CHICKEN WINGS & Red PEPPERS

Am microwaving chicken wings, brussels sprouts, squares of sweet red peppers and broccoli spears for dinner.

The aroma is wafting out to me on my sunporch and I’m salivating.

AND thinking about how the wonderful chemicals and substances and nutrients in these foods come directly from Mother Earth – really, they ARE Mother Earth, Her gift to us.

Amazingly, She gives of Her Body to sustain us and keep us alive and in good health.

Thank you Great Mother. I adore You more than words can tell.

Dressing THE BRIDE

This poem moved me to tears. Called "Dressng the Bride," it was written by Goddess Pages Editor Geraldine Charles.

Geraldine captures the heart & soul of what on this blog we call the 6000-year "slippery slide" of the Goddess into Her current underground hideaway. But read all the way to the end, because there you'll find a golden promise:

Sure, ‘twas as though the granite bones
And flesh of earthen Mother,
Rose up, said, “Well, I’ve a will to be wed
To my white and golden lover
My white, my gold-haired lover.

“He’s a son of the sun and a son of my own
So the sun and the sky I will wed,
For they say I’m owed a warrior bold
To protect the fields in my stead
To preserve the land in my stead.”

Will Sheelah-na-Gig then jig for joy?
Will fairies then dance in a ring?
Or will Morgan le Fay angrily say,
“We’ve started a terrible thing
Oh, begun a terrible thing.”

“Oh, Mother”, we said, “don’t marry that man,
We need no warriors bold and brave -
His kind will call you whore and hag,
Rip minerals from your caves,
Yes, rape iron and oil from your caves.

“No, Mother, don’t marry the son of the sun,
His sons will bring you sorrow -
They’ll shit in the ocean and piss in your wells,
For you there’ll be no tomorrow,
For all of us no tomorrow.”

And Sheelah-na-Gig won’t jig for joy,
The fairies won’t dance in a ring -
And Morgan le Fay will sadly say,
“We’ve started a terrible thing
Oh, begun a terrible thing.”

We’ll give you a day like you never had
A day of praises, joy and mirth -
Far better than tying yourself to that lad
A day for Mother Earth
Just to celebrate Mother Earth.

We’ll dress you in green; we’ll dress you in brown,
We’ll polish your lakes, from swords make ploughs,
And braid wildflowers into your crown -
And berries for your brow,
Gather berries for your brow.

And Sheelah-na-Gig will jig for joy,
The fairies will dance in a ring -
And Morgan le Fay will gravely say,
“We’ve avoided a terrible thing
Oh, escaped a terrible thing.”

But oh, my darlings, sad to say,
She wed the warrior bold and brave.
His sons forced all our maids away,
Ripping minerals from the caves,
Raping iron and oil from our caves.

So we went down to Troytown,
One cold and bitter winter’s day -
And danced into the Maizey Wheel,
And never came out again,
Not for five thousand years and a day.

And Sheelah-na-Gig is forced to church,
The fairies are no longer near.
And Morgan le Fay’s called bitch and whore,
There’s no place for the Lady here,
No, no place for the Lady here.

***

Now the dragon paths are trod again,
The veils are lifting from our eyes -
As earthen mother breaks her chains,
Flicks the warriors off like flies,
Flicks the warriors off like flies.

We’ll dress her in green; we’ll dress her in brown,
And polish her lakes, from swords make ploughs,
And braid wildflowers into her crown -
With berries for her brow,
Yes, to bind around her brow.

And Sheelah-na-Gig will jig for joy,
The fairies will dance in a ring -
And Morgan le Fay will gladly say,
“Our mother is everything
Mother Earth is everything.”

And Sheelah-na-Gig will jig for joy,
The fairies will dance in a ring -
And Morgan le Fay will sing all day,
“Our mother is everything
Mother Earth is everything.”

©2004, Geraldine Charles

When I read this poem, I want to sing it. Actually, I did sing it, in a Medieval kind of minor key that I just made up as I went along.

For me, singing this poem is a powerful experience. Try it, I think you'll like it!

In Switching to Goddess, I call for artists of all kinds to create works of art that bring The Goddess to the attention of the world.

