Today's Oracle 24th April 2021

Power of Place (Calling in the Spirit of Place)

The landscape, its hills, glens, plains, shorelines, nooks, and crannies, are the features of the body of the mother goddess, the earth. Place-names honour the unique qualities and lore of place. Similarly, honouring the power of place situates us in the passage of time.

Invoking the Qualities of Familiarity, Remembrance, and Continuity.

The Celts often name a place for its qualities and lore - a dell for providing shelter, a marshy corner for its soft and rushy bottom, a ring fort to signal an otherworldly ambiance, a meadow to mark the battles fought, or a holy well for its protectress. Affecting recollection, familiar places help us to situate ourselves in the passage of time and locale. Recalling such a place, Irish poet Cathal O Searcaigh concludes: "Contradictions are cancelled on the spot."

IF YOU ARE DRAWN TO THIS ORACLE, you are yearning for a place you can call your own, perhaps a home, a village, a region or country, or a community. You seem to want somewhere to root, to settle, and invest yourself fully. Not anywhere will do. The place must be uniquely right for you. The power of the place compels you. Its atmosphere, physical features, people, vegetation, smells, and wildlife attract you. It may be where you are but your psyche has not yet fully engaged it. It may be a place deeply familiar and redolent of personal memories. Wherever this place is, you are more fully alive there, as though the outer landscape mirrors the inner landscape of who you are and who you are becoming. This remarkable correspondence brings vitality and a sense of contentment and well-being.

The landscape - its rocky slopes, the forks of a river, an elder tree, a spring at its source, a widening plain, or undulating hills - reveals the features of the body of the mother earth, the goddess herself. Her countenance is found in the physical appearance of each place. The power of each place is utterly unique, so that its physiognomy and stories, so familiar, are wedded to the memory of the men and women living there. In Ireland and other Celtic lands, power implicit in the stones and earth of a place is frequently distilled in place names, recollecting in a word or phrase the deeds and fortunes of memories past. Like tonic to the human spirit, the power of place - in all its nuances, the horrific and foreboding, the beautiful and innocent - links individuals and community to lore and locale.

In discussing a genre of Irish literature known as dindseanchas, the poet Seamus Heaney writes that its poems and tales "relate the meanings of place names and constitute a form of mythological etymology ... marrying] the geographical country with the country of the mind. Heaney continues:

"The landscape was sacramental, instinct with signs, implying a system of reality beyond the visible realities. Only thirty years ago, and thirty miles from Belfast, I experienced this kind of world vestigially and as a result may have retained some vestigial sense of place as it was experienced in the older dispensation. As I walked to school, I saw Lough Beg from Mulholland's Brae, and the spire of Church Island rose out of the trees. On Church Island Sunday in September, there was a Pilgrimage out to the island, because St. Patrick was supposed to have prayed there, and prayed with such intensity that he branded the shape of his knee into a stone in the old churchyard. The rainwater that collected in that stone, of course, had healing powers, and the thorn bush beside it was pennanted with the rags used by those who rubbed their warts and sores in that water... That legend, and the ringing ascetic triumph of rising in the frosts of winter to pray ... all combined to give Blemish a nimbus of its own.

The power of place is so intimate and "self-contained" that it is virtually hidden from those who inhabit the home, the locale, the village, or the city. Entering the place, the stranger "is immediately aware of the otherness and the intimate nature of the 'place.' One senses the odours unique to the place - its sounds and artifacts.... It is this quality of intimacy, based on uniqueness, that provides the possibility for placehood." By intertwining landscape and lore, the power of place connects the human psyche within the nexus of time and space.

Over the course of life, there are times to take pilgrimages to distant places and to garner their qualities to yourself. At other times, such as now, you are invited to situate your life in a particular place, to settle in and to mature amid the familiarity and memories built up over time. Surrounded by these intimacies as though encircled by the lacework of your life, your inner life and external surroundings blend together in support of each other.

Today's Oracle 23rd April 2021

Hag, the Initiator (Beginnings)

The hag initiates change and transformation, and signals the potential for significant change and transformation in relationships and the affairs of everyday life. Her often terrifying appearance is a test of your readiness for change.

Invoking Readiness for Change.

IF YOU ARE DRAWN TO THIS ORACLE, the hag may be testing your readiness for change. Her presence signals the potential for significant shifts in business and professional life, relationships, and the affairs of everyday living. New beginnings are possible. While the hag's outward appearance may be ghastly, welcoming her signals your readiness for a shift in awareness and fortunes. Anything may happen if you embrace such an unlikely stranger across the threshold of your life.

In Irish myth, a ghastly hag symbolizes the sovereign goddess of Ireland in the quest for the rightful heir and king. Through her, he is joined to the land. When the hag mates with the rightful heir, she signals his sovereignty by becoming a lovely maiden. In Irish and Scottish folk tales, the hag gives birth to the mountains and valleys, hills and rocks, and the various creatures of the land. The hag tests and initiates beginnings and rightful change.

The powerful hag is one of the three aspects of the Triple-Mother Goddess, the sovereign goddess of the land. Typically old and yet ageless, her terrifying appearance tests the readiness of kings and heroes. In Irish, Welsh, and Scottish legends, she enchants her "chosen" heroes with magical powers and confounds and hounds any who spurn her advances. Her shape is spine-tinglingly horrid and yet radiant, as captured in a contemporary poem, originally composed in Gaelic, by Nuala Ní Dhomhnaill:

"She stood naked in the dark, her palms cold like luminous fish on my shoulders:

her hips flashing fire beneath the two moons of her breasts.

I sank my head in her seaweed hair and bitter waves of sea bruised and battered me, our white horse waves rusted to rats: all became empurpled.

In the morning waking my head aching I saw sallow scales encrusted her and rotten teeth from the abyss snarled at me and hissed.

I took my awl and last and left the place fast!"

