The Red Tent Temple at MotherRoots

Women are meeting every month on or near the new moon, all over the country to honor the natural rhythms and cycles of women and to celebrate & bless our common bond as women.

The Red Tent Temple Movement was begun to create spaces where women can heal, rest, renew themselves, connect with other women and enjoy that magic of being with other women. It is a time out of time; a sacred place where a woman can be herself without any demands on her at all.

Our Red Tent has simple but nurturing activities for women to choose from while they rest in the Red Tent; there is a prayer bowl, Goddess oracles and other divination tools, a Red Tent Temple journal, art projects and stacks of great books.

Some women come to rest, to nap, to dance, to sing, to heal, to renew.

We have a storyteller's chair for those who would like to share their wisdom with us and a word-of-mouth board where you can spread the news about events or places that are important to you.

We will offer you home made soup, light snacks and hot herbal teas to nurture your belly and your womb.

Here are some of the things women bring with them: their journals, handcrafts or artwork, books, candles, massage oils, snacks to share, and songs or stories to share with others. It is also very freeing to come with nothing but your Goddess self!

Our Red Tent Temple is non-denominational. If you have ever menstruated, you are welcome to come!

A talking circle will be held at 3pm. If you arrive during this time, please join us in circle quietly. You will be welcomed! The rest of the time will be left unstructured to allow the day to flow organically.

Bring your mothers, your sisters, your aunts, your daughters, your friends and co-workers. I would like to especially welcome our young, newly bleeding women and the women-elders in our community!

The Red tent events are always free and open to all women regardless of ability to pay however we are suggesting a $5 - 10 donation for those that are able to give, to help cover costs. Your loving donations will keep the Red Tent Temple going every month!

Volunteers Needed

We are all volunteers here. Would you like to volunteer to bring home made soup or stew (in a crockpot) to the Red Tent this month? Do you have a delicious dessert you want to bless us with? Nourishing herbal teas to share?

We also welcome dancers, musicians, storytellers who might want to share for a few minutes with us during the Red Tent days. Contact me if you can help us in this way.

Thank You!

Red Blessings,

Melissa

My Body is the Body of the Goddess

I was in circle once a long time ago and our leader was called out suddenly. One of the women among us, Rebekah, began a song. One by one myself and the women lying around me on the floor began to sing along with her. Soon we were humming, and harmonizing, singing and swaying as we allowed the words of this chant to infuse our very bodies with the truth of it's words. I sing this very often to myself to bless me when I most need it.

My body is the body of the Goddess
My body is the body of the Goddess
My body is a living temple of love
My body is a living temple fo love

This song is like the soothing waves of the sea to me. I sing it over and over again until I know I am this Goddess of love and holiness, until all shame and guilt wash away, until I know beyond knowing ~ in that deep river beneath the river of my soul ~ that I am bright, white, pure, holy, blessed, sacred, Woman.

May You Know This Feeling,

Melissa

Your Body is The Body of the Goddess

"May your body be blessed.

May you realize that your body is a faithful and beautiful friend of
your soul.

May you recognize that your senses are sacred thresholds.

May you realize that Holiness is mindful gazing, mindful feeling,
mindful listening,
and mindful touching.

May your senses always enable you to celebrate the universe and the
mystery
and possibilities in your presence here.

May Eros bless you.

May your senses gather you and bring you home."

~Celtic Blessing

Earth my body, water my blood, air my breath and fire my spirit!

The body is a sacred garment. It is your first and last garment. It is what you enter life in, and what you depart with, and it should be treated with honor."
~~ Martha Graham

Quoted in 'Divining the Body' by Jan Phillips

Revealing Mystery ~ Pomegranate

In the ancient and medieval worlds, pomegranates symbolized birth and death, being itself capable of bleeding. It was frequently associated with maidens and maiden-goddesses, for its bloodiness was often identified with the menses of an underworld goddess. It had simultaneous positive and negative associations, as cthonic divinities, and in particular Earthmothers, were the sources of Life and of Death, of Health and of Illness, of Fertility and Infertility.

I have been traveling through my own underworld of late. Unearthing roots that have gripped the earth too tightly. Trying to dig out seeds that had been planted long ago, and continue to produce weeds that are choking the life out of what wants to be born now at this stage of my life.

The fruit of the shadow journey is juicy, beautiful, magical and so powerful. Many turn away from such a journey due to the ugliness and death that can be encounter. Its a journey that marks the transition of maiden into Mother, princess into Queen.

Quite a few of my fellow Sisters are in this journey now. I bow to you, your strength, your beauty, and your grace. May we come out on the other end having honed our skill, and mined the treasures of our inner workings.

Blessed Be.

~Above writing by Elena Rego ~ To see her art & photography, click on the Persephone picture in the right hand column of this page.

Susun Weed on The Blood Mysteries

"Tell me that you feel me reaching out to you from the deep core of your being, from time out of mind. Tell me that you feel me waking up inside you, waking you up to your beauty and your power. Tell me that you are reclaiming your truth and turning a deaf ear to the lies. Tell me that you remember that you are the Goddess. Tell me that you remember that you and I are One.


