Reawakening Gaia by Iacchus 2000 (edited by Delta 2017)
In joining and becoming a priest of CAW I held a minority religious opinion. While most of CAW held the belief that our planet was its Goddess Gaia, an individual feminine Divine being who gave birth to all life, I did not. However I was in agreement with CAW in that out planet on whole was a living system. Based on my studies in Jungian and Archetypal psychology and training to become a Jungian analyst, I approached theology, religious myth and fable, at least but not only, as collective psychological projections and expressions in symbolic or metaphoric forms.
The linguistic attribution of feminine to soil and earth is inherent to all Indo-European languages and their patriarchal religious cults or religions. However I found ancient myths where the earth, or the ground of being was seen as masculine. For instance, the Norse titan/God Ymir was slain by the Norse Gods and from whom the Norse Gods fashion the earth. Ymir, so it seems, belongs to an earlier myth of the matrilineal culture & religion that the Indo-European Norse culture and religion supplanted.
So I speculated and hypothesized that Gaia (a Greek name for the Earth Goddess, a Goddess of sensation, sensual being and mother of all life on earth.) was a religious Anima (a Jungian and archetypal psychology term) projection of the Indo-European patriarchal culture and religion.
According to Jungian psychological theory, the Anima is “the inner figure of woman held by man”. The anima, as a part of the human male’s psychology, is a set of abilities associated with being feminine and the associations gained from his experiences and beliefs about women, which the male has assimilated from his culture and religion. The Anima is then projected unto women and into culture, theology, religion, myth and etc. where male consciousness is predominant. As a psychic component, the Anima is subliminal to consciousness and functions from within the unconscious psyche. Because of its archetypical connections, the Anima has been represented in many collective forms and figures such as Aphrodite, Athena, Helen of Troy, Mary and etc. (See “A Critical Dictionary of Jungian Analysis” by Andrew Samuels, Bani Shorter and Fred Plaut).
The psychological task, I believe, for patriarchal religion (i.e. the predominance of masculine psychology in defining a religion) is the withdrawal of their Anima projection upon the earth and the realization of a Wholistic Anima concept of what feminine/woman is. It is this ‘projection-withdrawal’ and realization of a Wholistic Anima concept of what feminine/woman is, that I call the “Reawakening of Gaia”. The removal of this projection, (the Reawakening of Gaia) is by analogy like the Hindu myth, where Lord Vishnu was asleep in a state of non-knowing and then is awakened by the Great Goddess Mahamaya, who removes sleep (the illusion/projection) and brings him to consciousness (knowledge).
This interpretation of “Reawakening of Gaia” means the envisioning and evolution of a religion with Holistic concepts of God & Goddess and man & woman as two immanent expressions. It reclaims masculine and feminine psychological aspects and associations that are repressed by the religious myths of both patriarchal and matriarchal cultures.
I had a vision where the Elder Gods and Goddesses of both Matriarchal and Patriarchal tribes came together and made peace at the beginning of a new age (the Age of Aquarius). This peace was consummated by a marriage of a God and Goddess from the younger generation of each of these Divine tribes. The marriage was fashioned upon the ancient matrilineal complex or group marriage, hence the “Marriage of the Younger Deities”. This marriage was to be a symbolic paradigm and spiritual guide in the evolution of a religion with Holistic (as opposed to perfectionistic) concepts of God & Goddess and man & woman. Therefore (in the Church of All Worlds) in the communion of water sharing, each participant can say the blessing of “Thou Art God or Thou Art Goddess and May you never thirst” while sharing and drinking water passed in a goblet.
The “Marriage of the Younger Deities”, as a symbolic spiritual paradigm, that is confirming SweetWood Temenos’ belief in Divine Immanence and its five Values. As an ordained priest of the Church of All Worlds, I envisioned: (1) God and Goddess as verbs refer to two great ways of being, (2) Gods and Goddesses as nouns are psychologically holistic individuations of either The God or The Goddess, (3) each Goddess or God has a primary psychological type; intuition, sensation, thinking and feeling (see Jungian types). So, in this paradigm, the Sky God & Sky Goddess represent masculine and feminine thinking types (Air). The Earth God and the Earth Goddess represent masculine and feminine sensation types (earth) The Moon God and the Moon Goddess represent masculine and feminine feeling types (water). The Sun God and Sun Goddess represent masculine and feminine intuitive types (Fire).
This new envisioning of the Goddesses and Gods allows the continued honoring (or worship) of the Gaia. This Earth Goddess is an expression the sensation type of the Goddess. This new envisioning does not deny the Earth God, who can also express the sensation type in a masculine way. Now Gaia and the all the Goddesses and Gods are envisioned in holistic terms. This vision & understanding invoked in me was one where our planet is symbolically envisioned as the living system of a flower, and the Universe as a Tree of Life. Our Earth is envisioned like a self-pollinating flower, expressing both male and female energy. The Tree of Life is envisioned as a manifestation of love that both the Goddess and God create.
It was left up to each member whether they envisioned all the Goddesses and Gods together constitute: (1) a great Oneness that has always been or (2) a great Multiplicity that has always been reproduced & always will be reproduced; the great Eternal Vine or Grove.
The Church of All Worlds ordained me as a Priest on February 12th 2000. My first official ritual I did was my ordination ritual, performed at the Freedom Festival 2000.
In this ritual I was acting as a priest of the Church of All Worlds and performed
“The Marriage of the Younger Deities”.
