Starhawk is a visionary author and leading voice in the pagan movement today. Her books such as "Spiral Dance", "Walking to Mercury", and "The Fifth Sacred Thing' have all become classics in their field. Currently, Starhawk is collaborating on a film biography about archaeologist Marija Gimbutas, and she has also recently co-authored a comprehensive resource book for children and parents called "Circle Round" (Bantam Books) with co-authors Diane Baker and Anne Hill. On Friday the 13th, I had to opportunity to talk with Starhawk about her new book, the future of humankind, and the benefits of raising children in the Goddess Tradition.

One of the jobs of a parent is to give your children a sense of their place in the universe, their connection to things that go beyond them, their ethics, and all of those things that traditionally come under the auspices of religion. I happen to think those things are best fostered, not by telling or lecturing your children, or imposing rules and beliefs on them, but by what you live yourself, and what you share with them. They come out of life experiences, not out of instructions. In "Circle Round" we provide a lot of opportunities for that to happen; ways to celebrate the holidays that are geared toward children, not geared toward making children suffer through an adult ritual; and fun activities that children and adults can do together like cooking, baking, eating, and making things. These are the kinds of things that create the warm, friendly, wonderful memories that we cherish from our childhood, and really often the kinds of things that parents don't do with their kids these days because they don't have time, or when they do have time, it doesn't occur to them. Tieing these activities to the seasons and holidays give a rhythm to the year.

My hope is that children raised in the Goddess Tradition, and what I have seen, is that they are going to have a deep sense of connectedness with the Earth and a willingness to learn to live in ways that we need to, in order to be in balance with the Earth. They also will have a deep sense of interconnectedness with other people, and live in ways that show compassion and caring for other people--personally, in terms of the larger community, and politically. Being raised in the Goddess Tradition also gives a basic sense of personal happiness, self-esteem, and an enjoyment of life.

What motivated me to write this book is that we really need to be passing this information on to the next generation. I know that my two co-authors, Diane Baker and Anne Hill who are both raising small children also feel this. The message we are trying to give to children and adults is the Earth is alive! Everything is interconnected and the Earth is a wonderful and miraculous place to be, and to be part of. We can learn to celebrate this on every level.

The resurgence of the Goddess Tradition and other Earth-based spiritual traditions need to be seen as equally valid as any other spiritual tradition. What we have seen in the last few years is the tradition continuing to grow and develop. I think it is likely that this will continue over the next few years. Reclaiming <www.reclaiming.org/cauldron/Starhawk/> is the group and particular tradition I work with, and we have been working to train women to be priestesses in their own communities. We are trying to understand how to structure our organizations so they don't become bureaucracies.

This is one of our strengths. My vision is that the Goddess Tradition doesn't end up as one monolithic equivalent to the Catholic Church, but that it will take many forms and different directions. People who come to the Goddess Tradition from Catholicism tend to have a different take on it than those that come out of Judaism or Lutheranism. People who practice in California come up with something different that those that practice in the Northeast.

For me, my creativity comes directly out of my contact with nature. I'm fortunate enough to live most of the time in the country, and I spend a lot of my time just walking around looking at things in nature. There was a time, maybe ten years ago, my inspiration came more out of my human interactions, with my groups, community, and partners. That is certainly still true, but at this point in my life, I am wallowing in nature. Also, children are always a source of inspiration.

I'm not sure whether it has an intent, but it certainly has a presence, a consciousness, and an awareness that is always communicating. I can go out and communicate with my redwood trees or with my garden. That communication is really the strongest and most clear when it is local and in the very immediate area. A lot of us are used to dealing with large abstractions in our spiritual life. Actually going out and sitting with a tree or a piece of land is what connects you.

I see human beings coming back to the realization that we are directly dependent on the natural systems that surround us. We are interdependent on each other, and I see us really taking responsibility for being connected, for sharing that care with each other in very tangible ways. So I see us learning from nature and working with the Earth, rather than trying to dictate our ideas to nature. We can learn to observe and let that observation teach us what we need to do.

In my book, "The Fifth Sacred Thing" I outlined a couple of versions of the future. I imagined a very positive future in Northern California where people will be able to reconceive the city as an organism, where people grow food and work together and have control over the work life, where diversity of race, culture, background or language is seen as a strength and gift and something to be cherish and not a problem, where there is a strong ethic that everyone and every child should be cared for and that everybody should have a home and have enough. In Southern California, I imagined just the opposite; a place where the negative trends that we see around us today like intolerance and hatred, concentration of wealth in the hands of a very few, will be carried to their logical extremes. It can really go in both direction, but after the recent elections I am much more heartened. It has always been my theory that the American people have never been as mean as the Republicans, and that we don't really like mean people.

Photo by Jane Krensky