In approaching this goddess, the Irish kings were chosen. By legend, the reign of the Uí Néill, descendants of Niall, was initiated by the blessing of the goddess of sovereignty, the hag. Though the youngest of the five sons of the king, Niall became the king of Ireland from 379-405. As the story is told in an early fifth-century manuscript, Niall and his four brothers were out hunting in the forest and were overwhelmed by thirst. One by one, each brother comes upon a pool of water guarded by a hideous hag. She offers each a drink in exchange for a kiss and each one flees at her dreadful appearance, except for Niall. He kisses the crone and makes love to her. As they kiss, the hag becomes the loveliest of maidens, her face like the radiance of the sun - none other than the goddess of sovereignty herself.

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Folk tales in Ireland, Wales, and Scotland abound in stories about the hag, the "Mountain Mother," the "Great Old One," or the Cailleach in Gaelic. Striding across the land, she "lets fall from her skirts" the natural features and creatures of the land. In Ireland, many tales tell of benevolent hags, loathsome hags, hags saved by saints from peril, and hags who turn to hares and turn back into an old neighbour woman again when caught milking the cows!

Life presents many situations that are unsettling, even abhorrent. When troubles arise, they may represent the presence of the hag, artfully disguised. There is no way to prepare for her, except to watch for her presence. She has come to test your nerve and willingness for living in a new way. Welcoming her many manifestations signals a ready and awakened consciousness. Having crossed the threshold of danger, many things - anything - is possible.

Today's Oracle 22nd April 2021

Triple-Mother goddess (Magnificence)

The Triple-Mother Goddess, commonly manifesting as maiden, mother, and crone, signifies the magnificence of Mother Earth in giving life. Expressing herself in all aspects of life, she encompasses all ages, polarities, and. expressions. Her qualities are majesty, generativity, and an inner connection with the life-giving sovereignty of the earth.

Invoking the Qualities of Majesty and Generativity.

IF YOU ARE DRAWN TO THIS ORACLE, you are invited to bring authority, stability, and vitality into your personal life and affairs. Your expression and activities may need to realign with the abundance of the Triple-Mother Goddess, the life-giving and sustaining power of the earth. Her powers are sublime and primal, rooted in the earth.

The Triple-Mother Goddess signifies the magnificence of mother earth in the giving of life. She presides over giving birth, the fluorescence and fruitfulness of plants, generativity at all ages, and the splendour of earthy and womanly wisdom. Though the mature wisdom of the aged woman is especially revered, she encompasses all ages, polarities, and expressions. Her qualities are majesty, generativity, and an inner connection with the life-giving sovereignty of the earth.

According to mythic history, when the Celts arrived on the shores of Ireland, they encountered the three sovereign mother goddesses, Ériu, Banba, and Fódla, who shielded and protected the land from harm. Each required the invaders to promise that if successful in occupying the land, the land would forever bear her name.

"They had colloquy with Ériu in Uisnech. She said unto them: Warriors, said she, welcome to you. Long have soothsayers had [knowledge of] your coming. Yours shall be this island forever; and to the east of the world there shall not be a better island. No race shall there be, more numerous than yours. good is that, said Amorgen; good is the prophecy.... A gift to me, ye sons of Mil, and ye children of Breogan, said she, that my name shall be on this island."

The Triple-Mother Goddess gives life to the land and its people. She preserves them from misfortune, injury, and danger. In her fiercest aspect, she is a warrior goddess wreaking havoc and death on intruders. Her motherliness more typically presides in the birthing of new forms of life and the nourishing and germinating of the land's flowers and vegetation. In locations as distant as Scotland and Hungary, and especially prevalent along the Rhone, Mosel, and Rhine river valleys of central Europe, carvings and sculptures of the Triple-Mother Goddess are remarkably alike. Typically she carries children, fruit, wine goblets, cornucopias or trays loaded with the fruits of the harvest.

Often the Triple-Mother Goddess manifests as a maiden, mother, and crone. One or two of the goddess figures is youthful with smooth skin and rounded cheeks and another is aged with creased cheeks and a wrinkled neck. At other times, their ages are much alike but their faces different in temperament. In the Roman-occupied areas of Germany, the three mother goddesses were consistently portrayed as a central goddess who is young with long, flowing hair, carries fruit, and is surrounded on both sides by older goddesses with large, circular headdresses made of supple willow branches covered with linen. With obvious dignity and stature, she gives the impression of unquestioned authority and magnificence.

In some ways you may feel uprooted, disconnected from the spontaneous fruitfulness of the natural world. The generative powers of the Triple-Mother Goddess will help lend a sense of majesty, authority, and ease to your intentions and actions. In aligning yourself with her spontaneous outpouring of energy, you will begin to reconnect your own life force with her expressions in others around you. Since the Triple Goddess faces in all directions, Her qualities are especially abundant in the natural environment and in the creatures that inhabit the earth. Spending time outdoors in nature enjoying her manifestations will help you to recharge.

Today's Oracle 21st April 2021

Banishing of Snakes (Loss of Hope/Regenerative Power)

The break in connection with the powers governed by the Otherworld is symbolized in the banishing of snakes (attributed to St. Patrick) in Ireland. This oracle signifies a loss of a vital connection with the powers of the physical and natural world and invites reconnection.

Invoking Breakthrough and Reconnection with the Natural World.

IF YOU ARE DRAWN TO THIS ORACLE, you are probably experiencing a loss of energy, vitality, and generativity in the world. The Banishing of Snakes signifies a disconnection with the primal elements of the earth responsible for physical, emotional, and spiritual well-being. Disconnected in this way, your body tends to feel limp and lethargic, and your emotions are likely to be depressive.

The break in the connection with the powers of the Otherworld is symbolized in the banishing of the snakes, attributed to St. Patrick in Ireland. As snakes are a well-known symbol of the goddesses, especially mother goddesses such as Brigit, the popular belief in their banishment represents a break with the primal and regenerative authority of the earth and the Otherworld. The banishing of snakes signifies the loss of hope and regenerative power and invites reconnection.

