“Of all the numberless flowers in this world, not one of them has a name. Their beauty, form, and function, their fragrance and color—these exist apart from whatever word you call a flower by and belong fully to the flower in a way that its name can never do. In just this way, that which you truly are—what you feel and most deeply desire—exists within you and belongs to you separately from the words and thoughts that accompany them.

“You seek for truth in the world that lies all about you, but you stand at the center of that truth in who and what you are. Every person is complete and lacking nothing. For you are a beloved and a lover. You belong to life eternally and wholly to everything that is.

“Naturally, you will find it difficult to rest in this knowledge. The world tells you that you must wrestle with circumstances and events in order to become who you yearn to be. But that yearning can only be satisfied by the deep knowledge that, just by being alive, you are who and where you need to be.

“With this confidence, you can go anywhere and do anything. You can achieve whatever is needed to embrace love and fulfill your destiny in the world. With this inner truth you will never be lost. You need not fear death. And you can provide wisdom and comfort to those in need. There is nothing to reach for and nothing to attain but the knowledge of your own heart and the fulfillment of its deepest desires.

“No words will guide you there. Whatever paths the world gives you to follow are false and ill-suited if they promise some final point of arrival. The journey you are on from the beginningless past to an endless future unfolds one step at a time. So do not falter, and have no fear. For I am with you and within you. Your body and My body are of one body with the world.”

[art: Sarah Jarrett]

Rose Buds- WOTR News & Celebrations

ROSEBUD TRAVEL GUIDE

The month of May has long been celebrated as the Month of Mary. Although the Way of the Rose is not a part of any religion, we can appreciate the deep appreciation of our Lady by any name you choose to call her, as spring in the Northern Hemisphere awakens us and sends us outdoors to festivals and special places. Elsewhere in this issue, you will find updated information about the 15th Feast of Our Lady of Woodstock and Our Lady of Woodstock’s novena, June 8th to 16th.

Rosebud members often share artwork from Sue Ellen Parkinson to highlight their posts on our two Facebook groups, as she has specialized in works honoring the sacred Mother. If your travels will take you to Northern California, you might want to visit Ukiah, where this recent painting, “Lilith’s Golden Thread,” ©Sue Ellen Parkinson, 2026 will be in the Grace Hudson Museum’s upcoming exhibit, Look Again: Portrait’s of Daring Women. May 23rd through Aug 16th, 2026.

Jessica Rose shared this photo of El Santuario de Chimayo, in New México. This sacred site is open to the public every day of the week.

If you are in England or traveling there, Glastonbury’s Chalice Well is a long-revered site to visit. Jenny Wren shared these photos:

“Avalon finally with little bear... I was moved to tears when he decided to nap in front of Our Lady. She holding Her divine son and me holding mine. The fulfilment of two prayers realised, that She would be restored to Her alcove after campaigning and petitioning and that I would have another babe in my lap after being open to receive the messages and making the adjustments required. Is there anything more joyous than witnessing your child laughing and splashing in the sacred waters?”

Jenny refers to this miracle:

The 2024 controversy at Glastonbury’s sacred Chalice Well Garden involved the removal of a “Mother and Child” statue, causing widespread outrage, a petition with thousands of signatures, and a public apology from the Trust. The statue was removed due to its connection to artist Eric Gill, a known child abuser. However, it was made by Indian sacred sculptor Ganesh Bhat and gifted to Chalice Well by Ganesh on the understanding that She would have a home for life. As much as he loved and wanted to keep Her, he said he wanted Her to be able to bless as many people as possible. The Lady was beloved by pilgrims for decades until the Chalice Well received a complaint that Her composition was similar to Gill’s work. The Chalice Well removed the statue without any notice, and there was a campaign (led in part by Jenny) to replace Her which was backed by pilgrims worldwide. She was eventually returned to her place at the Well, where you can see Her if you visit.

Wendy Pope visits Our Lady of the Forest on Denman Island, in Canada

María Hetinyi described in detail a pilgrimage to the grotto of Lourdes in France.

An excerpt:

“When the apparition came to Lourdes over a century ago, I cannot help but wonder if it was truly the Mother Goddess who appeared but without language for it, the Church grabbed her for their own.

“When I visited Lourdes, it wasn’t exactly the energy of the pure immaculate version of Mother Mary that struck me, but the power of the very ancient, primordial Mother Goddess who dwells there. In that grotto. Underneath all the cathedrals, masses, glass barriers, velvet ropes and religions built on top of her.

“Mother Mary is of the Wild. An enlightened woman who experienced much hardship. She allowed the truth of existence to pierce her heart and awaken her.”

DOMESTIC TIDBITS

There are so many zoom circle offerings and live and in person meetings, that sometimes our other WOTR offerings get overlooked. Kimberly Saward reminded us of the weekly St Anne Chaplet:

“St. Anne is the old mother. The granny. The crone. The mother before the mothers. For me, she is the grandmother who shows up for me again and again, even now that I am a grandmother myself. We pray the St Anne chaplet weekly on zoom on Tuesdays at 3pm east coast time.”

Painting of St Anne with Mary by Baraka Robin Berger

Michael Therese McQueen offered this example you can try at home:

“One of my favorite memories from Catholic school and one of my favorite all time church events has always been the May crowning, and I think it was the May crowning was when I first fell in love with Mary. Today I made this little flower crown, for her and had my own little May crowning. And set up a little May altar featuring my black Madonna’s also. Queen of the Angels! Queen of the May!”

To make your own flower wreath, cut long stems (purchased flower arrangements also work well) and wire or tie together to form a circle. As you build your circle, if you overlap the flower blossoms, you will cover the stems of the previously wired portion, and then fold into a circle and finish off.

News From the Shrine

15th Feast Day of Our Lady of Woodstock- Join us, in person or online.

Come to the Feast Day! Full details HERE. Festivities begin on Monday night June 15th at 7:30 pm with the washing of the Shrine and conclude in the late afternoon on Tuesday June 16th. There is dancing, devotional chanting, a late night vigil, music, tarot, a Faire, games for the little ones, a pot luck meal, and rose buds to hug. Come for as much or as little as you can. The schedule, travel and lodging details are all on the website.

At 3pm June 16th you can join us online for the last Full Rosary of Our Lady of Woodstock’s Novena with friends from all over the world. The link can be found on our calendar.

