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Welcome to new initiates

A while ago I opened the doors of The Temple of Mary
for the first time for online studies and initiations.
Welcome to those who have entered the Hearth
and may your every step be guided.
Through working with initiates in this ‘new’ way
I am updated and revising the course material
in an ongoing way and thus the flame is burning ever brighter


With the aid and help of God, She (Alchemy) reveals all hidden energies of the
whole wide world.  As the vine grower grafts the vine to the elm and
espalier, thus the magician, the alchemist, marries and unifies
heaven and earth, the lower and the higher energies.  (Pic de Mirandole)
(from the Initiation into the Immaculate Practise of the Sacred Heart,
Temple of Mary)


First Initiation into the Mysteries of the Temple of Mary – The Immaculate Practise of the Sacred Heart
 
The first initiation into the Temple of Mary is into the Immaculate Practise of the Sacred Heart.  This initiation takes place over a three month period and the meditations and practises shared during this circle of participation, form the foundation of all future practises and diksha.  The foundation work is set in this initiation and we will explore the context of the ancient temple mysteries, the alchemical process and symbols, the wisdom that Tarot offers, the tantric essence of all esoteric paths and more. 

The first step is to apply to enter into the Hearth of the Temple and a questionnaire has to be completed by the applicant. Upon acceptance you will be given a mantra to work with for seven days.  These seven days of chanting the secret mantra will serve to align your conscious and unconscious will with the work of the Temple.  Then you will sit at an agreed time to receive an energetic diksha (transmission of energies) which will initiate you energetically into the Mysteries of Mary.  
After this the manual will be sent to you in pdf format, as well as cds.  The cds contain recorded guidance and illumination of the practises, as well as selected meditation music and chants to be used during your own practise.  You will receive a healing diksha energetically at a mutually agreed time and on-going energetic support.  You will also receive on-line support through e-mails and I undertake to guide and support you to the best of my ability as long as the demands are within the boundaries of acceptable time and energy support.  I cannot resolve your life and its challenges for you – that is your part of your own personal journey.  The initiations of the Temple is designed to give you the context, the tools, the insight and the understanding into your own unconscious and its archetypes and the puppet masters of your psyche and through practise and application, you will be able to develop an awareness of the unconscious and allow the content to move into your consciousness, thus transforming and expanding your own personal consciousness.
When you have completed your training and have received your spiritual name you will have permission to use certain of the diksha and blessings on others in your capacity as Flamekeeper.
I will send you a list of recommended books to read which will assist on your journey towards Self-Realisation.
You will require a rosary, a japa mala, a small altar with cloth and a statue or image of Blessed Mary, as well as a prayer shawl or dhoti.
You will receive emails from time to time with instructions to join in with group meditations on an energetic level and also with healing focus for a specific period of time.
You may want to familiarise yourself with the Tarot as this will assist toward a deeper understanding of the symbols used in the initiations.
It is recommended that you follow my blog The Sacred Mysteries of Mary tarot at http://www.bookofmarysacredheart.blogspot.com for on-going teachings and deeper
insight into the forgotten story of  Mary.
It is important that you are subscribed to the blogs The Wisdom Keeper and The Temple of Mary – links are in the side column of this blog.

Here is the link to the website page :

http://hettiennema.wix.com/sanctamaria#!enter-the-hearth-as-a-flamekeeper/cd2px

blessings
Hettienne Ma



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jai jai maa!

Durga Maa Mala/Rosary
Prem Se Bolo Jai Mata Di
A beautiful hand-made mala or rosary
dedicated to Durga Maa.
Ideal to wear as a necklace and to use
in japa and chanting
She is the fierce aspect of Shakty, the Divine Feminine.
I made this mala in the same pattern as the Rosary of the Holy Mother.
She is one and the same, by whatever name you call Her.
I used freshwater pearls in four different shades of white, pale pink, bronze and cream, interspaced
with swarovski crystals and
beautiful bronze rose beads and a glass heart foil in the centre.
The pendant I bought from one of the traders outside the temple at
Haridwar, India and it is stamped with the OHM on the back.
Here is a beautiful mantra to Durga Maa
to use with the rosary
Ya Devi Sarva Bhutesu Maa rupena samsthita 
Ya Devi Sarva Bhutesu Shakti rupena samsthita 
Ya Devi Sarva Bhutesu Buddhi rupena samsthita 
Ya Devi Sarva Bhutesu Laxmi rupena samsthita 
Namestasyai II Namestasyai II Namestasyai 
Namo Namah 
To the Divine Goddess who resides in all existence in the form of universal mother
To the Divine Goddess who resides in all existence in the form of energy
To the Divine Goddess who resides in all existence in the form of intellegence
To the Divine Goddess who resides in all existence in the form of true wealth
We bow to her, we bow to her, continually we bow to her
————–
Asato Ma sadgamaya
Tamaso Ma Jyotirgamaya
Mrityur Ma Amritam gamaya
Which means:
From untruth, lead me to the Truth,
From Darkness, Lead me towards the Light,
From Death, Lead me to Life Eternal.
(Ma does not mean ‘mother’..its an ‘avyaya’ used for negation (Mayank)
Sharanaagata dinaarta
Paritraana paraayane
Sarvasyaarti harey Devi
Naraayani namostute
Which means:
Salutations be to you, O Mother
You who are intent on saving the downtrodden
and distressed that come under your refuge.
Oh Devi! you remove the suffering of everyone
Om Sarva mangala Maangalye
Shivey Sarvaartha Saadhikey
Sharanye Trayambikey Gauri
Naraayani Namostutey
Which means:
Oh Gauri Ma!, consort of Lord Shiva,
You, who bestow auspiciousness on all,
And fulfill everyone’s’ wishes,
I prostrate myself before Thee,
Take me under your care.
The following Mantras describe the various qualities of Ma:
Ya Devi Sarvabhuteshu
Shakti Rupena Sanshtita
Namastasyai Namastasyai Namastasyai
Namo Namaha
Which means:
Prostrations unto Thee, O Devi (Ma)
who dwells in all beings in the form of Shakti 
This mala, along with other rosaries are available in my shop
www.etsy.com/devata
and more is being added daily for the next two weeks.
Jai guru maa!
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Birthday of Mother Mary – 8 September



The dates of 7 and 8 September are the most sacred to devotees of Mother Mary.  The 8th of September is known as Her birthday.  The first initiation into the Temple of Mary is taking place on these auspicious days. 