This poem certainly does just that. I wonder if Geraldine would mind if a musician in our community put this poem to music?
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Thnx to Geraldine for letting me use this foto of her.
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Postscript: July 5, 2009. Geraldine said she has music to go with the poem. However, anyone who wants to put new music to it can, just give her credit for the words. Also, she's going to ask a good friend of hers -- a professional singer -- to make a podcast of the song. Alright!

MRS. B. BOWERS Explains MARRIAGE

In this not-to-be-missed video, Mrs. Betty Bowers, America's best Christian, explains marriage to everyone else:

THE WICKED CHILLY LINK BETWEEN War & RELIGION

It’s no accident that the Christian Bible is peppered over 300 times with the words “war” and “warrior.”

It’s no accident either that the History Channel offers almost nothing but shows on war and the bloody, blood-soaked Abrahamic religions*.

Fact is, there’s a wicked chilling link between war and the Abrahamaic religions*: It’s the Abrahamic and other war religions that cause war.

So how do we rid the world of war? Well, unless you’re willing and able to scrap the war religions, might as well forget it and go home, prop your dogs up, and snooze.
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*The Abrahamaic religions are Christianity, Judaism and Islam. So few differences exist among these three that they might as well be one religion. And since they spread like cancer, they now infect over half (53%) of the people in the world.
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thnx to spatial mongrel for the foto; go HERE to see more.

HAPPY SUMMER SOLSTICE!

Seems everyone who's anyone in the northern hemisphere celebrates (or has celebrated) the Summer Solstice.

Everyone except YAJ* that is, who despises Mother Earth as much as flies despise flypaper (because She's way more powerful than he is. Temper, temper, YAJ*!)

“Most societies in the northern hemisphere, ancient and modern, have celebrated a festival on or close to” the Summer Solstice.

For example, the Ancient Celts, Ancient China, Ancient Gaul, the Ancient Germanic countries, the Slav and Celtic tribes in Europe, Ancient Rome, Ancient Sweden, the Essenes, Native Americans, and the people of Prehistoric Europe.

Even the early Christians set their feast day of St. John the Baptist on June 24. It’s “one of the oldest [of all Christian] feasts, if not the oldest, introduced into both the Greek and Latin liturgies to honour a saint.”

Go HERE to read more.
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*YAJ is the god Yahweh-Allah-Jehovah, a schizoid diety who usually tries to pass himself off as three totally distinct holy dudes.

COMPASSION -- Like a Fox

These technically fab but amazingly violent illustrations come from a rare antique children's book I found recently.

I'm blown away by how violent and chillingly callous this book is. I can't believe that only a little over 100 years ago we, in our YAJ*-based culture, were reading this stuff to our four- and five-year-olds.

The book has four stories.

The pictures you see here come from "Tittums and Fido," and "Reynard the Fox."In "Ann and Her Mamma," Mamma points to a beggar girl and tells Ann to think how much more god has given her, Ann, than he has the beggar.

This girl is in bigtime trouble: "... her hands look like skeleton's bones; She has got a few rags, just about her to tie; And her naked feet bleed on the stones...."

And yet there's no mention of helping this human being starving right in front of their eyes; she's only an object lesson for lucky little Ann.

So much for Jesus and Christian compassion.

While I think we've come a long way, baby, since 1871, I seriously doubt YAJ* or Jesus had anything to do with it.

I just think the Goddess is on the rise again.

BTW, if you're interested in owning a book like this -- if only to remind yourself how far the Goddess has gotten us -- I'm selling it on eBay. Go HERE to see it (it's the red book with the parrot and crow on the front, called The Poll Parrot Picture Book).

You won't find any other copies of this book for sale on the Net -- it's just too rare. But you will find two copies in UK’s National Art Gallery.

The first was given to the Prince of Wales as a gift . Its gift inscription reads “To Prince George of Wales. June 3rd 1871 Michys (?), humble devoted duty. Many happy returns of the day.” Also in the book is this: "This book was presented to the Library of the Victoria & Albert Museum by Her Majesty Queen Mary."
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*YAJ is Yahweh-Allah-Jehovah, the god of Abraham. Many think YAJ is three different gods, but on this blog we know he's just one mean ol' cuss who's shot the world into the mess you see it in now.

WHY DON'T CHRISTIANS Act MORE LIKE CHRISTIANS?

You’ve seen it: Christians behaving badly.

