Return to the Magdalene Flame in Sparsholt. March 2023.

March 21, 2023March 17, 2023 / Ann Murphy / Leave a comment

Doorway into St. Stephen’s Church, Sparsholt.

When I said it was finished, I really thought it was. But this morning, with half an hour to spare on the way to my father’s, I had a sudden impulse to stop at St. Stephen’s Church in Sparsholt again. Actually, I had an impulse to explore the little road that turned to the left and which led to it, but then I made a snap decision and parked in front of the church gate instead. As I walked towards the front door, I questioned why I was there, when I had already done the flame. Was something else needed? Had I forgotten something? It had felt complete at the time, but as I know from experience, energy gets layered, so maybe this was one of those extra-layer-things.

Inside, all was quiet, so I returned to the altar where I could see the Magenta Flame burning steadily. As I waited, I felt that familiar sensation of energy activating in my lower Tan Tien and my energetic cord connected to the flame. Next, I had the same sensation in my heart, as it too made an energetic connection. Lastly, my third eye connected and as it did I noticed that the cords were like lightning and I was receiving the MF energy along them. I had never had this experience before and wondered what it was about when I felt my own MF expand and become as big as the one in the church so that we matched in frequency.

I began to receive information that this flame needed to be anchored somewhere, and heard ‘Across the Water’, and something about a lake. Then I remembered a message I had received a few days ago about a lake, and told not to forget Padua. Padua is in Italy, but did they mean literally a lake near Padua, or a church dedicated to an Italian saint who came from Padua and which is beside a lake here in the UK? I have no idea, but thinking practically, I imagine it was the latter. I have been wrong before, however. That’s the problem with trying to decipher the meanings of events before the event happens. I had made the same mistake at St. Catherine’s when I didn’t understand the Bull image. At the time, I felt it had to do with the symbolic reference to the four saints which I have seen carved into other small churches. But it was simply a reference to the name of the place: Bullington. Although it was St Michael, so I might have been half right!

Once I felt the energy stop, I gazed at the line of white stones someone had placed on the step right in front of the altar and beneath them, scratched into the step as if someone had accidentally scraped a layer of paint from the surface, was a shape that looked like Italy. As ridiculous as it sounds, and because everything means something, I wondered if it might actually mean there would be a visit to Padua, in Italy. I thought of my aunt, who lives in Sicily. I had planned to visit her there, so maybe I could also go to Italy … when I am free of current obligations, that is.

I felt myself being turned around. This is an energetic turning, not being physically turned, as if my energy-field is turned and I have no choice but to follow it. When I turned and was facing the other end of the church, I heard “Go.” And that was it. Done and dusted. But, I was so very aware that everything that happens while doing this work has layers of meaning, so they might also mean that I had to go to the lake, that it would soon be time to ‘go’. It would also explain the necessity for the larger than life recharging of the Magdalene Flame.

I wandered around, finding a little area with a wooden statue of Mary, or St. Catherine. I’m not sure which. I saw a picture when I came into the church which mentioned a chantry chapel dedicated to St Catherine. I wonder if this is the same St Catherine that they dedicated the church in Littleton to?

When I got to my father’s, while he watched rugby on TV, I Googled churches near a lake near with Padua. I found Saint Anthony, a popular saint for Catholics. I remember him well. Whenever anyone lost anything in Ireland it was praying to Saint Anthony that helped them find it. Anthony loved Padua, it was his spiritual home, and there is a large lake ninety kilometres away from the centre of the city. There is also a basilica there dedicated to him. The message “Across the water,” also implies crossing the sea, so we’ll have to see what they mean. If it really is in Italy, then I have time to wait. If, on the other hand, it is local, it might be in the next couple of weeks.

Either way, I’ll find out.

Later that evening, I was telling my friend Chris about it. He often comes up with interesting bits of information. but while he was mentioning lake Garda, I remembered wanting to do a Life Between Lives therapist training at Lake Garda a few years ago. But I ended up back in the UK, then Covid hit and my father needed me, so I put Lake Garda away. Looks like it was the right place, and definitely not the right time. Buy maybe the time was approaching…

I also remembered that before I had left the house earlier in the day, I had accessed the Tibetan Dai Ko Myo energy. I often get the impulse to raise my arms to bring something down and this time I found I was holding the symbol in my arms, guiding it into my crown centre and energy-field. I usually use this symbol when attuning someone to Reiki so I thought it might mean that.

In the church, the Magenta Flame transfer felt like an attunement, although why I was being attuned to an energy I had put there in the first place was beyond me. Perhaps it had something to do with the symbol itself. When I brought it in, the two arms of the ‘Y’ were my arms and the jagged little symbol between them was a lightning energy – which explains the lightning arcing from the flame to my three centres – and the spiral was in my body. Usually, when I use symbols that have spirals they coil around my Tan Tien, like serpent energies, otherwise known as Kundalini energy. Kundalini energy is earth energy but this energy was coming from above, not from the earth. Yet its job is to activate and open. (I often find with energy symbols that the little horizontal line on the top of a symbol represents the mind. So this symbol is like energy that comes into the mind while the arms bring energy through them, which connects at the heart and then activates the lower Tan Tien, otherwise known as the Dan Tien).

Not the best drawing without a tablet but you get the idea.

Also known as the Dragon’s Breath, it is supposed to represent the Kundalini flame, cleansing and purifying the chakras. Lightning, for me, has always been about cleansing negative energy, and I use a technique using the Lightning bolt of Neptune which does this when I am holding too much of other people’s energy. So, I’m guessing that my three centres, the three tan Tiens, upper, middle and lower, needed cleansing by the Magdalene Flame in preparation for holding more of that energy. But to what end I do not know and why I should need that is also a mystery. But, I’ll find out one way or the other. I usually do.

All I have to do now is wait for the personal healing that is bound to come with it!

PS. Nearly all the small churches in this sequence of activations have female Rectors, which must be significant, especially when the Magdalene Flame is about healing the wounded male consciousness. Many of the wardens are also female.

The Brigit and Magdalene Flame in Chilbolton. St Mary the Lesser.

March 9, 2023March 14, 2023 / Ann Murphy / 2 Comments

This was very simple sharing of the Magdalene Flame. After the last anchoring in Bullington church, I wasn’t feeling any great urge to do any more, yet a little energy still seemed to remain. I wasn’t sure what this residual energy was but I decided to follow the ‘sign-post’ anyway and headed to the beautiful village of Wherwell, which I thought might be the next destination. However, while I was driving, with only an hour in which to visit, just as I was passing the turn-off for Chilbolton, I followed the impulse to take that instead.

Chilbolton is another church on the circuit and the other churches were actually part of old Chilbolton Manor, as I discovered while researching St. Catherine’s in Littleton. I don’t like doing this research before doing the work as I don’t want my mental information to interfere with my intuitive hunches, although, many times, I am unaware of the church’s role in the circuit until I work with it. Once I’ve done the work, then I can do the research. This is also useful because it can confirm the information you have picked up with y our intuition.

It was only when I got to the village that I recognised it. I had been here before and had made a connection with a beautiful old Pine tree outside the main entrance. Actually, it was the tree I recognised, and as soon as I saw it I knew I had been there before. On my first visit, over twenty years ago, I was greeted by this old tree, and its energy spread out all around the area. Its job was as guardian, holding the energy for the area. Today, however, it was quiet, but I said hello anyway.

I had originally been introduced to this place by a friend called Lisa, who used to be the minister here. When I knew her, I was working in the Speaking Tree Bookshop in Winchester and she was a regular visitor. She was a very interesting lady who was trying to come to terms with intuitive knowledge while working as a Christian minister. She also had a wonderful connection to a Greek Goddess. Together we visited a number of prehistoric sacred places around Andover and received interesting information about the Anna Valley. (I’ll root it out and post it for anyone who might be interested).

I wandered inside the church, wondering if Lisa was still a minister there, and tried to connect to the energies. Finally, standing in front of the altar, I found myself channelling a prayer. I am not a pray-er, so when this happens, I am often immediately uncomfortable, but, reframing it, a prayer is a petition, so I put my judgement aside and said the words that came into my head.

“O holy Mother, I ask permission to install your flame so that all who visit and worship here can partake of your living, abundant energy. Let no person leave without you in their heart and may all who come here benefit from your wisdom and love. Let also those who receive it pass it on to those who need it. Amen.”

After this, I saw myself placing an already lit, large magenta candle on the altar. Although the candle was Magenta, the flame was orange; a combination of the Magdalene and Brigit energies. The light of the flame expanded filling the space with warmth and light. Next, just as at Crawley and Bullington, the May Queen’s Hawthorn flower wreath was placed around the candle’s base thereby anchoring the May energies too.

This was a short and simple anchoring of a portion of the Magdalene Flame and the feminine Spring mysteries.

Sometimes, the anchorings are this simple, especially if they come on the heel of longer workings. There must be some significance that, aside from the original Church of St. Edward the Confessor anchoring, all the others are part of the same network. Chilbolton was originally granted by King Athelstan to the church of Winchester and until church properties were taken by Henry VIII, the manor of Chilbolton remained in Church hands. Edward the confessor was the last Saxon king and was crowned at Winchester cathedral in April 1043. That makes me wonder if the anchoring of the Magdalene Flame has something to do with that time layer, when many small Saxon churches were founded.

The early Saxons were pagans but converted to Christianity under the influence of Irish missionaries (wouldn’t you know!). BUT, Irish Christianity was a different Christianity to the more dogmatic Roman version. On the Aran islands, back in 2006/7, my friend and I discovered a very beautiful Christianity, more nature-based than dogmatic, so this, I imagine, is why the pagan Saxons were able to accept Christianity in the first place. It was a beautiful movement which honoured both Mother and Father. Although it probably wasn’t as idyllic as I’m painting it. Saxon bishops were probably proclaiming their Saxon Christian power in the same way as other people have usurped the purity of spiritual energy and beliefs, using God as their weapon.

Looking at the history of Saxon churches and Edward the Confessor, it appears that he wanted to change the English church, with its hundreds of saints and continuing beliefs in Elves and Goblins, to a more European version, which was very Roman. Most of the churches in the Manor of Chilbolton were originally founded by the Saxons and might have been built on earlier sacred sites. But I might be looking for connections that don’t actually exist. Yet, when I think about working in a network of churches like I have been doing, there is a reason why those places are important, especially when they are historically connected. The Henry du Blois connection, at Littleton, was important, because he was more than simply a historic character. He was a very spiritual man who was devoted to the Divine Feminine consciousness and built his own network of churches with the intention of anchoring the balance between the male and female, although it would have been couched in terms more acceptable to the religious public.

But, there is also the Soul development aspect which plays a part. Humanity goes through cycles of beliefs, just as individuals do, and there are times when those beliefs need to be tweaked. Spiritual ideas are anchored at those points which the Guides of Humanity hope will take root. They don’t always, or if they do, the more emotional human desires get in the way and those new ideas are either rooted out or suppressed. No one knows how thoughtforms will be received, Humans have free-will and therefore make their own choices. I had an experience of this myself.

Twenty-three years ago, when I was working in the Speaking Tree bookshop, a man began coming in. He claimed to be a healer and told me he wanted to train as a Reiki practitioner. However, his idea of Reiki was to become a Reiki Master over a weekend and make lots of money. He was also someone who took advantage of women, using them for his own ends and fancied himself another David Icke. He had a choice as to how to use his ability to channel healing energies but he had free-will and therefore could act as he pleased. There will always be people who put power and money over Love, but the hope is that if enough people choose Love, they just might create something different, even if only in small, quiet communities. And who knows? Maybe Reiki helped that man heal his power issues, or maybe he was a Dark Knight, there to help people find their own power – the hard way.

In our little community of Chilbolton Manor Churches, the hope is that the energies will affect people with open minds and help bring a note of balance to the world.

Destiny is all… as Uhtred would say.

The Brigit and Magdalene Flame. Part Six. St. Michael and All Angels, Bullington, Hampshire.

