Encouraged by my devout sister-in-law, I’ve just finished Surprised at Oxford, a memoir by Carolyn Weber. Attending Oxford University on scholarship in the 1990s, Ms Weber experienced a year of emotional upheaval, leading not only to finding love but to a heartfelt religious conversion. She found her answers in Evangelical Christianity and the promise of eternal life, which, in her telling, gave ultimate meaning to everything.
PaganSquare
PaganSquare is a community blog space where Pagans can discuss topics relevant to the life and spiritual practice of all Pagans.
A great relationship can be cultivated, literally. By planting and carefully tending flowers that have special properties—like night-blooming jasmine for heightened sensuality, or lilies for lasting commitment—you can nurture your relationship. During a new moon in the Venus-ruled signs of Taurus or Libra, plant an assortment of flowers that will surround you with the beauty and energy of sweet devotion.
Before you place your hothouse posies or seeds into pots or flowerbeds, bless the ground with a prayer of health for your plants, yourself, and your relationships.
...Tantra, a greatly overused and gravely misunderstood term, comes from Sanskrit, and means “Ritual, Meditation, and Discipline.” It involves a form of mutual worship of the Godhead (lingam) and the Goddesshead (yoni), in which divinity is achieved through simultaneous erotic and emotional union. This exquisite approach to deepening the love between you and your partner requires you to share mutually held intentions.
At the nearest greenhouse or floral show, buy as many gardenias as your purse will allow. Ten or twenty of these heavenly flowers will fill your bower with a sweet, seductive air. Place some of the flowers in crystal-clear bowls of water and some in a warm footbath, and scatter some petals in your bed. Undress and light a single gardenia-scented candle at the head of the bed. Crush some of the petals and rub them into your skin and hair, then chant this love spell:
...In Ariadne's Tribe, we associate various animals, plants, and objects with our deities: the griffin with Therasia, the staff with Korydallos, geese and white and yellow flowers with Antheia, for instance. These items help us identify the deities in Minoan art. In that sense, they're kind of like name tags or labels.
But there's another collection of attributes that we associate with our deities as well. Like the ones I just mentioned, these can also help us identify the deity or their domain in the art. But more importantly, they indicate a special type of relationship between the deity and the humans who work in certain occupations or who raise certain food crops.
...To attract new love, two nights before the full moon, take a small pink votive candle and place it inside your cauldron or any large metal pot. Lay a rose and a bell beside the cauldron and your altar. Use either rose or apple blossom essential oil to anoint the candle’s wick. For the next two nights, light the candle, cup it in your hands, and direct loving thoughts into its flame. On the night of the full moon, take a thorn from the rose and carve the name of your heart’s desire into the candle’s wax, reciting:
I will find true love.
...
They enter from opposite ends of the circle: he in antlers and bare chest, she shrouded in shadow.
A flute sings. They join hands and dance.
Their dance ended, she reaches into his chest. He gives an involuntary, back-of-the-throat groan, and falls back.
Over him, she opens her hand: an apple, pulsing in the firelight. I wince at the juicy squelching noises as she cuts it up.
The pieces pass. We eat. On my palate, dull from fasting, the juice sings like autumn rain.