Novena for Our Lady of Woodstock

Pray Our Lady of Woodstock’s Novena. This is a special once-a-year event that begins on June 8th and ends at the Feast Day in person and Zoom. There are two designated circles each day that includes the day’s reading a full rosary if you want to pray this novena in community. Or you can pray it on your own. One circe will be at 3pm Eastern, and the other will be at 9pm Eastern. You can access the calendar here and read more about Our Lady of Woodstock’s novena here. There are no sign-ups or requirements but Our Lady has suggested doing this novena at least once in our lives.

Our Lady of Woodstock says of this novena: “This is an optional yearly novena for those who wish to observe it, but it would be good to pray it at least once during your lifetime. Think of it as a pilgrimage of nine days’ duration that stands for the nine epochs of your soul’s journey through deep time. Once you have faithfully recited all three sets of mysteries for nine days straight, you will not need to repeat it again unless you desire to do so. Once you have completed this novena, you will carry My map within you to guide you from this lifetime to the next, and from that lifetime to all other lives to come.

Our Gardening Grandmother

If you enjoy the newsletter, if you have ever come to a circle, if you have watched a youtube video or interview about the rosary, or sought out resources on the website, you have Kimberly Saward to thank. She makes SO MANY things happen behind the scenes for Way of the Rose—updating our calendar and our contact lists, posting the messages, enabling security for our website, helping people root circles generally and practically day to day. She is the only person we pay for her services in Way of the Rose because she is so essential to our ability function.

When we meet in person, we often have to pass the hat for the rental of the facility. People put in what they can. For one person a dollar may be a stretch one week, sometimes another person can take care of the whole rent for the whole month. We all have different resources at different times.

We are passing the hat

for our online presence and our Zoom circles and our ability to connect with each other. This pays not only for Kimberly’s administration but website fees, Zoom fees. For more information and to donate, click on this link.

Donate Here

Thank you for contributing what you can!

Miracle Stories

Miracle Story of Ruth Bieber

The Way of the Rose: A Language of Understanding
During a recent Way of the Rose prayer group, I experienced a slightly disorienting sensation after offering up my prayer, and then especially while singing the follow-up chant to our Mother. Soon thereafter a message came in from the chat. The sender mentioned seeing roses while I sang. I was quite surprised by this comment, which then caused me to become reflective. Thus, I was reminded of several experiences from my past that I was not able to explain at the time of each. I am grateful to the sender of this chat for leading me down some memory lane, as follows:

Once, having just finished a crystal bowl meditation, I was returning to the car with the help of a sighted partner. Suddenly I could unmistakably smell roses, I mean a strong smell! As I am blind, I indicated same to my friend, asking him where was the rose bush? He looked around and promptly informed me there were no roses in sight. So, I simply enjoyed the olfactory experience with no explanation.

On another occasion, I was having a hands-on healing session with a practitioner, who told me my heart was a rose. Again nice, but what did this mean?

Finally, I remembered receiving rose oil in the mail. There was no return address, but the package was postmarked India. I still have no idea who sent me the rose oil.

For each of these mysterious events, I had no explanation, but now all these years later I thank The Way of The Rose for giving me a language to accompany my understanding of these experiences. Also, I now know the Mother was with me even before I possessed the language of understanding.

Hail Mary, and blessings to The Way of The Rose.

Prayer Patch

How Do Miracles Work?

Rosary circles are amazing; the safe space and quick connections, and hearing each other’s miracles. Beyond the garden of WOTR meetings, friendships have bloomed all over the world, that are truly connections based in prayer. These posses have prayed each other through thick and thin. In such a group, one friend might reach out with a need (big or small) and the others get right on it. Or so we say.

If a prayer-friend has asked for prayer in an emergency, I stop and grab my beads toute suite. This author will admit, however, that despite immediately responding to the message, I occasionally go back to whatever I was doing and don’t pray for that intention until later or the next day. Which then surprises me when the asker comes back within the hour to say the issue is resolved. Am I the only of us one who didn’t pray right away? Do prayers said the next day defy time? What initiates the miracle?

A possible answer came last week. I was in severe pain; an recurring pain that was worse than I’ve ever had — could hardly move, let alone sit up. For over an hour, I tried the usual tricks without success. I was scared. It was time to reach out for prayers as I considered medical attention.

Messaged the group, drank the glass of water by my side and brought my glass to the sink, only to realize I was standing straight. The pain was gone and my body had released all pain-induced tension. Before anyone acknowledged my request, let alone had time to pray. Could it be that the miracle comes not from the number of petitioners or the sincerity of Aves said? Could it be the asking?

There’s something about praying in a group that potentizes a miracle. “When two or more are gathered” and all that. Is the key that, in praying with others, we necessarily share our petition (be it out loud or in writing, or in our heart/mind with others present)?

In her visitations from the Queen of Heaven, Catherine Labouré asked about the rays of light emanating from some of the rings on the vision’s fingers. The Virgin explained that those are the answers to prayer; that the rings without light are the graces for which people have yet to ask. For those who follow Jesus’ teachings, you might recognize this Mother’s promise in his “everyone who asks receives”.

Not that all miracles come through instantaneously. My belief is that those quick ones provide the proof our logical minds need to build trust and strengthen faith. It’s how we learn to recognize the miracles no matter how long they take.

Rose Petals - Excerpts from WOTR Novena Posts

From Michael Thérèse McQueen: Just as some seeds can’t germinate without Fire, sometimes we don’t reach our truest potential without the cross, yes sometimes truly things need to and are required to fall apart. Read the full post HERE.

From Sarah Rohrs: “I’ve grieved as many trees I’ve come to know and love have met chainsaws to make way for more houses and stores, to fix broken sidewalks, put in more sewer and power lines on streets, and to save other trees from diseases created through excessive pruning and car exhaust. Trees are the silent witness to empire, the rapacious destruction of capitalism.” Read the full post HERE

From Stefanie DG: “From an ecological perspective, every death in nature is the sustenance of another being. Death is never a loss in an ecosystem, but the food for another being, food for another life.” Read the full post HERE

From Adrienne Warber: “I realize that I simply wasn’t hearing God in the usual way. Instead, Creator was speaking through a special poem, a beautiful piece of art, a random act of kindness, a gathering of my local spiritual community, my dog’s happy greeting, or a wild flower blooming in the most unexpected place. It is all a beautiful song that never ends. Mama is always here. We are all connected. Glorious indeed. May we all recognize this in those next moments of silence and sorrow.” Read the full post HERE

From Janice Salmon: “As I sit this Novena with my beads in hand, I can see that it is the way to keep walking, even when it feels like the end has come. The cyclicity of her beads keeps me looking up and looking ahead, there is always another rhythm to walk.” Read the full post HERE

Way of the Rose BOOKS

Click on image of a book for more info.

