Now I have done quite a few. Started in my house; we have taken it to the Goddess Temple in Irvine, to Susun Weed’s place in Woodstock,  Karens beautiful Mountain View home with the rose garden and swimming pool, and now just recently to Nevada, JoAnna’s circle of women.

What is it? How are the Tarot Socials different from regular Tarot Readings?

First rule is whatever you hear in the Tarot Social stays confidential.

There is a special kind of relief that comes from being witnessed by your sisters. You belong into the fabric of womanhood. You are not alone with your problems, but you keep your mouth shut about what you heard once the event is over.

Second rule is don’t hold back. When I see that you are very, very upset about something, and I call you on it; feel free to vent. Feel free to cry and sob. We are accustomed to cry in therapy sessions, group or private. Tarot readings are a poor woman’s therapy. It’s faster than normal therapy; it doesn’t take weekly visits to keep you on the healing path. Instead you get folk customs, folk magic homework to do in order to sort through your options, pluck up your self-confidence, and stop the denial of your pleasures.

Third rule is to allow the support and friendships that come from such communal experiences to reach your heart. Life is to short, these sessions with your sisters are rare. As a planetary co-traveler, we need each other, we need the family of women.

So what actually happens?

We begin with holding a circle. We hold each other’s hands. We hum to unify ourselves, to open our psychic eye to the incoming wisdom. The hum opens up our door between the subconscious and conscious minds. We connect our feeling centers with our thinking centers, we become one unit.

A light smudging with white sage elevates our minds and creates a path for our guiding spirits to come through.

I hand you the sacred oil to anoint your hands with before handling the cards, I favor Amber oil. We both inhale this scent, an instant transportation into the temple.

Next I give you the deck to shuffle. The best way to mix the cards is up to you. But a good mix is needed, not just a little changing of the cards positions in the deck. There are 78 images, and ten positions which nuances them, the possibility of variations is infinite.

A good reader is synthesizing the meanings of the cards; filter it through wise woman’s wisdoms. This part is where the person who is the reader plays a major role. How intelligent is she? How well read? Do you know more then the prescribed meanings? How much experience does she have? Is she good at stepping aside and allow the spiritual take center stage? Can she leave her own attitudes aside, and see purely the divine advice? These are the most difficult tasks.

Most people when they meet you, either have a sympathetic vibration form in their brains or not. When I read cards to women, I don’t know them yet, just met them. I ask only three questions.

How old are you? What sign are you? What is your name?

Based on these answers the Tarot is able to pinpoint your planetary being like a GPS guide. This same information is enough for me to satisfy my “attitude” towards the new querrent, and not search for anything personal from me, like do I like this person or not.

Next I take the deck of cards that you have already shuffled, “cooked” and with my left hand towards the left away from me I break it into two piles. While I say, “Wisdom from the Nymph, Wisdom from the Queen, Wisdom from the Crone.” Each time repeating the breaking of the deck, into two piles, with my left hand towards the left away from me then placing the left over pile on top of the new pile. What I have at the end of this is the deck I use to read you.

From the very top of the already created pile is your Significator. I don’t make a Significator by selecting a card based on you being female or male, young or old, as it is often subscribed in Tarot books.

The card I get is far more then that. It already has information about you. The most significant feeling you carry, or situation you are in will show up here right away.

The rest of the lay out is up to the reader. I use the old Celtic Cross, but often I do a single card and pull more as needed. I watch what you hide from yourself, in the root of the cross, and discuss it. I examine the Soul position, how does your sprit feel? Your house. Your hopes and fears.

I often look at the correspondences, the Aces and the Queens, those count an extra card. I look at the numbers coming up, does anything repeat itself, like 3s, or 7s; numerology has things to say about that too.

Readings last as long as they last. I lose track of time when I stepped between the worlds.

In the Tarot Socials, I explain why I have chosen to say what I did, based on what cards, very informative for somebody who wishes to learn this kind of divination.

October is coming, the years end, when we are all between the worlds. Watch for my schedule where I will be doing this kind of community building teaching/counseling. (TarotSocial.com)

If you think you can call together at least 15 women for a Tarot Social, and you would like to host it for me, please let us know.

The Goddess work needs all of us to do our part.

Blessed be,
Z Budapest
www.ZBudapest.com

Some women say I have no money to treat myself and my soul for an uplifting spiritual experience. True. There is tighter money now. But you woke up this morning, and you are well and you have something to eat, you have roof over your head and have something to wear.

You are successful.

Somebody tells you they need your resources. You think to yourself, he needs me. He needs my money. He comes first. I have something; I’ll support him because I love him or because he is my husband, or son.

Your daughter needs you too, and you give to her as well. And all these resources you have given away so generously without thinking will never come back to you.

When is it your turn?

You are not too young anymore. You are mature. Your needs are mature. When is it your turn?

Who feeds your hunger? Do you support them? Do you give back to yourself at all?

Yet you are lonely and exhausted. You work so hard, and you give it all away. You are a good person. Is that really enough?

At the end what we take with us is experiences, the memories of the divine. Do you have enough? Did the Great Spirit fill up your hunger? Did you smell the redwoods? Did you hear the ocean?  Did you just love yourself?

If you died tomorrow, are you a rich soul on your journey? Or just a suffering deprived worker, who was never number one? Was your life a donation? Does this feel good enough to you? You have been given away everything keeping nothing, not even a biannual women’s gathering is not possible for you while you are alive?

