Articles – SHARANYA

Featured Article: Why She & Why a Dark Goddess

Humanity is now experiencing a shift in evolutionary consciousness especially catalyzed and facilitated by the Divine Female. Goddess, as She is often called, can be represented through a variety of guises, forms, and names; but it is because we tend to think of God as strictly male and usually transcendent that we avoid this term when speaking about Her, although she is nonetheless that. In this brief introduction to the Dark Goddess, we seek to shatter limiting notions of the Great Mystery and welcome you to Her embrace.

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Perceptions of Egoic Reality

Let’s talk about our egos. We can start by stating the obvious—our egos are now on high alert. But by holding the premise that a beautiful way in which the Divine is brought to awareness in this world is through a foundation of relationality, we’re going to start disrupting our usual response to ego engagement….

The Three-fold Nature of Tantra

Tantra, as is often said, is a difficult path. I liken it to being in the military, riding a frightening fun park ride, and hugging a eucalyptus-drunk koala bear all at the same time. Try as you might to practice under the auspices of Tantra and disentangle these elements, and you will fail. You will…

Honoring Ancestors

It’s interesting that in Hinduism we find steadfast traditions of ancestor reverence existing peacefully alongside a deeply embedded belief in reincarnation. To some, it may seem that these two ideas are irreconcilable. Yet, it is rather the case that they coexist within a framework of beliefs that include conceptions of time and space that are…

Forgiveness on the Path

Ksama in Sanskrit means forgiveness. An indispensible word on the spiritual path at practical and cosmic levels, ksama is a virtue that, perhaps more strongly than any other, binds us to a tantric life. Its practice requires that we move beyond our ego and take sanctuary in the naked truth of reality. It is a…

Tantric Motivations for Countering Climate Change

As a practitioner of Tantra, I suggest that despite evidence asserting climate change is irreversible, Tantra offers us a road to hope and a mandate that our activism on behalf of the planet prevail. Whether or not we believe that we can alter the course of our current predicament, we have more to consider than…

Tattva Shuddhi: Inspiring the Creative Process through Ritual & Reflection

Whether it’s an art project or the birth of a child, the creative process is often mysterious. We all know the magic involved in bringing something to fruition. And if we have nurtured life within our womb, we have an embodied experience from which to speak that ties us in yet another way to our…

Integral Ecofeminism: An Introduction

By: Chandra Alexandre First published in Integral Review Vol. 9, No. 3 (2013) This introduction to integral ecofeminism is a meditation resting on the juicy, rich, layered, and deep context afforded by critical spirituality, embodied mysticism, spiritual politics and ecstatic devotion. It is a pathway motivated by a deep call to spirit and the various…

How to Create a Living Altar to the Dark Goddess

By: Chandra Alexandre Many practitioners are afraid of dark goddess energies. Divinities such as Hecate, The Morrigan, Freya, Gran Brijit, Kali, Lilith, Oya and others prove frightening, leaving many without recourse to some powerful help, especially in times of challenge or crisis. Even the most seasoned among us can fear working with these goddesses. Why…

Crafting Puja for Maa

Dear Kaula, Community, and Friends of SHARANYA: I’m excited to report that, Crafting Puja for Maa: Understanding Ritual & the Devotional Experience in the Sha’can Tradition of Western Shakta Tantra, was chosen for presentation at the American Academy of Religion‘s national conference held from November 7-9, 2009 in Montreal. The presentation was part of the New Religious Movement section within…

Exploring a Cross-Cultural Women’s Spirituality: Inspirations from India

By: Chandra Alexandre She is Everywhere! This chapter is from Volume 2, An Anthology of Writing in Womanist/Feminist Spirituality. One counter-force to manipulative patriarchal identity branding and hierarchal control is the relatively recent development in the modern west of an articulated and engaged Goddess-centered spirituality. Within “Women’s Spirituality,” as the movement is sometimes called,…

Bagalamukhi Mantram

Om hlreem bagalamukhi sarvadustanaam vacham mukham stambhaya jihvaam keelaya keelaya budheem vinashaya hlreem om swaha! For those who wish to aid in their resistance to hate and make possible the furtherance of love, here’s the mantram for Bagalamukhi and some images from her temple at Nilachal Hill in Assam where we visited on pilgrimage…

