VISIONS

(A note on this post: this is my third attempt to post successfully with charts included in the text. If the old one is still posted below this, I apologise - I am hoping I have removed it! The space between text and charts may be variable. Pam.)

I am looking at the most beautiful face. I could look into these eyes for an eternity and it would be rest to my soul. The first time I saw him, he was waiting for me in a caravan, and I was astonished at the meeting; his hair was short, darkish and quite curly, and the eyes were all love, laughter and joy. Desperate to remember, I woke up. No effort with a pencil on my part could do justice to the face of this re-embodied Jesus.

But here he is, as if my computer screen were a window and his gaze would melt the glass. He has been brought to life in a painting called 'The Prince of Peace' made in 2003 by a then eight-year-old girl from Illinois, who in visions from the age of four has been painting at the request of God. She has painted Mary, too, and captured the ineffable sweetness that invaded my soul in Lourdes.

Her name is Akiane Kramarik, and a visit to her official website ( www.artakiane.com ) told me that she was born (to non-relligious parents) on July 9th 1994 in Mount Morris, Illinois. My first chart for her is a Q-chart (not having any birth time) set for 4 am, which is the time she habitually starts work on the day's painting. At this time, Venus is at the IC and her Mercury rises! The Moon is just past New, in Cancer; her Sun is in the exaltation of joyous Jupiter, and these happy Lights are most powerfully configured with all three outer, spiritual planets - opposite the conjunction of Uranus/Neptune, and trine Pluto with the Moon's Ascending Node. Her extraordinary creative gift is clear from an immensely strong 5th harmonic - Mercury biquintile Pluto and tredecile Saturn, Leo Venus biquintile the Uranus/Neptune conjunction and decile the Sun. Not only is her output prodigious - she is very, very shiny!

How did I find her? After a restless night, once the seagulls woke up this morning I gave up trying to sleep and settled down to watch a video taped 11 days ago. It was a programme screened by ITV at 9 pm on August 18th, its title 'Superhuman: Genius', and it began with Akiane. By 7h30 I was down in the study and online to her website to find out as much as I could about the blonde little girl who was born in the year I went to Jerusalem and took my first small booklet on the Birth of Jesus to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. From that website, this wonderful face will meet you.

It is when you enter the dwad chart, leaving the material for the conscious self, that the real magic happens. At work time, 4 am, Pluto and the IC meet; a transformation is taking place. The steady flow of her inspired and guided work is guaranteed by the 'kite' formed by the trines of Mercury and Neptune to Sun and saturn opposed across the Monn's Nodal axis.

The second chart for Akiane is her Q chart with Jesus (born 7th May, 5BC), set for his time of 18h43m55s and zone -2:20:48, at her birth location. First of all, it gives her a 10th-house stellium, and his work has become her vocation. But look what happens when the dwad is added! Neptune/IC comes to her Ascendant, Jupiter sets, Ascendant meets her Mercury, and of course that Capricorn/Cancer Sun/Saturn opposition straddles the nodes from South to North in the dwad chart as we have already seen, collecting her Uranus/Neptune and the late Cancer Moon into a spiritually, karmically intense 'full moon'. Dwad Moon/Mercury is conjunct her radix South Node. This whole picture is of a sacrificial soul on a lonely and focussed path, bound to Christ and her destiny, and totally tuned to the Voice which guides her all the way.

A third chart was necessary, too; the Q-chart of Akiane with Mary (born 4th August 24 BC), thus in her zone -2:21:12, at her time, 12h49m21s. Again it is stunning. Her Cancer New Moon rises with dwad Mars to energise her; again Neptune and Jupiter are angular, dwad Neptune on radix IC and a dwad conjunction of Jupiter and Midheaven. In the dwad, Venus sets with Ceres; and her dwad Sun/South Node meets radix Uranus/Neptune again on that same 'full moon' axis as before. Across those two powerful horizons Akiane relates directly to all the sweetness and motherliness of Our Lady, taking from her encouragement and strength in the Mars and Jupiter.

As for the Composites, they left me momentarily speechless. Akiane/Jesus has Pluto on Asc, a trio of Chiron/Sun/Mercury in Gemini opposite Neptune, and the MC conjunct Venus and the South Moon's node. This is an old, old love bearing fruit in the present, a powerfully spiritual relationship centred on inspired teaching.
The past becomes present with Mary, too; the Sun and Venus go to the South Node (so close to Akiane's Moon!); Saturn (and maybe Ceres? - I have no idea if it is accurate for births BC) conjoins the MC to discipline and guide, and the trio of Mercury/Moon/Mars in Leo on Our Lady's Sun/Pluto burns with creative dialogue. In both these Composites there are hardly any stresses; the aspects are sweet.