Blood Mysteries


In the beginning, according to the Wise Woman tradition, everything began, as everything does, at birth. The Great Mother of All gave birth and the earth appeared out of the void. Then the Great Mother of All gave birth again, and again, and again, and people, and animals, and plants appeared on the earth. They were all very hungry. "What shall we eat?" they asked the Great Mother. "Now you eat me," she said, smiling. Soon there were a very great many lives, but the Great Mother of All was enjoying creating and giving birth so much that she didn't want to stop. "Ah," she said smiling, "now I eat you." And so she still does.

We all come from the same mother. She is the wise woman. We all return to her embrace, her bloody-rich womb place, when we die. Every woman is a whole/holy form of her, able to be whole/holy mother of all life, able to be whole/holy destroyer of life. Her power is her blood that flows and flows, her blood which is life and gives life. Every woman's menstrual blood and birth-time blood is a holy mystery.

What are the blood mysteries? Why are they central to the understanding of the Wise Woman tradition.

Blood mysteries teach that menstrual blood and birthing blood are holy blood, power blood, healing blood. The blood mysteries teach us to remember that life and healing come from and return to woman, to the wise woman, to the woman who bleeds and bleeds. And does not die.

Blood mysteries reveal that menstrual (moontime) blood and birth blood are so holy, so full of potential, so full of the void, that they are to be used only to heal, to heal by nourishing. Holy woman-blood is nourishing blood, blood of love, blood of abundance, blood that heals the earth.

Blood mysteries recall the immense power of the bleeding woman. Power enough to share in great nourishing give-away from mother to matrix, give-away of nourisher to nourisher. When we bleed into the ground (in reality or fantasy) our power regrounds as our blood flows through the personal root chakra and into the earth.

Bleeding into the ground, bleeding freely, we know ourselves as women, as nourishers of life, as givers of nourishment to the plants, givers of holy nourishment: our moontime blood.

I am woman giving away nourishment to ensure this planet's life. With my moontime power, my blood, with my birthing power, my blood, I feed the earth who feeds us all. Every month I remember: I am woman. I am earth. I am life. I am nourishment. I am change.

I am woman, blatantly and repeatedly confronted with my changes: hormonal harmonics stirring moon time visions, ovulatory oracles, pre-menstrual crazies, orgasmic knowings, birth ecstasies, breast-feeding bliss, menopausal moods.

I am wholeness. I am woman. I know life, death, pain, and health in my marrow, in my womb. I know the bloody places: the narrow space between life and death, the bloody place of birth, the bloody mess of nourishing life, the bloody flow of letting life go. I am woman. My blood is power. Peaceful power. Peaceful blood.

My blood is holy nourishment. My blood nourishes the growing fetus. My blood becomes milk to nourish the young child. My blood flows into the ground as holy nourishment for the Great Mother, Gaia, Mother Earth.

Gaia, whose ways are bloody. Woman, whose ways are bloody. Blood of nourishment. But bloody. Bloody menstrual blood, bloody birth blood. Blood of peace, nourishing blood. Blood of health/wholeness/holiness, not of sacrifice. The Wise Woman tradition is a bloody-handed woman, a bloody-thighed woman, a woman who gives birth, a woman who sees to the other side of things.

Health/wholeness/holiness is always changing. Life is mysterious, moving in spirals of change. Spirals moving to, through, from the void. Change making the hole so we can see the holy healthy gift of our wholeness.

"Sit, sister, here on the soft green moss, and give your sacred moon blood to the earth, back again to the spiral of life. Let flow your womb's blood red to the green and brown of earth. Sit here. Relax and close your eyes and let the visions come. Rest now and give your moon blood to nourish the mother who nourishes us. Relax and let the visions come."

The time of menstrual bleeding, according to the Wise Woman tradition, is a time of visions. Any woman who pays attention to these visions will find the power of shamans, witch doctors, medicine wo/men.

"Add a bit of red leaf to your herbal mixtures, any red leaf except poison ivy. That will make the medicine strong," says a friend, apprentice to a Native American shaman. And the wise woman inside me whispers: "They do this to evoke the power of menstrual blood."

These are the natural powers of menstruating, menopausal, and post-menopausal women:

* Oneness with the earth as a responsive nurturing presence
* Communication with plants, animals, rocks
* Weather making
* Shape shifting
* Invisibility
* Communication with fairies, devas, elves, dragons, unicorns
* Foreknowledge
* Acutely sensitive senses of smell, taste, hearing, sight, touch
* Healing

The Wise Woman tradition understands healing/wholing as blood mysteries. The blood of birth and death, and the blood of nourishment, these are the natural knowledge of women, these are the things that make us wise.

For permission to reprint this article, contact susunweed@herbshealing.com
Susun Weed - PO Box 64, Woodstock, NY 12498 (fax) 1-845-246-8081
Visit Susun Weed at: www.susunweed.com and www.ashtreepublishing.com
The Goddess is Alive in Every Woman
The True Story of How She Came to Be, How She Disappeared, and How She Returned
c. 1999, Susun S. Weed

Bloody Women ~ A Magical Experience of the Menstrual Cycle

By Rachel Mayatt

For many years I have been interested in the connection between women’s menstrual cycles and the phases of the Moon.

