[sourwoodsun]

Neo-religions are cool and we should All Do It

I always felt drawn to female deities in history and fiction, even during my hardcore Christian phase. I also became a radical feminist in my 20's, which ended the hardcore Christian phase as it clashed too much with what I felt was fair and right. But the pull remained. In my late 20's, I discovered feminist spirituality and finally acknowledged the spiritual hunger. So I began to practice witchcraft.

For a while I felt awkward studying Wicca and other 20th century neo-religions because of their obviously constructed nature. I wanted to have a tradition to rely on in building my personal practice but just couldn't find the one I needed. Yes, there exist theories and models of matriarchal and femifocal societies in prehistoric times which could be very possible but we do not have written sources to understand the worldview and practices of those cultures. There is no unbroken tradition to inherit and pass on. Most if not all historical female religious practices that I could draw from are at least somewhat tainted by existing in the oppressive shadow of violent patriarchy. Only Dianic Wicca (which is also one of the 20th century neo-religions), in my opinion, went far enough in their divorce from male-centered spirituality. In my observation they also try to back up their practice by claiming to inherit the unbroken tradition going back to the aforementioned prehistoric times. While their texts are always lovely to read, they are forced to lean on at least a little bit on speculation there. And about a year ago I arrived at the thought: why speculate about the past to give weight to your modern values? Can't they stand on their own?

I'm thinking of how religion and spirituality, in folkloric conscience, usually reflect a worldview that includes not only supernatural explanation but material facts too. Things that people consider(ed) common knowledge. Some of which can be empirically and scientifically proven true. A myth is not a Disney fairytale that constructs an image of how the world works, a rootless fantasy. A myth is a spiritual and poetic narrative of what people observe to be true. It imbues factual knowledge with value and meaning, thus giving the material a divine dimension.

It just happens that maybe I know a little bit more of how the world works than, say, my great-grandmother (but I sure don't know how to make bread). The knowledge itself doesn't bar me from assigning spiritual meaning to it. Most things I worship are very real, such as the Sun, the changing of the seasons, Life, Death. A belief is less defined by its content than the attitude a person assumes about it. One can believe, wholeheartedly, in material facts. Moreover, I'm a radical feminist first, and this stance is informed by knowledge of sociology, statistics, economics and psychology. I also happen to assign the deepest meaning to female liberation, cooperation, friendship and the personhood of women. I believe in those things. I practice these things.

At this point I'm fine with the fact that my practice is deeply individual and self-made. Yes, I can't claim that women in ancient times shared my views. But I don't have to since my religion reflects my reality and the world I live in. I created them to help me to navigate this world, just as my ancestors created and co-created and tailored theirs for the same purpose. And I think that it might be a little bit of post-Christian residue speaking when we are itching so much to validate our practices by linking them to prior traditions (the sacred textsss!!1). For women, there might be also some old familiar self-invalidation thing going on. It can be hard at first, to raise your head this high to be able to say: I can be my own religious authority. But it can also be incredibly liberating and self-affirming. In short: I think neo-religions are cool and we should all do it (if even a little bit).

[read-books-by-women]

THE XX BRAIN: The Groundbreaking Science Empowering WomenTo Maximize Cognitive Health and Prevent Alzheimer’s Disease by Lisa Mosconi

The first book to address cognitive enhancement and Alzheimer's prevention specifically in women — and to frame brain health as an essential component of Women's Health.

Women are far more likely than men to suffer from anxiety, depression, migraines, brain injuries, strokes, and even Alzheimer's disease. However, through the lens of 'Women's Health', women's brains won't make the cut. Now, the director of the Women's Brain Initiative at Weill Cornell Medical College gives women the first plan to address the unique risks and strengths of the female brain.

Until now, medical research has focused on "bikini medicine," assuming that women are essentially men with breasts and tubes. The XX Brain confronts this crisis by revealing how the two powerful X chromosomes that distinguish women from men impact our brain first and foremost. The XX Brain builds from the recognition that women's brains age distinctly from men's, due mostly to the decline of a key brain-protective hormone: estrogen.

