The Wheel of the Year: Winter Solstice, 2022
The Divine Mother Gives Birth to the New Light
The Wheel of the Year: Winter Solstice
Each year the northern hemisphere of Mother Earth celebrates the re-birth of the Light from December 20th -25th. Whether we celebrate Christmas, Hanukkah, Winter Solstice, or New Year’s Day, we rejoice in the return of the light. Many of our cultural holidays, such as these, are aligned with the Wheel of the Year, the yearly cycle of the Sun and Earth.
We are just leaving the energy of Samhain/Halloween, the Gateway of Death. When we began the season of Samhain, we invoked the ancient goddess Hekate, Goddess of the Crossroads (and of Witches – Women In Total Control of Herself) as our guardian spirit. Did you ask her for guidance? Her dogs sniff out what lies beyond our seeing. Her torch gives us light in the dark. Her power is the power of choice and transformation.
Hekate
Did you decide what you’re leaving behind? Have you chosen a road? That’s all it needs to be right now. A decision, a knowing, a casting off of an old attitude. We are in the very darkest days around Winter Solstice. Surrender to the Dark one last time and see what you find out about yourself.
With Winter Solstice, the Wheel of the Year begins the new cycle with (Re)Birth – the (re)birth of the new Light. Because we simultaneously live in a linear consciousness and a cyclical one, this light and our individual consciousness, are something we know and yet the light contains a mystery, the unknown future light. Together, a straight line and a circle create a spiral – and suddenly, we’re in tune with the universe.
We get a chance each year to create something new with the light, with our energy, with our consciousness: still rooted in who we are – our BEING – while giving birth to a new DOING. The Feminine Being is eternal. The Masculine Doing is eternally re-incarnating. (Or not. We might be content with how we’re living life and so we just renew our energy and continue doing as we’ve always done.)
While at Winter Solstice/Christmas, we celebrate the Light and the Child, let’s not forget to celebrate the Mother, who gives birth to the Child of Light. She is the source of this new life and light. For me, this is the season of The Mother Goddess.
For those of you who haven’t experienced the birth of a child, it is the mother who is, and needs to be, the center of this archetypal drama. Without the Mother’s body, there would be no baby’s body. Without the Mother’s labor, there would be no birth into this world of ours. Without the Mother’s caring, the new life will not thrive. While we are blessed to live in a time when fathers are becoming great caretakers, it is still the realm of the Divine Mother who oversees the care and growth of new life.
In patriarchy, motherhood has been elevated (Madonna) as well as devalued (negative mother/witch). Supermom, especially a single mom, is often exhausted and stressed over her children’s expectations. And in our present patriarchal world-view, those expectations have become excessive and unrealistic.
Modern moms need a break from patriarchal expectations that are being planted in our children. Moms need to remember who we are before we can expect others to respect our needs and vision.
So let’s go back to basics and explore our ideas of Mother.
First, there is the archetype of the Great Mother – Mother Earth. This divine being created life here on our planet and continues to do so, despite the devastation of her natural habitats which help sustain Her life. A good metaphor for what is happening to Mother Earth with climate change is that She is in MEN-o-pause – she is putting ‘hu-men’ beings on pause as she tries to regulate her systems. Hot flashes and cold sweats are all part of ‘the change’ older women go through. Whether we believe it or not, women are created in the image of this Divine Mother, so thank goodness we have so many healthy, intelligent, creative post-menopausal women to help re-set our human systems as Mother Earth works to re-set hers.
Don’t you think it’s time to listen to the wisdom of the Grand-Mothers?
Aside from Mother Earth, how does this archetypal Mother manifest on a human scale? Basically, Mother is the doorway into life. It is the only way (for mammals) for a new baby, whether human or animal, to enter this world. Not only does Mother create our bodies out of her own, but she willingly suffers the pains of birth (a sacrifice, which means to make sacred – because pain and blood are the payment for the power of birthing something new into the world).
So with power and love, Mother births us into the world.