February 26, 2023March 8, 2023 / Ann Murphy / 1 Comment

The day after visiting Barton Stacey church, I drove along to Bullington. However, the church there was closed so I couldn’t get in to do what I was sure needed to be done. I thought I had gotten it wrong. Perhaps this little church, part of an old farming community and built by the lord of the manor for his family’s private worship back in the 1300s, was not part of the Magdalene network. So, I took some photos and drove to my father’s house, which was a five-minute drive away, and then forgot all about it.

The following day, I drove my father to Sutton Scotney to see his doctor but as I drove I saw the road as if it was a blue serpent, winding its way through the countryside, and I was following it. I wondered how far we were from the river Dever and googled it at the surgery. As it turned out, Bullington church was only a short distance away from the river which meandered, serpent-like behind it.

Later that evening, the local parish magazine was delivered to the house and as I flicked through it, I noticed that the church would be open for matins the following Sunday morning. OK, I would have to attend a service, but that was alright. Perhaps that would be important; maybe the other people’s energy might contribute to whatever was being anchored.

Once again, on the Sunday drive through Sparsholt, I felt the energy of the MF in St. Stephen’s church while I was driving through Crab Wood. I filled up with this energy and as I came near St Catherine’s, in Littleton, I sent out what looked like a gold fishing line from my tan Tien that connected to the work I had done there. As I drove on to Bullington, I brought both these energies with me.

It was a lovely sunny day and I got to the church with five minutes to spare. I was surprised that I wasn’t feeling nervous going into a place I was unfamiliar with and meeting people I didn’t know, especially a group of people who were already established in their community relationships. As an unknown, I would stick out like a sore thumb, which is not a position I feel comfortable in. Normally, I am quite self-conscious and situations like this can trigger feelings of anxiety. However, I didn’t feel remotely fazed. I said hello to the ten people there, took my seat, and the woman next to me, who was the churchwarden, gave me the prayer book open to the right page.

The churchgoers were warm and inviting and the church felt very cosy. I didn’t know what to expect, or what to do, but followed what everyone else was doing. When it came to the readings, I tuned in and anchored the energies. The main energy was the anchoring of the Magdalene Flame which was placed on the altar. The magenta tube then descended over it, as it did in the other churches. When these both were fully in place, rose petals gently descended, each one representing the love of the Mother. Once again, the palm tree appeared and the flame was anchored through the use of the Was-sceptre. The same as in Chandler’s Ford.

This entire anchoring was carried out while the service was going on; each part happening with small time gaps in between. This is a layering of energies, which takes place over a physical period of time, in a sequence.

After the petals had begun to fall there was a short pause and I saw my Ka-self (that Higher-Self part of me that does this work) standing at the altar again, placing the chalice of wafers I had received from MM at Barton Stacey, on the altar cloth, within the magenta tube of energy. A little while later, a chalice of wine was raised, in the tube, to be blessed by the Mother, her rose petals filling the chalice to combine with the wine. In the past, bread was charged over vortices in the earth, now they could be charged through the Magenta Mother channel, her love connection between ‘heaven and earth’. The bread, once charged in this way, would be shared with the congregation during communion, as would the rose-petal, love-filled wine.

The bread and wine I had received at Barton Stacey church had been for Bullington church. So when MM had said ‘This is my church’, was she talking about Bullington, or all the churches connected with her energy, a community of holy places? I’m still not sure.

The service went on and I thought that the work was finished, but the right side of my face began to feel hot, and out of the corner of my eye, I saw a Brigit Flame burning in the aisle, opposite the entrance. This flame felt very different to the higher vibrational MF at the altar. It was much more physical than that, another frequency entirely. I focussed my attention on this flame to see what was needed. Slowly, as I kept it in my vision, it grew to about six feet high. A gold band was then placed around the top of the flame, as had happened in Crawley Church, but this band was the regular gold band, holding the energy at a particular frequency. As I watched, I saw the band being adjusted, and then it transformed into a large, spoked wagon wheel, with a hub in the centre of the flame. The wheel expanded until it spread out, connecting to other places.

I have worked with energetic wagon wheels before, especially while anchoring energy in Egypt. It seems to connect different communities, or people together, the spokes representing the places to be connected. I had a feeling that these spokes were people, people who had a common cause, or belief, and who were held by this flame energy. This became clearer at the end of the service.

Next, I saw a priest bless the flame with holy water, casting little drops of it with an aspergillum (great word!), much the same as in Crawley church where the flame was blessed with incense. Although why one flame was sanctified with fire and the other with water, I have no idea. In Roman sacrificial rites, a laurel twig was used to sprinkle holy water but this was later replaced by the aspergillum. An aspergillum is used in Roman Catholic and Anglican ceremonies, including Baptism and during Easter. A priest will use the aspergillum to bless the candles, during candlemas, and the palms during Palm Sunday Mass. The name derives from the Latin verb aspergere ‘to sprinkle’. The Easter season was just about to start, so perhaps this was why the flame was being blessed. Palm Sunday was only around the corner. It would also explain the palm tree in both Chandlers Ford and here. The ceremonies carried out over Easter might have something to do with it.

At the end of the service, I stood and chatted with four of the congregation: The minister and his wife, the church-warden and another man. The rest had left. We stood around the flame, although they didn’t know it. It felt like they were the spokes of the wagon wheel because they do the rounds of all the churches I had been working on. There are not enough people in each village now for weekly services. I was particularly happy with the Minister (or Rev, or something). A lovely, connected man with a strong spiritual core, he had given a talk about mysticism, and Julian of Norwich, which struck me as very interesting, and he considered himself to be a mystic. He also explained an experience I had had during the service. We were going through the book of prayers they use and at one point I felt the energy of an Egyptian temple. The congregation then began to recite the Catholic creed. These were Anglicans; why were they reciting a Catholic prayer? This completely confused me but it also explained why I was picking up Egyptian energies. Catholic rituals go right back to Egyptian temple worship. But why was this happening in an Anglican church?

As it turned out, they are an Anglican-Catholic group, which seems to be a thing now. But it also makes sense to me, because the roots of Catholicism are in Egypt. But it was very interesting to be picking up these energies during the service and to see how Egyptian energies are still such a part of modern worship, and how that root is getting stronger again. Hopefully, though, it would not become the controlling dogma the Romans created.

Pink circles are MF and Orange circles are BF

When I was writing this up, I was reminded of the Bull image I had briefly seen in St Catherine’s Church in Littleton. They were saying ‘Bull-ington’, but I didn’t understand it at the time. It felt like I had come full circle, from the anchoring at Chandler’s Ford to Bullington. The above image shows the flames and their connections. Only one of those churches, St Mary the Lesser in Chilbolton, had an energy attached, but didn’t seem to be a major part of the circuit; the same as Crawly Church didn’t feel connected to the main circuit.

St Mary the Lesser would be the last church to be done in February, which I will post next time.

The Brigit Flame. Part Five. St Mary’s Church, Crawley, Hampshire.

February 23, 2023March 3, 2023 / Ann Murphy / 4 Comments

St Mary’s Church is a lovely village church, set back from the main street in Crawley. I had decided to drive through the top of the village, rather than the bottom like I normally do, on impulse. The village pond is at the bottom of this village and I like to see the ducks and coots sitting on the grass beside it or trying to walk across the frozen surface during cold spells.

This time, As I drove past, I had no intention of stopping. I had not received any energetic information about doing this church, no energy-connections or visual information to tell me I needed to do anything here, yet I spontaneously decided to stop. Sometimes, when that happens, it is as if another part of me wants my personality part to explore something. I usually have to give in because if I don’t, it tugs at me for days afterwards.

I parked up and walked the path through the very pretty graveyard. Inside, the church was freezing. I imagine it is too expensive to heat an empty church so they leave the heating off until they hold services.

As usual, I went straight to the Altar but felt nothing. Nada, zilch, not a glimmer. What was I doing here, then, I wondered. Why did I stop instead of simply driving past? I checked the time on my phone and discovered I had forgotten my reading glasses. Damn! Then I thought that I really shouldn’t be so negative. The feelings of irritation would not help me to pick anything up.

Because I could feel nothing there, I decided to look at the structure of the building. Energetically, nothing was happening in this part of the church. It also felt like there was no energy here at all but I could not understand why there wasn’t. I looked behind me and noticed the fragments of Norman dogtooth pattern on the masonry of the arch. I felt like I was looking at the external wall of the building and that this part with the altar was added on years after the Norman building. There were two very distinct energy regions going on.

I walked into, what I felt, was the original part of the building and when I stood looking at the altar from there, I heard someone say ‘Go back a little further’. So I took a few steps back and when I did, saw a bright Brigit flame ignite on the ground in front of me. I continued to watch it as it grew until it had expanded as much as it was going to expand.

Next, I saw myself place a green and white crown of hawthorn blossoms at its base. This is the energy of the ancient Feminine Spring rituals that we had been given the gift of experiencing a couple of years ago at the Bronze Age burial mounds on Magdalene Down, on the other side of Winchester.

Once this had been anchored at the flame’s base, I saw a gold bejewelled crown being placed above the flame. This felt like a more Christian, Godly symbol, where the hawthorn was distinctly ‘pagan’ as if the two belief systems were being joined.

I had ‘brought in’ energy the previous day while cooking my father’s evening meal. Often, when doing something very unconnected with energy, I feel the energy coming in, activating in my body. When this happens, I feel the urge to raise my arms into the air to receive something or to bring down energy for some future work. In this instance, I was given a gold crown with jewels on it. It was big when it was above my head but as it moved over me it became smaller until it eventually fit snuggly around my waist. At the time I did not know what it was for, or why it was around my body, like a girdle (remember those?), but I soon forgot about it and got on with the cooking.

Now, however, I watched as the crown moved down to contain the uppermost part of the flame, just like the girdle. I have done this with flames before, but not with a crown. Usually, the containing energy looks like a wedding band, containing the energy of a flame and holding it at a constant frequency. It doesn’t matter how big the flame is, the gold band will hold its upper part so that the flame curves out over it.

The final part of this activation was the image of a priest swinging a thurible of incense over the area, allowing the smoke to waft over the bright orange flame. This dedicates and sanctifies the flame, blessing it. This image of a catholic priest blessing a Brigit Flame felt like an acceptance of some older, pre-Christian energies.

The energy of the Brigit Flame is a very different energy from the Magdalene Flame. It is a more earthy, creative vibration, whereas the Magdalene Flame is of a higher heart/thought vibration. The Brigit Flame relates to the Tan Tien in the human body, the creative centre behind the navel; the Magdalene Flame is a heart energy but from a higher spiritual level in the energy body. It allows access to higher levels of Soul information and intention.

There are seven energy layers in the earth’s energy body just as our energy-body has seven layers. The first level is the fiery lava beneath the earth’s mantle; the second level is water as it runs below the surface of the earth; the third level is the surface. These three levels make up the creative layers of the physical world. But above these three physical levels the energy changes. It is no longer physical. The layer immediately above the earth is a magenta, ruby layer, relating to the Mother consciousness. Certain sites are created to connect to this layer and we can create energy tubes to channel this living, rosy energy onto the physical plane. The MF (Magdalene Flame) is the aspect of the Mother that heals the wounded male energies and as such, it is an archetypal energy.

There are similarities between how older, prehistoric sites, and later sites, are set up to channel and hold both the energies of the Brigit Flame and the Ruby (the Magdalene flame is an archetypal energy of the Ruby/Mother energy). The BF is often in the centre of a circular site, where people would have been living, but the MF is usually at a gateway point some distance from the site centre but from where it can feed the entire area, adding the love of the Divine Mother. The creative energies of the MF positively influence the more physical creations manifested by the BF. In the past, before Christianity, the MF would have been known by another name, but we no longer know what that is. Perhaps it was simply Mother.

I was reminded of the manifesting energies of this work when I had finished the flame-work and had headed over to the Norman baptism font. I took a couple of photos and then something on the floor caught my eye.

A pair of glasses. Laughing at myself for forgetting the principles of manifesting, I picked them up and put them on. I didn’t believe for one minute that they would be perfect. But they were, and I could write down all I had done so I wouldn’t forget it. It is easy not to remember important details later. They fade away like the mist.

I left them on the font before I left. Someone else might have forgotten theirs, or the owner might come back to claim them.

