Why I got here full circle. Grief, ritual, and dwelling between the altar and the celebrities
On this article, I wish to go extra deeply into explaining my latest Catholic V Astrological existential disaster. It needs to be checked out towards the backdrop of what occurred from February 2024 to February 2025 — in all probability essentially the most difficult twelve months of my life. Coincidentally, this era aligned with my second Saturn return and a Pluto-to-Solar transit.
The pull towards the Catholic Church wasn’t a conversion a lot as a recognition — a way of returning to one thing by way of grief, ancestry, and ritual. What at first felt like confusion and purging now appears extra like a cycle coming full circle.
So to place this all into context, we have to begin with my mom. Our relationship was all the time tough and complex, and her loss of life in February 2025 got here as a shock. Solely a yr earlier, she appeared indestructible — eighty-six, nonetheless operating her cardio courses, very cellular, fiercely unbiased, dwelling alone in Spain along with her cat. Then, unexpectedly, she collapsed and couldn’t rise up. From that second, all the pieces modified: she wanted fixed care.
Mom’s Descent
My sister and I had been in London; my mom had moved to Spain twenty-five years earlier. Cash was tight, and I confronted an inconceivable alternative: journey to see her or pay for her care. I selected the care. She appeared to be bettering, and we genuinely believed there was time. My sister saved saying, “She’ll outlive all of us.” She didn’t. I by no means made it again to see her earlier than she died, and there may be nonetheless guilt…
Mom’s Catholic religion, shared by my Sicilian grandmother (My Dad’s mom, whom I adored), was all the time a part of the backdrop of my life. After her loss of life this yr, I discovered myself drawn again to Catholicism once more, one thing I had been exploring again in 2021. Grief started pulling me towards one thing acquainted and ancestral, an area the place loss might be acknowledged in a soothing ritual. My mom had donated her physique to science, so there was no coffin, no funeral in Spain. After one other traumatic six months of clearing her flat on the market and checking out her money owed, we then felt prepared to rearrange a memorial service for her in England.
This last tribute to our mom was made potential by way of a beautiful Benedictine monk from Ealing Abbey — somebody my brother-in-law knew by way of the Catholic college the place he teaches music. Although we weren’t earlier churchgoers, he agreed to function the priest on the memorial mass for us and was extremely welcoming, heat, and non-judgmental. His availability meant the service was held on September twentieth. I believed this was wonderful synchronicity, the day earlier than the autumn equinox — a time historically related to transitions and letting go. Most of my Sicilian dad’s household got here, in addition to my mom’s oldest good friend within the UK. It was genuinely lovely.
Honoring The Ancestors
My sister gave a becoming tribute and trustworthy eulogy — humorous, uncooked, and filled with household tales that made everybody snigger and cry on the identical time. I had designed the memorial leaflet, which introduced up so many reminiscences as I sifted by way of previous images of my mom through the years: from her as a toddler, her days as a younger mannequin, to her last chapter in Spain. I feel compiling that collage for the within covers helped me reconnect along with her spirit in happier instances and make peace along with her.
On the finish of the memorial, the priest introduced all the pieces collectively in a means that felt deeply significant and virtually magical. It struck me that this sort of ritual can assist course of difficult grief as successfully as any remedy. My daughter burst into tears on the last hymn, which set me off, too. It felt cathartic and religious. Afterwards, I ran as much as the priest and feeling very emotional and grateful, instructed him how transferring the service had been. To my shock, he gave me an enormous hug. It felt extremely therapeutic and forgiving, prefer it had washed away the guilt of being the “unhealthy” daughter.
Picture Reference: Archangel Uriel By Marina Marchione On Etsy
The Latin Mass
What drew me to conventional Mass companies, like these at Ealing Abbey, was the ritual itself — the Benedictine monks, the organ, the choir, the incense, and the sense of one thing reverent, historical, and deliberate. After that, I started attending Mass each Sunday, and each introduced a tear to my eye, particularly the one on Remembrance Sunday (Poppy day within the UK), which is, after all, not far off “All Souls” day held on November 1st. Historically, it’s a time after we bear in mind the useless and our ancestors.
So once more, the timing of this church-going was acceptable and in tune with Scorpio season and my Pluto transit. With the vibration of the organ and the wafting frankincense, all of it felt deeply purifying to my soul. I used to be hooked, and I needed one thing much more steeped in historical past and nearer to the ancestors. So behold! The next Sunday, I entered the Brompton Oratory, a beautiful Baroque Cathedral in central London, for his or her Excessive Latin mass. The spoken Latin felt so very mystical, evocative and historical. Being the muse of many European languages, Latin carries a type of energy that I can’t fairly clarify.
What I hadn’t absolutely confronted till then, nevertheless, was the direct battle between Catholicism and astrology. If you happen to take Catholicism critically, astrology is taken into account divination — a mortal sin! That realisation was unsettling. On the identical time, I started consuming loads of on-line content material — particularly testimonies from individuals who had left New Age spirituality for Christianity. A lot of their tales resonated with me: tough childhoods, fractured household relationships, a seek for that means, a want for redemption. There was one thing very Plutonic about all of it — loss of life, rebirth, purging.
Purging The Witch!
So relatively impulsively, I threw all my tarot playing cards and astrology books out, till a good friend mentioned she would take them. I retrieved them from the recycling bin, however then I panicked that I could be “enabling witchcraft”, in order that they sat within the corridor for weeks. Ultimately, I’m glad I saved them. I don’t imagine Tarot playing cards are evil in themselves; there may be even a e book referred to as “Meditations On The Tarot ~ A Journey into Christian Hermeticism” by Nameless, displaying their hyperlinks to Christianity, which is mindblowing. It’s all related!!
