Carolyn Lee Boyd – Page 4 – Feminism and Religion

Earth Is Our Community by Carolyn Lee Boyd

“The beauty of the planet from 100,000 miles should be a goal for all of us, to help in our struggle to make it as it appears to be.” Astronaut Michael Collins said these words reflecting on seeing the Earth from space. To me, he is expressing the truth that the Earth is our community that we share with all other beings on the planet, our home base. But what does this really mean in its most profound perspective?

Over the years, I have heard people express over and over how they desire “community,” whether that means a neighborhood café or an ongoing circle to share our deepest lives over decades, or any of many other expressions. The emotional and physical impact of isolation and divisiveness over the past months of the pandemic has shown how essential “community” is to our well being, and how we need to think of it as more than just a sense of being part of a group. True community provides us with a sense of belonging and relationship, of being part of a vibrant, interdependent web, of assuming everyone will act in the best interests of all.

Sacred Food for Body and Soul by Carolyn Lee Boyd

Soon it will be Wives’ Feast Day, a holiday celebrated in Ireland and northern England on February 2, the same day as Imbolc, Candlemas, and St. Bridget’s Feast Day. On this holiday, women (in Old English, “wife” meant simply woman) would gather together and enjoy making and sharing delicious foods with each other, honoring themselves and their work providing nourishment and other aspects of making a “home.”

When you think about it, this delightful tradition is quite remarkable. Feast days are generally associated with saints, so, in a way, this feast day recognizes the sacredness of all women and also their daily labor. This echoes to me Old European cultures that connected women’s baking and weaving to divinity by placing workshops in goddess temples and associating goddesses with these tasks. Today, women work in many jobs not directly associated with food production, but still labor to make our communities and planet better “homes” in many other ways.

Sappho in a Locrian Mode by Carolyn Lee Boyd

The world Sappho envisions in her poetry is one with many lessons for us in the 21st century about how to live. While ancient Greek society, especially in later eras, was deeply misogynistic and women had few rights, Sappho’s words evoke a perspective in which goddesses, especially Aphrodite, are revered and the connection of worshippers to goddesses is intimate, art created by women is celebrated, women’s relationships are central to one’s well being, and love and sensuality are enjoyed.

But words only tell part of the story. Sappho’s poetry was meant to be sung, and while we can’t hear the songs she wrote, I think it is interesting to note that Anne Carson, in her 2003 translation “If Not, Winter” says that Sappho is credited with inventing the Locrian musical mode. A mode is a scale in which the progression of notes follows a set pattern of whole and half notes. We are all familiar with the major mode that makes music sound happy (Happy Birthday song) and the natural minor mode that we use for sad music (House of the Rising Sun). But there are many other modes, and the Locrian mode is one of them. (just a note: the Locrian mode is the same as the Greek Mixolydian mode and completely different from the modern Mixolydian mode, just to be confusing.)

Slaying Dragons Our Own Way, Part II by Carolyn Lee Boyd

Assipattle and the Mester Stoorworm is a Scottish dragon-slayer folk tale with many enticing details linking it to elements of an older culture centering the Earth with a reverence for female spiritual power. You can read a summary of the story and these clues in Part I.

While the tale was obviously not originally meant to reflect the 21st century, it has echoes of our own society’s challenges today, including inequality, injustice, violence, and ecological disaster. It may be a revision of an older story but, not knowing what that story was, we can perhaps re-envision the story to be meaningful for our own time with the characters and practices hinted at in the details. Maybe something like this (I’ve named Assipattle’s unnamed sister Morag) …

Slaying Dragons Our Own Way, Part I by Carolyn Lee Boyd

In winter people traditionally gather around the fire to enjoy stories as the stormy winds thunder outside. Come closer to the hearth as I regale you with Assipattle and the Mester Stoorworm, a centuries-old dragon-slayer folk story from Scotland’s Orkney Islands with many Norse elements. On the surface, it is a fairy tale about a village threatened by a gigantic sea serpent and how they responded to this existential threat. Though meant to entertain with its adventure and romance, it also has many details that perhaps link it to older roots of a culture that centered the Earth and healing and revered female spiritual power, all of which are profoundly needed in our own time. If we re-envision the tale through the lens of these clues, we may be able to find guidance for how our own communities — local, national, and global — can more successfully confront profound challenges.

Here is the summarized original tale:

Hope Lives in the Twinkling of the Stars by Carolyn Lee Boyd

For millennia, we humans have found hope in the dark of winter through holidays featuring lights or the sun such as the Winter Solstice, Diwali, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, Soyal, Christmas, and others. As the people of our beautiful, fragile planet celebrate these traditions in these perilous and momentous times, I have been wondering what fresh perspectives on hope our global goddess myths and stories can offer.

