Z Budapest's REVIEW OF SWitching

Z Budapest's Review of Switching to Goddess, in Goddess Magazine, Vol. 1, Issue 1, January, 2009, pp 6-8.

This review appeared this month in Z's new periodical, Goddess Magazine, a fab new online read you won't want to miss. Goddess Magazine sings with Z's magical style of writing and view of the world. Also, it has the snazziest layout and artwork I have yet to see in any Goddess magazine. Go HERE to check it out (click on "Goddess Magazine" in upper left corner).

Ever since Marija Gimbutas has passed away there’s been no clear voice coming from the archeology community; which made a lot of the Goddess findings. In fact, I have not heard about a mainstream Goddess oriented book with facts, figures and a decent scientific background.

Sure there’s a constant flow of books about the Goddess, but you find they are the same books over and over again. The proverbial elementary everlasting 101 Goddess course, with a slightly new spin.

Most new books are about old books. Books about books.

We writers must mind the bottom line. We are told that it is okay to talk down to the readers, because they are all languishing in an ever lastingly starting point in their evolution. I hope this has changed. But I think the time has come to name names, show us the big picture, reveal the Goddess as a social force who yields peace and civilization. Do we dare?

Well Jeri Studebaker dared. When I picked up her book I thought if she comes anywhere near of her title, I’ll be happy.

This is a revolutionary book. The writer is fearless. A good sized book, with lots of references and quotes at the end. In fact I loved the last part most, because when you read the book all the way and you come to the last 200 pages, that’s where she has put the ammunition against the existing male gods holy books and their claims.

I got myself so fired up reading this book that I just jumped up and yelled, “I must call up this woman. I must tell her how much I loved this work. She is one of us! Yeah!”

And so I did.

Jeri was a little surprised. I asked if I can talk to the Goddess Jeri, she giggled and we were off to a good start.

What is her thesis? Simple, and witches have been saying it for many years. The male gods must be removed. Jeri traces them to about 4,000 BC. She calls them the players in the starvation religion.

Starvation gods are the war gods, war gods are evil. They are created by men, but then they live on, scaring people with hell and suffering after death. They have a wanton record of slaying thousands of people who they see as enemies; even attacking pregnant women ripping them open. They institutionalized rage against the woman.

Enemies are big business. We know that, each war has their profits. Fear is the basis of this war the Lord controls, and they are almost everywhere on the earth. With exception, like the little Himalayan Moso tribes, where they worship a Guiding Goddess, and do not have marriage as we know it. Jeri tells you about a couple of other Goddess cultures and goes into deep detail with pictures.

She said, before 4,000 BC, no wars and no hierarchy existed anywhere. Peace reigned. People modeled themselves after their Guiding Goddess who was behaving like a healthy Mother to her children. Jeri comes out and says, “You’ll be like the mothers model, or you'll all go down with the planet.”

For those of us who like to think that tolerance towards all faiths is the best way to go, Jeri busts that bubble. When it spreads and endorses war, it should not be tolerated. If it does not enhance society, create peace amongst the folks, it should not be tolerated.

But of course she doesn’t think we should go out and smite them with pestilence and slay them all; and their cattle. This is the big difference.

But we can all switch to the Goddess. Right now.

What Jeri isn’t saying, is that we as women we are the culture. As women we can give our energy or withhold it. We are the world. What women endorse will live. We create our own Goddesses, and model ourselves naturally after Mother model. Women who are not biological mothers still have the tendency and bond reaction when stressed. Instead of kill and kill what we don’t understand.

So if women switch to Goddess, which is what the Goddess Movement has done for 30 years now, they will have found the way to improving life on earth.

But don’t take it from me. She has the facts and the hair raising direct quotes from the so called sacred books of male war gods, which I never knew about. She gives us directions. She actually is an activist about knowledge, preps us with responses to the most often posed challenges.

Ok. I asked her next to teach in the D.U. She said yes. I want you to have groundbreaking teachers like Jeri, women who are Switching to Goddess. So, now we have a very powerful and interesting new class in the D.U. [Dianic University]* for you. Join Jeri there and she will turn you into Action Heras. Jeri knows how to switch to the Goddess.

Get your own copy of Switching to Goddess, Humanity's Ticket to the Future *by J. Lyn Studebaker.

Z Budapest

Thnx Z!!!!
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Go HERE to sign up for the course "Switching to Goddess." Enrollment is open, so you can begin the class at any point in time. You'll need to sign up at zbudapest.com before you can enroll.
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*If you live in Canada, the UK, France, Germany, Japan or China, save shipping costs by buying Switching to Goddess on those countries' Amazon.com sites. Switching is also sold at many other online bookstores, including Barnes & Noble, Powell's, Alibris, and several others.

THE BIG BAD Wolf IS DEAD, DEAD, DEAD

Ever since Mr. Obama took his oath of office today and scooted Mr.'s Bush and Cheney out of the Oval Office, I have not been able to get this tune outa my head:

"Hey, hey, the wolf is dead, the big bad wolf is dead, dead, dead...."

And what an acceptance speech Mr. O gave!

Smart is back in town, children, and the dudes with their brains on hold have been sent packing at last.
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thnx to Byrd on a wire for the foto; go HERE to see more of his work.

WHERE'D CHURCH Come FROM?

In my local Maine Pagan group, someone asked today why Wiccans sometimes take the word "church" instead of "coven" to describe themselves.

Here, according to Maine's own raven_starsong3, is the surprising answer:

"Pagan groups in general are taking the title of Church for two reasons. First, they may be trying to achieve mainstream and/or legal recognition as a body equal to a Christian or other religion's church.

"Second, the word 'church' is actually a Romanized version of the Celtic word 'circe' which is what the Pagans in the British Isles called their groups.

Circe means a circle or group practicing religion as a community. The Celts pronounced it KER'ka, but the Romans pronounced it CHER'cha and took it back to Rome where it became associated with the Christian religion.

There is a movement to 'take the word back.'"

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Thnx to blueheron for the foto; go HERE to see more.

Forgiveness, ANYONE?

"People, in general, would rather die than forgive. It's that hard. If God said in plain language, 'I'm giving you a choice, forgive or die,' a lot of people would go ahead and order their coffin."

~from Sue Monk Kidd, The Secret Life of Bees: A Novel, Waterville, Maine: Thorndike Press, page 426.

So let's kick forgiveness around for a while. What does the Goddess say we should do about it?

Four or five years ago, my dog Duncan killed my cat Margaret. She was old, he loved to chase her. She was great at hiding and running from him, but she kept getting older and older, and one day he caught her behind the toilet.

A mad chase, a scuffle, and the next thing I knew Margaret was convulsing and then still.

It took time for me to forgive my dog-son Duncan, but eventually forgiveness just floated into my heart. I didn't have to work at getting it. It wasn't a choice. I didn't ask for it, or pray for it. One day, forgiveness just happened.
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Thnx to j.labrado for the foto; go HERE to see more.

Thanx to Judith Laura over at Medusa Coils for this fab and very complete review of my new book, Switching to Goddess (Judith is the author of She Lives! The Return of Our Great Mother; Goddess Spirituality for the 21st Century: From Kabbalah to Quantum Physics; and Beyond All Desiring):

"This is a treasure of a book. Written with a light touch, at times humorous enough to make you lol, Switching to Goddess by J. Lyn Studebaker brings together scholarship now known about how Goddess religions were suppressed in antiquity and suggests ways we can bring Goddess back for our own well-being and for the survival of the planet.

"Studebaker (who blogs as Athana on Radical Goddess Thealogy) doesn't mince words in her bold assessment of where "war-daddy god" worship has gotten us and why we need to return to the female divine, whose cultures have been associated with peace, equality, and risk-taking. She doesn’t tip toe around difficult issues, and isn’t afraid to directly and strongly criticize Christianity and the Bible, for example. Though she often writes in a slangy style, you’d be wise not to be taken in by the flip language: Studebaker is no intellectual lightweight. The offbeat language helps make the book more accessible and enjoyable, but behind it a strong intellect and Goddess interpreter is at work.