Being a Priestess of the Goddess I have found myself working with both - and exploring the mysteries and magic of this time in a woman’s yearly cycle. I have researched ideas and activities and looked at the attitude towards menstruation generally.

Our society tends to prefer that discussions about this kind of subject are kept out of ‘polite conversation’ and I can remember as a child being told it was not a subject to discuss in mixed company! Supplies for coping with periods were kept hidden away and quietly discussed. In fact I remember my own first experience of bleeding occurred after I had been exploring my own body at about 10 years old. The next day I had my first period and was absolutely terrified I had caused myself to bleed with my clumsy childish fumbling. No one had ever talked to me with regard to learning about my own body or masturbation. When I went to talk to my mother about what was happening to me she showed me some awful elastic belts and large sanitary towels to fasten to them. Between the legs of a little girl it felt alien and uncomfortable. I was told ‘not to mention it to my brothers, and keep my supplies hidden away’. My feelings of being ‘unclean’ had begun.

My own feelings of uneasiness and discomfort had to be kept to myself and there was little support from anyone else. On TV – adverts showed young girls cartwheeling on a beach or riding horses wearing white trousers as some discarnate voice coyly assured me that ‘that time of the month shouldn’t stop me from leading a normal life’! Or they demonstrated how well the product worked by pouring blue coloured water on the pads!! No wonder I was confused and mentally rejected this awful experience.

In fact I remember before I started my periods, one of my school mates who was first to begin her cycle having notes to excuse her from our weekly swimming lesson. She was so proud of the fact she was menstruating and I couldn’t understand what she was so proud of. I’m ashamed to say I even looked down on her! Now I realise she must have had a really great family that supported her and taught her how wonderful and magical it really is.

I believe the negativity with my own first menstrual experiences caused me to mentally and physically reject this normal and natural part of a woman’s life. I had several years of pain and awful cramps with each period. I actually felt I was disgusting and it was a dirty experience for several years. It was as my spirituality developed its pagan direction that I began to look at my body and femininity from a different perspective. I had had pagan beliefs and spiritual experiences from childhood, but being brought up by a Christian mother it wasn’t until I had had my first child that I got actively involved with the pagan community.

In the early 1990s, I was reading Sister Moon Lodge by author Kisma Stephanich; about the power and magical connections of my Moon Time. She suggested we collect our blood using reusable pads and soaking them. It was an act of self empowerment to take that beautiful scarlet water each month and pour it onto Mother Earth. I also benefited from fantastic tomatoes and green beans when I used it to fertilise my garden!! Another wonderful book – Red Moon by Miranda Gray helped me look further into my own connection with the Goddess through my menstrual cycle.

Organisations such as the Women’s Menstrual Health Foundation in the US run by Tamara Slayton (sadly deceased) were encouraging women to learn about themselves through the power of our menstrual cycles. WEN – the Women’s Environmental Network in the UK was also encouraging the use of reusable pads, made with soft cotton flannel, in pretty designs. Nowadays we also have other things available – sea sponges to use like internal tampons, and of course the Moon cup. There weren’t a lot of companies selling reusable pads this at the time, and so I bought some pretty flannelette and made my own.

As a Witch I encourage my students and circle members to make many of their ritual tools and spell ingredients themselves, and I found it even more empowering to take charge of honouring my body and dealing with my monthly moon cycle by making my own supplies. I take the time to give myself a gift of what I need at this time, listening to my body and intuition. Sometimes I need solitude so may not answer the phone or go out for the first day or two.

If you read some of the many books that have emerged over the last few years on the ritual and magical work done at this time, they show evidence of women in tribal or ancient village society being able to leave normal work, childcare and dealing with the village food to enter the moonlodge or ‘red tent’ as some describe it.

Some people have suggested the reason was that it was believed to be taboo and unclean. Whereas others think it was because it was seen as a magical event; a woman bleeding but not dying - this was powerful magic that should be kept away from the normal tribal daily events. I prefer to think of it as the later explanation but there isn’t a definite answer that’s provable. And of course those of you with several women in your household; daughters, sisters or housemates will find that over the months, your menstrual cycle will change until you are all bleeding at roughly same time of the month and your cycles regulate to each other.

I know for some women that taking time out is an impossibility and so I suggest you are kind to yourselves during your cycle. When you get in from work or put the children to bed, light a candle, draw a warm bath and just allow yourself the luxury of soaking. Use some bath oil or delicious smelling Body Lotion to treat your senses. Or have an early night with a hot water bottle if you need to. Massage your tummy lightly with an aromatherapy base oil such as almond oil in gently clockwise circular strokes. Treat yourself to delicious foods and dress in comfortable clothing. Light a candle in the morning before you have to rush to the office or do the school run, and have 5 minutes of honouring your cycle and the Goddess in your life.

It’s a most magical time and I cannot think of anything more intimately connected with the Goddess than appreciating the cycle I have been blessed with that so links me with the Moon and our Mother Earth.

©Blood Mother - Rachel Mayatt