Taking on all aspects of women's health, including brain fog, memory lapses, depression, stress, insomnia, hormonal imbalances, and the increased risk of dementia, Dr. Mosconi introduces cutting-edge, evidence-based approaches to protect the female brain, including a specific diet proven to work for women, stress reduction, and sleep. She also examines the controversy about soy and hormonal replacement therapy, takes on the perils of environmental toxins, and examines the role of our microbiome. Luckily, it is never too late to take care of yourself.

The XX Brain is a rally cry for women to have full access to information regarding what is going on in their brains and bodies, and a roadmap for the path to optimal, lifelong brain health.

[motherpriestess]

Why It’s Time to Return to the Worship of the Mother

In a world that often feels fractured, fast, and forgetful of what truly matters, many of us find ourselves yearning for something deeper. A sense of grounding. A return to balance. A sacred connection that nourishes both soul and society.

Perhaps what we long for isn’t something new, but something ancient. Something we’ve forgotten but not lost.

It’s time to remember the Mother.

What Is the Worship of the Mother?

For millennia, across cultures and continents, the Mother, under many names and faces, was honored as the source of life, wisdom, and regeneration. She was Gaia, Isis, Inanna, Shakti, Pachamama, and countless others. She was not above or beyond the world; she was within it. She was the world.

To worship the Mother was to revere the earth, the body, the cycles of life and death. It was to see the sacred in birth and blood, in growing things, in the moon, in our emotions and relationships. It was to honor the feminine, not only in women, but in all beings and in the world itself.

And then, she was silenced. Replaced. Forgotten.

But we are remembering now.

Why It Matters—For You

Worshipping the Mother isn’t about dogma. It’s about reconnection.

You reconnect to your body. The Mother teaches that your body is sacred, not something to be conquered or fixed, but something to be listened to. Your hunger, your rest, your pleasure, your pain, all carry wisdom.

You reconnect to your intuition. The feminine is fluid, mysterious, inner-knowing. The Mother invites you to trust your own cycles, your instincts, your dreams. She gives you permission to slow down, and in doing so, you find clarity.

You reconnect to the earth. The Mother is the soil, the water, the forests. Worshipping her means seeing nature not as a resource to extract, but as a living being to care for, and to be cared by.

You reconnect to wholeness. In a world that divides spirit and matter, masculine and feminine, head and heart, the Mother holds it all. She reminds us that everything belongs.

Why It Matters—For Society

Imagine a world that honored the Mother. A world where:

Compassion is a strength. Rather than dismissing empathy and care as "soft," we recognize them as essential to justice and healing.

Community matters. In the Mother’s worldview, we thrive not through domination, but through connection. Cooperation replaces competition. Relationships are sacred.

The earth is sacred again. Ecological destruction stems from forgetting the divine in nature. Worshipping the Mother rekindles reverence for the planet, and the will to protect it.

Balance is restored. We’ve been living in a lopsided world, tilted toward control, consumption, and conquest. The return of the Mother restores what’s been suppressed: nurturing, creativity, mystery, softness, sensuality, wisdom.

This isn’t about rejecting the masculine, it’s about healing the imbalance. The Mother holds space for all of us to remember who we are.

This Isn’t New Age—It’s Ancient

This isn’t a trend or a fantasy. It’s the root of who we are.

Archaeology reveals thousands of years of Goddess-centered cultures, often characterized by peace and egalitarianism, where women held leadership roles and life was viewed as a web, not a ladder. From Catal Huyuk to Minoan Crete, from the temples of Sumer to the myths of India, the Mother reigned, not with a fist, but with open arms.

These societies weren’t perfect. But they remembered something we have forgotten: that life is sacred. That creation is divine. That women are not lesser. That the body is not shameful. That the earth is not ours to dominate.

A Personal Invitation

You don’t need to join a temple. You don’t need a label.

To worship the Mother, you might:

Light a candle and whisper thanks for your breath.

Touch the earth and feel her heartbeat in your feet.

Honor your emotions as messengers.

Create, nurture, nourish yourself and others.

Say yes to cycles. Say yes to softness. Say yes to the sacred.

This is not about belief. It’s about remembrance.