Croagh Patrick in County Mayo is the traditional site associated with St. Patrick's banishing of the snakes from Ireland. The conical mountain, tipped with white quartz, stands majestically overlooking the Atlantic Ocean at Clew Bay. Also known as the Reek, the mountain commands attention and has been a site of religious activities since ancient times.

In a delightfully Irish manner, ancient and Christian traditions intertwine at Croagh Patrick. Some thirty thousand pilgrims still come annually to ascend the mountain, circuit the stations for prayer, or join the festivities on the first Sunday in August (or the last Sunday in July), the day traditionally associated with Lughnasa, the harvest festival in honour of the warrior god Lugh. By some reports, since the mountain is associated with fertility, even. into the mid-nineteenth century only women were allowed to ascend the steep slope to the summit. There the women, and especially those who were childless, slept in the "bed" of the goddess in hope of obtaining fertility.

Many legends associated with St. Patrick depict his struggle with a snake goddess, symbolizing Brigit, and commonly known as the devil's mother, the Caora or the Caorthanach. By tradition, the mountain goddess attacks Patrick as a great bird and later as a monstrous snake. He banishes her from the mountain, but she escapes to a lake at the side of the mountain, reappearing at Lough Derg, County Donegal, to attack Patrick once again.

Reestablishing a stable connection with the transformative powers of the Otherworld typically involves a lengthy and steady process of recovery. If severely depleted, your physical body and even your emotions may require a slow rhythm to heal and revitalize. You may also have to break strong personal habits that deplete your energy and health. Many factors are involved in this process, including attention to proper diet and exercise, adequate sleep and rest, time spent outdoors, and sustaining a nurturing social and emotional life. If you have a positive and appreciative attitude toward your natural environment, your recovery will be quicker and stronger. It may also be necessary to look at ways in which you may be dismissing your own physical and sexual needs or participating in addictive habits that undermine your physical and emotional vitality.

Today's Oracle 20th April 2021

Changeling (Exchange Between Worlds)

The Changeling represents the exchange between worlds. Some people are faeries or have otherworldly characteristics. Some of them bring exceptional talents and skills. Received and used wisely, an exchange between the worlds brings otherworldly knowing.

Invoking Otherworldly Knowing and Talent.

IF YOU ARE DRAWN TO THIS ORACLE, opportunities to encounter or exchange with the Otherworld are possible. There are people of all ages who naturally convey supernatural qualities and often impress others as fey, strange, mysterious, or extraordinary. They often have exceptional supersensory or uncanny abilities, especially in music, healing, or psychic awareness. In drawing this oracle, you may be encountering these otherworldly gifts in yourself or others.

The Changeling is a faery who has taken the place of a human, often a child or a baby. In more general terms, changelings are people of all ages who bear otherworldly, fey, or faery characteristics, but otherwise live ordinary human lives. Like the Changeling, they may be unusually sensitive and have remarkable talents, such as natural musical abilities, capacity for healing, psychic awareness, or sensitivity to subtle energies. Their exceptional talents become blessings if encouraged and used wisely.

The Changeling is an exchange with the world of the faeries. A faery has taken the place of a friend or neighbour, often a child or a baby. In recent times, these stories have been sinister and frightening, engendering more fear than respect for faery sensitivities and talents. The stories now remaining may be a distorted remnant from a time when an easy and natural exchange between the middle human world and the faery world was commonplace and beneficial.

Throughout the north of Europe, and especially in Ireland, Scotland, and Wales, traditions attest to kidnappings of children by otherworldly beings with sickly or precocious impostors - changelings - left in their place. In Ireland and Scotland, changeling children are sickly, mettlesome, cranky, laugh when misfortune befalls the home, and sometimes have beards and long teeth. Though appearing as children, they typically betray their identity by conversing like adults, revealing ancient knowledge or memory of times long past, rising out of the cradle to play the pipes or the fiddle, or other unnatural actions for a child. Sometimes pipes, a fiddle, or another instrument are left beside the cradle and, when the family hears the most lovely music imaginable, the child is surely known to be a changeling. As many of the Irish and Scottish stories go, the changeling is discovered by a travelling tailor while applying his craft alone with the children:

"The man of the house wanted some clothes and sent for the tailor to make them. On that day they had a group on the bog cutting turf. Dinnertime came and the woman went out with the food for the men. She told the tailor to mind the babies while she would be out. One of them was at the bottom of the cradle and the other at the top. She wasn't long gone from the house when they spoke in the cradle. "An awkward woman's food for the turf cutters! " said one of them. "Do you remember such and such a war?" said one to the other. "I remember," said he, "and hundreds of wars besides." "Get the violin, Cathay" said the other man, "and we'll have a spell of music and dancing." He did and one of them played and the other danced.... They warned the tailor not to let on that he knew anything or he would come off worst. When the tailor finishes his work ... he put a shovel into the good turf fire and "reddened" it twice... . When it is red . . . he placed the red shovel under their backsides in the cradle and out the door with them.... A woman came to the door, and she threw in one of her own children and after a while, the other one."

Sadly, the belief in changelings has explained childhood diseases and abnormalities and has legitimised the torture of babies in attempts to rid them of the exchange. A unique or exceptional child - or even adult - runs the risk of being thought of as "away with the faeries."

In other ages, knowing things before they occur or at a distance, or healing others through touch and inward knowledge of plants and herbs, was valued and respected. People with such natural talents were recognized early on, encouraged, and trained by elders who had developed and rightfully used these talents. You may now have the opportunity to awaken and develop otherworldly talents in yourself or to support these talents in someone close to you.

Today's Oracle 19th April 2021

Hearth and Family (Right Relations)

In the cold lands in the north of Europe and elsewhere, family and friends gather near the fire at night. The warmth of the fire and the closeness of family, friends, and community is strengthened and valued.

Invoking Friendship, Family, and Community.

