Living with the Stars

  Thanks to a little book I got from a book fair, I came across a list of historical events which happened on Christmas Day. It has long been accepted that the day itself is probably not the date of Jesus Christ’s birth. The New Testament states that shepherds watched their flocks by night, something which would not have occurred on long winter nights, but rather on late spring nights, according to astrologer Christine Arens, who examined the possibility that the bright star in the East, mentioned in the New Testament and, according to Arens and others, was a Jupiter-Saturn conjunction (occupying the same ‘portion’ of sky). Point of note: Christmas was first celebrated on the 25 th December in the year 336AD. Celebrating the birth of a messianic king did leave its impact, however. Both Charlemagne and William the Conqueror were crowned kings on Christmas Day. The story of Charlemagne is one of a devout Christian and successful conqueror who was crowned by Pope Leo III in Rome, on

  Merry Solstice, readers!  At 16:59 hrs today, the 21st of December, the Sun moved into the zodiac sign of Capricorn, marking the end of its journey south and the return of light to the northern hemisphere. In three days, the light will begin to increase.  The return of light may not be that significant for us people living on an island in the Mediterranean, but further up north, where the nights are never ending, Yuletide was a huge event, where logs were burnt and people sat around fires and told stories. More south, our megalithic temples are now understood to be calendars in stone to mark the seasons, so tracking the movement of the Sun is understood to have been important, whether it was done for spiritual or agricultural purposes.  Astrologically, the chart cast for the Capricorn Ingress tells us a little bit about what's to come over the next few months. The Sun (circle with a dot) was below the horizon at zero degrees Capricorn. Most notable is a square aspect (ninety degr

  Full Moon in Gemini   Hello everyone! Apologies for uploading this a few hours later than I intended to. Nevertheless, I hope you enjoy this bit of writing about this morning's Full Moon. The Full Moon on the 18 th of December falls in Gemini, the sign of the Twins. This event occurred at 05:35 this morning   with the moon setting in the west. Full Moons in Gemini usually highlight issues to do with communication and movement and pertain to all those things which concern how we move about and commune in daily life. As Mercury rules this full moon (Mercury rules the sign of Gemini), we should look to its position in the chart and whether it makes any aspects to another planet or point (such as the Midheaven). In the chart, Mercury is at 8 ° of Capricorn and trines (120 ° to another planet/point) Uranus, which is currently at 11 ° of Taurus, so watch out for inspirational, brilliant, out-of-the-box ideas. Mercury is also out-of-bounds (a term which means its declination

    Sometimes I feel that the universe sends me down a rabbit hole to piece together bits of a jigsaw. In a previous blog entry, I made mention of how astrologers try to see patterns. When two planets come together in the sky, the question usually asked is ‘what happened the last time these two planets came together?’. That was the question I asked when writing up the blog entry for the 12 th December 2021. By no means am I extraordinarily knowledgeable when it comes to these affairs. There are some formidable astrologers out there and I love to read their findings. Here’s one for you and I think you will enjoy this. Venus and Pluto are together in the sky this month. I pondered this event’s meaning, and thought, did anything of interest happen in Malta the last time these two planets came together at this degree of Capricorn. Pluto is currently at 25 ° of Capricorn (astrologically) and because I was aware that the US national chart of 1776 has Pluto close to that degree (in fa

I mentioned in my last post that I’ve been following the movement of Venus in the sky. She’s been quite prominent in the night sky this month, being even brighter than Jupiter, because of her proximity to Earth. I’ve also become interested in this planet because in doing some research on the Maltese national chart (the astrological chart for the moment when Malta became independent – 21/09/1964 at 00:00hrs CET+1), I found that the position of Venus at 13°Leo is repeated or reflected in quite a few of Malta’s prime ministers. I’ve also mentioned before that yes, countries can have birth charts. This leads to another question – how can you tell when a country is ‘born’? To be truthful, it really depends on whether the astrologer finds a chart ‘works’. Take the chart of the United Kingdom; some astrologers find the 1066 chart (when William of Normandy was crowned king of England on Christmas Day at midday), whereas others use the Act of Union Chart (Jan 1 st , 1801) as it works well f

    There’s so much to say I honestly don’t know where to start. Firstly, you are probably aware of the two twinkling things in the sky (that’s Jupiter and Saturn). [i] Directly beneath, is the planet Venus (see photo: taken from Venus has been one to watch over the past few months. She seemed to be getting brighter and on the 3 rd December will reach maximum brilliance. [ii] This is something that the ancients would have noticed, especially around an eclipse, so let’s turn this into a story. The Sun, who represents the king in the sky narrative, is travelling through the sign of the centaur. (The story of Chiron is quite interesting, as it speaks of a half man, half horse who sacrificed himself to release Prometheus from his chains.) Sagittarius follows the sign of Scorpio, a sign associated with death and transmutation, so in this sign, perspectives are broadened and you are challenged to widen your horizons. This sign is ruled by Jupiter and in this sign has associations