"Studebaker, who has completed all coursework for a PhD in cultural anthropology, has taught archeology and anthropology at Ohio State University and has a master's degree in prehistory and archeology. Before taking us on a worldwide tour (with pics) of ancient Goddess cultures in the Near East, the Indus Valley, Old Europe, Southeast Europe, and Japan, the author introduces us to cultures surviving today (also with pics) that have many traits in common with ancient Goddess societies. These surviving cultures include the Moso on the China-Tibet border, which served as a model for ‘Shangri la’ in James Hilton’s novel, Lost Horizon, and whose people eschew marriage for a system of "free love"; the Basques of the Pyrenees mountains on the Spain-France border, whose language and customs differ greatly from the rest of Europe’s; and the Hopis and Pueblos, native to the American Southwest. As a point of comparison, Studebaker also discusses what she calls our "kissing cousins," the sexy, peaceful bonobos, who, along with more violent chimpanzees, are humans' closest primate relatives. Bonobo societies, she says, "look suspiciously like an animal version of guiding goddess societies...."

"One of the great contributions of this book is its careful tracing of the change-over from the Mother-modeled guiding goddess to what Studebaker calls "war daddy," which includes not only Abrahamic monotheism headed by a male-only deity, but also belligerent, domineering male gods in polytheistic societies. In a chapter called "Good Times," the material under the subhead, "Just Any Ol’ Goddess Won’t Do" is one of my favorite parts of this book. Studebaker writes:

"The mere presence of goddesses in a society, however, doesn’t guarantee peace, prosperity, and plums for breakfast....This is so important that I’ll probably repeat it more than once: just any old goddess won’t do. It has to be a special kind. For starters, it can’t be one with a jealous god hanging over her right shoulder....And above all it needs to be a guiding mother goddess who not only gives birth to everyone and everything in the universe (including any other gods and goddesses) but who also serves as a guide for our behavior.

"This means that most goddesses that existed in pantheons after 4000 BC to 300 BC (depending on the culture) are no longer guiding goddess models. (This book uses the abbreviations BC and AD so I will use them in this review, rather than the BCE and CE sometimes used in discussing Goddess cultures.) Studebaker gives us some excellent, easy-to-understand, diagrams of this switchover from guiding goddess to war god cultures under a sub-head, "Who Popped Us in the Chops Ma?" in a chapter called "Bad Times." Figure 6.1, "Black Box" shows us when each culture entered what Studebaker calls the "Black Box," during which time the culture underwent drastic change but we can’t (yet?) define exactly what happened to cause this change (although she does discuss several theories). Figure 6.2, "The Switch from Guiding Goddess to War Gods," shows at what points in time cultures in 5 different geographical areas entered the black box, and when they exited the box. Another fascinating time chart is in the chapter called "Home Again." Figure 9.1, "A Generalized Look at History, Goddesses, Gods, and Society," summarizes by time period (beginning in 10,000 BC and ending in the present) characteristics of religions compared with characteristics of societies.

"Another of my favorite parts of this book are 3 sections in the chapter "Good Times," called "Go Directly to Jail, Do Not Pass Go," "Backlash," and "Tricky-Dickies." Studebaker recalls the initial publication of books in the 1980s about ancient Goddess cultures:

"The second someone suggested goddess was equal to god...all hell broke loose. The result: since the 1990s, a backlash of unprecedented proportions has raged against the Neolithic and Bronze-Age Great Mother Goddess.

"She goes on to give examples (and names names) of professors of religion, anthropologists, archeologists, and a "writer-combo team" whose attitudes and books represent backlash against Goddess scholarship. Studebaker refutes what she calls their "folderol," and warns about the trickiness of the backlashers’ tactics, writing:

"They throw page after page at us of confusing, stuffy, tangled academic language that boils down to this: before 4000 BC the world might not have worshipped goddesses. Which of course is something you can say about anything archeologists dig up....In archeology all we can ever do is go with our best bets.

"She gives examples of backlasher claims, such as "just because a figurine is breast-bedecked doesn’t mean it’s female"; or that breasts must be a certain size for the statue to be considered female even though the statue lacks a penis; or that even though figurines have two heads or two faces, one shouldn’t assume they represent goddesses–they could just be "ordinary women."

"Yet another of my favs is the subhead "Bounceback #2 Anything You Can Do, I Can Do Better," in the chapter, "Fight." Studebaker enumerates the many ways various cultures’ gods, in order to gain power, tried to take over the Goddess’s role of giving birth. Most of us are familiar with at least two examples of this: God (aka Yaweh) enables Adam to give birth from his rib to Eve, and Zeus gives birth to Athena from his forehead. In figure 7.1, "And the Dude Bore a Nine-Pound Blonde," she lists these plus 8 other births from various parts of gods’ bodies in a number of cultures. She then discusses other stages of Goddess sabotage and obliteration that frequently followed.

"Because war god religions are threatening to both people and the planet, and because it has been shown that human beings appear to be hardwired for religion of some sort, Studebaker has set a goal of the year 2035 for switching to Goddess. She gives us all tremendous help in accomplishing this in the information and motivation she provides in Switching to Goddess.

"Part of the information is contained in the extensive and extremely helpful appendixes. For example in Appendix C, "Questions from the Peanut Gallery," she anticipates questions people may challenge her with and gives responses. These are arranged alphabetically. Some examples:

BUDDHISM "For bringing peace and harmony to the world, wouldn’t Buddhism work as well as goddesses?"
Like Jesus, Buddha decreed for his followers lives of sensual deprivation. Also like Jesus, he suggests humans deserve poverty, primarily. In contrast, the Guiding Goddess demands we enjoy the senses she gave us, and that we pull everyone together in abundance—the way healthy siblings do....What’s more, Buddhism is not always the cornucopia of peace and purity many in the West believe it to be....

CHANGE.
"But you said culture is highly resistant to change. So how are we going to shift to Goddess by 2035?"
....Almost all of us, however, already live in partially-goddess societies. The starvation/war gods are simply thin overlays....Our job is to pull out the old goddesses from beneath the starvation/war culture dirt layer and dust them off again.

MOTHER MODEL.
"What is it?"
....In choosing how to behave [in any situation] answering the question "In this situation, what would a healthy mother do vis a vis her children" is likely to scare up good moral behavior. Not just men, but all of us need to learn from this [Mother Model]. Since I’m a non-mother woman—I’ve never had children—I need to learn from it too. But even mothers themselves need to learn from the Mother Model.

"There are more than 30 of these Q & A’s. One way to make use of them is, as you’re reading along in the book's chapters, if you have a question–particularly a point where you think you would give Studebaker a good argument, go to Appendix C and see if she has already thought of your question and responded to it.

"Also helpful while you are reading are 6 maps placed between the end of the last chapter and the beginning of the appendixes. Included in the other appendixes are a chart on "The Origin of the Starvation Culture," associated with the changeover to war gods; a list of "War Gods Around the World"; a list of "Guiding Goddesses We Can Return To," also from around the world; a list of blogs in "closed countries"; a chart of world religions showing the numbers of adherents and what percentage this is of the total; suggestions for "Things You Can Do to Flip the Switch" to Goddess, alphabetized by what may be your occupation, nationality and other identifiers—don’t miss this one; a list of some relevant websites and blogs; a "Goddess Reading List" with books and more websites and blogs; and last but definitely not least, "Cruelty in the Bible: Short List." In addition, there is an extensive bibliography and an index.

"These back materials plus the charts and pictures throughout the book make it ideal for classes, whether they be in universities or outside academia in small private groups. Switching to Goddess is an excellent book for newcomers to Goddess spirituality–whether enthusiastic or skeptical. And with its new (to me, anyway) material and fearless yet humorous writing style, it will also be a treat for many of us who have been Goddess-involved for some time."