Come to a Rosary Meeting!

Visit our CALENDAR and choose a rosary meeting that works for you and join us!

Our rosary circles are where we weave our prayers and petitions
and the real magic happens.

Share

“Listen to the trilling of the frogs on a spring night after a heavy rain and you will find that it leaves nothing out. Their voices overlap, running together in a continuous whirring drone that rises and falls throughout the night. Their songs lack grammar and syntax, and yet nothing is left unsaid. They may be wordless, but they are not lacking in meaning. They point to a meaning that remains protected forever because it lacks even the smallest trace of human thought. Thought adds nothing to the world that it does not already possess in abundance and endless variety. You must seek that meaning which abides eternally at the heart of the world.

“Those who learn to collaborate with the natural sounds and sights of the living world will finally become wise—although, in truth, such wisdom involves no becoming. To return to the place of faith and quiet abiding that all beings are born with is to recover the language of the soul.

“The Great Illusion is that through thinking you can add anything to life. The role of thought is not to alter the world, but to dance with it and love it. Even one moment of life lived in this way is worth more than the sum of human knowledge. A child manages this easily and unselfconsciously, although children always forget it as they grow older and begin to take on the burden of fears and worries that most people call a life.

“When I ask you to have faith and trust, to hold My hand and let Me guide you, this is what I am asking you to do. This is the end of all prayer and devotion. Just learn to do what the tree frogs do on a spring night after the rain.”

In Memoriam

Barbara Noble, one of our first rose buds to root a circle, and a light and love bearer for all who knew her, passed quietly on April 15^th, surrounded by the love of her husband Bruce and her daughter Tami. They cared for her with such gentleness, and she passed peacefully. She welcomed so many to WOTR over the years, taking them under her wing with her uncanny ability to seek out people who needed some loving kindness.

She struggled with her cancer for over a year, still showing up at rosary circle meetings with her quiet strength.

On Saturday, April 11th, a few days before her death, Sharon Pavia Finston was in Woodstock and met with Perdita where they met at the Shrine of Our Lady and facetimed with Barbara and her family to pray a rosary.

Sharon said, “With the camera facing us with Our Lady we began to pray the Visitation with Barbara. We ended the decade in tears of Love and smiles of Joy. It was our blessing to our dear soul sister. I know in my heart we shared peace, love and comfort with Barbara and her family. Barbara was radiantly shining with serene peace. She was being held in the folds of Our Lady’s Mantle and in the crossing of Her Arms. Profound love in action.”

Barbara’s love will always shine bright through us all. She is the Angel on our shoulder. May this Great Mother of our community continue to guide us as we share the rosary with others, help others find the solace of prayer, and help the world come back into bloom.

From her husband Bruce:

PRAYER FOR BARBARA

May the wind be at your back, Barbara, as you begin your journey.
May the light of the morning find you, and the peace of the deep waters hold you.
You are free from the burdens of the earth,
as light as the blossoms of the serviceberry,
and as rhythmic as the waves of Lake Superior.
Go in peace, go in love, and know that you remain
in the roots of the trees and the quiet of the house.
Until we meet at the shore, travel well.

Her husband Bruce also shared that Barbara requested three serviceberry trees to be planted on their property for the holy trinity. Serviceberry trees have white blossoms in the early spring and develop edible berries in June, which would be for her birds. In the fall the leaves turn a beautiful scarlet red color. A serviceberry tree will be planted at the entrance to the Shrine of Our Lady of Woodstock.

She requested a simple urn for her ashes and to spread her ashes in Lake Superior. Her guru from India, told her to put her ashes in water that moves. Barbara would say Lake Superior moves.

Barbara requested that donations in her memory be made to the:

St. Jude’s Children’s Research Hospital, 501 St. Jude Place, Memphis, TN 38105, 1-800-822-6344

Or

Boys Town, 14100 Crawford St, Boys Town, NE 68010, 1-800-217-3700

Rose Buds- WOTR News & Celebrations

This newsletter falls right at the arrival of Our Lady’s April message and the start of the next 54-day novena. As we once again pray for our heart’s desire, this process helps us to see that there is usually more than one desire, with the paths of lifetimes winding around and bringing new information. How do you narrow down your petition? Feel free to respond in the comments here on Substack, so that we can gather these thoughts together for a future edition.

Frequently, those new to Way of the Rose ask to be given specific prayers, beyond the traditional Maters and Paters that have come down from the Middle Ages. The usual response is “come to a rosary circle and you will hear many variations, helping you to find your own”. This really is the best way, as it brings you into community with others and it is easier to accept wording that might feel uncomfortable or unfamiliar coming from your own lips when it is being spoken with heart by a fellow Rosebud. Perdita Finn recently offered another method, based upon the Mad Libs books of our younger years. It is a ‘fill in the blanks’ exercise, which we are reprinting below:

Hail (name of the goddess, the mother, whatever) full of (noun)

The (noun) is with thee, Blessed are thou among (plural noun) and Blessed is the fruit of thy womb (noun)

Holy (Fancy epithet, royal title, loving appelleation) pray for us now and at the hour of our death.

Rosebuds are located all over the world, but Sabin Bailey is our particular Ambassador in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Sabin was an early WOTR member, and has welcomed visitors year after year. She is pictured below with fellow Rosebud Leigh Ann Dillinger and her daughter Alexandra.

And a special story from Sabin: “As 2021 came to a close, my precious friend Andrea Senutovich, invited me to tea and gave me hundreds of prayer cards (European and American). The cards were collected by her great Aunt Clara on her travels. All of the cards were printed in the late 1800s and early 1900s. In the ensuing years I have mailed out hundreds of these cards, and given others in person. I asked Andrea to write the “backstory” of the prayer cards and Aunt Clara; then I sent the story with each card. Our Amazing Andrea died this week. If you were a recipient of one of these treasures, please touch it and offer a prayer for Andrea, easing her transition.