I say stop!

Your life is NOT a donation. You deserve to have a weekend every two years when you are a Holy Woman, not somebody who is a resource for everybody else.

We have kept our path strong. WE endure poverty gladly, because our soul is promoting the future. Join us. Take your life seriously! Take your spiritual needs seriously!

Get yourself registered now. Ride your own passion. WE only live once.

Gather the pleasure of your company. Share your joy with sisters. Look deep into the mirror of womanhood.

We have 200 beds to offer.  One of those is yours.

Blessed be,
Z Budapest

www.Goddess-Festival.com

What’s in a Name? Sometimes Everything
February 24, 2010 — narajane84

While our coven, Daughters of the Sacred Torch, was still in its planning phase, one of the other coven council members and I were discussing what kind of coven we would be, what—if any—tradition we would follow. I suggested that we just go ahead and call ourselves a Dianic coven. After all, we are following all of the basic tenants of Dianism, and the major works of Dianic tradition founder Z. Budapest figure prominently not only on our reading list but also on our practices. The other coven council member present for this discussion agreed. But her husband—who, by the way, is a nice guy and by no means hostile to Dianism—thought we should reconsider using such a “loaded word” as “Dianic.” read more….

Z Budapest’s response…
Blessed be the women with brave hearts! The brave hearts with skills of language, insights and leadership!.

The Dianic Tradition had been maligned because its for and by WOMEN. Who loves women? Why is that a bad baggage? Don’t you love your mothers and sisters? Shame on you if you hate us.

Women in the Dianic Tradition are hetero, bi and lesbians. We don’t ask if they are or not, in spirituality its besides the point. When women gather to worship the Goddess they worship their own ancestors, their own mothers and sisters. Why can’t males do the same?

And as to why males insist to be in the circle with females and malign the female only circles, is because males don’t really bother to develop Men’s Mysteries. And why not Men’s Mysteries? Because its WORK. It’s study, it’s reading, digging deep, and spending the time like I have. The it’s creativity, it’s taking a lot of flack, it’s being called names.

We have pointed the way in the Holy Book of Women’s Mysteries, under Sacred Sons, but in 35 years NONE have gone there to develop a male specific non-sexist spiritual tradition based on ancient heritage. All the old fraternities still lay dormant, the Salii, the Bacchos, Dionysus, Iacchos ,Bassareus, Euios, Zagreus, Theyoneus, Braites, Lenaios, Eleutherus, Bromios, Pan, The Horned One. Where is the studious male mind who wants to reclaim the true magic of males?

Stop harping on your fear induced “baggage” (all yours). The women are WAY ahead of you. Care enough to have your own. You will not know the true meaning of being a fully male human until you get together with your brothers and fathers, and practice.

Mixed groups twice a year (Midsummer and Halloween) is also part of the Traditions. But, the men have NOTHING to bring to the table. Men … women are no longer doing your jobs! Do your own research and develop the male mysteries. Wake up and create yourselves.

To the women, wear your womanhood proudly, we paid for it in blood during the Burning Times. Be well and bless your loved ones as you bless each other.

The Goddess IS alive, and magic IS afoot!
Blessed be,
Z Budapest

“Make Merry in Step and Songs” by Bronwen Forbes (Llewellyn )

Spring is warm enough to take a book out and read it while you inhale the fresh new air with flower scents. Reading about pagan rituals and enhancing your vocabulary in songs and folk dances, for circle leaders what a gift.

This is a great book! I love old England and loved learning about these many dances. The music is written down, and one can actually learn it. The dances are explained with meticulous precision, and the gentle prodding towards more practice makes the book a delight.

The author is a great lover of folk art, it shows in every selection, but those who think this is all about sugar and a little spice don’t know the English. Some of the heritage is gruesome, the character of the players murderous and unpredictable.

Yes there are the well behaved May Dance participants, wooing the fair Elinor, but there is also a story of a mother who hexed the young wife of her son with infertility. She can never have a child, until the son learns what she has done to hex her and undo the spell.

Then there is the humor.  In the John Barleycorn Play, Old Woman questions Doctor Brown .

“What diseases canst you cure?”  Doctor Brown: “The hips –pipsy, the palsy, the gout, a man having twenty-two senses in his head. I can cast twenty one out. Why I cured a snag tail last week nearly twenty-five feet long! Surely I can cure thy son who is not quite gone.”  And then proceeds to raise her dead son from the dead. Not your everyday pabulum culture here.

I find it exciting that so much has remained still in practice, which the rebirth of the pagan traditions I am sure will contribute with more longevity.

This kind of culture requires costumes and props, a bit of pageantry peasant style. I think this is the kind of book you can consult at each turn of the seasons plus to make more merry at pagan parties. The information in here creates community, cohesiveness and entertainments. Well done Bronwen!

“Echoes of the Goddess” by Simon Brighton and Terry Welbourn (Ian Allan Publishing)

This is a book that should be made mandatory for all Women’s Studies students, and of the Craft and Goddess studies. Beautifully laid out with splendid color photographs just the object of the book itself is classy.