Very badly.

They murder doctors (see two posts below), they murder their own children*, and they’ve even been known to wipe out entire flocks with one fell swoop of their poison-Koolaid pitchers (enter “Jim Jones” and “Peoples Temple” into any search engine and read all about it).

Where’d this pipe spring a leak? I’ll tell you where: In the Old Testament.

The Old Testament – which Christians refuse to burn and bury – is run by Jehovah the control freak, or as the famous British writer and scientist Richard Dawkins puts it, “… a vindictive, bloodthirsty …, misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully.”

Dawkins adds: “Those of us schooled from infancy” in Jehovah’s ways “can become desensitized to their horror.”

And there you have it. This is why Christ means nothing -- as in zero, zip and nada – to Christians. His daddy Jehovah swamps him out.

Christians have never behaved like Christ.

From their beginnings in Rome when they ran around burning and looting the city, through their bloody Inquisition and “witch”** purges in the Middle Ages, to their modern Jonestowns and systematic killings of physicians, gays and their own sweet offspring,* Christians have been “misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bullies.”

The nut never falls far from the tree, does it?

But please, mamas, don't let your kids grow up to be Christian!


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*Go HERE to read about Andrea Yates, Susan Smith, Deanna Laney and Christina Rigg.
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**I put "witches" in quotes here because while many of the women burned and tortured by Christians during the Middle Ages might have been real witches -- in the real sense of the word, i.e., women with the power to do magic -- it's a well-known fact that most of them were not.

The Christians went hog-wild killing and maiming during the Inquisition, and after a while didn't care who they ground into the dirt with the heels of their boots. Why? Partly because The "Church" was making it profitable for them to do so.
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Thanx to alfire for the foto; go HERE to see more.

WAS JESUS REALLY A Goddess?

Compared to his dad Jumping Jehovah at least, Jesus plays ball more like a goddess than a god. For example, he says, “Suffer the little children to come unto me” (although you’d be hard pressed to find him doing anything awesome for, to or with any of the kiddies in the Holy Bible).

He says, “Hey! Listen up dudes! I’m really serious about this: Do. Not. Hit. People. Or do anything else mean and janky to them.”

I do, however, think Jesus goes a tad further than any healthy, respectable goddess would go when he says, “Be a doormat. Someone bites you, sit on your big, throbbing need to bite back and offer the back of your other hand to let them sink their teeth into.”

In bigtime contrast, I think the Big-Cheese Guiding Mother Goddesses tell us not to hold out our hands for mutilation, but to teach, educate and reform biters.

The Mothers aren’t keen on having any of their babies bitten once, let alone twice.

And maybe *that’s* why Jesus’ disciples were mostly men! About 90% of all goddesses are heterosexual, and what good het goddess doesn’t adore the company of men?!?

And there, too, is why Jesus never married. His dad would sooner salt and oil gays and fry them up for breakfast as look at ‘em. So of course Jesus the goddess could hardly go around dating men. How would that make Her daddy look to all his carefully trained homophobic Christian buds?
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Many thnx to ElenaRay for the picture above. Go HERE for more of her fab work.

A CLUE: RELIGION ISN’T Going ANYWHERE

I don’t know about you, but I’m getting fed up with the “Religion is so bad to us -- why won’t it go away” camp. (See this article and the snippets from it below).

First, dust off your anthropology books, sweeties. Religion won’t go away ‘cause we humans exit mommy’s womb blank slates – stupidos, really – and we need something to clue us in on how to behave.

Animals have all the luck – they’re born with instincts. We aren’t. To survive, we hafta hang on for dear life to a “culture” – a connected spider web of rules for how to do everything from raising baby Bing to tying your shoe laces.

And religion is the center around which all cultures spin. Every single society anthropologists have studied has had religion. Why? ‘Cause without religion, humans can’t cope. (Well, dudes like Chris Hitchens can cope, but that’s only because they suck off a society already organized around a religion).

Second, the only reason some think religion is bad is this: The only religions they “see” are the ones with daddy-war gods ruling the roost: Yahweh’s religion, and Allah’s, and Jehovah’s, Ares’, Mars’, Zeus’, Indra’s, and the daddy-war god religions of the ancient Aztecs, Incas, Mayans, and Egyptians.