The Mother is not far away. She is already here, in your breath, your blood, your belly, your longing.

And she’s waiting for you to come home.

[lemonlamblaura]

I find it funny how many faiths around the world (not all, but many) refer to the sun as a male deity when it's actually the ultimate life-giver, when you think about it

If the sun didn't exist, neither would anything on this planet. The sun helps give us the plants that we eat and admire, which in turn feeds the animals we love and consume, and provides the world with oxygen to give us life

The Sun is a life goddess, to me

[the-mortal-coil]

On the Efficacy of Ritual Magic

Ritual magic works primarily because consciousness is not as passive as the modern worldview assumes. The human mind does not merely observe reality, it participates in shaping it, and ritual is one of the oldest technologies for directing that participation deliberately.

The first thing ritual does is focus. Ordinary consciousness is scattered, running across dozens of competing desires, doubts, and contradictions simultaneously. A ritual collapses all of that into a single point. The candle, the words, the gesture, the timing, all of it serves to gather the practitioner’s attention and intention into coherence. A coherent will is exponentially more potent than a diffuse one, and most people never achieve it outside of structured practice.

The second thing ritual does is communicate with the parts of the mind that don’t respond to ordinary language. The unconscious thinks in symbol, image, sensation, and repetition. Rational intention alone rarely moves it. But when you enact something physically, when you burn a thing, bury a thing, speak words at a specific hour under a specific sky, you are sending instructions downward into layers of the psyche that operate below argument. The ritual bypasses the skeptical intellect and lands somewhere older and more receptive.

The third dimension is relational. Ritual magic operates within a web of relationships with forces, entities, or principles that exist beyond the individual self. Whether those are understood as literal beings or as aspects of a deeper reality that consciousness can interface with depends on the practitioner and the tradition. But the engagement is real regardless of the metaphysics used to describe it.

And finally there is the matter of alignment. Ritual magic at its most serious is not about forcing outcomes. It is about aligning the practitioner so precisely with what they are calling in that the outcome becomes natural rather than coerced. The magic is less a command and more a becoming. You don’t so much make something happen as you become the kind of thing it happens to.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

[ioanadelamare]

Finally allowing myself to come to witchcraft feels so natural and grounding that I wonder why it took so long. Then I remember growing up with the aftermath of the Goddess movement and Wicca and the absolute shit those women got daring to try break away from male-dominated religions. It's like every iteration of an attempt at female spirituality has been demeaned since the beginning. I'm also thinking of the female performance and land artists of the 70's who worked parallel to these movements and were trying to conceptualise their own relationships to their body and the earth and how they were labelled as neurotic and crazy for linking the two. We never really got past that.

[sourwoodsun]

Tell me about it! There is such a strong internal barrier one must overcome and then you do, and it is so natural and uplifting... maybe that is why the barrier is installed in the first place. Women's spirituality has the potential to make us too unapologetic, too confident, too whole to be good for the patriarchy

[housecarpenter]

thank GOD for female folk singers. Without them and their haunting voices I would just be walking around with a big old HOLE in my chest. 

[h4nifah]

this idealistic self-optimised fully healed completely emotionally regulated and stable person with zero negative qualities or behaviours that people imagine you can become after a certain amount of healing or therapy literally doesn’t exist

[pixiebiz]

Dianic Wiccan Goddess Self Blessing, as taught by Ruth Barrett. Can be found in her book "Women's Rites, Women's Mysteries: Intuitive Ritual Creation"

[dvoeverie-stitches]

From:

Goddess Embroideries of the Northlands by Mary B. Kelly, 2007

Personal library

[twoblogger]

It kind of fucks with me that somebody killed ötzi the iceman because ötzi himself is like whatever but the silent presence of human hands that drew back the string of the bow that shot the arrow that killed him is crazy. the idea that there were various people involved in that situation and while one of them has had his last hours painstakingly reconstructed and studied to no end, the others now only exist insofar that an arrowhead had to get into his shoulder somehow. imagine killing someone and then suddenly your entire existence is only a vague shadow implied by the fact that you killed them. much to consider

[twoblogger]

