found in the pattern of the natural world conditions will be most beneficial to life, as for example in the number of petals in the flowers of edible plants.”

(Note: In my earlier reference to the Red Spring at Chalice Well in Glastonbury, England, and its blood-birth symbolism, the inner chamber below the ground-level where the red spring emerges is a pentagonal shape based on ancient Egyptian geometric measurements… a further key to the sacred patterns and the mystery of the Divine Feminine.) 

Ancient Grail legends promise the healing of the wasteland, our torn and fragmented human psyche and its reflection in the spoiling of the Earth. The Grail of the fire in the heart shall be restored, and the missing chords are being found again in the song of the sacred feminine. We must reclaim the gardens of Earth, and invite Magdalene’s beauty and blessings into our lives. At last it is time for her to re-emerge from the underworld of the deep caverns of denial and enter fully into our consciousness. Mary’s legacy is the path of deepest love, unsealing the springs long dry and deserted, and opening us to a greater passion for life. Her signs and images reflect back to us the harmony of the heavens, here in the land and in our hearts. And interestingly, the Roman numerals for this millennium are MM, the initials of Mary Magdalene and her secret insignia in the Grail Mysteries. 

Merovingian grail watermark
Signs of love in the land (old tree stump)
 

And I do believe all shall be well,
all manner of things shall be well,
when the fire and the rose are one.

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The Black Madonnas of France by Cassandra Eason