Thank you, St Mary’s, for the timely lesson around the manifesting energies of the Brigit Flame – and the perfect vision.

The Magdalene Flame. Part Four. Barton Stacey Church.

February 18, 2023February 24, 2023 / Ann Murphy / 22 Comments

The following morning, I made sure I had time to go to Barton Stacey church before visiting my father. He has lived in the village for over twenty years, as did my sister until she died. She is buried in the graveyard of the church close to a lovely old yew which has snowdrops blooming beneath it. It is a very peaceful place.

To get into the church, I had to get the key from the shop. However, getting into the church created challenges that felt like a spiritual message, or quest. Sometimes, doing this kind of work necessitates opening your awareness not only to the energies of place but also to other communications. Everything means something, and usually, when receiving this information, usually through actions you might be taking, a ‘recognising’ happens that tells you what you are doing is a message you need to take onboard.

My message that morning came in the form of keys. Having retrieved the key to the church from the shop, I made my way back to the main door. I was surprised that there was only one key as there were two keyholes, one old keyhole for an old iron key, and a yale lock. But the key in my hand was a chubb, yet I couldn’t see where it fit. I thought perhaps it opened a door around the side and so walked around the church to find it. There were two doors, but the key fit neither. Yet the key was definitely for the church, so it must fit somewhere. I walked back to the main door again and looked harder. Then, above the yale lock, higher in the door, I noticed a brass disc and realised that there was a third keyhole behind it which, lo and behold, my key fit!

I was aware of the message here: three doors, three keys but the key fit only one keyhole. The higher one. OK. Message logged, and door unlocked, I continued into the church.

Although All Saints is an old building, having been recorded in the Domesday book, it is not the original church. The original Saxon building was in a lower field behind the current site. My brother-in-law told me that they’d excavated the original site and come to the conclusion that it had been moved because the lower field flooded in winter; being too close to the River Test. The current building is on the higher drier, ground which proved to be far more successful.

However, history notwithstanding, there was an energy in the building which was quite ‘’regal’. My usual process is to make my way to the Altar. This is where, anciently, the feminine energies of water beneath the ground, or of earth vortices, are to be found. But, in this church, I heard someone telling me to ‘Approach’, in a rather regal tone, as though there was already someone waiting for me and who was worthy of my respect. It felt like other times when I visited ancient sites and was greeted by the Guardian-protector. It also felt strangely, more like a temple than a church.

At the altar, I stopped and noticed the stained glass window to my right. It depicted Mary Magdalene being told by an angel at Jesus’ tomb that he was no longer there; that he had ascended. Interesting, I thought. And a nice synchronicity.

Tuning into the energies, I saw a Pelican. Then I heard ‘An impediment stands in your way’. The pelican is an older Christian symbol of a pelican making its chest bleed so it can feed its young with the blood. Self-sacrifice. I thought that it might be a personal message and took it onboard. But, was the impediment a personal message or might it refer to something else? As it turns out, it did.

Continuing with my intention, I placed the Magdalene Flame on the altar and expanded it with my breath. When it had grown, a woman with the Magdalene energy appeared behind the altar. In each hand, she held a flame. Her left hand held the Magdalene flame and in her right hand sat the Brigit Flame. She transferred the flames to my hands so I could take them somewhere else, but I didn’t know where, yet.

Next, she handed me a gold chalice filled with communion wafers and a goblet of wine, as though she was a priest. Then she said, ‘THIS is my church. Go amongst my people. Share my love with all. Give freely.’

I did not know what she meant. Did she mean I was to do that, and if so, how? And what did she mean by THIS is my church? Did she mean this physical building or the beliefs around her as a Divine Feminine energy? It felt esoteric, rather than purely physical. Her church felt energetic, like a thoughtform of her. I didn’t really understand. But I did understand that the communion wafers were the bread of the Mother and that when energised, fed the people spiritually. The wine, when consecrated, represented the energy of the Father and did likewise. These wafers were her energy.

Sometimes, when the energy of the Mother is to be shared, I am given it in the form of communion wafers, but this didn’t seem to fit that message. It felt too ritual-y. More like for a mass or a church service. But, needing to trust what was given, I held the energies anyway as I knew it would make more sense further down the line.

Which of course it did.

It has been quite a challenge, balancing the physical obligations of life with the energetic work of connecting these churches. I have to be able to dance between the two states; to move between them even though I feel very earthbound. Looking after my father means I have to stay physically focused, which means I don’t ‘feel’ the high energies like I usually do. And yet, they come anyway and I can be in the physical world without losing my connection to the other dimensional worlds. This is reassuring because sometimes when the energies are not very strong, they can be harder to read. At those times it is easy for me to think I am imagining it, wanting to see what isn’t really there. When that happens, I just watch, as I learned to do in the years of meditation and healing training I did. Being so grounded in the physical world makes it harder, as my vibration feels very ‘normal’, but remaining present to what intuitively, and psychically, appears is the key. One of them, at least.

Because this energetic feminine presence had given me these things, I knew they had to go somewhere, but it took a couple more weeks to find out where and the message about the impediment also became clear.

Before that one, I called into another church, after an impulsive detour the following day: St. Mary’s Church, in the village of Crawley. That work reminded me of the lesson about trusting my ability to manifest what I need.

But, I’ll share that with you next time.

The Brigit and Magdalene Flame. Part Three. St Catherine’s Church, Littleton.

February 12, 2023February 20, 2023 / Ann Murphy / 7 Comments

Driving through Sparsholt again, I noticed, as I came out of Crab wood, over 1.19 km away from St Stephens’ church, that the Magdalene Flame I had anchored only a few days ago, had energetically expanded. It now covered an area of over two kilometres in diameter. I was surprised at how fast this had happened but as I drove closer to the church I felt my Hara centre (behind my navel) activate. I was making a connection to the flame via an energetic cord which stayed with me as I drove past, elongating like an elastic band.

As I passed the church, this sensation became stronger but now I knew that I was taking that connection with me to put someplace else, but as yet did not know where. I continued on to Barton Stacey intending to take the small side road that would take me closer to the road I needed but instead, I was told to “take the long way”. I did what they said and continued on towards Lainston House crossroads and again, I was told to “go straight ahead”. This was the old road to Littleton village and as I came closer to the village I knew why they had sent me that way.

St. Catherine’s Church is another one of those churches built on a mound. Originally a Saxon church, and perhaps before that another sacred site, the church was built in an area of ancient sacred significance. It lies only five hundred meters away, to the north of the Flowerdown burial mounds: three Bronze Age burials which were also the site of ancient, important ceremonies.

Still feeling the connection in my stomach, I made my way into the church and headed towards the altar. This church had a lovely village-y feel and once again, I had the awareness that it was well-loved.

As I walked towards the raised platform, I heard my guides say, ‘put your hand on the Altar’. My immediate reaction was: ‘I can’t do that! What if someone comes in and sees me?’ Old fears die hard, I realised. I was still seeing the altar as the domain of the priest, a figure of authority from my Catholic childhood; a male authority. When I resisted, again I heard ‘Put your hand on the altar.’ There was no way around it. I glanced around, just to make sure there was no one else there, and placed my right hand on the white cloth of the altar.

As soon as my palm touched it, I heard ‘my Higher Self say ‘I consecrate this church to Mary Magdalene, disciple of the most holy Jesus Christ; Mother of all and purveyor of all good things.’ A bit religious, I thought, but later realised that she was the feminine to his masculine. They are archetypal energies, after all. I don’t work with religions but symbols and archetypes are contained in them too. I see these personalities as energy thought-forms rather than physical beings, even if they once did have a physical life on earth, even if not the life we are told about.

Next, the Magdalene Flame appeared and it became the magenta channel. This channel, which looks like a hollow tube, sits behind the altar where the person who leads the service stands. It goes from the floor to above somewhere and always reminds me of the transporter in Star Trek.

I can only assume that the person standing in the beam, leading the service, will be influenced by the Divine Feminine energies anchored there. A previous visit to the Catholic cathedral in Arundel showed me how regular ritual service builds up a channel of energy which also allows energetic information to be accessed. All sacred ritual builds power and if the same intention is held every time, unchanged, like the blessing of the bread and wine, etc, then that energy will be perceived and read by others.

Once the channel had been established, a sword appeared inside it, its point towards the earth. (The sword means many things. In earth working it is often the tool that opens or closes energy vortices. It is also a mental, masculine energy, bringing with it higher thoughts, the balancer of emotional energies). Around the top of the tube, a white feathered serpent, like the white dragon energy, began to twine down around the outside of the channel, moving towards earth. But as it got closer to the altar it changed to blue and wound itself around the magenta channel. A spear then appeared inside the channel and it held the serpent like a worm on a fish hook, anchoring it to earth. This was definitely not what I was expecting. The serpent looked like it was writhing, much as eels do when hooked and brought onto the riverbank and trying to escape captivity and certain death. The spear is one of the tools of the Tuatha de Danaan and this is a use for it that I have never seen before, although it is an energy which connects other energies so it shouldn’t have come as such a surprise that it was anchoring a serpent.

The spiritual energy of the white serpent had transformed into an earthier blue, and the resistance to that transition was apparent. Yet, I knew that this process was necessary. Sometimes it is a challenge to materialise spiritual beliefs and there is often resistance to that process. It is so much easier to keep spiritual ideas and desires in the ether, rather than actually act on them. It is as if these particular beliefs will have to be pinned down, the blue force pinned into place, like water through a funnel.

Another aspect of the ‘white’ becoming ‘blue’ is that the blue serpents represent water energies; the serpents that run through rivers, estuaries and between sites of sacred significance. I am thinking here of two of which I know: Winchester and Salisbury cathedral.

The white serpent is a spiritualised energy, usually existing on higher levels of the earth’s energy-field, like the earth serpent’s higher-consciousness. The white holds the ‘plan’ or the template for healing, which the blue serpents materialise.

There are two possibilities for this serpent achoring here:

One: the serpent represents a person who carries this serpent energy and can work with the water energies, but who will initially experience resistance and struggle to bringing in new ideas. In older times, ‘Druid’ priests were known as adders, perhaps because they were able to work with the fertility energies of water. I have known female rectors who have held both Christian and pagan beliefs and they struggled to reconcile those two apparently opposing systems.

Or Two: it represents the energies which bring water fertility, such as rain and rivers and that this is the way these serpent lines have always been anchored. Think St. George and the dragon.

A flash of a Bull’s head appeared, which turned out to be a message that I would understand later.

Later research on the history of this church yielded some interesting information. The original dedication of this church was to Mary Magdalene. It was changed, over a hundred years ago, after renovation, to St Catherine of Alexandria. So, it would seem that today’s dedication was really a rededication to the original energy.

I also discovered that this church was one of nine in the Manor of Chilcomb and it was ordered, by Bishop Henry de Blois, to pay revenue to the priory of St Swithin and the Hospitallers of Jerusalem. The revenue went towards entertaining guests, and feeding the pilgrims to St Swithin’s shrine.

Again, there is that Jerusalem link but now it places it in Templar history too. Mary Magdalene was also a venerated saint in the medieval period and there was a leper hospital dedicated to her on the Alresford side of Winchester. Bishop Henry was apparently also the man who created the stories of Merlin and dragons, and the stories of the Grail, and thanks to him the stories of the Grail entered popular consciousness. In all our earthwork in the UK, and in Paris, his energy has always played an important role and he is usually a reliable sign post.

Once I felt the work was finished, I left the church, stopping to record a robin ‘chatting’ with another robin in a distant tree. They were definitely having a conversation! I couldn’t see the other bird; it was in a tree someplace else, but it was a lovely reminder of frequency, in this case ‘sound’ travelling between two points.

As I drove out of Littleton, I had a clear image of the church in Barton Stacey; the next dot to be joined. But that would have to wait until I had more time.

I didn’t have long to wait…

The Magdalene Flame. Spring 2023. Part Two. St Stephen’s Church, Sparsholt.

