Acknowledgements and Gratitude
Deepest Gratitude to Elizabeth Gould Davis, Merlin Stone, Marija Gimbutas, Doreen Valiente, Ruth and Jean Mountaingrove (WomanSpirit), Helen Diner, and Z. Budapest for their vision, courage, inspiration and tenacity. Early voices for Goddess Spirituality, each of you has made the emergence of the Goddess a reality and influenced all of us with your vision. Deep Blessings upon all who kept Goddess Culture alive these many millennium. The creation of the Goddess 2000 Project is dedicated to You!
We are also Grateful to Monica Sjoo, Barbara Mor, Carol P. Christ, Barbara Walker, Mary Beth Edelson, Prairie (Mari) Jackson, Margot Adler, Carolyn Whitehorn, Diane Mariechild, Selena Fox, Jade, and Starhawk for their enormous contributions to Goddess imagery, ritual, information and our Community.
Our Gratitude to the men whose vision helped bring the Goddess Home; Gerald Gardner, Robert Graves, Robert Briffault, Erich Neumann, Sir James George Frazer, Joseph Campbell and Michael Dames.
A special thank you to the wonderful visionaries who contributed their words so generously to this powerful ritual. The information below will tell you a little about them.
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Z Budapest
Z Budapest started Women's Mysteries/Dianic Tradition in the USA when she organized the Susan B Anthony Coven number one, which she led for ten years. She has written six books on the subject, "The Holy Book of Womens Mysteries", "Grandmother of Time", "Grandmother Moon", "Goddess in the Office", "Goddess in the Bedroom", and "Summoning the Fates". Z has lead many public rituals, including her Goddess 2000 Festival for Women" in CA (www.zbudapest.com/gtrip/Default.htm).
* NOTE (This is not the same event as the Goddess 2000 Project.)
Masika Szilagyi
Z's Mother ~ My mother Masika Szilagyi was a sculptor and poet, storyteller and folklorist. She has two statues still standing in Budapest, Hungary. She passed on in 1979 at the age of 63.
Marcia Bianchi
Marcia Bianchi/ Mavesper Ceridwen is a Brazilian wiccan, 36 years old, living in Brasilia, and is Country Coordinator of Goddess 2000 Project in Brazil. She leads the Silver Circle and in the website "The Goddess Temple" www.templodadeusa.com.br she dedicates her time to help all Brazilian people that are searching the Goddess. Marcia is a Law consultant to the House of Representatives for living, and is the proud mother of a little witch, Camila Julia, 4 years old.
Marcia says: "When the Lady comes to my life everything is new. Never before was I so alive! Dannu came to my life as a memory and seed of old and future lives. To Her, as the Great Goddess in Her multiple forms, I dedicate all my days, all my work and love."
Valorie Dove
Valorie is an eclectic witch, she is 34 years old, married, and a parent to one male child. She was raised in the Great Basin area and now reside near the ocean in South Florida. Valorie is a gifted poet and weaver of healing words. She enjoys gardening, sociology, playing the flute, and cooking with love.
I was raised by my father, he was always teaching me how important it is to keep a balance between all things in Nature, to under-stand It, to re-spect It, and to learn from It. Being an eclectic witch is, for me, the best way to do this. I am dedicated to an ever spiraling awareness of our personal and natural interconnections.
PERSONAL QUOTE: I've been told laughter is the magic of the soul -- so laugh a little and charm a little.
Myria Egito
Myria Egito is known on the Net either Branwen or Brighid. She is from Brazil, 47 years old, mother of a couple of 21 and 15 year olds. Myria is an MD for a living , and an student of the Old Traditions for LOVE.
To quote Myria, "I am on the Goddess Path since 1991. Brighid came to me as my GodMother in my First Iniciation and has been with me ever since. When I joined Ord Brighideach sometime ago, I was blessed with ,what the old celts called, Imbas, and amusingly, started to write poems in English! I say amusingly because I have allways writen but in Portuguese. Brighid is really a powerful Great Goddess and being close to her is an unique experience , specially for those with anykind of artistical abilities."
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Riane Eisler
Dr. Riane Eisler is the author of the international bestseller "The Chalice & The Blade", hailed by Princeton anthropologist Ashley Montagu as "the most important book since Darwin's Origin of Species.” Her most recent book is the groundbreaking "Tomorrow’s Children: A Blueprint for Partnership Education in the 21st Century" (Westview Press).
Other books drawing from her research as a cultural historian and systems theorist include "Sacred Pleasure, The Partnership Way", and "Women, Men, and the Global Quality of Life". Dr. Eisler is President of the Center for Partnership Studies, keynotes conferences worldwide, and consults for business and government on applying the partnership model and cultural transformation theory to all aspects of life - from the family and business to education, politics, and the environment.
Selena Fox
Selena Fox is a psychotherapist, teacher, writer, photographer, ritual performance artist, and priestess. She is founder and co-executive director of Circle Sanctuary, an international Nature Spirituality resource center headquartered on a 200 acre Nature preserve in southwestern Wisconsin, USA.