In joining and becoming a priest of CAW I held a minority religious opinion. While most of CAW held the belief that our planet was its Goddess Gaia, an individual feminine Divine being who gave birth to all life, I did not. However I was in agreement with CAW in that out planet on whole was a living system. Based on my studies in Jungian and Archetypal psychology and training to become a Jungian analyst, I approached theology, religious myth and fable, at least but not only, as collective psychological projections and expressions in symbolic or metaphoric forms.
The linguistic attribution of feminine to soil and earth is inherent to all Indo-European languages and their patriarchal religious cults or religions. However I found ancient myths where the earth, or the ground of being was seen as masculine. For instance, the Norse titan/God Ymir was slain by the Norse Gods and from whom the Norse Gods fashion the earth. Ymir, so it seems, belongs to an earlier myth of the matrilineal culture & religion that the Indo-European Norse culture and religion supplanted.
So I speculated and hypothesized that Gaia (a Greek name for the Earth Goddess, a Goddess of sensation, sensual being and mother of all life on earth.) was a religious Anima (a Jungian and archetypal psychology term) projection of the Indo-European patriarchal culture and religion.
According to Jungian psychological theory, the Anima is “the inner figure of woman held by man”. The anima, as a part of the human male’s psychology, is a set of abilities associated with being feminine and the associations gained from his experiences and beliefs about women, which the male has assimilated from his culture and religion. The Anima is then projected unto women and into culture, theology, religion, myth and etc. where male consciousness is predominant. As a psychic component, the Anima is subliminal to consciousness and functions from within the unconscious psyche. Because of its archetypical connections, the Anima has been represented in many collective forms and figures such as Aphrodite, Athena, Helen of Troy, Mary and etc. (See “A Critical Dictionary of Jungian Analysis” by Andrew Samuels, Bani Shorter and Fred Plaut).
The psychological task, I believe, for patriarchal religion (i.e. the predominance of masculine psychology in defining a religion) is the withdrawal of their Anima projection upon the earth and the realization of a Wholistic Anima concept of what feminine/woman is. It is this ‘projection-withdrawal’ and realization of a Wholistic Anima concept of what feminine/woman is, that I call the “Reawakening of Gaia”. The removal of this projection, (the Reawakening of Gaia) is by analogy like the Hindu myth, where Lord Vishnu was asleep in a state of non-knowing and then is awakened by the Great Goddess Mahamaya, who removes sleep (the illusion/projection) and brings him to consciousness (knowledge).
This interpretation of “Reawakening of Gaia” means the envisioning and evolution of a religion with Holistic concepts of God & Goddess and man & woman as two immanent expressions. It reclaims masculine and feminine psychological aspects and associations that are repressed by the religious myths of both patriarchal and matriarchal cultures.
I had a vision where the Elder Gods and Goddesses of both Matriarchal and Patriarchal tribes came together and made peace at the beginning of a new age (the Age of Aquarius). This peace was consummated by a marriage of a God and Goddess from the younger generation of each of these Divine tribes. The marriage was fashioned upon the ancient matrilineal complex or group marriage, hence the “Marriage of the Younger Deities”. This marriage was to be a symbolic paradigm and spiritual guide in the evolution of a religion with Holistic (as opposed to perfectionistic) concepts of God & Goddess and man & woman. Therefore (in the Church of All Worlds) in the communion of water sharing, each participant can say the blessing of “Thou Art God or Thou Art Goddess and May you never thirst” while sharing and drinking water passed in a goblet.
The “Marriage of the Younger Deities”, as a symbolic spiritual paradigm, that is confirming SweetWood Temenos’ belief in Divine Immanence and its five Values. As an ordained priest of the Church of All Worlds, I envisioned: (1) God and Goddess as verbs refer to two great ways of being, (2) Gods and Goddesses as nouns are psychologically holistic individuations of either The God or The Goddess, (3) each Goddess or God has a primary psychological type; intuition, sensation, thinking and feeling (see Jungian types). So, in this paradigm, the Sky God & Sky Goddess represent masculine and feminine thinking types (Air). The Earth God and the Earth Goddess represent masculine and feminine sensation types (earth) The Moon God and the Moon Goddess represent masculine and feminine feeling types (water). The Sun God and Sun Goddess represent masculine and feminine intuitive types (Fire).
This new envisioning of the Goddesses and Gods allows the continued honoring (or worship) of the Gaia. This Earth Goddess is an expression the sensation type of the Goddess. This new envisioning does not deny the Earth God, who can also express the sensation type in a masculine way. Now Gaia and the all the Goddesses and Gods are envisioned in holistic terms. This vision & understanding invoked in me was one where our planet is symbolically envisioned as the living system of a flower, and the Universe as a Tree of Life. Our Earth is envisioned like a self-pollinating flower, expressing both male and female energy. The Tree of Life is envisioned as a manifestation of love that both the Goddess and God create.
It was left up to each member whether they envisioned all the Goddesses and Gods together constitute: (1) a great Oneness that has always been or (2) a great Multiplicity that has always been reproduced & always will be reproduced; the great Eternal Vine or Grove.
The Church of All Worlds ordained me as a Priest on February 12th 2000. My first official ritual I did was my ordination ritual, performed at the Freedom Festival 2000.
In this ritual I was acting as a priest of the Church of All Worlds and performed
“The Marriage of the Younger Deities”.