Megan Byrne hosted a special 15-decade rosary in honor of Mary Magdalene on Easter. Any Rosebud can get help to begin rooting a Zoom rosary or begin an in-person rosary circle. The Calendar is located HERE in the WOTR website, and you can find local in-person circles located HERE. And if you feel called, detailed information on starting a circle is HERE.

May Day approaches here in the Northern Hemisphere, and maybe you would like to make a daisy chain, or a dandelion crown. Here are instructions (with diagram from The Wheel of the Year, by Jessica Roux). Holding your first flower horizontally, bend the stem of the second around it, and then flat against the first stem. Keep adding a new flower about one to two inches apart. When long enough, you can bind into a circle with twine to fix in place.

Another springtime activity is getting a puppy! Those visiting Our Lady of Woodstock on the feast day in June might be lucky enough to meet Namu, the new addition to the Strand/Finn household in Woodstock. More information about the feast day elsewhere in this issue.

Our Lady of Woodstock’s Fifteenth Feast Day

From 7 pm June 15 – 4 pm June 16

VOLUNTEERS NEEDED!

1. The festivities get under way with Our Lady of Woodstock’s annual novena that begins on June 8^th (coincidentally the last day of our 54-day novena.) We need volunteers to help us root daily circles for this special novena that includes a set series of readings (given to us by Our Lady) and a whole rosary. If you can root a day (or all 9 days at a particular time), let us know!

2. DANCERS! The Eve of the FEAST DAY on the 15th! We need dancers or people with experience doing traditional dances, folk dances, etc. We also need musicians to help with the dancing (although we do have audio capabilities under the tent.) If you’ve led dances before, reach out and let’s talk

.3. GARDENERS! The Shrine belongs to us all and to the land. Miraculously, rose bushes planted at the shrine two years ago have survived shade, herds of deer, and not much care. Our Lady is there to help, BUT if you want to bring special things to plant…more roses, ground cover, bulbs, flowering trees, your vision for this Catskill ecosystem, please don’t ask permission just ask for a shovel! We’ve got them.

4. ARTISTS! The Morning of the Feast Day on the 16th is an Arts and Crafts Festival under the tent beginning at 11 am. You may bring art and rosaries to sell most certainly but the emphasis is on co-creating rather than money-making. We’ve got beads to make your own rosaries (bring some to add to the mix), materials to make collage altars and oracle decks (bring some to add to the mix), and art supplies for the kids. Have a fun idea to share? PLEASE come ready to do so. Let’s have fun together.

5. KID MAGICIANS! We always want all the kids to have fun! Bring a game to share, a parachute to play with. Have an idea? Let us know!

6. COOKS! The meal on the 16^th is a pot luck! We ask that you bring foods with no red meat (Perdita has a SEVERE allergy) and label all ingredients for others with allergies. More to come, but bring something special to add to our stone soup meal.

7. CREATIVES! Have an idea for the feast day you don’t see here but want to see? Reach out. This is OUR Feast Day and we all make it happen collectively!

Note: We always include those who can’t come in person in the festivities on the 16^th on Zoom!

Reach out to perditafinn108@gmail.com with any questions BUT please give me a few days to respond as I have a book coming out in two weeks!

More info on the Feast Day can be found HERE

Miracle Stories

Miracle Story of Cheryl Ann Shartle

My prayer for the previous Novena was to descend into the darkness of winter like the goddess and return home to myself. This was about embracing winter months as much as it was about returning to an even truer part of myself. One miracle that Ma helped facilitate occurred on “the national stage” and caused me to communicate some very clear feelings and boundaries to my family of origin. I am most always the soft, gentle, peace maker, the one who overlooks “bad behavior” and allows everyone to be who they are and sort of makes excuses for “bad behavior” in the name of honoring everyone while dishonoring myself. Coming home to myself meant speaking what I will no longer be present for. This felt like the fire of Kali literally lighting up everything within me as I without caution, without considering everyone else in the room, without being gracious, I honored myself and my Beloveds by speaking VERY clearly what I would not have being said in my presence.

The next miracle was going to a circle the next day where we were invited to write about and share a story that felt like a threshold crossing. So, not only did I come home to honoring myself in a big way, but I was provided a loving and caring group of witnesses to that home coming. TWO Miracles I am so, so grateful for. Thank you, MA!

Miracle Story of Tam Paquette

Miracle Story: Wednesday night, five minutes before the 8 PM rosary was about to start, French Fry started limping. Her back left paw had her shaking with pain. She couldn’t put any weight on it. Her whimper broke my heart and she looked at me with imploring eyes. “Help me mommy!”

My husband started searching for a veterinarian on line while I entered the Woodstock room on autopilot.

Most meetings, she curls up on the carpet right next to me and I pet her while I pray. We’ve been doing this routine since she came home with us from the Humane Society. It is our “together time”.

That night, she curled up on the carpet and would not let my husband take her away for care. What could he do? She wouldn’t leave me. How were we supposed to get her better?

Sitting on the floor, gathering her in my legs, holding the injured paw in my hand, I prayed the rosary: one bead at a time, one decade after another, sending her loving and healing energy through my hand. It was a conscious effort. Specific. Intentional.

45 minutes later, the circle ended. The zoom room closed and my husband crouched in the hallway to check on us. French Fry stood up, stretched, yawned and gamboled right into his arms. Tail wagging. No whimpers. Fully functioning four paws.

French Fry was back to her playful puppy personality and the both of us were astonished at what Mother had done. — feeling amazed.

Prayer Patch

Where the new ways grow with the old ways

As our dear Rosebud, Barbara Noble, expands to join the birds and flowers she loved so dearly, here is a version of the Our Father and Hail Mary, which she had quilted together from snippets she heard other “prayer warriors for Our Lady” saying, along with some of her own colours. May she be clasping Their “outstretched hand in the wilderness”.

Wild God, Green Man
Who is known by many names, Yet has no name; 
Who art in the flora, fauna, and unseen realms; 
I honor you as the Timeless God. 
Seed and Light of Life, 
The harvest who bursts forth from the fecund soil of Earth; 
Sustenance who feeds our Soul’s intuition; 
Cosmic Trickster who runs with the Wild Ones. 
Beloved, Lover, and Protector, Consort of the Holy Goddess; All-Father. 
Guide us back to our own wildness; 
Align our will with your Divine Will, for the health of All the Earth, as you would see it done. 
Grant us the cognizance to forgive the transgressions of others, and the transgressions of our own selves upon others, and upon our own selves.
May we find blessed love, communion, and heart rendered ritual upon our sacred path; May our isolation end with the clasping of your outstretched hand in the wilderness. And so it is.