And of course the chart for the programme is no less expressive. Here I have put the dwad at the centre of the biwheel - to show you that the Prince of Peace is indeed present. Because the dwad has the conjunction of Sun and Jupiter setting, just as Jesus does at his Nativity ... and they are still together, and still on the horizon, in his dwad. Akiane herself is shown in the sensitive, painterly trio of dwad Moon/MC/Neptune, as well as the radix pattern where the Pisces Moon has just risen conjunct Uranus and still opposite the 6th-house Mercury/Venus. Pluto is radically on the MC: Akiane and the other four people in this study are all exceptional people. But she has chosen the most exceptional life of all.

EMAIL CONTACT -

- has been restored! Profound apologies to all of you who have been trying to get in touch; I had forgotten to unblock the address at TheHolyTwelve(at)aol.com. It should be working just fine, now. I look forward to conversation!

DEAR RICHARD DAWKINS ...

... what would I say to you if we came face to face? You seem desperate to present yourself as a nice man, yet everywhere you go, a hundred hackles rise.

First, on the current scientific understanding of evolution I am 100% with you. I have strolled home from Great Orme's Head with my pockets full of fossils, and who could doubt their antiquity? Secondly, I share your admiration and respect for Charles Darwin, and all the pioneers of practical science. But thirdly - how do I not accept and integrate my own experience and that of thousands of other sane men and women who have found their souls to be more than 'a collection of neurons'?

I take my hat off to the science teachers who 'stuck to their last' and refused to attack the faiths of their sensitive pupils; these may indeed be indoctrinated by their priests and parents, but however odd, however skewed, their beliefs - like mine - are founded on authentic and disconcerting experience. Now, I cannot personally vouch for that authenticity in most cases, so where I would share your ambivalence toward a particular faith, all I can do is give its adherents the benefit of the doubt - and my respect. But there remain certain incontrovertible facts.

1. The mobility of consciousness.

My husband-to-be, in straitened circumstances, was soaking in one of the men's public baths in Sittingbourne when he found himself floating near the ceiling; from this unexpected vantage-point above the partitions he could watch the local vagrants splashing and drinking in the adjoining cubicles. After a few minutes he was looking through his physical eyes again and could only hear the sounds of the men.
A close friend was listening to a concert at the Royal Albert Hall; he was so shocked to find himself looking down on orchestra and audience from the ceiling of the dome that he shot straight back into his seat.
Another friend was out walking when she saw herself several yards ahead. She followed herself, alarmed and fascinated, for several minutes until she rejoined her body.

This kind of experience cannot be dismissed as a dream state - generally in dreams we do not inhabit and navigate the immediate space and time. The above experiences and hundreds of others documented in OOBE research over several decades point to individual consciousness - at least in humans - inhabiting and exploiting rather than arising from the evolved structures of body and brain.

2. Cosmic integration.

This is a difficult one for someone like you. Let me begin by stating that for 25 years, since I was 40, I have had to endure frequent and crippling migraines. Trying to coax one's life into some kind of acceptable shape around these bouts of miserable illness is a real challenge (which, for all I know, you may share.) At least I knew when I was at risk; the migraine always came around ovulation and menses, so I steered clear of commitments at these times. But a total hysterectomy at 46 put paid to all that. Neither did it rid me of the illness; instead its timing became chaotic and my life, personal and social, was in ruins.

Here's the bit you won't find easy to accept: since my teens I had had an interest in astrology, and in my twenties began studying it seriously. By my forties I had become a counsellor, teacher, researcher, lecturer, writer and occasional broadcaster on this unorthodox subject, respected by my peers, and still full of delight in its endless intellectual and philosophical adventure. I had always been a bright child; I could turn my hands and my mind to most things with noticeable success - and I had been brought up to value criticism and analysis, so anything that failed to 'do what it said on the tin' would be dismissed as a total waste of time and effectively binned. Astrology, unlikely as it will seem to you, consistently rose to my challenges, decade after decade. As you are probably as unfamiliar with its language as I am with Urdu or Mandarin Chinese, there is little point trying to explain much of its technique; but the fact is that it gave me my life back. It was the only tool I had in 1989 (in the absence of effective treatment, which didn't turn up till 1992) to get a handle on the apparent chaos of the attacks.

I will now inflict upon you a little of the terminology ... knowing that the planetary energy of Mars connected with pain, heat and blood-flow, with acute symptoms, strong stimuli, and traditionally with the head, I started watching its interactions with my own birth pattern, both natally and as the sky diagram turned slowly through the days and years in what we call 'progression'. In brief, whenever Mars approached the meridian or horizon, Moon, Sun or inner planets of any of my astrological charts within 2 degrees of arc, even if my circumstances were relatively stress-free the migraine would hit. Several concurrent hits on different charts, a cluster of impacts, would coincide with intensified symptoms. As soon as Mars separated from the vulnerable degrees, the migraine disappeared. I could go through quite a busy and potentially stressful period which in theory should invoke an attack - yet if Mars was not impacting on any of my patterns I would not become ill. A common reaction to such findings is that they are merely self-fulfilling prophecy. I can assure you this is not the case; the studies I made were retrospective, based on my diaries. Soon I had the confidence to plan my engagements around the movements of Mars, and was at last able to keep my promises and stop letting people down at the last minute. I have lived this way for 20 years now - quite a decent long-term test of migraine management, don't you think?