Let’s start with the Greek goddess of hope, Elpis. In the Greek Pandora’s story as usually told, Elpis/hope is all that is left for humanity after Pandora lets misery escape into the world by opening her box, However, according to Patricia Monaghan in her New Book of Goddesses and Heroines, originally Pandora was the ever-abundant Earth goddess and her box was a pithos, a clay jar used to store food, but also remains of the dead awaiting rebirth. In her Roman incarnation as Spes, the goddess of hope also served Fortuna, the goddess of destiny who brings people together to create life. Finally, She is associated with Salus, the goddess of health.

Reshaping Our World with Words by Carolyn Lee Boyd

Pagasasthai, kernos, thiosos, sloinneadh, taibhsear. These are centuries-old words that help describe and create a world in which the Earth is sacred and receives gratitude, people revere the wisdom of their ancestors, and those who see beyond our everyday reality are honored.

Every day we build the world around us with words. Their tone and subtle meaning tell us who we are, what our place in society is, and how we should live. Which objects and concepts become common words indicate what is “real” and important or not. When an object or concept has its own word it gains clarity and power. Here at FAR, for example, we have had many wonderful posts about rewriting religious texts and liturgy to re-invigorate them with the sacred female spirit and be resonant with female presence.

The Tree of Equality in the Forest of Harmony by Carolyn Lee Boyd

For millennia, people have struggled for gender and many other kinds of equality, with progress achingly slow and sometimes regressing. Egalitarian societies have existed and do exist, such as those described by Marija Gimbutas and Heide Goettner-Abendroth and others. So why does a 21st century egalitarian world seem so far away? Sometimes looking at challenges from a fresh perspective can be illuminating as well as inspiring for the long journey ahead. So, what if we envision equality as a tree, those wondrous beings that make life on earth possible and symbolize our world in so many cultures? What are the roots, the source truths which lead to all forms of equality and, if embraced by everyone, would make equality an assumed fact of life? What is the trunk where the roots manifest as positive supports for equality work? What are the branches, our acts reaching up towards our greatest aspirations for a truly equal society?

Let’s start with the roots, the basic statement from which all forms of equality grow. To me it is “All participate in the essential life force of the universe and are therefore inherently, completely, and infinitely valuable.” “Essential life force of the universal” may or may not refer to a deity, depending on individual beliefs, but it does have a spiritual element in that it relates our individual existence to that universal essence which gave us life, connects us to all other beings, and is beyond any personal characteristics. You may have a different root statement but I think that any root statement is more powerful with a spiritual element.

When Your Garden Gardens You by Carolyn Lee Boyd

Summer is a time when we are surrounded by the power of Nature, the impulse to life, balance, and well being. Even small actions to align ourselves with it can create momentous changes and healing within ourselves and towards a more sustainable world. Over the past couple of years, I have noticed a decline in pollinators like bees, butterflies, and birds in the small garden behind my home. This may be part of the worldwide pollinator crisis, or the result of nearby housing developments overtaking wild land, or my own past bad gardening decisions. I decided that this year it was time for me to join the many other gardeners worldwide who are creating pollinator-friendly spaces.

So, I did some research into what native and non-native plants already growing in the garden are good for pollinators and which native plants I should acquire from gardener friends or native plant organizations. I also learned to make a better environment for pollinators by waiting to move or shred leaves until warmer weather so as not to disturb pollinators wintering over, making sure that plants on which insects are making homes are left alone, and building up berry brambles, shrubs, and brush piles for birds and butterflies to find food and shelter in.

Eruptions of Inanna: Justice, Gender, and Erotic Power by Judy Grahn BOOK REVIEW by Carolyn Lee Boyd

Any new book by Judy Grahn is cause for celebration. For decades, Grahn has been a lyrical and passionate poet, author, mythographer, and cultural theorist whose work features both goddess wisdom and contemporary culture centering on women and queer people. Nightboat Books has just published her newest book, Eruptions of Inanna: Justice, Gender, and Erotic Power, which offers ancient yet fresh world views with which to approach such issues as injustice, sexuality and gender, climate change, and more just when we need it most.

In Eruptions of Inanna, she brings what she calls her “poet’s eye” to eight stories featuring the Sumerian goddess Inanna as well as religious practices of those devoted to her. She explores how these have directly influenced our world and, in her words, can continue to “feed our needs and help us take better care of each other and our world.” According to Grahn, Inanna “is a combination of human, creature, erotic and other energetic forces, and civilization. She also inherited very old powers that grew out of women’s rituals” (55). Her essence engenders sovereignty and self-worth, especially in women and queer people. She is a goddess of love, espousing passion and the joy of eroticism as integral to both life and society. She practices an expansive justice that creates positive outcomes in response to horrific acts. She creates a civilization of the arts, beautiful and useful crafts, abundance, and a jubilant communal life. She demands respect for nature and ecological sustainability.