May 2008
1. Thursday-Color Purple- Crowning of the Blessed Virgin Mary- Beltane- Order of the Illuminati formed in 1776- Waning moon- Feast of St. Peregrin Laviosi- patron of cancer suffers
2. Friday- Color White- DJ Conway born- Waning moon- Kite Day (Japan)
3. Saturday- Color Black- Holy Cross Day- Waning moon- Feast of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Queen of Poland and James the Lesser, patron of the dying and St.s Philip and James, patrons of Uruguay.
4. Sunday- Color Yellow- New York woman brought up on charges of witchcraft by her neighbor 1895. Waning moon. St. Florian patron of Firefighters
5. Monday- Color Ivory- Cinco de Mayo- Waxing moon
6. Tuesday- Color Scarlet- Waxing Moon- Martyr’s Day (Middle East)
7. Wednesday- Color Brown- Waxing moon.
8. Thursday- Color Turquoise- Waxing moon- French Liberation
9. Friday- Color Rose- Joan of Arc canonized 1920. 1st day of the Feast of Lemuria, the feast of the dead in Ancient Roman Culture. May have been the forerunner of Samhain. Waxing moon.
10. Saturday- Color Blue-Birthday of singer and activist Paul Hewson aka Bono of U2. 1st day of the feast of the birds celebrating the beasts of the air. Waxing moon. St. John of Avila- patron of clergy and St. Cathal- patron of hernia sufferers.
11. Sunday- Color Orange- Mother’s Day- American colony Puritans ban Christmas as a Pagan holiday. Waxing moon. St. Gengulf, patron of unhappy marriages.
12. Monday- Color Silver- Waxing Moon- Florence Nightingale’s birthday.
13. Tuesday- Color Grey- Waxing moon- Pilgrimage to Fatima
14. Wednesday- Color Topaz- The widow Robinson of Kiddermunster arrested for using magik to try to stop the return of King Charles II 1660.
15. Thursday- Color White- Feast of St. Dymphna, patroness of the mentally ill and the possessed. Waxing moon.
16. Friday- Color Copal- St. Honoratius, patron of millers, baker, and cake makers. Waxing moon
17. Saturday- Color Indigo- Waxing moon.
18. Sunday- Color Amber- Waxing moon.
19. Monday- Color Lavender- St. Celestine, patroness of book binders. Full moon.
20. Tuesday- Color Red- St. Bernardino of Siena, patron of advertisers. Full moon.
21. Wednesday- Color White- Gwyddion Pendderwen, Pagan Bard born 1946. Full moon.
22. Thursday- Color Green- St. Rita of Cascia, patroness of parenthood and infertility. Waning moon.
23. Friday- Color Pink- Waning moon.
24. Saturday-Color Grey- St. Mark patron of cattlemen. Waning moon.
25. Sunday- Color Gold- Scott Cunningham initiated into Wicca 1981. Waning moon.
26. Monday- Color White- Memorial Day- John Dee begins experimenting with crystal ball gazing 1581. Waning moon.
27. Tuesday- Color Black- Isobel Gowdie final confession to witchcraft without torture 1662- Waning moon.
28. Wednesday- Color Yellow- Ouija Board is patented by Elijah Bond. St. Germaine’s Day and St. Bernard’s Day- patrons of mountaineering and the Alps.
29. Thursday- Color Crimson- St. Bona, patron of flight attendants. Waning moon
30. Friday- Color Purple- Death of St. Joan of Arc, patroness of France. St. Ferdinand III of Castile, patron of persons in authority. Waning moon.
31. Saturday- Color Indigo- Mary Our Lady of Grace, patroness to military chaplains. Waning moon.
Zodiac Signs of the Month
Taurus-(April 20-May 20)- The Bull- The builder, practical and patient, steadfast, enjoys physical comfort, and well being, ruled by Venus. Loves art, beauty and music and creates deep friendships and love bonds, seeks harmony, cares for money and resources of people and things.
Gemini- (May 21-June 21)- The Twins- Magikal communication, adapting to change, new ideas and inspiration to writers.
Herb of the Month
Ginseng- the master of confidence, love, protection, and attracting love. Stimulates sluggish senses. Sovereign for recovering from illness. Use as a root, a powder or an elixir.
Tarot Card of the Month
The Ace of Wands
A hand in the heavens holding a large wand over a valley with a small white building in the background and a small stream in the foreground.
A new phase of life. Be confident and forge ahead.
