08 Jan SAINT CATHERINE OF ALEXANDRIA, CHTHONIC — LUNAR GODDESS
There are several festivals in November which lead us in a procession deep into the Sacred Dark. Following the folly of Halloween, then All Saints’ and Souls’ Days, I celebrate Samhain season for the entire month of November. If you overlay Christian and Pagan festival calendars a number of coincidences will be revealed. Dr. Georgi Mishev, scholar of Bulgarian and Thracian folk magic traditions, made the discovery that the Feast of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary on 21 November overlaps with the Wolf Days of Bulgarian of folklore. The coupling of the two celebrations draws a connection between the Mother of God and the wolf mother of legends. The fusion of the two is the She-Wolf, Hekate-Lykaina.
The goddess Hekate has two modern festivals in November which flank the feast days of Saints Catherine of Alexandria on the 25th and Saint Catherine of Labouré on the 28th, and Hekate’s Night on 16 November is the beginning of Saint Catherine of Alexandria’s novena. When I began to probe into the legends about Saint Catherine of Alexandria, I found that the name ‘Catherine’ is derived from ‘Hekate.’ Another revelation was that her story is not historical; it was appropriated from the life of martyred pagan philosopher Hypatia. This year, in the U.S., Thanksgiving falls on the feast day of Saint Catherine of Alexandria, the significance for me is that both holidays are colonial relics that propagate false historical narratives. And yet, buried below colonial narratives are the bones of forgotten cultural heritage.
Below is a creative retelling of my discovery of the magical entanglement between Saint Catherine of Alexandria, the goddess Hekate, and the philosopher Hypatia.
Saint Catherine of Alexandria, Chthonic — Lunar Goddess
In November the sun fails to ascend to its apex in the sky and instead slides lazily along the southern horizon, giving the northern hemisphere a reprieve from its glaring rays. After the winds have diligently blown every single leaf from deciduous trees and frost has put an end to new buds, nature reflects the death principle of the Great Mysteries. It is said that as the days shorten and nights grow long that the veil between the living and the dead becomes thin, allowing the living to communion with spirits.
My necromancy teacher calls the saints, our ‘big dead,’ “those who are mothers to many.” Last November she gave me a magical assignment to choose my patron saint. Wisdom I’d heard months before whispered through my memory, “your name is your destiny.” So, I began to call out to the saints with my name, Catherine, hoping to hear a familiar voice respond.
In my search, I scried deep black autumn night skies. I etched glyphs with sticks into snow and sand. I haunted historic cemeteries. And I found her. Or, rather, she found me. As I walked one night on lumpy earth, among rows of graves, a soft glow from the ground caught my eye, a headstone reflecting moonlight, upon it was my name, Catherine, engraved in marble worn by time.
Below my feet were the secrets of my patroness, Saint Catherine of Alexandria. I knelt down to the ground and traced with my finger the letters of her name, my name. As I did so, the script morphed Catherine… Αἰκατερίνη… Ἑκάτη…Ὑπατία… Magical names, forgotten epithets, prickled my skin as they scrolled under my fingertips.
With a longing spanning lifetimes, to be drawn back into the Mysteries, I fervently pulled up handfuls of grass and tugged at dense root tangles. My fingernails tore through sand, then dug into dense earth. My excavation took me down through layers of time to antiquity, and beyond into the primordial dark. At the bottom of the hole, I found an ancient statuette. I lifted up a small Hekataion of a triple-formed figure and rubbed away red clay from smooth white stone. Below the sediment were revealed three maidens, three faces, three stories that converge.
The first face I unveiled was Saint Catherine of Alexandria, beautiful, learned fourth century noble maiden and martyred mystical bride of Christ. The second figure I uncovered was virgin astronomer, Hypatia, who studied the stars. Her life story of faith and martyrization is the basis for the fabricated legend of Saint Catherine of Alexandria. The third revelation of the triplets was the goddess, Hekate, whose name is the origination of ‘Catherine.’ She claims dominion over land, sea and sky and is the embodiment of the moon.
In November, searching for my ‘big dead,’ I found the moon. Just as the moon is a mirror for the sun, I also saw my own reflection in the shining figures I excavated from the earthen pit of the dying year.