We are so thrilled to be celebrating 1 year of having a Goddess Temple premises in Stroud town centre!
We now have team of fabulous Temple Melissa volunteers holding the space for public drop-ins 6 days each week, for visitors of all ages, beliefs and backgrounds to be welcomed into the sacred feminine heart-space. Visitors are welcome during the drop in hours 10am-1pm Monday to Saturday, with Wednesdays open 11am-2pm. Drop in Opening is for anyone to take time out to rest or pray in the temple, have a cup of tea or read a book, light a candle, write a prayer or ask for a blessing.
It has been a very full year, with open days for each seasonal festival, sharing circles and workshops, ceremonies, Priestxess training and fundraising. We have managed to cover the costs of keeping the temple open and invest in better security and a broadband connection for the space, as well as a card reader for the maker's corner gift shop. We are still open to new stock of arts, crafts and other items made by people in our community with a goddess, pagan or wellbeing theme.
The community library has been well used with many precious books and oracle decks going out into the homes of our visitors to be enjoyed. We have dressed the temple in the colours of each season, opened pop-up temples at festivals and held the first ever Gloucestershire Goddess Camp event in the Forest of Dean. We made banners to celebrate the wheel of Cotswold Goddesses, and held a banner parade which was covered by the BBC!
We collaborated with Stroud Sisterhood and raised £129 at the temple for Stroud Women's Refuge during International Women's Week celebrations. We also had a presence at the Red Hearth gathering with several workshops and collaborations among goddess loving women of Stroud.
We are continuing to thrive in the space at 50 London Road, where our what3words address is ooze.honey.covenants ! The garden has been lovingly tended, with planters changing through the year to showcase seasonal blooms and herbs, and we gratefully received many donations of furniture, fabric, rugs, fridges, cushions, artwork, statues, food, hot chocolate and teabags have been put to good use by our goddess loving community at the temple during opening times and events. The red fabrics donated from the 5 Valleys Red Tent are currently in use for Menarche ceremonies at the Red Hearth.
We developed a booking app for room hire, and continued to offer regular drop ins for visitors as well as talks, workshops and educational courses. Some of the past, continuing and upcoming events at the temple include:
Monthly Sunday Meditation Group with Sam Tinkabel Hawkins
New Moon Women's Circle with Linda Rogers
Connect to Cuda and the Cucculati with Kate Dineen
Magical Wand Making with Helen Hart
Sacred Land Walking with Colleen Heller and Louise Phelps
Cacao Ceremonies with Ju Avila
Cotswold Celtic Spiral with Fleur Camille
Sacred Chanting with JJ Howell
Kemetic Magic School with Clare Annaly
Crystal Healing Introduction with Crystal Catalyst
Priestxess of the Cotswolds Spiral 1 Stone Stream and Sky Year long collaboratively taught training with Sarah Dixon, Kate Dineen, Billie Rose, Anna Saqqara, Dawn Oakley-Smith, Fleur Camille, Phyllis Baker, Yvette Staelens, Bliss Magdalena and Nicola Haasz
Temple Arts Practitioner Training, Reiki Attunements, Hot Stone Massage, Pelvic Herbal Steam workshops with Bliss Magdalena
Here are some quotes from volunteers and visitors to the temple:
"Thank you so much for creating this beautiful space. I felt so happy when I heard of it. Bringing more energy into Stroud from the Feminine. "
"Making a connection with the Goddess Temple space. The spirit of this place is Tangible. Already it begins to absorb and radiate peace and happiness. Blessings and Light, Chris."
"Thank you for creating the space together. So grateful to be a part of this. Blessings, Love and Light, Marisa xxxx"
"I'm so blessed to hold space as a Melissa at the temple, to see faces light up at the sight of our beautiful changing of the seasons altar and glorious Cuda, to show people around and share tales and truths of our ancestors, to see feminine and masculine alike in full embrace, and honour our sacred history. To just be here, is peace joy love rolled into one.
And a cuppa .. ♡♡♡Ananda"
"Thankyou for kind welcome and gentle spirits, M"
"A wonderful space filled with a wonderful community. Elle"
"Thankyou thankyou thankyou. I feel held here. Alice"
"Beautiful space, peaceful haven. Thank you"
"Peaceful and blessed - Beautiful honouring of the Goddess. JJ"
"Peaceful and calming, I love it xxx"
"Being able to connect to, volunteer, train and attend events at The Stroud Goddess Temple has been a wonderful experience for me. I feel so lucky to have been drawn into this accepting and loving community and benefitted from the support there, which was last year, when Bliss handfasted my husband and I, and asked me to create for the temple. I know it would have taken months, if not years to brave such an unknown alone, and thank the Goddess that it happened when it did.
To be able to fully express freely, and celebrate my own personal understandings of Mother Earth, of spirit, of female divinity in balance with the male and experience true sisterhood is a blessing too great to fully express in words and my wish is that many more people will be blessed with it too.
Helen Hart"
"Blessings to nature of love, all of your calming joy and compassion and flexibility, may all your abundant gifts shine through timelessly through all of us infinitely."