Saint of the Month
ST. Joan of Arc
Feast Day May 30
St. Joan was born at Doremy in 1412 to a peasant farmer family. When she was 14, she had an aural visitation, which became an actual vision of saints Michael, Catherine, Margaret and other holy people. They revealed to her that she must show herself to the French forces and predict a loss. When the loss happened, Joan was given royal escort to present herself. There she requested the king give her a detachment of soldiers for the relief of Orleans, which was besieged. With much disbelief, the king did as she requested and even provided her with her own standard, the fleur de lis with the words Jesus and Mary. On the 8th of May, Joan and her men marched into Orleans and won it in battle and was herself wounded. She won further victories at Patay and Troyes. On July 17, 1429, Charles VII of France (the Dauphin) was crowned with Joan at his side.
Sadly this was the end of her victories and her visions began to fail her. The king of England captured her May 23, 1430. King Charles VII abandoned her to the English who tried her on February 21, 1431. She was accused of witchcraft and sorcery and for wearing men’s clothes. She was condemned as a heretic and on May 29, 1431 she was burned at the stake. She was eventually canonized May 16, 1920.
Spell of the Month
With the up swing of youth gone awry, this spell may help you deal with the more rowdy elements in the home or the neighborhood.
No More Delinquents
Paper Poppet
Incense (your choice)
4 Red Candles dressed in Myrrh
If known, write the name of the delinquent on the poppet. Surround the poppet with the red candles. Light a candle deosil after each verse
These candles I light do symbolize
The troubled soul thus inscribed
God give them strength to change
And become better each day
Here is love to guide their life
And keep the young one from strife
Hoping one day they will lead
A life of serving other’s needs
Understanding comes their way
Beginning now, this very day
For this child cannot manipulate
Nor will they be led astray
Now give me patience with this child
Because I can teach them to be mild
I can in straight paths this child lead
And guide them care for humanity
Child, grace and courage has come to your side to resist negativity in your life. For good you live and strive and a good name you take pride. Only that which is right stays forever in sight. A leader you will be for all humanity. Doing what’s right for the entire world to see.
Blessed Be and Merry Meet
As I will it, so mote it be.
Herb of the Month
Ginseng
The root of love, confidence, protection, and wisdom. Can be used as an aphrodisiac and as a stimulant. Known for its healing properties. Can be substituted with ginger.
May Essays
The Meaning of the Broom
Mother Meave Stardancer
I remember my mum used buy a new broom every year. The local blind school made them. What I loved the best about these brooms was what the brushes were round, bound with hemp cord with neatly cropped wheat straws. The old brooms would go to my uncle who would cut off the brush, sand stain and varnish the stick and put a rubber cap on them to use as canes. Most of the ladies of the neighborhood would give him their old broom and mop sticks that he would sell for 2 pounds.
I loved those brooms, I innately understood them. I knew they were more than simple housekeeping implements. They were powerful tools, weapons and symbols. Even long before I became a witch, I knew they were instruments of wise women and had their own energies hidden in the stick and the broom.
I remember watching the film “Bed knobs and Broomsticks”. Angela Landsbury played an apprentice witch in England at the beginning of World War II. I remember how excited she was when her broom arrived by post. When I went to university the first thong I ordered for my flat was a blind made broom. It arrived by post in a long box.
I became a witch in college. This was of course during the heady days of the 60’s. Gerald Gardner and Alex Sanders had come screaming from the broom closet and there were a lot of debates about what was “witch” and what wasn’t. Many witches ignored the sweet broom for the sword and Athame and wand and staff. Brooms were far too annexed by Hollywood and secular Halloween. Few witches had a real ritual broom.
The first Brooms were simple bundles of sticks, twigs and straws to brush out the debris of daily living. As the simple brush evolved so did housing. Shelters became more permanent homes and cleaning needed to be more efficient. By simply adding a stick to the brush, the woman could be upright and sweeping could be a faster more thorough chore. Many superstitions began to evolve:
Sweep the house from the back to the front and you’ll sweep away bad luck.
If a lazy girl allows another woman to sweep around her, she will never marry.
Never bring an old broom (domestic, that is) to a new house.
If a broom falls, company is coming.
In some communities, a woman set her broom by her back door to tell her friends she was not at home. A broom by the back door with its brush up signaled she was home and open for visits and gossip.
In earlier times, villagers came together for mutual support. If defense was necessary the men might have a few swords among them but they also had pitchforks, axes, sickles, and scythes and staffs and clubs and hand knives. Women too had their weapons and her broom became her staff or club to fight with. The broom is a symbol of domesticity. If the man was the king of his castle, the woman is the queen of the hearth. The broom is her scepter.
How does the broom then become symbolic of the witch? Well there is an awful lot of codswallop about priaptic wands hidden in the brush and hobby horses and squeamish little details about witches flying brooms to black masses and murdering babies and doing things with the fat. The truth is, brooms are associated with witches because they are associated with women and the world of women. To demonize women is to demonize their tools: witness the cauldron filled with cats heads and toads, where once the cauldron was where the food came from, the recipe book which becomes the devils black book of spells, the hen party which turns into a coven. Why not the broom as well?