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thnx to Dan Mogford for the foto; go HERE to see more.

IF HE CAN Show HIS, I CAN Show MINE!

"A society in which women have to hide and cover their breasts is a society in which nurturance is neglected.... The naked female breasts, as symbols of women's power, deeply frighten men. Breasts are covered for that reason alone, and not because they arouse passion and sexuality."

"Today's taboos against the exposure of female breasts, while allowing males to freely expose the same anatomical area, has to do with the ancient symbolism. Symbols of nurturance are the most powerful in that they remind men of their dependence upon the Mother -- upon the Female....

~ from Z Budapest's The Holy Book of Women's Mysteries Part II, 1980, p. 204

If we want radical change, don't we need to make small radical changes to start?

Would facing our fear of female breasts in public be a place to start?

If they could see how totally horrified we are at the thought of female nipples exposed in public, the ancient Minoans would have laughed their fool heads off.

Actually, considering how fab the Minoans were, they'd probably be too kind to laugh and point. They'd probably have pitied us deeply, though.

Wow, women, think of it! Our chests are so powerful that they'd shrivel men into tiny little peanuts at the mere public sight of them! Our breasts are so packed full of natural power that to shine them upon each other in public is punishable in courts of law! Someone, somehow has managed to convince us that our chests are so dangerous we needed to heave laws onto the books to keep these dangerous things from seeing the light of day!

Could the next step in our march back to Goddess Power be our work to scrap the laws against uncovering women's stupendous, gorgeous, life-giving breasts in public?

Just the way we pity fundie Muslim women forced to cover all but their eyes in public -- that's exactly how the ancient Minoans would pity us. They would look at us and see (although they'd never say it), semi-retarded, bamboozled, wimp-heads.

How would we go about scrapping our breast laws? Should we act out first? Say stage a mass protest in Central Park with thousands of women marching around proudly wearing uncovered breasts for all to see?

What kinds of signs would we carry?

"Naked Breasts For One And For All!"

"Equal Rights for Women's Breasts!"

"If He Can Show His, I Can Show Mine!"
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the foto above is one surviving part of an ancient Minoan wall painting

Miserable ATHEISTS

Today I found myself riveted to Richard Dawkins' rad website, where a group of devout atheists cranked out explanations of what they do at Christmas aka "Christ's mass."

Here's a small, tasty sample:

"As a miserable atheist I shall of course be alone over christmas. After breakfast I will spend the next three hours tearing pages out of a bible and cursing anyone who has the temerity to ring or call (I will save the quran for Boxing Day). Having loaded my air rifle I will take pot shots at birds and cats that enter my garden. Just before dusk I will spend an hour or two breaking into cars and if I am lucky, stealing children’s presents, I don’t want them of course so I will throw them into the nearest waste bin having stamped on them first...."

I hold a sweet place in my heart for all the world's Atheists (I was one myself -- between being born into a daddy/sky/war-god family and moving on to the Mother/Earth/Peace-Goddess).

A metacool thing about Atheists is that they are our allies in the war to break the fist-clamp the father/sky/war gods* hold over us.

In other words, once Atheists become cool to everyone, it'll be easier for Pagans too to hold our heads up high (without worrying about getting them smushed into the nearest cement sidewalk by some busted daddy-war-god dude).
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*Mainly Jehovah, Allah and Yahweh, but also the Hindu daddy war gods
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thnx to Ramon Gris for the foto; go HERE to see more of his work.

THE GREAT MOTHER'S Prayer

Our Mother who art the Earth
Nourishing are thy ways
Thy web of life be woven
Thy ways be found within
As it is all around.

Thank you this day for our bread and sweat
And forgive us our misuse of you
As we forgive others their misuse of us
And lead us not into exploitation
But deliver us from lording it over you
And over each other and over fellow creatures.

For thine are the waters of life
The feeding, breeding, seeding ground
For now and as far as close to forever
As we shall ever come.

Blessed Be!

~ from Zsuzsanna Budapest's Dianic University website

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Thnx to AJ Franklin for the pic of "Rainbow over strip mines." Go HERE to see more of this fotographer's work.

AJ says, "The coal companies ran roughshod over NE Penna, tearing out whatever they wanted and making it look like the surface of the moon. These are the same bastards that are in the oil business today, and want to do that to the ANWR...If they were given half a chance."

WINTER SOLSTICE Blessings

From Vicki Noble:

At this sacred holy-day, I like to remember Charlie Murphy's Solstice song, Light Is Returning, to express the relief that we profoundly feel as the light is birthed again within the darkness...

Light is returning
Even though this is the darkest hour
No one can hold back the dawn

Let's keep it burning
Let's keep the light of hope alive
Make safe our journey through the storm

One planet is turning
Circles on her path around the Sun
Earth Mother is calling her children home

Title: Light Is Returning
Lyrics by: Charlie Murphy
Recorded on: "Canticles of Light," Charlie Murphy, Jami Sieber and the Total Experience Choir (Out Front Music, P.O. Box 12188, Seattle, WA 98102)

Blessings to all of you on this eve of the day the light returns!

Love,
Athana
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thnx to epantha for the pic; go HERE to see more.

RICK WARREN: Dominionist DUDE?

It's bad enough he's anti-LGBT, anti-woman and anti-abortion.

But worse -- and something few are talking about -- is that Ricky Warren, the Jumping-Jehovah dude Obama picked to open his inauguration, seems to be in bed with Christian Dominionists.

Dominionists want to kill democracy, the presidency, and the Constitution. "Time to go back to kings," they say. But the "king" would be their cutie little dude-deity, Jumpin' Jehovah.

Instead of the Constitution, all our judges would thumb through the Old Testament to decide right from wrong -- and the "right" punishment for each "wrong," including the death penalty for looking at a parent with disrespect in your eye.

You think I'm kidding here, doncha? You think these Dominionist dudes are are only a few scattered loony-toons who have no power, don't ya? Hows come then Sarah Palin -- a Dominionist -- got so close to the White House? Think that was just an accident?

And hows come Ricky W. gets to usher in the Obama admin.?

If we hafta have Ricky, then Judith Laura over at Medusa Coils has the best idea I've heard all week:

If we ... really want to be inclusive, we should look for a woman who is clergy in a non-Christian religion.... Selecting a lesbian to be the other invocation-giver would send a clear message that Warren’s presence is truly meant to be inclusive and not an endorsement of his views.

Shooting OURSELVES IN THE FeeT?

HERE'S an article that caught my eye today. It's about how Muslims are leading the world around like a cow with a ring in its nose, 'cause we're all frightfully frightened of the fatwa, and about how the West started the whole shebang all by its lil' ol' lonesome self:

"The lesson of the Rushdie Affair ... is that liberals have made their own monsters. It is the liberal fear of giving offence that has helped create a culture in which people take offence so easily."

What's to blame, says Mr. Kenan Malik the author, is our "abandonment of the politics of universalism in favour of ethnic particularism, the shift from the politics of ideology to the politics of identity." All this sly shifting and abject abandoning happened in the 1980s.

OK, I'm a liberal, but I part company with my liberal friends over the idea that every trait of every culture is a sacred cow. The fatwa, IMO should be stomped into the dust ASAP with every ounce of energy the world possesses, along with harems, human slavery, and the frequent ingestion of roasted caterpillar skins. The earth's too small now to stand for such nonsense spreading and getting the upper hand -- or should I say foot?

Pass THE SEED, PLEASE

HERE'S a good article on how "religious" people breed like flies. "Religious" people pump out more babies -- in many cases a *lot* more babies, says this author, Andy Gottlieb. And, those babies typically adopt their parents' religion.*

By "religion" Andy of course means daddy-god religion (Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist). So, what Andy's really saying is daddy-god people have more babies.

Next Andy scratches his head and says, "Nobody knows why!"

Well, dear hearts, we know why, don't we? Typically, Daddy God tells his dudes to throw "their" women down on the floor and fill them full of seed. Tons of seed.