Jeesh, dudes, get a grip! Reams of other religions in the world haven’t lead to “political excesses … intolerance, persecutions, expulsions, forced conversions, [and] autos-da-fé…”. And guess what? They weren’t run by daddy-war gods. Look for example at the religions of the Pueblos, the Tahitians, or the Inuit.

And for big, beautiful complex civilizations run without daddy-war gods, feast your eyes on the Minoan and the Indus Valley Civilizations. All signs point to these two swirling around not daddy-war gods, but gorgeous guiding oddesses.
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“Prominent secularization theorists like Peter L. Berger who, as recently as the 1960s, openly conceded religion's demise, are having to radically alter their forecasts. They have had to invent new concepts and categories to describe the phenomenon of religion's unexpected global resurgence.”

SNIP

But Jeesh, look at “… the historical and political excesses of dogmatic belief: the intolerance, the persecutions, the expulsions, the forced conversions, the autos-da-fé….”

From Reason vs. Faith: the Battle Continues
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thnx to SLS Photography for the fine foto; go HERE to see more of her work.

AUNTIE ATHANA ON Tiller's KILLER

Sweet Babies, this is your Auntie Athana speaking.

I've come to bark at you again about how we've gotta boot YAJ off the planet before he boots us all off, along with all other life on earth (well, YAJ would have a hard time booting cockroaches, lice and sharks off our Mother. These dudes have been around so long they have tricks up their sleeves to smear and spank just about anything that might do them damage. Besides -- since he's a lice-and-cockroach infested shark himself, YAJ feels right at home with these critters).

As most of you know by now, YAJ is Yahweh/Allah/Jehovah, the god of Abraham.

Most think YAJ is three separate gods, but naaaaah. He's just one old slimy, primitive, desert war god drunk with the desire to do us all in. On a regular basis, this sick slickie takes normal, sane human beings and turns them into deadly dirt.

Take today's christian killer of Doctor George Tiller in a YAJ house of worship, for example. This dude was born an innocent, sweet-as-pie little human, blessed by the Goddess. But the lord god Jehovah got his cockroach hooks into him, and look at him now. A piece of human waste.

But what else can you expect when a human gets sucked in by a primitive tribal war god who thinks he can give birth? Excuse for a minute (HAHAHAHAH, HA, HA HA HA HARDY HAR HAR!!! [hachoo].) Ahem. Okay. Better now.

Anyhoo, it's time to make YAJ disapper so he can't infest any other beautiful, gorgeous human being with soul lice. You can see what YAJ-infected people do if they don't get their way. They kill. They murder. They gun people down even in places supposedly sacred to YAJ. Of course this isn't hard for them, because almost nothing's actually sacred to YAJ. That's all a scam. The only things sacred to YAJ are war, killing, and getting his own way. Go do a serious scan of his book the Bible if you don't believe me.

But it's not people who're at fault. People just get suckered in by YAJ. YAJ makes them miserable, and then they think the only way to get unmiserable is to suck up to YAJ. What we need to do is boot YAJ off the planet. For good. Period. End of sentence.

And then we can all return to female and mother deities as our major guiding lights.

Unless of course we all want to live in a world run by killers, murderers, war-starters and control freaks. (I won't even go into the history of mass murdering done by YAJ and his sucky sucked-in followers. I haven't had dinner yet, and I'd like to eat before next week is over.)

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Thnx to Leopard Girl for the foto "Lunch - La Cucaracha." Go HERE to see more of her work.

Breaking NEWS: BUSH'S WAR & THE bible

Hot-off-the-press: Rumsfeld used Bible verses to help keep G.W. Bush in the Iraq War:

ON THE MORNING OF Thursday, April 10, 2003, Donald Rumsfeld’s Pentagon prepared a top-secret briefing for George W. Bush. This document, known as the Worldwide Intelligence Update, was a daily digest of critical military intelligence so classified that it circulated among only a handful of Pentagon leaders and the president.... On this particular morning, it showed the statue of Saddam Hussein being pulled down in Firdos Square, a grateful Iraqi child kissing an American soldier, and jubilant crowds thronging the streets of newly liberated Baghdad. And above these images, and just below the headline SECRETARY OF DEFENSE, was a quote that may have raised some eyebrows. It came from the Bible, from the book of Psalms: “Behold, the eye of the Lord is on those who fear Him…To deliver their soul from death.”