The English do not usually come out with this “in your face we got the Goddess all over our country” narrative. I recall when I was in England looking for the pagan heritage, the locals didn’t brag a lot about it. The London National Museum put the goddesses in room 22, a side show. It was all well known near the temples and stone, yet hush, hush at the same time. With this book, England at last owns her pagan heritage.

I have never seen goddess book this thorough, a well produced overview of the Goddess Culture. Starting with the Lost Goddess, prehistory goddesses, subterranean goddesses, holy wells, freshwater sirens, saltwater sirens, the Celtic and dark goddesses, the rude goddess, the Christianized goddess, the goddess in myths, legends, and in the labyrinth.

Rich chapters lead you through the countryside of England showing you what even tourist guides cannot see. And the Goddess is here bold and beautiful. Indeed, this book has a Holy book quality to it in content and presentation.

It’s hard to pick a favorite, but I am partial to stones. Looking at the breathtaking spiral paths, on a slab from Malta boggles the mind. Four to six thousand years old, these were people who knew about the spirals in the sky, understood the world to be part of the great whole. Another favorite of mine is the image on the Picardy Stone Aberdeen shire, from the 6/7^th century AD; it was a tombstone once on an ancient grave.  It has a curvy snake, a symbol of reincarnation; several images which could be maps of the stars said that it had a relationship to the hill of Dunnideer. Mysterious, yet riveting.

When you absorb all this good information take it easy, do a chapter at a time. Its like a rich meal for your mind you want to savor.  The book takes you through history and accurately documents where the goddess was worshiped, by whom, for example the Pictish people, who gave women equal rights even back then. Then the great goddess was taken down with misinformation, destruction of her legacy and values.  The Synod of Whitby in 664 AD finally crushed the Goddess Culture; all her physical representations were destroyed.

But not the She na gig, the vagina Goddess, she survived decorating the Christian churches, inside and outside. Good luck was her value and sexuality. The same folk also had many Green Man images to keep her company.

Make this book a success. Give them to friends for high occasions. Share it with your book clubs, keep it where you can see it and reach for it.

I know it can be. A woman body is a full time job. Just to be healthy, we need to mind our natural cycles, bleeding every month is not fun. Two weeks tied down with the menstruation, one week pre-tension, then the bloods, and then the waning of the bloods.

Whoever says otherwise is lying. While we balance on high heels, secretly we hope our bloody pad wont move up to our back, or aspire to become shoulder pads. Bleeding is hard work. And it’s expensive. The cost of tampons, pads, the teas, the pills, the loss of joy in life, comes out of our own pockets. We finance a nation’s fertility. Not fair.

The government doesn’t pay women for being fertile, but it pays men to have erections. Viagra is covered in health plans. Birth control for women is not.  Where is the outrage?

The other day I managed to get my hands on a precious old book called, “Handbook of Women’s Liberation” written by Joan Robins. This was the very first book I read when I arrived in Los Angeles written by a contemporary feminist sister. Back then it costs $2.95, today I got it for twenty dollars. But I was so happy it was avaible at all.

In order to hold on to your Goddess consciousness you have to build in your mind a place for her with feminism. This is how she sticks with you through thick and thin.

What’s in the book?

Ms. Robins gives us a quick background on the early feminists, the suffragists from the last century. It’s good to know whose shoulders we are standing on. It’s good to know what they have done right. They organized themselves, set reasonable goals, and were relentless in pursuit of their goals. Unfortunately the narrow goal of the vote was all they could get us in order to change the female social status from chattel to citizen with a vote. This took them 75 years. Only the youngest daughter of Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Harriot Stanton Blatch, lived to see the vote won. Young Alice Paul drafted the Equal Rights Amendment, the very night the women celebrated their right to vote. That law has still not passed.

The short history of where the Second Wave comes from the Civil Rights Movement, and the Peace Movement where women have participated, only to be ordered back to make coffee for the male peaceniks and the black male revolutionaries.

There was a point when the women came to consciousness about how inconsistent that was with the goals they have supported. This is when the women left the movements of the males and created their own. There are wonderful pictures in the back of the book showing us these young faces, just like yours today, marching down on Fifth.

This is the Second Wave that invented the ingenious and effective C.R. Groups, consciousness raising groups, which I think we should reframe and reinvent for this huge wave of generation Z.

How is C.R. Groups different from study groups or discussion groups?

In the C.R. Group, the emphasis is on the personal experiences of each woman. We use what we learn first-hand from each other to politically analyze the status of women. “We wanted to build our own analysis of the conditions of women and from that derive a theory of action,” Robins writes.

I think our oppression certainly changed since 1970 when this book was written, but not so much in essence.

For example in the seventies, two-thirds of women were not employed. Instead we all labored privately; the unpaid labor of housewives’ and genital work (marriages).

Today the workforce is majority female workers, but the country is still run by old white males, who live in the fifties mentally.

Back then, women were not admitted to universities, or just not as many as men, today since admittance finally changed into merit based decisions, 75 percent of women comprise the student body in all collages and universities. Wahoo!

So we can pat ourselves on the shoulders, good work! Education is the key to liberation. Education is the key to independence. The key to human-hood for women. And we got it!

But here is a list what we have not dealt with yet, and these are huge problems.

Male supremacy:
This is the active behavior of men to hurt women. It starts in elementary school, and lasts a lifetime of anti-female propaganda. In our times, it’s very sophisticated, but hidden or not, its worse then ever before.