Mary is personification, embodiment and goddess of  spirit in ‘matter’ (mater = mother).  The sacred body of Earth and all living beings is the Mother.

As we approach the end of Kali Yuga, a transformation is taking place and a new mythos is being born into the consciousness of humanity :  that of the Cosmic Mother and the Sacred Feminine and very importantly and powerfully, the mythos of the Sacred Marriage, the Union.

Mary, as divine mother for our times,  is recognized in all cultures and traditions.  Here is an extract written by Elizabeth Clare Prophet in the lineage of the Ascended Masters :

Mary – World Mother

In knowing Mary as she really is, I have come to see her as a relentless and constant force, challenging the oppression of her children everywhere, in every faith, in every religion.
She is a World Mother, and I have seen this in her tremendous mastery of life. Her knowledge of administration and organization, as she has conveyed it to me, has given me the real teaching of how to administer my organisation and, with a very capable staff, bring it to this level of complexity of service that we enjoy.

The Mother Flame

When we want to master the details of life in any field, we realize that it is the Mother aspect of God that actually corresponds to Matter, or the Matter universe, as mater is the Latin word for Mother.
And so, here on earth, if we are going to accomplish anything, we must invoke the Mother flame. We must understand the Hindu concept of the Mother aspect of God as the Shakti, the active principle, the force that brings into manifestation the Father’s will.

Ask Mother Mary

So if you want to know how to get things done and how to get them done because your aim is helping people and glorifying God—which is our only reason for being—then ask Mother Mary. And you will find that she is truly a master and not an ignorant peasant woman who happened to be called to give birth to Jesus, as some would have us believe.

Virgin of the Globe - Mother MaryTwin Flame of Archangel Raphael

Mother Mary is of the angelic evolution. These hierarchies also serve on the seven rays of the Godhead that emerge through the prism of the Christ consciousness.
Mother Mary’s ray is the fifth ray, the ray of emerald green, the ray of healing. It is the ray of science, of medicine, of supply and abundance. The economy also comes under the fifth ray.

The Mind of Mary

Mother Mary, then, has great talents in many areas. I don’t think there is a field of human endeavor where she does not have the expertise and understanding to teach others how to realize and implement the highest and best goals. Mother Mary’s mind is vast, vast beyond comprehension.
As we see Mary in the present day, we move to the understanding of a woman in our midst—a Mother Mary who is as modern, as liberated, as tough, as determined as many of the finest women we might meet on earth who are fighting for various causes.

Friend and Companion

We need to see her as friend, as companion, as sister, although she may rightfully be called “goddess” because of the tremendous God consciousness she has.
We must not place her on the pedestal that forces us to become idolaters of her image. But we should revere her in the sense that she has great attainment and great standing in heaven and was chosen to be the mother of Christ because she had the ability to hold the light and the balance for his entire mission.

Mother Mary – Healer

And so the Mother comes to heal us of our sense of sin regarding ourselves or other people. She comes to liberate us, especially in the Christian world, of the enormous division that renders Christianity ineffective. And of course, she comes carrying the sorrow of the people of every single nation on the planet and the determination to help them as we give the prayers and the calls.

Archetype of the New Age Woman

Mother Mary Archeia of the Fifth Ray copyright TSLMother Mary has bequeathed to humanity the archetype of the New Age woman. By her example and constancy, she calls forth the Divine Woman in us all.
She not only shows us how the feminine principle can be redeemed, but why it must be redeemed in order that the Divine Manchild as the unfolding Christed man and Christed woman might appear within every son and daughter beloved of God.
Until the feminine principle of the Godhead is ennobled in each man and each woman, the Christ cannot be born. And until Christ is born in the individual, the evolving identity of man and woman cannot experience the new birth.
Thus, the rebirth of the Christ in man and woman, often referred to as the Second Coming, is necessary for the salvation of the soul; indeed the individual Christ Self is the Saviour of the world of the individual.

Mary’s Appearances Since Her Ascension

Since her ascension, Mary has made several famous appearances and continues today to respond immediately to the call of any and all of her children on earth. In the twentieth century alone, more than two hundred appearances of Mary, the Mother of Jesus, have been reported in over thirty countries.
Some claim Mary has appeared to them as they pray. Others say they have watched her statues “weep” or have seen her images on walls or windows. And some tell us that Mary has revealed to them urgent prophecies and secrets.
Mary has entrusted her messages to unlikely ambassadors—not prelates or popes, presidents or politicians, but children and simple folk. Innocent ones who could receive her messages in humility and convey them with undiluted simplicity.
For forty years Mother Mary gave messages through Mark and Elizabeth Prophet to comfort and enlighten spiritual seekers of all paths.


Excerpted from The Age of the Divine Mother, The Golden Word of Mary series by Elizabeth Clare Prophet.

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Upcoming retreat by The Temple of Mary