IF YOU ARE DRAWN TO THIS ORACLE, it is time to lighten up on your professional identity and worldly status and cultivate friendship, conversation and camaraderie, and family relationships. This oracle suggests that your life activities have carried you too far adrift from the social activities and ordinary joys of life. Being in right relations with those immediately around you is to be relaxed with the human and unprotected side of who you are. In good company, your identity and attachments to status and worldly pursuits can relax, even if only for a short while. This relaxed demeanour is not the side of your nature that you necessarily take to the office, but the side of your nature that wants to be known and nurtured informally and intimately among those you love and trust.

Before the advent of electricity, the rural Celts would entertain one another with conversation., riddles, songs, ballads, and storytelling. With a fire brightening and warming a windowless home, a storyteller would blend fact and fiction to form a seamless tale. After working in the fields by day, men and women would gather around a central hearth for evening levity, swapping of news, and storytelling. The mingling of friends and family and the welcoming of strangers around the hearth represent right relations among people.

Alexander Carmichael describes his experience of the evening ceilidh (gathering time) of the crofters and farmers of the Outer Hebrides in the late nineteenth century. As evening approaches, the house of the town's storytellers is full, making it "difficult to get inside and away from the cold wind and soft sleet without." The house is

"Roomy and clean, if homely, with its bright peat fire in the middle of the floor. There are many present men and women, boys and girls. All the women are seated, and most of the men. girls are crouched between the knees of fathers or brothers or friends, while boys wherever boy like they can climb. The houseman is twisting twigs of heather into ropes to hold down thatch, a neighbour crofter is twining quicken roots into cords to tie cows, while another is plaiting bent grass into baskets to hold meal. The housewife is spinning, a daughter is carding.... Neighbour wives and neighbour daughters are knitting, sewing, or embroidering.... The speaker is eagerly listened to, and is urged to tell more. But, he pleads that he came to hear and not to speak, saying

The first story from the host, story till day from the guest."

The joy and art of ready conversation, music, humour, banter, and repartee are greatly prized in Celtic lands. Even today in Ireland, the soft warmth of a peat fire and lively conversation attract more attention than the nightly news or BBC. In the winter months, much of the home entertainment of Ireland, Scotland, and Wales is graced nightly by the conversation of neighbours, especially if houseguests are willing to oblige an eager audience with tales of distant places (though anywhere will do, like America or England). If you are known for pipin' or fiddlin' or tellin' stories, you will be asked to entertain. A praiseworthy Irish compliment is to be thought a "good crack," that is, capable of setting others laughing, thereby fashioning an atmosphere to forget the cares and struggles of the day. As is proverbial in Ireland, village pubs are the gathering places of neighbours. Here the melodious strains of conversation and music intertwine.

The art of socializing for the sheer joy of it seems curiously dated in the twentieth century. Nonetheless, all of us need the community of right relations, the cultivation of familiar and relaxed social relationships.

Today's Oracle 18th April 2021

Leprechauns (Earth)

Leprechauns represent the playful and resourceful qualities of the earth. By poking fun at our desire for riches, the leprechauns teach us detachment and equanimity in relationship to material wealth and status.

Invoking the Qualities of Playfulness and Mirth.

IF YOU ARE DRAWN TO THIS ORACLE, you are attracting the playful and resourceful qualities of the earth. The leprechaun is boundlessly rich. Each time he opens his silken purse, he finds another golden guinea. Yet his presence often has a double meaning. On the one hand, he beckons the rich resources of the earth toward you, tempts you, and may bountifully reward you. On the other hand, he often turns your attachment toward wealth into a standing joke in which you are the principal player.

The leprechaun is a small, mischievous, and wizened man who often appears dressed in fanciful clothes such as a red vest, green trousers, and a conical hat. Aligned with the otherworldly powers of the subterranean earth, he knows its hidden treasures and is therefore very rich. When encountered cobbling in a lonely place, humans torment him to relinquish his golden guinea purse or lead them to a crock of gold. Through cleverness and trickery, he typically outwits his captors and escapes.

The leprechaun is known by many local names throughout Ireland. All manner of similar dwarves and gnomes inhabit the stories of western Europe, especially Germany and France, particularly Celtic Brittany in France. The leprechaun often lives in the ground or in rock caverns and caves. Though commonly connected with the faeries or known as the cobbler to the faeries, the leprechaun is a singular otherworldly being associated with the underground and its riches, especially gold and hidden treasure.

Most commonly, a leprechaun appears as a small and mischievous man, a wee cobbler, who possesses an inexhaustible purse of golden coins or hidden treasure. Typically encountered at the thresholds of time, just before dawn or after night has fallen, a leprechaun will often be dressed like a country gentleman of the last century, wearing a fanciful red vest with gold buttons or a gentleman's dress coat with large buttons, tight fitting trousers or knee-breeches, and curious shoes with large metal buckles or boots with curled-up and pointed toes. Occasionally, a leprechaun will befriend a poor farmer or a child by leading them to hidden treasure or leaving a guinea in an old chest each night. Some leprechauns live merrily in the wine cellars of old and noble families - as long as good wine is kept in the cellar. Nonetheless, most leprechauns are seen cobbling a single shoe in a hedgerow or out in the bog. When chased, he may disappear as though swallowed by the ground.

A common leprechaun story tells of a man, or occasionally a woman, who catches a leprechaun cobbling on a single shoe and makes a "close prisoner" of him. Until he tells where the gold is, the leprechaun has no chance of getting away. Taking the man out to an old ring fort where the faeries live, the leprechaun shows him a big ragwort, and says, "Dig under this weed tomorrow morning and you'll get a crock of gold." "Wait," he says, "and we'll mark it. Take off my red garter and tie it around the [ragwort], and you'll know where to dig in the morning." The man does exactly that and lets the wee man go. When he comes out in the morning, there is a red garter on every ragwort in the field, thousands of them, exactly the same size and pattern.

