#it is not necessarily written to be pagan but still it’s recording important folk practices from the time he wrote it

[ceallaighcreature]

A reminder that Kevin Danaher’s excellent “The Year in Ireland: Irish Calendar Customs” can be borrowed online for free on archive.org! It contains a wealth of recorded practices and customs for Irish holidays, including Brigid’s day, Samhain, and many other important days.

[vavuska]

“Cancel culture” is nothing new, so why are we acting like it is? Those in power have written their own version of history as they’d like it to be remembered for ages. That “winners write history” is simply another way of saying that selective erasure (or canceling) of inconvenient truths is built into the fabric of documenting history.

What’s new is that now we’re looking backward to “uncancel” some of the important stories not widely shared about groups of people who have more power today than they’ve had in the past to record their truths for a broader audience.

An exemple is how has been washed, cleaned and packed up, the figure of Christopher Columbus in history books and mainstream european culture.

Some facts that you must know about Christopher Columbus:

- Christopher Columbus didn't discover America as a continent, and wasn't aslo the first European to visit American coasts: half a millennium before Columbus “discovered” America, Viking's feet may have been the first European ones to ever have touched North American soil. The expedition’s leader was Leif Eriksson (variations of his last name include Erickson, Ericson, Erikson, Ericsson and Eiriksson), son of Erik the Red, who founded the first European settlement of Greenland after being expelled from Iceland around A.D. 985 for killing a neighbor. (Erik the Red’s father, himself, had been banished from Norway for committing manslaughter.)

But Christopher Columbus was remarkably the first who came with the intention of a great military conquer.

- He didn't discover that the Earth is spherical: this knowledge was still accepted in the Middle Age and by the Christian doctrine.

Knowledge of the sphericity of the Earth survived into the medieval corpus of knowledge by direct transmission of the texts of Greek antiquity (Aristotle), and via authors such as Isidore of Seville and Beda Venerabilis.

Though the earliest written mention of a spherical Earth comes from ancient Greek sources, there is no account of how the sphericity of the Earth was discovered.

A recent study of medieval concepts of the sphericity of the Earth noted that since the eighth century, no cosmographer worthy of note has called into question the sphericity of the Earth.

Some examples are the papers of Pope Silvester II, who was awer of the knowledge of ancient greek philosophers and also of the researches of Muslim mathematicians. Also Saint Hildegard portrayed the Earth as a sphere in her Liber Divinorum Operum; Giovanni Sarabosco, an Italian astronomist wrote a paper (Tractatus de Spahaera) based on the knowledge of Ptolemy about the sphericity of the Earth; Honorius of Autun, a theologist very popular also in lay community,in his Elucidarium, a survey of Christian beliefs wrote about the sphericity of the Earth. His works was translated frequently into other languages.

Another proof that this knowledge was diffused also in the low folk and not only among the intellectuals of the Church, can be found in some of Berthold von Regensburg homelies in which he explained that the earth is spherical.

A practical demonstration of Earth's sphericity was achieved by Ferdinand Magellan and Juan Sebastián Elcano's expedition's circumnavigation (1519-1522).

- Christopher Columbus was the first European to have the idea to enslave native Americans and force them to work in colonizer's encomiendas. According to Cuneo, Columbus ordered 1,500 men and women seized, letting 400 go and condemning 500 to be sent to Spain, and another 600 to be enslaved by Spanish men remaining on the island. About 200 of the 500 sent to Spain died on the voyage, and were thrown by the Spanish into the Atlantic. (Bergreen, 196-197)

Those left behind were forced to search for gold in mines and work on plantations. Within 60 years after Columbus landed, only a few hundred of what may have been 250,000 Taino were left on their island.

- If you think that Christopher Columbus was loved and admired by people of his age, you are wrong: he gave land to the settlers and permitted the enslavement of the Taino people to work it. Complaints for his violence against Caribs and Taino Indians, but mostly for his cruelty against Spanish settler, trickled back to Spain, and eventually the monarchs sent a commissioner to investigate. Shocked by conditions at the colony, the commissioner arrested Columbus and his brothers and sent them back to Spain for trial. The brothers were released by the king and queen, but Columbus was removed from his position as governor of Hispaniola.

- Christopher Columbus was the fist European to commit a genocide: 56 years after Columbus's first voyage, only 500 out of 300,000 Indians remained on Hispaniola.

