On the Mysteries of the Moon

Should we disconnect from the moon energy?

I feel called to write on this topic as I have seen conversations popping up in some of my circles about how the moon is an artificial object, and (merited) concerns about a negative alien agenda, the dark Lilith/ dark Saturn matrix, and mind control technologies that use the moon to influence humanity. Some are renouncing any sort of moon rituals and doing other kinds of ceremonies or rituals to disconnect themselves from moon energy as I have decidedly increased my study, and spiritual practices on full and new moons. Whenever people are throwing around words like—‘innately evil’ my hairs raise on my skin and I think—oh no, are we really doing another round of witch hunts, and yet again pointing fingers at one another and saying (in a new way) you’re anathematized—or you’re a heretic/evil/against God/on the outside of what’s holy or socially acceptable? Well, probably.

First, a little about me and my background, as I believe it’s about as easy to escape our cultural influences as it may be to escape the moons influence on us (even if you’re rejecting—you’re still reacting). Like all of us in the West, I have been shaped (for better and worse) by Christianity. After a mystical experience in college, I saw beyond what I had initially felt was boring and out of touch, to a renewed interest in God. This could also be because my family are active practicing Christians who sing in their churches, who teach, preach, and serve the poor in their neighborhoods, and those influences carry on as well.

But what kind of Christian since there are about as many varieties in the US as ice cream?

In college I struggled to explain to my peers when I told them I was embracing being a Christian and they immediately thought of frantic televangelists like Jim and Tammy Baker. My boyfriend thought I was losing it. Friends thought that there was no way I could be an intellectual and also have faith which only put more fire under my feet to achieve high marks and honors while also exploring my spirituality. I come from a long line of Lutheran pastors on my mother’s side, and my mother was a worship leader at many of the churches I grew up in. Since my father was in the Air Force, we moved about every three years to a new place. My parents would find a church they felt God was calling them to be a part of, and they were actively involved in church life. My brother and sister and I would sometimes be pulled in to sing with Mom and her worship band and Dad would play bass and help with sound. We went to all kinds of churches growing up: Presbyterian, Methodist, Lutheran, non-denominational, and charismatic to name a few. Not only that—but every school day we would be woken up to do family devotions at 5:30 a.m. which involved reading a psalm (103 was a favorite) a gospel, and each of us had to say a prayer out loud. I still giggle recalling my little brother curled up on the floor underneath his blanket and we’d usually have to nudge him to wake up and say his sleepy prayer.

By the time I had graduated from high school I was a little confused about what to believe because every new church we attended had different theologies and a different vision of external/internal threat to spiritually protect against. After college, and this mystical experience, I decided to go to seminary where I naively thought I could sort it all out. At the very least, I was able to begin to piece together my own theology and spiritual practices that seemed a best fit for me as a woman recovering from sexual abuse, in a church with predominately male leadership, with a lack of divine feminine imagery, practices that looked at the feminine perspective, at a seminary where they were still debating if women could be in the pulpit and ordaining women to do just that. After seminary I no longer felt guilty when some (usually) male pastors would come at me with a theological diatribe about women or my faith personally—I felt I could now stand my own and not fall apart internally or be blown about by every person’s opinions on God.

My Grandpa, who was also a Lutheran pastor, shared his love of the stars with the family and I recently inherited one of his favorite books on the constellations. My father was a weather man who also worked with expensive military satellites also directed our imagination up to the heavens as he would often give us a weather report (which I rarely understood) before school. (I still don’t know what isobars are) but the men I admire taught me to look up.

Somewhere along the way, things like the study of the stars and planets became relegated to the realm of science not faith. Science and faith were in a way agreed upon to be at odds in exploring consciousness in different realms, though today faith and science are now in dialogue again. But like Galileo disrupting the zeitgeist of his time with his discoveries, the conversations are still sometimes heated. Study of the stars was to be on the other side of the fence of faith. When I was growing up—and still today—to blend things like Tarot and Jesus, or Astrology and Christianity, or even exploring the Goddess spirituality and yoga (which I now teach) is considered by some to be “doing the devils work.”

