Yuletide Super moon, Stars and Stones

Today is a new moon in Capricorn. It is also a super moon- the moon at perigee, closest in its orbit to the earth, and at its most powerful even though unseen, while the asteroid Chiron, ‘the wounded healer’ stations direct after being retrograde since July. Symbolically, a time of powerful memories; mending and healing. Christmas time always brings a tallying, a counting of heads and faces round tables, present and past. There are more ghost stories attached to Christmas than to Halloween.

The vein is thin again.

Orion is spectacular right now, striding westwards in the southern sky. It is the season of the brightest stars, as seen in the northern hemisphere. The story of the Star of Bethlehem, or Christmas Star, appears in the nativity story of the Gospel of Matthew chapter 2 where “wise men from the East” are inspired by the star to travel to Jerusalem. These magi were later re-designated kings, but they may well have been astronomers.

Norah Lofts wrote a novel, ‘How Far to Bethlehem?’ published 1965 in which she retells the story.

Melchior had never seen anything like it; the star was so bright, so full of tragedy and glory. He knew at once that it was his task to find the child and warn its parents. But Melchior was old, poor and unwise in the ways of men. Providence took him to the barbarian king, Gaspar, who wanted to know if this great King in the East would be a threat to his empire. It was Balthazar, the escaped slave with a wonderful knowledge of languages, who helped them find their way across hazardous and violent country to Judea. Just as the three men began their journey, a young girl stood bravely before her betrothed husband in Nazareth trying to find the words to tell him that she was pregnant. Not only was the child not his but she had never known a man. How could she make him understand that their destiny was to raise the Christ-child together?

Astronomers speculate that the Star of Bethlehem may have been a

*supernova

*comet

*triple conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn c 7-5 BC

*conjunction of Jupiter, Regulus (little prince) and Venus (birth).

Read more HERE

We are in the first decan of Capricorn territory, the element of earth. The quality is cardinal. These natives are instigators, initiators and executors; natural born leaders, naturalists and historians. Their drive is to inquire, build, conserve and consolidate.

The first decan of Capricorn is associated in the Tarot with the Two of Pentacles/Coins/Disks-or Stones.

The symbolism here is bridge building, or juggling resources.

Vladimir Putin is a Libra subject, but this card has previously shown his ambition to create a new land bridge, joining port to port. He will join a Russian controlled corridor Mariupol all the way to Kaliningrad if only he can. Though it isn’t looking as though he can though he may have another go at taking Odessa, thus land locking Ukraine, hence the recent public display of talks with Lukashenko.

But should he launch a new front in Transnistria come the New Year, this may be the ultimate aim. What if Germany, using Putin’s same arguments, decided it wanted to liberate Kalingrad, and take it back…decided it was still Konigsberg, actually.

In more general terms Capricorn says, what do we mean by homeland?

It is my mother’s birthday today. A true Queen of Pentacles, daughter of Demeter, she wrote this poem:

The Stone People

We are the people and we are the stones

The greater the stones, the higher we stand

We are the stones, our feet in the earth

And under the earth and over the ground

The shape of the stones is the shape of the land

And the shape of the land shapes us

And the shape that we are says who we are

And the shape of the land is us

And the stones where we are is the place where we are

And the place where we are is us

And we are the stones and our bones are the stones

And the stones are us, are us

When we are not here to hold hands in our ring

To talk and plan as we must

You can hear the beat of our stony feet

In the circles that stand for us

-Margaret Whyte

from ‘Mrs Noah Lives In The Real World.’

People of the stones. Our natal, native, physically formative patch of ground can be identified thousands of years after our death by the mineral profile of our teeth.

The lucky stone particularly associated with this time of year is the Moss Agate. It is not a true agate, as it is not banded, but is counted in this family and considered a semi-precious crystal. It’s made of silicon dioxide and chalcedony. The hue comes from emerald ore and a minute quantity of metallic particles, such as iron or chrome.

In superstitious or magical terms it stands for Earth itself and the element of water on Earth. It is said to be a wealth attractor; to soothe anger and calm grief, and to protect against atmospheric pollutants.