00:01:15.700She co-authored an overwhelming goddess history called The Great Cosmic Mother.
00:01:20.200She walked through live munitions testing from Silbury Mound to Stonehenge.
00:01:25.620had her iconic paintings threatened with gross indecency charges and as the guardian wrote in
00:01:31.120their loving obituary she and others from end patriarchy now interrupted a bristol cathedral
00:01:37.060service to demonstrate against the non-recognition of female spirituality by the church of england
00:01:41.960and the dean joined hands with them to sing to the goddess in front of the altar turns out that
00:01:47.820last bit may be some wishful historicizing as it doesn't play out quite so satisfyingly in her own
00:01:53.900telling of what went down that day. Nevertheless, we knew we'd found the feminist activist artist1.00
00:01:59.240which we'd been looking for. In the wake of life-shattering sickness and death,
00:02:04.740Show ventured deeply into the world of 1970s and 80s New Age. And in response to what she found
00:02:10.880there, she wrote a fucking scathing takedown under the title New Age and Armageddon. She wrote of0.99
00:02:17.940its gatekeeping, patriarchy, and earth betrayal, and of the reckless appropriation of indigenous
00:02:23.420of spiritualities by the New Age movement that still resonates and shakes you when you read it
00:02:27.980today. At least it shook me. I read Cosmic Mother and shows New Age and Armageddon while I traveled
00:02:34.640across Canada, seven months pregnant, camping in national parks and forest reserves and at folk
00:02:40.680festivals. This is not my norm. I work in tech and media and produce events, but this was my
00:02:47.140hippie baby moon, and Monica Cho was a fierce and loving and ideal companion. Monica Cho grew up in0.95
00:02:55.320Sweden. Her father was a minor painter who seems to have left her with an inherited instinct for
00:03:00.440direct, uncluttered, raw folk Nordic art, as well as a revulsion for the way the male gaze and
00:03:07.360sneaking hands can violate a woman's experience of loving art and making art or earning a little
00:03:13.120necessary money by being painted as an artist's muse. Her mother was a wonderful painter, but as
00:03:18.240Sho said, her father would turn her mother's paintings to face the wall. Her mother and
00:03:23.680father separated, and Sho was on her own by the age of 17, with 20 pounds in her pocket.
00:03:28.660She worked as an artist model in Paris and Rome, traveled around Europe, paid her way by experiencing,
00:03:33.880in her words, being seen as the ultimate object. She says her feminism originated in the experience0.97
00:03:40.840of having her second son in her home. She had a home birth after a highly medicalized and
00:03:46.020stressful hospital birth, and about seven years before the great godmother of the home birth
00:03:50.640movement in the States would publish the book most cited on the topic today, Ina Mae Gaskin's
00:03:55.840Spiritual Midwifery. Spiritual Midwifery, published in 1975, asserts that birth can be euphoric
00:04:02.420and an experience of a uniquely female power. Show expressed this on canvas. She writes,
00:04:09.040The painting was based on the natural home birth of my second son, Toivo, in 1961, a birth that I experienced as a first initiation to the great mother who was both imminent and transcendent, both dark and light.
00:04:22.040For the first time, I experienced the enormous power of my woman's body, both painful and cosmic, and I saw in my mind's eye great luminous masses of blackness and masses of radiant light coming and going, the goddess of the universe in her pure energy body.
00:04:41.700This birth changed my life and set me questioning the patriarchal culture we live in and its religions that deny the life-creating powers of the mothers and of the greater mother.
00:04:52.040In ancient matrifocal cultures during the Neolithic, women gave birth in the sacred precincts of the great goddess, where they were attended by shaman priestesses who were midwives, herbal healers, and astrologers.
00:05:06.220Birth was a sacrament, and Vicki Noble once wrote that the original shaman is the birthing woman, as she flies between the worlds, bringing the spirits of the ancestors back into this realm, risking their own lives whilst doing so.
00:05:22.040I had given birth to my first son in a hospital in Stockholm, and it had been a disaster for both of us.
00:05:28.680This home birth, without medical and technical interventions, opened me up to the powers of the Great Mother.