The Black Madonna Tradition
Black Madonnas are potentially the most exciting mystery and source of mysticism within the Catholic Church today. They can be frequently traced back to pre Christian mother goddess figures and have become even more than conventional Marian figures, associated with healing miracles, pilgrimages and even magical powers. For this reason they are often kept in crypts or dark corners of a church, tolerated, but often mistrusted by more conventional religious authorities.
The Black Madonna
The Black Madonna is the hidden secret in the heart of Catholicism, the old often demonised pagan goddess tradition actually thriving in churches today, though to those who worship her she is the Mother.
In some cases Black Madonnas are the oldest of statues. Often Catholic churches and cathedrals were built on top of former goddess shrines and in the case of at least some Black Madonnas, for example at Chartres Cathedral near Paris the original statues now worshipped as Black Madonnas may in fact have been originally pagan goddesses who were renamed to transfer worship of the Earth Mother to the Virgin Mary.
In France, where the majority of Black Madonnas are found, indigenous mother goddess worshipping traditions date back to the Goddess of Laussel, found in the entrance to an Ice age cave in the Dordogne region in central France. She was crafted around 23,000BCE and is important because she is the first representation of the Earth Mother as a lunar deity. She holds in her right hand a bison horn, shaped like the crescent-Moon. The horn is divided with 13 marks probably representing the 13 moons in a lunar year. Her other hand touches her womb.
Photo: Black Madonna at Meymac in the Correze department, France.
The Origins of the Black Madonna in Europe
Even today there are more than 500 known Black Madonna statues and paintings throughout the world, the majority in France, though many more that have been documented in historical records were destroyed during the French Revolution. Others too may stand unnoticed in shadowy corners of small churches and chapels, as they have done for hundreds of years, loved by the local worshippers and without any need to be rediscovered.
As the indigenous goddess worship evolved in Europe, statues of dark skinned Middle Eastern goddesses such as Inanna, Astarte, Artemis and Cybele were introduced to the European continent by Phoenician traders from 1550BC to about 300BCE. The Phoenicians came from the coastal regions of modern day Lebanon, Syria and Israel and were highly influential culturally. Indeed their phonetic alphabet is believed to be the forerunner of most modern alphabets. The Roman invasion of Gaul (France) and other parts of Europe also encouraged worship of these goddesses, to flourish.
The cult of Isis was the dominant religion of the Mediterranean during late Roman times, and had spread into Roman-occupied lands, including Gaul. Many Isis statues cradling her infant son Horus on her lap passed straight into Christianity as churches were created over the temples.
As late as 550 CE, Isis still had a temple in Soissons, just north of Paris and the Middle Eastern goddesses co-existed with the Celtic Gallic deities.
The Graeco-Roman Mother Goddess Cybele and Artemis/Diana of Ephesus, both dark skinned fertility goddesses were still worshipped in France and the Mediterranean coast from Antibes to Barcelona during the later centuries of the Roman Empire. Cybele was during the 3rd century the supreme deity of the town of Lyon that was capital of a vast area of South-eastern France, a region where many Black Madonnas are found. Marseilles was devoted to Artemis.
During the Middle Ages, the Crusaders returned from the Middle East, bringing goddess statues and some such as the mystical Knights Templar, many of whom who were wiped out as heretics,were involved in promoting the cult of the Black Madonna and her association with Mary Magdalene.
Mary Magdalene was the alter ego of the Mary virgin birth. The Merovingians identified the Black Madonna as Mary Magdalene. Through the bloodline of Mary Magdalene, the Merovingians claimed to be the rightful Kings of France, with descent from Christ’s son by Mary Magdalene, the infant depicted in her arms in the Black Madonna statues. Some legends say she married Christ at the wedding at Cana where he turned water into wine.
The Goddess beneath the Earth
Further evidence of the Black Madonna’s pagan and nature worshipping origins is the fact that Black Madonnas were frequently discovered hidden in trees or caves in France and Spain as late as the seventeenth century. Legends grew up that suggested these dark wood statues had magical powers that called the chosen finders to hiding places sometimes deep in undergrowth. Of course there were priests who perhaps were sympathetic to the old ways who may have known that a pagan goddess statue was kept in a particular cave and brought out for worship in the old nature religions that are still practiced in woodlands and groves worldwide today.
At a particular time when the local religious climate was amenable to combining paganism and Catholicism, some priests may have persuaded simple peasants they had discovered one of the Black Madonna figures in its hidden natural place and so this was a way of introducing the pre Christian statue into the mainstream religion. In churches today, Black Madonna statues may by coincidence or design, be kept in a crypt or subterranean part of a church or cathedral near a sacred spring or well.
Photo: St. Quentin-la-Chabanne (La Creuse (23) France): Notre Dame de Sous-Terre situated in the crypt. 17th centuryreplacing the original that was destroyed by the Protestants.
Our Lady of the Trees
Many Madonnas found locally are made out of local wood, as with the linden wood Madonna of Altötting in Bavaria. In Altötting the tiny chapel is described as womb like, windowless and painted black, with the walls studded with gold and silver images and ornaments. Her shrine is surrounded by thousands of ex voto or stone tablets expressing thanks for blessings received. Some date back to the 13th century and range from healing when all hope was lost to the safe return of a traveller and crutches were also left as proof of healing.