Rose Window Cathedral Notre Dame de Paris
Many voices tell us the same message in different languages, symbology, hidden messages and at times obscure poetry.  One has to keep in mind that there is always power at play.  When you have something that someone else wants, you are holding the power.  This is also true for the ‘spiritual’ journey.  There is only one way to ‘know’ and that is to trust your heart and to disobey the Judge.
Seemingly a simple and straightforward step, to trust yourself, but as we know, layers of conditioning have distorted your mind and has led you to believe in the ‘other’ within.  At all times you are self-conscious and aware of watching yourself or being watched by others and acting on the assumption that you are separate from ‘God’ and that there are others who know better or more.
When you discover that you are the ‘other’ and that all beliefs in separation grows from your own mind, you face an inner chaos and darkness which seems impossible to navigate and survive.  And it seems easier and simpler to hold onto someone else’s belief system or to jump back into trying to control your physical reality.
True knowing is not an intellectual activity.  The left brain that continually analyses and tries to make sense of what is going on, depletes your energy system;  breaks down your immune system;  opens you to accident and events that is hurtful.  The left brain ‘rapes’ and plunders the psyche, the Soul within, the heart which is intrinsically part of the One Heart.
This inner division grows into a web of characters and sub-personalities and the inner child (the heart self) becomes stressed and falls into childhood patterns of thinking and reacting.  You may feel overwhelmed and disheartened by the ‘state of affairs’ when you look upon ‘the wasteland of the lands ruled by the wounded fisherking’.  Indeed, fairy tales and myths, mystics and religions alike, have been telling us that we are living in the age of the mind, the brilliant Sun, that scorches the land in the absence of the rain of mercy.
In the alchemical process we are shown the importance of becoming the one.  Or I should say, realising the One.  The duality is created by the mind – the One exists at all times, behind the shadow play of the mind.  And remember, this is not an isolated case of Maya;  this is a collective group mind that has developed through the Age of the Father.
 The first step is to become one in the personality self.  To end the voices of dissension and self-sabotage;  to unite under the Beloved leader within and to obey each and every command of the heart, without question.  One could call this Answering the Call.
Once you have answered the Call, you have to stay with the course, despite the winding labyrinth that your journey takes.  Here you will face many adversaries :  distractions, fear, doubts, suspicion, and running after every red herring that crosses your path.
But it is to stay focused, with your eyes fixated on the symbol of the Beloved, reminding yourself that this work demands the tempering and forging of the sword (the symbol of the mind that serves your healing and highest purpose).
The symbol of the Beloved in the Temple of Mary is indeed the Eternal Bride, the Beloved Goddess and the Sacred Feminine, the Feminine Soul of the One.  The qualities of the feminine are wisdom, beauty, mercy, grace, compassion, nurturing and feeling :  an all-embracing Self that creates and births the alchemical container through Self-Acceptance and Self-Love.
The centre of the alchemical process is the hermetically sealed container and the ability to live with the pressure and the tension of the ‘cooking process’.   Indeed, the many layers of the self will be melted down and this is not a glorious process.  It will invoke fear and resistance in you;  you will try every trick in the book to escape this certain dissolution of the walls of the castle;  and you will fall and you will fail.  But you always have the choice to return to the Great Work and to pick yourself up from the last fall and to take the next step.
The Great Work is the Hieros Gamos, the Sacred Marriage between self and Self;  Heart and Mind;  Psyche and Eros;  God and Goddess.
You right now, already know yourself as all of the above, you are just not aware that it is indeed conscious and present.  Who is looking through your eyes right now?  Who is reading these words?  Who is it that feels great love awakening within your heart?
Maria Sophia is one of the oldest names of the Goddess in Sanskrit.  Maria Prophetissa is the oldest known Alchemist in our mythical history.  She is the Soul, the Shekinah, the in-dwelling Divinity and Presence in you.  The undivided One.
Why do we refer to Her as feminine?  Why do we use gender at all?  Why the Great Mother and the Goddess?
Do not be blindsided by the terminology :  symbols are a way of describing that which we cannot describe with words.  Words limit our knowing and experience as it puts us back into the left brain.  By stepping into the imagery through ritual, ceremony, movement, sound, contemplation and witnessing our feelings, we immerse ourselves into the Knowledge of the One :  the One who is closer than your own breath.
This is a small taste of what you can expect during the first initiation of the Temple of Mary, during the weekend of 7 September.  A weekend of awareness and direct experience;  simple and practical exercises to awaken the inner knowing;  ritual to stir the unconscious and bring the Love to light – a balance between structure and free flowing.  You will receive a note book which you can read in leisure after the retreat and keep with you as a guidebook.  This weekend will be the first of many – each designed to deepen the knowing of Love and to support you as you step out on your path of Soulful purpose and meaning.
All energy blessings (diksha), darshan and any blessings that you receive during this weekend, you may use for your own healing and the healing of others;  you may freely pass it on to others and you will be shown how to do this.
In Grace
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Holy Day of Our Lady of Lourdes

11 February is the Holy Day of Our Lady of Lourdes
As though we are Divine
Ancient friend
Our Divine Mother looks at us
as though we are divine
Flinging flower petals onto our path
she worships the very air we breathe
Adoringly she pulls us onto her lap
embracing her beloved children 
with the passion
of one who has waited for eons
for this reunion.
She whispers softly into our ear
‘my darling son’ my darling daughter’
once and for all shattering any doubt
hat we are the only reason
for her existence
Ethan Walker III
blessings
Hettienne
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Anandamayi Ma

“There comes a time when the Beloved does not leave one anymore;  wherever one may go, He is ever by one’s side and His presence constantly felt.  At an earlier stage one perceived Him within all objects; but now He is not seen within the objects anymore, for there is nothing but He alone. Trees, flowers, the water and the land – everything is the Beloved and only He.  Every form, every mode of  being, every expression – whatever exists is He, there is none beside Him.
If everything is the Lord and nothing but He, then one’s body must also be He – the One Existence.  In this state, when one is deeply absorbed in dhyana, no physical activity – be it the performance of ritual or acts of service – is possible.  For He alone IS.  One no longer exists apart from Him.  Nevertheless, for some who have attained to this condition, the relationship between the Lord and His servant remains and is felt thus : He is the Whole and I am part of Him, and yet there is only the one Self.  Verily, everything is identical, undivided.  To realise this means to be immersed completely into the ocean of Oneness.
After this has been accomplished, one can again do puja and service, for the relationship between the Master and servant persists.  If, after the One Self has been realised, the relationship of a servant to his Master still continues, why should anyone object?  At first this was the path to one’s goal.  After realisation it is He, the One, who serves.  This is real service.
Does then ‘to merge into IT’ mean to become stone-like?  Not so, indeed!
For form, variety, manifestation are nothing but THAT’
We are THAT
It may be asked why there cannot be one and the same path for all?
Because He reveals Himself in infinite ways and form and verily, the 
One is all of them.  In that State, there is no ‘why’. 
Quarrels and disputes exist merely on the way.
With whom is one to quarrel?
Only while still on the way is it possible to have disputes
and differences of opinion

‘At dawn, we went by cycle rickshaws to the railway station. Even at that early hour, pilgrims flocked to the Ganges in a steady stream. Finally, hooting, with a cloud of smoke trailing overhead, the train from Varanasi pulled in, and screeched to a halt. Four young men in spotless white dhotis entered the first class compartment, and carried Ma out on a chair, to which four handles were attached. Ma looked fragile and delicate, wrapped in white cotton cloth. Her black, oiled hair fell over her shoulders. She looked at us with calm eyes. There was no reaction on her face, no sign of recognition of her devotees, many of whom she would have known for decades. She simply looked and her eyes moved slowly around the group. It was pleasant, and I had the strange feeling, that nobody was there behind those eyes. Inexplicably, tears started rolling down my cheeks. “That’s normal when one is touched by a great soul,” someone next to me reassured me. Indeed, I had the feeling that I had been touched by a very pure soul.

