Portland artist and spiritual guide, James Galluzzo is having an art show exploring and dedicated to the sacred feminine from 11-4 on Sunday, 16 September, 2012. The show will be centered around six large paintings that cannot help but pull you into the energy of the divine feminine. There will be prints, posters and cards available at the show with 25% of the proceeds going to support the Leadership Conference of Women Religious in their struggles with the Vatican – the Women Religious have been in the news lately as they have fought to keep their focus on social justice and helping those in need.

Galluzzo describes the six large paintings as:

HER NAME — these are many of the names for the sacred feminine founded in pre-Christianity.

MOTHER EARTH — words and images of the Earth Mother.

MOTHER OF PASSION, FIRE and SPIRIT — the heart and passion that brings life and creativity to the world.

SOPHIA — Wisdom, Spirit.

MOTHER MADONNA — the mother, Madonna image throughout Christianity, life bearer.

COSMIC MOTHER — the mother of the universe, the one who holds the sacred creation story.

On a flyer distributed for the show, Galluzzo gives some background information about the Sophia aspect of the sacred feminine. He writes:

HISTORICAL CONTEXT: Sophia: Goddess of Wisdom
Who is Sophia? Literally she is Wisdom, because the Greek word Sophia means “wisdom” in English. Sophia is the Wisdom of Deity. She has been revered as the Wise Bride of Solomon by the Jews, as the Queen of Wisdom and War (Athena) by the Greeks, and as the Holy Spirit as Wisdom by Christians.

Sophia is found throughout the wisdom books of the Bible. There are many references to her in the book of Proverbs, in the apocryphal books of Sirach and the Wisdom of Solomon. She is Wisdom Incarnate, the Goddess of all those who are wise.

Is it any wonder that Sophia is constantly associated with wise King Solomon? 1 Kings 4:29-31 tells us that God gave wisdom to Solomon.

The Jews revered Sophia, King Solomon even put her right in the Temple, in the form of the Goddess Asherah. However, after the brutal “reforms” of King Josiah described in 1st and 2nd Kings in your Bible, the veneration of Sophia went underground. Josiah slaughtered all her priests and priestesses and destroyed her shrines and places of worship. But Sophia adherents remained active in the “underground stream” for centuries even while patriarchal Christianity held total sway in the Western World.

Thanks to her continuing presence in the world and her presence in the Bible, veneration of Sophia surfaced in the Eastern Christian traditions with the construction of the Hagia Sophia cathedral in Constantinople. The Russian Catholic liturgical service to Sophia combined with the assumption of Mary on May 15. The Russian Orthodox Church has also begun a school of “Sophiology” to explore the theology.

PRESENT TIME
In the West, Sophia has not always been honored, she has been in exile and it is time we must call the Bride out of Exile.

The world, the church and our country are in deep need of the sacred feminine. We are in need of passion, the heart, compassion and caring for others. It is our responsibility to embrace the sacred feminine.

What the Vatican is doing to religious women is just another example of keeping the bride in exile.

The show will be held at the Urban Spirituality Center at 1314 NW Irving, Ste. 512 in Portland, Oregon. Push 052 to enter.

Sekhet-Matt Lodge, the Portland chapter of the Ordo Templi Orientis, was the victim of an arson fire early this morning. According to the story on OregonLive, the fire resulted in roughly $5,000 in structural damage and another $1,000 worth of damage to contents of the lodge.

The Portland Tribune’s coverage of the story was the only place I saw where they asked what Sekhet-Matt Lodge and the OTO are, although the answer was so vague that it may have been better left out altogether. My concerns about this are more about who did this and why. The OTO is an esoteric initiatory order which carries on the teachings and work of the occultist Aleister Crowley and has not been free of controversy since Crowley took over and restructured the order nearly 100 years ago. My concerns are echoed by a local neighbor in the story on koinlocal6.com when she says, “If it is a personal act against people for what they believe in, it concerns me.” That is what concerns me as well.

The fire was even mentioned on KATU News:

The wonderful folks over at PortlandWiki are reaching out to the Portland community for contributors, readers, and feedback. They are holding a “barn raising” event next Saturday, 5 March from 2pm until 5pm at Central Library in downtown Portland (801 S.W. 10th Ave.), which will include speakers, participatory discussions, “how to” lessons, and an all around great opportunity to participate in building community. For more information, you can visit PortlandWiki’s wiki on the event, or you can visit the facebook event page or the calagator page. Free food and drinks will be available.

Earlier today, hundreds of people gathered into downtown Portland to stand in solidarity with the workers in Wisconsin. While I was unable to personally attend the event, Mark Dilley was able to get some great photos of the event:

While the circumstances in Wisconsin are getting a lot of attention (and justifiably so!), Wisconsin is only a more extreme instance of what seems to me to be an all-out assault on American workers. In their coverage of the story, local news station KATU noted:

Meanwhile, negotiations with public employee unions are under way in Oregon, with much less noise than the fights in the Midwest.

Still, the stakes are high for Oregon union members, as the state looks to save money wherever it can. All sides agree that government workers will see smaller paychecks when lawmakers wrap up negotiations on a budget for the next two years.

Tomorrow people are supposed to be gathering in the capitals of all of the American cities to stand up for worker’s rights. Can it make a difference? Yes. Will it make a difference? That is yet to be seen.