Population figures from 500 years ago are necessarily imprecise, but Bergreen estimates that there were about 300,000 inhabitants of Hispaniola in 1492. Between 1494 and 1496, 100,000 died, half due to mass suicide. In 1508, the population was down to 60,000. By 1548, it was estimated to be only 500.

Some important facts about slavery, Catholic Church and the famous Monarchs of Spain, Isabel of Castile and her husband Ferdinand of Aragon:

In 1492, Kingdom of Castile and Aragon had a disperate need of money: King Ferdinand and his wife Qeen Isabel used a lot of money in their wars against Portogual and their Conquer of the Emirate of Granada, that was an indipendente Muslim state at the age. They were deeply in debt, also with jews pawloaner, who at the age, were the only allowed to borrow money (Christian doctrine, by the way, didn't allow it), so they wrote the infamous Alhambra Decree with witch all jews were forced to left Spain and their properties passed in the Monarchs' hands.

I red some people associated the Dum Diversas with Columbus, but it has nothing to concern with "discovery" of the "new world": Dum Diversas is a papal bull issued on 18 June 1452 by Pope Nicholas V. It authorized Afonso V of Portugal to conquer Saracens and pagans and consign them to "perpetual servitude". It was referred to the muslim population of North Africa and also to the Turkish territories in Europe.

By the way, the Catholic Chruch condamed slavery in various occasion: in 1537 pope Paul III condemned "unjust" enslavement of non-Christians in Sublimus Dei. In 1686 the Holy Office limited the bull by decreeing that Africans enslaved by unjust wars should be freed. Eugene IV and Paul III did not hesitate to condemn the forced servitude of Blacks and Indians, in Sicut Dudum (1435) and in Sublimis Deus (1537). Their teaching was continued by Gregory XIV in 1591 and by Urban VIII in 1639. Except those formal condemn of slavery, the Church keep an ambiguous sentiment: the condamn was absolute, but most of the government of their age were built on slavery and keep allow their people to profit on slavery, for the reason that "indigenous" people were not Christians, they didn't have a soul, so they were like animals. The Holy See was unable to stop the trade, despite their good intentions.

The pontifical teaching was continued by the response of the Holy Office on March 20, 1686, under Innocent XI, and by the encyclical of Benedict XIV, Immensa Pastorum, on December 20, 1741. This work was followed by the efforts of Pius VII at the Congress of Vienna in 1815 to have the victors over Napoleon outlaw slavery. The 1839 Constitution In Supremo by Gregory XVI continued the antislavery teaching of his predecessors, and was in the same manner not accepted by many of those bishops, priests and laity for whom it was written.

[ayearinfaith]

𝗔 𝗬𝗲𝗮𝗿 𝗶𝗻 𝗙𝗮𝗶𝘁𝗵, 𝗗𝗮𝘆 𝟮𝟮: 𝗡𝗼𝗿𝘀𝗲 𝗥𝗲𝗹𝗶𝗴𝗶𝗼𝗻

Norse religion, also known as Norse mythology, Norse paganism, Heathenry, and other names, is the collection of mystic traditions, folklore, and other such cultural aspects of pre-Christian North Germanic people, the ancestral peoples of modern day Denmark (Faroe Islands included), Norway, Sweden, and Iceland.