Testing the mummified bone marrow of ötzi to figure out his ancestry whole time there’s definitely another person, maybe more than one, standing in the room with us but I can never see or speak to them because I only know them through the assurance that they were there too in the form of one single arrowhead. I hate prehistory so much it’s unreal

[angel-derangement]

I hate it too tbh

[twoblogger]

It kind of fucks with me that somebody killed ötzi the iceman because ötzi himself is like whatever but the silent presence of human hands that drew back the string of the bow that shot the arrow that killed him is crazy. the idea that there were various people involved in that situation and while one of them has had his last hours painstakingly reconstructed and studied to no end, the others now only exist insofar that an arrowhead had to get into his shoulder somehow. imagine killing someone and then suddenly your entire existence is only a vague shadow implied by the fact that you killed them. much to consider

[twoblogger]

Testing the mummified bone marrow of ötzi to figure out his ancestry whole time there’s definitely another person, maybe more than one, standing in the room with us but I can never see or speak to them because I only know them through the assurance that they were there too in the form of one single arrowhead. I hate prehistory so much it’s unreal

[angel-derangement]

I hate it too tbh

[corrucyst]

REAL masculinity is about [traits and behaviors that anyone can have that youre gendering for reasons that are ultimately misogynistic]

[watermelinoe]

mind-body dualism will have people thinking that pregnancy is passive

[watermelinoe]

mind-body dualism is the reason people think of the female body as an incubator. both the left and the right think this way. people who believe in gender, left-wing or right-wing, think of the female body as the living meat-sack that gets pregnant while the "real person" is trapped inside. that's why defining womanhood simply as one's sex is inherently dehumanizing to the gender-believing left, because they think the human body is something crude and primitive, unenlightened, unlike the true essence of humanity, whether that's the human mind or soul, which pilots the corruptible flesh. it's an inherently religious belief even from the non-religious.

if the female body is just meat and not "us," then pregnancy is simply something that happens to your body. the right believes it is our god-given duty to allow that process to happen, like the virgin mary quietly accepted her fate and allowed her body to be used. the progressive left argues that we don't have to allow that process to happen, because our body is not owned by god, it is owned by us. but from both perspectives, the framing of pregnancy is passive. our body is property, whether it belongs to god or to us.

what if my body is not a container? what if my body is me? what if pregnancy is active, not some external process happening to the container i happen to own and inhabit? what if it shapes who i am, not just my body, and there are actions i can take because i don't want it to? thanks to human innovation, the same way your god decides whether to grant life, i can decide not to create new life. it's not just my body, my choice. it's me.

[luminouslumity]

I love the story of the Yellowstone wolves!

[unrespectability]

i think the weirdest bit of anti-terf warriors' propaganda i've seen is this constant insistence that radfems are all feminine women who hate gender-nonconformity & despise masc lesbians and masc women in general 😭 i definitely get what purpose that lie Serves & it's serving it well but it's wild that people like. genuinely, sincerely believe that. to the point of finding it AMUSING to stumble upon a masc woman in radfem spaces. hello...

[gloomyrelaxing]

We are puritan prude tradwives who exclusively subscribe to 50s feminine ideals but also hairy ugly feminazis who are bitter that we can’t get husbands but also lying detransitioners who have a hate boner against the TQ+ cause hormones didn’t make us attractive but also plain boring white cis women who are jealous of transwomen for performing womanhood better but also-

[sourwoodsun]

We are everything. They're just Ken.

[read-books-by-women]

Conforming to feminine stereotypes of subservice and self-abnegation has provided women with a back-door route to self-assertion. You can have a voice as long as it does not look too much like speaking for yourself. Perhaps your priority is God, or your children, or the rotten souls of men, or the good of society as a whole. Perhaps it is ending cisnormative heteropatriarchal capitalist cultures of exclusionary radicalisation (aka Mumsnet). As long as your priority isn't just yourself or other women. This apporach has sometimes been viewed as a 'feminine' way of exercising power. Alternatively, it can be viewed as a last resort for those denied the ability to express their needs plainly.

Victoria Smith (2025): Unkind. How 'be kind' entrenches sexism. Fleet, p. 44