Family and cultural taboos were always such a mystery to me. I wanted to know why, while I also held the innate fear of something “other” and potentially “evil” my persistent curiosities often led to the discoveries: it’s myself I fear—my own feminine nature that men fear and are projecting on me—or it’s “the other” or “the unknown” I fear.

The Old Testament prohibits the building of Ashura poles which were connected to rituals of the Goddess cults derived from the worship of Ishtar & Inanna and the honoring of the planet Venus. The Temple Mount, where the three Abrahamic religions of Judaism, Muslim, and Christianity hold claim, buried beneath is a temple to Venus. I discovered later in the Apocrypha—the books of the Bible sometimes included between the Old and New Testament—which are from the time of second temple Judaism—you can find The Book of Enoch where it describes that the practices of reading the stars and performing oracles are connected to the Archons (demonic rulers of the planets—or High Holy Sophia’s fallen children) and are forbidden.

and if God ever hits you with a don’t –
He has His fingers crossed,
He is just fibbing
for your own
good.

-Hafiz

On the Necessary Sin

Carl Jung explores the notion of “the necessary sin” as a requirement for individuation. At the beginning of life a child is taking in all the rules, and usually about two the child starts to push back and express their own budding self awareness of wanting to do things their own way. Tough love literature may have encouraged breaking a child’s will and spirit—but healthier psychological models recognize that the development of a self is not “selfish” but an innate process—and very challenging work and capstone of human development. In order to move from the psychological stage of mere obedience to external rules towards an inner motivation towards the good (or an Old Testament God to a New Testament God) often the mystics would encourage people to have their own experience of God, or gnosis, or even to choose their own path of faith. (I would recommend Stages of Faith by James W. Fowler on consciousness development corresponding to faith expression.) Jung says there is often a necessary sin that the individual must make and this comes when one realizes that the rules in society are sometimes imperfect, and at times harmful, and so the archetype of the prophet, the rebel, the artist arises to tear down the old gods which no longer work for a new generation and to move towards a more just society whose values and spirituality more accurately reflect the consciousness stage of an emerging generation. The necessary sin is disobedience to the external law, in favor of an internal one that helps the self grow in integrity, while also helping the community to reach new potentials. The sin is consciousness, eating the apple and taking on the heavy responsibility for what we know.

How did I get from Christianity to Moon practices?

When you explore the roots of Christianity you go back to Judaism, and back further to Egypt, where life danced with the lunar calendar. When Roman conquerors invaded the Egyptian & Greek culture, solar time also took over, which included naming months after emperors, and having to readjust the calendars over and over to fit more appropriately with the seasons. The lunar calendar worked, many argue, better than the solar.

Mindfulness of moon cycles is as old as humanity and likely one of the first methods used to tell time. The lunar calendar was used by the Hebrews and is still used in Judaism today to determine holidays such as when Passover falls. The book, The Red Tent is a beautiful depiction of how these women’s mysteries were hidden within the dominant culture as patriarchal values shifted from Goddess worship to worship of God as Father, from the lunar calendar to the solar. (I also recommend Inanna, Lady of Largest Heart Poems of the Sumerian High Priestess Enheduanna, by Betty De Shong Meador on this time period). As I was having my own divine feminine awakening after seminary—going back to the moon cycles felt like an important part of my own reclamation and acceptance of womanhood and understanding the way my body worked and how to honor her cycles better.

Instead of twelve months (twelve disciples, twelve constellations), the lunar calendar marks 13 (a Goddess number), as menstruating women tend to bleed and ovulate 13 times a year. Before artificial light and before it was more challenging for a group of women to live together in community, women also bled together. I’ve read and remembered traditions of women leaving the town once a month to let men and older children take over their duties were probably not because they were really ‘unclean’ but because women needed to rest on their cycles, they needed to connect with one another and share wisdom. When they came back to town refreshed, they were also appreciated for the work that they did for the city had carried it without them for a brief time. In our modern “liberated” life I often grieve how difficult it is to take a few down days and connect with other women once a month, or how I’m forcing my body to keep going when I have cramps or I’m tired but life goes on non-stop like the shining sun rather than the ebb and flow of the moon.