Priestess of Kali

I am a priestess of Kali. With these few words, a whole cacophony of syllables arises in me. These are not the seed sounds of mantras turning on my tongue. Rather, they are the tones of language rushing to respond. Some attempt to elucidate, help the uninitiated understand what it means to occupy this space…

Reclaiming Hell

Most of us grow up knowing about heaven and hell. Whatever our faith or place of birth, and by whatever names we might choose, the split of light and dark into above and below seems to be a fact of our heritage as human beings. It is reflected in myriad cultures ancient and modern, from…

Spirit and Social Justice

Creating and Sustaining Spaces for Marginalized Spiritualities& Social Transformation By: Chandra Alexandre Presented at the 5th Annual Conference on Current Pagan Studies, February 2009, Claremont University In early 2000 when I first began an exploration of dissertation topics, I was coming fresh off of several years’ worth of engagement at the intersection of politics and feminism….

Women’s Mysteries

By: Julie (Sanatani) McCord In many cultures special taboos appear around menstruation and childbirth. Because a woman’s cycle is often about the same length as the lunar cycle, special ties are acknowledged between women and the Moon. Because women bleed each month without taking harm, they are believed to have special powers during the bleeding,…

Looking Positively at Menstruation

Empowering Women and Girls First published in Women’s Sahayog (1999), Calcutta, India By: Chandra Alexandre Around the globe, girls often experience some form of initiation into adulthood at menarche (the first coming of menstrual blood). Although such rites of passage can be as simple as a mother showing a daughter how to use a sanitary…

The Great Leap of Faith

An Initiation into Womanhood By: Delphyne Jodie Platner We Begin With a Story Naila perched on the edge of a sharp cliff overlooking the sea. On this momentous day the sun shone even brighter than usual, causing the water beneath her to sparkle a clear azure blue. During the last moon, Naila’s blood had come…

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…As one’s breath slows and one’s eyes close under the measured rhythm of chanting, Kali is made to expand and fill the room. She is in every flickering flame and in the glinting bronze, she is in the incense and in the mounting rhythm of the chant, she is in the bodies of the people present and in those who are missing but are thought of. She is in the Sanskritic root mantras and in the ordinary English syllables, which sound so extraordinary when said with new meaning and new purpose. She is in one’s mind and in one’s body, and though she is a goddess, her body is also somehow present and tangible and real.

Nicole

Becoming Kali’s priest as Rashani has meant that I have consciously invited the process of birthing my soul. And whether in Kolkata or San Francisco, this goddess has both represented and simultaneously been more than personification, metaphor or archetype of my transformation.

Today, after annual pilgrimages to her homeland and over thirteen years of public pujas offered in her name, I am much more comfortable with my role and responsibilities relative to Her teachings in the flesh. The learning continues as I plunge more deeply with community into the realms She inhabits and seek to know more intimately the gateways She guards. Her gifts, sometimes even the passwords that open the gateways, have been largely earned on the path of practice and service.

Chandra Alexandre

Kali has appeared serendipitously in my life since I was a teenager through a variety of channels, including images, books, people, and altered state of consciousness experiences. I knew in my heart that there was meaning and purpose to this pull I had to her. However, I was living on the East Coast where my surroundings and relationships did not validate or help me understand her presence in my life, causing me to wonder whether she was just a figment of my imagination.

Moving to the San Francisco Bay Area and discovering SHARANYA and, subsequently, meeting other people with a similar connection with Kali was greatly affirming. Through SHARANYA I have learned volumes about a presence in my life that, prior, was a mystery. The opportunity to develop a deeper relationship with Kali within the spiritual community of SHARANYA has been empowering, healing, enlightening, and rewarding.

Sha'can Initiate

Tonight’s puja was such a powerful reminder to me of why I become involved in SHARANYA, why I walked through the threshold of initiation, and why I am so passionate about the work we do in the world in Her name. The devotion, the mantras, the songs, the ceremonies allow us to see Her, touch Her, and experience Her within our own hearts. She is a part of us. We are a part of Her. The entire Universe, the cycles of Nature, and the yearning of our soul is Her wondrous dance, loving weaving all things into being.

Jaratura

I found the Hindu chants workshop to be extremely informative, lovely and powerful. I believe it was perfect for Unitarian participation because it addressed the spiritual, emotional and intellectual aspects of this practice, as well as lots of live practice…I have actually been using some of the chants, several times a week, having incorporated them into my normal meditation routine. Given that I work in a fast-paced environment in a pretty harsh town, I love the connection I feel to these chants and how incorporating them has resulted in a calmer, more intuitive me.

