Author Archives

• Joan of Arc from The Goddess Project: Made in Her Image by Colette Numajiri

  By Guest Contributor on October 8, 2019 • ( 7 )

  

  “I’m not afraid. I was born to do this.” -Joan of Arc Women are inherently valiant. In extreme situations we armor up and lead others through whatever we are battling at the time. Joan of Arc was a human woman… Read More ›

• Adoring God in Labor by K Kriesel

  By Guest Contributor on October 7, 2019 • ( 2 )

  

  The day before the 2019 Nevertheless She Preached conference at First Baptist Church of Austin, TX my own Catholic church’s young adult ministry hosted Eucharistic Adoration. Although I’ve enjoyed Adoration dozens of times, several factors made this evening different. I… Read More ›

• Autumn Equinox with the Ancestors, or after ecstasy indeed the laundry*) Eline Kieft

  By Guest Contributor on October 1, 2019 • ( 22 )

  

  As I hang the laundry back home, I remember how just 24 hours earlier I arrived back on the beach after an incredible time at the ancestral burial mound where I spend the night in ceremony at the Autumn Equinox…. Read More ›

• Climate Change, the Generations and Religion’s Bad Rap by Susan de Gaia

  By Guest Contributor on September 30, 2019 • ( 14 )

  

  As I reflect on my experience at the climate strike on September 20, 2019, I see a connection between climate change and the bad rap that religion has today. When asked what they think about religion, many are quick to… Read More ›

• White Monkey Chronicles: Myth-busting in Eden BOOK REVIEW by BJ Austin

  By Guest Contributor on September 29, 2019 • ( 11 )

  

  I binge-read White Monkey Chronicles The Complete Trilogy. The first time. It’s like Douglas Adams, Kurt Vonnegut, J.K. Rowling and Gloria Steinem got drunk one night and decided to write a book.  A second, slower read was even sweeter. The first paragraph of… Read More ›

• Me and Brother Francesco by Rachel Hollander

  By Guest Contributor on September 20, 2019 • ( 11 )

  

  At the age of nine, I was taken to see the film Brother Sun, Sister Moon. It is a gorgeous film about the early life – and spiritual revelation – of Saint Francis of Assisi, or as I like to… Read More ›

• In A Sacred Grove by Laurie Goodhart

  By Guest Contributor on August 31, 2019 • ( 22 )

  

  I’ve always been an artist-painter, with an innate drive to explore the mystic and ethereal. Concurrent with artwork I minored in Philosophy as an undergrad, then farmed (certified-organically) with animals and plants for thirty years, all the while accumulating a… Read More ›

• Siddur – An Amendment by Ashley Roque

  By Guest Contributor on August 30, 2019 • ( 4 )

  

  July 24, 2018 “Blessed are you O God, King of the Universe, Who has not made me a Gentile Who has not made me a slave Who has not made me a woman” Blessed are you Yahweh Elohim Jehovah Jireh… Read More ›

• PENTECOST a time to FILL THE WORLD WITH SPIRIT by Mary Jane Miller

  By Guest Contributor on August 17, 2019 • ( 7 )

  

  Pentecost is followed by Ordinary time, the longest season of the church year. It gives us plenty of time to think about what happened when the Holy Spirit descended on the Apostles. I have always loved the idea that this… Read More ›

• Greenness, Whiteness, Blackness, and the Nature of the World by Marisa Goudy

  By Guest Contributor on August 13, 2019 • ( 25 )

  

  There’s magic in hiking alone, but as women, we’ve been taught to worry about venturing far on our own. In fact, we’ve been taught to worry about a lot more than that. Though once I merely shrugged off the warnings… Read More ›

• Happy Birthday Isis: Isis Isis…Ra! Ra! Ra! by Karen Tate

  By Guest Contributor on July 24, 2019 • ( 5 )

  

  I wanted to pull myself away from the ugliness out there and take time to honor the Egyptian Goddess, Isis, as Her birthday is recognized to be in the latter part of July.  My husband, Roy, and I formed the… Read More ›

• The Philadelphia Eleven: A Documentary by Margo Guernsey

  By Guest Contributor on June 17, 2019 • ( 3 )

  

  Storytelling is as old as humanity. We tell ourselves stories – about who we are as individuals, about our families, and about our people – to understand who we are. A lot of narratives are told by a dominant segment… Read More ›

• Re-Imaging Three Marys by Janet Sunderland

  By Guest Contributor on June 11, 2019 • ( 14 )

  

  The recent #metoo movement, along with young women entering Congress, has pointed to an important question. Why, in this 21st Century, are these achievements remarkable? Why has it taken so long for women to be recognized as capable for these… Read More ›

• How Can Change Happen If We Can’t Imagine It First? by Darla Graves Palmer

  By Guest Contributor on June 10, 2019 • ( 13 )

  

  More than one hundred years ago, a small group of women joined together and decided to create their own village, one rooted in relationship and guided by spirit. They weren’t the first such women-led town in the country – there… Read More ›

• Climate Change as a Socio-Spiritual Feminist Issue (Or 10 ways to be a leader in the era of climate change) by Nurete Brenner

  By Guest Contributor on June 4, 2019 • ( 5 )

  

  Authorities have observed that climate change is a feminist issue because it disproportionately affects women. Among these, the United Nations has gone further to acknowledge that climate change is a feminist issue because women are on the forefront of adopting… Read More ›

