Rising to the Occasion

On the June 2015 solstice (summer solstice in the northern hemisphere, winter solstice in the southern hemisphere), She Rises, the first offering from Mago Books, will be published. What began as a collective writing project on Facebook’s “Mago Circle” two years ago has transformed into an anthology of monumental proportions—470 pages of writing and artwork by 90 contributors from different continents and backgrounds.

To help celebrate the book launch, I’m posting the link to the new Mago Books website and reprinting below a slightly finessed version of my initial (quick & dirty & inflammatory) contribution to that first writing project.

A Personal Story

I got involved with women’s liberation in the early 1970s, so involved that it became my life for many years. During those beginnings of what is now called “the second wave of feminism,” everything was new to us and everything was mushed together—the political, the economic, the intellectual, the emotional, the spiritual. I liked that a lot; It felt as if all the parts of myself were coming together.

During that time, I learned something crucial: the imagery and concepts of patriarchal religion justify and are embedded in the material structures of oppression. I don’t know which came first, institutionalized oppression (of almost everyone; I’m not speaking here only of women) or the religious expression of that oppression. All I’m certain of is that patriarchal religion permeates, for example, the Oxford English Dictionary, which I use all the time in conjunction with Websters’ First New Intergalactic Wickedary of the English Language, conjured by Mary Daly in cahoots with Jane Caputi.

I wouldn’t describe myself as an especially spiritual person; I don’t practice any spiritual discipline, unless you can call reading and writing spiritual. And I agree with Marx that religion is “the opium of the people,” “the heart of a heartless world,” that which keeps people alive within the iron cage of oppressive systems while it also discourages them from collectively opening the door of their prison.

Although I reject the rebellion-squashing function of father-god religions, at the same time, and somewhat paradoxically, I look to the new Goddess writers, re-discovering and re-inventing the early religions of humankind, for inspiration. The earliest religions seem to have worked to bring people together, rather than to tread on some while lifting up others. That is attractive to me. The love of the earth and the stars and the mysterious invisible worlds that permeate Goddess spirituality also attracts me. Plus, the old and new Goddess images are beautiful, and there is something enticingly poetic about the ceremonies being created and re-created in the name of Goddess spirituality.

What’s not to like about all this?