𝗧𝗵𝗮𝗻𝗸𝘀, 𝗦𝗻𝗼𝗿𝗿𝗶 𝗦𝘁𝘂𝗿𝗹𝘂𝘀𝗼𝗻

Though Scandinavia was among the last parts of Europe to be Christianized, becoming fully Christian around the 12th Century CE, we have precious little direct evidence of the native traditions. The Old Norse people did have written language, the runic Futhark, but lacked the robust literary tradition of the Greeks and Romans, instead preserving their traditions primarily orally. The very earliest attestation of Germanic religion comes from the Roman historian Tacitus in his 1st century CE book, the 𝘎𝘦𝘳𝘮𝘢𝘯𝘪𝘢. This book was likely compiled based on secondhand information about West Germanic peoples, and as such is not a great source for true Norse religion (or even that of the West Germans). It does give us the Roman interpretations of the Germanic gods, the same interpretation upon which the days are named in all Germanic languages, and as such we do know that by this time Germanic people were already worshiping a distinct pantheon from their sun-worshipping Indo-European ancestors (the Romans, by contrast, still worshiped the sky god Jupiter). Between then and the 13th century the record is sparse, the occasional runic inscription or placename, and a few off topic mentions in 11th century history books. The majority of what we now know as Norse mythology come from two sources, both from 13th century Iceland: the Eddas. The “Poetic” Edda is a collection of poetry compiled from several sources, primarily the 𝘊𝘰𝘥𝘦𝘹 𝘙𝘦𝘨𝘪𝘶𝘴. Neither the Codex nor the additional poetry has a known author, though it is believed to be more or less authentic transcriptions of oral Icelandic folk (i.e. non-Christian) traditions. The “Prose” Edda is a composition by Snorri Sturluson, a prominent Icelandic lawspeaker, historian, poet, and very much a Christian. Snorri purpose in writing the 𝘌𝘥𝘥𝘢 was not to preserve Norse faith but to preserve Icelandic poetic traditions. Snorri believed that without the record of these old fables that the poetic kennings, metaphors, and common sayings would become incomprehensible to future generations. It is Snorri’s Eddic version of Norse mythology that most of us in the modern world have grown up knowing, Snorri’s Thor and Loki that became re-imagined as comic book icons. We do not know how much of his work was authentic, Christianized, or simply made up to fit his fancy, but there is reason to believe a mix of all three. Both Edda’s, and in fact most of the sources listed here, would remain largely unknown and some almost lost until the era or European Romanticism and the “Viking Revival” in the 18th and 19th centuries. This was the culmination of several factors: advances in printing press technology made the spread of books much wider than in prior centuries, the translation of the Eddas into Latin (at the time still the most widespread language of literature in Europe), and a sudden surge of interest in pre-Christian Europe. While this enabled Norse myths to become the pop-culture fixture it is, it also means most “common knowledge” on the subject comes through the lens of enthusiastic but often inaccurate imaginings of what Norse religion was like.

𝗪𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝗡𝗼𝗿𝘀𝗲 𝗥𝗲𝗹𝗶𝗴𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗪𝗮𝘀 𝗟𝗶𝗸𝗲

Distinctive Germanic faith, at least the version we are familiar with today, probably emerged in the second half of the 1st millennium BCE. We know from linguistic evidence that the familiar figures of Odin, Thor, and others were prominent before the splintering of the Common Germanic language into Western, Northern, and Eastern varieties between the 1st and 3rd century CE. Norse people probably did not think of themselves as having a religion in the Western sense. Instead, they would have viewed their faith in a way quite similar to how many modern Japanese people do with Shinto: their rituals and tales weren’t so much a faith as simply a culture, a definitive feature of Norse-ness and not necessarily incompatible with or exclusionary to other beliefs. This is part of why we have little record; with no centralized houses of worship or canonic texts there was little pressing need for much else than the bardic oral tradition. We do know that Thor has always been popular, from Denmark to Iceland, as his name is a common element in places and personal names and the symbol of his hammer, Mjolnir, is common. Sacrifice was definitely practiced, both of animals and humans. Most attestations we have of ritual human sacrifice come from Christian origins with a clear political agenda, so the specifics can only be guessed at, but archaeological and linguistic evidence definitely supports that it happened. We know that goddesses and other female spirits were important in both North and Western Germanic faith, but the male written histories and male written 𝘌𝘥𝘥𝘢 have largely doomed them to obscurity. The number 3, and by extension 9 (3 squared), were auspicious and came up often, for example gods are often depicted in 3’s and the cosmos was divided into 9 realms. A unique feature of the Norse tradition is the separation of the gods into two rival and eventually allied clans; the Æsir and Vanir. Some historians have theorized that this developed from an ancient memory of migration and conflict, a position that feeds into linguistic theories that Germanic languages were effected by a now extinct non-Indo-European language. The word “Æsir” has been shown to be related to the Hindi word “Asura”, an antagonistic class of gods often equated with Greek Titans. Another peculiarity of Norse religion is the position of Thor in the divine hierarchy. Thor has brothers across the Indo-European spectrum: the Greek Zeus, Roman Jupiter, Slavic Perun, and Hindu Indra. All these gods wield lightning and storms, are very popular in their traditional homelands, and fight with serpents or dragons. All of them, except Thor, are also kings among their kind. The Norse uniquely have demoted their storm god below a “new” king, the enigmatic Odin. Norse rituals typically were outdoor affairs and associated with certain features of the landscape. This may be the origin of the term “heathen” which is itself derived from “heath” meaning an open patch of land, though it may also have been coined to parallel the Latin derived “pagan”, which originally simply meant “rural”.