While waiting for Ma, we were singing bhajans or reciting the Hanuman Chalisa. Once, a girl of about 10 sat next to me. She sang full-throatedly, though a little out of tune. Listening to her, I liked her more and more. My heart was overflowing with love for her. Then the verandah door opened, and Anandamayi Ma appeared, supported by two women. Even before she reached the cot, she briefly stopped; half turned, and looked somewhat irritated in my direction. When she finally sat down on the cot, her glance settled on me for a long time. Yet this time, Ma’s glance did not strike me or induce any feeling. It seemed as if there was no centre that could have been struck. I simply looked back at her.

Probably Ma’s glance was attracted by the love that I felt for that girl, and probably she really did not perceive us as separate persons. After all, she often declared that it is a mistake to consider one as separate from others. However, almost certainly all of us, as we were sitting there on the verandah during her daily darshan, wished that she appreciated us personally. In addition, if we were honest, we most likely even wished that she appreciated our own person a little more than she appreciated the others.

However, Ma didn’t oblige. She was not consistent in her attention and affection. A genuine guru can see, even if his disciple can’t see it, that the ego is the culprit which makes life difficult. Naturally, he is not interested in flattering the ego and strengthening it – on the contrary. “The association with an enlightened being consists in getting blows to the ego,” Anandamayi Ma once remarked. My ego felt the blows. For example, when she didn’t look at me for long, and it reacted with heavy, resentful thoughts. It wanted to leave. On the other hand, I felt attracted to Ma, because I learnt around her almost effortlessly a new way of life – for example that everything is just right as it is.

“Trust in God. He certainly will look after you and all your affairs, if you really put full trust in Him, and if you dedicate all your energy to realise your self. You then can feel completely light and free,” Ma claimed and it sounded convincing. By ‘God,’ she meant the formless essence in everything. Nevertheless, this essence is not something abstract and cold. It is love, and can be experienced as the beloved. She also said, “You are always in His loving embrace.”

Extracted from www.lifepositive.com/spirit/gurus/the mother supreme

How much more time will you spend at a wayside inn?

Don’t you want to go home? How exquisite it all is….
One is, in his own Self, the wanderer, the exile,
the homecoming and the home….oneself is all that
there is…

Do you want deliverance from the bonds of the world? Then weeping profusely, you will have to cry out from the bottom of your heart: Deliver me, Great Mother of the World, deliver me!…. When by the flood of your tears the inner and outer have fused into one, you will find her whom you sought with such anguish, nearer than the nearest, the very breath of life, the very core of every heart….




It is by seeking to know oneself that the Great Mother of all can be found
(Matri Darshan Ananda Mayi Ma).



Aum Sri Anandamayi Ma Namaha
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La Feile Bride

Bridgit, Mary of the Gael, Goddess and Saint of Poetry, Crafts, Healing and Fire :  Inpiration of poets, artists and artisans.
Brighid, excellent woman,
Sudden flame,
May the fiery, bright sun
Take us to the lasting kingdom.

Song of the Virgins of Kildare

St. Brigid’s church in Kildare was built on a site sacred to Brigid. Where Her eternal flame had once been tended by 19 priestesses, 19 nuns took it in turn to each tend the flame for a day and a night. On the 20th day, the Goddess (or the saint) tended the flame herself.

February 2 is one of the great cross-quarter days which make up the wheel of the year. In the Northern Hemisphere It falls midway between the winter solstice and the spring equinox and in many traditions is considered the beginning of spring and in the Southern Hemisphere it is the beginning of autumn.

In Western Europe, this was the time for preparing the fields for the first planting. This was an important day for grain growing communities who depended on the crops of the earth mother. This is the time of year, when the ground is first awakened and the seed placed in the belly of the earth. The fields were purified and offerings were made to the goddess.

This medieval Anglo-Saxon plowing prayer was said by the farmer while cutting the first furrow.

Whole be thou Earth 
Mother of men. 
In the lap of God, 
Be thous as-growing. 
Be filled with fodder 
For fare-need of men.

The farmer then took a loaf of bread, kneaded it with milk and holy water and laid it under the first furrow, saying:

Acre full fed, 
Bring forth fodder for men! 
Blossoming brightly, 
Blessed become; 
And the God who wrought the ground, 
Grant us the gifts of growing, 
That the corn, all the corn, 
may come unto our need.

 February 2 is also Imbolc, and Candlemas, the holy day of Brighid, Goddess and Saint, La Feile Bride. (pronounced Breede)  

The Sacred Well and Shrine at Kildare

Brighid is a Goddess of many names. In Ireland She is called Brigid, Brigit, Brighid, Brid. In Scotland She is called Bhrighde, Bride Breo-Saighit, Brede. The Welsh call Her Ffraid and the French call her Brigandu.
She is called Brigantia by the Northern English and Bridget in Sweden. Her name is pronounced Brighid or Bree-id.  Some have said that Her name may have come from the word Brihati, which means “high” or “exalted one” in Sanskrit. Her name in Gaelic means “fire tipped, exalted one, high one.”


 Imbolc, also called Oimelc [‘ewe’s milk’] marked the first stirrings of spring when young sheep were born, and when ewes came into milk. On this day, the first of the Celtic spring, Brigid was said to use her white wand to “breathe life into the mouth of the dead winter”, meaning the white fire of the sun awakened the land. 


An old poem stated; “Today is the day of Bride, The Serpent shall come from the hole.” An effigy of the serpent was often honoured in the ceremonies of this day, making it clear that Brighid had aspects as a serpent goddess. As the serpent sloughed its old skin and was renewed, so the land shook off winter to emerge restored; the snake symbolised the cycle of life. When Brighid’s cult was suppressed, then St Patrick had indeed banished the snakes [Pagans] from Ireland. However, Brighid’s popularity was so great that the church transformed her into a saint, allegedly the midwife of Christ and the daughter of a Druid who was converted to Christianity by St. Patrick, and who went on to found the Abbey of Kildare. 

Her festival became Candlemas when church candles were blessed. 

My painting of Bridgit

Brighid was invited into the home by the woman of the house, in the form of a doll or corn dolly dressed in maiden white. Oracles were taken from the ashes of the hearth fire, which people examined for a sign that Brighid had visited, i.e. a mark that looked like a swan’s footprint. If found, it was considered a lucky omen. The swan was an ancient attribute of the goddess Brighid. Many Irish homes still have a Brighid’s cross hung up somewhere. This was originally a solar symbol.


