The Temple of your Heart is in the form of a Rose
celebrating the Rosa Mundi
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Balance, order, and perfection is the desire of the Divine. Yet, here on the Earth plane, we are subject to the ever-waxing and waning tides of time and change. Each year, our journey around the Sun moves us through the seasons, leading us through the sacred unfolding cycle that mirrors the eternal. Here, on Earth, we partake little by little as the year advances while in the eternal divine realms, "All is One" and " All At Once."
Last week I wrote about Witch Hazel, and within that piece, I mentioned the season of the fiery, activating masculine, and a few weeks before that, I wrote about The Mythic Seasons and the expression of the Sky Father and Earth Mother, The Solar King and Lunar Queen acting as a power couple.
All of that distills in July, a month with no seasonal festival on The Wheel of the Year. Yet, this month is a time of alchemical wonders. The world brimming with the resplendent goodness of the union of opposites, the time of the caduceus and ouroboros, a month charged with healing and renewing power, underscoring our need for completion and union.
I just finished re-watching a TV series some of you may be familiar with, A Discovery of Witches. The series is overflowing with archetypal imagery and Jungian concepts. The show's overarching theme is the integration of the anima (feminine) and animus (masculine). Diana, a scholar but also symbolically The White Goddess, and Matthew, a scientist and symbolically her Shadow Prince, must find each other and unite. They heal each other through their relationship and become a unified field of power and love. A second but crucial theme is integrating one's own shadow. Diana's shadow side is Juliet, the femme fatale, and Satu, an envious and ambitious witch. Matthew's shadow, his inner rage, is seen in several characters, including Jack, who he helps heal. This is a wonderful watch, especially when viewed through a Jungian lens.
With all of July's masculine and solar energy, you'd think the feminine would be eclipsed. However, the Divine impulse to balance, perfection, and unity is unstoppable. So July brings a particular celebration of the Divine Mother through the imagery of The Rose.
In fact, July is the Month of the Rose, and the ancient celebration of the Rosa Mundi celebrated on July 16 calls us back with ancient echoes to a time when The Mother in Summer's beauty dominated our ancestors' consciousness.
Rosa Mundi, the Rose of the World
On the joyous summer festival, we celebrate the Rose of the World, the Heart of Creation, the Consuming Fire. It is supremely the Mother's festival and is the time we meditate most deeply upon our relationship to Her. She is the maker and shaper of each individual soul in its pure and perfect form. We are born from Her joy, and only in Her are we whole.
It is the custom at the Rosa Mundi rite for the handmaiden to give everyone a rose to hold during the contemplation, that they may meditate upon the inner meaning of the manifest flower. The altar is decked with roses and candles. ~ Lawrence Durdin-Robertson in The Year of the Goddess quoting from The Coming Age, pg. 15
There are all kinds of fascinating connections to explore with the Rosa Mundi. The Romans were exceedingly fond of roses. The Rosalia, the feast of Roses, was celebrated by various locales on dates spanning from June 1 through the middle of July, the peak of the Rose's bloom time.
The story of St. Rosalia tells of her being carried by angels to a remote and wild mountain abode where she dwelt for many years in the cleft of a rock. Her devotion was so profound and immovable that she wore away the stone with the imprint of her knees from countless hours of prayer. She is a perfect representation of the struggling soul seeking spiritual perfection while encased in the limitations of a material body. She is traditionally depicted in art in a cave with a skull and bones, representing the sacrifice of the body to the cross. She receives a chaplet of Roses from the Virgin when she has accomplished her earthly mission.
The Sacred Rose of Venus
The Rose has many levels of symbolism attached to it. One such symbolic correspondence is The Star. The festival of Rosa Mundi also marks the time of the rising of the star Sirius, our spiritual Sun. In ancient times for the Graeco-Egyptians, this would fall on July 19-20 on our current calendar.
The Rosa Mundi, July 16, commemorates the Blessed Virgin Mary of Mount Carmel.
Hermits lived on Mount Carmel near the Fountain of Elijah in northern Israel in the 12th century. They had a chapel dedicated to Our Lady. By the 13th century, they became known as "Brothers of Our Lady of Mount Carmel. Their great saints and theologians have promoted devotion to her and often championed the mystery of her Immaculate Conception." ~ franciscanmedia.org
The Mother Half of the Year
Rosa Mundi is the Summer Solstice Festival of Our Mother God. It is the first High Feast of the Mother Half of the year. It represents the southern pole of the World Axis and the Southern Gate of Heaven.