When did we forget that power and love? That divine purpose? Not every woman can or should have children, but the process is imprinted in our bodies. Women’s bodies are shaped to create life. Isn’t it time we remembered to honor it? Hint: It’s not by legislating that creativity though. Sometimes Mother Earth grows weeds that don’t support life and so die out early on. We really need deeper, feminine, spiritual insights into pregnancy and developing life. And we also have to speak to the issue of free will. This is about a woman’s choice.
Let’s also honor the ground we live on, since Mother Earth sustains us. I live in a tidal river valley that slopes up to cliffs that overlook the Atlantic Ocean just as it begins to become Narragansett Bay. I am embraced by water, sheltered by water birches and old oak trees.
This specific landscape shapes my everyday world with earth and sunlight, wind and water. The four elements are constantly moving and shaping not only the landscape but my life. I’m seeing that the wind plays a big role in my landscape, blowing leaves and trash cans with abandon. I’m going to have to go talk with the wind and understand its fierceness.
What landscape are you a part of? How is it birthing you this year?
Winter Solstice Goddess: the Divine Mother
With the Christian Christmas story, our focus is on the miraculous Child being born. Winter Solstice is the right time to celebrate the birth of this new Child of Light being born into the world, since that’s what happens on Winter Solstice.
For the northern hemisphere of Earth, the weeks before Solstice are the darkest of the year. There is less daylight and more dark night in our 24 hour cycle. At Winter Solstice, the Sun descends to the tropic of Capricorn in the south, stops and goes no further south. It ‘stands still’ (the meaning of solstice) for about 3 days and then begins to move north again. The darkness feels just like Susan Cooper imagines in her magical Winter Solstice book – The Dark is Rising.
In the Christian Christmas story, there are Three Wise Men (magi meaning astrologer) who came to worship the Child and leave gifts. Perhaps they suggested that we celebrate the Divine Birth of the Christ Child on Christmas Day, like the Persian god Mithra, who was also born on December 25th, because that is the day the Light begins to move north again for another year.
In looking for an aspect of the Goddess who embodies the virtues and gifts that are necessary at this point in the Earth’s life cycle, it is obvious that we are calling on the Great Mother. Whether we see her as Mother Mary or Isis or Haumea or Demeter, we do have archetypal stories that show us what the positive Mother energy is for. (In patriarchy, which devalued and suppressed so much of feminine wisdom, we often have too many stories of the negative mother/ stepmother/ witch.)
Haumea is the guardian goddess of the Hawaiian Islands, a goddess of fertility and childbirth and the mother of Pele and her sister, Namaka, the waters that surround the island and which receive Pele’s fiery lava, as well as many other Hawaiian deities. Haumea, like the Greek Mother Goddess Gaia, creates out of her whole body – not just her womb. Like the Earth, Haumea changes from maiden to mother to crone as the seasons change, so she takes many forms and comes back in many rebirths. Haumea is the archetypal energy of earthly creation and abundance, as well as the necessary death that proceeds new life. (Also see Pachamama.)
Demeter, the Greek Mother Goddess of the growing grain and agricultural abundance, was also the Mother of Kore, who became Persephone, Queen of the Underworld. This is an archetypal imagination of the Great Mother who is a nurturer of human life – providing not just for our physical needs but for our spiritual needs as well.
In the ancient world, there was a mystery religion that centered on women, abundance, life and death as well as the knowledge of re-birth. The Eleusinian Mysteries, dedicated to Demeter and her daughter Persephone, was one of the most sacred and secret initiations in the ancient world; it’s mysteries celebrated for over a thousand years. While we don’t know all the particulars of these ancient mysteries, (not one of the initiates ever revealed the secret knowledge – pretty impressive statement of the power of these initiations), we do know it was an experience of the immortality of the soul and possibly the knowledge of reincarnation. This story shows that Demeter was more than just a fertility goddess; she was the guide and guardian of our human soul – a fitting job for a Mother.