The site of the Altötting chapel was sacred in pre Christian times and the linden tree was revered by pre Christian peoples. The Black Madonna is the oldest Christian site in Bavaria, dating back to 680 CE and the Linden Madonna was placed there. In 907CE the town was ransacked by the Hungarians and only the chapel and statue survived. The present Black Madonna dates from 1300.The ancient linden tree stood next to the chapel, but in 1674 was cut down to make room for a basilica to enclose the chapel, but it was never completed. Centuries later a new linden tree was planted. A number of miracles have been attributed to the linden tree Madonna. In 1489 when a three year old boy drowned in a local stream and her mother took her dead child to the Virgin statue, the child was revived. Not long afterwards it was reported that a farmer’s six year old son fell off a horse drawn grain-wagon and was crushed beneath the wheels. The family asked for help from the Virgin and the boy was restored to full health. The unbroken Mother tradition associated with the tree has transferred comfortably to the people who visit the Madonna and many thousands of tourists flock to the site, so making her a valuable resource to the church which may outweigh any doubts about tree worship.
The Protective Virgins
Just as the Black Madonnas became cult worship for many pilgrims, so hatred of them was also very great; especially among those who consider them an affront to the sexless conventional Mary, or fear their darkness, since darkness is quite mistakenly popularly associated with evil.
Over the centuries a number have not just been destroyed but mutilated and decapitated. But the Black Madonna, like her pagan predecessors in nature who incorporates both the creative and destructive aspects of the earth, may fight back.
A fascinating story comes from Evaux-les-Bains in the Creuse area of France; a town famed for its hot springs and was made a spa town by the Romans. This Madonna is mentioned by Ean Begg in an older version of the book, though I have not as yet been able to find other references to this event. It describes how only the head of the statue was preserved after the statue was mutilated at the Revolution and thrown into a well. Of the four profaners soon after the event, one (according to popular legend) cut his throat; One died falling from a rock; one who boasted of breaking the statue’s jaw had his tongue cut out and one was struck by lightning.
In another church, Notre Dame de la Roche, near Mayres in the Puy de Dome, the 14th century black virgin holding a naked crowned child, was apparently stolen at the end of the 18th century, but brought misfortune on the family of thieves.
Photo: In October 2007, the BM pictured above, was decapitated by vandals. She was in the Notre Dame de Marceille just outside of Limoux, near Carcassonne. This photo was taken exactly one year before.
Defending her children
Even more graphically, Our Lady of Rocamadour, 100 miles north of Toulouse in France, who was reputed to bring dead babies back to life long enough so they could be baptised and so their souls go to heaven, took revenge on the attackers of three of her faithful pilgrims. It is told how in the 12thcentury, three pilgrims were robbed and guided on impassable ways they might have perished. They called out to the lady and she took away the sight and paralysed the hands of the robbers. But the pilgrims asked Mary to restore them and so she did. A bell on the ceiling of the Madonna chapel rings when she saves someone who calls on her for example sailors at sea as a sign she has saved them and they would make pilgrimages to thank her.
The original Rocamadour site was dedicated to Cybele and to later to Venus, the Roman love and fertility goddesses. This Madonna is one of a number attributed to St Luke but the present statue is 9th – 12th century.
But it is the painting of the Black Madonna of Czestochowa, Poland that is credited with the most magical powers to protect Poland from attack and is revered by Polish people throughout the world. It is a painting of the Madonna and Christ Child which legend states was originally painted by St. Luke the Evangelist, on a table top from a table built by Jesus.
The picture itself has been damaged in battle and again the Virgin took her revenge. In 1430 in the town of Czestochowa, in Poland where the painting was kept in a specially created monastery church, Hussites overran the monastery and one of the invaders slashed at the painting twice with his sword. One of the robbers drew his sword, struck the image and inflicted two deep gashes. While preparing to inflict a third gash, he fell to the ground and writhed in agony until his death. The two slashes on the cheek of the Blessed Virgin, together with a cut on her throat in an earlier attack, have always reappeared though many attempts have been made to repair them.
In 1655, Poland was overrun by the forces of the Swedish King Charles X, The monks defended the portrait against a forty day siege and, it was said, as a result of the Madonna’s intervention, Poland was able to drive out the invaders.
In 1920, the Russian army gathered the banks of the Vistula River, threatening Warsaw. The image of the Madonna was seen in the clouds over the city. The Russian troops withdrew.
Our Lady of the Snows, who takes her name from an apparent natural phenomena miracle
Like any good mother, our Lady of the Snows, the Black Virgin of Aurillac, the Cantal region of the Auvergne in France, defended her children with her life. The first Black Madonna in Aurillac was brought back from the Crusades by one of the local feudal lords. Yet though her body was destroyed by the Huguenots, it is believed she helped defeat them. On August 5th, 1581, the enemy were camped ready to storm the town by night. But the Black Madonna is credited with lighting up the sky as bright as the sun and so the cockerels began crowing. The noise and the light woke the people and the Black Madonna was seen at the chapel door holding Baby Jesus. She then sent a huge snowstorm to drive back the enemy. Freak electrical lighting? Hail? Whatever the effect the people were inspired to rally and defeat the enemy. Earth goddesses are traditionally said to have great power over the weather.
