Lynn Hayes: September 2009 Archives

The earthquake yesterday in Samoa was a severe one, with a magnitude of nearly 8 on the Richter scale, resulting in a tsunami in the Samoan islands that have killed hundreds of people.

This event occurred as the Moon joined Jupiter, Chiron and Neptune, but even more significant is the square of Ceres, the planet of nurturing and our relationship with the Earth, to Neptune in what is now a stellium in Aquarius. 

Neptune of course represents the vast oceans, and the square of Ceres to Neptune is reminiscent of the devastation that Ceres caused to her devoted followers when her daughter Persephone was taken by Pluto into the underworld.  Sad and desperate, Ceres caused the crops to wither and die, and the people experienced a disastrous famine.

Ceres is rising in the chart of the earthquake event, which occurred at 6:48 am just south of Apia in the Samoan islands.  As the planet rising in the chart it is extremely powerful and suggests that our balance with the Earth is somehow implicated in the event.

Certainly earthquakes and tsunamis have occurred for millions of years and we can't really say that our lack of care for the Earth has caused this current event.  But we live in a manner that does not respect the simultaneous power and fragility of our connection to the planet.  Humans continue to build settlements and cities in areas which are known to be risky locations for earthquakes and floods, assuming that the power of humanity is greater than the power of the planet.  Every now and then we have to realize that this is just not the case.

Now this is interesting and mirrors what I suspected was the case.  The Kaiser Family Foundation has published new poll numbers with answers to two questions:

Even people who don't believe in astrology believe in Mercury retrograde.  I usually start hearing it around the office co-op where I spend my days about a week into the retrograde period.  "Is Mercury retrograde?" people start asking me.  Email can get glitchy, computer and other equipment starts to fail, contracts take forever to negotiate.

Well folks, Mercury turned direct this morning so it's moving in the right direction again, but it will be in the news for a little while longer.  Mercury is still within a degree or so of an opposition to Uranus, and the thoughts and ideas are coming faster than we can moderate them.  This can lead to errors and miscommunication, especially since one Mercury is past Uranus it bumps right into Saturn on October 7.  

Mercury is in Virgo right now, one of the signs it rules, so it is happy coming up with great ideas and perfecting them.  But Mercury is less happy with the kind of intense flood of data that pours forth from the opposition to Uranus.

This is a great time for writing and planning a lecture or conference, but the implementation will be easier after the 7th. 

Honduras is not a country that has been much in the news, but in June of this year president Manuel Zelaya, who had attempted to rewrite the constitution of that country to permit a president to serve two terms, was ousted by a military coup ordered by the Honduran Supreme Court.  Zelaya re-entered the country illegally last week and demanded reinstatement and the fall of the replacement government.  The government reacted by suspending civil liberties and instituting martial law in many places in the country just as Saturn opposed Uranus exactly.

My bible for national charts is Moon Moore's Book of World Horoscopes, but written back in the 1960s it lacks the benefit of knowledge of more recent history.   Moon used the date that Honduras seceded from the Central American Federation as the date for the national chart of Honduras, but the military ruled the country for many years until 1979 when the country returned to civilian rule (source: WIkipedia).  A new constitution was approved in 1982. Still, the new constitution did not particularly change or alter the country in any way so I am going to go with Moon's original date of November 5, 1838. 

That chart reflects very well the nature of the Honduran government, which like many Latin American countries has bounced back and forth between civilian and military rule   The Sun in this chart is in Scorpio, the planet of power and drama.  Scorpio is not very concerned with democracy or the will of the people - there is an intense desire and passion with Scorpio that holds on to power with an iron grip.  The Sun conjoins Mercury, planet of communication and movement, signifying that despite the fixed nature of the Scorpio Sun, the national identity (Sun) is changeable or Mercurial  (Mercury).  The national identity is further stressed by a square from Neptune, planet of illusion and confusion, making it difficult for this country to settle on a role that suits it for any length of time.

The Mercurial nature of the country is reflected in the unaspected Gemini Moon, since Gemini is ruled by Mercury.  The Moon in a national chart describes the common people and the public mood, and in Honduras they are not afraid to make changes where changes are needed.  

Mars (aggression)  in the chart is opposed by Uranus (revolution), so we would be surprised not to see a continual erosion of the power structures (Scorpio Sun) by rebellion and radical changes.  However, Saturn (restriction and oppression) forms a square to both planets, reflecting the power (Scorpio Sun) of the military (Mars) to squash any such rebellion (Uranus).

Over the past few months transits to the Moon in the Honduras chart revealed that change was coming (Uranus square to the Moon) but that this change, though potentially uncomfortable, would ultimately facilitate healing for the nation  (Jupiter, Chiron and Neptune trine Moon).  But now that Jupiter, Chiron and Neptune have moved away there is just the square of Uranus and Saturn to the Moon, and martial law has been declared to quelch (Saturn) the rebellion (Uranus) that has resulted from the militarized society.  

Transiting Pluto is in a tight square to the nodes of the Moon in the chart - the evolutionary path of the country, an indicator that the current events will have an ultimately transformative (Pluto) effect that will have the power to create lasting change. 

This ties in nicely with the ongoing conjunction of Chiron and Neptune, since Neptune addresses the question of martyrdom and expiation of our sins through a third party, and Chiron facilitates the healing process by forcing us to face up to our own stuff and atone for it in a deep way that encourages transformation.

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