Reclaiming Our Power to Remake the World
The first eclipse of 2020 happens Friday, January 10 at 2:21 pm EST.
It’s a lunar eclipse with the Moon in Cancer and the Sun in Capricorn. This is an incredible stellium (several planets conjunct) in the sign of world systems. The Sun, Mercury, Ceres, Saturn, and Pluto plus centaur planet Chariklo are all conjunct within 4 1/4 degrees while Jupiter is tightly conjunct the karmic South Node.
The fact that it happens two days before the exact Saturn-Pluto conjunction adds to the power of this eclipse. Saturn and Pluto are conjunct every 34 years but this is the first time they’ve been conjunct in Capricorn (Saturn’s sign and the sign of world systems) since 1518. Here are some things that jump out at me about this eclipse.
Goddess Power!
That’s a huge old stellium – a conjunction involving three or more planets – in Capricorn in the eclipse chart. What does that mean? Basically that almost all the planetary power is focused along the eclipse line of 20 Cancer – 20 Capricorn. Looks like a pretty black and white, cut and dried picture. Until you notice that the Sun, Mercury, Ceres, Saturn, Pluto and Chariklo and the eclipsed Moon are all square Eris, the archetype of the revolutionary feminine, at 23 Aries. This T-square funnels a huge amount of energy to Eris. (Saturn and Pluto square Eris by < 1 degree.)
Eris, the Goddess of Discord, introduces chaos into patriarchal, linear, status quo systems, agitating for a more egalitarian setup. It’s hard to overstate the power of the eclipse-Saturn-Pluto alignment, even without Eris in the picture. I feel like Eris’ presence as focal point for this alignment has radically amped up the destructive energy we’d expect to see.
In the build-up to the eclipse, we’ve seen the Trump and Tehran flirt with starting World War III, the mind-boggling wildfires in Australia, the start of the Harvey Weinstein trial in Los Angeles (remember #MeToo ?) and devastating earthquakes in Puerto Rico, a country that still hasn’t recovered from Hurricane Maria.
There’s a very pronounced emphasis on society’s treatment of women, children and the ecology in this picture, with Ceres conjunct Saturn and Pluto by < 1 degree. Ceres was active in the eclipse charts for 2017, when the news of the many women allegedly molested by Harvey Weinstein launched the #MeToo movement. As well as being the mother of Persephone, Ceres/Demeter is the goddess of the harvest. You may remember that in some versions of the myth, she cursed the natural world and stopped the plants from bearing fruit as a way of getting Jupiter’s attention and getting her kidnapped daughter back from Pluto.
There are a lot of interesting connections from this eclipse and the Saturn-Pluto conjunction to the USA’s chart, which I will tackle in more depth in a future video. I saw several news articles pop up on Apple News mentioning that several awards recipients and/or presenters at the Golden Globes had used their screen time to advocate for women’s rights and the environment. This makes a lot of sense in light of Ceres’ placement in the eclipse chart. And that whole Capricorn stellium is opposite the USA’s Mercury (what we think and communicate about as a society).
In case you missed it, Tatiana and I did an Instagram Live on the eclipse Wednesday night. I’ve edited the live stream into two shorter videos. The first (see above) focuses on how this energy is affecting us personally and what we can do to feel better and align ourselves with its transformational power. The second eclipse looks at the big picture and why this is such a revolutionary moment:
Ceres’ tight conjunction to the New Moon indicates that Ceres themes (the pain of women and children in societies based on patriarchal privilege; abortion, abduction, sexual assault, pedophilia) are going to predominate. As I noted in my piece last week on 
Ceres is often described in astrology writing as a benevolent but somewhat impersonal nurturer. In my experience working with Ceres in client charts, though, she more often symbolizes the suffering of women and children under patriarchal privilege.