And the Wheel of the Year keeps on turning.
My little pagan soul is happy.
We have just passed the first cross quarter day of the year.
That day midway between Midwinter and the Spring equinox.
In the Celtic extremities of Europe and among neo paganists Imbolc is still celebrated with a distant rememberance of the mother goddess Danu.
The Christans not to be out done then transmutated this, as they did with all the other pagan festivals, into St Brigid’s Day or Candlemas
And as nicely explained by John Anthony Brennan in his post Festival of Imbolc and the Two Brigids.
Meanwhile in the Afro Brazilian sector of the southern hemisphere we celebrate Iemanja which is probably the most observed feast in the pantheon of Afro Brazilian deities and calender celebrated by the up to two million followers of Candomble, especially women.
Both of these dieties Iemanja and Danu stretch far back to the dawn of time and both are celebrations of the great mother, symbolizing fertility and protection.
That James Joyce was also born on 02 February just helps delightfully square this circle.
Axé.