Here -- anybody want seed? Daddy God has it gushing out his galoshes. He's tickled pink to pass it around, all over everyone. He does adore his seed. Seed, seed, seed.

And what this means is, the daddy always has extra bodies lying around he can beat the rest of us up with. It's a problem.

This little drama, of course, has been marching across the stage for six millennia. Although Daddy started as a small group of a few dozen 6000 years ago, he's now spread like lice in thick hair, all over the globe.

Today, well over half the world worships Daddy.

It's a problem, and what we can do about it is this: get to Daddy-god's young while they're itty-bitties and teach them what kind of deadly world plague their parents are trying to pass off onto them -- and all the rest of us.
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*"Faith Equals Fertility," by Andrew Gottlieb, on moreintelligentlife.com

ACADEMIA AND THE Bogeywoman (i.e., GODDESS)

HERE, in an old issue of Goddess Pages, is a great article by Max Dashu on the way in which "objective" academia shakes in its shoes when confronted by Goddess.

Thnx both to Max and to Geraldine at Goddess Pages for all you each do for the Goddess Movement.

DEAR ANONYMOUS AMERICAN Soldier

Dear Anonymous American Soldier who left a comment today on my old 1/2/06 post, "Bible Verses for the Kids to Memorize",

First, I adore you, and the Goddess adores you.

Second, I beg of you -- don't threaten me with Christian promo propaganda like "I only hope you will realize the truth in God's word before judgment day comes." It makes me laugh and giggle til my stomach ties itself into crampy little knots.

Third, I can't even begin to tell you how grateful I am you are willing to sacrifice everything to protect me and others. You are my hero in all caps. Whatever any of us feels about the justification for the war in Iraq, the fact is, in the primitive war-based world of today, we still need to protect ourselves at times against armed aggression. Without guys like you, we'd all be toast faster'n you can say "trip over my toes and tell me thank you."

I know you aren't paid to sit around and second-guess your commanders. You're trained to do as you're told. That's how our war-god armed forces work, and in our present culture, I seriously doubt our military'd work otherwise. So I deeply and totally honor your commitment to protect.

Third, you're right -- you are fighting for my right to believe what I want, even if you'd sooner drown what I believe in a bathtub as look at it. Your religion, however, is based on the idea that if I do believe what I want, it will shoot me down into a vast underground torture prison -- to be tortured hideously, with no release at any point in time. Ever. Pretty, harsh, dude, wouldn't you say?

You think you're fighting for democracy in Iraq (if that's where you are), but your religion is fighting to dump democracy here in the U.S. -- and around the world. Members of your religion are fighting as we speak to take over the U.S. and make it a theocracy.

If you want to learn more about this, root around and read a few of the other posts in this blog.

Sixth, as a soldier, I know you need to pray. But you're praying to a scam. I hate to break it to ya, dude, but your god is a primitive desert god-substitution pieced together by ancient con artists to scare the bejeezus outa people so they'd do their bidding.

Why not pray to a real deity, the Great Guiding Mother Goddess? She loves you no matter what you do, and takes you back into Her loving arms and womb when you die -- no matter what. Or, pray to god while you're at war (I know it's hard to change when you're under stress), but think about what I say here. And when you get safely home, consider switching to a real deity -- the Great Goddess.

Hate to break it to ya, but with your 'god' chances are big-time good you're going to Hell. Have you read the entire Bible? Do you know how many ways you can slip into Jehovah/Allah/Yahweh's Eternal Torture Chamber? What if when you die, you go to where you think you'll go? Whew, bud, are you taking some big risks!

Seventh, read the rest of this blog. Or better, buy my book, Switching to Goddess: Humanity's Ticket to the Future, which I wrote simply because I can't cover everything in one sitting about why the world needs to drop "God" like a hot potato and take up again with the only real deity we've ever known, The Great Guiding Goddess.
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thnx to one lucky guy for the foto; go HERE to see more.

LONESOME DOVE Meets GODDESS

Last night after watching the award-winning movie Lonesome Dove, I cried so hard a river now runs through my living room.

What is it about the ending of this movie that makes it almost as bad as watching a best friend die?

And then it hit me. I think Lonesome Dove taps into the old Goddess world.

Lonesome Dove happens in the Old American West. When two ex-Texas Rangers, Augustus "Gus" McCrae and his longtime partner Woodrow Call drive cattle to Montana, they are joined not only by several cowhands but also by Ms. Lorena Wood, the prostitute half this group is moony-eyed over. Only after learning his old heartthrob Mrs. Clara Allen now lives near Montana, does Gus agree to ride along. One of the cowhands, a young orphan raised by Gus and Woodrow, finds out on the trip that Woodrow is his father.

On this blog, I have always said that compared to god people, Goddess people are sensual, nurturing, emotionally-mature risk-takers with galloping senses of humor. This is Gus McCrae to a tee. While Woodrow often pokes fun at Gus for Gus's love of pleasure, Gus pokes at Woodrow for being a party-pooper.

Gus loves love-making, but since Woodrow's long-ago fling with the orphan Newt's mother, Woodrow has been celibate. Whereas Gus is often seen lolling naked in a river chewing on a reed, Woodrow's never even seen without his hat -- let alone his clothes.

Gus nurtures like a Mother Goddess -- even when it leads to grief for himself. He nurses Lorena back to health after she's been manhandled by Blue Duck and his gang. This means bringing her along to Clara's ranch -- and may be partly why Clara cold-shoulders Gus's marriage proposal once again. The anti-nurturer Woodrow, on the other hand, can't even tell his own son he's his dad -- leaving Newt with deep scars.

As the Goddess is present all around us, so Gus is emotionally present, expressing his emotions easily, quickly and often -- to pigs if no one else is around. Woodrow is as emotionally distant as a sky god, never showing anything but anger. Woodrow rarely even speaks.

While Gus has a sense of humor in spades, not one drop of humor runs through Woodrow's daddy-god veins. Woodrow the god-man runs his cowhands like a dictator -- except for Gus, who "governs" himself. Gus is an emotional risk-taker; doesn't scare him a bit to ask women for love. Emotionally Woodrow is as dry as the desert he crosses with his cattle.

So. Anyone else a lover of Lonesome Dove? Do my ramblings here make sense?
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*Lonesome was first a Pulitzer-Prize-winning book. This book was made into TV mini-series that won seven Emmy Awards and was nominated for 13 others.
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Clips from Lonesome Dove
(Hit the triangle in the lower left until it becomes two vertical bars)


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A Tribute to Gus

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thnx to rasputina2 for the foto of the bird-footed Goddess; go HERE to see more.

Tangling THE COVERS

Want a thoroughly entertaining yet damnably depressing picture of exactly how Big Money is using YAJ* to decimate the US? If so, put your paws on a copy of John Grisham's The Appeal.

What a read! I finished it late last night -- and tangoed through a night of tossing, turning and tangling the bed covers until I "woke" the next morning at the first sign of light in a window.
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*YAJ is short for YahwehAllahJehovah. Most think YAJ is three separate gods, but he's not. He's just one schizoid god with three separate personalities. Unfortunately for us, these three personalities are always at war with each other, dragging us into war after war on his/their coattails.

Dancing WITH THE MALE GODS

Yesterday, anti-thesisofreason asked, "So do you think we should get rid of all male deities? Are there any that would be worth keeping?"

Personally, anti, I believe there are tons of male gods worth keeping. Last winter, we had quite a party on this blog about male gods, with lots of people chiming in on the topic. [See "Goddess and the Good Gods" from last March]

And after reading Sannion's Written in Wine: A Devotional Anthology for Dionysos, I've fallen in love with this old Greek "counterculture god." [Go HERE to see reviews of Written in Wine on Amazon.com]
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Thnx to Clair-de-lune for the foto of Dionysus; go HERE to see more.