The Druids’ Black Madonna
Chartres Cathedral near Paris, home of the magnificent 11-coil labyrinth that is 40 foot (approximately 12 metres) in circumference, itself a mother goddess symbol, is home to two Black Madonnas. The pagan earth religion is never very far from the surface of this magnificent Gothic cathedral. Chartres Cathedral, built on a former Neolithic burial mound, was known to the Gauls as Carnutes and was according to Julius Caesar, the central annual meeting place for the Druids and Druidesses of Gaul and beyond.
Above the South door at Chartres Cathedral are sculpted oak twigs and tree spirits. Oak leaves are also entwined around the Black Virgin of the Pillar a statue who stands in the main church and it is believed that the wouivre, the ancient female earth power rises up through her from the well.
The Black Madonna of the crypt, Notre Dame sous terre (Our Lady Underground) made of pear wood, with her crown of Druidic oak leaves, was one of the major prayer and offering shrines on the mediaeval labyrinth pilgrimage. She is apparently a replica of an old Black Madonna, destroyed during the French Revolution when the statue was actually burned on an execution pyre during the Revolution. But this destroyed statue was itself an 11th or 12th century statue and there are earlier references to a small black image, of pagan origin, the Virgin whom it was predicted by the Druids would give birth to a saviour. What has happened to this is not known. Even today you can walk as pilgrims have for hundreds of years through the crypt past the Druidic healing well, through the centre of the labyrinth to the place in the east where the sun strikes a nail in the paving on the Summer Solstice. This is another ancient spot that has been Christianised, perhaps once the site of a monolith, a single stone aligned to the Midsummer sunrise, in both cases representing the birth into light. The Virgin Mary’s veil she wore to give birth is also kept here, so making it even more of a female fertility site, as it may have been for thousands of years albeit under a different goddess name.
Sick pilgrims would through the centuries sleep in the crypt, the womb of the mother and as they emerged, reborn, well again it was hoped and here nuns cared for them.
The 11-coil labyrinth shown here is situated in the nave of Chartres Cathedral, said to be the finest Gothic cathedral in Europe.
The Healing Madonnas of the leys, the Black Virgin of Montserrat
Great powers of healing are associated with Black Madonna statues. One explanation is that the statues conduct the powerful earth energies associated with Ley lines along which many Madonna sites are found. Montserrat near Barcelona in Spain, like Chartres is on a Ley line. Ley lines are hypothesized as invisible psychic energy tracks beneath the earth along which people from ancient times built their temples and shrines.
Their purpose was so that they might connect with a power beyond themselves that in earlier times was associated with the power of Mother Earth. The small wooden Virgin of Montserrat called La Moreneta (the Dark Maiden) is a statue of the Virgin Mary and infant Christ that is venerated at the Santa Maria de Montserrat monastery in the Montserrat mountain near Barcelona in Catalonia. The original statue is attributed to St. Luke, brought to Montserrat; it has been suggested by St. Peter in AD 50.
Centuries later, the statue was probably hidden from invaders, in nearby Santa Cova (now the Holy Grotto) and rediscovered in the late 9th century by shepherd children among rocks. They saw bright lights and heard singing coming from a cave in the mountain. Stories abound of how a Black Madonna chooses its own site and will either return there mysteriously if moved or become so heavy it is immovable Legend has it that the Benedictine monks could not move the statue from its Holy Grotto to construct their monastery, choosing to instead build close to the grotto. The Benedictines are said to be the last religious order to have knowledge of ley energies and to build their abbeys and monasteries along them. The present statue is carbon dated to the 12th century. On September 11, 1844, Pope Leo XIII declared this high profile virgin of Montserrat patroness of Catalonia.
Another Black Madonna who insisted on returning to her own site again associated with ley energies is the Black Madonna of Limoux, south of Carcassone in France, The church at Limoux is called the Notre Dame de Marceille and as with Montserrat the Madonna was found in the earth like the Montserrat Madonna.
It is told, though not accurately dated that a ploughman digging a filed on the slopes of Marcellan found his ox would not go forward whatever he tried. The ploughman started to dig and found the wooden smiling Madonna, brown and dark. He took the statue home but the next morning it had disappeared and was back in the place he found it. This happened three times and when the local monks heard they built a chapel there. Other Madonnas prove too heavy to move no matter how hard people try if they are in the right place. Our Lady of Oropa, the northern Italian region of Piemonte was brought to Italy by St. Eusebius (martyred in 371 A.D.) and placed in a cave that was a pre-Christian site sacred to Apollo and various goddesses. She had been found buried under ruins in Jerusalem. When more than a thousand years later a group of monks tried to move her to a new location, the three foot tall statue became so heavy the monks had to return her to her cave and she felt light again.
Photo: Black Madonna in the Notre Dame de Marceille just outside of Limoux, near Carcassonne
extracted from http://www.http://cassandraeason.com/vierge_noir/
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Alchemy – living with the inner tension of a Hermetically sealed jar

