The recent backlash against women and feminism, highlighted by the Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v. Wade, has left many people asking: Is feminism dead? Or if it isn’t dead, is it lost? The decision dealt a blow to one… Read More ›
Goddess
Legacy of Carol P. Christ: The Mountain Mother: Reading the Language of the Goddess in the Symbols of Ancient Crete
The blog was originally posted on May 22, 2017 Before he told the story of how his people received the sacred pipe, Black Elk said: So I know that it is a good thing I am going to do; and… Read More ›
Elena and the Reindeer Goddess by Judith Shaw
The mad pre-Christmas rush of activity has passed and we find ourselves again in the quiet, dark and cold of winter. Winter Solstice, the longest night and shortest day of the year in the Northern Hemisphere, occurred last week. With… Read More ›
“Our Lady of the Shards”: Icons for the Buried and Rising by Lauren Raine MFA
When I became a feminist, I realized that somebody had to write all about this women’s art that was out there being totally ignored, and it was going to be me. And of course the ideas and the discoveries about… Read More ›
Goddess Pilgrimage to Crete – Reborn! by Laura Shannon
Thirty years ago, Carol P. Christ founded her Goddess Pilgrimage to Crete, which she wrote about in her book A Serpentine Path: Mysteries of the Goddess (original 1995 title Odyssey with the Goddess) and in numerous posts on this site over the years. She… Read More ›
Biblical Poetry – Trees by Janet Maika’i Rudolph
In many cultures of the world, including our own, trees are considered the ancestors of humanity – own our ancestors. Trees are connected with great goddesses throughout antiquity. We see this in the bible where, as I’ve noted before, the… Read More ›
Legacy of Carol P. Christ: Restored in Beauty
This was originally posted on May 11, 2015 The path leading to the Klapados Waterfall begins at the edge of an open meadow in the pine and oak woodlands of a mountain in the island of Lesbos. After driving several… Read More ›
Legacy of Carol P. Christ: Tree-Hugging Is About Trees and So Much More Than Trees
This was originally posted March 11, 2019 Not too long ago I heard someone deride members of a seminar who were building labyrinths in the olive groves of Greece as “a bunch of tree-huggers.” I bristled! I probably first heard… Read More ›
Equinox amongst the Stones
A Modern Pilgrimage to the Isle of Lewis & Harris, Part 2 In the previous post of October 14th, I introduced my recent pilgrimage to meet the Goddess, honour the physical and psychological changes that have happened inside me recently. I described… Read More ›
Triple Goddess in the Land by Eline Kieft
A Modern Pilgrimage to the Isle of Lewis & Harris, Part 1 For a long time, I felt a soft but insistent tug to go to the Isle of Lewis & Harris, on the west coast of Scotland. Third time… Read More ›
Legacy of Carol P. Christ: “Fertility” and the Regeneration of Life
This was originally posted on October 12, 2020 Prehistoric and indigenous religious traditions are often disparagingly mischaracterized as primitive fertility religions, concerned not with higher morality, but rather with the processes of reproduction of humans, animals, and plants. When these… Read More ›
Legacy of Carol P. Christ: Visions of the Goddess: A White Horse
This was originally posted on May 4, 2020 Imagine my surprise when, a few days ago, I looked out my window to see a dappled horse munching on flowers in the field across the street from my house. In the… Read More ›
Legacy of Carol P. Christ: Goddess as Love: From Experience To Thealogy
This was originally posted on September 24, 2012 If theology is rooted in experience, how do we move from experience to theology? In my life there have been a number of key moments of “revelation” that have shaped my thealogy…. Read More ›
Legacy of Carol P. Christ: Let Us Proclaim the God Who Bleeds Now
This was originally posted November 19, 2018 we need a god who bleeds now we need a god who bleeds nowa god whose wounds are notsome small male vengeancesome pitiful concession to humilitya desert swept with dryin marrow in honor… Read More ›
The Legacy of Carol P. Christ: “MERMAID, GODDESS OF THE SEA”
This was originally posted on November 4, 2013 On the recent Goddess Pilgrimage to Crete, I visited the Historical Museum in Heraklion where I saw a beautiful embroidered silk panel of a mermaid identified only as having come from Koustogerako, a… Read More ›
The Legacy of Carol P. Christ: Dance of the Bees: Reading the Language of the Goddess
