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Libra Full Moon April 5, 2004 Sun at 16.00 Aries Sabian Symbol: Two prim spinsters are sitting together in silence. Moon at 16.00 Libra Sabian Symbol: Retired sea-captain in uniform watches ships sail away. 12:03 BST 5:03 MDT 7:03 EDT 4:03 PDT 6:03 CDT 21:03 AEST

Rituals lift us from mundane concerns and connect us to the greater flow of things.  Our MoonCircles CyberRitual is a monthly experiment in collective attunement -- to each other and the moon.  Across time zones, we collect our creative energies into a healing meditation, as a gift to ourselves and the world. Feel free to harmonize at a time of your own convenience, so that our astral voices may continue throughout the moon's waxing and waning cycles, as in a round.

Libra Full Moon Reflections:

The Season of Love and Strife
by Jean Hinson Lall

t the Aries New Moon we began a fresh astrological year, turning toward the future rather than the past. Anticipation rather than memory is the keynote of the season. Aries moves through life the way plants grow and volcanoes erupt, fueled and guided by the forces of nature. Its sense of "I am" is not reflective and thoughtful but instinctive and primary. It expresses its truth in action: exploration, adventure, competition, creation, invention, combat. It opens new frontiers and is fearless on the front lines of any campaign. Its strength lies precisely in not caring what has gone before, what anyone else thinks, what is regarded by society as possible or appropriate, or what barriers stand in the way. It trusts in its own vision of the future and acts with courage to bring that vision to realization.

The Full Moon in Libra brings a complementary reflection to Aries’ self-awareness, showing that heroic individual actions ultimately depend for their meaning on a social context. Great works of art and great journeys of exploration need their audience; athletic feats must be judged relative to a history of achievement and a field of contenders. Innovations in science or technology require cooperation with others to find their practical applications and markets. Courage in battle or in nonviolent struggle means little unless undertaken in the name of justice and for the sake of one’s country and one’s friends. And the great campaigner or adventurer finds completion in returning home to tell his story to a waiting, responsive partner.

While Aries is ruled by Mars, the god of war who marks off and defends his territory, Libra’s queen is Venus, who refines and relates all things in a meaningful and beautiful cosmos. In Greek myth these two deities were lovers, showing their intimate bond as complementary principles. In the philosophical theory of Empedocles, as we saw at the Virgo Full Moon, Love and Strife were even given the status of cosmogonic forces, separating and uniting the four Elements to produce all things. This can be a helpful insight to hang onto in the midst of a struggle with a partner who seems to be selfish, distant, willful, clingy, unfair, possessive or divisive. All relationships involve a continuing alchemical process of separation and reunion on many different levels. Whenever we have become too closely bound up with each other, something will demand to break out. Aries will force distance and create an awareness of difference. Then Libra will set to work to create a new level of relatedness that takes the differences into account.

Both Aries and Libra are cardinal signs with definite agendas and the union of Mars and Venus, though passionate, is seldom smooth. If we look closely, however, we can often see evidence of their underground intimacy. Libra can be surprisingly aggressive in advancing and enforcing her social rules and relationship plans. When her sense of justice or propriety is offended, she may go on the warpath. And the realm of the war god is pervaded by Venusian influences, including the intense, sacrificial love of soldiers for their fellows and the stunning beauty of military rituals and uniforms.

The intimacy of Mars and Venus can be seen at the biological level in the development of young animals. Their instinctive aggressive play -- biting, chasing, wrestling and mounting each other -- both prepares them to fight to protect themselves and their young and also makes them ready for courtship and mating. The same behavioral patterns, given in their genetic makeup and developed through early social interaction, serve both bonding and aggression.

Aries and Libra also represent war and diplomacy, the two means by which we can hope to advance our aims and protect our interests in the world. Where diplomacy fails, war becomes inevitable. Where war is undertaken unwisely, for unjust reasons or with insufficient planning, concluding the peace becomes more difficult. This Full Moon thus provides an appropriate time for hearings, public discussions and private reflections concerning the preparation and rationale for the invasion of Iraq, the conduct of the war, the proper ways to prevent and oppose terrorism, and the prospects for peace and stability in the region.

The rulers of Aries and Libra, Mars and Venus, are both in Gemini and will be traveling along side by side for some weeks to come, several degrees apart. Normally Venus, being the faster-moving planet, would catch up to Mars, permitting a conjugal encounter between the two, but Venus is slowing down and preparing to turn retrograde in mid-May, so the marriage will be delayed until December, when they will meet in Mars’s other sign, Scorpio. Resolution of these questions of war and peace lies many months or years in the future, but we can use this Gemini transit to clarify our thinking and to see to it that adequate information is made available to citizens and legislators. The ruler of Gemini, Mercury, will turn retrograde the day after the Full Moon and move from the early degrees of Taurus back into Aries, emphasizing the opportunity for review of past actions related to war.

Look for the Taurus New Moon and solar eclipse
on April 19, 2004.