Selena has been a Wiccan priestess and Pagan artist since 1973. Selena's approach to spirituality emphasizes Nature communion and blends together ancient and contemporary European and American folkways, Wiccan traditions, multicultural shamanism, and transpersonal psychology. She is one of America's best known Pagan elders, networkers, and civil liberties activists. She is founder of Circle Network, Lady Liberty League, and the Pagan Academic Network.
Over the years, Selena and her work have been covered by various regional, national, and global media. She has spoken at a variety of international and multicultural conferences and is a member of the American Psychological Association, American Counseling Association, Association for Transpersonal Psychology, and American Academy of Religion. She is a spiritual counselor in private practice.
Hallie Austen Iglehart
Hallie is author of "The Heart of the Goddess: Art, Myth and Meditations of the World's Sacred Feminine" which presents a worldwide selection of the art, values,and the living lessons of Goddess culture. Hallie's dedication to making the Goddess accessable and easily understood has been an enormous contribution to all of us. She is a long time meditation leader and visionary of Goddess Culture. Since the early 1970s Hallie has held large group meditations and workshops. She has transported thousands back to the time of the Ancestors and has been a profound influence on the development of contemporary Goddess Culture.
Hallie lives in the San Francisco bay area. Her meditations on the Goddess are available through Raindreaming Productions, PO Box 697 Point Reyes, CA 94956.
Judith Laura
Judith Laura has been involved in Goddess spirituality since the late 1970s. One of the great joys of her life has been witnessing the growing recognition of the Goddess and she is thrilled with this flowering at the "millennium."
She is author of two books: "She Lives! The Return of Our Great Mother"(1989), which has just been released in a revised and expanded 10th anniversary edition, and "Goddess Spirituality for the 21st Century: from Kabbalah to Quantum Physics"(1997), from which her material in this ritual is drawn. A group discussion guide for the latter book is available on her website at http://members.aol.com/Ashira. She lives in the Washington, DC, area.
Lorellyn Marshall
Lorellyn Marshall named our Ritual "Dancing the Goddess Home". She is a 47 year old Eclectic Witch and Goddess Lover living in Bend Oregon. Lorellyn is mother to one daughter, and grandmother to two little girls who are being raised with the love of the Goddess. Two years ago she was instrumental in bringing to fruition a women-only coven, the Grove of Arachne. Community building is her main focus and she recently formed the Pagan Awareness Network (PAN) of Central Oregon, a non- profit, proactive organization whose goals are Spiritual Growth, Public Education and Community Service. PAN sponsored it's first Harvest Festival this past Mabon in honor of Pagan Pride Day, and is currently planning and sponsoring "Dancing the Goddess Home" in Bend.
Lorellyn said, "I am very much grateful to Abby Willowroot for bringing out the artist in me. Before the Goddess 2000 Project I had never picked up a brush, now I'm painting like a mad woman! Working on G2000 Project has also honed my leadership skills, and now that I know I can accomplish whatever I put my mind to, I've finally taken up the harp, which has been a ten year dream come true for me."
Patricia Monaghan
Patricia Monaghan's "Book of Goddesses and Heroines" was the first cross-cultural encyclopedia of the goddess ever published; the third, greatly-expanded edition of the book was published in 1997 as "The New Book of Goddesses and Heroines."
She is also the author of "O Mother Sun: A New View of the Cosmic Feminine"; "The Goddess Path"; "The Goddess Companion"; and the forthcoming "Wild Girls: The Path of the Young Goddess." Patricia is also a poet whose goddess-centered poems have been collected as "Seasons of the Witch." She lectures regularly on the goddess and can be reached at www.altogether.com/patricia.
M. Macha NightMare
M. Macha Nightmare, Priestess and Witch, is a Pagan organizer, ritualist and writer who co-created, with Starhawk, The Pagan Book of Living and Dying: Practical Rituals, Prayers, Blessings, and Meditations on Crossing Over, HarperSan Francisco, 1997. A member of the Reclaiming Collective for all of its existence (17 years), she now teaches and leads rituals throughout the country, and was recently a featured presenter at the 9th annual CUUPS Convo in Salem, Massachusetts.
Macha holds Elder and ministerial credentials through The Covenant of the Goddess (CoG), the oldest and largest organization of Witches in the United States. A member since 1981, she is a former National First Officer.
In March 1999 she was a participant in the Biodiversity Project Spirituality Working Group, a retreat of religious leaders, scholars and Washington DC-based policy makers to formulate strategies to increase biodiversity awareness, preservation, and activism within religious communities. She also works with the Sacred Dying Foundation in educating funeral professionals and hospice workers about Pagan beliefs and practices about death and dying.
Her matron is Kali Ma. Her magical practice is inspired by feminism and a concern for the health of our planet, and is informed by Celtic, Hindu and Tibetan practices, the sacred art of tantra, and the magic of enchantment. In addition to traveling the broomstick circuit, Macha is exploring the concepts of dedication, initiation, elevation and ordination within the diverse community that is American Witchcraft. She has one daughter, one step-daughter, two stepsons, and a loving partner of the male persuasion.