First we thought that only a few men, not capitalism was the culprit, who benefit from women’s unpaid labor. But male chauvinism is a cultural belief that males are superior to women. Most male god religions endorse this. Southern Baptists for example, President Carter just has written a letter of why he quit the church over their ingrained sexims.The Taliban teach the same thing, different male god … same oppression for us. Taliban kills us if we talk to a boy who’s not our relative; not long ago in Europe the church killed for six hundred years long women for witchcraft. Once accused, the women never came home again.

It’s a self-entitlement to feel superior to women, to make women serve and benefit males. Financially, in sex trades, children are the next target; born to poor mothers, men sell children to each other for sex and free labor. All men derive benefits from this enslavement of women, not just the pimps and johns, but the good men who do nothing culturally to control their brothers.

Back when Robins wrote her book, women could not foresee how to get out from under. But as herstory shows us, the collective female energies converged quite naturally and choose to go through the cracks of the doors that the Second Wave has opened for us.

What has become the norm are the personal solutions. We used to scuff at personal solutions versus the collective solutions, but in retrospect I think the female principle was right to fix our status with education first.

We are just not ready to attack the rest of the problems.

We tasted little of the return of the collective solution when we have voted for Hillary Clinton. She did get 180 million votes. That’s a good chunk of approval from women with jobs. Now if we just contemplate the Pro-Woman line, the bearers of the new society.

Blame. If we just stopped blaming each other and victims of violence, and see all women … the talented and the slow, the beautiful and the homely, the fat and the skinny, the PhD and the high school drop outs, the pregnant and the barren. We are all connected in the web of life. When you walk down the street, men don’t look at you and say, there goes a PhD. educated women. They still just see a female, any female, vulnerable.

Wake up and stay awake! Speak up wherever you are. Form the new C.R. Groups. So much work still needs to be done.

Por Z Budapest

(Traduzido por Aphrodisiastes)

Eu tenho falado sobre o Nascimento do Movimento de Espiritualidade das Mulheres em meus discursos. Descrevi nosso primeiro Sabbath, no Solstício de Inverno, em 21 de Dezembro de 1971, em Hollywood, Califórnia; é deste ponto que eu dato o começo da espiritualidade das mulheres. Essa história está em meus livros, The Grandmother of Time (A Avó do Tempo) e Grandmother Moon (Avó Lua).

Um assunto sobre o qual eu nunca falei foi como eu estive lá. O que me fez levantar esta bandeira da Deusa? O que me mantém conduzindo-a por todos esses anos? O que eu tirei disto, pessoalmente? É mais difícil falar sobre mim do que falar sobre filosofia, teologia, política, feminismo, qualquer coisa exceto minha jornada pessoal. Por que tenho sido tão tímida? Estou com vergonha? Por que?

Mesmo agora, quando tento olhar pra trás e organizar minhas memórias, eu sinto uma pontada de “Humm, eu não importo, tudo que importa é a Causa.” Mas eu sei que estou mentindo. Esta mulher, eu, importava sim. Esta pessoa, a habitante deste corpo que é meu fiel esposo, merece um amoroso exame. Eu tenho que verter meu medo de minha própria humanidade e dizer toda a verdade que possa recordar.

Como um fenômeno começa? Leva-se a mudança dos ventos históricos, primeiro do que tudo. A sub-era de Aquário que começou em 1962 deu-nos os ventos, idéias, sentimentos, e os Beatles, que colocaram isto na música. A Música se tornou um ato político. Sim, aqueles decisivos ventos históricos, controlados por ninguém, tinham que começar soprando, decidindo quais canções se tornariam as primeiras nas paradas de sucesso. Forças coletivas invisíveis estão trabalhando quando os ventos mudam, e nós os inalamos como a doce fumaça das ervas sagradas, sentindo-os expandir nossas mentes e horizontes, sentindo o vento alcançar uma geração viva e erguê-la. Foi um vento, e foi uma onda. Surfar na história é uma experiência pesada, especialmente quando isto conduz uma geração inteira de jovens a um mundo novo.

Onde nós estávamos? Nós tínhamos acabado de sair dos anos Sessenta. A América estava mudando. Deus estava morto e as mulheres estavam marchando. Mulheres estavam marchando pela paz e liberdade para controlarem seus corpos, e eu estava marchando pela paz e pela liberdade da alma. Eu absorvi o passado feminista, li Susan B. Anthony, mas acima de tudo me modelei segundo Elisabeth Cady Stanton, a rebelde espiritual do século 19. Sua notável vida produtiva, um milagre por si só, fascinou-me. Esta mulher gerou sete crianças e escreveu todos os discursos para Susan B., sua melhor amiga. Uma solteirona, Tia Susan cozinhava e ajudava a cuidar de muitas crianças, apenas para deixar claro, ela fez com que um ótimo discurso sobre a luta pelos direitos de voto para as mulheres fosse levado às ruas. Eu li a respeito destas mulheres que tinham trabalhado muito por um direito que as demais mulheres deveriam agradecer agora, e gradativamente comecei a perceber que eu, também, tinha um destino.