The Ancient Wisdom is imparted to those who have ears to hear
and eyes to see.  Keeping an open mind and a willingness to
see beyond the veil of the ego-mind, bent on its own ideas
being right and on its own knowledge,
will reveal that all structured religion, as well as
its esoteric, hidden side, contain the same message
and has done so for much longer than the past four
thousand years of better known history,
The Alchemist is such an ancient symbol, as is Alchemy.
Alchemy is a symbolic representation of the unfolding
and transformation of the
spiritual and invisible inner life as well as
the reflection thereof in the physical life – as above, so below.

Alchemy seems almost magical :  without any outside interference, other than
providing the container and the initial material.
And actually, the Divine Alchemist, provides both and
you are caught up in the process without even realising it.

Processes of discolouration, chemical and substantial changes
and elemental  transformation takes place, with the
grand opus being the manifestation of the most valuable metal,
gold.
When you witness the spiritual unfolding of the Self in your
own self, the image and symbol of Alchemy arises spontaneously in your inner seeing,
and without any prior knowledge of these symbols,
And even more importantly, these symbols are not bound to
any culture, tradition or religion.
They arise from the collective unconscious and are
then integrated into the culture and tradition under various names
and into the cultural myths and stories.
However, when you look deeper and beyond the name,
you will recognize the same qualities and attributes.

This shows us that our own spiritual unfolding
and enlightenment (the process of revelation)
is not a process limited to the individual self, but
that these Great Beings and Powers, work
in and through us;
that these aspects of the One lies dormant
in the psyche until the Wheel of Time stops
at a crucial point and the necessary mix of
feeling, thought and events meet on the cross
of the physical and spiritual.
Unless your hand turns the Wheel of Time (Kala),
you cannot possible regard these events
as personal.

At that crucial junction where above crosses with below,
it is as though these Powers move onto the stage
of your inner world, playing out the script which is required.
At these times you are aware of extreme pressure,
discomfort, intense feelings and emotions and often
you feel ‘put upon’ by life and its injustices.

It would seem that without any help or real input
from you, amazing (not always pleasant or easy)
changes take place in the
inner laboratory :
at times you feel as though you are dissolving
and disintegrating;
at other times you turn black with depression
and red with the anger of injustice.
It seems that life is grinding down your very bones
so that only white chalk remains
and when you remember to step back, into the role of the observing
alchemist, you eventually will
witness and realise that the contents of the jar
has blossomed and that old habits and thought forms
are a dim memory in the past.
But obviously this does not happen overnight,
and it requires great patience and no attention
to be paid to Time.

At the centre of the alchemist’s laboratory is the
hermetically sealed container.
The word hermetically comes from Hermes, the
messenger of the Gods and the Bringer of Alchemy,
an Egyptian god. 
Hermetically means that the jar is air-tight,
a vacuum jar really.

When it is hermetically sealed, it implies that it is isolated
from its surroundings and everything outside of itself :
that it is completely dependent on and focused on the inner process 
between the prima materia (the first matter or material
that was placed in the jar) and the pressure
from being contained in a sealed container.
Sealed off also implies that the matter undergoing
the process, is contained.

The alchemical container represents the central nervous system,
which runs up the spine and looks like a living tree,
the Tree of Life. Serpents of Fire and Light
live in this Tree, the one gold and the other black
or seen as red and white – they bring darkness
and light; negative and positive, joy and sorrow.

The sealed container is one of the most important parts
of the process.  In practical terms, the inner container
is sealed through mental focus and Awareness.
During this time you are aware of great inner tension and
pressure.

As the Divine Life, the Prima Materia, dances
and moves, marry and blossom
into new life, the tension of the opposites
can seem unbearable at times.
As the Light and Darkness snake up and down
the Tree, your inner self is confronted with
a collective unconscious which seems almost
too fantastical or frightening to witness and absorb.