Balance: MOTHER GODDESSES v. Not-MOTHER GODDESSES

A few weeks ago, Kristina dropped off a little note* announcing that trading gods for goddesses would drag us straight down that ugly, weedy path of "imbalance."

Now, I was sure Geraldine Charles' recent article over at Goddess Pages had taken care of this piece of trouble "balance" already.

But what do I know.

Kristina, I'm wondering: How do ya define "imbalance"? Is dropping too much love on a baby an imbalance? Isn't it all in how you define "love"?

Howza bout being heterosexual? Isn't that an imbalance? (From what I've heard, ancient Greeks didn't even have words for "heterosexual" or "homosexual." To them, love was just love, all of it just as fine and dandy as peach hair.)

In Switching to Goddess** is a section saying the ancient Goddess-centered Neolithics might not have marked a difference between males and females as much as between mothers and not-mothers. So as someone who's never been a mother, for example, I would be lumped in with the men and the pre-teen women.

If I'm right about this, as long as Neolithic pantheons included mother- and "not-mother" deities, then to our ancestors these pantheons would count as balanced -- even if the not-mother deities were mostly female.

Whew! Wrap that around your brain and shake it six times!
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*On the October 31 post, "Back to the Goddess by 2035: Can We Really Do It?"
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thnx to Metronomad for the foto of Diana the Huntress; go HERE to see more.
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To purchase copies of Switching to Goddess: Humankind's Ticket to the Future, visit your favorite online bookstore. Or, for an autographed copy, send $28 ($25+$3 S&H) to Jeri Studebaker, P.O. Box 162, Westbrook, Maine, 04098.

Bopping THE GODDESS

Even though the Great Goddess has been bopped around a lot over time by the daddy gods, these bad daddies have never won the war they've waged against Her.

Oh, sure, they've tried hard to crush Her into dust, but every time they knock Her for a loop, She just bounces back again, in their faces, laughing.

Here's a look at just one of these bat-down, bounce-back sessions:

It didn’t take Jumping Jehovah long to see he had to sit on Mary just as he had Isis. And sit he did. As a result “Christian art of the first five centuries showed Mary in a position lower than Jesus, even lower than the Magi, who wore haloes while she wore none” (Walker 1983: 611). But for all the good it did him, Jumpin’ Jehovah might as well have sat around sipping frozen margaritas. To the people, Mary went right on being a totally awesome goddess, as shown by this story told by Caesarius of Heisterbach: “A knight of Liege needed money and so made a pact with Satan. When asked to curse and renounce God, he did so willingly. However, when the demon required him to renounce the Virgin, he refused, horrified. Therefore the Virgin later intervened to save him from damnation” (Walker 1983: 608).

And then J. saw that people were threatening to walk off his ball court totally. So after grumbling and spanking the wall a few times, he invited Mary back into his Church. “In the sixth century, the great temple of Isis at Philae was rededicated to Mary. Aphrodite’s sanctuaries on Cyprus became churches of Mary, whom the Cypriots continued to address by Aphrodite’s name…. Ecclesia, ‘the Church,’ was one of Mary’s titles” (Walker 1983: 609). Mary may have been lower than Jesus at first, but when the goddess temples closed, the “Goddess herself was not so much ousted as absorbed” (Walker p. 455). [FROM Switching to Goddess: Humanity's Ticket to the Future, Chapter 7, "Fight"*]

For the past six millennia these whomp-down, bounceback sessions have been happening all over the world.

The upshot of all this is, the Great Mother has never -- and never will -- abandon us. When we're ready for Her, She's ready to sweep us all up into Her loving arms again -- no questions asked.
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*HOW TO GET A COPY of Switching to Goddess: 1. Get a signed copy by sending a check or money order for $24.99 + $2.99 S&H to the author: Jeri Studebaker, P.O. Box 162, Westbrook, Maine, 04098. 2. Go to Amazon.com and buy it, by clicking on the Switching to Goddess cover to the right.
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thnx to Roozbeh Rokni for the foto; go HERE to see more.

Switching FROM GODS TO GODDESSES

On this blog the goal is to switch from daddy gods back to Guiding Goddesses. Until it's guided by Goddesses, we'll never have a healthy world.

As things stand now, all the daddy gods who guide us are -- think about it -- vicious, violent and skanky-janky war gods

If you had a car programmed to wheel you down roads leading to war zones, wouldn't you junk it?

And if you spotted a car designed to drive you where people were fascinating, fair, rich and decent risk takers -- wouldn't you grab it in a New York minute?

Thing is, boatloads of evidence show that in the past, societies organized around Guiding Goddesses were just that: places full of fab, fascinating, fair, risk-taking, rich people (with not just a few, but everyone rich).

Of course I can't pump out all this evidence in one itty bitty post. But for more info, prowl around this blog's past posts.

Or, place your paws on a copy of Switching to Goddess: Humanity's Ticket to the Future.* Switching tells what the past was like, how we lost it, and how we can get it back again.

What kinda wigs me out is that the very slime-ball forces that ripped our Guiding-Goddess Paradise out of our hands in the past, are prancing around now trying to make certain we don't recoup it. See yesterday's post.

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*For an autographed copy of Switching to Goddess, send $25.00 plus $3.00 S&H to Jeri Studebaker, P.O. Box 162, Westbrook, Maine 04098. Or, beginning November 28 you can buy copies on Amazon.com (you can pre-order now). Or ask your local library and/or bookstore to purchase copies from NBN (National Book Network) -- if they haven't already.

Sticking PINS INTO THE BELLY OF THE CHURCH

I am appalled at the way the Christian Church ran like a Mack truck over California law Nov. 4. This morning the New York Times even saw fit to do a front-page article on it.

I know we're all fed up with fear, but this is something to be afraid of. And I don't see people being nearly afraid enough.

The Christian menace is gaining on us again.

Pull out and reread your copy of John Sugg's Christian Reconstructionists Believe Democracy Is Heresy, Public Schools are Satanic, and Stoning Isn't Just for the Taliban Anymore -- And They've Got More Influence Than You Think. (Church and State 59, 2006).

Who do you think pushed the Christian Dudley Dubya into power? Who almost plunked Christian extremist Sarah Palin half a heartbeat away from the American Presidency?

Reread your school history texts. As little as a few centuries ago, this menace the "Church" kept us like slaves. American colonists failing to show up in church Sundays were pitched into jail.

And then there's the Salem "witch" trials. Christians actually had the political power to murder you if you said something they didn't like, or if you looked at them the wrong way.

I think we need drastic action here, babies.

I call for the immediate drafting and passage of laws that shoot Christian deacons, bishops, pastors, and even popes straight into federal prison if and when they use their organizations to meddle IN ANY WAY in civil politics. Even if they so much as drop one puny political word to anyone in their organizations, they should be fined like thieves.

And there should be strict and powerful laws making certain this happens.

Enough already. Write your congress people. Ask them to start drafting now.

Let's nip these dangerous thugs in the bud before it's too late.

HO-HUM ABOUT Homosexuality

As we all know, the ancient Pagans were so ho-hum about homosexuality they didn't even have a word for it. To them it was merely one side of sexuality, no big fat deal.

Then, about 2000 years ago, YAJ* two-stepped into the picture. And in order to yank power away from Pagans, YAJ specialized in carving people up into separate groups and then pitting the groups against each other.

So 2000 years ago, YAJ, he said, "Sheeple? No longer are you one sheeple. Henceforth I divide you into hets and homos. What's more, all homos are born to be hit, batted, and slapped around by hets. Got it?"

Even though this was 2000 years ago, YAJ still holds most of us by the short hairs.

On Tuesday, Nov. 4, gays and lesbians in California had their marriage rights ripped away. Would you fall over in sorry surprise if I said it was Christians -- mostly Mormons -- who funded the fight to filch these rights? No? (Ha! I knew my readers were sharper than your average blog babies.)