𝗥𝗲𝘃𝗶𝘁𝗮𝗹𝗶𝘇𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻

Starting with the aforementioned Romantic “Viking Revival” new traditions of faith in the gods of the Old Norse have risen and fallen. Many of these early movements did not start in Scandinavia but nearby Germany and England, where they were often hand in hand with unfortunate conceptions of Germanic racial supremacy. The Nazi’s, though very much Christian, were keen to adopt many Norse symbols that had been popularized by these movements, most of which collapsed with the Nazi regime. To this day the community of “Germanic Neopagans” are deeply divided on the issue of racism. The term “Heathenry” is more commonly used by non-racist organizations, as it contains no explicit relation to German-ness. Racist organizations are more likely to use such explicit language, and especially enjoy use of the word “folk” (either in English or another Germanic language) and terms similar to “Odinism”. The movements also often struggle with sexism and homophobia, an unfortunate side-effect of the perceive hypermasculinity that is more a result of male romantic idealism than actual Norse culture. One of the larger, less problematic, and more well-known organizations is the Ásatrú, originating in Iceland. The name is literally “Æsir-true”, in the sense of loyalty or allegiance to the Æsir, though the practitioners do venerate spirits and divinities outside of the Æsir as well. Few practitioners, even more organized ones like Ásatrú, have an established dogma or set of canon practices. Similar to the ancestors they emulate, they generally believe that learning, telling, and thinking about legends and taking part in rituals are sufficient guidelines for the practitioner to find their own spiritual and ethical path.

Image Credit: Viking Age (8th-11th century) Runestone G 181 from Gotland, Sweden

[mygoddessmusings]

Circle Series: Post 1 - Part 1 - Goddess History

Hello! Welcome to post 1 of the Circle Series! For an intro to what the Circle Series is see here.

Before we get into the fundamentals of how to practice feminist, Goddess Spirituality, which I will call Goddessia for brevity, it seems logical to first discuss what is feminist, Goddess Spirituality and just who is this Goddess anyway? This turned out a little longer than I anticipated, so I’ve divided it into two parts.

In part 1, we are going to explore matriarchal prehistory and discuss the history of our modern Goddess spirituality. In part 2, I will attempt to paint a textual portrait of the Goddess as she is known today, in the words of some of Goddessia's founding mothers, and we will discuss some core concepts of Goddessian thealogy.

Let's begin! :)

Matriarchal Prehistory - History and Sacred Narrative

(Source)

"In the beginning, people prayed to the Creatress of Life, the Mistress of Heaven. At the very dawn of religion, God was a woman. Do you remember?"- Merlin Stone, When God Was a Woman

In Copper Age southern and eastern Europe, there existed societies which were "matrifocal, sedentary, peaceful, art-loving, earth-and sea-bound,"1 which is sometimes called Old Europe. These societies shared cultural ideas and a had common symbolic language, which was the language of the Goddess.  "[The Old European] culture took keen delight in the natural wonders of this world. Its people did not produce lethal weapons or build forts in inaccessible places as their successors did, even when they were acquainted with metallurgy. Instead they built magnificent tomb-shrines and temples, comfortable houses in moderately-sized villages, and created superb pottery and sculptures. This was a long-lasting period of remarkable creativity and stability, an age free of strife. Their culture was a culture of art." 2

The peoples of these cultures worshiped "the Great Mother Goddess who gives birth to all creation out of the holy darkness of her womb [...] the cosmic giver and taker of life, ever able to renew Herself within the eternal cycle of life, death, and rebirth." 3 The Goddess of these peoples was the Giver of Life, the Taker and Regenerator of Life, and the Renewing and Eternal Earth. Some of her many symbols include circles, spirals, lunar crescents, triangles, vulvas, breasts, and rounded bellies, along with a variety of birds and beasts. 4 "[...] Women played central roles in the religion and society of Old Europe. [There were] no great disparities  among individuals or between women and men. [These civilizations were] 'matristic,' worshiping the Mother and honoring women, and 'matrilineal,' with family ties being traced through the female line. [. . .] Women played central roles in the creation of Old European religion and probably also the leading roles in rituals." 5

Tragically, these peaceful, art-loving societies were overthrown by waves of invaders whose society was "patrifocal, mobile, warlike, ideologically sky-oriented, and indifferent to art." 6 The Great Mother Goddesses worshiped in Old Europe "were slain or made subordinate to the new Gods of the patriarchal warriors, such as Zeus and Marduk [...] to legitimate the new culture of the patriarchal warriors." 7 The arrival of these invaders ushered in the ascendancy of patriarchy, which we have been living under ever since.