But, imagine the woman with her broom, sweeping her house, deep in thought over her family: Her worries over the harvest and her husband who sometimes works too hard, her child who may be ill, her friend with a difficult pregnancy. As she ponders deeper and deeper, as she sweeps she feels the tension flowing out, down to the floor, under the broom and out the door. Perhaps she prays as she sweeps. Then the broom becomes magikal.
Well, that’s the way I think it happened, anyway. You are free to disagree. In the meantime, I order my broom every year from the blind school and I have my ritual broom, decorated with symbols, ribbons, flowers and bits and pieces by my hearth. No witch should be without one.
Mother Meave Stardancer is a ritual toolmaker, herbalist and yoga instructor. She has been a witch for forty years. She lives in London with her husband and her dog Shelby.
Handfasting
By Sybil Greyraven
As spring comes thoughts of love bring us to the topic of Handfasting, the witch’s wedding ceremony. On of my first acts as a priestess of my Christo Pagan coven was to officiate a Handfasting ceremony. It was a lovely ritual in a public park for a lovely gay couple that wished to have their relationship solemnized.
Though not considered a legal ceremony (yet) it is a popular service or ritual. Surprisingly, I and other Crafters can confirm that it is popular among gay couples who still seek a religious wedding ceremony. This is despite the fact that no state or federal government regularizes same sex unions. These matters are of no concern for the witch priest or priestess (regardless of your tradition) Even Christian and Christo-Pagan priests and priestesses do not judge these couples that stand before us. We are taught; after all, that we are not to judge any man, that judgment is dangerous and thoughtless and goes against Christian and witchcraft philosophy.
There is no one set ritual for a Handfasting. The couple can write their own vows. Elements like music, flowers, candles, and other details can be added to a basic ritual. The format should include a processional or presentation, an introductory explanation of what Handfasting is, the exchange of vows and or rings, the lighting of a unity candle, the tying of wedding cords, stepping over the broom and final presentation of the couple.
Handfasting can be made for a year and a day and can be used to solemnize an engagement prior to a church/ legal wedding service. There may also be lifetime bindings. Some people celebrate periodic Handfastings throughout the relationship. The couple may Handfast for the traditional year and a day and at the five-year mark, the fifteen-year and the twenty-five-year mark, celebrating each phase in their relationship. Regardless of what you wish, the Handfast is a generous ritual that accommodates the need of each couple.
In the matter of money, the priest or priestess should not set a dollar amount but allow the beloved couple to make their own free will offering. There just simply is nothing like a wedding in the spring.
Sybil Greyraven is a Christo-Pagan and Python magician and illusionist performance artist. She makes Celto-Norse leather accessories. She lives in San Diego with her partner Nicodemus Starstag
Psychic Vampires
How to be your own Abraham Van Helsing
Isaac Littleowl
You have this friend you dread to see coming because you know that by the time they leave you will feel exhausted while they feel energized. They always say things like: “You always make me feel better” and they make you feel like the flu is coming on by the time you close the door on them. You may have even said something like “They would suck the sun from the sky” And you’d be right. You’ve just met a psychic vampire.
Sometimes people don’t know they are psychic vampires. This is usually because they are more than a little self-centered. They have very little sense of apathy and are never on hand to help anyone else in their time of need. To them, it is all about them.
They swear they hate the waves of trouble that wash over them, but we know they are drama queens and kings. They come for advice and ignore it because they love the trouble they are going through.
Magikally they want constant tarot readings, ask for charms and take no heed to your warnings. In short all they do is tire you out.
What should you do? Obviously you must rid yourself of the vampire. The most complete way is to cut yourself off, make yourself unavailable to them. I know you want to help them, but the thing is there is no helping them. They do not want your help. It may even take the drastic step of you telling them you cannot be their friend anymore. Keep in mind that the psychic vampire feigns emotions to their own purpose but the truth is the only honest emotions the psychic vampire feels is the self-motivated, self serving ones.
Then clean your house. Make a simple alcohol spritz with alcohol, garlic, salt and pepper and vinegar and spray it lightly around the house especially at doorways, windows, and even on the favorite chair of the psychic vampire. You may smell the faint scent of garlic around your house for a few days but as the scent dissipates, the residues of the psychic vampire do as well.
Isaac Littleowl is a Kabala teacher and Jewish Mystic in New Jersey.
The True Holy Grail
Marc the Wise
I remember the furor caused by Dan Brown’s book The DaVinci Code. Let me say on the outset there is no Priory of Sion, there are no bones of Mary Magdalene, and the person sitting on the right of Jesus in the DaVinci painting The Last Supper is not Mary Magdalene. If that figure is Mary Magdalene, then where is John the Beloved? Why aren’t there fourteen people sitting at the table?