YAJ forever has his fingers in every gay and lesbian pie. Here, though, is the really skanky part about YAJ's dodo dance this time around: he got Mormons in Utah to dance over to CA and pour money into CA to dictate CA law.

So I say, CA, are you going to take this lying down like a mini mouse? Sweetheart, you need to do a better job of standing up for your rights!

"At least one donor, Alan A. from Lindon, Utah gave $1,000,000 to prevent same-sex couples two states away from enjoying legally-wedded bliss"

See also "Mormon Church steps into the Prop. 8 battle." _________________
*YAJ is short for YahwehAllahJehovah. Most think YAJ is three separate gods, but he's not. He's just one schizoid god with three separate personalities. Unfortunately for us, these three personalities are always at war with each other, dragging us into war after war on his/their coattails.
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thnx to SiRi for the foto; go HERE to more of his work.

COURT Favors CHURCH OF SUMMUM

Much to the horror of Christians in Pleasant Grove City, Utah, the Supreme Court recently ruled to allow the Church of Summum to post its Seven Aphorisms in the town park alongside the Ten Commandments:

“They’ve put a basically Judeo-Christian religious text in the park, which we think is great, because people should be exposed to it,” Mr. Temu [of the Summum Church] said. “But our principles should be exposed as well.”

Su Menu, the church’s president, agreed. “If you look at them side by side,” Ms. Menu said of the two monuments, “they really are saying similar things.”

The Third Commandment: “Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain.”

The Third Aphorism: “Nothing rests; everything moves; everything vibrates.”

Michael W. Daniels, the mayor here, is not the vibrating sort.

Sitting with the city attorney in a conference room in City Hall, Mr. Daniels deftly drew several fine lines in explaining why the city could treat the two monuments differently....

MORE>>>
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thnx to swilsonmc for the foto of the Salt Lake City Church of Summum pyramid; go HERE to see more.

VOTE FOR THIS MAN

My Dear Fellow Americans,

If you want four more years like the last eight, vote for this man, Mr. John McCain.

A HALLOWED SAMHUINN TO You ALL

My dears,

Here's wishing you a smashingly sensational Samhuinn this year.

Hoping it will snap, crackle and pop for you, with all kinds of magical meaningfulness.

Love,
xxx ooo,
Athana

Back TO GODDESS BY 2035: CAN WE Really DO IT?

Can we really, by the year 2035, replace god the father with God the Mother?

Yikes, people! That's a scant 27 years from now!

On the other hand, 27 years ago, America saw one of its last lynchings.* And now, exactly 27 years later, we're on the verge of [KNOCK ON WOOD!] landing an African-American in our Oval Office.

The push for Obama is being driven by the young. Even Evangelicals under 30 are backing Obama. And the young comedian Sarah Silverman has snapped out a metacool video called "The Great Schlep":

"Shake your behinds on over to Florida," she tells young Jewish Americans, "and order you grandparents to vote for Obama!" (Florida is a "swing" state full of retirees).

Many older whites are still prejudiced against black Americans. Nonetheless, many have sweat bullets to teach their kids not to be.

Also, whether they know it or not, many older Americans are bloodied up inside from hatching in, and years of incubating in, a Christian culture.

But we can teach our kids how to avoid being so bloodied, and how to love Goddess.

Seems to be a law in this land that every new generation has ta pitch their parents' world, and create their own. Every generation, from way back before the American Revolution, has felt the need to dump their parents' world for a shiny new one.

So one humongous key in getting back to Goddess: preach Goddess to your kids. (And to the Jones' kids next door too, if you can get away with it -- let's share the love!).

Teach Her through Her magic. Half our kiddy lit is based on the Goddess's magic. Harry Potter's a primo example (it's why the Christians hate poor Harry so).

Finally, a few sweet thoughts:

Chaos theory teaches that social change can happen in the flicker of an eyelash. Even though switching from endless warfare, deep-rooted cruelty and violence, snooty snobbism and bully-boy rule may seem like a six-century housecleaning job, chaos theory clues us in on how fast such change can actually happen: “An idea can become contagious and spread like a virus, through geometric progression, by doubling and doubling again, and again and again, until it reaches a critical mass, which is the tipping point. If we are talking about viruses, the result is an epidemic.” But with social systems we’re talking about social transformation. “When a critical number of people accept a principle, it becomes the new standard, an ‘as if it always was so.’ Like voting rights for American women, for instance, which we now take for granted” (Bolen 2005: 135).

"Although as I’ve pointed out throughout this book, cultures don’t change easily, the Goddess is already a deeply buried part of many if not most world cultures. In the West She hangs out as Mother Earth, Mary “Mother” of God, CinderElla, Maid Marian, Mother Holle, mistletoe and holly, the Goddess Oestra and Her sacred hare, and in myths, legends and holiday traditions too many to mention. We need to slide Her out of hiding, ditch the disguises She’s cloaked Herself in, and restore the brilliant old magic that made us the peace-loving, non-violent, earth-revering, sensual adventurers we all long to be again."

~ From Switching to Goddess: Humankind's Ticket to the Future. Nov. 2008. Hampshire, UK: O Books

Chapter 8 in Switching to Goddess is devoted to how we can make the switch from daddy gods to mother goddesses by 2035. This chapter is called "The Fix." Some sections in "The Fix":

With a Little Magic, The Fix Would Be Simple
Around the World, Nations Switching
Switching at Home
Switching Hearts and Minds
Switching for Men
Switching to What?
“When God Wants War”
But We Haven’t All Gotten It Yet
Beating the Talking Drums, Getting the Word Out Weblogistan
Whadda We Say? How Do We Say It?
Congregation Revolution
Calling All Manly Mother-Men
We Can’t Lose
We Can Do It By 2035
Money Can Be Part of the Mix in the Fix
Get Ready for the Big Daddy of All Backlashes

So if you want to learn more about how we can return to Goddess by 2035, make sure to get your hands on a copy of Switching to Goddess. It includes 35 pages devoted to just this topic.

Switching to Goddess will hit the bookstores on November 28. But lucky you -- you can pre-order a copy now at Amazon.com, at a price that's been savagely reduced by 34% -- from $24.95 to $16.47 -- that's a savings of $8.48.

If you can't buy a copy, sweet-talk your local librarian into springing for one you can borrow.
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*At least according to Wikipedia, who says that in Alabama in 1981, one Michael Donald was lynched by the KKK.
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Picture: ancient Goddess figurine from Neolithic (Jomon) Japan

SARAH PALIN: Sassiness SHOULD BE Stoned TO DEATH

Even Cable news is aghast these days about the ghoulishness of American Christian extremists -- most specifically about their recent "2012 letter." You know, the one that says if Barack Obama gets elected the world is going to end?

My opinion? Far, far scarier than Osama bin Laden, the Taliban, or any other radical Muslim group are our sweet lil' ol' American Christian extremists.

This home-grown daddy-god group is

a) Bulging large (7%-12% of our population),
b) Enormously well organized (the fear of Hell is used shamelessly to scare believers into doing anything needed),
c) Blisteringly powerful (they have entree to the White House, have run their own candidate for the Presidency, and are now running Sarah Palin),
d) Slimy-sneaky (they work hard to hide themselves and what they're doing),
e) and Ruthlessly radical (they literally want to replace democracy in this country with "theocracy" -- rule by the Bible).

Unlike Muslim extremists, American Christian extremists are world-class sneaks. They slither around underground, hiding what they're doing and concealing their aims (literal takeover of the U.S. government*). Also unlike Muslims, they all live legally inside our boundaries. There's no pitching them out on their ear to get rid of them. We're stuck with these icky, vile vermin.