Também se leva um ano fatídico para uma única mulher gerar mudança. Para continuar nesta jornada uma mulher precisa de um desejo que seja incontrolável, um profundo desejo que se alimente na mais profunda fonte da psique humana, nas cavernas das Moiras. Daí em diante ela deve desistir de tudo que não a conduz a sua meta. Ela deve ter uma mudança total das circunstâncias, deixando para trás família e casa. Ela deve encarnar esta alta meta, respirá-la, vivê-la, manifestá-la. E ao fazer isso, ela dá a luz a si mesma. Para mim, isso significou deixar meu casamento, a Costa Leste, e a Cidade de Nova York.

Eu tinha trinta anos de idade. A ignorância paralisante tinha feito do meu progresso através do meu primeiro Retorno de Saturno, uma batalha dolorosa. Eu não sabia que era normal na vida de alguém ficar preocupado aos vinte, pois todas as certezas se dissolvem. Eu não sabia nada do poder dos desígnios do destino. Eu estava mudando, mas não sabia como. Eu tive que deixar Nova York, a maravilha super-povoada, sem árvores e barulhenta na maioria das vezes. Nova York, aonde ir do ponto A ao ponto B era um esforço diário enorme, arremessando o corpo de alguém contra os tubos escuros de metal sob a estrondosa terra. No fedor de um lugar, onde os homens se aliviam na escuridão das ladeiras e corredores, qualquer um podia sentir o mau cheiro agressivo do patriarcado. O fato disto ser “normal”, permitido, e tolerado era profundamente ofensivo pra mim. Se mulheres tivessem urinado por todos os metrôs de Nova York, teria havia um protesto público por civilidade. Mas estava tudo bem para os homens. Não havia civilidade em Nova York. Ver um homem qualquer se expondo quando o trem se afasta, olhando diretamente em seu rosto, era quase preferível ao fedor de urina (especialmente no Verão).

Eu não achei ninguém que me amasse em Nova York. Estava preparada para ter relacionamentos amorosos, para ser satisfeita na cama. A cultura encorajava o sexo. Sexo era glorificado em canções e em peças. Eu estava no auge da minha beleza, e ainda não conseguia achar uma parceira para amar. Verdade, eu fui casada, mas era o tipo de casamento Europeu, um de conveniência, no qual nós eramos livres para fazer o que desejássemos, romanticamente e sexualmente. Na Europa isto teria sido ideal. Lá, ter casos era o que mantinha os cônjugues juntos.

Eu estudei teatro na Academia Americana de Artes Dramáticas e estava lendo tudo do Young, Kerenyi, Adler. Gradualmente comecei a entender bastante o significado da magia popular que havia encontrado na Hungria quando era criança. Minha mãe foi uma psíquica, e eu percebi que eu era a herdeira de uma tradição de poder feminino. Fui lentamente descobrindo o princípio feminino em minha própria pessoa. Ser uma mulher nunca foi uma dúvida pra mim, eu era feminina e esperta. Mas agora eu pertencia a um grupo maior de mulheres, o qual seus destinos afetavam o meu. O que quer que tivesse acontecido a este grupo de mulheres certamente estava acontecendo a mim. Que estranho. Ser mulher era agora uma coisa complexa, de fato, era totalmente revolucionário. Quem teria pensado que esta coisa simples, minha identidade feminina, poderia tornar-se tanto! Eu fiquei encantada com isto, aproveitei a atenção, e senti que estava ganhando confiança.

Precisa-se de vontade comum de um pequeno grupo, que está de acordo com a mulher personificando a vontade, para criar uma “meta sagrada” ou uma “missão”. Mulheres são feitas para missões, ninguém pode advogar melhor do que uma mulher. Quando uma mulher começa alguma coisa, centenas de mulheres começam alguma coisa, milhares de mulheres começam alguma coisa, e isso cresce, e o fenômeno se revela. Uma missão é alimento para a vida – o alimento da alma. É quando a alma é reconhecida pela mulher vigorosa e é bem-vinda. Missões são história. Missões são necessárias. Se você não tem a energia para advogar por si mesma, ninguém mais o fará. É por isso que as mulheres devem advogar elas mesmas: os homens nunca farão isto (veja na própria história). Muitos pensam que nós já conseguimos ir muito longe com esta coisa de “liberação das mulheres”. Eu digo que não fomos longe o suficiente.

Qual era a missão? Quando todos aqueles fatores se uniram – o novo movimento de Liberação das mulheres, minhas leituras sobre o Movimento de Direitos das Mulheres, psicologia Jungiana e mitologia – eu percebi que o que o Movimento estava precisando era de uma dimensão espiritual. Nós precisavamos recuperar a Deusa para as mulheres e gerar uma nova cultura pacífica que incluísse as artes sagradas. Nós precisavamos suscitar os veneradores da natureza, devotos da Deusa, e encher essas atividades com energia. Trazer recurso para as mulheres assim como fazer das mulheres um importante recurso para o país. Trazer devolta a Senhora, a Grande Deusa que eu tinha venerado como a “Mulher Feliz” e “Boldogasszony” quando era criança.