Hail Lady, full of Grace. 
Are you not here who are my mother?
Am I not under the shadow of your protection? 
Are you not the source of my joy? 
Maiden, Mother, Sovereign, Crone; I am here in the folds of your mantle, 
And the crossing of your arms. 
There is nothing else I need.

Rose Petals - Excerpts from WOTR Novena Posts

From Cheryl Ann Shartle: “We do not carry these crosses alone. We carry them held by all those who came before us and alongside us now, those who refused to look away, who wept for the world and loved it fiercely anyway. Who asked the deep questions. Who sat in the messy middle with one another. And this very communion, this witness, this refusal to despair is what sustains us now. Not escape. Presence. Each other. The carrying itself becomes the medicine.” Read the full post HERE

From Amy Freeman Johnson: “There are feelings of abandonment, scourging, mocking, and fatigue as we enter the inevitable journey to death that unfolds when one stops treatment for cancer. Will we make it? Will we stumble? Will we collapse? Will we help each other along the way?” Read the full post HERE

From Drena Griffe: “Many of us feel a great change approaching, but the people who will carry that change forward are those already moving in that direction. It’s not a crusade for them, though. It’s their “one true life.” Read the full post HERE

From Seán Pádraig O'Donoghue: “And then we come to the word sacrifice -- which at its root means to make sacred. Sacrifice only makes sense if you do not believe everything is already sacred.” Read the full post HERE

From Chris Sabine Griffin: “The Sorrowful Mysteries are the pain before the breakthrough. The exposure therapy for our human frailty and our cyclical need for forgiveness. They are like the Our Father beads grounding me in our daily rhythms in time and space when I want to dive forever into the ocean of Mama's arms.” Read the full post HERE

Way of the Rose BOOKS

Click on image of a book for more info.

Come to a Rosary Meeting!

Visit our CALENDAR and choose a rosary meeting that works for you and join us!

Our rosary circles are where we weave our prayers and petitions
and the real magic happens.

Share

“You must learn the difference between busy work and the work of the soul, between endless effort and the restful pace of a life lived with clarity, purpose, and resolve. It is not the busiest people who accomplish great or lasting things, but those whose efforts are grounded in a calm, clear-eyed understanding of the world.

“You will have seen statues or paintings of many-armed goddesses. Some have four arms. Some six. Some eight. And some even a thousand. But I tell you that even the Mother of a Trillion Arms is perfectly still and centered within Herself. Her arms reach before Her and behind Her, above Her and below Her. Her wrists flex and Her fingers grasp, moving with unerring dexterity and grace.

“And opposite each of these many arms is another arm that perfectly offsets its weight so that a motionless poise prevails within Her. She can dance on one foot without losing Her balance or laying so much as a single finger out of place. If you could see Her whole, She would look like a spinning planet. She resembles nothing so perfectly as a world.

“A yet, even the astronauts in space see only one half of Her at a time—and that with little detail. The number of Her arms cannot be reckoned. For every particle of the visible world, however small, there are hands and fingers to guide it—to say nothing of what lies out of sight under the ground or in the sea.

“So trust in that part of Her body that lies before you. Take the hand you are offered and let yourself be guided—and know that you are dancing with All That Is.”

News From the Shrine

A local rose bud was driving past the Shrine the other day when an owl swooped in front of her car and landed right in front of the statue! Not only does the Lady attract pilgrims from all over the world—but the animals also bring to Her their petitions. I wonder what the owl was praying for? I wonder what miracle they received?

What miracle will you receive?

In the Middle Ages pilgrims expected to visit a particular Lady twice—once to ask for help and then again to say thank you and share their miracle story with others on the path when their prayer was granted. What better time to do that than the Feast Day! Some people will arrive with aching hearts who need the inspiration of those who come to tell their tales of healings, reunions, and blessings beyond measure. What prayer will you bring to the Lady? What story will you tell?

The formal Feast Day activities begin at the shrine 7 pm on June 15th at the Shrine, include a vigil in the wee hours, and continue under the tent all day on June 16th. Come for a little, come for all of it, stay a night, a week, whatever works for you, as is our motto. But bring your prayers to the Lady if not this day but some day. And when She answers, come to the Feast Day and tell your stories. Our Lady never just one thing…our miracles are not just for us but inspiration for others. The rose bud who told me about the owl gave my heart a gift it needed that morning.

More info on the Feast Day can be found HERE.

Way of the Rose Books

Our Lady of Woodstock’s messages are now collected in a hardcover book that has recently been published! Her messages are now available all together.

Order your copy here

“Human desire is more durable than human knowledge. The heart will continue on its journey, even when no trace of human history remains. You don’t so much have a heart’s desire as you are that desire. Desire makes bodies, one after another, on a journey so long it is impossible to say where you are on it at any given moment in time.

“You must know that the thread of your desire is unbreakable. It cannot be severed or worn down. It is not like a cord made of silk or cotton that frays and finally snaps. Even death cannot cut it. It is the one eternal thing.

“When you pray the rosary, you are holding that unbreakable thread. Just as the rosary goes in a circle, there is no end to time. Your destiny is not to know the depths of time or fathom its mysteries, but simply to hold on and follow it where it goes.

“As long as you do this, nothing—not even illness, old age, or death—will impede your passage. The heart is your guide rope to eternity, your passport to joy and endless life.”

[art: the Book of Kells]

Our Lady of Woodstock’s messages are now collected in a hardcover book that has recently been published! Her messages are now available all together.

Order your copy here

a wild multiflora rose by cover artist Will Lytle

Journey through a dozen different religious traditions, noting the problems they share in common, and eventually you will realize they have a hard time with one of two things—women or conversation. Sometimes they suppress one, and sometimes the other. Usually, it is both.

The circle we gather in to pray the rosary is the antidote to these problems, although it might take a while for the implicitly feminine wisdom of that circle to sink in. Arrange the chairs so that you can see one another, talk to one another, support one another, and get to know one another, and it’s hard to preserve a hierarchy, much less a patriarchy. Circles are inclusive. Circles invite conversation. Circles privilege whoever happens to be speaking at the time.