This mixing of Crusades-like messaging with war imagery, which until now has not been revealed, had become routine. On March 31, a U.S. tank roared through the desert beneath a quote from Ephesians: “Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand.” On April 7, Saddam Hussein struck a dictatorial pose, under this passage from the First Epistle of Peter: “It is God’s will that by doing good you should silence the ignorant talk of foolish men.” (To see these and more Bush-administration intelligence cover sheets, visit GQ.com’s exclusive slideshow)."

Other verses Rummie used:

Their arrows are sharp,
all their bows are strung;
their horses' hoofs seem like flint,
their chariot wheels like a whirlwind. Isaiah 5:28

Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged, for the LORD your God will be with you wherever you go." Joshua 1:9 (shown with pics of tanks and a war plane)

No king is saved by the size of his army;
no warrior escapes by his great strength.
A horse is a vain hope for deliverance;
despite all its great strength it cannot save.
But the eyes of the LORD are on those who fear him,
on those whose hope is in his unfailing love,
to deliver them from death
and keep them alive in famine.
Psalms 33: 16-19

All this comes from some very cool investigative journalism by the Gentlemen's Quarterly (GQ). Go HERE for the rest of the article.

BTW, if you're ready to hear more about how Jehovah is first and foremost a war god, read Switching to Goddess: Humanity's Ticket to the Future.
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a big thnx to Josef Meixner for the suit of armor; go HERE to see more of his work.

WORLD without GODDESS: TOTALLY WACKED

After we humans lost the Goddess as the center of life, liberty and sunny joy,* we morphed into a totally wacked out, wiggy species:

”Today most of the world’s business is conducted by wolf- and dog-like dominance hierarchies peopled by packs of young men headed up by top-dog alpha-males.

"Like a bunch of starving psychotics in a small sandbox, the world’s major nations today spend most of their energy violently snatching food and other resources out of the hands of 'weaker' nations. From our constant wars and interpersonal violence (if you [feel you] never have enough you 'need' to take from others) and our rape of women, their children and the environment (deep down we feel Mother Earth abandoned us) to our obesity, overpopulation and propensity to hoard, starvation culture supplies explanations for almost everything about ourselves we deeply despise. As a matter of fact, when you finally realize it, it’s hard to see why we didn’t see it before. Almost everything we loathe about ourselves looks suspiciously like the behavior of wild dog packs, wolf packs, or the unhinged humans we keep locked up in mental and penal institutions."

~From Switching to Goddess: Humanity's Ticket to the Future, 2009, Jeri Studebaker, Winchester, UK: O Books, p. 206

How did we lose Goddess? It has to do with long-ago climate change, and something called "starvation culture."

Is your interest piqued? Then tap those keys on over to your fave online bookstore and pick up a copy of Switching to Goddess: Humanity's Ticket to the Future.

Whether you live in the UK, Australia, Canada, Italy, France, Germany, the Netherlands, China, Japan or the US, there's an online bookstore in your country selling Switching to Goddess.


LIVE IN THE U.S.? Switching is being sold at the following online U.S. bookstores:

Buy.com $19.24
Alibris $19.93
Paperbackshop-US $20.00
biggerbooks.com $20.74
Overstock.com $21.72
Bookbyte $22.36
ecampus.com $23.43
TextbooksRus $23.62
Blackwell $28.44
Powell's Books $28.93
Barnes & Noble.com $28.94
A1Books $16.42
SuperBookDeals $18.46
Buy.com $19.24
Copperfields $19.50
Allstarbooks $21.07
Destined2Buy Books $22.70
Robin Pugh's Nest of Treasures $27.65
all_books $37.84
SuperBookDeals $18.46

LIVE IN THE UK? Switching is being sold at the following online UK bookstores:
Pickabook $19.45
Blackwell $23.57
Amazon.co.uk $27.04
Browns Books $19.93
The Saint Bookstore $22.50
Books2Anywhere.com $24.44
Revaluation Books $27.88
Quartermelon $38.30
ABC Books $36.19

LIVE IN CANADA? Switching is being sold at the following online Canadian bookstores:
Amazon.ca $24.54
chapters.indigo.ca $33.90

