The Liberal Catholic Church
A tri-annual magazine exploring the deeper aspects of religious thought,
experience and practice in the world today
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The Miracle of Birth and the World Mother Geoffrey Hodson On the front cover and on this page are reproduced two paintings of the World Mother, as described by Geoffrey Hodson in his book "The Kingdom of the Gods" (TPH Adyar). Hereunder we reproduce the text belonging to these illustrations from the aforementioned book. During investigations of pre-natal life I constantly became aware of the presence and ministration of certain types of angels which were assisting in the dual process of the construction of the new bodies, mental, emotional, etheric and physical, and the induction into them of the reincarnating Ego. Though I did not realise it at the time, I have now come to believe that, during the involutionary arc or descent into incarnation of each life cycle, these angels perform for every individual a function closely resembling that carried out on behalf of the race by the Pitris, the so-called ancestors of man, sometimes occultly referred to as the Satanic Hierarchies.A study of these angels revealed them as agents of a great Intelligence which presides over and directs all maternal processes throughout Nature. The teachings of occult philosophy relate this Being to the Feminine or Mother Aspect of the Deity, of which She is a manifestation and a representative. Matter itself, universal substance or prakriti, is the arche or womb wherein all worlds gestate, from which all are born and to which all return. The true World Mother is this primary substance of a universe when first differentiated from the root of matter or mulaprakriti; for therein reside the seeds of all living things and the powers of conservation and reproduction. When differentiation occurs at the dawn of Cosmos, following the night of Chaos, the three Aspects of the primordial Trinity, the Creator, the Preserver and the Transformer, become self-manifest and creatively active. They are then represented by lofty divine Intelligences, Powers or Emanations, themselves the highest fruits of preceding Manvantaras, whose bodies are "of the essence of the higher divine light ". Intelligences of such a nature, when emanated from root substance, direct the course of evolution under immutable Law. They are no Beings such as the human mind can conceive. They constitute both the highest Sephirothal Triad and the Seven which proceed from Them, or rather the Spirit behind each. They may perhaps be described as Very Soul of the Very Soul of the universe. The cosmic maternal Principle is universally manifest and its conserving and reproducing attributes are active throughout all Nature. Physically, it is expressed both as chemical, negative polarity and as femininity throughout the whole organic world. It is active within every single cell as also in every multi-cellular organism. Without it nothing could be conceived and born, nothing preserved, nothing reproduced. Superphysically, the maternal Principle is of equal importance. For man, it is the Auric Envelope, the arche of the Spiritual Soul, the Augoeides or Causal Body, the womb wherein gestate Initiate, Adept, Logos-to-be. All nations have recognised, honoured and worshipped this maternal Principle in Nature. All their exoteric religions have personified it as a Goddess, an Archangel Mother of universes, races, nations and men. These personifications of the World Mother are amongst the very noblest concepts of the human mind, which in creating, reverencing and serving them reaches its highest degree of idealism, devotion and religious self-expression. Such reverence, such devotion and such worship as are offered to World Mothers are therefore worthy of the deepest respect and, gross superstition apart – ever to be resisted – may usefully be encouraged. For through human devotion, human beings may be reached from on high. Through human aspiration, highest love and supplication, man is susceptible to both his own Spiritual Self and the influence of the Adept Ministrants of mankind. The Madonna ideal, for example, has been and still is of incalculable value in consoling, purifying and ennobling humanity. Through it, a realisation of the Mother-Love of God has been brought within reach of millions of suffering and aspiring people. The concepts of Kwan Yin, Isis, Ishtar, Parvati and other Goddesses are similarly founded upon the existence, nature and function of the same great Being. Perhaps because I am a Christian and the cases I was examining were also Christian, the Madonna-like forms here pictured presented themselves to my mind. The planetary World Mother is conceived in certain schools of occult philosophy as a highly-evolved Archangel Representative and Embodiment on earth of the Feminine Aspect of the Deity. She is also thought of as an Adept Official in the Inner Government of the World, in whom all the highest qualities of womanhood and motherhood shine forth in their fullest perfection.
In reverent salutation to Her as Queen of the Angels, I bring to a close this illustrated study of the Angelic Hosts.
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Since She is beyond all limitation of form, no picture can truly represent
Her. In Plate 28 (pictured on the