00:05:35.160In all patriarchies, women are desacralized and diminished, and medicine and religion have been taken over by men who envy women's creative sexual powers.
00:05:43.960I wanted to create a painting that would express my emerging religious belief in the Great Mother as the matrix of cosmic creation.0.99
00:05:50.940I didn't want her to be a white woman. As a result of this work, I was nearly taken to court and my0.99
00:05:56.680painting was censured many times during the 70s and 80s. It was considered ugly, obscene, and
00:06:02.840blasphemous. A modern-day witch hunt was carried out against me in my work, and it was racist also.
00:06:09.780I didn't know at the time I did the painting that the entire human race is thought to have
00:06:13.680originated from one or a handful of African women in the mists of time. This has been traced through
00:06:20.180the mitochondrial DNA which is only carried through the mothers and women. In 1968 there was
00:06:26.060also no women's arts movement or a goddess movement and I felt totally alone. I had a sense
00:06:31.840though that ancient women who coincide with us in another time space were communicating with and
00:06:37.940through me. I was their medium and gateway into this world. Sho's descriptions and paintings of0.51
00:06:45.000her own experience predate the modern midwife movement and the goddess movement and much of
00:06:49.460second wave feminism. By 1968, her painting God Giving Birth, which came from her own experience
00:06:55.640of connecting with the living web of women stretching back hundreds of millions of
00:07:00.500generations who have nurtured life from the dark and with great labor brought the next link forward,
00:07:06.000her powerful visual expression of that viscerally learned new knowledge was exhibited and by 1970
00:07:11.660censored. The mayor of St. Ives objected to the painting and ordered it to be removed on the
00:07:16.620grounds that it was blasphemous. God giving birth and some other of my paintings were censured and
00:07:21.840not allowed to be shown anywhere in the town. It caused a scandal and I was traumatized. I was
00:07:26.740breastfeeding at the time and felt vulnerable. Sho's friends will know much better than we can0.99
00:07:31.660poring over her paintings and essays and books but looking at them from this distance I wonder
00:07:36.400if she ever did find a safe place to land. Besides that is that liminal place she gave us
00:07:41.240and crucially gave herself in her paintings. In her paintings, she became a spiritual conduit.
00:07:47.120She magically brought into being this woman, these women who had been before. The paintings are
00:07:53.200beautiful. We'll post several on our Missing Witches Instagram this week so you can see.
00:07:58.300They are sometimes stark with hard whites and blues like stones, cairns, great birds at night,
00:08:04.980the gray scale of a world lit by the moon. They most often depict women, often many races together,
00:08:10.420with a gentleness and strength and an iconic simplicity
00:08:37.140a lovingly and beautifully produced magazine of feminist spirituality.
00:08:42.080And she is co-authoring The Great Cosmic Mother with incredibly devoted researcher and writer
00:08:46.980Barbara Moore, and is reading key early essays in the rising tide of second-wave feminism
00:08:52.080from Sheila Robotham, Mary Daly, Susan Griffith, Adrienne Rich, and Andrea Dworkin.
00:08:59.600The Guardian described her as a bridge between radical and spiritual feminism and British
00:09:05.200Wiccans during the 1970s and 1980s. She poked holes and stitched links and repeatedly put her0.99
00:09:12.320own body on the line against the all-consuming status quo. The Great Cosmic Mother, her research1.00
00:09:18.460tome of women's spiritual history is, in our opinion, a must-read for women and witches trying
00:09:23.920to put the current witch trend into a context long violated and obscured. Just a couple examples from
00:09:31.460500 pages of truth bombs and snatch your breath insights. Just as established religions assume
00:09:39.340the maleness of God, just as Freud and psychoanalysis assumed the maleness of libido,
00:09:44.540so have the social sciences, and in particular anthropology, assumed the generic maleness
00:09:49.800of human evolution. Both popular and academic anthropological writers have presented us with
00:09:55.260scenarios of human evolution that feature almost exclusively the adventures and inventions of man
00:10:00.700the hunter, man the toolmaker, man the territorial marker, and so forth. This despite the known fact
00:10:08.540that among contemporary and historic hunting and gathering people, as among our remote hunting and
00:10:13.700gathering ancestors, 75 to 80 percent of the group's subsistence comes from the women's food gathering
00:10:19.700activities. This despite the known fact that the oldest tools used by contemporary hunters and
00:10:25.640gatherers and the oldest, most primal tools ever found in ancient sites are women's digging sticks.