Isn’t that what mothers do? We want to guide our children so they have the tools to survive in the world and the values that will help them thrive. The world needs this wisdom of the eternal return of life so we can step away from our fear of, and fascination with, Death. Since the Great Mother is not only the life-giver but the death-bringer, she can give us the faith and courage to face death without fear and in hope of our spiritual survival. That’s what Christianity was supposed to teach us but it looks like it failed, because the Church concentrated on sin and death rather than resurrection and renewed life.
The other two Mother Goddesses, Isis and Mary, have similar birthing stories. Both are impregnated by an absent Father god. Isis is more pro-active about it than Mary, but she began as a goddess while Mary had to deal with being human. And of course, we’ll never know how pro-active Mary actually was!
The importance of these two Mothers is that we know their personal stories. We can connect with them on a human level. Both gave birth in hidden places; both had to deal with someone (a king, a brother) who wanted their baby dead.
With Mother Mary, she was the Virgin who gave birth to the Sun King. While she ended up playing an archetypal role, Mary as a human mother was the source of life for her son Jesus. Mary went into labor and gave birth to a son. She nursed him and kept him warm and safe, even though the world was turned against them. Mary gave all her attention to making sure that her son survived those first few months of life. She was his world, and he was hers. That’s what mother’s do after a baby is born.
If we want to ask for guidance on mothering this new Light that is coming into our world on December 21st, Mary tells us that it takes focus and love and nurturing to make sure that our child’s life force gets strong. It’s hard work and it takes a while to get to those quiet nights, but contentment washes through us every time we hold our child. That’s what this winter time is for – that quiet focus and contentment. To stop our patriarchal programming to do, do, do, we have to turn to our inner mother and ask to be held in her loving arms. Even when we try to squirm out of them!
This Winter Solstice season (from December 21, 2022 to February 2, 2023), skip trying to exercise and diet your way through January. Instead, listen within and ask yourself what does your body need. What does your heart need? What does your soul need? You can start your new programs after Spring Equinox, with big planets changing sign, therefore of focus, from March to May.
Winter Solstice December 21, 2022
The Sun enters the sign of Capricorn on Winter Solstice, December 21, 2022 at 1:48pm PST/ 4:48 pm EST/ 9:48pm GMT.
The Sabian symbol for the Sun at 1* Capricorn is: An Indian chief claims power from the assembled tribe. Each year at the Winter Solstice and the birth of the light, this symbol asks us to take on our authentic authority. It is wonderfully symbolic that our most revered mythic leader, King Arthur, was born on Winter Solstice. This need to step into our own power is a repeating theme this year. The power of leadership means to take responsibility for our world, our people and ourselves.
The Sabian symbol for the Moon at 9* Sagittarius is: A Mother leads her small child step by step up a steep stairway. Our emotional body wants the Mother to teach us how to move in our new life. How do we do things differently? How do we learn things thoroughly? How do we build the muscle to get up to this next phase of human consciousness?
We can read this chart as shaping the cosmic energies for the next three months until the Spring Equinox. I cast the chart for Washington, D.C. so the Cancer ascendant is specific to the United States.
The first thing I noticed in this Solstice chart is that the Moon is in its Balsamic phase, the phase right before the New Moon. This is a finishing up and ending energy. It’s interesting that as the US Pluto return is energized for the last of three passes on December 28th, the January 6th committee has recommended criminal prosecution against Donald Trump for inciting a riot against the US government and against the rule of law. A country’s Pluto return is often experienced as a disintegration of its power, but ultimately as a renewal of that country’s ideals. If Pluto’s evolutionary energy can stabilize the rule of law over personality here in the US, it will finally and truly mark our independence from the mindset of ‘divine rule’ by kings or despots. We have to stop idolizing the ‘rich and famous’ – our homegrown, American bourgeois royalty.