A small community of Brigidine nuns are keeping the sacred light of Brigit burning at Solas Brihde in Kildare.  I spent a week in Kildare, walking the pilgrimage of Bridgit, visiting her sacred well


Her favourite oak tree
a candle blessing at one of the stations of the Brigid walk
prayed at the Abbey of Brede
Weaving the St Bridgit cross is traditional on this day.

I found this step be step instruction on the site of the Brigidine sisters :
1.     Take the first rush/reed and hold it vertically.
2.     Fold a second rush/reed in half at the mid point of the first.
3.     Take a third and fold it around the second parallel to the first. This will now form a T-shaped piece, with one arm having one strand, the second having two and the third having three.
4.     Fold the fourth around the third to form a cross.
5.     Fold a fifth around the fourth, parallel to the single strand. Make sure you hold the centre tight!
6.     Continue folding each reed around the previous reeds.
7.     Work in a circular way until you have created enough of a woven centre. When your centre is as large as you want, hold in the reeds tightly so that the centre is tight and will hold the cross without any difficulty.
8.     Tie the end of each arm carefully and trim ends.

If you would like to read more about my pilgrimage to Brigid, Mary of the Gael and her presence in Glastonbury, please go here :  http://pathofdivinelove.blogspot.com/2011/04/brigidbrigitbridebrede-mary-of-gael.html

Carving of Bridgit milking a cow – on Tower of Michael,
                                                                                  the Tor, Glastonbury                                                                                  

A blessed La Feile Bride to you!!
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Lakshmi’s gilded basket spills over with wealth
But it is Saraswati’s humble mat on which sits wisdom.
Bengali Proverb



Saraswati is the Goddess of learning, knowledge, and wisdom. Her name derives from the Sanskrit words  sara meaning “essence” and swa meaning “self.” She is the wife of Brahma, the creator of the universe. Saraswati is worshipped by students, teachers, schoolchildren, scientists, academics and anyone interested in learning.


She has many titles including Goddess of Speech, Dwelling in the Front of the Tongue, She who Dwells on the Tongues of Poets, the Power of Memory, and She who is Intelligence.

She is usually depicted wearing a white sari, representing purity, sitting on a white lotus which symbolises supreme knowledge. Sometimes she is shown with four arms, and sometimes with two. Her rear left hand holds a book, which betokens that knowledge should be used to better humankind. Her rear right hands holds a rosary, which signifies that knowledge must be based in spiritual truth and not the ego, since knowledge dominated by ego can be destructive. She is accompanied by a swan, a symbol of transcendence and perfection. Saraswati is shown playing a veena, a type of lute, which denotes that the seeker after learning must learn to live in harmony with the world.

One aspect of Saraswati is the early goddess Vac [‘Speech’] who played a major part in creation: the god Prajapati’s mind produced Vac, who then wished to multiply and extend herself. It is said that the world was created through sound; the syllable Om is said to contain the whole process of creation.
In later myth, Saraswati also played a part in creation as the god Brahma divided his body into two parts, male and female. The female half was Sarasvati. She and Brahma mated and produced Manu who went on to make the world.

In a similar legend Krishna divided himself into male and female, purusa and prakriti [spirit and matter]. The female half had five shaktis or dynamic powers; Sarasvati was the shakti whose task was to provide insight, knowledge and learning.


Her feast day is celebrated in early spring, in January or February. on this day, pictures and statues of her are displayed in schools and universities and books, pens and musical instruments are blessed. It is considered auspicious if children speak their first words on this day.
Sarasvati is the inspiration behind all learning, culture, science and the arts, music and dance. She gave the gift of writing to humankind so that her songs could be written down and preserved. She is also the goddess of the spoken word, and eloquence, and words are said to pour from her like a sweetly flowing river’.
She is not a domestic goddess, and would rather give birth to works of art and learning than children, her essence is entirely spiritual, unlike most of the other Hindu goddesses, who are concerned with fertility and motherhood. 

Saraswati is the goddess of learning and acquired knowledge, rather than innate knowledge, whether in the arts, sciences, or spiritual thought. She is the patroness of students and academics, as well as musicians, poets and dancers. As the patron of rhetoricians and writers, she aids in the flow of words and eloquence.Saraswati is invoked to overcome the frailties of mind and poor memory. Above all, she is entreated to bestow the power of conveying knowledge to one’s students. It is said that she is a jealous rival of Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth, and that pursuing wealth alone will assure that Sarasvati’s gifts will desert you.

This beautiful piece was written by Anna Franklin. With thanks to :
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The Goddess




The feminine aspect of the divine has had many faces – goddesses of love and hatred, war and peace, birth and death, summer and winter, night and day, amongst thousands of others. It is time for us to reclaim the Goddess, to reclaim a balanced, harmonious spirituality, and to recognise the Oneness of being within all of creation – Anna Franklin


The Goddess has been known to every race and in every corner of the world. She has had many names and many faces. She is chaste virgin and passionate lover, fruitful mother and barren crone, creator of life and bringer of death. In many places, the feminine side of the divine has continued to be acknowledged, though in the western world, goddesses have been banished and demonised for centuries. ‘God’ is viewed as exclusively male.



However, our earliest deity was the Great Mother who gave birth to and nourished the cosmos. The first images of her appeared from the Pyrenees to Siberia over twenty thousand years ago as the Ice Age receded and people began to follow the herds of bison, horses and cattle across the emerging grasslands. These were figures of goddesses carved in bone, ivory and stone, with large breasts and heavy, pregnant, motherly bodies. The breasts were large enough to nurture many; an image of love and trust. The figures were often daubed in blood-coloured red ochre, and some held horned crescents representing the moon, making the connection between the waxing moon and the waxing womb.


The moon was a powerful image for the Stone Age peoples and embodied a central mystery, changeless but ever changing, constantly renewed. The moon was the first method used to calculate time, marked by its waxing and waning periods. The root word for moon still gives us our words for month, measurement, and menstruation. The moon has four phases (represented on Neolithic pots as a four-armed cross), three visible – waxing, full and waning – then three days in darkness. It seems to have been imagined that the dark phase was the invisible dimension where life gestated; the place where renewal and rebirth occurred. Life begins in darkness; the seed entering the earth emerges from it as a tender plant in the spring. Likewise, the seed of life enters a woman and her baby grows in the shelter of her womb. In the darkness of the tomb, the soul moves towards rebirth.