Interestingly, in Norse mythology, the Sun is considered feminine (Sol) and the Moon is masculine (Mani). In the great white North it was the Sun who hid most of the year, and the moon was more visible, and so people yearned for the hidden feminine as the light and the warmth. And in The Bhagavad Gita, Krisha says, “among the stars of the zodiac, I am the rabbit-marked moon.” I wonder if similar to Shiva and Shakti, maybe the moon is actually both masculine and feminine. I also wonder, maybe depending on our level of mirrored consciousness, we are either experiencing the energies as Lilith/Saturn or Mary/Jesus. From a Jungian perspective, the shadow not integrated is projected outward. Personal complexes and unconscious materials make up an inner “shadow government” that runs the show without the conscious minds awareness. So are we just projecting this onto the moon? Are these the illusions we are co-creating? I don’t know, but I wonder.

As the moon affects the tide, and I’m not sure we can actually totally escape it’s influence, but I do think we can co-participate and make it a holy experience rather than a negative one during full and new moons. In places in India the moon cycles are so sacred, they do not work or have school on full and new moons, but celebrate with pujas!

Galactic Histories & Negative Aliens

In the lore around Lilith, much from ancient Jewish literature, she was Adam’s first wife. In one telling her and Adam fight for several hundred years before God decides maybe this isn’t working and created a more submissive woman—Eve. Still (like many men) Adam is still torn between them (the virgin-whore complex). Lilith did not want to submit to man. Maybe she was older, sometimes depicted with bird feet, the animal woman of the ancient primal. Ereshkigal was also depicted as having bird feet. In another myth Lilith is the life force inside of the Tree of Life. She’s the serpent. She’s Eve’s shadow counter part. Legends say when Gilgamesh cut down the life tree to make a marriage bed, Lilith fled. She would not be domesticated, and maybe in all women, no matter what we have been through, also exists a spirit that will not be domesticated either, there’s a wild part of our woman nature too. Barbara Black Kultov in The Book of Lilith points out that she holds the memories of all that was thrown out of consciousness in the repression of Goddess cults. For her rage, many amulets of protection were made for people to wear, to protect babies and women in childbirth. Lilith is noted at the middle of the tree of life in the Kabbalah, also where Venus and the Devil are also placed. Carl Jung says she represents a necessary stage of consciousness. She’s not at the top, but she is a stage along the way. She also represents the unconscious desires of man, as Lilith is a temptress and as such she reports to God men’s failing—in a way she keeps them honest before God. She was charged to kill humans at the point where their soul would not spoil and they could still become fragrant.

It is said that at the end of time, Lilith and her children of aliens and demons present to God a scroll upon which are the sins of mankind. Like the Tree of Life has branches above and branches below, the realm of Lilith is the shadow, and whenever dealing with a shadow the only way to remedy is to make it conscious. Denial, avoidance, only make it bigger. One can only become possessed by that which is unconscious. This would be my main argument in dealing with the “dark lunar nature” and “mind control” and a “negative alien agenda”. This is shadow content and the work with the shadow is to face it, to make it conscious, not to avoid it. Maybe even as some teachers would say: I am that. I am Lilith. And also, I am not. She exists somewhere in our collective consciousness. To face the inner dichotomy is to unlock it for the collective grip. If Lilith energy is traditionally known to be stronger during the waning phase until the new moon, then that would be the ideal time to become more aware of our own Lilith tendencies to tempt others with our sexuality, to note other’s sins, to make conscious the inner feminine war between Eve/Lilith or Ereshkigal/Inanna Magdalene/Mary and the work of integrating the lower body energies that deal with survival, sex and power, with the upper body energies of unconditional love, soul voice, and the activation of our human dignity.