Personally, we might find these next 3 months to be a time of finishing up old business in many ways. Mars and Mercury will be retrograde as we begin 2023, so both our mind and our energy are being reconfigured. After they turn direct on January 12th for Mars in Gemini and January 18th for Mercury in Capricorn, we’ll still need to re-orient ourselves to a new year. When Uranus also turns direct on January 22nd, a day after the Aquarius New Moon, we can begin to make some changes in our outer life.
But remember the Mother Goddess, who is our guide this season, and go slowly. Kids learn to crawl before they learn to walk, and walking is a pretty shaky business for awhile, until they get running down pat. Climbing steep stairs is also a challenge. So start slowly and make what you do now count.
Both luminaries make major aspects to one planet each. The Sun at 0* Capricorn squares Jupiter which just entered 0* Aries. The Sun in conservative Capricorn will be challenged to act too quickly by Jupiter in Aries if we don’t pay attention. Jupiter in Aries is all set to explore new possibilities. But remember, Mars will be in Gemini (ruled by Mercury), the realm of ideas and the mind, until March 25th, so let your imagination and mind explore and play with ideas until then. Those plans can begin to manifest when Jupiter moves into the sign of Taurus in mid-May.
The Moon in Sagittarius is opposite Mars retrograde in Gemini. Our lunar emotional body will want to light up the night and go on our quest, but Mars will stay stuck in his head for a while longer. Moon in Sagittarius will need to move and possibly shake things up, so spend the first few months of 2023 organizing and consolidating files, throwing things out, planning a trip or a quest. Give your Sag Moon something to do while you’re contemplating what you want to do with the rest of the year.
Saturn will finish up his business in Aquarius and move into Pisces for the next 2 ½ years on March 7th. After about 5 years in two signs (Capricorn & Aquarius) he rules, Saturn is going to let go of control and sink back into the collective unconscious to reacquaint himself with the heart of the Anima Mundi/World Soul.
Saturn takes 28-30 years to complete its cycle. Looking back, in April, 1966, when Saturn was in Pisces, Time Magazine asked the question on its cover, Is God Dead? Looking back, it seems like that was a pertinent question. What will Saturn’s passage through Pisces ask us this year?
In early 1994, with Saturn in Pisces, “Ukraine announces that it will give up the world’s third biggest nuclear arsenal. Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, Ukraine had received over 1,800 warheads and 175 long-range missiles. After two years of talks between Ukraine, Russia and the United States, the country agreed to get rid of all nuclear weapons if Russia would respect its sovereignty.” Perhaps Russia will remember its promise when Saturn returns to Pisces.
Chiron in Aries turns direct right before the Capricorn New Moon on December 23rd, moving us forward again to reclaim our own unique identity from our patriarchal patterning. This is echoed by the Sabian symbol for the Winter Solstice sun. Take on your authority, with humility, grace and wisdom.
Winter Solstice is the time of
the Longest Nights. During this time of great darkness, why not let
your imaginations run wild, much like we did as children. It is a time to return to the child-like wonder of life.
This year on December 20th, Jupiter passes out of the Omega sign of Pisces into the Alpha sign of Aries, signaling a shift from deep spiritual connection to a cosmic curiosity, which can have us exploring (at least in our minds with Aries’ ruler Mars retrograde in Gemini) what we envision for next year in this new light.
This time between Winter Solstice and 12th Night/January 6th was once the Roman celebration of Saturnalia, a time out of time when the world descended back into chaos so it could be reborn anew. After the past few years, it’s time to really renew ourselves and our culture. Use this time to let go of your old story and experience each day without expectations – but with delight. Set your world on its head – let the servant be the master, as it was during these ancient celebrations. Let your imagination be the master during these magical days. Let your rational side take a control break and serve the imagination. Use both to create magic, which will filter down through the year. What we do now sets up a template for the coming year. (Check out how to record your dreams for the 12 Days of Christmas.)
And check out my Winter Solstice Story.
May the peace and the love of the Goddess and the God be ever in your hearts. Merry meet and merry part and merry meet again.
See you next year!
Cathy