LIVE IN FRANCE? Switching is being sold at:
Amazon.fr $32.39

LIVE IN AUSTRALIA? Switching is being sold at:
AussieBookSeller (via AbeBooks) $52.88

LIVE IN THE NETHERLANDS? Go to:
van Stockum $46.63

LIVE IN ITALY? Go to:
deastore.com $31.07

LIVE IN GERMANY? Switching is being sold at:
Amazon.de $39.92
buch.de $44.53

LIVE IN JAPAN? Switching is being sold at:
Amazon.co.jp

LIVE IN CHINA? Switching is being sold at:
Amazon.cn
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* This happened first around 4000 BC in the Middle East but may still be going on in places recently discovered and still centered on Goddess.
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thnx to mediageek for the foto of "cyrus whackin weeds."

The Vanishing Face of [Mother] Gaia: A Final Warning

A few tidbits from a review of James Lovelock's new book The Vanishing Face of Gaia: A Final Warning:

THE GIST OF THE BOOK: "‘The Earth, in its but not our interests, may be forced to a hot epoch, one where it can survive, although in a diminished and less habitable state. If, as is likely, this happens, we will have been the cause… too many people, their pets and their livestock - more than the Earth can carry.’

WHO IS LOVELOCK?: "... creator of the ‘Gaia hypothesis’. Back in 1974 ... Lovelock wrote cheerfully: ‘Assuming the present per capita use of energy, we can guess that at less than 10,000 million we should still be in a Gaian world. But somewhere beyond this figure, especially if the consumption of energy increases, lies the final choice of permanent enslavement on the prison hulk of the spaceship Earth, or gigadeath to enable the survivors to restore a Gaian world.’

"[Lovelock is] an intelligent man who developed highly sensitive scientific instruments for NASA, ... a free thinker who could be selectively quoted to provide succour to an enormous range of views, from the failings of climate science to the benefits of nuclear power.

WHY DOES THE REVIEWER THINK LOVELOCK IS DANGEROUS?: " ... his writings ... throw up the possibility of a world in which Nature is placed before humanity, with irrational and reactionary consequences.

WHAT IS THE GAIA HYPOTHESIS?: "For Lovelock, the Earth is a self-regulating, living system. He was initially struck by just how precisely the Earth’s atmosphere suited the maintenance of life compared with that of Mars, and concluded that this could not have simply been some geophysical accident; he argued that a web of complex feedbacks helped to ensure that the proportions of different gases were closely maintained.

"Lovelock is certainly in no doubt that the Earth is alive, though he is not really sure what that means. ‘Why do you keep on talking about the Earth as alive? This is a good question, and there is no rational answer; indeed to some of my friends my suggestion that the whole planet is alive is not “scientifically incorrect”, it is absurd. In reply, I say that science has not yet formulated a full definition of life.'"

For other reviews, zip on over to Amazon.com.

HOW YAJ* Grew INTO A BIG DUDE

This is an oldie but "goodie": a 2007 article I bumped into about how UK Muslim teenage girls are being beaten up in the streets if they refuse to become Muslim. Some are in for double trouble: beaten up AND forced to quit the university.

If you've ever wondered how sects as skanky as the war-god religions* have swamped the earth -- they've now infected over half the world's population -- wonder no more. This is exactly how they did it: by ramming it up our noses.
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*YAJ is short for Yahweh/Allah/Jehovah. Many think Yahweh, Allah and Jehovah are three separate gods, but they're not. They are just one god -- the god of Abraham.

**Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Hinduism -- are all headed up by warrior gods who do almost nothing all day but kill, maim and slaughter. Open up a christian bible sometime and check out how often Jehovah does anything else. Think there might be any connection between that and the fact that Big J's followers kill, maim and slaughter on average about once every decade or so?
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thnx to Mr. Azza for the foto

Praying TO GODDESS?

Anyone wanna take a stab at answering a friend of mine?

"I'm reading [Switching to Goddess].... One thing that occurs to me is that many of the people you are apparently addressing, i.e., religious people who are slave to male god concepts, hold very dear the idea of personally communing with God by means of prayer.

"Almost all the religious people I know (i.e., the two or three) plus my own memories, involve prayer. I find the goddess or pagan religions don't emphasize this much. In Spiral Dance, is that the Starhawk?, anyway I recall reading lots about ceremony and ritual, but not about prayer.