The whole season of Rosa Mundi which can vary in length according to local custom but always covers at least several days following the festival and is known as the Fire and Rose Season. The two themes, obviously, are fire and roses, and it is not coincidental that in various forms of the Sleeping Beauty story, the sleeping Princess may be guarded by thorny briar roses (Sleeping Beauty's name is Briar Rose) or by fire (cf, Brünnhilde sleeping on the fire-girt rock).
The secret behind all this is that the Sleeping Beauty is the Spirit herself, the Guarded Treasure. Fire and the Rose are ambiguous in this context, in that both are Treasures and both are Guardians – even the lovely Rose with her thorns.
So, ultimately the joyous Fire and Rose season, with its flowers and its fireworks – like the beautiful fairy tale – is about the soul's quest for the Spirit, for the Temple of the Heart whose form is the form of a Rose...the sacred Rose whose petals are pure fire.
~ from Chapel of our Mother God website, mother-god.com/rosa-mundi.html
All of these threads begin to weave a pattern that we can begin to glimpse. July, the month of fire and rose, the heavenly gateway into the mother half of the year, the unification of masculine and feminine, the solar light that reveals the shadow, the rising of our spiritual Sun, Sirius, and Venus, the goddess not only of passion, fertility, and love, but also beauty, poetry, prosperity, and success sinking lower toward the horizon in the evenings with each passing day in July. Did you know Venus, like the Moon, moves through phases, crescent, half, and full? While the Sun dominates the summer season, Venus and the Moon continue their presence and hold space for the feminine to thrive alongside the masculine energies of the month. As the month progresses, Venus and her lover Mars will drift apart in the night sky, and the glorious time of their union, the month of fire and rose, will diminish and give way to the next phase of the seasonal wheel.
Devotion to The Rosa Mundi in July
I love to focus my devotional intention on The Rosa Mundi in July. I include in this The Virgin Mary, the Mother of God, Mary Magdalene, sometimes known as the hidden Madonna, The Black Madonna, Venus, and Isis.
I fill my life with roses, rose bath salts and perfume, and time with the Rosary, sometimes slightly modified to align with my understanding of spiritual truth. Pink rose-scented candles, rose tea, and rose quartz are all used in ritual ways.
This yearly focus and devotion to Mary as The Rosa Mundi has helped me find the Divine Mother within the tradition of patriarchal religion. It's a time to reset the balance and redress the expulsion of the feminine from the Western religious imagination.
Remember the angels of the hours and the days, and indeed the angelic host in its glorious infinity, for the angels will help reveal the mystical essence of the Rose.
From the depths of time, the Rose has been considered the queen of flowers, akin to holy books and teachings in its symbol of evolved spirituality and in its magical perfection of form and fragrance - a sort of guru of the garden. The Rosicrucians (Brothers of the Rosy Cross) believed that the Rose signified the ultimate flowering of the Spirit when the lower self of humanity was stretched in sacrifice on the cross of matter so that the star of light within the heart shone forth in radiance and the Rose bloomed upon the cross, transmuting all pain and anguish to heavenly ecstasy; So the Rose was matter made divine. ~ Claire Nahmad
How are you finding ways for devotion to The Mother, the Rosa Mundi? Do you pray the Rosary in any form? Have you found ways to find and honor the feminine within traditional Western religion? Do you, like me, see the mystical hidden and embedded within Nature?
The comments section is a safe and welcoming space to share your insights and experiences.
Comments and conversation are always appreciated and enjoyed, so feel free to let your voice be heard. I read them all and try to respond to each one.
Thank you for reading Hedge Mystic and participating in this vibrant and growing community of creative, spiritual humans. You are always welcome here, appreciated, and loved.
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Discussion is encouraged. Leave your reactions and insights in the comments.
I so enjoy the way you are able to blend cultures, ideas and thoughts. I myself gravitate towards Mother Nature and also the Crone energies. But have been steeped in many other areas of Rosa Mundi effect. Thank you.
Thank you, Jan. Your catholic and pagan fusions speak to me and always with a very informative perspective. 🧡