Even with a tight grasp about a leprechaun, the wee man can only be trapped by an unbroken stare. Many stories of leprechauns tell of his imitating a lover's voice from behind, alerting the captor to some alleged danger, creating a ruckus, and the like. A likely story from Ireland goes like this:

"The clocharachán [a local name for a leprechaun] makes shoes inside a little rock cavern and he has sparán na scillinge: every  time you'd look. the purse there would be a shilling there. You'd seldom see the clocharachán and it is very difficult to catch him. A man heard that he was in some rock cavern or other. He came upon him one evening and gripped him firmly.

",give me your purse! " said the matt.

"Let me go," said the clocharachán, "and I'll give you the purse."

If you took our eye off him he'd get away from you.

"Get a red-hot spit," said the clocharachán, "and stick it in his backside!"

The man looked all around him and the clocharachán departed and took his purse away with him!"

The presence of this oracle suggests that you are being tempted by material resources in the form of money, great opportunities, or a "deal." These material resources may come, but more likely, they are ephemeral. Being a natural trickster and mischief-maker, there is no telling what the leprechaun's influence will be. There is no human logic predicting his rare gifts of hidden treasure. There is only a slim hope that your present circumstances will result in making you rich or famous.

Spiritually, the tempting yet ephemeral riches of the leprechaun invite you to cultivate detachment and equanimity with regard to material treasure.

Today's Oracle 17th April 2021

Faery Hill (The Hidden World of Faeries)

By legend, the faeries are the descendants of the Tuatha De Danann, a godlike race who once inhabited Ireland. They now reside beneath the ground inside hills and mounds in the countryside. Their presence signifies inspiration.

Invoking Inspiration.

IF YOU ARE DRAWN TO THIS ORACLE, you are attracted to the spiritual forces around you. These spiritual forces, whether faeries or nature spirits, are sometimes the special friends of poets, artists, playwrights, musicians, and the inventive and creative ones of every trade or profession. The presence of the faeries and nature spirits gives the landscape around you its wondrous qualities, and you are attracted to its supernatural qualities.

The faeries, the people of the goddess Danu, live as neighbours in the hills and mounds of the countryside. Having yielded the land's surface to the Celts, the faeries now inhabit the Otherworld, beneath the ground, where they live merry and carefree lives. Their supernatural presence brings a lively, nostalgic, and passionate feeling to the landscape, especially enlivening the poetry, music, and song with a sensuous and haunting lyricism. Faery hills, in particular, denote unique sources of inspiration from the faery realms.

With the coming of the Celts to Ireland, the powerful Tuatha De Danann, the people of the goddess Danu, eventually retreated from the Middle World on the earth's surface and yielded the land's surface to the Celts. They gently slipped into the Otherworld, where they now live fanciful and merry lives as neighbours in a parallel realm to humans. Living in certain hills throughout the countryside, often ancestral burial mounds called sidhe or sí (pronounced "shee"), the inhabitants of the sidhe are known as faeries. At night some faery hills are seen as ablaze with sparkling lights and alive with merrymaking and music. On certain nights the doors between the worlds open, particularly Samhain (now Halloween), marking the beginning of winter, and May Eve, marking the beginning of summer. On these nights, faeries are often encountered travelling about in our world and may lead humans to gateways to the Otherworld. Familiar caves and cliffs may open, revealing splendid faery castles within. While kindly observers and visitors may be rewarded, interfering with faery hills or castles invites reprisal.

A typical story from Donegal in Ireland tells of a man stacking turf on the bog. Returning at nightfall, he comes upon "a big black hole with mud lying on the surface ... and a kind of big opening down into the ground. He stuck his stick into it." When he tries to pull the stick out, "what did he do but take a jump into the hole. He went down until he hit hard ground at the bottom and began to walk until he reached a castle where there were many people singing and great entertainment and eating and drinking. He sat in amongst them but he did not eat anything" because he might never return home if he ate or drank.

The presence of the faeries living close by animates the landscape of the earth with lively activity. Along with nature spirits particular to trees, flowers, and features of the landscape, the Otherworld of the faeries imbues the natural, human world with movement, exuberance, and passion. Our world mirrors theirs.

While the Celts are unusually attentive to the presence of otherworldly beings who share the earth with us, the earth is sacred wherever you live. If you live in nature, especially in secluded places where supernatural beings are more at ease, you may be especially aware of their presence and passionate, spirited vitality. Quite unlike contemporary notions that portray the faeries as fearful and meddlesome, the faeries would much rather cooperate with us, especially sharing inspiration, visions, frivolity, song, and music. Unfortunately, the faeries - and other nature spirits - have become wary of humans, so attracting their support requires respect and care for our natural environment and the spirits who dwell there.

Today's Oracle 16th April 2021

Bear (Fierce Femininity)

The wild bear of the forest is the expression of motherly devotion and loyalty to family and kin. In times of provocation and danger, the mother bear protects and defends her young without regard to her own safety. Her actions are swift and unselfish.

Invoking the Quality of Selfless Actions.

IF YOU ARE DRAWN TO THIS ORACLE, this may be an ideal time to develop the fierce, feminine qualities of readiness and responsibility for others into your character. Not only does the mother bear protect her own young, but she personifies selfless, courageous acts on behalf of others. She acts immediately and powerfully in service to others to protect and preserve in times of danger and distress. Her actions bring peace and tranquillity to life. Everyone benefits from her watchful attention and protection.

The wild bear of the forest is intimately linked with the Celtic goddess Artio, her very name meaning bear. Artio, the bear goddess to the Gaulish Celts, appears fiercely protective in the manner of a mother bear defending her young. She guards the bears from danger and guards humans from the bears. Accordingly, Artio personifies divine watchfulness and protection for both the human and animal realms. In human affairs, her motherly and bearlike protection brings a sense of safety, ease, and well-being.

