(published originally in 2006)
If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book: And if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life.
Revelation 22:18–19
This fall, a Lutheran church in San Francisco hopes to enlist 18 women to go on a “Goddess Pilgrimage to Crete”:
“Feel Her power in the holy mountians [sic], sense Her mysteries in the darkness of the caves, pour libations of milk and honey on Minoan altars. Contact a sacred energy that will transform the way you feel about women, about yourself” (http://www.herchurch.org/id10.html).
Closer to home, the church every year sponsors a “Retreat with She Who Is.” Led in these activities by a Lutheran pastor, participant Jo Ann Heydron describes her experiences on the church’s website:
The pastor “invited us to form our own images in clay of Asherah, the mother goddess of the Canaanites … with a sacred body just like mine” [for a photo, see the website]. There was also a project “to make a mandala, a circular, meditative image of the self” [originally used in Hinduism] and meditative dancing. Finally, “all ten of us prayed the Goddess rosary (some beaded their own Goddess Rosary that afternoon).” Pastor Stacy “called us to remember the sea as the primal water from which life emerged, to think of it as the amniotic fluid of our mothers’ wombs” (ibid.).
Blogger “Athana,” of radical goddess thealogy [sic.], puts it succinctly:
“[T]his weblog is dedicated to the goddess and to saving the planet … by gently replacing god the father with god the mother by the year 2025” (http://godmotherascending.blogspot.com/).