Não poderia fazer isso em Nova York. Deixando tudo pra trás, eu parti para a Costa Oeste e terminei no Sul da Califórnia. Quando coloquei meus pés pela primeira vez no primeiro Centro de Mulheres (apenas com seis meses de inaugurado), em Crenshaw Boulevard em Los Angeles, um evento histórico e decisivo aconteceu. O Feminismo encontrou a Bruxaria. Deveria ter havia um rufar de tambor quando eu entrei , uma bruxa hereditária da Europa Central onde as fadas uma vez dançaram. A arte popular e as canções populares com as quais eu fui criada reverberaram em minha memória quando escutei música Mexicana nos arredores do Mission District no centro da cidade de Los Angeles. Esta fusão do antigo e do novo – da tradição da bruxa Européia e do feminismo do século vinte – foi uma audaciosa mistura. Isto deu dentes ao feminismo e relevância à bruxaria. Nunca houve uma bruxa feminista antes.

O conceito foi tão estranho, e ainda tão natural. Todos viam a bruxa como um arquétipo, uma megera com um chapéu pontudo voando em uma vassoura. O arquétipo feminista não era mais animador, a imagem de uma “Mulher Libertária” era a de uma mulher nada atraente com uma grande boca, um monte de palavras sabichonas, com confortáveis sapatos. Mulheres fora de controle. Irmandade, um grupo de lésbicas. Lugar onde os “espadas” vão para morrer. Primeiramente, Feminismo e Bruxaria não gostaram um do outro. As feministas diziam que elas não precisavam de nenhuma religião – que religião é sempre ruim. As bruxas diziam que elas não precisavam de políticas, muito obrigada. Eu estava ficando entre elas, internalizando ambas sem qualquer problema, e sabia que elas teriam que se misturar umas as outras se a revolução das mulheres desejasse durar.

Políticas/ativismo como um modo de vida é importante, mas acaba com as pessoas. É onde os movimentos mais erram. Conseqüentemente, há muito trabalho e nenhum divertimento, e as pessoas voltam para casa. O que uma mulher faz depois de panfletos e tumultos e de trabalho duro? Vai beber? Fumar um “baseado”? Isto vai preencher o vazio? Dificilmente.

Eu já tinha visto mais história de perto do que muitos. A Segunda Guerra Mundial aconteceu antes que eu aprendesse a andar. O ambiente sustentador de minha infância foi destruído. Eu aprendi a andar e a falar em um abrigo subterrâneo, o lugar onde nós habitualmente guardavamos nosso carvão para o inverno. Nós éramos bombardeados várias vezes ao dia. De manhã, eram os Alemães, de tarde os Russos. Por volta das 4:00 da madrugada, os pesados aviões Americanos de bombardeio voavam sobre nossa cidade como se fossem a própria morte com asas. Eu me deitei rezando para que eles não destruíssem nada na minha casa, para que então, um dia, pudessemos sair dali. Sim, eu conhecia a história e o que estas decisões significavam, humanos contra humanos, fogo e pobreza, mulheres arrastadas para serem estupradas, água suja, diarréia, pessoas como minha avó morrendo de fome. Eu estava muito ciente da história.

Eu cresci durante a Ocupação Comunista da Hungria. Quando a Revolução Húngara rompeu em 1956, eu tinha desesseis anos. Compartilhe da excitação extasiante de se erguer contra o oppressor e o horror de ver meus colegas de classe assassinados quando os Comunistas revidaram. Eu sai da Hungria e escapei pela fronteira, determinada a ser livre.

Embora muitas das pessoas que eu conheci em Los Angeles naqueles dias não tivessem tido uma infância tão excitante, nós fomos uma interessante geração. John Lennon, dos Beatles, nasceu no mesmo ano que eu, Ringo Starr também, foi um ano decisivo para muitos de nós. Nós éramos a Geração da Semente. Nossos pensamentos e sentimentos sobrevivem nas canções dos Baby Boomers¹. Foi esta geração semeadura que criou o conteúdo emocional para a vinda da enorme explosão musical, cultural e sexual.

Assim como muitas coisas, nosso movimento não foi planejado. Ele apenas brotou. Uma semente sabe que vai ser uma árvore quando brota no solo? Foi assim conosco. As mulheres que vieram à loja de velas Feminist Wicca estavam famintas por conhecimento, por poder, por ritual. Nós costumávamos converser sobre como seria celebrar os Mistérios das Mulheres do jeito que nossas antigas mães celebravam há muito tempo atrás. Pessoas diziam que não se podia mas fazer isto nos dias de hoje, mas por que não?

Eu decide que havia chegado a hora. Em 21 de Dezembro de 1971 eu disse que ia fazer um ritual para celebrar o retorno da luz. Mulheres que quisessem se juntar a mim deveriam ir ao meu flat em Hollywood ao pôr-do-sol. Eu não sabia quem apareceria, mas a Deusa sabia. Quando começou a escurecer havia seis mulheres na sala, seis ótimas amigas trançando as cintas das bruxas com lã vermelha, a cor da vida e do sangue. Minha mãe tinha me ensinado a fazer um círculo, a dar as mãos e deixar a energia crescer. Nós chamamos as ancestrais para se juntarem a nós. Uma das mulheres começou a cantar.

Juntas, nós rezamos e nós cantamos, chamando a Deusa para pegar a semente dos mistérios das mulheres do passado e cultivá-la como uma religião de mulheres indígenas. Nós rezávamos por justiça social e pelas bênçãos da terra. Queríamos alguma coisa que fosse ao mesmo tempo tradicional e revolucionária. Nós estávamos removendo o antigo poder do deus masculino sobre as mulheres. Quando tínhamos terminado de abençoar todas e tudo nós podíamos perceber que aquilo era necessário, nós saímos ao ar livre. Até então não tivemos nenhuma chuva naquele inverno, mas naquele momento conseguímos  ver que as nuvens estavam sobre nossas cabeças. Eram lindas, girando com as formas de espíritos. Nós levantamos nossas mãos ao céu, e uma suave e saudável chuva começou a cair.