Ok so maybe a planet did explode in a galactic war and more advanced beings came in and reset the system, placed an artificial moon around the earth, and some black stones that hold the consciousness of that old planet here on earth that holds the collective unconsciousness of those beings not from earth and many reincarnated here at different levels of consciousness so they could finish up their life cycle and here we all are at the end of the age still wondering wtf has been going on. (It would take another blog and maybe some more courage for me to share my own alien experiences). And maybe the earth is a prison planet (I have seen underground bases and clones in visions before I heard other people talk about this sort of thing—and while Roe v. Wade is distracting—what about the alien hybrid program? anyone?) and maybe the military is collecting our consciousness through AI and our devices and they are projecting programs from the lunar base. What can we actually do about it? Well we could try and avoid or we could actually take back the star gates. We could take back our body temples and stop playing victim to these agendas as the light of God can take it all out. If the star gates are connected to our own chakras, and to the deep unconscious currents and realms beyond our seeing, then like any human journey, the work is to become more embodied, more conscious, more present, more filled with God’s light, or simply more aware and evolved. The saints recommend praying. If Lilith is the shadow of the Goddess we have rejected and demonized, then somehow the Divine Mother, the Shekinah in all her glory and High Holy Sophia herself is also connected to her (she’s at the top of the tree), as Lower Sophia is deep in the consciousness of the earth, and so with reverence and prayer at full and new moons we not only face the shadow feminine (and our own shadow) we also face the potential bliss of Mother Divine we have forgotten. Maybe too this is the work of integration of the upper Sophia with the lower Sophia, or the repairing of the life tree that was cut.

The practices that I have been doing for the past few years were written on ancient palm leafs and hidden for over two thousand years and only recently released to the public in my lifetime. They are connected to a lineage of Jesus and Mary and they hold the codes and practices for a purification of our womb chakras (which both men and women have—which is an interesting revelation with men appearing pregnant on name brand ads recently—maybe a refocus here to the spiritual meaning is in order) so that we can connect to the Holy Mother again. The practices are intense. They ask that you refrain from meat, sex, any fluid exchange with another (no wet kisses or touching other’s sweat), and alcohol three days around the full or new moons. There are also mantras to recite and yantras to draw. And fires to burn away the obstacles. It’s a work of “winning the mother’s heart” again. (Learn more about this at DivineLineage.org or in a private session with me.) Another basic recommendation is to stare at the full moon as it is rising while reciting the Gayatri mantra! (find my recording of it here.)

There was one Cancer full moon recently where I held strong to the practices and instead of feeling wonky or overly emotional, I felt totally washed clean. Like a new born child. Bliss.

So maybe there are agendas to block or distort the energy at this time, or maybe our karmas and past actions and collective unconsciousness is flowing back to us at these moments as it is the mother’s prerogative to “put the illusions” on your soul and reflect back to us our own distortions. I sense there are practices that we as humanity can pick up again that will help take the star gates back, and help connect the light from our hearts across this galaxy all the way back to the heart of the mother, which is connected to our own heart and the heart of the earth (and the sacred elements). I see the moon as a sort of mirror. One that requires a pass code, a prayer, a golden key through the more difficult unconscious layers of the feminine psyche to find Mother Divine again—and our own true faces.

I’ve begun to offer experiences to practice honoring the new and full moons to reconnect with Mother Divine, and if you’re interested, please consider joining me for this next Scoripo full moon ceremony! This Saturday at 4:30 p.m. CT. I will upload a pre-recorded meditation (as I’m up in the mountains and my wifi is not great this month). This ceremony will include a mantra series, simple movements, a reading and more. Join us for $10 at www.taraloma.com and bring a candle and wear cozy clothes. It will be available for a week, though the most powerful time is the three day window. The exact full moon is late Sunday 11:14 p.m. CT. And this one comes with a full lunar eclipse which will be a powerful time to realign ourselves.

Detoxing God: A Memoir
By Zdenek, Jessica

If you’d like to read more about my personal journey of faith check out my memoir.

Amazon Block
Search for an Amazon product to display. Learn more