From 30,000 to 10,000 BCE the cave seems to have been the ultimate sacred place, a sanctuary of the Goddess and a physical representation of her womb- the source of her regenerative power which brought forth the living and took back the dead. On the exterior walls of the cave, images of the Goddess were sculpted; on the inside of the cave, stones were placed representing the souls of the dead who would be reborn there. Animals were painted on the walls so that the spirits of hunted beasts would be placated and renewed. This idea persisted into the Megalithic period.  Among many other such structures, the passage grave at Gavrinis, Brittany, is aligned to the rising sun at the winter solstice, and to the rising moon. Spirals, swirls and other energy patterns are cut on some of the upright stones. Possibly the stones were believed to be the dwelling places of the ancestor spirits, who could be contacted through the stones when summoned. New Grange in Ireland is also aligned to the rising winter solstice sun, and the sun’s rays which flood the chamber at this time fertilises the sleeping earth, and the sleeping dead.

Valentina at Goddess Conference 2007



The Goddess was the goddess of the heavens, the earth, and the underworld of her womb. There are many images of the Goddess as a snake, or depicted with snake patterns over her womb. The snake symbolises the waters of the dimension beyond, the fourth phase of the moon, the powers of regeneration. The umbilical cord connecting the child to the mother has the form of double snakes, and this may lie behind the concept of the double maze connecting this world to the next. The snake was observed to hibernate in the earth, and emerge to shed its skin and regenerate itself, thus it became a symbol of renewal and rebirth. As the Goddess of the Heavens, the Great Mother was depicted as a bird, which travels the sky and roosts on the waters or the earth, and thus can journey through all the realms. Sometimes the body of Goddess statues was egg shaped or carried eggs, or the womb was depicted as an egg.

Just as the breaking of the waters of the womb heralds the life to come, the Goddess was also believed to be the source of the water that fell from the heavens as rain and which welled up from the earth – her body – as springs and rivers. This ancient association persevered for millennia. Wells and springs were named after goddesses such as Anu, Elen, Brigid, and Danu, later to be Christianized as St Anne, St Helen, St Bridget, or preserved in the names of rivers like the Danube.


The development of agriculture freed people from the uncertainties of a hunter gatherer lifestyle; they could settle in one place, cultivate the soil, breed cattle and develop crafts. More than ever, the Mother Goddess presided over the whole cycle of planting, growth, and harvest: the bringer of life, death, and rebirth. Agriculture was probably discovered and developed by women; the harvest season was presided over by Virgo, the virgin mother of the corn.  She was visualized as a maiden holding an ear of wheat marked by the bright star Spica. It is possible that the cultivation of grain dates back to c.15, 000 BCE in the Age of Virgo- earlier than is usually thought- since grindstones, grinders and grain-cutting sickles have been found in Egypt dating from c. 15-16,000 BCE.  The constellation of Virgo is associated with many harvest goddesses including Isis, Ceres, Ishtar, Baalita, Inanna (meaning ‘Queen of Heaven’) and Demeter.

Sometimes the ancient Goddess was portrayed as one being with two heads, an image of the source and its manifestation as one and the same: mother and daughter. This ancient pattern is seen in the story of Demeter, the Greek corn and harvest goddess, and her daughter Persephone (or Kore); the first written reference to the Demeter was in the thirteenth century BCE. The version of her myth that we have today has had male personalities added, but the thread of the original tale can be discerned.

Kore (or Persephone) was picking poppies when Hades, king of the underworld, abducted her. She was taken down to his realm and forced to stay there as his bride. Demeter sought her all over the length and breath of the world, while the earth became barren and sterile as she neglected it. Winter ruled. Then at last, overcome with weariness, she sat down for nine days and nights while the gods caused poppies to spring all around her feet. Breathing in the soporific perfume she fell asleep and rested. The gods took pity on Demeter and decreed that Persephone could return to her mother providing she had not eaten anything while in the underworld. Unfortunately she had eaten six seeds from a pomegranate: she would have to stay in the underworld for six months of the year, and this is why we have winter. When she returns to earth her mother rejoices and the earth blossoms.



The name Kore or Cer for a grain/earth goddess is echoed in many parts of the world. She is Ker, Kern, Kur, Kar, Kan, Kali, Kami-Musumi, Kanya, Kaya-Nu-Hime, Kedesh, Kenemet, Keres, Khamadhenu, Core, Kele, Ceres, Ca, Cabiro, Cailleach, Cel, Cer, Ceridwen, Car, Carman, Cor, and Cybele. She gives us our word ‘corn’ and her name is remembered in the Northern English/Scottish Border custom of making a ‘kern-baby’ or ‘kernababy’, a corn dolly bound from the last sheaf of the harvest. We find her name in the kernel (kern-el) of the grain. According to Robert Graves, cer derives from a Cretan word to do with bees, as cerinthos is bee-bread,cērinos is waxen and so on.  The name multiplied into the name of the Roman corn and harvest goddess, Ceres, meaning ‘spites, plagues or unseen ills’ and this aspect of the Goddess has to be placated- she can blight as well as give. The harvest goddess is also a goddess of death- she kills the spirit of the corn.