Merlin Stone
A woman whose work has influenced many on the Goddess path. Her pioneering work and insights led the way for many other Goddess writers to follow. Merlin Stone is author of "When God was a Woman"; "Ancient Mirrors of Womanhood: Goddess and Heroine Tales from Around the World"; and "The Paradise Papers: the Suppression of Women's Rites". She has worked as a sculptor, exhibiting widely and executing numerous sculpture commissions. Merlin has also taught art and art history at the university level. She became interested in archeology and ancient religion through her art and researched this book for more than ten years.
She is a mother, a writer, a visionary and a woman who continues to inspire us with her cross-cultural and cross-time wisdom. She is a pioneer in Goddess Spirituality. Merlin Stone lives in New York.
Lunaea Weatherstone
Lunaea Weatherstone is a legally ordained Priestess of Brigid, and has served the Goddess and pagan community as writer and priestess for nearly twenty years. She is the founding mother and former editor of "SageWoman" magazine, for which she is a featured columnist. Lunaea is also a collage artist and the creator of the "Full Moon Dreams Tarot" deck.
Her experience with creating public ritual spans more than 15 years. She serves as Priestess of the Grove of Brigid of the Crossroads, in Santa Cruz, California. Lunaea can be contacted through her web site at www.lunaea.com.
Marion Weinstein
She is a writer, a comic and a visionary who has taught many. Marion is the author of "Positive Magic: A Dianic Book of Shadows, A Guide for Witches"; "The Ancient Modern Witch"; and Positive Magic: Occult Self Help". Marion Weinstein is one of the pioneers of the modern Witchcraft Movement. Her gentle wisdom and clear voice inspires and instructs.
Marion's popular radio show, Marion's Cauldron, on New York's WBAI FM, ran weekly for 14 years. She is a wildly funny woman and performs Stand-up comedy. Tapes of Marion's performances including "Comedt & Ritual"; and "Stand-up Witch" are available through Earth Magic Productions at www.earthmagic.com .
Abby Willowroot
Abby is an artist who has been researching the Goddess and creating Goddess imagery since 1971 in jewelry, sculpture and graphics. Nine of her pieces are in the permanent collection of the Smithsonian Institution, Women's History section. She is the mother of two sons, a symbolist, visionary, solitary, and a webmistress. She has co-written two reader's theatre plays "Broken Silence" and "Truths". Abby's graphics have appeared in WomanSpirit and SageWoman magazines, and several book covers. Her work is in many private and public collections. She is a past Crafts Coordinator for the West Coast Women's Music Festival, and a former member of "MotherTongue Reader's Theatre", and is a member of COG. Abby is a Priestess of Goddess Symbology. JBL Statues is currently offering several of her Goddess sculptures.
Abby is founder and director of the Goddess 2000 Project and hosts a sacred online Goddess Temple, the "Spiral Goddess Grove" at www.spiralgoddess.com
She speaks and offers workshops on the "Sacred Visual Language of the Goddess" and "Creative Impowerment: Creating Change through Art" and is currently working on a book.
Oberon Zell
Oberon Zell-Ravenheart, co-founded the Church of All Worlds in 1962. First to apply the terms "Pagan" and "Neo-Pagan" to the newly emerging Nature Religions of the 1960s, and through his publication of the "Green Egg" (1968-1975; 1988-96), Oberon was instrumental in the coalescence of the Neo-Pagan movement. In 1970, Oberon formulated and published the thealogy of deep ecology which has become known scientifically as The Gaia Thesis.
Oberon and Morning Glory co-founded the Ecosophical Research Association, whose projects have included raising Unicorns, chasing Mermaids, visiting ancient sacred sites and exploring the Underworld. Currently, Oberon is the primary sculptor of The Mythic Images Collection, creating and producing museum-quality replicas and beautiful original altar figurines and wall plaques of Gods and Goddesses. He is working on a book to be called The Gospel of Gaia. He has been married to Morning Glory for 26 years, and they are now in a 6-person expanded family called the Ravenhearts, allliving together in Sonoma County, Califia.
Oberon's artwork has illuminated the pages of various fantasy and science-fiction magazines since the late 1960's. The eight Goddess portraits he created for Ann Forfreedom's Book of the Goddess have also been published as altar posters. Oberon has illustrated Anodea Judith's Wheels of Life, Gwydion Pendderwen's The Rites of Summer, Orion Stormcrow's The Four Brothers That Weren't, Urmas Kaldeveer's Single Fathers' Cookbook, Phil Snow's Blast From the Past, Jeanne Mara's Listen to My Heart, and Morning Glory's The Hunting of the Ri. He has drawn up an extensive Darkovan Bestiary for Marion Zimmer Bradley's science-fiction series, and his Forever Forest T-shirt designs may be seen at any gathering of environmental activists. But Oberon's favorite art project is his ongoing sculpture series of ancient Gods and Goddesses, and of mythological, prehistoric and legendary creatures, currently being marketed through TheaGenesis LLC as the Mythic Images Collection. His masterwork is "The Millennial Gaia." (www.mythicimages.com)
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