Depois disso, nós sabíamos que tivemos alguma coisa boa. Aquele primeiro ritual deixou-nos elevadas por dias. O que falavam era que bruxas davam ótimas festas, mas nós todas sabíamos que estavamos fazendo algo mais. Um pequeno grupo de nós começou a se reunir para rituais e cada vez que nos encontrávamos, haviam mais mulheres. Quando super-lotamos o apartamento, começamos a realizar rituais ao ar livre. Costumávamos nos encontrar na praia. Cavavamos a areia e colocavamos nossas velas lá, protegidas do vento. As mulheres trouxeram flores, cristais, fotos de antepassados falecidos.

A Deusa nos ensinou como venerá-la e nós ensinamos umas as outras. Eu aprendi como esclarecer o que era necessário, e a necessidade me ensinou como ser uma sacerdotisa. Nenhuma de nós queria uma hierarquia – este era o antigo estilo masculino do qual nós estavamos tentando nos livrar. Não seria bom se eu tentasse dizer a alguém o que fazer. Mas eu achei que podia conseguir com que todas participassem, observando a energia coletiva, aceitando o que as diferentes mulheres estavam fazendo e liderando o grupo para apoiá-las. “A Deusa está viva!” eu gritava, “A Magia está em ação!” A Religião não deveria ser séria; deveria ser extasiante. Deveria ser um poder que queima em seu ventre e canta em sua alma. Nós gritávamos, nós uivávamos, nós cantávamos. Sentíamos o poder da face feminina de Deus e Ela era impressionante. Tivemos um ótimo tempo, e nossos números cresceram e cresceram.

Este foi o começo. Muitos livros depois, publiquei Summoning the Fates (Convocando as Deusas do Destino²), no qual eu entendi muito mais sobre como a mão das  Deusas do Destino organizam a vida de alguém de acordo com a missão destinada. Destinos e vida são conceitos permutáveis. Podemos fazer planos; as Deusas do Destinos vêm de qualquer jeito e finalizam.

Desde que eu entrei no terceiro destino em minha vida, as Deusas do Destino se tornaram entidades confortantes. Quanto mais você aprende sobre elas, mais você aprecia a si mesma, e mais felicidade e paz metal você alcança.

Nota da Tradução:

¹ Pessoas que nasceram durante o período democrático após a Segunda Guerra Mundial.

²  Conhecidas em Inglês como Fates, Moiras na mitologia grega e Parcas na mitologia Romana, eram três Deusas mitológicas que regiam os destinos das pessoas e dos Deuses.

Here we are in 010, entering the second decade of the 21^st century. It is still the sub-age of Aquarius. It is still the favorable times for humans to wake up to a new self understanding. This is happening in big quantum leaps, fueled by technology and science. Congratulations to all fellow planetary travelers! We have arrived in the future.

But now what?

We have more and more women come to us searching for a LOCAL group, contact where they can join, study and grow. This used to be rather easy in the last century. You went to your local bookstore; you hung out around the bulletin board, read the stuff on it, then added your own request, “Goddess study group forming” and the phone number. Pretty soon the first woman would call, who knew another, and in a couple of weeks you had a good little eager group; armed with Goddess books, healthy tea collections, and time set aside to be just a student of your own culture.

Women’s studies at Universities is not what it used to be, its still great we have them at all, alas under the name of Gender Studies, but who cares let’s just be grateful. These are still places where women can gather and plan actions.

Once you have created yourself an account with us, the Dianic University, we will let you use our Global Goddess Dianic Groups virtual bulletin board, look it through for women in your neighborhoods, add you name to the particular state and region you are at. Then we will have a central board  to post on for just this. Local connections.

Because we only let people we checked out on the board, you are safer to post and call whoever you find. I recommend exchanging email addresses first and get to know each other. Once you decide to meet up, do it in a public place first … maybe for coffee or tea. Check each other out and then exchange contact information.

But more than beginners, first timers, seekers of all kinds, we also need volunteers who help us battle the cultural anti-woman forces. You don’t think that the battle field is any less than before computers. Each time I go on the radio, or write something very pro-woman, anti-establishment, anti-male god material, I get attacked on the internet from men who hate that we have advanced as much as we have. They would like to see the Goddess Movement fade with my lifetime; me destroyed on the visibility field, my ideas and philosophies relegated to the trash bin.

Bobbie, my mighty Amazon, is the only one on the field battling this, so far successfully. But we could not have been defending ourselves without the help of women working in those technology citadels of power, the Goggles, wikis, who knew about the Goddess Movement. Imagine that! We are everywhere.

We need new allies with some time and skills. Not just hey I want to try to help, but rather … hey, I can battle on the techie field with the best of them and I don’t mind a little work out against the invisible forces.

This is what l’d like to put out to you. Please techie women with writing skills, step forward and make contact with me and Bobbie. The cultural war consists often in creating material, but also tracking down where the trouble comes from, correction information when it’s wrong.

Our visibility on the cultural field is crucial in the elevation of our sex.