Notable amongst the planets, Pluto ('demoted' or not!) has an energy which is potentially devastating. When its slow progress against the ecliptic brings it (for between one and three years) onto a sensitive natal degree, life gets pretty heavy. These are the times when the greatest moral dilemmas have to be faced, or the greatest physical challenges. Power - its use and abuse - is often involved. Temptation to take the destructive, selfish path comes at you from every direction. Empathy, compassion, loving-kindness, altruism, are the strongest armour in this spiritual battle. Pluto's purpose is to wake one up to the core values of one's very existence, and sometimes it takes trauma to do this. One can come close to death, as I did, giving birth to my first son by a nearly fatal emergency Caesarian, having to learn to walk again, and then coping with an autistic child. Pluto was in my rising degree. One can become the object of collective hatred for sticking to a principle, as my husband (a Bishop) did in honouring his calling and ministering to a friend who had done something very stupid that landed him in prison for two years. This test of conscience was extremely hard; but he achieved the moral victory. Pluto was on the degree of his Sun. When it made a right-angle (we call this a 'square') to my own Sun-degree, circumstances drew me into the Christian Church - a major step for this free-thinking woman! - and since then I have applied myself to the astrological study of its history.

The implications are that human lives (and probably life in general) are inextricably linked to the movements of the Solar System - and ultimately the observable universe - through meanings locked into relative position and orbital geometry. Poetically, we are phrases in a mighty and stirring music; or tiny, vital cells in an immeasurable body. Each human consciousness is a living and possibly eternal fragment of the consciousness of eternity itself, a huge mind comprised of or generating billions of fractal minds, whose totality we might call God. Each mind is itself an evolving thing, and shifts dimension into the material to learn how to grow and improve, using a body that evolution has declared fit for purpose. And because Mind is the over-arching reality, communication between embodied and discarnate minds can take place under favourable conditions to offer guidance to those who are floundering, and aid to people in danger or in pain.

You are currently in a very good position to test some of this for yourself, if you have a mind to. Your own natal tropical Sun is in 5 degrees of Aries close to the descending node of the Moon at Aries 1, in a friendly relationship with Pluto at 2 degrees of Leo, and in a tight square to recently 'promoted' Ceres at 4 degrees of tropical Capricorn. Venus is not far back, at 29 degrees Pisces. All these positions are being challenged by the transit of Pluto over the next three years, ( it has already been affecting your relationships and resources through Venus ) with its maximum impact in February-June 2010 ( including very hard work, even struggle ), September 2010-February 2011 ( big opportunity/success here if all goes well ), and August-October 2011, when the personal significance of the previous years' experience should give you pause for thought. It is meant to be a period of conscientious soul-searching - but for you of course this would mean acknowledging that you do not just have but are a soul!

On this point let me round off my comments with a brief look at your pattern. To use another image, each one of us is, astrologically, a minute shard of the macrocosmic hologram, specific to our birth-point in space and time. The sky patterns at birth are charged with complex meaning, which reflect both who we are and what we are endeavouring to become. I have seen few patterns as polarised as yours, torn as you are between the passionate science pioneer who wants to be the first and the best and to win every argument by verbal force if need be, and the diametrically opposed soul within who believes on principle in fairness, justice, kindness and balanced dialogue. Driven by a compulsive sense of mission, you can over-heat to the point of arrogance, betraying that gentler, fairer self - and this Aries combativeness is what will inevitably undo all the good that you have achieved, if you insist too often on picking a fight and fail to listen to - and honour - your neighbour's point of view. The focus of this inner contest will always be the relationship between nature and time - nothing but the structures of evolution (Ceres in Capricorn) could ever hold such fascination for you. By embracing in your work and in your life the competitive principle, don't forget that ultimately it is only through peaceable collaboration that you will attain real success. All people born with the Sun close to the Moon's descending node have to make sacrifices, and in your case it is that provocative stance and the very drive to win, that can turn friends into enemies and careful argument into incoherent bluster.

I respect your passion and your work, and I like the other man I see beneath the determined atheist. I hope he will take to heart a little of what has been said.