The oldest harvest cult is that of the earth goddess. References to it are almost completely obscured in later myths, but occasionally can be seen shining through. In Norse myth Loki steals the golden hair of Sif (the corn). In Ireland, Macha was similarly described as golden haired and was honoured at Lughnasa, the start of the harvest.
Sometime during the 5th millennium BCE, people began to raise stones to form circles, alignments, and burial chambers. Chambers could be built to recreate the womb of the Goddess, activated by a shaft of sunlight entering it at certain times of year. At Midsummer, the shadows of a tall phallic stone crept into the stone circle womb to fertilize it. For megalithic people the earth was not an ‘it’ or a commodity, but a living being.
In some places, the Goddess was believed to have emerged out of the primeval waters as a hill or mound, often seen as the centre of the Earth, its navel or omphalos. The place was often marked by an obelisk or stone, such as the one at Delphi. A similar stone was placed at the druid sanctuary at Uisnech in Ireland and believed to be its navel. From the mound rose the first tree, the cosmic axis which connects the realms. The mound raised over the planted seed is an ancient image of regeneration, reflected in the idea of the burial mound raised over the Megalithic dead, and the pyramid raised over the body of the pharaoh.
In the Kennet Valley (Wiltshire, England) lies the massive man-made Silbury Hill, 130 feet high, built in Neolithic times nearly 4,600 years ago. For years archaeologists thought it must be a burial mound, but investigations have disproved this. Turves were used to construct the inner part of the hill in the Stone Age and remain within, with the grass and insects preserved. They were cut at the beginning of the harvest. Then over a period of about fifty years blocks of chalk covered the turf. It is a harvest mound, representing the womb of the Goddess. Originally, a water filled trench surrounded it, carefully constructed. The full moon in late July or early August (Lughnasa) would be reflected in the waters, so that it appeared a child’s head was emerging from the womb. As the moon moved up through the sky, it appeared reflected at the breast of the image, as though suckling. As the moon moved higher, the ‘milk’ was released from the breast as the moat reflected the lunar light. With the cutting of the umbilical cord (when the moon appears to detach itself from the hill), the signal was given to begin the harvest. Throughout the ancient world a mound of earth was symbolic of the Goddess, sometimes magnified into a mountain of the gods.


Initially the Goddess reigned alone. She had no son or lover. For many thousands of years the Goddess was seen as the single source which was capable of constantly generating and regenerating by her own power- the original meaning of the word ‘virgin’. There are many myths of virgin goddesses giving birth since the power of life was hers alone. Sometime during the seventh millennium BCE came the first recognition of the part males played in the act of creation. Images of the God appeared as horned animals, such as the ram, the bull, or the goat, and the phallic shaped serpent. Images of the sacred marriage of the God and the Goddess began to appear around 4,500 BCE. The god was the fertilizing rain or the light and heat of the sun.


During the Bronze Age the vision of the oneness of creation and the power of the Goddess became fractured and diversified. The Goddess retained the power of life and death, but she now had brothers and sisters, daughters and sons. She acquired many names and there were a variety of mythologies attached to her, but one was held in common: the Goddess acquired a lover who died and was reborn. The pattern of their relationship followed the seasons- they married in spring and their love caused the earth to flower and blossom. With the autumn her lover, the spirit of summer vegetation, died and descended to the underworld realm of the dead. She followed him there and released him again when spring came, and the cycle began anew. This story is reflected in the tales of Osiris, Tammuz, Adonis, Dumuzi, Baal, Jesus and many more.

The Goddess was sometimes visualized as the land itself and called the Sovereign Goddess because everything that happened upon it had to have her approval or it was doomed to failure. In many cultures the earthly king was deemed to rule only through with divine authority. His investiture included a symbolic marriage to the Sovereign Goddess or a real marriage to the queen who represented her. In Irish myth Niall and his brothers were out riding and came to a well with a very ugly hag guarding it. They asked her for a drink, but she demanded a kiss from each in return. All the brothers refused but Niall said that not only would he kiss her, but that he would lay with her as well. He embraced her earnestly and found that instead of an old crone a lovely woman was in his arms. She told him that she was Sovereignty, and he was confirmed as king of Tara. The goddess of the land often has the dual form of maiden and hag (summer and winter).

Towards the end of the Bronze Age the settled Goddess worshippers were overrun by tribes of Aryan and Semitic descent. These warriors worshipped sky and thunder gods, gods of battle, fire and storm, a mythology which developed in the later Palaeolithic Age amongst these nomads who had to contend with a much harsher environment. The invasions had a dramatic impact on the Goddess cultures from Europe to India. The invaders were patriarchal, rode horses, herded cattle and prohibited writing. They appeared as Hittites in Anatolia, as Hurrians and Kassites in Mesopotamia, Achaeans and Dorians in Greece, and Aryans in the Indus valley. Wherever they penetrated they established themselves as the ruling caste. They introduced the idea of the opposition of light and darkness, rather than the totality of the older view. They introduced the idea that man was separate from the deity, and the deity was separate from creation. All that was good and noble was attributed to the master Gods, all that was the native nurture power of the older religion of the Goddess was related to the darkness, which became a negative concept.

In early Sumeria, Egypt and Crete, women played a public role, owning property and transacting business. Sisters and brothers inherited equally. After 2,300 BCE their status deteriorated. The Semitic tribes regarded women merely as the property of men. Brothers, husbands and fathers had the right of life or death over them. Daughters could be sold into slavery or exposed to die. Sons inherited all property. The Aryan peoples had no priestesses and regarded women as chattels.



The concept of the single male deity, a father needing no mother, gradually took hold. The role of the Goddess was denied, and in consequence the status of women was lowered. Christianity, Judaism and Islam converted the Goddess mythology into stories of evil, building churches over sacred sites, and declaring the old gods and goddesses to be demons, or where this was difficult, changing them to Christian saints, as the goddess Brighid became St Brigit in Ireland. Women became less than second class citizens in religion, some theologians even denying them souls. Even today, many deny that women can become priests – a vocation, intelligence, faith and dedication meaning nothing alongside the fact of possessing the wrong set of genitalia. This is a world view that has women as an adjunct to creation, a view that keeps her in her place. All that is male is glorified; all that is female is denigrated as unclean and unfit – too earthly for participation in the worship of a glorious, exclusively male deity who lives apart from his sinful creation. Of course, many Christians, Moslems and Jews are far more enlightened than this, but it remains a lop-sided view of spirituality. The English occultist Dion Fortune said that any religion without a goddess is half atheist.



The deep seated need for a female aspect to deity has persisted throughout the centuries. Denied a goddess who understood the patterns of their lives, their sorrows and their joys, women met this need through cults of various saints, particularly the veneration of the Virgin Mary. However, these saints are never whole women and only holy because they deny their female natures. Mary’s womanhood is repudiated by the church – her son was conceived without sexual intercourse, she gave birth with no pain and without rupturing her hymen; she lived with her husband as a celebrate. The message is clear – holiness is only achievable by denying normal human love.



In the twentieth century, men and women began to realise that female spirituality and the role of the goddess had been denied. Feminists and modern Pagans alike have striven to restore this balance, most recognising male and female spirituality in equilibrium, two halves of an harmonious whole. This world view regards humans as part of nature, children of the Great Mother, along with the Earth, plants and animals, all related in a single whole. The Goddess is revealed in manifest nature, part of it and part of us.