00:10:32.580This despite worldwide legends that cite women as the first users and domesticators of fire.
00:10:38.780This despite the known fact that women were the first potters, the first weavers, the first0.68
00:10:43.980textile dyers and hide tanners, the first to gather and study medicinal plants, i.e. the first0.56
00:10:49.980doctors, and on and on. Observing the linguistic interplay between mothers and infants, mothers and
00:10:58.020children, and among work groups of women, it's easy to speculate on the female contribution to
00:11:03.140the origin and elaboration of language. That the first time measurements ever made, the first
00:11:08.640formal calendars were women's lunar markings on painted pebbles and carved sticks, is also known.
00:11:14.620And it is thoroughly known that the only God image ever painted on rock, carved in stone, or sculpted in clay, from the Upper Paleolithic to the Middle Neolithic, and that's roughly 30,000 years, was the image of a human female.
00:11:32.880The threefold goddess of Arabia, Magna Dea, was enshrined in the sacred black stone, the Kaaba at Mecca, where she was served in ancient times by her priestesses.
00:11:43.440The sacred black stone at Mecca, site of so many pilgrimages, is imprinted with her Volva Yoni sign
00:11:49.260and covered with a black pall called the Skirt of Kaaba.0.59
00:11:53.200The male priests who serve her today are called Benisheba, which means the sons of the old woman, i.e. the moon.
00:12:00.800Present-day Muslim pilgrims to this shrine, the most holy place of all Islam,
00:12:04.640are probably mostly unaware of the pre-Islamic significance of the Kaaba.
00:12:08.760They circle the black stone seven times to attain the summit by spiraling around it.
00:12:15.280Seven is the number of the moon, and the ancients always danced the way in spiral processions to the summits of her earth mounds.
00:12:22.860Moon shrines and sanctuaries were situated in forests, in caves, and on mountaintops,
00:12:28.340and by lakes, sacred springs, and wells that were also healing centers.
00:12:34.460Priestesses guarded the water supplies as well as the sacred fires.
00:12:37.620This was true even in Roman times, where the priestesses were called Vestal Virgins.
00:12:43.060Ancient Moon Priestesses were called Virgins, and Virgin meant not Mary, not belonging to a man, a woman who was one in herself.
00:12:51.640The very word derives from a Latin root meaning strength, force, skill, and was later applied to men, Viral.
00:12:59.400Ishtar, Diana, Astarte, Isis were all called Virgin, which did not refer to sexual chastity.
00:13:06.080sorry about it, but sexual independence. And all great culture heroes of the past,
00:13:13.600mythic or historic, were said to be born of virgin mothers. Marduk, Gilgamesh, Buddha,
00:13:19.800Osiris, Dionysius, Genghis Khan, Jesus, they were all affirmed as sons of the great mother,
00:13:25.920of the original one, their worldly power deriving from her. When the Hebrews used the word, and in
00:13:33.000the original Aramaic, it meant maiden or young woman with no connotations of sexual chastity.