Artio was the bear goddess of the Celts of Switzerland and the Moselle Valley during the Roman-Celtic period. While retaining the calm and tranquil bearing of the mother goddess and characteristically bearing fruit for her supplicants, Artio was nonetheless a fierce protectress. She had something of a double identity, as she was both the guardian of the bears and wild creatures of the forest, and the guardian of the sacred hunt.

Like a mother bear defending her young, Artio watched over animals and humans alike. Fiercely loyal, she was venerated by the Celts for the protection she provided against the wild forces of nature and, by extension, against enemies. Hunters and warriors propitiated her interventions. When enraged she was aggressive and dominant. Raging like a mother bear protecting her young in times of danger, the Celts felt safer under her sway.

Artio's fierce qualities resemble the "Mother Terrible" aspect of the goddesses of Old Europe from the Balkans discussed by Marija Gimbatas (6500-3500 B.C. ). Artio's supernatural character may be a remnant from a time when goddesses were revered as the primal forces of nature, presiding over life, regeneration, and death. While Celtic mythology abounds in stories of fiery goddesses and queens, archaeological evidence for Artio (or other ferociously dominant goddesses) is scarce. A small bronze statue found near Berne, Switzerland, depicts a regal Artio bearing fruit before the full figure of a bear, who appears to be greeting her. Between them is intimate identification, as though they are matched in strength and ferocity and equally divine.

Being watchful and safeguarding the rightful needs of family, kin, and community are beneficial and necessary qualities in human life. Men and women are called on to intervene and mediate when the rights of others are unjustly violated or circumscribed. Trust your immediate and selfless response to situations when others are in need or danger. There is no reason to hold back and think about it. Act.

Today's Oracle 15th April 2021

Sacred King (The Oath)

The sacred king represents the successful union of the sovereign goddess with a mortal king. If the king is faithful to his oath, the people prosper. The sacred king signifies honourable and responsible actions.

Invoking the Qualities of honour and Responsibility.

IF YOU ARE DRAWN TO THIS ORACLE, your actions must be especially honourable and unselfish. You are in a situation of responsibility asking you to protect the well-being of others. Your sense of honour and duty demand that you put aside personal inclinations to serve others.

If the royal cloak fits him, the royal chariot obeys him, the Stone of Fál at Tara shrieks at his touch, and the goddess joins with him, a mortal man will be chosen king of Ireland. Bound by sacred oaths, geissi, to govern wisely and protect his people, the king's authority is carefully constrained and obliged by duty. The destiny of the king and his reign and the land and its bounty depend on the king's fealty to the royal oaths. The sacred king signifies honourable and responsible actions.

In former times, before the Norman conquest of Britain and coastal Ireland and Wales, Celtic kings were chosen by the sovereign goddess who granted the new king otherworldly powers so as to reign justly and wisely. To find the rightful man among the young men of the royal clan, the candidates were watched and tested by the druids for signs of providence. Niall of the Nine Hostages was born by a well, a sacred threshold to the Otherworld. Later, he meets and couples with the goddess there and is elected king of Ireland.

The tests of honour for the rightful king remain much the same throughout history. The king must show exceptional virtue, as though already appointed by the Otherworld. In Ireland, according to tradition, the royal cloak must fit him, the royal chariot must obey him, and the Stone of Fál at Tara must shriek when he touches it. Then, the sovereign goddess of the land must accept him as her own choice from among the others. In myth, their union is sexual: the exchange of primal energies bringing fertility and greenery to the land. Recorded in the twelfth century by the Roman chronicler Giraldus Cambrensis (Gerald of Wales) was the ritual bath of the Ulster king in the broth that boiled the butchered flesh of a white mare, symbolizing the sovereign goddess. At the royal court at Tara, the heart of legendary Ireland, their union is ritually reenacted. Ériu, a goddess and namesake of Ireland, offers a gold goblet of red wine to successive kings, symbolizing their union and her promise through this union to bless the land with ceaseless bounty.

Once elected, the king is bound by sacred oaths and strict rules of conduct, securing that his reign will provide for the well-being, prosperity, and protection of the people. He is not free to do as he pleases and follow his whims. He is bound by rules of fealty and honour, the betrayal of which signals his individual ruin, a lackluster reign, the failure of crops, and the demoralization of his people. His only honourable choice, once king, is to govern wisely and justly, speak only the truth and keep his promises, show impartiality, provide protection to the weak and the strong alike, render hospitality, take up arms to defend the people from enemies, and in his noble conduct set a standard for all to follow.

In order to be successful, your actions must be honest and impartial. In the present situation, your personal likes and dislikes, or impressions formed in the past, may be untrustworthy. Make decisions based on what is valid and invalid, on the weaknesses and strengths inherent in the specific circumstance. Tell the truth and keep your promises. Accept responsibility graciously. Extend generosity and concern, especially to those who are less fortunate in your community. Be mindful that your personal life is now an aspect of your public life and that your actions set an example for others.

Today's Oracle 14th April 2021

Esus Cutting the Tree (Sacrifice)

A living tree signifies the source of life and is therefore sacred. The ritual of cutting or sacrificing a tree represents relinquishing the practiced and familiar for the new and unknown. Cutting the tree signifies surrender of the old and receptivity to the new.

Invoking Surrender of the Old and Receptivity to the New.

IF YOU ARE DRAWN TO THIS ORACLE, your deep instincts are pulling you into new endeavours and prospects and away from the known and familiar. Now is a great time to sacrifice graciously the old for the new. The new needs space in which to grow. By voluntarily clearing your life of the clutter of unnecessary habits and possessions, the transition will be much easier. If you can just clear your thoughts, fresh thoughts and ideas are ready to arise in your imagination. Your dreams and daydreams are probably already guiding you. Little can stop you except your own holding on to well-known habits and patterns of the past.

The unique image of Esus portrays him as a woodcutter chopping down a tree. The young woodcutter, the surrounding animal and bird imagery, and the prominence of the tree as a symbol of life all hint at a once popular myth. Throughout the Celtic world, trees were (and still are) considered sacred, and indiscriminately cutting one down was punishable by tribal law. To sacrifice a tree signifies the relinquishing of the familiar for the new and unknown.

