Week 33--in which the heart goes on a search. For Her. And finds something unexpected.

Beautiful Ones,

Throughout this appalling week, in which the worst of patriarchy preened and celebrated itself, I have kept my hope and heart and spirit alive by visiting other places and other times.

That’s where I’d like to take you in today’s Notes from the Field.

Step with me out of the chaos and fear and let us remember together the Field that once covered the Earth.

• A Field overflowing with art and nature, joy and beauty, reverence and community.
• A Field that flourished for tens of thousands of years before any patriarchal gods burst upon our ancestors spewing laws, hurling punishments, and creating governments and religions that gave them all the power.
• There is, and was, a Field that can and must be renewed.
• It is Her Field. The Goddess’ Field. It is a garden of reverence for life—all life.

I acknowledge the horrors of unrestrained white Christian nationalism unfolding all around me.

• I see the military pounding city streets.
  Not that long ago, 250 years to be precise, the presence of British soldiers in the streets angered the people so much that they included military occupation in their list of what is prohibited in their Declaration of Independence.
• I see the blatant ploy to gerrymander voting maps so only the "correct" few can vote, ensuring that power stays in power.
• Actually, these two things go together, don’t they: restrict voting and then ensure power stays in power with a military force created by power. It frightens me.
• I saw the big-show dictators shaking their bloody hands on an appropriated-tinted red carpet before they stepped behind closed doors to carve up the world to their liking. Patriarchal power has always done this. England did it. Portugal did it. Spain did it. And guess who officiated? The pope. And heaven knows Russia has always done it.
• Carving up the world is how power stays in power.

I see. And please don’t think I am saying look away. The days of sitting on our meditation cushions seeking individual bliss and peace are over.

The time of seeking peace for the collective—the entire collective—has arrived.

But how?

How can we create a world of harmony and peace, a world that’s safe for women and children, a world where empathy is celebrated not denigrated. I think we can find seeds of how to do that by remembering and studying the Original Fields. The Goddess Fields.

Here are a few threads I followed this week. This quote from Merlin Stone’s When God Was a Woman captures the essence of the search. I added the bold.

“The deification and worship of the female divinity in so many parts of the ancient world were variations on a theme, slightly differing versions of the same basic theological beliefs, those that originated in the earliest periods of human civilization.

It is difficult to grasp the immensity and significance of the extreme reverence paid to the Goddess over a period of twenty-five thousand years … and over miles of land, cutting across national boundaries and vast expanses of sea.

Yet it is vital to do just that to fully comprehend the longevity as well as the widespread power and influence this religion once held.”

That quote led me to wonder about the themes, the beliefs, the reverence for the Goddess, and to bask in the world this reverence created.

A few paragraphs later, Merlin Stone wrote this about the Goddess:

“[S]o many of the names used in diverse areas were simply various titles of the Great Goddess, epithets such as:
Queen of Heaven
Lady of the High Place
Celestial Ruler
Lady of the Universe
Sovereign of the Heavens
Lioness of the Sacred Assembly
or simply
Her Holiness.”

This list gave me pause. I spoke all the titles aloud. The only one that has continued into our current religious culture is “Queen of Heaven.” Growing up Catholic, I thought that was Mother Mary’s title. Surprise! It was the supreme and first title of the Goddess. In standard-issue syncretism, Christianity simply took a title people loved and pasted it onto their new mythology.

Look at this list. Say the titles aloud. Apart from Queen of Heaven, none of these are in use today. Yet they feel so majestic, so wonder-filled. And so beautiful. I try to imagine being a child and praying with my mother and father, my family and all families, to “Lady of the Universe” or “Her Holiness.”

And I know, my heart knows, that those epithets would have changed everything. Everything.

Which ones feel warm and comfortable—and powerful—in your mouth?

There is one on this list that grabbed me and won’t let go. I carried it inside me all week. I spoke it aloud saying grace before dinner. I dropped it into deep soul writing. I carried it to bed. I dreamt it. The title for the Goddess that will not let me go is:

Lioness of the Sacred Assembly

Imagine this. Picture the Lioness, the fierce mother, the mastermind and champion of the hunt, the leader of the pride, and teacher of the children, sitting peacefully with all the other animals on earth. Creating a sacred assembly. A sacred assembly not of people, or not just of people, but of all Nature, all life on Earth.

What a glorious image.

It is that image, or pieces of it, that imbue the tens of thousands of images of the Goddess throughout time and across the lands. She is everywhere. She is seen everywhere. And she is loved everywhere.

I googled Her “Lioness of the Sacred Assembly” title and wasn’t the least surprised that it does not appear anywhere in the Bible. Of course it doesn’t. This sacred epithet long precedes the men who wrote the bible. This tidbit of information made me happy.

She is original. She is sovereign. She is ours. Always was. Always will be.  She reigns everywhere in the Field.

Look deeply into this regal lioness’ eyes and listen carefully to what she wants you to remember about who you are and how life on earth is supposed to be. Life in relationship to the entire sacred assembly.

photography by Jean Wimmerlin Unsplash

All this week, I went on a search to find Her. I did find a literal lioness Goddess in Egypt, Sekmet, but she is just one tiny piece of the Lioness of the entire Sacred Assembly of Life.

I wanted to find the bigger assembly. And sure enough, I found aspects of Her in Australia, Asia, Africa, and every country in Europe. I found Her in the Celtic lands and throughout the Indigenous cultures of the Americas.

I reveled in Her clothes, Her crowns, Her adornments, Her symbols, Her postures, Her stories.

It is She who is carrying me through the horrors unfolding. She has seen all this before. We have experienced all this before. We remember the angry hordes screaming and yelling and terrorizing the assemblies. Then and now. We remember how they destroy the land, abuse the women, starve the children.

We can see the wasteland they have created. And we weep.

But we also remember. We remember that this is NOT how we are meant to live. We remember, somewhere deep inside, that “extreme reverence” for Her and for all Life is the only way to heal the wasteland.

I invite you to start remembering. There is no time to waste.

Life is Fragile. Handle with Extreme Reverence.

Janet
PS: Registration for ART 6 on Reverence and Devotion is closed. But all previous ART intensives are available On Demand at a fraction of the cost of a live intensive. And Deep Soul Writing with Friends is also available. Enjoy!
website: janetconner.com

facebook: janet conner prayer artist

YouTube: Janet Conner