February 12, 2023 / Ann Murphy / 2 Comments

I have driven through the village of Sparsholt many times on the way to my father’s house in Barton Stacey, but never thought to stop there. Mainly because I am under time constraints. But I began to enjoy driving the little roads that connected old villages. It gives me some valuable alone-time and also I can feel the movement of the people of the past as they walked these roads, or travelled on horseback or carts or later in motorcars. I can imagine them visiting relatives in the other villages and going to church on Sunday, going to the market to sell their wares or to buy what they cannot get at home, or even for a change of scenery if they have the time to spare. My father thinks I am mad. He believes in getting someplace as quickly as possible and does not understand why I would want to take a longer route. I tried to explain but don’t think he was convinced.

The little roads between villages, created by the inhabitants of small hamlets, which were often part of old manors or estates, are like veins; a network joining the villages together; an entire template in time. This template is important when working on energetic layers. It is like a layer in photoshop, a layer that can be blended with other layers but which you can work with on an individual level. The layer I was working on was the connection between village churches. Still, when I started this, last week in St. Edward the Confessor’s Catholic church in Chandler’s Ford, I didn’t know that the journeys I had been making through Winchester’s outlying villages over the past few weeks would prove to be so important.

St. Stephen’s church is a small village church perched high above the village that surrounds it. It started life as a possible ‘pagan’ site on which the Saxons built their own place of worship; a common practice at the time. Whether by design, or intuition, energy attracts. In the distant past new cultures came into England and they brought their religious beliefs with them. Their beliefs might have been very similar to the beliefs of the people who already lived there and the new people would have settled, married into already established families and communities, and little by little religious culture would have changed. Special sites, which may no longer have been used, would have been the obvious energetic site to build a religious building on. Whether it was a known site or not it would still act as a magnet, drawing people to it. Religions might change, but those changes do not happen overnight. It takes time for them to shift and there has to have been an opening for them in the first place, a vacuum that needed to be filled; a Soul-need for change. St Stephen’s Church might originally have been one of these sites.

I walked through the little graveyard and into the church, which is obviously loved and well-taken care of. However, inside, the flint building was very cold, and I wondered how the original church-goers warmed it. It had been a Catholic church once upon a time before Henry VIII created the Church of England, so perhaps sitting on cold hard seats in a freezing church in winter was a form of penance or self-sacrifice. But maybe they didn’t feel the cold quite like we do. But, on the plus side, it was filled with flowers and smelled divine.

I walked up to the altar and stood in front of it, tuning in. Immediately the Magenta Flame appeared, part of the flame I had been given in St Edward’s. But I also saw the Jewish Menorah with all its candles lit. It appeared as though it was sitting on the altar. At first, I dismissed it. After all, why should a Jewish ritual object be present energetically in this little village church in the middle of the English countryside? But I discovered, when I googled it, that St. Stephen was born in Jerusalem and was the first Christian martyr stoned to death by Jewish elders for blasphemy. Again, the Jerusalem link; the same as last week in St. Edward the Confessor’s church. The symbols associated with Stephen are the censor; three stones; a Martyr’s Palm frond and a crown. These symbols were to be important later on, especially when I worked in St Mary’s Church in the village of Crawley. It was as if the energies of one place connected with, and were anchored in, the other churches; themselves acting as connectors of archetypal energies.

The next part of the anchoring was to blow energy towards the Flame of the Magdalene which is a striking magenta in colour. This blowing expands the energy or directs it. When you blow out it is done with an energetic intention; an intention that the part of you doing the work understands the purpose of. When you are doing this kind of work, you, as a personality, have little control over the process. Your Soul-self is the active Self.

As a result of blowing breath towards the flame, it grew and expanded, reaching the wooden-beamed ceiling. I heard the words “In Perpetuam”, which means ‘For all of Eternity’. This reminded me of the Perpetual flame of St. Brigit in Kildare, Ireland, a flame dedicated to the pagan saint and kept burning by a group of nuns dedicated to St. Brigit and kept alight for the past thirty years. The flame they tend is to send out the solar light of Brigit, the light of Justice, Hope and Peace.

So what did the anchoring of the Magdalene flame mean here? Mary Magdalene was one of Jesus’s disciples, and her flame-energy, originally channelled by a lovely Canadian man named Jhadten Jewell who played a really important part in my own energetic development, is the flame that helps balance, and heal, the wounded male. Her flame assists in the anchoring of the New Adamic energies, the New Male consciousness.

This is what he says: I have come to understand the power of the Goddess in Her great Return, in healing the wounded male energies of the planet that have resulted from the imbalance (i.e. predominance of the male energies that we can still see working today) of male and female energies. This is the return to balance, wholeness and unity. In my work, I have explored so many avenues of this and know that to be centered in the Goddess Light is the beginning of all creation. No matter how masculine a Soul may be, it is still and always one half feminine, in order for the alchemy of creation to unfold through all of us. We know that we have one half of our father’s DNA and half of our mother’s and yet the illusion of the physical gender, as important as it may be, lets us forget, again and again, the need for balance in these energies.

So why was the flame being anchored in these village churches? I know the answer might never come, but my Higher Self knows exactly why it is placed here and how it will affect the people who came here and who live in the area. All I can do is watch and facilitate.

Much of this work is carried out this way. I am under instruction, working in a dimension of consciousness which my personality self does not understand. Although I do get to watch, and enjoy, the higher Archetypal energies that exist in those higher dimensions, my Higher Self, or KA as they call it in ancient Egypt, is the one doing the real work. My body is simply the vehicle and the taxi service, driving from place to place and being a channel, or medium, for these energies to come through.

My next stop is in the church of St Catherine in Littleton. Another surprise visit and not so very far away.

(This post was written on a mobile keyboard. It makes it possible to write on the go with my phone. It is a genius contraption suggested by Chris Bishop, who I usually work with. Thanks Chris. A brilliant idea!)

The Brigit and Magdalene Flame. Spring 2023. Part one. RC Church of St Edward the Confessor.

February 1, 2023February 12, 2023 / Ann Murphy / Leave a comment

31^st January 2023

I’ve been working with small churches for the past two weeks, connecting them with the Spring Brigit flame and the Magdalene flame energy.

Catholic Church of St Edward the Confessor.

The first work was in the Church of St. Edward the Confessor, a small Catholic place near what used to be Otterbourne Manor (the place still exists but is diminished in size). I had been driving one of my daughters to work in Chandler’s Ford for a couple of weeks and had passed the church on my way there. On my first drive, I noticed a Brigit flame in the building and wondered about it, but did nothing. I thought it meant there was already one there. Later, driving to my father’s, via Sparsholt, I passed the little church of St Stephen and saw a magenta flame there. Again, I thought it meant there was already one there, so I ignored it, wondering instead who might have planted it.

On the way back from another Chandler’s Ford journey, a full bladder forced me to stop in the church of St. Edward the Confessor to wait until the traffic subsided and to find a toilet. Inside, the church is quite modern, having been built in the early twentieth century. As I approached the table altar, behind which is a striking stained-glass window, I saw, with my inner eye, hands place a large, wide shallow bowl on the altar. It reminded me of the fire bowls they use outside in Egypt, to keep warm in winter. In the bowl was a small orange flame and I had the impulse to blow energy which ignited it so that it rose to the ceiling.

I next saw the Was-sceptre symbol anchor the flame into the lava layer below the earth’s crust. The upper part of the symbol went into the sky and there was a date palm behind the altar to which it connected. In the ancient Middle East, the Date palm was seen as the tree of the Goddess, the dates her fruit, the only food in an otherwise arid desert. I have worked with palm trees while living in Egypt and anchored many energetic palm trees, especially where people live at subsistence level. The feeling then was that the people would always be fed from the fruits of the Goddess. They would not starve but would have what they needed. (The palm tree, in ancient Assyrian religion represented the connection between heaven and earth and was sacred to the Goddess Ishtar. The Goddess, in her many guises, is often depicted as residing in a tree, giving her ‘fruits’ freely).

The Palm means Life. Pure and simple. Especially in dry times.

While I was in Luxor, I read a theory that the Was-sceptre represented a giraffe. The bottom of the symbol represents the cloven hoofs of the giraffe, which are quite dainty, while the hook at the top, represents the head. The ‘foot’ of the sceptre touched the earth, while the ‘head’ could reach up to the heights and get the fruits from the tall palms. It was a medium between the food of the Goddess and earth. The symbol, in mythology, is associated with the god Set, who is the god of the hot, dry desert, an arid place where there are few resources. It is a staff of power, wielded by the priests. It symbolises the power to bring the Food of Heaven to earth and only those who could act as mediums between divinity and humanity could use it.

Other theories abound around the meaning of the symbol, of course, but in the course of my work, the Was-sceptre is always used to anchor flames deep beneath the earth’s mantle, and to anchor the flame to a higher level of the earth’s energy field. The sceptre itself is a strong ‘holding’, a rod of power, a connector. It keeps the energies stable, and in place, because the flame is an active energy.

So why was an Irish Goddess flame of Brigit being anchored by the use of Egyptian symbols in a small Catholic church in Chandler’s Ford? As I tuned in, I tried to sense what it might mean. What came back was something about the origins of Christianity being from the Middle East. Jesus was born there, after all. There was something about reconnecting the energies of this church to its origins, reconnecting it to its roots in Jerusalem. There was something about the original, unsullied beliefs around the goddess being brought back to common consciousness. That the Divine Feminine was once an equal partner to the Divine Masculine, each one valued for its gifts.

This was a small community church, albeit well used, and the hub of the Catholic community, yet it was the start of a series of connections between other, smaller, churches, all of Saxon origin and mainly Church of England. I was raised a Catholic, and attended a convent until I was ten years old, going to mass every Sunday, which I hated. But out of choice, I also went to the evening devotions. This I loved. There was a sense of ancientness here, between the incense filling the church and the hymns reminding me of ‘Faith of our fathers’, my favourite hymn. All those dungeons, fires and swords! back then, I felt very connected to an energy that seemed far removed from the God we were being taught about in school and at Sunday mass.

When we relocated from the country to Dublin, I was educated in a private, protestant school and lost that religious connection but I loved the school, nonetheless. It was child-centred, as opposed to God-centred. Now, between the two educations, I had a fairly good idea of the difference between them and how it made me feel.

Years later, living in the UK and at an Initiation workshop in Glastonbury, myself and another attendee decided that, rather than go to the Goddess rituals that everyone else was attending, we would go to the local Catholic church where they were having a healing service. This was a new experience for me and a reminder of an older one. As I watched the Catholic ritual of communion and wine, in my eyes, the priests were enacting an ancient Egyptian ritual. The roots of these rituals came from the temples of Egypt. The woman who had come with me had seen the same thing, which was amazing to me. Even more interesting was that I could see the effect that the ritual was having on the wine, but also saw that it had no effect on the bread. And yet, at that time, only the priest drank the wine. Now, of course, it is different and everyone gets both. However, the bread is still nothing but bread, but the wine is charged with energy.

But that experiment taught me that the Catholic ritual was a very ancient, energetic process, with a deeper connection to a ‘Mother’. Yet it was the Spring Flame of Brigit being anchored here, in Chandler’s Ford, Brigit herself being a Goddess who became a Catholic saint. She wasn’t destroyed by the religion but rather incorporated into it. She is also a goddess of light and fertility, the returning sun after a dark winter.

I thought I was finished here, so went to look for a loo. When I came back, I was ‘instructed’ to do more so I stood in front of the altar again. This time, a magenta channel of the Magdalene descended with a small magenta flame inside. It reached to the floor and high into the sky, a veritable pillar of fire. Again, I felt the impulse to blow and when I did the magenta flame expanded until it filled the channel. I was given a portion of this flame to transport somewhere else. I already guessed that it was for St Stephen’s church in Sparsholt.

On my way out, I found the holy water font and blessed myself with it. On impulse, before I left my house that morning, I had applied holy water I had gotten from Arundel cathedral last year. This is another ritual that we have forgotten the original purpose of: the application of holy water in an equal-armed cross as you enter a sacred space. This entering ritual was to open the energy-field for the ensuing ceremony. The energies generated by the Mass fed you, energetically. After the ritual Mass, on leaving the building, you then applied holy water again, this time to seal the energy-field so that all the energies you absorbed would be retained, much like sealing the energy-field with the raku symbol after passing a Reiki attunement. Originally, the Mass was an attunement, but not in the way we pass attunements today. In the original Usui Reiki system, Mikao Usui ‘attuned’ his students every time they met. He shared the energy with them by sharing his own reiki-field. They sat in that energy for the duration of the meeting, their fields open and receptive. In the original Catholic Mass, this was the way it was done too. The energy of the ritual was shared and absorbed. It was a ‘communion’, a sharing; an attunement. However, after the Synod of Whitby, that all began to change, Celtic Christianity, with all its blend of Christian and Celtic beliefs, was replaced by Roman rites and rituals… and control.