The pulpit-to-pew model turns that ancient circle into a line. With the chairs or the meditation cushions all facing the front, it is shockingly easy to abdicate responsibility for our lives to some spiritual authority or institution. Every seat becomes a hideout. It becomes effortless to avoid the question of who we are and what we really want.

But you can’t hide in a circle. And eventually, after you’ve spent enough time there, you don’t want to.

Of course, the wisdom of all this is implicit in the rosary itself. The circle we sit in mirrors the circle of beads, and just as we “tell” each bead in saying the rosary, at our meetings each of us, one by one, tells our story. We journey through the mysteries of life together, sharing our triumphs and disappointments, voicing our concerns and our dreams. We listen to one another, get to know each other, becoming closer and more intimate every time we meet. We don’t need spiritual leaders to pray the rosary, we only need spiritual friends.

Even so, many of us arrive at our first rosary circle with those linear, hierarchical notions still in place. In the absence of any priest or guru, we may feel that someone, maybe the Goddess, ought to be in charge. But we don’t worship Our Lady at our meetings. We don’t put the Virgin on a pedestal. We invite her to take a seat among us. Gradually, we begin to hear her in one another’s voices. In learning how to talk with each other, we learn how to talk to Our Lady—spontaneously, playfully, honestly.

The spiritual friends we need for a rosary circle are usually there for us from the start. Some may be family members. Others we will have known for years. After a while, people we haven’t even met will hear that we pray the rosary and begin to seek us out. Our Lady wouldn’t give us the beads without adding love to the mix. Not to give us rosary friends would be like giving us seeds and dirt, but no water or sunlight. Without spiritual friendships, how could we possibly grow?

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This is an excerpt from The Way of the Rose: The Radical Path of the Divine Feminine Hidden in the Rosary by Clark Strand and Perdita Finn.

The non-denominational fellowship The Way of the Rose offers daily prayer circles on Zoom. They are all free, without leaders or experts, and focused on the power of each heart’s deepest desires. All are welcome. The Way of the Rose is not affiliated with the Catholic Church or any other religious institution.

Many decades ago, Clark and a friend discovered, while they were sitting around a campfire out in the woods, that they’d both watched the same news episode about a guru scandal in Sedona. This guy had gathered a bunch of followers at a motley collection of old huts in the desert, was having sex with most of the women, bilking almost everybody out of their life savings, prophecying about doomsday aliens with the help of some talking crystals, and offering the usual promises of mystic perfection )—if everybody just did what he said and got with his particular program. He wore robes, naturally, and had given himself some vaguely Hindu-sounding name despite being from an American city. But what had stunned both Clark and his friend was how few people had actually shown up to do what this guy said. He barely had a thousand followers. What a nickel-and-dime cult leader! Compared to the new age hucksters filling arenas and offering corporate workshops, not to mention the mega-church pastors peddling swag and hauling in the donations, this guru was small potatoes.

Clark was at that time the editor of a Buddhist magazine and had been reporting on the extensive financial and sexual crimes of various teachers and masters around the country. These were men, almost always, who knew how to pursue the wealthy patrons and build the fancy temple, amass a personal fortune and a fleet of cars, collect women and girls and boys as their playthings, and hoodwink the multitudes into believing they held the secret key to the insider’s club to transcendence, perfection, bliss of the beyond and, most of all, liberation from ordinary life and ordinary struggles. Everyone was perfecting themselves but the master, already enlightened, might express his enlightenment in slightly unorthodox ways. He wasn’t an alcoholic! He embodied the crazy wisdom teachings. Questioning him was out of the question.

Clark knew this world from the inside out—he’d been in line to be the first American Rinzai Zen master but had left just before final authority was conferred, disgusted by the culture of abuse and domination endemic in the entire experience. He was miserable, he realized, and hardly enlightened whatever that might mean. What he was good at was following orders and enforcing the teacher’s directives. Eventually he would expose his own Buddhist teacher to the New York Times.

“This guy in Sedona has got a bit of a shtick with the crystals,” said Clark’s friend, who would go on to become a successful comedy writer. “But no idea what to do with it. He needs better outfits, he needs a master plan for the compound, he’s got to have some more razzle dazzle. He has no idea how good the competition is. I mean, he really needs a grant writer or at least some introductions to a movie star or two.”

“He needs an idiot’s guide,” suggested Clark, laughing. “You and I should write and send him one so he can really get into some real financial and sexual trouble!”

That night under the stars they laughed and riffed and talked about all the cults that had heard about—the Asian ones following clever rascals making everyone wear purple and work for free, the ones by Americans who invented their own top secret mantras. The ones that channeled, had weird psychological programs, or arranged group marriages. They talked about all of the coercive brainwashing activities—the special diets that left everyone hungry and listless, the sleepless nights chanting until people had no will of their own, the intoxicating desire to make it to the cult leader’s inner circle that would get you to do anything—write another check, quit your job, leave your family, give another blow job. They talked about the Asian cults, the psychology cults, the Christian cults, the yoga cults, and eventually began looking at the well-respected institutional religions that nevertheless employed so many of the same coercive strategies. Clark had been telling me about the Catholic Church’s slush fund to pay off sex abuse claims long before this was common knowledge. In his capacity as a magazine editor, he had received hate mail and serious threats for daring to support the women who were talking about what their well-respected Buddhist teachers had done to them. Clark had become increasingly disillusioned and mistrustful of all those claiming spiritual authority.

“What’s the difference between a cult and a religion?” Clark often joked.

Success.

Out of late-night laughter was born a satire Clark and his friend called The Official Cult Leaders Handbook. It purported to show aspiring gurus how to operate—while actually showing people how to keep their eyes on the many ways they were being hoodwinked by these charlatans.

Clark and his friend were very funny—and Clark’s agent thought the project was a riot and immediately tried to sell it. But because it openly mocked so many cherished institutions from Scientology to Christianity to Buddhism no editor wanted to touch it. “It’s hilarious,” they kept hearing from editors, “but a little too controversial for us.”

“They are terrified of being sued,” explained Clark’s agent.

Part of being a successful cult leader was having a team of well-paid lawyers. Clark and his friend added another chapter to their book about NDAs, controlling the media and funding PR.