You can imagine a pressure cooker as a modern
symbol of alchemy.  It can only cook
while the steam is kept within and the pressure is maintained.
When you take the lid off and let the steam out,
the pressure cooker can no longer cook the food
inside and the raw ingredients will not become
the nutrient and hearty soup that is meant to feed and nourish
 your body.

Through Awareness, you can contain the inner process
of transformation.  When you react emotionally,
get entangled mentally in trying to understand the
process, picking at reasons for why the matter
is turning into these various substances,
you are unsealing the container – you
are literally letting off steam and the process
is spoiled which means that you will have to start
all over again – eventually you will run
out of Time and you will have to spend
another lifetime trying to allow the same process
to alchemize.

The ancient alchemists and philosophers called the human psyche
the Prima Materia, or the Microcosmos – a small world, wherein heaven,
earth, fire, water, and air exist as well as sickness, death, birth, the creation,
the resurrection, and also the Philosopher’s Stone, as it was made of one thing.
The key to Wisdom lies within the hermetically sealed jar, within the
Prima Materia, that secret ingredient which cannot be
dissected or analysed.
The Prima Materia, or the Psyche, is connected by a thread,
a breath of Prana, to the Divine.
This connection is symbolised by the Ankh, given to Isis by Hermes.

In the esoteric western mystical traditions, the goal or final
object of the spiritual quest is the Holy Grail, the cup of fulfillment
and eternal life.

The Holy Grail is the process of Alchemy – it is living with the
tension of the opposites, through Awareness and with
the Divine Knowledge that you hold the Ankh in your hand.

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Important dates in Temple of Mary




TEMPLE OF MARY INITIATION, RETREAT AND WORKSHOP DATES


INITIATION RETREATS


Second Initiation into the Temple of Mary – Mystery of the Cosmic Christ and the Rose Queen
Friday 19 (19h00), 20 and 21 April till 15h00 at Blue Butterfly Tulbagh. This will be the Second Initiation in the Temple of Mary incl Initiation Manual,  Freedom through Love process on cd. Cost R2750

Third Initiation into the Temple of Mary – The Mysteries of Sophia, Our Lady of Wisdom and the etheric bodies
Friday 30 (19h00), Saturday 31 to Sunday 1 September 15h00 at Blue Butterfly Retreat Centre Tulbagh Cost R3000

Fourth Initiation into the Temple of Mary – The Ancient Power Mysteries of Isis
Friday 14 March to Sunday 16 March 2014
Blue Butterfly Retreat Centre Tulbagh

YATRA (PILGRIMAGE)
Sacred pilgrimage to Paris, Chartres and the South of France – Notre Dame, Montmartre, The Temple of La Madeleine, Chartres, the Mary Magdalene pilgrimage, Sarah la Kali and Lourdes
18 – 30 May 2014
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Redemption



There is a favourite story of the Hopi, who once lived under the earth 
and there was an overpopulation problem. 
The Hopi men did nothing about it but then the women
became so intolerable that the Hopis made up their mind to climb a level higher. 
Then they settled again and everything went right, 
and then again there was overpopulation, and the men did nothing. 
They would have gone on like that forever if the women 
hadn’t become so impossible, making scenes from morning till night. 

Then the men got going. That is still true. 
And that is why the doctrine of a lady, 
who should never raise her voice and always be like the Virgin Mary, 
really causes her husband to remain asleep about his anima problem. 

If she doesn’t make a thunderstorm from time to time, 
he generally doesn’t wake up, 
he just doesn’t see. – Marie-Louise von Franz, 
The Cat A Tale of Feminine Redemption





She who will no longer be silenced.

This relationship between masculine and feminine,
man and woman, husband and wife,
starts within the self and She is stirring
and waking the masculine world.
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To find our true heart is to find our dark side too. The heart is not all bliss and goodness. An opened heart reveals who we are in all its fullness. Sin (the error of missing the mark) is the choice to act out our dark side – what Carl Jung calls our shadow.

Our work is to turn from sin, that is to repent and make amends. Then we commit ourselves to act from choices that lead us to act from light. Our mistakes
motivations.