Having written this, but not yet posted it, I was with my father when the local village magazine came. Inside was a list of ceremonies for Lent, one being an ‘Ashing Communion’. This is where they put ash on your forehead, again in an equal-armed cross. (That cross signifies equilibrium). I wondered what the ash meant. The palm used in Palm Sunday is burnt and applied to the forehead. In Roman times, penitents wore ashes and sackcloth to repent for their sins. Now, everyone is a sinner, by all accounts. BUT it was the palm, and again, we come back to the pagan origins of Christianity, which feel far more real to me. The palm, sacred to the Goddess, is still being used in Christian religions, which has to be a good thing.

I’ve put the link at the bottom of this page so if you want to visit the church and partake of the energies there, feel free.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faith_of_Our_Fathers_(hymn)

Naqada Culture

https://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/christianity/saints/edward.shtml

https://www.stswithunwellsparish.org.uk/sted

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synod_of_Whitby

In the beginning…

November 4, 2022November 2, 2022 / Ann Murphy / 3 Comments

I have worked, energetically, with stone circles for twenty years, but it was on a trip to the remains of a stone circle in Cumbria, deep in a forest plantation, that I was granted a wonderful insight into one way in which our Bronze age ancestors used the circles.

From that experience, I understood that some circles were associated with maintaining fertility. They were used ritually at certain points of the year, (solstices, equinoxes, etc) and at that time priests, priestesses, and the entire community channelled the energy of the solar light into the circle to fertilise the wheat they had harvested the previous season, and to fertilise the waiting earth beneath; the masculine creative force of the sun, fertilising the female earth.

At the end of the Mesolithic period, ancient communities moved from hunting and gathering, to growing and tending. Their focus was on the growing of food, so taking care of both the physical landscape and the energetic landscape meant they had a better chance of survival. Their awareness of the Oneness of life was a part of them. They did not simply live on the planet, separate to it as we do, but they understood they were an integral part of it.

But how did the Early Neolithic farmers begin to use stone to contain and hold the energies they built in the landscape? How did they learn that particular form of energy-work in the first place? I have found no evidence of fertility work of this nature in the earlier Mesolithic hunter-gatherers. It seemed to arrive with people who grew their food on a large scale and who needed specific energetic help to accomplish that.

Before agriculture, hunters worked shamanically to connect to the spirit of the animal they were about to hunt, communicating with it before the hunt and asking for, and acknowledging, the creature’s sacrifice to feed them. But, with the advent of agriculture, some of these practices changed. To the ancestor, everything was energy. Every living thing, including apparently inert objects, such as stone, soil, etc, had a spirit and therefore deserved respect and acknowledgement. (You only have to look at the current indigenous people of the world to see how our ancestors might have lived).

It has always been a mystery to me how practices changed, from hunting and gathering, to include the growing of crops. Once you begin to grow food, the process and focus changes. But when did they begin to associate stone circles with corn-energising rituals?

It was only while reading Home by Francis Pryor, that I found a possible answer. Francis had been working on a Neolithic causewayed enclosure site in Etton along with his wife. The enclosure was part of a complex of enclosures, like Salisbury Plain, and comprised a single circuit of interrupted ditches. They discovered, at the end of each ditch segment, objects which had been carefully placed there. The deposits in the segmented ditches were laid in layers, each protected by a birchbark mat, which would have been naturally waterproof. Intact pottery vessels, turned upside-down, skulls, and broken quern stones, for the grinding of grain into flour, were also placed in layers in the ditches.

According to Prior, the objects placed within the ditches were crafts traditionally carried out by women: pottery, weaving, bread-making, etc. That makes me wonder why they deposited these particular objects in the ditches? Was the site traditionally viewed as female? Just as with the Cumbrian circle? The female energy was believed to reside in the earth, so it makes sense that if they wanted to ensure the positive flow of energy into their own home and tribe they would make offerings of gratitude for the resources already received and the petition for that flow to continue for the coming year.

Within the henge, there were also multiple pits filled with ritual deposits, but the most striking thing for me was that in the ditches on either side of the causeways, quern stones had been placed on their sides, so that they stood upright. Stones were placed on either side of the causeway, of which there were possibly four, oriented North, South, East and West, although the South entrance was subsequently destroyed. The deposits seem to have been placed, on separate occasions, but in the same place each time, in layers, perhaps during large gatherings, and by kin groups. Each time they gathered, they carried out ceremonies and a new stone was placed there; again on its side so that it stood upright, but above the buried layer of the previous celebrations.

Grain was an important part of their survival and the excavators of Etton discovered evidence that “cereal crops were both grown and processed within the immediate vicinity, perhaps within the enclosure.”

Datchet causeway. Example of how ditches were spaced.

When I read this for the first time, it immediately reminded me of my visit to Cumbria. and the importance of the stone circle in charging the wheat for the following growing season. The deposition of saddle querns, upright in the ditches, signalled for me the mental leap made by the Neolithic communities from ritual deposits of stones for wheat-grinding to standing stones. Wheat was such an important part of their survival that it stood to reason that the objects associated with grain processing should be held in such sacred esteem. I imagine, through the deposition of these stones, each family was both manifesting their food for the coming year but also giving something back to the Mother, in gratitude for feeding them; for taking care of them. And, as the quote above suggests, if the site was used for the processing of wheat, then corn rituals might well have been carried out in the centre too, creating what later became, the stone circles.

In Knowth, there is the huge concave stone in one of the recesses within the burial mound. Burial mounds represent the womb of the Mother. Knowth is part of the Newgrange complex, where the sun enters the chamber at Midwinter, to light up the darkness within. Again the solar rays fertilising the Mother. The large concave stone is like a huge ceremonial saddle quern and may well symbolise the fertilising of the grain. A gift to the mother and holder of the ashes of people who may have been the ones who carried out the sacred ceremonies.

The carving inside the stone is interesting too: To me, it looks like an energetic representation of the solar rays fertilising the seed within the womb of Mother Earth.

Of course, it may have had multiple meanings. As modern humans, we see symbols as representing things we only have understanding of ‘in the present’. We see things one-dimensionally. Our ancestors may have had access to knowledge we can only imagine, or re-learn, as we work in the energetic landscapes of the Mother.

The positioning of the saddle querns in the site in Etton also made me think of Mecca, where before Islam, tribal communities gathered there yearly. Each tribe had its own stone statue representing the energy of their tribe, their over-ruling deity, part of a circle of stones around the sacred site. Only with the coming of Islam was this practice destroyed and now only the ruling family have their ‘stone’, contained in the Kaaba. (Mecca had been a sacred site for many centuries, sacred to a triple goddess. One of these goddesses, Al-Uzzah, was a grain goddess).

As I was writing this, I found this very interesting article: https://www.hunebednieuwscafe.nl/2017/10/british-stone-circles-were-used-for-parties/ The article states: The research into the Ring of Brodgar also showed that each stone comes from a different part of the Orkney Islands. Apparently, each of the diverse groups of people brought its own stone and placed it in the monument. Remarkably, Professor Bayliss’ research also found evidence that people travelled to the Orkneys from as far away as Belgium. This fits very well with the idea of family groups/tribes having their quernstone in the circle.

Many ancient Mother/Goddess sites were symbolic womb; places where, at certain times of the year, the energies of fertility were strongest. The midwinter ritual of the sun piercing the darkest recesses of burial mounds, and temples, were fertility processes: the male sun sending his fertilising principle into the dark womb of the Mother to activate the egg waiting there. These were no empty rituals, however. Our ancestors understood the active energies that revitalised the energy lines in the earth, that brought new vitality after the dark of winter, warming the earth; bringing new growth. Where energy flows, so too does life.

There are naturally powerful places on earth where the energy is palpable, such as volcanos, places where crystals have formed, and deep underground caves. Places too where elemental energies are strong: rivers, lakes, mountains, and forests. But energy is also built through ritual and intention. I have never been a ‘ritual’ worker. I never really understood the purpose of ritual except as a focus for creating and for intention. But, I recently had an experience in a Cathedral Church in Arundel where I saw the result of ritual actions on the energy of a place over time.

We were working on making a triangular connection between the sea and the river Arun. I wasn’t sure where this connection was supposed to be anchored but we went into the cathedral, just in case. I had been given water energy by a wonderfully loving sea elemental on Littlehampton beach and although I knew I had to put it somewhere; I didn’t know where, until it happened. As I approached the altar, which was built on top of an ancient spring, I saw the blue column of light behind it, which had been built up over the years by the priests doing the bread and wine ritual. This was a surprise to me. The energy had built up over so many years and had created a healing channel in the cathedral. This is also where the water energy gift was anchored, which was also a huge surprise. (One of the important things to remember when doing energywork is that religious belief plays no part. It is the positive intentions to help humanity which are important. Although saying that, the ancientness of the catholic ritual contains an energy that I have not found in other, more modern religious rituals).

But this ritual also involves the energising of bread, just as the ancient ritual in the stone circle Cumbria showed. (I think the energising of the wine might have been Roman in origin and added later as patriarchal religions became more prominent. The wine is energised from ‘above’ whereas the bread should be energised by the mother-energy ‘below’).

So that brings us back to the quernstones. We know that causewayed enclosures were the forerunners of stone circles so if the quernstones were placed as sacred objects and connected to a particular kin-group, (as in old Mecca, and Orkney), then it is not such a stretch to see that the later ‘standing stones’/quernstones in a circle came to represent each kin-family’s offerings to the Mother Goddess. The rituals building up over time gave these places their sanctity but there may well have been an extant ‘energy’ that told them where to build these sites in the first place.

The alignments of the main causeways appear to be directional, and the east/west entrances align with the sun. (We have often found main energylines crossing over in these sites, although not necessarily NSEW aligned). The astrological alignment aspects of stone circles might have come into play as a way for them to be sure about the timing of important events. I’m sure the simple beginning of the ritual circles became more complicated over time.

A very good book which explains how Glastonbury abbey was created is: The Gate of Remembrance by Frederick Bligh Bond, F.R.I.B.A. It is a book about the discovery of The Edgar Chapel through automatic writing and gives very interesting energetic information on how a sacred site is created.

Here are some more links for information.

https://www.historyscotland.com/exploring-scotland/stone-circles-and-henges-c-3500-1000-bc-history-map/

Causewayed enclosures

https://www.lakedistrict.gov.uk/visiting/things-to-do/historical-places-to-visit/stone-circles

The Bread of The Mother.

November 2, 2022 / Ann Murphy / 10 Comments

Yesterday morning, Sunday, (I wrote this a few years ago) I was listening to the Radio 4 church service (not something I often listen to, but it was an impulse I followed). The teaching was ‘The loaves and the Fishes’. You know, the one where Jesus miraculously fed the 5.000 people with only 5 loaves and 2 fishes after the death of his friend and teacher John the Baptist? Finishing up a beading project, the fact struck me that people never question this story. They relate it as though it is an absolute truth. But to me, they are missing an important point. Jesus was a spiritual teacher, teaching people something important. There was a deeper meaning to this story.

People, such as Dr Marcellino D’Ambrosio, have looked into certain Judaic meanings behind the symbolism, such as the five loaves representing the Mosaic teachings in the Torah. There are 5 books in the Torah. So perhaps, on one level, Jesus was expanding on the teachings and inner story of Moses, who was also a prophet, and a teacher.

But he was also quoted as saying that he was the ‘Bread of Life’. To my mind, this was a misinterpretation. He was also known as the ‘Water of Life’ which felt more appropriate. Could he be both bread and water? All spiritual nourishment? To many he was/is, but I have experienced a completely different awareness of what the bread represents. Over the past twenty years of doing energy healing, at many sacred sites around the world, I have found that the Bread represents the Bread of the Mother, of the earth.