The existence of matriarchal, egalitarian societies in Europe prior to their overthrow by violent, patriarchal societies, a hypothesis first put forth by Marija Gimbutas in the 1950's, is a founding sacred narrative of Goddessia. You may find that Gimbutas' hypotheses surrounding Old Europe and the subsequent rise of patriarchy are now frequently brushed off as outdated or pseudo-history in modern Pagan discourse. However, the Gimbutas' "Kurgan" hypothesis is still the most widely-accepted regarding the origins of Proto-Indo-European peoples in Europe and Asia and is supported by the archaeological and linguistic record. If you took a world history class in school, it's quite likely you learned about the Proto-Indo-European invasion/migration to Europe, the Middle East, and Southern Asia. It is only Gimbutas' hypotheses regarding nature of the cultures of Old Europe which are not widely taught or which are thought to be unsupported, partly because she based them not only on the archaeological record but also on artistic, mythic, and folkloric record. 8 It is important to note that some pieces of the hypotheses are more firmly supported by "hard" evidence than others, but regardless of whether 100% of the above narrative is verifiable historical fact, many Goddessians claim this story as part of our spiritual history. It is our sacred lore, no different than when those of Abrahamic faiths claim the stories of the Old Testament as their sacred history, regardless of whether all of it is 100% verifiable. Many of us feel in our bones and the depths of our spirits a deep kinship with Old Europe. The story of these matrifocal cultures gives us hope and comfort to think that society was once peaceful and woman-valuing, and that it can be again. It challenges the prevailing cultural myth that patriarchy has always existed as the natural structure of society. And it shows us the ancient roots of our modern Goddess worship. We are their Goddess-worshiping, woman-valuing descendants, and we are striving to bring about a rebirth of their ancient ways.

Modern Goddess Spirituality

( Source)

We are the flow

We are the ebb.

We are the witches,

back from the dead!

We are going to skim over the last few thousand years of Western patriarchy as I assume you’re fairly familiar with the major events. Reverence for the Great Mother persisted into patriarchal antiquity, even as women were subjugated under patriarchy and the Goddesses demoted in importance in the written versions of their myths. Goddess-centered mystery traditions, such as the Eleusinian Mysteries, and popular worship of Great Goddesses, such as Isis, persisted into the early Christian era. Even with the rise of Christianity, Mary assumed a goddess-like importance to its followers; however, her narrative often served to justify anti-woman rhetoric and misogynistic violence.

We're going to fast-forward a little bit more to mid-twentieth century and the birth of modern Paganism. Modern Paganism finds its roots in the romanticist and national liberation movements of 18th and 19th century Europe. New studies of European folk traditions and culture resulted in the belief that almost all such folk customs were survivals from the pre-Christian period. 9 Margaret Murray applied this belief to the witch trials of early modern Europe and hypothesized that they were  an attempt to suppress a pre-Christian, pagan religion that had survived the Christianization of Europe." 10 This hypothesis has since been discredited, but Murray's "witch-cult" and existing western occult practices were merged to create a new religious synthesis: Wicca. Many now believe that Gerald Gardner created Wicca, while others maintain that he drew from an existing witchcraft tradition; regardless, Wicca made it's way to the United States in the 1960's, just in time for the Women's Liberation Movement. 11

Feminists of the Second Wave sought to analyze and critique societal power structures that uphold male dominance, and religion was not exempted from that critique. Feminists concluded that "Judaism and Christianity are sexist religions with a male God and traditions of male leadership that legitimate the superiority of men in family and society." 12 Feminist theologians critiqued not only the male-centeredness of patriarchal religion, but also the dualism and hierarchical mentalities found in these religions, which "opposes soul, spirit, rationality, and transcendence to body, flesh, matter, nature, and immanence. God is identified with the positive sides of the dualism, and 'the world' with the negative sides. [...] This is a model for domination because reality is divided into two levels, one superior and one inferior. [...] Scholars have noted that the dualistic world view contains the seeds of ecological crisis; for, if the world and nature are seen as mere matter, then they are subject to human control and exploitation. Classical dualism also became the model for the oppression of women when the culture-creating males identified the positive sides of the dualism with themselves and identified the negative sides with women over whom they claimed the right to rule." 13 In response to these critiques, some feminists sought to reform their traditional religions, resulting in movements for female clergy and god-language. Others felt that this was evidence of society's need to get rid of religion altogether. Others still felt that new woman-honoring traditions were needed.

