When I was growing up Catholic, I felt connected to the Sacred through my religion in many ways - but also deeply hurt by the ways my church wanted me to limit myself to a very narrow set of roles as a woman (primarily "wife" and "mother.")
The traditional system of men leading and women quietly following was justified by my community's all-male names and imagery for the Divine.
With an all-powerful Divine Father, Lord, and King in charge of the universe - which "he" alone had created (how is there ever new creation without a Mother??) - it was easy for many people to believe that men should be the leaders in church, in society, and in families.
I remember privately wanting to call God "She" in my journals... but I didn't know a single other person who did that.
I wish I'd known then, that SHE - the Divine Mother, the Sacred Feminine, the Goddess who births and sustains all of existence - has been present to Her children throughout our history, including within the Christian tradition.
I wish someone had told me, It's okay to call the Sacred SHE, Mother, Goddess - because the Feminine is indeed sacred!
If I could go back and give myself one thing at that time in my life, it would be a women's circle.
Not the kind I experienced through my Catholic student group in college, where we were encouraged to get married and become stay-at-home mothers after graduation, as if this were the best or the only choice for all women to make.
No: I would give myself a Divine Feminine women's circle.
One where we learned about the Sacred SHE both inside and outside the Christian tradition, and came away with spiritual practices to call Her into our daily lives.
One where we learned to trust our deep inner knowing by speaking our truth and being heard and affirmed by other women.
One where we could come back over and over to remember: I am sacred. I am divine. SHE lives in me - not "despite" my womanhood, but deeply within it!
And so, years later, after earning my Master's degree in theology and teaching high school religion for almost a decade... I have dedicated myself since 2021 to helping Christian-raised women get to know the Goddess.
Because the extreme imbalance of patriarchy we're currently living with is literally killing people and the planet... and because the rising of the Goddess, and our return to Her ways of compassion and peace, begins with us.
In Sacred Feminine women's circles, we practice coming home again and again to Her presence, Her guidance, and Her love - within ourselves, in our sisters in circle, and in the wisdom we receive from nature. I am grateful to The Wild Woman Project for introducing me to this sacred practice of circle in the Divine Mother!
If you come from a Christian background and are frustrated and hurt by patriarchy (in church and in society) - please know that the Sacred is feminine, and She lives in you!
And so, so many of your sisters are longing to talk with you about Her in a sacred circle.
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