"Had a great time. Beautiful soft Goddess energy. Feeling safe and chill. Love you all. Dave."
"Beautiful, so beautiful. Soft and nurturing. Thank you, so much love."
"A very nice, relaxing place to be - lovely energy, feels very held. Kaia"
"I just love this Goddess Temple, it's brilliant thanks! Bob"
"A beautiful and relaxing space to spend time, thanks a million for creating this. Margaret"
"A wonderful gentle space to slow down and rest, Lucy"
"Singing the Goddess back home, Love, JJ"
"I'm very happy that this lovely space is here, thank you, Paul S."
"It was a pleasure and an honour to hold space and close down the altar in the quiet room. A heart felt connection is now open from my temple to yours. Diann"
"Wonderful Women's Week, Oh blessed sails of deepest love, how we ebb and flow, Ellie"
"With gratitude for the creation of this beautiful space, Bright Blessings, Jean"
"thank you, a safe, calming space"
"lovely couple of hours, very interesting"
"such a loving, accepting space, grateful to have found you, thank you."
We are celebrating one year of opening Stroud Goddess Temple with extended hours and workshop offerings from our Melissa volunteers this Saturday 22nd October to celebrate the season of Samhain!
All welcome of any background, gender or belief, children and well behaved dogs.
Nix Sheldon is holding the space for visitors from 10am
Linda Matthews - 12noon, 2:30pm Sound Healing and Reiki Tasters
Ananda - 1:15-2:15 Quantum Healing, Journalling and Visualisation with Drumming
Juliana Avila - 4-6pm Cacao ceremony, Honouring the Ancestors, bring an offering or prayer for your ancestors
On Sunday 23rd October there is a Women's Circle from 10am-12noon with Linda Rogers for Donations between £5-10 per person, all identifying as women are welcome.
Also on Sunday at the Trinity Rooms are two Wand Making Workshops with Helen Hart, 12:30pm-2:30pm or 3-5pm, £5-£17 dependent on materials.
The temple is kept open through donations, please give cash in the cauldron, or sign up to be a regular subscription supporter and receive a goody bag or money tree in the temple during your visit as an incentive for this ongoing help. Sign up here: https://donorbox.org/stroud-goddess-temple
It has certainly been a very full year with a lot of amazing offerings, creativity and sacred service at the temple. Bliss was invited as a Priestess of Rhiannon to present at the Orchard Gathering in Glastonbury, where she shared a presentation about opening the Stroud temple and the Wheel of Cotswolds Goddesses with elder priestesses in the Avalonian tradition. Bliss chose to receive the mark of the lifelong dedicated Priestess, a crescent moon tattoo on her forehead, at this time.
Bliss says: The process of visioning, raising and running a temple with the community in Stroud has been the achievement of the dreams of our town. When I came to this town in 2015, my life had taken a drastic tumble and for a short time I was without a home, friends or support network. A very difficult breakup at the same time as relocating left me at my lowest ebb. I was lucky to have met my Priestess teacher and mentor Katinka Soetens at Path of Love Mystery School this same year, and found under her care and tutelage a way to integrate my deep wounds and shadow places, transforming what had caused so much shame into a way to shine my light, and share the radiance of Her love into the world for the benefit of everyone.
The Goddess Temple in Stroud, and my dedication and service as a Priestess, is a direct result of this path of self healing, devotion and healthy village dynamic co-creation which working with Katinka inspired in me to keep walking the path of Goddess love through 3 years of intensive development and initiation, becoming a Labyrinth priestess. Over the last year since opening the temple in Stroud, I have been mentored and further developed in my Goddess path by Dr. Lynne Sedgemore CBE, on the Luminary Leadership training, and am now a dedicated Maeutic Luminary walking the path of empowered leadership to continue supporting and lifting up the volunteers and facilitators, Priestesses and healers who make up the body of the Stroud Goddess Temple CIC. I have another year with Lynne which I hope will enable us to develop better models of collaboration and growth within this organisation for the sustainable future of the Stroud Goddess Temple which I am proud to be a director of, along with Sarah Dixon and Kate Dineen.
Coordinating volunteers, caring for the space and managing the CIC is time consuming and often hard work, but the rewards of knowing how much good is coming out of the project make up for the stress and overwhelm most of the time. I feel so humbled by the amazing love people show for one another in the space, and I feel so proud of my incredible students who are themselves stepping up into healing and temple arts or priestessing. It is wonderful to be able to represent Stroud and Gloucestershire in the global goddess movement, and I felt so much joy to know that the banner parade of Cotswold Goddesses was happening in Stroud, and covered by BBC Radio Gloucestershire, on our Lammas Open Day at the temple, held by our Gloucestershire Goddess Community members, at the same time I was serving as Directional Priestess of the South for Nimue, Lady of the Lake at this year's Glastonbury Goddess Conference dedicated to the Sovereign Goddess of Avalon. This really shows that what we have co-created here is a living temple much bigger than any one of us dreamers, long may it serve Her.
We look forward to welcoming you to the temple on your next visit to Stroud, Blessed Be from Gloucestershire Goddess Community.