Just wind me up. . .

At the Sophia Centre graduation seminar, I met the delightful Crystal Addy. I didn't realise she was John Addy's grand-daughter until I met up with her again at the AA conference. Anyway, here we are, one our way home from the conference.

I reckon being around such inherited brilliance had an effect on me as I'm now doing some astrological work for my school, which, as the school has a Christian ethos, is a rather interesting experience (I'm analysing the birth charts of pupils who are in danger of permanent exclusion to see if there is anything that can be done to help them). It's not that the powers-that-be don't believe or aren't interested in what I have to say, it's more like they're worried about what The-Powers-That-Be at the Head Office are going to say. So here's an edited version of my response:

"I'm glad you've asked about Christianity and astrology. Let’s start by exploring who the Wise Men were and just why Jesus Christ was born at the Winter Solstice and resurrected at the Spring Equinox. We’ll explore how Jesus healed the sick, talked to the dead (and even raised them), spoke to spirits, cast out demons and used magic rituals in his “miracles.” Next we’ll look at how and why a priest named Lucifer was immortalised by St Jerome. Perhaps we could have a discursive argument about the differences between fact and fiction and the relative merits of realising the Bible was not written by God with a big silver pen. We won’t speculate on how much Pagan art was defaced with Christian symbols or how many innocent people were burned at the stake by Christians (or continue to be persecuted). We’ll move smartly onto Thomas Aquinas and how he quite ingeniously merged Aristotlianism with astronomy/astrology and Christianity. Then we’ll take a detour through to Cosimo deMedici’s prodigy Ficino and his translations of Platonic texts which helped bring about a renewed interest in astrology and magic and therefore, the Renaissance. We’ll let ourselves embark on a tangent and study Pico’s famous attack on astrology and expound on how he may have been stitched up by a mad priest called Savaronola. Backtracking slightly, we’ll investigate the works of Paracelsus, Albertus Magnus and Cornelius Agrippa whose works were based on astrology and formed the basis of modern medicine. Let us mention Shakespeare and his thoughts on astrology as evidenced by his work. If someone would still like to say that what happens "up there" doesn’t affect us "down here," then I’d be happy to do a demonstration on how the tides and seasons work, and if that isn't enough, take you somewhere where we can wonder at the perfection of a lunar or, for that matter, a solar eclipse. If anyone wants to say that not everyone fits into the twelve neat categories found in newspapers then I’d be happy to agree with them and point out I have never and will never do a star sign column because I believe that that is the equivalent of a priest selling fake holy water. You want to make fun of what I believe? That smacks of bigotry—which has its basis in pure ignorance. I can put forward a very convincing argument that astrology is actually a religion and to ridicule me or my work is not only bigoted but amounts to nothing short of religious persecution."

Phew. . .I had to be fanned. And no one argued with me, hehe, but I'm ready if they want to!

Make a joke out of that? I hear you ask. Here's a Venus in Virgo, trine Moon in Taurus trine Sun in Capricorn (get it?) joke:

You know what would have happened if it had been three wise WOMEN instead of men, don’t you? They would have asked for directions, arrived on time, helped deliver the baby, cleaned the stable, made a casserole, and brought disposable diapers as gifts!