My first experience of this came in 2006, in Cumbria, at a stone circle complex in the Broomrigg Plantation. One of my psychic gifts is the ability to tap into ancient knowledge and experience it in the present. It is psychometry; I suppose. Tapping into objects or places and opening doorways into past lives.

On this occasion, standing on an ancient stone which had once formed part of a stone circle, I went back to the Bronze Age and found myself watching an ancient winter solstice ritual. Within the circle, a priest stood, and around the inside of the circle also stood containers of wheat which had been harvested the previous autumn. A priestess, who personified Artemis (I was a little surprised at that) drew down the energy of the sun and brought it into the earth, which opened like a womb to accept the solar energy. This fertilised a giant ovum and filled the womb with golden light. The priest had strewn wheat grains around the inside of the circle petitioning the Goddess Artemis, within whose hands he had placed a sheaf of corn. As this happened, the wheat in the containers was also ‘charged’, which effectively imbued the seeds with life, so that when they planted them again in the spring the resulting crop would be abundant. At the end of the ritual, the priest sprinkled water around the inside of the circle, because, without rain, the wheat could not grow.

Once the ‘ritual’ was complete, some of the grain was taken from the containers, ground into flour and made into bread. Each household in the tribe was given a portion of this ‘charged’ bread in order to bring fertility to the entire tribe over the coming year. Everyone was equal and everyone was fed. No-one was left out.

This experience prompted many questions. Over the past few years, some of these questions have found answers. I had, on occasion, to travel back to Ireland for Catholic funerals or memorial services, and noticed during the consecration of the bread and wine, during Mass, that all the energy from ‘Above’ seemed to charge the wine but not the bread. I also thought it was significant that only the priest drank the wine, (things have changed since then!) thereby gaining the benefit of its charged energy. But the communication wafers, the Bread/Body of Christ had no energy and yet this was distributed to the people during the Mass. I found this very interesting Why was the bread not ‘charged’, and why was it only the priest who benefited from the spiritual energy which should have been shared? I wondered if it was to do with power dynamics within the early church? Communion is such an important part of the Catholic Mass ritual and I can remember, as a child, taking communion seriously, believing that I was eating part of Jesus’ body. When it stuck to the roof of my mouth and broke, and I tried to remove it with my tongue, it was a serious disaster. Jesus was real to me and I thought I was breaking him apart.

The word communion signifies a joining, a sharing of energy, but there was no energy in this communion. It was rice paper, nothing more. For years, I had wondered why this was (I only rarely have communion now. If I feel an impulse, I will take it, even though I know it contains nothing). However, this year, I experienced another teaching, through ‘psychic time-travel’, that explained more of the mystery. It was in St. Dogmaels’ Abbey in Wales, near Cardigan Bay and I was doing my usual energy work, as I do in many churches, (both ancient and those still in use), when I felt an impulse to stop at a point which was below ground level. In the past, the altar of the church would have stood above this room and as I stood in the centre of this ‘cellar’ I felt a powerful female earth energy, like a vortex. It was still active, and very strong. When I stood in it, I ‘saw’ a monk standing in front of the altar in the room above me. He was consecrating the wine and the bread, but as he focused on the bread, which was a round loaf, he drew the energy of this vortex into the bread, spiritualising it with the female energy of the Earth, the Mother. Next, he drew down the energy of the sun and consecrated the wine with that energy, the Male fertilising principle! Finally I understood! Somewhere along the line, this connection and honouring of the role of Mother Earth, in sacred ritual, had been lost.

The Abbey itself was built in the 12th Century and is a Trionian Abbey, founded by monks from France who were dissatisfied with the way things were going in the French Monasteries. They wanted to get back to a simpler way of living, and of serving. But they also knew that the balance depended on honouring both Mother and Father.

At one point during this exploration through time, I was also given the understanding of the Holy Trinity: The Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. The Father is obvious; he is the male principle, Solar, Christ Light. The Holy Spirit is the Mother, the Female principle: the Earth; and the son, is the priest /medium. The Son of both Mother and Father is the priest; he is the medium between the two; the one who can work with both energies and who is trained to materialise these energies in the bread and wine, thereby bringing succour to the community through their distribution. What is missing here, of course, is the female representative, the priestess. But, at least they still knew what they were doing, even though they were using both energies in a less earth-focused way than our ancestors at Broomrigg had done.

But, what I still did not know, was when this understanding disappeared. Perhaps during the dissolution of the monasteries, when the Divine Feminine, through Mary, was removed from the collective consciousness? Perhaps that understanding will come later.

So, back to the loaves and the fishes. Jesus (or someone) was trying to teach about the balance between the Masculine and the Feminine. The bread of Life comes from the earth, from the Mother. The fish is a male symbol, and one which I also have experienced in the course of my work, and which I know to be a symbol of life in the Ancient Solar priesthoods of Egypt, Greece and Western Europe. The symbol of Christianity is the Fish. The fish swims in water; water is life. The fish is a symbol for the fertility that comes from water, the abundance of a masculine god.

Jesus was teaching the multitudes about Honouring the Mother and Father, just as the commandments told them to. Not just your physical, earthly Mother and father, but all of life through the Earth Mother and Solar Father. I believe the story tells us that nourishment comes from Mother and Father. What comes from the sky is Masculine, sun and rain, which fertilises the earth, the feminine, so that all her people can live. You cannot exist without both. What can you create with sun alone? Without the mixture of earth, what is it? If you honour both, you can feed thousands.

Maybe we need to get back to that. We need to relearn these ways of thinking about the earth, or Gaia, and her relationship with the Father, in order for us to live sustainable and fulfilling lives. It’s really not that hard. We just have to change our core beliefs. It might take years but at least the world of the future will be one worth living in again! And I wonder what would happen if we started to do these rituals in the way they were intended? That would be an interesting experiment.

PS. When I was in the Hare Krsnas, back in the seventies in Dublin, they cooked their food and blessed it before sharing it with people so that everyone could eat the sacred prasadam of the god of love, Krishna. Even one meal was enough to give you Krsna’s mercy. Blessing food is an ancient tradition.

A more modern story is the story of the foundation of Findhorn, one of my favourites.

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An Invitation.

August 26, 2022August 30, 2022 / Ann Murphy / 2 Comments

“Down through the centuries, man has attempted to outwit the forces of nature. Now, it falls to them to be the custodians of those same forces. It is no longer enough to live on the world; now it is necessary to live in it.

The time has come for all men (we include women here but it is more expedient to use one term only) to unite against the destructive beliefs of those who seek to destroy the natural world. It is time to unite against the forces of humankind who would seek to eliminate the wealth of the natural world in order to line their own pockets.

But how can we accomplish such a task, we hear you ask?

From your perspective, it appears to be an insurmountable task, but from ours, it is relatively simple. Those of you who work with the natural forces, i.e., the trees; the elemental spirits, the Ancient Ones, the dragons, etc., already have it within your means to help stem the tide of destruction.

All you have to do, and we will assist all those willing to give of their time and skills, is to focus daily on the energies that surround you, your gardens, your parks, your woodlands. Focus on your own area, then contact, mentally, the elementals of that area. Commune with them. Concentrate on their essence, see their forms, and hear their songs.

Once you have accomplished this, create centres of learning so that others can go there and learn to commune with them. Create your own Nature Elemental Universities, where students can visit when they feel called, to connect with the Elemental energies that wish to work with them.

There is still time to change the tides, but you must not tarry.”

I received this a couple of weeks ago and wondered how to connect with the Elementals as they suggested. It usually takes me a few weeks to process what they have given me but then I remembered something that happened at my friend’s house a few months ago. She lives just a few miles outside Winchester, surrounded by fields, ancient trackways and woodland. Having a cup of tea, and looking out her window at apple trees, roses, and the pheasant who comes for feeding daily, I saw images of a thin, gaunt giant striding slowly across the landscape in the field opposite her house. He was the Elemental energy of the area, the one who took care of what used to be the old estate. He is the one who maintains the balance and looks after all the other energies who live there, both seen and unseen. I hadn’t called him, but he came of his own volition, inviting my friend to connect with him.

He was not what I expected from an Elemental, but his energy was calm, slow and peaceful. He exuded love and care which was a joy to feel. My friend saw a different image of him, one that had meaning to her. (We all see the Elementals according to our beliefs so however they appear to you is the right way for you).

I remember too, at another friend’s house in Dorset, seeing another Elemental. At the time I didn’t quite understand what he was doing as he was peering at me, rather grumpily I thought, through a triangular portal I had anchored there. He looked like a Sulamith Wulfing illustration. (She could see the elementals clearly). I knew the triangle allowed communication between humans and the Elementals but didn’t quite realise why they were created there. The channelling above explains why.

A few weeks back, I created a triangle portal on the site of an old Roman villa, in Sparsholt. When I opened the portal, I didn’t understand why they placed it there. The roman villa was not a sacred place, I thought. But my thinking was limited. I was only seeing what used to be there, not what is there now. I was thinking of the past, not the present.

When anchoring the triangle at that place, I did not know its purpose, but on a return trip, after receiving this channelling, we went back up, passing the bronze age burial mound on the way, to connect with the elemental energy there. As soon as we entered the woods, the wind started rising, moving through the branches of the beech trees. We walked around the edge of the woods, listening to the wind rise and fall. I had the impression that the elemental communicated like that, through wind in the trees and I remembered a similar experience many years ago after trying and failing to find the villa site.

Hopelessly lost, after half a day of searching the woods, I gave in and asked the energies of the woods to please help me. Almost as soon as I uttered the words, a wind moved through the trees on my left as if they were saying, ‘follow me’. So, I followed what seemed like a wave of wind as it moved the tree branches. I followed this wave of softly moving branches, walking in a straight line through brambles and undergrowth, until five minutes later, I found myself in a square clearing. A feeling settled in my stomach as I heard the energies, through the wind and trees, say ‘Welcome.’ The voice was low and airy and I was both amazed, and overjoyed at having finally found the place. I was also fascinated by how the energies there communicated with me and how they had helped me locate what I had spent ten years trying to find.

That was my first experience. I didn’t know it at the time but I had connected with the elemental guardian there but on this last visit I understood more. Because I knew it was there. Placing the triangle of energy told me that. After walking the old paths, we came to the site of the villa and the winds stopped, completely. There was a stark difference between this clear space and the surrounding trees. Outside the space, the wind moved strongly, rustling the branches, but inside the space, there was no movement, at all. It was completely still, peaceful, like the eye of a storm.

Sitting on the wooden bench, I mentally called to the elemental telling him(?) of my intention and I waited. I noticed a wind come up again, to my left, and saw a man taller than the trees, striding through them, moving the branches aside as if they were tall grass. To my mind, he looked like the BFG. Gentle and caring. But he did not enter the villa site. He moved in the trees surrounding it. I was curious about this so as we walked back I asked him how we could help, based on what the channelling had suggested. I also wanted to know more about him.

This is his area. It even looks like an elemental.

I heard, as words in my head, ‘This is my kingdom.’ And he showed me the entire woodland and a red line drawn around the boundaries. As the elemental ‘King’ he strode around these boundaries, holding within them his trees, as though he was a tree-shepherd. This sounded familiar and I remembered Tolkien talking about Tree-shepherds. But Tolkien’s shepherds were trees. This elemental was not. He was distinct from them. A being in his own right. Trees are rooted. They cannot move. But he can, and does, caring for and protecting everything within his red line. Looking at the map of over 130 years, I can see that he has done a pretty good job as the woods are still there and have been added to, not diminished.

We passed an old beech tree that had been planted as a boundary tree to separate arable land from woodland. I looked up into its branches and was reminded of Enid Blyton’s The Magic Faraway Tree with its ‘lands’ at the top that changed all the time so you never knew what land was going to be there next time you climbed it. This reminded me of what my guides had said about how to access inspiration, by moving along the branch of a tree and connecting with the story/poem/painting there; an interdimensional tree.

That, it seemed, was the answer. Write stories. Let the stories be about them. At least for me. For you it might be different, based on your life’s work.