When women don’t know how to link up, network, and publish … we can easily be marginalized again.

Don’t forget women are the majority of all humans. We create everybody from our own bodies. We raise citizens, consumers, and all the tax payers.

Women deserve their own culture. This is the part of the battle field that needs boosting. Individuals can do a lot, but we need the help, the link-up with the successful women, the higher end income women, the university program directors, and the leadership who organizes workshops, conferences, and gathering of all kinds.

For example, link us up with organizations where the women already formed groups, where we can cast a wider net when we disseminate information.

When we tighten our skills around the new technology and form a cultural staff around our own interests, then we can serve women on all level much better.

What I don’t want to end up is alone, battling the evil forces of cultural marginalization, and witness the new century pushing women’s issues, women’s needs and women’s spirituality aside.

What we have is a lucky opportunity to flood with our skillful energy into the collective consciousness, making room there for the love and respect for women; create a world where women don’t have to go to collage to learn about their past, our own  dianics, and whose shoulders we are standing on.

Information about our spiritual heritage will create a proud generation of women, talented, blooming, and confident.

Let us all go into the depth of the sub-age of Aquarius in this certainty, when women lead the planet thrives.

Blessed be,
Z Budapest

Still we live in male centered societies. Males often rule by violence and rape, and the everlasting wars. Not by law. Too many rapists have gone free, too many murderers as well. White-collar thieves live long and hardly ever fall into the hands of justice.

But something has happened here in the San Francisco Bay Area that tripped the “that’s enough!” wires for me as a witch. A lesbian was viciously gang raped by four men. Then they kidnapped her, and continued their assault for another 45 minutes. She was brutally beaten to within an inch of her life for being a woman, for being a lesbian. Then, they stole her car and left her naked in the chilled winter winds and pounding rains, daring her to survive.

She did.

I have not hexed anybody since the Trailside Killer (still in jail) in the 80’s, but something turned inside me when the crime came this close to my life. I’m much older now at 68 and somewhat incapacitated with artificial hips. I gathered enough courage to call to arms all those women who considered holding a hexing circle in defense of our lives a worthwhile effort.

13 women answered the call. It was a magical number. I went ahead.

As always we document all hexes, so there could be NO doubt we are not calling on the devil.

I contemplated the situation and carefully chose the Lady of Guadalupe as our Queen of all Americas to be the center. I asked a friend to get me some large banners of the Lady. She sent us two large banners, glorious in her appearance, the Lady in her full queenly glory. Thank you, Karen!

Next I gathered the all-important occult supplies. Yes you can cast successful spells without anything, just praying but when you are up against a rape culture, violence of this hate crime magnitude, it’s good to have some mandrake root with you, and other secret baneful herbs to burn in your cauldron.

I represented the lives of the rapists with red thread, and over the smoking cauldron, praying to the Queen, I cut their luck into many small pieces. The only man who came to our hex, Lez, helped to put them all into the burning cauldron of change. This was important. Men must stop rape. Men must come over to the women’s side and fight for us.

Rarely ever happens.

To the Queen who we invoked as grandmother (her old name used to be Tonatzin) , we asked her to help us and to bring these men, and ALL rapists down with Unluck. We cut their luck into tiny little pieces, their luck now gone.

Next I hexed them so nobody would hide them. Hexed them that their own family would give them up. Hexed them that they would turn on each other. Hexed them that the youngest one would talk.

Video of parts of this hexing ritual are on my DU website: http://wicca.dianic-wicca.com

Then we went home. I lie down on my couch and let the new year arrive. Thought it would be a little while that this spins out its necessary wheels.

By Wednesday, the news was on the front pages of the SF Chronicle. Three of the men were arrested. The younger one’s family gave him up! And then he talked as the hex had requested. They arrested two more and by Thursday the fourth criminal turned himself in. Blessed be Tonantzin!

Sisters of the Susan B. Anthony Coven Number One participated with us globally in this incredible fast Justice. In Orange County in Southern California, and elsewhere, the women gathered to support this hex. All could see the success of their labors. Enough is enough!

On the same day the arrests began here, a serial rapist was caught in Columbus, Ohio … No luck for rapists! Justicia rules! So now I have allowed myself a little victory toe-dance. Yeahh!

What I hoped would result from this experience is a nation wide hex on ALL rapists and similar gender initiated violence. This would take place annually, on the dark moon at the end of every year.

But the real change can only come from a change of consciousness. A mind change that would see women differently. Not as meat, not as holes, or whores, but as sisters and mothers and citizens with rights.

Male gods’ religion didn’t help at all. Thousands of years and the societies are still not civilized. The male gods remain the Lords. They have holy books full of violence and trashing of women. Switching back to Goddess culture and appreciation of life is what would help see women in the loving light.

After all we are the doors of life. We birthed everybody.

Where is the gratitude? Why the rage against us?

I hope that women ‘grow a pair’ and learn not to be fear driven, to stand up for themselves and each other. Learn SISTERHOOD again!

Maybe it’s time that the ‘Take Back the Night Marches’ that I started back in the 70’s, becomes an annual hexing ritual done by sisters and brothers alike. A hex on all enemies of women and peace. Maybe that will make the difference! It has to begin somewhere!

Z Budapest
www.ZBudapest.com

Copyright Z Budapest 2008