Maureen, UU Chant Workshop Participant

Shakta Tantra is a belief system whose cosmology reveres the immanence of spirit and in turn provides ritualized as well as lived practices in which the body acts as, and becomes substance for, the Divine. Shakta traditions consider Female/Feminine energy to be fundamental and activating—the source of all creation without which the gods and humanity would perish.

Hinduism is a source of inspiration in myriad Western spiritual communities, with practitioners offering devotions to Hindu deities on their home altars as readily as they supplicate resurrected and reconstructed divinities from other pantheons. Combine this trend with a confluence of feminism, goddess-focused spiritualities, and a growing Indian-American population that has Hindu diasporic roots and bi-cultural sensibilities, and we witness the birthing of new, culturally relevant and accessible Hinduisms.

Chandra Alexandre

yā kālī paramā vidyā brahmarupā sanātanī |
kāmākhyā saiba deveśi sarvasiddhivinodinī ||

You, Kali, Ultimate Mother, the one who is the form of the Absolute Eternal;
Kamakhya, Goddess of Desire, in you reside all powers.

kāmākhyām&#803 kāmasampanām&#803 kāmesvarīm&#803 harapriyām&#803 |
kāmanām&#803 dehi me nityam&#803 kāmesvarī namo-stute ||

As we offer our prayer, we recognize that this sacred land of spiritual upliftment, the abode of Srī Srī Kāmākhyā, is a land offering connection to what resides both here and beyond. When the rest of the world is agog with material pleasure, the life that is present in Her abode seems to be the summum bonum of humanity’s yearning; we come to Her and drink the pleasure of life, taking back with us to ordinary reality the deepest wisdoms. – Rajib Sharma

Devi Kamakhya Pranam Mantra

अयं निजः परो वेति गणना लघुचेतसाम् ।
उदारचरि तानां तु वसुधैव कुतुम्बकम् ॥

ayam&#803 nijah&#803 paro veti gan&#803an&#257 laghucetas&#257m |
ud&#257racarit&#257n&#257m&#803 tu vasudhaiva kutumbakam ||

It is the calculation of those of small minds to think that someone
is either ‘one of us or one of them.’ But for those of generous heart
all the world is their family.

Mahasubhashitasamgraha

Mahalakshmi, wisdom keeper and guardian of secrets, be among us. From your reserves of kindness, fill us a basket of daring, of yearning, of helpfulness, and of home-spaces filled with sweetness. Come to us radiant to remind us each of our own gifts and gratitudes, of our own capacity and caring. You who are gifted in making dreams reality, we ask for your benediction, your blessings and your boons in our troubled times.

Om Mahalakshmi, namostute namah!

Aindri, She whose four arms and thousand eyes radiate from a golden visage, open us to the expanse of richness that lies within. Holding your thunderbolt, you are a flash of cosmic power; please lend us your insight. With spear and club in your hands you conquer ill-will and pierce the walls of deceit. Let us, oh goddess, do the same.

Om Aindri, namostute namah!

Chamunda, goddess of all reckoning, you who inspire fear with a glance, you who licks the wounds of asuras (demons) as you laugh and trample them to death, come to us drunk on the blood of life, inebriated on the wings of hope. Your skeleton red reminds us of our origins in Mama’s darkness as your digambari (garbed in space; sky-clad) pleasure makes us tell the need for nothingness. Garbed in space, your hair aflame in a cobra tiara, you dance on cremation grounds and bring joy to despair, laughter to sorrow, mirth to uneasy embarrassment. Holding your kapala (skull cup) full of your enemies’ blood, you choose life at every juncture and will us to do the same. Divine mother of might who rides the owl of death, the corpse of ultimate transformation, be with us now.

Om Chamunda, namostute namah!

Varahi, goddess with the head of a boar, we beseech you to let us ride with you upon your elephant tonight. Let us ride with you in your search for reason, in your quest for the ultimate sacrifice, in your march towards responsibility and justice. You who are adorned with ornaments made of coral, bring to us your knowledge of the sea, that primordial ocean of bliss from which you come, that reservoir of infinite love, that place of belly-wrenching righteousness and surreal splendor. You who represent the color of clouds before illumination, you who kill the enemies of freedom, you who devour darkness, be with us now.

Om Varahi, namostute namah!