00:13:39.120But later Christian translators could not conceive of the Virgin Mary as a woman of
00:13:44.100independent sexuality. Needless to say, they distorted the meaning into sexually pure,
00:13:49.900chaste, never touched. When Joan of Arc with her witch coven associations was called la pucelle,0.58
00:13:56.520the maiden, the virgin, the word retained some of its original pagan sense of a strong
00:14:02.160and independent woman. The moon goddess was worshipped in orgiastic rites, being the divinity
00:14:07.640of matriarchal women, free to take as many lovers as they choose. Show's writing in her work is
00:14:14.900luminous and furious. In The Cosmic Mother, and even more so in New Age and Armageddon and
00:14:21.200subsequent essays, she is howling and raging against the violence done to the earth, to true0.58
00:14:26.100history, to women's bodies and spirits, and she is furious and activist against the slippery ways
00:14:31.980she sees patriarchy, not just men, taking what it wants from ancient knowledge to sell it to us all0.84
00:14:38.440again and keep us docile and afraid. She writes in New Age and Armageddon, channeling originated
00:14:45.080in California. Shirley MacLaine a few years ago held a working seminar on reincarnation and
00:14:50.580channeling which sold out at over a hundred pounds a ticket. The actress explained to a thousand
00:14:56.100people why she had to charge for helping people to find their power within because it is karmically0.55
00:15:01.340unbalanced to do something for nothing, she said. Psychic News feels she has sanitized the0.95
00:15:07.580supernatural for Americans. Another medium, Mrs. Jay-Z Knight, has been channeling the spirit guide
00:15:14.960Ramtha, who claims to be 35,000 years old since 1977. She charges people $400 to attend her
00:15:22.540meetings, and the sale of videotapes and other items brings in millions of dollars each year.
00:15:27.560She has said, I'm not a guru or someone's savior.
00:15:32.680As a result of Ramtha's apocalyptic teachings, rich followers are moving to the Pacific Northwest
00:15:38.600and building pyramid houses in preparation for catastrophes to come.
00:15:44.020This is in contrast to the loving service given by ordinary spiritualist healers and
00:15:48.540mediums in Britain who only ask for voluntary contributions and who believe that their powers
00:15:53.600come through them from the spirit and must not be abused or used for personal gain.
00:16:00.240It cannot be a coincidence that now, when women are reawakening worldwide and the goddess is
00:16:06.280speaking through us, along comes the New Age movement with its innumerable male gurus,
00:16:11.800teachers, masters, shamans, and therapists, telling women yet again who we are, who we should be,
00:16:19.040and what we are to believe. We are to aspire to Christ consciousness and identify with the sons
00:16:24.700of light and solar fathers, never mind that to the ancients the sun was most commonly a goddess.
00:16:30.000We are to act out the feminine principle, popularly called yin, as defined by heterosexual
00:16:35.600patriarchal men. Many of these self-proclaimed authoritarian and misogynist new age gurus could
00:16:41.060be mistaken for reincarnated Old Testament prophets. The rebirthing movement which emerged
00:16:45.860in California in the 1970s encapsulates many of the most reactionary aspects of the new age.
00:16:51.920Rebirthed women, it is claimed, should aspire to become as one with Babaji, an Indian yogi who is
00:16:57.860seen by rebirthers as the father of the world, a modern Christ, and physically immortal. I find it
00:17:04.300fearful that all monotheistic patriarchal religions set out systematically to sever our umbilical
00:17:10.100psychic cord to the body mind of the earth mother or spider woman. It is as if they are attempting
00:17:17.000to tear apart the very web of life. New age thinking is of such dishonest, smug, self-righteous0.99
00:17:26.420and right-wing double think paraded as spirituality. New agers such as rebirthers can then cynically1.00
00:17:33.460claim that they deserve to be rich and physically immortal. Money flows towards those who have1.00
00:17:39.220plenty of prosperity consciousness and make the proper affirmations. They don't have to think
00:17:44.200about living in a world rampant with Western imperialism, that poverty and starvation are
00:17:49.220increased in the third world, and that as Westerners, they are the most privileged people on
00:17:53.980earth. The new age movement is, in my opinion, fundamentally flawed because new age men cannot0.99
00:18:00.360come to terms with women's real powers or with the goddess who is both of this world and of the0.69
00:18:05.740other world, both imminent and transcendent, and behave as if the women's liberation movement and
00:18:10.860goddess awareness had come and gone without a trace. In the New Age movement, there is no