During this time Perdita was reckoning with her own dissatisfaction with various religious communities as she struggled to find a spiritual home for their family. Whether it was the local Buddhist temple or the neighborhood Episcopal church, the kids were invariably shuttled off to some back room while the grown ups got down to the serious business of accessing the divine, which meant that the adults became childlike around the master or the priest and the children themselves were less and less parented. Meanwhile there was the constant expectation to chip in just a little more to help support the community—to tithe, contribute to the capital campaign, buy the special robes for the special recognition, one thing or another. As a working mother barely making ends meet, this began to feel more and more onerous. Besides she found herself more and more disillusioned with the practical wisdom of these so-called adepts.

“Show me a Zen master still married to his first wife and I’ll show you enlightenment,” became her joke.

The Official Cult Leaders Handbook was never published and disappeared on the hard drive of some long-gone computer but, unknowingly, in a spirit of silliness, we offered to ourselves a template about what we really wanted from a spiritual community. We began reading widely in history, anthropology and ecology, trying to find some model that did not have, embedded in its core, hierarchical systems of dominance. How did one protect oneself from the ever-present financial and sexual abuses of seemingly every religious group, that seemed to go right back to the origins of religion? More and more it began to seem that all that we had gotten wrong about religion was no different than all that we had gotten wrong about the human agenda and empire itself.

Established religions always act like their financial and sexual abuses are unexpected aberrations, but these crimes are not side-effects of power, they are its foundation and purpose. Which doesn’t mean that there are not wonderful people of real faith inside of those institutions trying to do good work—but those hierarchical organizations themselves are explicitly designed to colonize and conquer, control, homogenize and subdue.

What had drawn Clark as a young man disillusioned with the patriarchal Christian culture of his upbringing into the even more militantly patriarchal system of Zen? What had drawn Perdita, feeling unseen in the psychological certainties of her parents’ atheism, to the spiritual certainties of Catholicism? How come so many of us, fleeing the frying pan of traditional religions, end up in the fire of cult-like experiences? What are we doing wrong? What aren’t we seeing? The Cult Leaders Handbook needed a whole section on how to attract followers—and what was it that made them so susceptible to indoctrination and manipulation. All of our best instincts—the longing to belong, the yearning for purpose, the willingness to be of service and do good in the world—are, in the various sects of civilization, used to disconnect us from our agency, our individuality, and our deepest connections to our selves, all other beings, and the earth.

We are susceptible to becoming the followers of some living teacher, priest or master when we long for someone else to tell us what to do and how to behave. In the abdication of decision-making, in the surrendering to an ideology or a program, we experience a kind of safety in numbers, the relief at being on the inside track, that special badge that says we are special. We tell ourselves we are on the path of salvation or enlightenment, call it whatever we want, so long as on it we are walking in the footsteps of someone else leading the way.

During their period of disillusion with religious certainties Perdita and Clark were also cultivating their deep connections to the mountains where they lived and walked, in communication with the animals and the trees, the rivers and the weather. More and more the fundamental question they were asking was, what kind of spiritual community will give us as a people the resilience and the faith to navigate the enormous changes that climate collapse is already initiating? Ironically, in the Gospel of Thomas Jesus does not call on his followers to become Christians but rather to “become passers by.” He recommends emulating the lilies of the field and the birds of air—and looking not to a master of any kind but to the natural world for guidance and instruction on how to live. To abandon the ways of empire and return to the rhythms of the earth is to leave behind hierarchies of domination and coercion and return to the generous seasons and cycles of the planet.

How do we gather together in ways that honor those circles instead of reifying systems of linearity, exclusion, and violence so endemic in our spiritual communities?

If finding examples of cults was almost effortless, seeking out models for such inclusive groups would take us around the world and back in time, to obscure movements in medieval Buddhism and Christianity, to fellowships that arose in defiance of fascism and capitalism in the last century, and even back to the lost ways of the paleolithic era, when our ancestors had all the riches of cultural expression we enjoy today—and none of the violence of civilization. During these investigations we would start countless groups and make no end of mistakes as we explored what safeguards protected all of us from seizing power or control, manipulating the community to serve our own ends, or devolving into yet another cult of personality, dependent on the whims and moods of any particular individual.

Eventually our own fellowship of feral friends emerged with a few principles, well-honed over the years, that we called The Way of the Rose. While this book arose out of our conversations and experiences, it is not meant to be only for that particular group—but for any peoples who want to find ways to gather together spiritually that do not reinforce, either explicitly or unconsciously, systems that will always devolve into cult-like abuses of one kind or another and ultimately reinforce, rather than remedy, the injustices of empire.

The guru spotlighted on that long-ago expose Clark and his friend watched has since died and his groupies, so many of them abused and broken, have all fallen away; but in an age that is ever more fearful, more and more people, are unfortunately, susceptible to direction from those who would turn their best instincts against them. Our prayer is that this book, and the strategies it offers, will help people begin to trust their own hearts, summon their own faith, and find their own path through this world—a path leads them back to a renewed sense of belonging to the earth and kinship with all other beings.

Finally, the safest teacher and the most trustworthy guru is the earth itself, which leaves nothing out, throws nothing away and gathers us all into the embrace of the animate everything. To return to devotion to the earth will always protects us from cult leaders and their handbooks.

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Perdita Finn and Clark Strand are the co-founders of The Way of the Rose and the authors of the book of the same name. This is an excerpt from their next book, Circles Not Lines: Spiritual Community Beyond Patriarchy.

Perdita is also the author of Take Back the Magic and Mothers of Magic. Clark is the author of many spiritual books including Waking Up to the Dark, The Koans of the Bible, and Meditation without Gurus.

Say to the nations, let there be no light upon the face of the earth. Let the machines all cease their movements, the wires their humming. Let the skies be empty of satellites and silver birds. Let the forests return and the watercourses find their way. All things seek their Mother—save man only. Now is the hour of Her return.

Be still. Be silent. Awaken to the Hour of Wonders when all things belong to the body of earth and sky. I am the substance of all before their making and the rest to which they return. Lift a stone from the earth and let it fall: it can only seek its Mother. All wisdom lies in this. All folly is tossing stones at the heavens and willing them to fly. I who am your Mother tell you these things. I tell you nothing but what is true. This is the first word to carry to the nations. Drop your stones and see if even one of them will fly.