Even our faults become honey in the hive of our hearts.

How do we deepen our hearts as well as open them? We increase our capacity to love others unconditionally This inclusiveness makes letting go of fear a spiritual practise. We cannot do this alone. It requires Grace. The belief that. if we dont do things ourselves, they wont happen, leads to a sense of emptiness. Grace is the gift of God that expands and and extends our love and virtue beyond what our ego is capable of on its own – Robert B Clarke, The Sacred Heart of the World

blessings
Bhakty Maria Ma

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Grace by Astera Devi Maria

Of mind and heart, soul and spirit,
Grace; the thousand suns, the darkest hour.
An oozing puss of mystical reality,
Paradox comprehended for one brief moment.

A sigh,
Suspended.
Oh the sweet sweet breath,
What humbling rapture of true stillness.

Grace; the bursting Love of Being,
Generosity of existence – life and death.
To my knees I’m driven,
May I dissolve to merge more.

My tears flow;
in joy, in humility, in reverence.
A shudder taketh my breath away.
Gasping as my eyes close again,
my head surrendering the bow of my own crown.

Sweet sweet surrender…

Divine
Saving
Grace

Astera Devi Maria

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Embodiment

After the second initiation you may find that it seems as though your inner and outer landscape is once again shifting and changing. When you marry the physical with the archetypal unconscious, the fairy-tale like atmosphere and reality of Spirit and Soul, then the journey has profound meaning and it becomes a wondrous journey.  With this perspective you also realize that it is your personal journey and that which you see and experience comes from the projection of your own processes.
In ancient symbols the unborn egg of the world is depicted as an egg encircled by a serpent. This serpent guards the unconscious in the same way as your ego guards the shadow.  Kundalini is depicted as the awakening serpent. It is therefore obvious that as the serpent rises up into the masculine levels of consciousness, ie understanding and morality, the unconscious will be opened up. The unconscious waters (mares, Maria, mother) represents the collective unconscious Soul, the feminine principle.  Consciousness must extricate itself from the unconscious, but not completely.  A marriage is needed – a relationship has to be maintained between masculine and feminine, the egg and the serpent.  The spiritual worlds are real – as real as this one – and your soul is fed from the world of spirit.  Red represents matter, soul, feminine, blood and feminine; white represents air, breath, higher thought, spirit and semen and masculine. Red and white are two fundamental colors and processes in alchemy. This sacred interplay of polarities play out right through all the levels and realities until it is manifested in the physical. It is the world’s  ignorance and small, personal point of view that creates the imbalance and dogma and not the masculine and feminine duality. Duality is a wonderful opportunity of creativity and transformation. As the human transforms, so does God(as in life and all its processes).

The journey of kundalini awakening is one of making the unconscious conscious.  And obviously you are battling yourself. On the one hand you are trying to keep your mind safe against the content of the unconscious and on the other hand you are trying to uncover the unconscious. You are indeed hanging on the cross of two polar opposites.  Belief systems is what creates this world of illusion and also which keeps your unconscious tightly locked up in its Pandora box.

It is a subtle journey of walking  with two feet in both worlds.  Resistance to that which is playing out in yourself, will manifest in your mind, your body and your reality. You can regard this as Cosmic guidance.  When you see your own life story reflected in the great archetypal story of Mary, Mary Magdalene and Jesus, then you realize that your personal life and personal unconscious is just a mirror of the greater Mysteries in order for you to undergo the Soul and Spirit Marriage ahead.  The rosary and its mysteries is an invaluable tool to heal the wounds of Pride as inflicted by your ego.  The other side of Pride is the lack of Self-worth inflicted by ego, and its gifts of fear and panic. Can you see the healing available here :  my struggle is the lesser mysteries in reflection of the greater mysteries – I am a point of god consciousness AND no need to be so arrogant and prideful in my own personal struggles (I don’t have to take it all personally)!
Jai jai Maa!
Know that you are at the foot of the mountain of this journey.  An infinite mountain once you have passed through the veil of clouds which seemed to be at its top. Enjoy the journey
Blessings
Bhakty Ma 
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