The feminine aspect of the divine has had many faces – goddesses of love and hatred, war and peace, birth and death, summer and winter, night and day, amongst thousands of others. It is time for us to reclaim the Goddess, to reclaim a balanced, harmonious spirituality, and to recognise the Oneness of being within all of creation.



This is the writing of Anna Franklin of www.merciangathering.com

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The Path of Love

The Path of Love is a path towards peace, happiness and ultimately knowing your real self.  Your real identity lies in a core consciousness beyond the mind and ego.  When you move beyond your limited idea of ‘I’ or ‘me’ and you move into extending love to yourself and to all beings, then you are on the path of Love and the path towards uncovering the real you.

Love is Light made manifest.  In Vedic teachings we are given a beautiful image of a shrine in your sacred heart (your inner non-physical heart).  In this shrine or cave, burns a candle brightly.  Nothing can extinguish this candle.  It radiates peace and stillness and silence eternally.  ‘My love radiates like a bonfire.  It is focused on none and denied to none.’

To a seeker with a willing heart, this is a natural path that will unfold in front of you as you take each step.  No striving, no violence required, gently, gently does it.

The Path of Love is a divine marriage between masculine and feminine selves, through all levels of your being. This sacred marriage, the hieros gamos, takes place on the mental, emotional, physical and spiritual levels of your being;  it takes place between Soul and Spirit, Spirit and the Living Light.

The word enlightenment is used in many contexts and with many different meanings. If you look at it simply, it says en-light-en-ment, moving into the light or being filled with light.  Love is the manifestation of the Living Light. Moving into the light requires action (masculine) and being filled with light requires receptivity (feminine). You can look at it as a two-fold path of eliminating darkness and to bring in the light :  the light that is already there.

What do you expect from enlightenment?  Surely happiness.  When you have deep inner happiness, you need nothing else.  No external circumstance can affect a deep happiness that bubbles forth from within.  When you are happy, you are ‘in love’ with the world and all its wonders.  When you are happy, you seek nothing and you lack for nothing. Happiness is also called bliss, or Ananda.

The Path of Love will take you within, to the fountain of this inner happiness, the river of Light that flows through you without ever running dry, which is within you.

The process that leads to enlightenment is gradual and requires patience.  It does not deliver big pyrotechnic dramatics, but it does yield ever-increasing peace and self-acceptance and the purification of stress.

But none of this will be obvious to the one that does not live in awareness.  Awareness is your intuition and it is often veiled over by negativity in the mind; external distraction and the emotional response to stress.

Stress is caused by negative thoughts, and the emotional response to experiences that create fear in you.  We do not have a choice about what happens to us, but we do have a choice as to how to respond.  Every response and action by you, has a chemical reaction in your brain.  This chemical reaction can deliver serotonin, which brings you joy and a sense of well-being, or it can deliver disharmony which will affect all cells in the body.  This disharmony takes you out of alignment with your Source and it creates stress in mind and body.

Meditation alters the brain in many positive ways.  The main purpose and focus of meditation should be purification.  The physical effects of sitting quietly and going inward are many.  It activates the prefrontal cortex and stimulates the release of neurotransmitters, including dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin and brain opiates.  According to Dr Deepak Chopra dopamine is an antidepressant;  serotonin is associated with increased self-esteem; oxytocin is believed to be the pleasure hormone and opiates are the body’s pain killers.

Fears and anxiety are not merely psychological issues.  All emotions have a correlate in the brain and these manifest in your physical body as imbalances and disease.  Humans have memory and we remember painful occurences and fear them re-occuring.  We may bury these fears deep into our subconscious, but the body will manifest these hidden thoughts and beliefs.  We as humans are very adaptable and we adapt our behaviour and reasoning to hide these painful memories and fearful thoughts from ourselves.  We move into denial, rationalisation, escapism and anger, to avoid awareness of the unlived life beneath the surface of the mind.

But through the central nervous system the brain makes every cell in your body aware of those buried thoughts and fears. And through your inner awareness you can access what your body is telling you.  Your body and heart will communicate to you what is really happening beneath the surface.  But in order to have greater awareness, you need to purify your mind of the negative thinking and responses.

This is achieved through diksha, mantra, meditation, forgiveness and Love as action.

Diksha is a transference of energy.  This is usually between guru and follower, but you can receive Light directly from the Living Light at all times.

Mantra is the repetition of a sacred name or sentence. It is an invocation, containing a sacred syllable or set of syllables. A mantra has the power to awaken the divinity that resides in that vibration.

Meditation takes you into utter stillness.  In this stillpoint there is no thought, no intellectual movement and in short, no ego present.  When you stay in this stillness for long periods of time, the neural pathways are purified and eventually re-set to a new path.  Negative emotional responses can be removed and replaced with ones of compassion and acceptance.

You can choose your actions and responses.  When you are caught up in subconscious behaviour (also called the shadow self, the hidden part of yourself), you are often caught unawares by your own response and action.  You may find yourself sabotaging your own happiness and hurting others without your conscious choice.

Your heart is the barometer of your soul.  At any time you can listen to your heart and hear what it wills you to do or not to do.  As part of your action of choice, always consult your heart before you act on emotion.  Your heart is the doorway to experience empathy, compassion and love.  When the Sacred Heart of Compassion is awakened in you, Love flows through you and blesses the world and everything in it.

The next step of action that forms part of your sadhana (spiritual practise/application) on the path of Love, is bhakty.  Bhakty is the focused and committed devotion of your will, your heart, your body and your soul, to the Living Light and its manifestation as Love on this Earth.

The action of Love encompasses the above steps of sadhana (meditation, diksha, mantra and others) and this action will awaken the Sacred Mother, Kundalini, within you.  Kundalini is not limited to kundalini yoga.  Kundalini is the flow of the Living Light within you and it is acknowledged in all spiritual paths and many religions.  The ignition of the fire that does not burn, is known as Shaktipat, the descent of the Holy Spirit, Baptism of Grace amongst others.

When kundalini (Shakty) has awakened in you, your path intensifies. Through its intensity and inner fire, you are purified.  It is a blessing desired by all those on the spiritual path.  There are myths and legends around kundalini.  However, it is the Living Light that flows in you and the discomfort and inner pressure, spurs you on to go ever deeper into awareness and into Love.

You may also want to read my posts on Awareness, Acceptance and Surrender on http://pathofdivinelove.blogspot.com and http://shaman-shewhoknows.blogspot.com

Om Namo Bhagavate Mata