Goddess Remembered

In 1990 Canadian Public Broadcasting aired a trilogy of films. Goddess Remembered, The Burning Times and Full Circle.

These films traced the birth of the neo-pagan movement, which at the time was very closely tied to both the environmental movement and the women's movement.
I know now that it was historically inaccurate, but it opened my eyes to the idea that the old religions were not buried in the past, they are alive today.

Starhawk gives several interviews in these films and while I know that she has been criticized for her strongly stated ties between neo-paganism and environmental activism, she is a passionate voice for the women's movement as well as environmental concerns, which echoed with me.

I recorded the videos and watched the films over and over again. I did not know or care about whether the history was accurate, I wanted every detail of the neo-pagan movement and how much of old agricultural beliefs and rituals had come forward into this time.

I felt an overpowering emotional tug to explore this further, but in the end my Catholic upbringing won out.

Even though I had roundly rejected the Church and had no second thoughts about that I could not make the leap. Goddess worship, rituals, magick, secrecy, satanism, dark rites, manipulation....the Church had bound them all together for me into one neat package.

While I recognized this on an intellectual level and I felt a strong pull on a deeper level toward Paganism....I found myself watching the tapes one more time, making the judgement that those people were well intentioned kooks messing around with stuff better left alone...and I turned my back.