During the previous week, while anchoring a red dragon line on the south coast which will eventually stretch from Worthing to Portland Bill, I opened a triangle portal at Littlehampton. Once it was open, I contacted the most beautiful sea elemental I have ever connected to. The triangle goes from Littlehampton to Arundel, making it a water portal as it follows the river, Arun. I had never opened a water portal before, not like this anyway.

And I have also never experienced such loving elemental energy. I wanted to stay in this place forever. Usually, when I do energy work, once I have completed the work, I have no more desire to be there, but this place was different. I didn’t want to leave! The elemental appeared as a large brown boulder covered with barnacles and mussels, like a rock you would see beside the sea when the tide has gone out. It looked bulbous, rounded and swollen, with a wide, round nose and large, large lips that stretched around its face, like a cleft in the rock. Its eyes were closed and its face turned towards the surface, absorbing the sunlight that filtered through the water. He didn’t move around, this elemental, but remained in this place doing his job as elemental balancer. But he did give me a gift that would allow me to share his energy as an attunement.

I am not a beachy person; I don’t enjoy lying on a beach all day but prefer to be walking, picking up fossils and stones and feathers and taking photos. But I could quite happily have stayed on this beach, within his loving, nurturing energy.

Putting all these things together, I assume that triangle portals open up places to be used as Elemental Universities. Visiting these places and having the intention to learn from these elementals will teach you what they want you to learn.

Perhaps too, a human will be a guardian of a particular portal. Someone who feels drawn to being there. Each place has one. Someone who can communicate with the Elemental guardians and help keep the balance, and can share the knowledge of these wonderful guardians, passing on their teachings through the written word, music or art.

For now, I will share the places where portals exist, which is also the reason for this post, so you can go yourself and connect to them and see what they want you to do.

There is still time, as they say. But do not tarry…

If you wish to work with the Elementals in this way, you can receive the Elemental Portal Attunement. which will attune you to their energies and which will allow you to install the portals where you are guided to.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sparsholt_Roman_Villa

https://www.greatbritishlife.co.uk/things-to-do/walks/walk-around-farley-mount-7246968

Durrington Walls and the Cuckoo Stone.

January 14, 2022January 13, 2022 / Ann Murphy / Leave a comment

On the 2nd of January, we felt an impulse to drive to Durrington Walls, near Stonehenge. It was our first trip to do energy-work in months and it felt really good to connect to the ancestors again. I had been weighed down by the darkness of winter, and the constant rain, and felt permanently rooted in modern life and its stresses having been in the UK for far longer than originally intended. As result, I had lost my focus, so the trip to Durrington felt like a positive step and as we drove there, feeling the intention, I remembered how much I loved doing this work.

When we arrived, we walked into the henge, looking with archaeological eyes at how the settlement had been constructed. We then tried to find the site of the two circles that originally lay within it. It felt very Avebury-ish and we thought about how close the settlement had been built to the river Avon that passed just below.

Having spent time discussing the possible thinking of the original settlers, we wandered back, but as I crossed what would have been one of the entranceways to the river, I felt the urge to connect. In my mind, I raised my arms to the sun, or to where the sun would have been, had it been a cloudless day. (I am far too self-conscious to do physical arm-raising in public so I see myself doing it in my mind). I raised up and connected to the sun. As I did so, two ancient people, one male, one female, appeared. The man held a brown book which he handed to me. It felt like a bible, and he explained that it was the spiritual and historical beliefs of his people; the two being connected, just like the Old Testament is both the history, and spiritual beliefs, of the Israelites.

I began to get an understanding of what had brought these people here and why they had left. I was told that they had originally come from the north – it felt like Orkney – and they came to create a new colony down south, where they had people they were connected to. They had been told that it was warm here and that the land was fertile, good for crop growing. This felt like the beginnings of agriculture when they were learning how to work with the fertility in the landscape in a new way. At first, it was good, and they were successful enough but then the climate changed. It became wetter and there was less sun to ripen the corn.

The bad weather continued for several years and they could not survive, forcing them to go back to an older way of life – more a foraging and hunting lifestyle. There was a feeling, that in their fear, they focussed more on learning how to work with the earth’s energy-field, and the serpent lines, and less on the more physical aspects of survival. In the past, hunting and gathering had been their way. It was a shamanic way of living. In order to survive, rituals were performed before the hunt, rituals that connected them to the essence of the animal, ensuring the creature’s participation in the hunt. They had no real control over the animals. All they could do was connect with their essence, communicating on subtle levels their intention and need to feed themselves. We are familiar with the Nat. American way of life. Our ancestors were no different.

Transitioning to agriculture took a long time. Not only were they learning how to farm, and how to tame animals that originally roamed free, they were also learning how to work with the earth’s forces differently. It was an entirely new world for them.

However, the efforts of the early people of Durrington Walls were not successful. With the change in weather patterns, food supplies ran out and their people dwindled in number until eventually, they decided to return to where they had come from. They knew there would be food there. Fish was always plentiful, as were mammals, so they had to go backwards for a time. This feels like an important message for us in our time too. Climates have cycles, they change. We are currently in one such change. There may come a time when we too have to go ‘backwards’ for a time, back to an older way of doing things. But it is a temporary going backwards. Things will move forward again and things will progress.

Some of the tribe did not want to return, telling the others that if they only waited the weather would get better. But they did not know how long it would remain like this so they opted to leave. Before they left, before it got too bad, they had tried to improve the fertility of the soil by working energetically in the landscape but all their work was for nothing. They spent too much time doing that without realising that they could not control the world’s weather pattern changes. They could only improve the earth’s fertility in the soil. (This also answered a question I have had for years! You can improve the soil and growing conditions but not the global weather).

After receiving this information, which continued coming in as we walked and explored, we next made our way to The Cuckoo Stone. Before we had left the house, we had been instructed to take a bottle of water to make an essence and as soon as we got to the stone, ( which I never knew about), I understood why.

Our first impulse was to walk three times around it sun-wise, (clockwise). This meant that it was a masculine sun-stone. (At feminine sites, you usually walk anti-clockwise. When you walk around a stone, or site, it energetically opens it, creating a doorway into its energies and functions.) Walking around this stone made me feel dizzy on the third pass, which I thought I was imagining, until Chris said it was making him dizzy too. It’s always good to have confirmation. Again, this dizziness is something I have experienced before at the stones at Avebury. Years ago, a friend and I were at that circle. It was my first visit, and I felt so excited to be there having wanted to see it since I was a teenager in Dublin watching Children of the Stones on TV. Coming close to the circle at Avebury then was like coming home after many years away.

At that time, my friend and I walked around the stones but experienced a dizziness as we did so. It was as if each stone was a battery with both positive/negative energies. Each stone too was either male or female making a huge force-field around the circle. The entire Avebury complex was a giant male-female balancing in the landscape.

This Cuckoo stone also had a magnetic field, even though it no longer occupied the same site it had originally, and was only half the size of what it once had been. But it was close enough.

Once we had activated the stone, we sat on it and tuned in. Almost immediately, we saw a youngish woman with dark, curly hair and wearing a band of flowers around her head. Behind her stood a male priest dressed in a creamy white robe. He was older than her and seemed to be her mentor. He remained behind her while she carried out the ritual. This felt to be a later time than had our previous Durrington information.

While we sat on the stone it was as if we were both the stone, and ourselves. The young woman placed a garland of flowers around our shoulders but she was really dressing the stone, just as they still do in Ireland at holy wells. The ritual was to welcome the sun from the east after the long winter. It was an acknowledgement of the life it brings and in recognition of the stone and its importance to the vitality that flowed from the sun, through the stone, and into the earth’s energy-circuit. The couple placed the garlands facing Woodhenge, where the sun came up, but we did not feel that Woodhenge was significant to the ritual. Chris was aware of a Mayday reference to this too, so perhaps the stone was dressed at more than one time of year.

West Kennet Long Barrow. What our Long Barrow might have looked like.

Once they had finished at the stone, I saw the woman, followed by the priest, carrying a shallow, pottery, bowl of water with flowers in it, over to where the Neolithic long barrow once stood, meters away from the them. The bowl had been at the foot of the monolith while she did the ritual dressing and the water in the bowl was charged by stone and sun. The barrow was still there in their time and we could see it’s energy clearly. The woman laid the bowl at the entrance, as a gift to the ancestors and an acknowledgement to them. Their line of kinship was still intact and important. If it hadn’t been for the lessons learned by their ancestors, these people would not have survived and thrived, so they offered their gratitude. Death and life were One, the two sides of life. The ancestors still lived, but in another form, their presence still recognised.

(This reminded me of the St. Mullin’s Pattern when I was young. At the feast day of St. Moling, all the locals from local towns came to the ruins of St. Moling’s monastery and his holy well. Traditionally, the people walked three times around the well, sun-wise – called ‘Doing the Rounds’ – in their bare feet. They then dressed the graves of their family; ancestors who had been buried there for generations, and some more recently. There were certain other traditions associated with the day, namely that of spending a number of hours in the only pub in St. Mullins and spending money on the stalls. The water of the holy well was reputed to cure all manner of illnesses and everyone in my town had a bottle).

Next we were instructed to make the essence. I put the bottle on the stone and saw the dark-haired woman place a garland of flowers around it, as if the bottle of water was also the stone. Next, to my surprise, she put a fat earthworm in it then told me to close the bottle quickly. The worm had to do with the fertility of the soil as though there had to be a combination of both energy-work and physical work to ensure fertility. Energy alone cannot grow things.

Next, we were told to bring some of that blessed water to the site of the long barrow. As we walked towards it, I felt a sudden powerful flowing in of energy that made my whole body tingle. I love that feeling! I poured the water onto where the barrow once stood, connecting to the ancestors and sending our gratitude to them and once we were finished we began to walk back to the car, towards Woodhenge. As I did, I became aware of an image of the long Barrow behind me and I stopped walking. It was as if we were walking out of the darkness of the winter/death and into the light of a new phase and I had to walk with that intention.

It was a very welcome ending to a very satisfying day’s work.

Magdalene Down Male Mysteries

April 25, 2021April 24, 2021 / Ann Murphy / 1 Comment

After our first day’s information about the Female Mysteries of Spring, we went back the following week to learn about the Male Mysteries.

This time we stood on the second largest barrow, where we had seen the Elder the previous week. As soon as we tuned in, he appeared and he instructed us to sit.

I felt as though I was in a class, as it would have been held centuries ago, but I was male. There were five or six of us being trained. The elder explained about our role in the Spring festival. We were a new cohort, and this was the start of our training. The Elder would instruct us on how to serve the Mother, both in what we did, as priests in training, and for the rest of our lives. What we were being shown was male priest training, rather than simply something for the festival rituals.

He explained that male fertility was connected to the waterways: the rivers and to the sea. I saw the Itchen river in my mind, running around he base of St. Catherine’s hill. As we were being shown the connection between the river and the hill, an image of Silbury Hill, near Avebury, with the water all around the base, popped into my head. I wondered if, in ancient times, the waters also rose at certain times of the year and flooded around the base of St. Catherine’s; the mound a pregnant belly that emerged from the waters of life.

Water carries fertility, like seminal fluid carries sperm. This is how they understood it. Because many female fertility sites were connected with waterways i.e., Stonehenge, Stanton Drew, etc., it fell to men to hold the energy of water-fertility. They were the active principle and the female was the receptive.

The Elder, having explained about the importance of water to these young men, then went on in a more serious tone. He handed each one a rounded, river pebble. He told them that the water had shaped these stones, tumbled and smoothed them over many years. The water had the power to shape the hardest material, BUT, the stone was of the earth and the river ran THROUGH the earth. The water, on its own, was simply water. The Mother, Earth, was the channel/river-bed through which the water ran, it ran through her body. She was the foundation of all.

This teaching was to curb feelings of power the young men might harbour, believing that because they held the power to fertilise, this meant they were more powerful than the earth itself.

At that point, to continue the lesson, the Elder told us all that we would now go to the other side of the hill, but to bring our stone with us. This was a couple of miles across the land for them, but necessitated a car-ride for us. From last week, we knew the men had their training by the river and that by the time of the Spring rites, they would proceed from there to the top of St. Catherine’s.