Vaishnavi, we call to you. She who rides a Garuda to the crest of the waves and the valleys of grief, She whose beautiful visage marks enlightenment, be with us now. Honor us with the long-sighted goal of your cakra thrown in the name of unity and common purpose. Bring us the power of your club, bow, and sword to deter our egos and false illusions. Sound for us your conch shell so that we may hear the resonance of perspectives garnered from about the globe in support of sustainability, nurturance, mindfulness and peace. To you who comes to us in the colors of dawning preservation, we bow.

Om Vaishnavi, namostute namah!

Kaumari, goddess of the springtime, of the melting snow and birthing doe; you who are six-faced, come to us with your news of foreign lands, discoveries, reverie, and insight. Hold us in your sight as we enter into the dreamtime of ritual, seeking to commune with all those who have birthed innocence and peace. You whose memory is first in the minds of ancients, come to us bringing the many-colored eyes of your peacock to help us understand. Lend us your spear so that we may pierce the veil of ignorance. From your four hands, give us the gifts of perseverance, humility, passion and desire; and accept our offerings this evening of honesty, devotion, reverence, and respect. To you who resides under the fig tree, She who is ever strong, we bow.

Om Kaumari, namostute namah!

Maheshvari, woman of the bull, carrier of the trident, and seer of the moon, we honor you as manifest courage, strength and guided, transformational rage. You who are colored white, remind us of our pure potential. You who are four-handed, bring us the knowings of the four directions, the bounty of the earth, air, fire and water. You who have five faces, each with three eyes, see with us into the past, present and future; hold us in your gaze as we venture in our individual and collective quest for wholeness, righteousness, and sublime adoration of truth and beauty. You who in name manifests the supreme power located in the heart that unites all opposites, we bow to you.

Om Maheshvari, namostute namah!

Brahmani, you of the Great Revelation, we bow to you. Dressed in yellow of the newest day, you who make your enemies inert with the blessed water from your womblike pot, tonight make us inert in wonderment, open to receive your boons and blessings. Let us count with you upon your akshamala (rosary) the names of love and compassion that you have manifested upon this earth. In our minds and hearts, we hold with you all the beings and spirits who have touched us through your golden visage, golden grace. We call upon you to be with us, bringing your red lotus seat to fire our imaginations, and your swan companion to grant us the wisdom of ages.

Om, Brahmani, namostute namah!

Know that we recognize Spirit as the lantern, which, perhaps for reasons unknown, calls to you. Should the soft hearth-glow beckon and you acknowledge, we invite you to come! For it is not only the light that will beckon. It is the night and all that resides within and beyond that will welcome you in with graceful spirit.

As you approach, learn and practice that which is true to Her heart, to your heart. Let the strong black arms of Kali Maa wrap snugly around you, offering guidance and protection. As this happens, know too that as all earth-bound spirits cast shadows, there will be a time you must confront your own…your own Shadow. A shadow, that which is neither light or dark, that which veils, that which can be deceiving, changing shape so constantly that it becomes nearly impossible to tell where the source actually originates.

Sha'can Initiate & Elder

My experience [of Daughters of Kali] was profound and fulfilling. I gained not only ancient and mystical wisdom, but also a family that became connected to me on the most deep, soulful and sacred level.

Sha'can Initiate

On reading the Kali Puja Festival programme, I became very enchanted…I am proud that you are helping to fulfill my desire to spread Mother Worship outside of India and also hope that in the near future it will spread throughout the world. Go ahead, my blessing and the blessing of Mother Kali is with you!

Shyam Sundar Dash

Kali Maa: Tradition, Devotion and Puja…rocked my world. We chanted Sanskrit syllables together, learned some new devotions and met the Great Mother Kali Maa with a priestess that is so devoted that she glows with it. What a gift! What an experience! We left that rite fairly buzzing…

Carrie

Where male and female worship one another is the play of the Divine Mother.

Tantra Shastras

After having taken 5 online classes in seminary, I was really impressed with Kali Vidya. I thought the structure, content, and feedback were all superb…Reconnecting me with my spiritual exercises and discovering some new ones were among the greatest treasures of the course. I love how the material balanced the intellectual and the embodied, the theory and practice.

- Rev. Jeremiah Kalendae

This past Sunday’s ritual was pure delight. I am so grateful for this community. I am delighted and excited by the ritual I was part of…the power, the energy and the openness of everyone there was just the juice I needed to energize my soul. I look forward to circling with you all again in the future!

Nishima