In this latter group of women, we have the mothers of modern Goddess spirituality. "They find the history of Goddess worship inspiration for feminist theology and spirituality. They argue that the Goddess symbol found in many traditions can aid modern women's liberation by providing an image of female power that can counteract the symbol of God as male." 14 Wicca, at this time, was still purported to be descended from an unbroken line of Pagan survivals of Christianity. The Goddess/God duotheism found in traditional Wicca is not necessarily feminist (as I have discussed before), but its inclusion of Earth-reverence and Goddess worship, along with the possibility that it was a survival of the Old European culture they were trying to rebirth, made Wicca a foundation on which Goddess Feminists could create new, explicitly-feminist, woman-honoring traditions, including Dianic Wicca, Reclaiming, and the Goddess and Womanspirit movements more broadly. ""Reaching across the centuries, we take the hands of our Ancient Sisters. The Great Goddess alive and well is rising to announce to the patriarchs that their 5,000 years are up -- Hallelujah! Here we come!" 15

Suggested Reading:

Why Women Need the Goddess by Carol Christ

Suggested Exercises/Reflection Questions:

Once and Future Goddess - Take some time to meditate an ancient Goddess image and learn Her history, such as the Venus of Willendorf, or one of these: Venus of Laussel, Cucuteni Goddess, Goddess of Kato Chorio, or the Nile Goddess.   Let Her speak to you. How does She make you feel?

Goddess Names - Try chanting along with a Goddess-name chant. Isis, Astarte is a well known one. I'm a fan of the chant between the verses of Ancient Mother by Robert Gass and On the Wings of Song, though it's a bit long. You could use the names from the Charge of the Goddess or create your own, if you prefer. Listen to the sacred names. Say/sing them yourself out loud, and feel the sound of them vibrate through you. How do they make you feel? Do they make you feel connected to your ancestresses who also used these names? Do you feel you are calling on a multitude of Goddesses, or is there a sense of unity behind the many names? [We'll explore this more in part 2 :) ]

Next: Post One - Part Two: Goddess Today

Sources

1. Gimbutas, Marija, "Women and Culture in Goddess-Oriented Old Europe," Weaving the Visions p.63, as found in Rebirth of the Goddess, by Carol Christ, p.55.

2. Gimbutas, Marija, The Language of the Goddess, p.321, as found in Rebirth of the Goddess, by Carol Christ, p.55.

3. Gimbutas, Marija, The Civilization of the Goddess, p.222, as found in Rebirth of the Goddess, by Carol Christ, p.55.

4. Christ, Carol, Rebirth of the Goddess, p.55.

5. Christ, Carol, Rebirth of the Goddess, p.56.

6. Gimbutas, Marija, "Women and Culture in Goddess-Oriented Old Europe," Weaving the Visions p.63, as found in Rebirth of the Goddess, by Carol Christ, p.55.

7. Christ, Carol, Rebirth of the Goddess, p.62.

8. Leslie, Jacques, "THE GODDESS THEORY : Controversial UCLA Archeologist Marija Gimbutas Argues That the World Was at Peace When God Was a Woman" (x)

9. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_Paganism#Renaissance_and_Romanticism

10. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witch-cult_hypothesis

11. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Wicca

12. Christ, Carol, and Plaskow, Judith, eds, Womanspirit Rising, p.1

13. Christ, Carol, and Plaskow, Judith, eds, Womanspirit Rising, p.5

14. Christ, Carol, and Plaskow, Judith, eds, Womanspirit Rising, p.10-11

15. Edelson, Mary Beth, "Seaking for Myself," as found in Womanspirit Rising, p.277-278

(Feel free to share, reblog, etc., but please do not repost the above without credit. Your feedback is more than welcome! Let me know what you think!)