Rev. Pam Crane

19/8/08: JUPITER RETROGRADE...
... has been on my Quotidian MC today. Yes, I re-ordered our monthly box of the finest chocolates money can buy (from our friend Roy Nesling, Chocolatier, established in East Looe) and put up cheery new curtains in my study, and made an excellent stew ... but the day was really about Channel 5's gory hour on the Romans & Druids during the 1st-century invasion of Britain. At 20 past 8 we were told that the Roman legions trampled across the South-East, mowing down anyone who was unlucky enough to be in their way. At last I had confirmation of one of my earliest flashbacks.

This had taken me totally by surprise over 20 years ago in my own kitchen at Ospringe (whose fields have since been much visited by diggers, including my old drama school acquaintance Tony Robinson). I was standing by the sink, holding in my hand a bone-handled knife which hitherto I had never brought myself to use. Suddenly my skin felt covered with very different clothes; against my cheeks was soft but firm leather - the lining, I assume, of a helmet's cheek-pieces. I had sandals on, and a short tunic; and I knew in that moment that I was a Roman legionary. But I was frozen in a dilemma - at the edge of the rough path on which I stood (just like the beaten tracks shown on Channel 5) cowered an old man, a local, who was in my way, and I was supposed to stick my bone-handled knife into his skinny body and be rid of him. The problem was that at some point I had encountered the teachings of Christianity, and I couldn't do it. For about ten minutes the vivid flash-back and the agonising dilemma held me motionless and fascinated beside the open cutlery drawer, before normality returned and I could put the knife back again. Ever since that episode my life-long nervousness of knives ebbed away.
Twice more in the 1980s that Roman life came back to me - once at Reculver where I remembered spending months of boredom staring out to sea, 'keeping watch' (about as enthusistically as the Yorkshire cops in 'Last of the Summer Wine'!) and once at Broadstairs where the oppressive aura of old and bloody battles sent me home miserable with migraine. This evening that sick revulsion at the violence we met and meted out returned in full force - and this time the story had moved to North Wales, our home for the past six years.

I now understood that Qotidian Jupiter, moving backwards; in my nativity (also retrograde and so inviting a return to the past) it rules the IC, therefore both the home and the past itself. In east Kent I was living on the southern end of my local space Jupiter line; coming to north-west Wales we had moved along its diagonal to pitch camp near its northern extremity. In 1981 our honeymoon on the Nile had taken me sailing and exploring where Jupiter had culminated at my birth - and here again memories had come flooding back, amid some joys bringing the lessons of much private pain.

Yes, it turned out to be quite a day!

Straight from the horse's mouth!-
- as we arrived in the Lakes for our annual hols, my p. Moon finally hauled itself out of Scorpio and started its liberating trek through Sag. The change is extraordinary. For two plus years all I've really wanted to wear is black and various shades of khaki, very strange arrivals in my normally vibrant wardrobe! And now, to coin a phrase, 'when I am an old woman I shall wear purple' - can't get enough of it, also red, since Mars occupies Sagittarius in my sky (in fact the mauves were beginning to leak in at the tail-end of the last degree of the old sign.) And most oddly I've begun to find my beloved mountains really quite oppressive; they are looming at me now, taking my space, which I want to extend, and stretch out in, and (as a typical Capricorn!) have all to myself ... or do I? Even my solitariness is shifting; my charity-shop stint last week meant sharing a cluttered space with another volunteer for 4 hours, which would normally give me the heeby-jeebies; but I found myself able for the first time to work in close proximity with abundant good cheer, far more relaxed than I've been all year! There is not a shadow of a doubt, if you want to learn what a Sign is all about, study the progress of your own Moon through all of them, remembering how you were, who you briefly became. It fascinates me, including the colour thing - I could never wear blue till the Moon went into Libra, and through Leo - well! How yellow and orange can one girl get?! Moon in Cancer was a very green phase, Virgo demure and in love with tiny patterns. You can have a lot of fun with this.

Talking of imagery, and getting back to Formula 1, Jenson Button is driving a Honda with 'Earth Dreams' writtten all over it ... just as Sidereal Neptune is driting and dreaming over his tropical Capricorn Sun!
And, interestingly, after my earlier post, on July 19th at Hockenheim the German Grand Prix started with the same pattern as Silverstone - Ceres on the MC (with Mercury) opposite Jupiter and Lewis Hamilton's Sun.'Looks like Lewis is going to win again!' I remarked to Gerard ... and he did, in great style! 2007 at Budapest also brought him home in front - and Ceres was setting at the start. He also won in Japan last year when his Sun rose on the starting grid. But his last race was pretty disastrous; it ended up with his partner Heikki Kovalainen sharing the podium with Timo Glock and the other flying Finn Kimi Raikkonen. Ceres had abandoned the angles of the starting grid, and the UK was nowhere.

I haven't looked at Valencia yet, next weekend, but the last race of the season looks good for Lewis again - I wonder if it will also mean the championship, after this exciting, closely-fought F1 season?