The first remark I want to make is that Brown does nothing that a good episode of In Search Of or Mysteries of the Bible has done in the past. The legend that Christ married at Cana (some say this is why Mary tells him that there is no more wine) and lived an ordinary life including fathering children is an old one that has floated around for centuries.
The second remark I wish to make is Dan Brown’s book is pure fiction, drawing upon Judeo-Christian mythology, various anti-Catholic conspiracy theories and fractured art theory and his own imagination. The book isn’t even very articulate.
Mythology of the Holy Grail is the progression of ancient mythologies about cups or cauldrons of plenty, healing, and wisdom. These stories evolved as Christianity was thrown into the mix. It is a natural progression of the early religions to the Christian religion.
The story of the Holy Grail, that is the cup of the Last Supper, are romantic medieval tales where the knights bold and true and pure of heart went out to find the thing that would heal the king and country. It may be a moot point but I would like to point out Celtic kings could have no blemish, no wounds, no disease, no defect of mind and as pre-Christian Celtic become Semi Christian Celtic kings (like the archetype of Arthur) where Christian images and themes begin to mix and eventually supplant ancient Pagan themes.
Legendary stories of the Christ and his marriage to Mary Magdalene were a part of medieval mythos and this is where this mythos seems to begin. The myth seems to reflect the growing Christian supremacy and the lingering Pagan imagery.
These tales float around for centuries and are the subjects of early religious art and story telling and as this is happening the Church goes through periods of both peaceful and violent transformations with the reformation and the counter reformation and periods of Inquisition and witch hunts and Jew baiting and Crusades. It is from these periods of turmoil within the Church that the stories are the most pervasive.
Something incredible then happened in the twentieth century. In the late 1940’s a young boy found a collection of scrolls that seem to suggest there is more to the New Testament than the orthodox religions would like to admit. They are intriguing and capture the imagination but are worthless unless you can read them in the original languages. They have special insight into the lives of early Christians who heard not only the gospels we are familiar with but heard mythos that were already forming even during Christ’s life. Remember, Christ even asks the disciples “What do they say of me, who do people say that I am?” But these writings which may have been very important to read for people of the Christian faith except that their authenticity is compromised by the attempt to translate into Elizabethan English to seem a part of the King James version of the Bible.
In the 1960’s and the rise of feminism there was a sudden surge in interest in the old Jesus and Mary Magdalene are married theory.
But what about Jesus’ blessed Mother? Mary of Nazareth was a direct descendant of King David. According to Church Theology Mary was preserved from the stain of original sin, “Full of Grace” she is called. When she was 15 and 16 years old she is betrothed to Joseph who may have been considerably older than her and may have had children from a previous marriage (women often died in childbirth was not uncommon). This would account for Jesus having brothers and sisters in the Bible. At about the same time, Mary of Nazareth is visited by an angel and told she would be the mother of the Son of God. Then we are told that the Spirit of God overshadowed her and she conceived a child. The church then teaches us that she remains a sexual virgin all her life. (A fact argued by Protestants all over)
Feminists also ignore Mary, the mother of Christ. She is, they contend, a prisoner of God, prisoner of her grace and her virginity and her submission to a patriarchal system. I’m glad God didn’t have to depend on modern women to have the Son of God. We’d still be waiting for his birth.
Mary Magdalene reflects the woman of liberation. She was the woman possessed by the Devil (no, she was never a whore, the Church confused her with the woman taken into adultery and the woman who washed Jesus feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair.) She traveled with Jesus, preached in her own ministry and saw Jesus on the day of resurrection.
But was she Jesus’ wife? Very doubtful. Jesus would have been allowed to marry according to Jewish Law, this is very true, but Jesus also knew his mission on earth was not to have a family and begin a dynasty. He was sent to preach and to die an ignoble death and to be resurrected.
We are tempted to humanize Jesus but we don’t wish to embrace the human Jesus we see as revealed in his Passion. We know that we are the reason he is suffering. And it is his physical self that is suffering, the flesh that is suffering, the flesh that he has from his mother. From the Woman of Grace comes a Son of David. Jesus royal bloodline comes from his mother, who is of the direct line of King David,
Do you wish to find the true Holy Grail? And I do not speak of some supper cup lost to the ages in the dust of time. It is found in the womb of a woman. Not the womb of Mary Magdalene, but in the womb of Mary of Nazareth, the Virgin Mother of the Son of God.
Marc the Wise is a twenty-five year Pagan witch who teaches theology in Oklahoma. He believes that Christianity is simply a natural progression of the Pagan religion and is excited to see how Christianity changes fifty years from now.