This blog was originally posted on December 1, 2014 The image from an ancient Cretan bowl (c.1700 BCE) from the Sacred Center of Phaistos pictured here has often been interpreted as an early depiction of Persephone’s descent or rising. But… Read More ›
The Legacy of Carol P. Christ: Weaving and Spinning Women: Witches and Pagans by Max Dashu A Review
Moderator’s Note: This was originally posted on September 19, 2016 Max Dashu’s Witches and Pagans: Women in European Folk Religion 700-1000 challenges the assumption that Europe was fully Christianized within a few short centuries as traditional historians tell us. Most… Read More ›
A Poem for Our Abortion Rights by Marie Cartier
Fecundity: the ability to produce an abundance of new growth, but also the ability to produce new ideas And now in the hour of our discontent, we are asked to worry about fecundity. I suppose we can call it that—have… Read More ›
Sheep – Gentle Wisdom by Judith Shaw
Sheep – soft-footed, fluffy creatures – graze and amble along with frolicking lambs by their sides. Know worldwide as docile and friendly, sheep – in particular the female ewes and their lambs – have come to symbolize innocence, gentleness and… Read More ›
From the Archives: Answering the Call by Joyce Zonana
This was originally posted on April 30, 2020 Very early in Henri Bosco’s 1948 novel Malicroix, a young man, Martial de Mégremut, living placidly amid fruitful orchards in a tame Provençal village, receives a letter informing him he has inherited… Read More ›
The Callanais (Callanish) Stones and the Cailleach by Judith Shaw
I felt compelled to visit Scotland without truly understanding why. I said I was called by my studies of Celtic mythology and by images I had seen of the land. I told people in Scotland I was on an artist’s… Read More ›
Carol P. Christ’s Legacy: Great Goddess, Mother Goddess, Creatrix, Source of Life
This post was originally posted on February 5, 2018 The symbol of the Goddess is as old as human history. The most ancient images of the Goddesses from the Paleolithic era are neither pregnant nor holding a child. In Neolithic… Read More ›
Whispers of the Ancient Ones by Judith Shaw
Moving from town to town – by train, bus and ferry – I have walked and walked the ancient land of the Scottish Highlands. From Paleolithic to Mesolithic to Neolithic and on to Picts, Celts, Scots, Romans, French and English… Read More ›
Carol P. Christ’s Legacy: Was There a “Golden Age” before Patriarchy and War? by Carol P. Christ
Marija Gimbutas coined the term “Old Europe” c.6500-3500 BCE to describe peaceful, sedentary, artistic, matrifocal, matrilineal and probably matrilocal agricultural societies that worshipped the Goddess as the power of birth, death, and regeneration in all of life. Gimbutas argued that… Read More ›
From the Archives: Medusa and Athena: Ancient Allies in Healing Women’s Trauma by Laura Shannon
This blog was originally posted on June 24, 2017 Rather than being a bleeding image of female disempowerment, Medusa may be read as…one of the most ancient European symbols of women’s spiritual abilities… [and] an empowering image of feminine potential.’… Read More ›
The Magic of the Ordinary, by Molly Remer
“Nothing is so simple, or so out of the ordinary for most of us, then attending to the present.” — Ernest Kurtz & Katherine Ketcham, The Spirituality of Imperfection I often speak of being in the temple of the ordinary,… Read More ›
Carol P. Christ’s Legacy: “THE OLD RELIGION” OR A “NEW CREATIVE SYNTHESIS”?
Moderator’s Note: Carol Christ died from cancer in July, 2021. Her work continues through her non-profit foundation, the Ariadne Institute for the Study of Myth and Ritual and the Goddess Pilgrimage to Crete. This blog was originally posted June 30, 2014. You can read… Read More ›
From the Archives: Grainne – Sun Goddess/Winter Queen by Judith Shaw
This was originally posted on June 24, 2015. You can see the original comments here. In the ancient Celtic world the Goddess was the One who expressed Herself through the many. Grainne is such a one. She is both Winter… Read More ›
Persephone Rises, Part 1 by Sara Wright
While researching Minoan Crete I learned that each autumn young girls once gathered blue violet saffron crocus to leave as an offering for the Wild Crocus Goddess as they prepared for adolescent female initiation rites. I was intrigued by the reference to… Read More ›
Carol P. Christ’s Legacy: THE LABRYS: A RIVER OF BIRDS IN MIGRATION
Moderator’s Note: Carol Christ died from cancer in July, 2021. Her work continues through her non-profit foundation, the Ariadne Institute for the Study of Myth and Ritual and the Goddess Pilgrimage to Crete. This blog was originally posted July 29, 2013. You can its original… Read More ›
feminismandreligion.com 