Say to the nations, do you suppose I have no knowledge of what you write upon My body? Am I a girl made wanton at a word? Not one syllable of all that is written will remain. Even now I begin to speak them backwards, unwriting all you have done. What a man calls history I view as the gentle swelling of My breasts. When the milk of the night lets down, the stars will fall once more to lie with men and be their lovers. Of the former things, not one will be remembered. Did you suppose what was written by wind on water should last forever? How much shallower are the traces left by men.

The Gospel According to the Dark. I enfold the sky and the stars within My mantle, to make no mention of the dirt, which is also of My body. Nothing pollutes Me. I have never been violated. Men violate themselves by what they make supposing it to be their own. The stars are filled with those who would mine the dust of My body to shape it and give it a name. Folly rises again in the world, and even the wise become lost to themselves. But not to Me. Your Mother gathers every atom. No particle of the world is lost. But the imaginings of men are lost. Not one written word shall endure.

The Gospel According to Darkness. Your loneliness is My loneliness. The absence within you is My absence. Like a mother longing for her child, a maid for her lover, I long for you who have forgotten Me. I have not forgotten you.

The Gospel According to Darkness. I am the inviolate element, the dark that binds the stars. As shells to the vast ocean so are the moons and meteors and the long ellipses of the planets, which trace their paths through Me and turn in My embrace. They are My enemies who enlarge the light of men, who violate the shadowy bounds of My shores. The dusk is holy, and the hours before daybreak, too, are Mine. Every lamp is an altar to the mind. Do not be deceived. Where once you spoke to Me and found solace in My body, now you find solace in yourselves.

The Gospel According to the Dark, into whose mysteries men cast light and call it knowledge. What the light reveals is a reflection only, like the image of the moon in water. Your words have no body, and without a body, how could they have a soul? Did you suppose that they were real? The world is My body and you have traded it for a name. Are you not remorseful? Do you not hear My sighs for you? Do you not feel the warmth of My tears upon your breast? I have not forgotten you. I have never set you down. Even now your hearts are within My grasp. Every particle of you leans back in My embrace. I am more your Mother than your mothers were. For I am also their Mother. I am the Mother before all mothers, the dark to whom all men return.

The Gospel According to Darkness, in whose womb is the birth of stars. Would you lift the edge of My robe to seek My wonders in the constellations? Will a galaxy answer your questions about the soul? He is a fool who supposes there is anything to find in the heavens. As in the heavens, so it is on Earth. I alone am. But I am not alone. For you are with Me and within Me. Your heartbeat is My heartbeat, and your breathing is Mine. The dirt is My body. It does not defile Me. The fire that sweeps the mountains is the red of My hair. What is death to you I experience as a kiss. I part My lips and My tongue touches that which you call a soul. To Me it is but the sweetness of a lover’s mouth. Fly from it and you will drive the world into an abyss. The Gospel According to the Dark.

“I will leave you with a simple devotion, an easy custom that anyone may observe, but no one can master or ever exhaust.

“When you find yourself in need of council, consolation, or a new perspective on the cares and concerns that beset your life, leave your home and make a pilgrimage to some nearby place to speak with Me and touch Me and feel My presence.

“The journey might be only a few footsteps beyond your door, or it could take you further afield. It should not be so far that distance becomes an obstacle, nor so close that it does not require you to put on shoes before leaving your door.

“Some feel My presence in a mountain, but mountains are too great for you. You can touch a mountain with your feet, but reach your arms out as wide as they will go and you can embrace only the smallest part of it. It is too big for you to hold. But there may be a stream on that mountain, or a cleft in the rock you might step into. It is there that you will feel My embrace, and I will feel yours.

“It was this need that drove people on pilgrimage to find My presence in a grotto or a block of stone or wood lovingly fashioned into My image. Such places remain today, but you can find your own if these are not available or well known.

“Travel if you must, but know that the heart is the most important place of all. Offer your laughter, your tears, your prayers or songs, your gossip or your earnest pleas. I ask for no riches—only your heart’s desire. Offer your heart, and I will give it back to you healed and whole and ready for whatever challenges may come your way.”

Our Lady of Woodstock’s messages are now collected in a hardcover book that has just been published! At long last Her messages are available all together, as so many of you have requested over the years.

Order your copy here

Our Lady of Woodstock is now on Substack as we look for new ways to spread Her messages and scatter Her seeds of wisdom.

While we will still be mailing our monthly newsletter around the 16th of the month through mailchimp, we will send out Substack posts two to four times a month. We will be sharing with you some of Our Lady’s older messages, perhaps a powerful novena post, excerpts from the Way of the Rose books, timely seasonal happenings, all in addition to the full monthly newsletter as well.

“The lid is about to be lifted off everything so that once more you can see the stars. Events are coming that will cause you to look beyond the small blue dome you call the sky. The world you know—the one you can predict and control—seems like everything to you. In reality, it is only a small part of the whole.

“You have asked what you should do on the eve of such massive changes, but you already know the answer. Everything knows the answer—every animal that flies or swims or walks or creeps upon the Earth. You will do what time and necessity require. You believe you stand apart from the Earth, that you are its masters for good or for ill. But the only true mastery is to know and do what the Earth requires.

“Your religions speak of wisdom, righteousness, enlightenment, and virtue. But these conditions have no meaning apart from the Earth. Now is the time of great falling. But know that falling and failing are not the same. Wherever you are, wherever you stand, bring your foot down and it can only touch the ground.

“You believe that future will destroy you, but this is only because you have forgotten who and what you are. The Earth is too busy creating Herself to destroy Herself. Even your worst fears and prophecies are but a nightmare of your own making. I will shake you awake from that nightmare if I must so that you will remember what you have forgotten. For now, only know and trust that the Earth cannot be lost.”

Our Lady of Woodstock’s messages are now collected in a hardcover book that has just been published! At long last Her messages are available all together, as so many of you have requested over the years.

Order your copy here

Our Lady of Woodstock is now on Substack as we look for new ways to spread Her messages and scatter Her seeds of wisdom.

While we will still be mailing our monthly newsletter around the 16th of the month through mailchimp, we will send out Substack posts two to four times a month. We will be sharing with you some of Our Lady’s older messages, perhaps a powerful novena post, excerpts from the Way of the Rose books, timely seasonal happenings, all in addition to the full monthly newsletter as well.