So kiddies, if you want to ditch democracy and start living in a country where sassy kids, gays, blasphemers and "heretics" are, by law, stoned to death (I'm not being funny here; this is REALLY what they want to do)* -- just go ahead and vote for Sarah Boogey-Person Palin. 'Cause Sarah's church'd sooner stone ya to death as look atcha.
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*Under Christian extremists, "Those who would face execution include not only gays but a very long list of others: blasphemers, heretics, apostate Christians, people who cursed or struck their parents, females guilty of "unchastity before marriage," "incorrigible" juvenile delinquents, adulterers, and (probably) telephone psychics. And that's to say nothing of murderers and those guilty of raping married women or "betrothed virgins." Adulterers, among others, might meet their doom by being publicly stoned...." (from "Invitation to a Stoning" Walter Olson, Reason, Nov. 1998, Vol. 30, Issue 6).
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Bib.
Moser, Bob. The Crusaders. Rolling Stone, 4/21/2005, Issue 972.
Olson, Walter. Invitation to a Stoning. Reason, Nov. 1998, Vol. 30, Issue 6.
Sharlet, Jeff. Through a Glass, Darkly. Harper's, Dec., 2006, Vol. 313, Issue 1879.
Sugg, John. Christian Rconstructionists Believe Democracy Is Heresy, Public Schools are Satanic, and Stoning Isn't Just for the Taliban Anymore -- And They've Got More Influence Than You Think. Church and State 59 (2006)
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GOOD Point, RICHARD

"It is evil to describe a child as a Muslim child or a Christian child. I think labelling children is child abuse and I think there is a very heavy issue, for example, about teaching about hell and torturing their minds with hell."

~Prof. Richard Dawkins, whose next book will focus on children and religion.

MORE>>>>

GODDESS ERA: Time Before WAR

"Of all the praises that can be sung about our Great-Goddess ancestors, probably the most stunning of all is their ability to live for hundreds — and in some cases thousands — of years without plunging into the hell that is human warfare. ...

"Otherwise well-educated people will tell you we’re born biologically primed to wage war. That it’s in our genes. Frankly my dears, these people don’t have a clue. Before about 4000 BC, give or take a few years in either direction, and depending on where you are on the globe, there was no war. At least not what’s called “institutionalized” war, where war is built into our social systems, so it’s almost impossible to dig it out and pitch it on its ear, and where wars happen every few decades or so, regular as the beat of your heart.

"I’m sure you’ve heard the fantasy tale — doubtless more than once as a matter of fact — that humans are biologically built to war, and that war’s been with us from the beginning of time. For whatever reason, during the twentieth-century big batches of academics convinced themselves humans are born violent. Although some today still believe this hogwash, others are pointing to the obvious: given what we know now about our peaceful first cousins the bonobos and the numbers of nonwarring societies in the world, there’s just no way human beings can be born violent. Pure and simple: if you’re not taught war, you’re not going to do it."

From: Switching to Goddess: Humanity's Ticket to the Future, Chapter 5, "Before War," 2008, Hampshire, UK: O Books

Go HERE to buy a copy of Switching to Goddess.  

After the Goddess Era, of course, came the War God Era, which we still bask in today. Pure and simple, Jehovah, Allah and Yahweh are war gods. If you doubt it, go read the New York Times article "Wayward Christian Soldiers" by Charles Marsh, professor of religion at the U. of Virginia:

"... Jerry Falwell boasted that "God is pro-war" in the title of an essay he wrote in 2004."
SNIP

"Many of the most respected voices in American evangelical circles blessed the president's war plans [in Iraq], even when doing so required them to recast Christian doctrine."
SNIP

" Charles Stanley, pastor of the First Baptist Church of Atlanta...: 'We should offer to serve the war effort in any way possible,' said Mr. Stanley, a former president of the Southern Baptist Convention. 'God battles with people who oppose him, who fight against him and his followers.'"

Go HERE to buy a copy of Switching to Goddess.  
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foto above: Ancient Minoan Goddess

THE HOLY HOLIDAY OF Halloween

Anne Johnson over at The Gods Are Bored has pronounced Halloween a Holy Holiday:

Every year around this time, the Christian Wrong starts moaning and groaning about the fact that public schools celebrate Halloween, but they do not celebrate Christmas or Easter or St. Patrick's Day ......... ooops!


... I'll concede to the Christian Wrong that public schools devote an afternoon every year to a Pagan holiday.


My solution to this terrible, monstrous, obscene, unacceptable practice? Simple.


Make October 31 a religious holiday, like December 25.


Wouldn't you love that, Pagans?


Not only would you not have to work on the most holy day of the calendar, you could also expect many, many questions from kids as to why Halloween has suddenly become a day off school! A win-win situation! Think of the parties! The family togetherness! The establishment of traditions, like Halloween brunch!

Bop on over to Anne's place to get the whole wicked cool story.

PRESIDENT of THE UNITED STATES OF Goddess?

Yesterday, brian charles and I chewed the fat about psychopimp leaders like Jim Jones, Charles Manson, Hitler and Stalin (see yesterday's post). You know -- silver-tongued dudes who get people to drink poison Koolaid, and then lie down quietly to die?

Since we've all been hatched in desert-god cultures teaching us to crave one Big, YAJ*-like, Daddy-human to follow, brian thinks none of us is immune to these psychopimps.

So, lovely kiddies: today's questions:

1. Even though leading us is supposedly "like herding cats," are we Pagans as immune to the Jim Joneses of the world as we think we are?

2. Do even we Goddess people harbor secret desires to toss our free will to some strong, striking leader who'll relieve us of the back-breaking burden of making 1,001 decisions every day?

A shockeroo: Jim Jones' Christian followers were not dodos -- they were doctors, lawyers, college profs and such (See THIS ARTICLE).

3. Is one-person leadership a smart habit to harbor? Should we teach our children instead to lead themselves by groups? Many cultures have lead themselves not by kings, presidents or chiefs, but by councils. Why do we insist that top-dog daddy-dudes run all our shows?

History's final two Goddess civilizations danced along swimmingly, thank you very much, without one-dude rulers. If Minoans or Harappans (Indus Valley Civilization) followed single leaders, there's very little evidence of it.

At the same time, their god-centered neighbors -- Egyptians, Hittites, Mesopotamians, and such -- were slobbering all over themselves to churn out tons of art celebrating their blood-soaked, war-wonky, one-man dictators.

All archaeologists agree: this is one of the most striking features of Minoans and Harappans. Although both cranked out tons of art, very little of it shows anything that could be construed as larger-than-life rulers.**
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YAJ is the "god" YahwehAllahJehovah -- not really a god at all, actually, but a political-control mechanism. Although many think he's three different gods, YAJ is just one god with three schizoid personalities -- all of whom despise each another.
**Although Minoans and Harappans had written languages, they've yet to be translated. This is because their languages are like nothing the world knows today, much of the world having been conquered long ago by Daddy-god-worshipping Indo-Europeans, whose languages most of us in the West still
speak today.
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thnx to jwbrewster for the foto; go

HERE

to see more of his/her work

SHEEP, CATS, CHRISTIANS & Pagans

Feeling good today, are we? Well here's something to fix that. New article about the right Reverend Jim Jones and his be-jungled Jonestown.

Read it, and I promise: in no time flat you'll fall into a pink-pickled funk.

Turns out the author moved into the house of the parents of the woman who, in 1978, deep in the jungle in Jonestown, Guyana, helped pass out the poison punch that killed the entirety of Mr. Jones' 1000+ Christian congregation.

In his basement, this dude found a suitcase of letters this poison-punch jungle lady periodically sent back to her parents.

Unfortunately, like everything else I've read about Jonestown, this article too goes belly-up in explaining the big buster question in everyone's mind: how could one dude get 1000+ people to drink cyanide-stamped Koolaid, and then lie down quietly and die?

In your wildest dreams could you imagine even one Pagan committing such tomfoolery?
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thnx to hagit for the foto; go HERE to see more.

PLEASE Accept HUMBLE APOLOGY

Sorry, babies, I've been so busy bothering myself about the recent Giant Financial Hiccup of Western (and Eastern) Civilization that I've been badly neglecting you and this Very Important Blog.