I did throw out all of the crystals in the home, although, satisfied they’d absorbed the emotional residue of previous relationships — particularly the unhealthy ones I’d had after my divorce. I suspected these adverse experiences had been aggravated by a certain quantity of demon possession. In reality, after all, I had attracted these shadow males from my upbringing and unresolved wounds. Nonetheless, the act of clearing issues out felt obligatory. The stones have ended up in a shallow pond close to my residence — and a part of me thinks I’d retrieve them in the future, cleansed by water and moonlight.
Gnosticism
Whereas creating my pagan and Christian calendars for 2026, I listened to extra balanced discussions on-line, together with whether or not astrology and Christianity may coexist. I additionally went again to researching the Gnostics, the very earliest Christians (Earlier than the Romans made it the state faith), which had all the time been an curiosity of mine. That led me again to one thing I’d all the time identified deep down: the profound overlap between Christianity, the Solar, the seasons, and the zodiac. The Church calendar mirrors the agricultural and photo voltaic yr. Easter, Christmas, saints’ days — all of them align with seasonal thresholds. Irish Saint Bridgit herself is a Christianised model of Brigid, the Celtic Goddess of artists, poetry, fireplace and blacksmiths. Then Jesus, after all, is the Solar; Virgo Virgin Mary stands on a crescent Moon, topped with stars. This isn’t a brand new concept — it’s all specified by works like Manly P. Corridor’s writings.
Church structure strengthened this for me. Church buildings are historically oriented east–west, going through the rising solar. Stained glass captures mild on the altar. Jesus says, “I’m the sunshine of the world.” When the host is raised, it resembles a photo voltaic disc. Even the phrase Eucharist echoes the Greek “efcharistó” — giving thanks. The Final Supper is a thanksgiving meal for the harvest, which finally comes from the Solar.
Solar Gods & East-Going through Altars
The extra I appeared, the extra apparent it appeared: Christianity carries the construction of photo voltaic and seasonal worship beneath its theology. Greek Orthodox church buildings adhere most strictly to the east–west alignment, as do, weirdly, church buildings present in my very own ancestral properties, Sicily and Malta. Germany comes subsequent in accuracy, then France, Spain and England much less so. They’re nonetheless East/West predominantly, however extra at an angle.
So all of this raised tough questions for me. I wrestle with the concept lacking Mass is a mortal sin, and that religion turns into a system of rule-following relatively than internal transformation. My Mom went to church each Sunday with out fail, night with a banging hangover from dancing late the evening earlier than. Lots of people do that whereas breaking loads of the commandments throughout the remainder of the week (I’m taking a look at you Michael Corleone.) I do know church attendance doesn’t routinely make somebody “good”. (My Sicilian grandmother, nevertheless, was an precise saint!) I personally struggled essentially the most with consistency in Church-going. I typically discovered myself pondering throughout Mass that Jesus must be an enormous narcissist to be demanding all this on-your-knees worshipping.
On the identical time, I perceive the attraction of construction. Ritual, repetition, reverence — they are often stabilising and soothing. Going to Mass each Sunday, sharing the identical actions and repeating the identical phrases with others, is alleged to foster empathy and connection. It’s one of many few instances I’m ever in a crowd. As a solitary particular person, that will really be wholesome for me. One other excuse for me to attend Mass (even when I don’t take communion) is to apply Ecclesiastical Latin, which I’m studying on an app. I find it irresistible! I additionally suppose Mass reminds you to at the least attempt to obey the commandments and that self-discipline is mostly a “good factor.”
Coming Full Circle
The place does this depart me now? I truthfully nonetheless don’t know. I’m now not giving astrology readings, in order that cuts out the overt divination. I’m completely happy retaining this web site up and operating now. I don’t wish to throw the infant out with the bathwater so all of the archetypical, psychological natal astrology will keep. I’m additionally leaning in the direction of the truth that predictive astrology can be legitimate when utilized to the collective relatively than a person. Astrology began out as studying sky omens in spite of everything. Natal astrology was reserved for royalty solely and even then, the monarch typically represented the destiny of its individuals relatively than itself.
What I do know is that this: my return to Catholicism wasn’t about dogma. It was about grief, ancestry, ritual, therapeutic and closure. It was about my mom’s loss of life, my very own reckoning, and my try to know how all these methods — astrology, Christianity, the Solar, the seasons — are way more interconnected than we’re often allowed to confess. In the meanwhile, I’m studying “Jung and Astrology”, which, for now, helps me to make sense of how Christianity, mythology and astrology can all work collectively.
So in the long run, I stay on the ecliptic — that historical, tilted path the place mild strikes, seasons flip, and that means isn’t mounted. It’s the line that binds the Solar to the Earth, heaven to matter, time to ritual. Standing in a church, going through the east-turned altar the place mild is anticipated to return, I recognise the identical order I as soon as traced by way of charts and stars. My mom’s loss of life, and the rituals that adopted it, virtually pressured me to desert one system for an additional. However as a substitute, they introduced me full circle, again to the place the place religion and type, image and physique, grief and lightweight, all meet. Hopefully, after extra analysis, I cannot want to decide on between the altar and the zodiac however discover a means I can comfortably mix each with out diluting or corrupting both aspect.