"So the question is, in what manner does one access the goddess? Is it largely an intellectual idea, or is there an analog to Christian prayer? How human is the goddess?"

STILL Hiding THE GODDESS

Unbelievable! This May 2009 NatGeo article about China's Sichuan and Yunnan Provinces mentions zip & nada about that region's most totally amazing people: the Moso (Mosuo) of Mother Lake.

Not only do the Moso center their lives around goddesses, they're also the only known culture in the world giving the old heave-ho to the institution of marriage.

Although the article's subtitled "Searching for Shangri-La," the author says he didn't find it.

Of course the poor dude didn't! He didn't visit the Moso!

For the real story on the real Shangri-La, get your hands on a copy of Switching to Goddess: Humanity's Ticket to the Future, 2008. In it you'll find an entire up-to-date chapter on the marriageless Moso and their magnificent goddesses.

Love,
Athana
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thnx to Dirk Borchers for the foto of the Moso girl.

Helping GODDESS SUCCEED

"...the fact is that almost all new religious movements fail....

"The sociologist Rodney Stark is one of the few people who have been willing to develop specific ideas about what makes new religious movements succeed.

SNIP

"'The main thing you've got to recognize,' he [Stark] told me, 'is that success is really about relationships and not about faith. What happens is that people form relationships and only then come to embrace a religion.'

SNIP

"'Something else: give people things to do.... The Mormons are great at giving people things to do too. You know, they not only tithe money but they also tithe time. They do an enormous amount of social services for one another, all of which builds community bonds. It also gives you this incredible sense of security—I'm going to be okay when I'm in a position of need; there are going to be people to look out for me. That makes a difference.' "

Go HERE for MORE, to "Oh Gods!" in The Atlantic >>>>>>> .

I Adore CHRISTIANS

I adore Christians, Muslims, Hindus, Jews and Zeus worshippers. They're all sweet, lovable beauties born out of the Goddess.

It's their earth-killing, people-eating "religions" that make me want to punch holes in pillows.

Sweeties, tons of religions are out there to choose from. Why latch onto the ones that are mean, ugly, and out to take the human species to the cleaners?
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thnx to jaki good for the foto; go HERE to see more.

Buried MOTHER-GODDESS STORIES

Buried in an old box of books I snapped up at an auction last week, I discovered a great old 1934 book called Tales of the Cochiti Indians. These stories were collected by the anthropologist Ruth Benedict. Nestled in this book are 10-15 stories about the Cochiti Mother Goddess. Here, for your reading pleasure, is part of one:

"The Origin of Death

"They were coming up from Shipap. One of their children became sick and they did not know what was the trouble with him. They had never seen sickness before. They said to the Shkoyo (curing society) chief, 'Perhaps our Mother [Goddess] in Shipap will help us. Go back and ask her to take away this trouble.' He went back to our Mother and she said to him, 'The child is dead. If your people did not die, the world would fill up and there would be no place for you to live. When you die, you will come back to Shipap to live with me. Keep on traveling and do not be troubled when your people die...."

This story is an "origin tale." Benedict collected these stories in the summer of 1924, from old Cochiti. Why old people? Because "in Cochiti the first age group to be systematically sent to Government boarding school is now about 35 years old, and below that age even the commonest tales are known only by hearsay."

Good reason for this: Once in the "boarding schools," the Indians of the American Southwest were tortured until they cried uncle (i.e., agreed to skip out on every last inch of their old Mother Goddess ways).

I guess we're lucky that plucky old anthropologists like Benedict waltzed in and snapped up the last traces of the indigenous American Mother Goddess. Otherwise, instead of knowing next to nothing about Her -- we'd all know *totally* nothing.

But it makes you wonder, doesn't it? How many hundreds of thousands of Mother Goddesses around the world got pitched into the scrap bag before anyone could save any trace of them?
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thnx to teyacapn for the foto of the Cochiti family. Go HERE to see more.

Ice AGE WORDS?

Wowza! Here's a linguist says some of the words we use today were used back in the days of the cavewoman: I, who, we, thou, two, three, five.

For MORE, go HERE.
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thnx to wiccan for the foto; go HERE to see more.