The complex and evocative imagery of two stone bas-reliefs from the first century portray a young man chopping down a tree or cutting branches off a tree, surrounded by the imagery of a bull and three cranes or egrets. The larger of the two monuments, discovered in 1711 at the site of Notre Dame in Paris, is dedicated to Jupiter during the reign of Tiberius by a guild of sailors, and consists of six beautifully carved stones. On one stone is a large bull standing in front of a willow with two cranes on his back and a third perched on his head. On an adjoining stone, a woodcutter chops at the branches of a willow. Inscribed above the bull and water birds is Tarvostrigaranus, meaning "The Bull with Three Cranes," and the woodcutter Esus, meaning Lord. The other, more dramatic stone monument from Trier, Germany, combines these images, evoking the drama of a complex myth of which we know little aside from the images and inscriptions themselves. On the stone from Trier, a woodcutter chops at a willow surrounded by the head of a bull and three cranes or egrets.

A woodcutter and willow so artfully depicted evokes the portrayal of a sacred act, probably ritually enacted. The bull signifies the powers of the Otherworld, especially potency. The water birds connect the image to lakes and marshes, thresholds of the Otherworld. The graceful willow is native to the banks of rivers and lakes and especially prevalent in marshes. All trees are sacred, symbolizing the passage of life and death in its cycle of growth. In temperate climates where deciduous trees so noticeably change with the season, this symbolic Tree of Life dramatizes the passage of life each year. As seen in the tree oracles and especially regarding the thorn tree, the violation of such a tree brought havoc to human life and was often punishable by tribal law. To cut or chop a tree signifies a ritual act of sacrifice and surrender to the numinous forces that impinge every day on human life, an awareness perhaps unsettling but always familiar to the rural and agrarian Celts, and other indigenous cultures worldwide.

It may be important to do some practical things, such as cleaning your house, closets, garage, attic, basement, office, studio, or desk to initiate clearing your life of the useless debris that invariably accumulates. Throw away or store out of sight things you are no longer using. Then rest and wait for your imagination to awaken and your new life to begin.

Today's Oracle 13th April 2021

Mother Goddess Carrying Children/Food (Well-Being)

The goddess of care-giving provides comfort, ease, and contentment in the home and wherever she goes. Her qualities provide for daily nurturance and the necessities of life and support for our physical and emotional fulfillment.

Invoking the Qualities of Comfort and Contentment.

IF YOU ARE DRAWN TO THIS ORACLE, you are attracting physical and emotional comfort and well-being into your life. You may be in the midst of a challenging situation, or the mundane activities or weariness of life's struggles may be tiring or exhausting your reserves.

The mother goddess in her aspect of beneficence gives nourishment, food, and well-being to domestic life. Her mothering tends to the immediate and personal needs of daily human life. She cradles and nurses infants, is surrounded by children under her care, and carries fruits, ears of corn, grains, cakes, breads, goblets of wine, kegs, pots, baskets and cornucopias spilling over with fruits, grains, and breads. Her dependable and soothing attention provides comfort and contentment in daily life.

Images of the mother goddess of well-being are found throughout the Celtic territories. As a local maternal sovereign, she attends to the everyday needs of life by sustaining the local crops, blessing the harvest, nursing the babies, comforting the sick and the dying, pouring out the wine, and dispensing the fruits of the harvest. The passing of life, the cycle of birth and death, and the vicissitudes of day-to-day existence are her concerns. Her presence is familiar, homey, and soothing. Amid the insecurities and dangers of life, she blesses life with comfort, constancy, and contentment.

Whether depicted as a single goddess or in groups of two or three representing her magnificence, the mother goddess in her aspect of loving care carries symbols of well-being, security, and prosperity intended to bless and provide for life's daily needs. In image after image, she holds fruit, grains, ears of corn, bread, pots of honey and mead. Ordinarily, she carries babies and is encircled by toddlers and older children seeking her attention and perhaps her good counsel. In this lovely image from the Rhineland, she carries two enormous cornucopias, signifying her bountiful presence in providing food and sustenance throughout the years.

The goddess of the home and locality is immortalized in the words of the ancient poet Amergin:

"I am the womb: of every holt, I am the blaze: on every hill, I am the queen: of every hive, I am the shield: for every head, I am the tomb: of every hope."

Drawing this oracle is a wake-up call to nourish yourself with soothing activities and relationships. A complete rest is not necessary. Nonetheless, you are asked to focus your attention on your immediate and personal needs for comfort, nourishment, and well-being. What activities would soothe you? Is your diet supporting your life? Do the people around you give you comfort and reassurance? Is there a way to receive more physical or sexual contact and comfort? Do some people and activities unnerve you or deplete you? Even seemingly minor activities can be enormously tiring or rejuvenating. Look for patterns, especially in your home life. Write them down, even if they seem unimportant at the time. Since the mother goddess is devoted to tranquillity at home, it is especially important to consider ways to bring more ease, contentment, and security to your domestic life.

Even amid trying situations, it is possible to support your physical and emotional well-being. Small signs of joy, acts of kindness, personal prayer, meditation, and attention to diet and exercise are essential. The presence of this oracle gives hope that the nourishment and comfort you need is available in your immediate environment.

Today's Oracle 12th April 2021

Rowan (The Alchemical Wand)

The rowan and its red berries in winter are connected with the Otherworld. Twigs are sometimes worn on clothing for protection from malevolent spirits. Rowan berries signal chthonic protection, divination, good luck, and sometimes healing and the giving of wisdom.

Invoking the Qualities of Otherworldly Protection.