• Advocating Respect for Goddess by Susan de Gaia

  By Guest Contributor on May 30, 2019 • ( 26 )

  

  I served as general editor for the recently published Encyclopedia of Women in World Religions: Faith and Culture Across History (2018/19 ABC-CLIO). It was an honor and a pleasure to work with a hundred and thirty wonderful scholars, many with… Read More ›

• The Tree as Mother by Mama Donna Henes

  By Guest Contributor on May 19, 2019 • ( 9 )

  

  Arbor Day, Earth Day, May Day and Mother’s Day are deeply connected conceptually, etymologically, culturally and emotionally. The tree, with its roots buried deep in the earth and its branches reaching upward toward heaven, spread wide to embrace all of… Read More ›

• May is the Month of Mary by Mary Jane Miller

  By Guest Contributor on May 18, 2019 • ( 4 )

  

   Mary Icons There are three classic prototypes of Mary Icons, their collective messages point toward a new contemporary kind of trinity. Perhaps the concept of Mary is still undeveloped, as our society has changed her message is still provocative and… Read More ›

• The Legend of Arawello, the Somali Goddess by MaryAnn Shank

  By Guest Contributor on May 16, 2019 • ( 18 )

  

  I did not intend to find her.  In fact I wasn’t even looking.  But there she was, soaring before me, on my last night in Baidoa.  This majestic Somali woman reached high into the heavens, engulfed in a glorious wraparound… Read More ›

• “Closer to Fine:” Trans Femme Reflections on the Sacred Found in Lesbian Music Culture by Nathan Bakken

  By Guest Contributor on May 8, 2019 • ( 16 )

  

  “I’m trying to tell you something about my life.” I joke with my friends that if the 1990’s weren’t so transphobic, I would have thrived as a trans lesbian. Citing my knowledge of the L Word, Pacific Northwest flannel sensibilities,… Read More ›

• Slippery Package: A prayer poem by Isabella Ides

  By Guest Contributor on April 24, 2019 • ( 3 )

  

  She speaks a various language.   Bound in the bardo bereft vaguely present, almost dead. For fucking shining aloud let me   back in. Come again, sweet terror Carve my shadow on your cave walls Render me a soul, source me… Read More ›

• Storytelling as a Spiritual Practice by Nurete Brenner

  By Guest Contributor on April 10, 2019 • ( 17 )

  

  “The master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house.” Audre Lorde Question: What tools do we have that are powerful enough to dismantle the Master’s house? Answer: Storytelling. Storytelling does not belong to the “master.” Storytelling is subversive because it… Read More ›

• Why Pro-Life Stops at Birth: Who Really Supports Life and Why by Winifred Nathan

  By Guest Contributor on March 31, 2019 • ( 13 )

  

  The patriarchal Catholic Church claims to be pro-Life.  But is it pro-Life?  Or is it pro-Birth?  A Catholic Benedictine sister outed the pro-Life movement. Her position: the pro-life crowd shows little if any ongoing interest in life after birth.  They’re… Read More ›

• A Letter to Senator Feinstein by Sarah Robinson-Bertoni

  By Guest Contributor on March 30, 2019 • ( 5 )

  

  Dear Senator Feinstein, I distinctly remember celebrating the 1992 historic victory when you and Barbara Boxer were elected as the first female Senatorial duo from any state in the union.  My father brought my sister and me to an election… Read More ›

• Sawbonna: Godde and Another Route to Forgiveness by Margot Van Sluytman

  By Guest Contributor on March 21, 2019 • ( 3 )

  

  From the day my Father, Theodore, was brutally and callously murdered in Toronto, on Easter Monday, March 27, 1978, I wanted to meet his killer. I wanted to know how it was possible to do such a horrific thing. I… Read More ›

• Ariel, just fighting to get above water…by Yara González-Justiniano

  By Guest Contributor on March 12, 2019 • ( 7 )

  

  I am all for the critical deconstruction of Disney Princesses, especially since now I see more of a commercial push for them as a collection than when I was growing up in the late 80’s. However, I too had a… Read More ›

• Recognizing Abuse by Karen Tate

  By Guest Contributor on March 8, 2019 • ( 8 )

  

  I’ve been thinking a lot about abuse.  Of course, most of us know about the domination, exploitation and  need for control meted out by patriarchy, but I wonder if we have actually normalized many abuses?  Abuse in the home, in… Read More ›

• Leading by Mandala by Nurete Brenner and Elizabeth Meacham

  By Guest Contributor on February 17, 2019 • ( 9 )

  

  Lake Erie Institute The old myths and images that sustained us in earlier periods are no longer serving us during this time of breakdown of the old and the uncertainty about the future. The lone wolf, the frontiersman, the all-powerful… Read More ›

• Creatrix Mundi: Speculating The Godma by Isabella Ides

  By Guest Contributor on January 19, 2019 • ( 24 )

  

  What does it mean to approach the idea of a Godma, a mother-of-all, as an act of the imagination, as a pure act of speculation? I particularly love the word speculator: one who is mining for the diamond, one who… Read More ›

• Mantra and Meditation in Buddhist Hospice Chaplaincy to Alleviate Anxiety by Karen Nelson Villanueva

  By Guest Contributor on January 5, 2019 • ( 15 )

  

  Mantras are not just the prescribed sound formulas or sentences found in Eastern religions, but they can also be thought of as the words or phrases that we continually repeat to ourselves. The word mantra comes from Sanskrit and its… Read More ›