We drove around to the other side of Winchester, and tried to find a car-parking space close to the river. That proved tricky, as now everyone goes for coffee and a walk beside the canal! Because we could not find a space, we went to the water-meadows at. St Cross Hospital, where we had access to the river. This was better as it was the more natural part of the river; the part currently flowing alongside St. Catherine’s Hill is the navigation canal built in the late 17th Century.

We stood by the river bank and waited for the Elder to tell us what to do. We still held the stone. Because the Elder was not physically real, the stone he gave us wasn’t either. But, I had one in my pocket I had picked up somewhere. I’m always picking up stones! It didn’t have to be physical, of course, but it made it feel more real.

Itchen River, St. Cross Hospital, Winchester.

Standing by the river’s edge, the Elder told us that we had to throw this stone into the water. But, in throwing it in, we were handing over our ego, or sense of power and personal Will to the Mother. We were acknowledging that we, as men, served her. We were not master over her. In order to serve, we had to let go of all our attachments to power over others, over the tribe, over the land. We were making a commitment to serve her as she wished to be served.

It was a very solemn, and thought-provoking exercise. If we, as young priests were unable to let go of our male ego, our need for control, then we would be unable to serve in a fertility capacity and therefore would not be able to officiate at the Sacred Fertility Rituals, such as the Spring rites.

Because I was, effectively, a young man in this experience, I felt the seriousness of what I was doing and when I felt I was ready to give up my need for control and power, I threw my stone into the water, giving it back to the Mother, from whence it came. I accepted that she was more important than me and that I willingly sacrificed my need for power and control.

I was aware of the other young men in my group. Some were reluctant to let go, not fully understanding how it would impact on their lives. They were not ready. Some might never be and would go on to do other work within the tribes. But, for those, who were not quite ready, they would be given the chance to continue their training and repeat the exercise the following year. But that also meant, they could not be chosen to be a candidate in the current year’s Spring Festival. There was no judgement around this from the Elder, as they were only human and he understood the challenge of the sacrifice.

This experience, and the previous week’s one, was an amazing glimpse into how our ancestors worked with the very potent Spring fertility rites. The exercise, by the river and on the barrows, was quite a powerful one for the young men; the fear of letting go of personal power was palpable.

By contrast, the women’s rites felt free and joyful. There was such excitement and light-heartedness as they began the rites. But the men’s seemed quite serious, as if they had more to learn, more to let go of. But all were young. From late teens to early twenties. An appropriate age for Spring.

Next week, we’ll be up on St. Catherine’s Hill. It’s the culmination of the Spring festivities, the joining of the male and female energies, the festival that ensures fertility for the coming year. I am looking forward to seeing what we experience then. All we have to do is avoid the coffee-crowds.

Queen of the May.

April 14, 2021 / Ann Murphy / 1 Comment

It has been an interesting few months. The winter has been long and I really did not feel like going out much. Winter is never my time, energetically anyway, my time begins at Imbolc, the beginning of February. This is the time of female fertility, when plants emerge once more from the womb of winter and begin their growth towards the sun.
This February, we explored a part of Winchester that has always beckoned but never quite seemed to be the right time. Because there are now so many people walking the places we usually frequent, we wanted to explore some place quieter. We found ourselves on Magdalene Hill Down and the five Bronze Age burial mounds there.

It took two days, a week apart, to receive this information, so I will focus for this entry, on the first visit to the burial mounds.

On the slope of the Down, there are five Bronze Age burial mounds. Three are still intact, albeit with dips in the centre. The other two are barely discernible. We stood on the first large one in the row and tuned in as usual. This brought me back to the past in a wonderful way. The story is a female story.

Moving into the past is like re-experiencing past events in a physical way. I become part of it. Standing on the barrow, I am in the distant past and I am aware of being a woman, wearing white. There is a huge sense of joy and celebration and I am calling to the clans from the settlements to the east of the barrows. Many women and girls hear the call and they come, joyously, dressed in white, to join me. There is much excitement and I am aware of how important these sites are for the women. They are not merely places to bury their dead, but sites of great significance, of birth, of renewal, of life.

They come from their settlements with a sense of urgency. This is the time they have been waiting for. It has to be now – today! They connect with each other on a telepathic level so they are all working together with one mind. There is no separation here. Together, all holding hands, while I remain on the mound, the women dance around the barrow. Collectively, we call in an energy, which I recognise as dragon-energy, but they identify as something else, a creative-force, a tangible thing, alive. To me, with my modern mind, it is the white-dragon, which is highly creative and inspirational and feminine. To them it is a living energy, the same energy but we each have our own ways, through time, of experiencing it.

When the women call in this beautiful, creative force, it rises from the barrow and travels along an energetic path to St. Catherine’s Hill. They watch it, holding its energy with their Will and hearts until it reaches the summit of the hill, where it then encircles the top.

The process they are initiating will culminate in May. There is a corridor of time and energy between the beginning of Feb and the beginning of May in which to do this work.

On the second barrow, there was a distinctly masculine energy. It comes in the form of an Elder, with grey hair and beard and he is dressed in a grey robe. This energy is about male fertility, symbolised by the fish. It feels hot here, and a spring flame, which I call Brigit’s flame, is burning.

(We didn’t get any more on the male energy rituals until the next time we visited.)

Next, we stand on the third barrow, which after the heat of the previous one, feels really cold. This one is female again. I can see the women who had joined in celebration but now they are creating a tunnel of Blackthorn boughs in blossom, holding them in an arched corridor above their heads. Each girl takes her turn, like a dance, going through the blossom arch and as they travel, the energy of the blossom permeates them so they become the same energy. It is a fertility dance and they are being imparted with the fertile energy of the Spring Blossom which makes them fertile too. It is an energetic process, not a simply ritual one. They absorb the fertile energy of the blossom into their bodies, by osmosis until they and the energy of the Blackthorn are One.

Individually, they dance through, until the ones at the beginning of the archway, are now at the end, until each has had her turn. When Mayday, in their calendar, arrives they will process to St. Catherine’s Hill to complete the ritual. Everything they do is in preparation for that day and it all takes time. They know how to wait for the processes of nature and nothing is rushed.

When May arrives, one woman is chosen to be the representative of the earth’s creative energies and one man is chosen to represent the fertility aspects of water and sun. Together, each holding their respective energy, they reign until the following year, when a new couple is chosen. The couple chosen do not know who they were going to be paired with until the day of choosing, and the two are chosen because they showed the right qualities of dedication and learning over the preceding year.

The newly crowned couple hold the energies for the surrounding areas for a year, enacting rituals that ensure the fertility of the area around the hill. They know their work will ensure the continuance of life for everyone and that the Mother and father will continue to care for them, providing them with food and shelter for another year.

This was a beautiful thing to witness. The Queen and King of the May are such an ancient tradition but it was interesting to see just how far this tradition went back. In modern times, the ritual is a re-enactment, but in times past it played an important role and was very real. The female group in the ritual were young women that appeared to be part of a group of women who trained to play this part. Only they were trained to hold the energy and to work with the necessary energies.

(The same applied to the young men, who had their own training, which we discovered when we returned the following week. But on this visit, we were shown the female aspect).

In May, they joined together, each representing, and holding, the masculine and feminine forces of creation.

This entire experience seemed to be a process through time, where the celebrations and calling happened first, followed by the blossom-archway and then the celebration on St. Catherine’s.

On the fourth barrow, we were given the same information about the Queen’s awakening. Between February and May, she awakened, life returned. This was her time. Perhaps this is also about the Queen’s representative awakening to her role. The fact that this all happened around St. Catherine’s Hill was also magical. Maybe we should reinstate it?

On the Importance of Heresy…

June 15, 2017December 13, 2019 / Ann Murphy / Leave a comment

If we have no heretics we must invent them, for heresy is essential to health and growth. ― Yevgeny Zamyatin

This morning’s on-awakening message was about the importance of heresy and heretics. Changes in deep-seated religious beliefs cannot happen without the heretics challenging the rigid status quo of beliefs about God, or society.

I’ve been thinking about that all morning, and I went online to check out some famous heretics. Living here in Egypt, we have our own famous heretic, Pharoah Akhenaten, who tried to change the spiritual beliefs of the entire country, failing, but only somewhat. His spiritual beliefs became part of the Jewish tradition.

The world is kept alive only by heretics: the heretic Christ, the heretic Copernicus, the heretic Tolstoy. Our symbol of faith is heresy. ― Yevgeny Zamyatin

Yes, Jesus was a heretic, as was Mary Magdalene, the first Christian. So was Mohammed, and his first wife, Khadija. She too was the first Muslim. And Moses? Well… not that that is any consolation to fundamentalists of our three main western religions, all of which originated in the Middle East. Or perhaps I am being heretical?

Anway, hopefully you get my point. These heretics came to change the way humanity was doing things, none of them really succeeded, but they tried. Some got the real message and used it to base their life on, but most just used the beliefs to prop themselves up with. They are still doing it now.

I’m not sure why ‘upstairs’ are giving me this info at this time? I am searching my inner and outer world to see why it applies. Are they reassuring me? Are some old Irish Catholic beliefs being stirred up internally? That’s probable. I do struggle with some issues of the Gaia Method system, especially when talking to men about it. It gives me a hot flush; being menopausal really shows me where my anxieties lie!

Working with the Gaia Method is a challenge because it really does challenge some unconscious beliefs around God, the Father! Because it is divinely Feminine in nature, and not Masculine, like our three main western religions, I suppose the fear is always there that it will end badly! Or that our Divine feminine energy will be suppressed etc. Not that I am putting myself on a par with the Moses, Jesus and Mohammed, but you get the idea. I believe too, that without the wives of these men, they could not have come as far as they did. The women played a vital role in their ability to teach their new ideas and to live them. Akhenaten was not an exception; if it wasn’t for Nefertiti’s strength he might never have gotten to Akhetaten in the first place. If it wasn’t for Khadija, Mohammed would have been too terrified to pass on his channelled information and if it wasn’t for Mary Magdalene, Jesus would not have learned about the rights of women to be free. Moses too learned his stuff from a Bedouin woman, who became his wife!

I believe too, that without the wives of these men, they would not have come as far as they did. The women played a vital role in their ability to teach their new ideas and to live them. Akhenaten was not an exception; if it wasn’t for Nefertiti’s strength he might never have gotten to Akhetaten in the first place. If it wasn’t for Khadija, Mohammed would have been too terrified to pass on his channelled information and if it wasn’t for Mary Magdalene, Jesus would not have learned about the rights of women to be free. Moses too learned his stuff from a Bedouin woman, who then became his wife! All of these men had female teachers, who taught them self-trust and awareness. Without those female teachers, our three main religions might never have come to be. It’s a shame that the rest of the population could not accept the teachings, but the seeds are still there.

Perhaps my own fear of what it means to be a heretic, especially after dying rather horribly having been accused of being one in the USA a few centuries ago, as a young Quaker girl, is triggered. Yes, even writing about it brings on a hot flush. I came in with that lifetime very close to the surface, and obviously, I chose that for a reason. Even though I know I am ‘safe’ enough in this lifetime, the fears still remain, although I know I can move past them. I know rationally that they don’t apply this time around, so I need to have an inner conversation with myself.

I’ll let you know what happens!

The Gaia Method Earthways

The Way of the Earth

Blog

Return to the Magdalene Flame in Sparsholt. March 2023.

The Brigit and Magdalene Flame in Chilbolton. St Mary the Lesser.

The Brigit and Magdalene Flame. Part Six. St. Michael and All Angels, Bullington, Hampshire.

The Brigit Flame. Part Five. St Mary’s Church, Crawley, Hampshire.

The Magdalene Flame. Part Four. Barton Stacey Church.

The Brigit and Magdalene Flame. Part Three. St Catherine’s Church, Littleton.

The Magdalene Flame. Spring 2023. Part Two. St Stephen’s Church, Sparsholt.

The Brigit and Magdalene Flame. Spring 2023. Part one. RC Church of St Edward the Confessor.

In the beginning…

The Bread of The Mother.

An Invitation.

Durrington Walls and the Cuckoo Stone.

Magdalene Down Male Mysteries

Queen of the May.

On the Importance of Heresy…

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