IF YOU ARE DRAWN TO THIS ORACLE, the protection and good luck of the rowan are being offered to you. Are you presently engaged in challenging or risky situations that beg extra protection and comfort? Do circumstances or the time of year invite circumspection and care? Do you feel any need to shield yourself from the unkindness of others or from spirits in the psychic realm? The presence of the rowan suggests both caution in worldly affairs and the protection of unseen forces. Its otherworldly authority dispels fear and anxiety, enabling life to proceed beneficially.

The rowan tree and its winter clusters of red berries signify the protection of the Otherworld within the human middle world. A rowan branch above the door protects homes from unwanted intruders, especially mischievous spirits. A small rowan twig concealed underneath garments protects the wearer while traveling. Eating the red berries of an enchanted rowan brings wisdom. But beware, a fire of rowan wood may entreat the presence of otherworldly spirits, both gentle and malevolent.

The rowan tree or mountain ash, is honoured throughout the Celtic world for its role in the magic and enchantments emanating from the Otherworld. Its aspect can be potent and fierce. In the mythological cycle of Irish tales, Etáin is struck with a "wand of scarlet rowan berries" and instantly disappears into a pool of water. In the Fionn Cycle of Irish tales, the hero Finn acquires understanding of all things by eating a red-speckled salmon that fed on the berries of the enchanted rowan tree overhanging the pool.

Rowan trees are favoured because they provide chthonic [relating to or inhabiting the underworld] or otherworldly protection and good luck. People like to have one neighbouring the house and holy places or to secretly fasten small twigs to their clothes to bring good luck. A rowan branch above the door protects the home from fire and unkindly intruders and spirits. In a story collected in the last century in the lowlands of Scotland, the rowan protects the peasantry while watching the procession of faeries, which takes place at the coming of summer. From beneath a door arrayed with rowan branches, they can safely "gaze on the cavalcade, as with music sounding, bridles ringing, and voices mingling, [as] it pursued its way from place to place."

Rowan berries and rowan branches are the certain protectors of cows, sacred to the goddesses of the underworld. Rowan are kept in the barn "to safeguard the cows; put in the pail and around the churn to ensure that the profit of the milk [is] not stolen." In a story told in County Cavan in the 1940s, Charles King relays that the "old people would tie roundberry [rowanberry] to the cows' tails. They would make a small ring of the roundberry and tie it with a red rag, and slip it in as far as they could on the cow's tail.... That was done as a 'protection' against the butter being taken from the milk during the year."

Rowan wood also serves in divination. It is likely that the Norse carved runes from rowan wood. A rowan wand is used in divining the future. A fire of rowan wood casts spells and anticipates danger by summoning underworldly spirits, not all of them benevolent.

It may be an auspicious time to consider and appreciate the chthonic forces at hand in your life. Such forces stir within the human realm, bringing vitality and even healing and guidance. In the slow, steady pace of the underworld, you may be dreaming or "seeing" in new ways, prompted by otherworldly forces stirring within your unconscious mind. In this way, the presence of the rowan is a means of divining your next step, goal, relationship, or endeavour. Usually, there is no great drama or vision, just a gentle and pervasive shift in perspective and inclination. Like the rowan's red berries in winter, changes accord with the rhythms of nature.

Today's Oracle 11th April 2021

Hammer god (Scepter of Authority and Choice)

The Hammer God is primarily a tribal father god, wielding his hammer or mallet as a symbol of authority and command. He is mature and kindly, yet his presence signifies the need to consider options wisely and make sound, discriminating decisions.

Invoking the Qualities of Wise and Just Decisions

IF YOU ARE DRAWN TO THIS ORACLE, you need to make wise and careful decisions regarding your own resources and activities, and perhaps those affecting a large number of people, such as your extended family or community. Others are looking to you for guidance, leadership, and support.

The Hammer God is primarily a tribal father god, wielding his hammer or mallet as a symbol of authority and command. Of mature age and kindly disposition, he is the most good-natured and benevolent of the major male deities. Frequently holding a pot or goblet or standing near wine barrels, he is also linked with the inexhaustible cauldron of the Otherworld. His Celtic name is Sucellus, meaning "The Good Striker," and his presence brings wise and judicious decision making, especially in community affairs.

The Hammer God had widespread influence throughout the Rhineland and ancient Gaul, extending southward to the mouth of the Rhone. Over two hundred stone and bronze representations have been found, largely along the Rhine and the Rhone River valleys. His mature and kind appearance lends a benign and fatherly presence. In the image he not only carries a large club but his erect penis depicts power and robust fertility. He holds a hammer or mallet, his signature attribute among many Celtic tribes. Often the hammer is crudely carved; sometimes it is realistically portrayed, with a long-shafted handle and metal blade. Occasionally, a double-ax, suggestive of unlimited authority, is present along with the hammer. The Hammer God is so ubiquitously associated with the hammer that sometimes his presence is marked by the symbol of the hammer alone.

The most prominent father-god of Irish mythology is the Daghdha, meaning "the good god." He is one of the Tuatha De Danann, the people of the goddess Danu. Like the Hammer God, he wields an enormous club, suggestive of authority, fertility, and perhaps its role as an agent of renewal. Another of the Daghdha's attributes is his possession of an enormous, inexhaustible cauldron, also associated with the otherworldly powers of the mother goddesses.

In a similar manner, the Gaulish and Rhineland Hammer God is also associated with pots, goblets, and wine barrels, particularly in wine-producing regions like Burgundy. Though always signified as holding a hammer or mallet over one of his shoulders, he sometimes carries a pot or goblet as well, or stands with wine barrels at his feet. This association assumes his protection of the grape harvest and the production of wine.

You must consider the situation perspicaciously, carefully examining the circumstances and options, as well as the possible outcomes of your present actions. You may need to be very patient, waiting for information to form a discernible pattern. Only then can you make prudent decisions. The fatherly presence of the Hammer God signals an auspicious opportunity to better your own circumstances and the circumstances of those for whom you are responsible. If you take sufficient time and care to listen to all sides of the discussion and weigh all the possible outcomes, you will not only be successful but garner the esteem of your family and community.