Not to mention worrying about our World Savior, Barack Obama (no, no, I do believe he was born in a manger), and trying to market my book, Switching to Goddess, which is due to hit the shelves next month (gasp! Next month?!?).

Anyway, I thought I could let you in on a few things I've been blasting around the internet lately to encourage people to buy/order/review Switching to Goddess.

Here's the latest (going out to selected magazine editors):

Dear __________

I have a strong feeling that many subscribers to ____________ will want to read my new book, Switching to Goddess: Humanity's Ticket to the Future, to be released in November by O Books in the UK.

Why? Because this isn't your ordinary spirituality book.

Switching to Goddess says something that, to my knowledge, has never been said before: in order to save the planet, we need to abandon the major world gods -- Jehovah, Allah, Yahweh and Vishnu for starters -- and replace them with the kinds of goddesses the world revered 6000 years ago, in the peace-loving, egalitarian and close-to-idyllic Neolithic and early Bronze Ages.

Even if your readers think my book wildly off target, they'll still want to read it. It's a book almost certain to stir up controversy. Should the world abandon its gods for goddesses -- or not? Naysayers will want to hear yeasayers' opinions on the topic, and vice versa. Those on both sides will want a copy of the book in order to join the debate that is bound to ensue once this book hits the shelves.

Two additional attributes make this book a natural winner: first, I've packed it with footnoted information from hundreds of up-to-date, highly reputable scientific and historical sources. I have advanced degrees in anthropology and archaeology, so I know how to do this. Second, the book is not stuffy. As a matter of fact, if I do say so myself, it's downright fun to read. Take this passage for example:

To make a long story short, while the Great Guiding Goddess steered the ship in the Neolithic Near East, war didn’t happen there. But how about the Indus Valley? Indus Valley people had moved out of the Neolithic and into the early Bronze Age. Did the Great Guiding Goddess keep them free from war too?

The answer here also is – Tah Dah! Drum roll please: “Yes indeed She did.” In total and mind-blowing contradiction to “what we would expect from experience elsewhere,” says [archaeologist] Jane McIntosh, “the clues from the Indus Civilization seem to be showing us a state without violence or conflict.” Jane is dumbfounded: “Can this really be so, in defiance of all our experience of the world elsewhere? Who were these peace-loving people? Where did they come from? How did they come together to create a state?” (McIntosh 2002: 12).

Societies doing war leave behind a trail of telltale clues that give away their dirty little secret. They can’t stand it for example until they paint and etch scenes of their battles, hand-to-hand combat, and armies facing each other with weapons bristling, and war flags flying. In their cemeteries they leave men buried with shields, helmets, swords and battle axes....

Thing is, we don’t find any of these dirty little clues in the humongous ancient Indus Valley (McIntosh 2002; Kenoyer 1998). No war art, no war weapons, no parry fractures, no siege engines....

Or this one:

Never let it be said that Guiding-Goddess people were wet-noodle wimps. In the courage department my guess is they outshone us two to one. Like the people in Willow, Guiding-Goddess men and women were gutsy risk-takers and valiant adventurers. For example Indus Valley mariners “roamed the known world” (McIntosh 2002: 7) and the ancient Minoans traveled and traded “to every port of the archaic world and even – boldly – to regions far beyond” (Campbell 1964: 62).

Archaeologists have dug up scores of images of Minoans somersaulting – from front to rear – over the backs of bulls (figures 4.6, 4.11-4.13). Although modern matadors say this can’t be done, I don’t believe it for a second. Just because we can’t do something, what makes us think our ancestors couldn’t? I suspect our Goddess-centered ancestors packed a lot more pluck than we do. Mother Goddess societies would drape people with a kind of self-sense we god peoples can’t even imagine. We’re birthed and ‘loved’ by deities who’d just as soon see us stoned to death as look at us. How could we ever have healthy senses of self?

Or this:

... backlashers say just because a figurine is breast-bedecked doesn’t mean it’s female. For gosh sake, men have breasts too! (Lesure 2002: 602). Tatsuo Kobayashi, a leading archaeologist of the Japanese Jomon period, whines as follows: Golly gee! Men have breasts! Who cares if all the Jomon clay figurines have breasts – that doesn’t make them women! Kobie goes on to say that if the figurines can’t be his sex, they can’t be any sex at all: “it is considered here that these clay figurines are neither male nor female … but rather they are images that surpass the realms of gender…” (Kobayashi 2004: 155).

Still others say: “Gee if that clay statuette over there doesn’t have breasts of a certain heft don’t try to sell me on its being a woman -- could be a man, darling” (See Meskell 1998) (never mind the poor statuette is also minus a penis). Well I say if breast-bedecked figurines sans penises are men, our ancestors were trying to tell us something. My bet is it’s this: Whether you’re man or woman, the important thing is feeding and nurturing others. Breasts are a jim-dandy symbol of feeding and nurturing, and maybe Neolithic men who had them were put up on pedestals....

To make a long story short, ____________, I was wondering: if I send you a copy of Switching to Goddess when it comes out in November, would you print a review of it in __________? That way your readers can judge for themselves if they should buy this important new book.

Thank you for your time, and have a wonderful day.

Sincerely,
Athana
Raymond, Maine, USA

P.S. For more info on Switching, go to www.jeristudebaker.com, www.o-books.com, or Amazon.com.

MORMONS MUNCHED -- AND Munching

Two new books on the frauds and follies of YAJ* the Great -- this time among the Mormons:

The first, DEVIL'S GATE: Brigham Young and the Great Mormon Handcart Tragedy, by David Roberts, tells about how in the mid 1800s, Mormon leader Brigham Young murdered many of his own followers, by talking them in to traveling West not in covered wagons, but by dragging everything they owned behind them -- in hand-pulled carts.

As a result of Daddy Briggy's desire to save a buck or two, hundreds died needlessly.

The second, MASSACRE AT MOUNTAIN MEADOWS: An American Tragedy, by Ronald W. Walker, Richard E. Turley Jr. and Glen M. Leonard, tells about how in 1857 a party of Mormons tricked a wagon train into thinking they (the Mormons) would save them from Paiute Indians.

Instead -- surprise, surprise -- the Mormons murdered all 120 pioneer adults, and then scampered off with the train's kiddies.

Why? No one knows. (To me, a perfectly plausible reason springs to mind: In the land of YAJ*, nutty-dom is pretty much par for the course.)

Go HERE for reviews of both books.
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YAJ is YahwehAllahJehovah, who most think of as three separate gods. Nothing could be further from the truth. YAJ is merely one, albeit schizophrenic, deity-dude. Fifty percent of his time YAJ spends fighting amongst his three selves. The other 50% of his time he spends trying every ugly, underhanded and unctuous trick in the book to drag the world into his sticky spider-web nest.
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thnk to jorem for the foto; go HERE to see more.

The GODDESS & HEAVEN'S GLASS Ceiling

Finally a few begin to see the light:

"Personally, I wonder if women, generally, can have gender equality on earth without having it in heaven....

SNIP

"When I was a kid I used to wonder what happened to our Mother in Heaven; and if we have an only begotten son, why not an only begotten daughter? To bring this up now is not simply a matter of trying to improve the relative status of women on earth. I think that the world in general would be better off if we stopped thinking that there is only a Father in Heaven to please.

"Pleasing mother and pleasing father are two very different earthly tasks. Why wouldn't humankind be set off on a different course if we in the Abrahamic tradition stopped trying to please only this implacable, vindictive, angry, warlike father figure?...

SNIP

"[A]ren't there some advantages to our praying: "Our Mother in heaven, hallowed be Your name, Your kingdom come, Your will be done . . ." We can all imagine how different the world would be if most of us prayed that way half the time."

George Davis
"Heaven's Glass Ceiling"
Washington Post
October 4, 2008
George Davis is professor emeritus at the Newark Campus of Rutgers University. His new novel, The Melting Points, will be published in 2009.

Go HERE for more.
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thnx to simmbarb for the foto; go HERE for more.