00:18:16.520recognition that women were the creators of the most ancient cultures, and that the original
00:18:21.000mother of humanity and ancestor goddess was African and black. Hers is the luminous darkness0.99
00:18:26.460that creates life. There is no recognition of women's shamanistic death and rebirth every month0.99
00:18:32.480when we bleed, that women are the guardians of the twilight zones between life and death as we risk
00:18:38.240our lives giving birth, bringing spirits from the other world womb into the earth plane. Women are1.00
00:18:44.120always the communicators with the great unknown. We are so because the rhythms of our body minds1.00
00:18:49.380are in tune with those of the earth, the tides of the oceans in our very beings as we rhythmically
00:18:54.880menstruate with the moon, the radiant queen of heaven in her changes. The moon, home of the
00:19:04.120spirits and the maternal giver of mind, knowing intelligence, wisdom, visions, psychic powers,
00:19:11.540and lucid dreams. She who is both dark and light, anathema to new agers who fear the dark maiden,
00:19:18.500mother and crone. We are in conversation with the earth all the time. She is after all our mother
00:19:26.480and there is a silver astral umbilical cord that joins us to her whether or not we are aware of
00:19:32.620this. She speaks through our bodies and what we do to her we do to ourselves. Within earth in her
00:19:39.680internal fires, ores, minerals, crystals and waters there are mysterious life-giving powers that we no
00:19:46.640longer understand. I have been writing this book with a great sense of urgency because I know in
00:19:51.840my very bones that the earth is suffering and we must now use our second sight which is our birth
00:19:57.960right and be still and listen to what our mother the earth is telling us. Here's one secret of why
00:20:07.240they burn witches. Witchcraft and activism are one. With our acts, words, and rituals we are summoning0.81
00:20:15.740a better world. We summon it for ourselves. Yes, personal healing, joy, and fulfillment are one,
00:20:23.160an important part of honoring the women who came before, who brought us this far. Two, how we
00:20:28.300muster strength to press forward again, to take the knowledge of our luck and strength and beauty
00:20:33.440with us into the next entanglement for justice. Three, as above, so below. Individual healing
00:20:40.040from trauma helps set a piece of the pattern of the universe into a new and ancient rhythm
00:20:45.460of resounding care deviates the drumbeat of trauma on repeat. And this is where self-help
00:20:52.640new age magic might leave you, but this is only half. This is low tide, a drawing in
00:20:59.480of breath, a rest, a gathering of strength, a necessary withdrawal. But after low tide
00:21:08.020comes high tide, as show makes so clear over and over again in her writing and research,
00:21:14.020power and magic come from the earth she writes i believe that we are conscious and alive only
00:21:20.540because she is earth is our great planetary mother spirit we have to fight as well as heal
00:21:28.660turn to the work of resistance and of remaking the world add our energy to the waves and together
00:21:35.980make change use our healing to bring about her own to find and support each other's work
00:21:42.120to learn about her and each other with the humility and bravery of priestesses and flocking
00:21:48.520Amazons, protect the seeds, and preserve the grassroots. The Guardian describes Sho as a
00:21:57.620writer, feminist, formidable networker and activist, eco-witch, anarchist, founder member
00:22:03.560in 1969 of Bristol Women's Liberation and Inspiration Behind Amu Mawu, a Bristol Women's
00:22:10.220spirituality group. In the 1980s, with a hundred green and women, she walked across prohibited land
00:22:15.680to celebrate on the Saracen stones at Stonehenge at the full moon's eclipse.
00:22:21.500Here's how she describes that act of witchcraft melding with activism.
00:22:26.180This was the night of Beltane, and we were here to celebrate the mother. We made a Beltane fire
00:22:31.240carefully so as not to damage the mound, and then gathered to discuss a possible ritual.
00:22:35.600By now we had been joined by the American wise woman witch, Starhawk.
00:22:40.880I shared with the women the vision I had for so long of women reclaiming Silbury as our very own.
00:22:47.100And for some years, Silbury indeed became a place for a women's yearly unofficial festival at Lamas in August at full moon.
00:22:54.460Starhawk, an experienced leader of ritual, suggested that we cast a circle, calling the elements, ground ourselves, and dance the spiral dance.
00:23:01.860We danced and drummed and chanted in great joy
00:23:05.200Finally we slept, curled up close together around the mound
00:23:08.640Like children in our mother's belly or breast