Moon Rituals and Why I Don’t Want to Colonize the Moon
Will we soon need a Moon Day too?
I Don’t Want to Colonize the Moon
It’s Earth Day, but I want to write about the Moon. I want to write about how it breaks my heart that we are in a space race with China to colonize the Moon. I want to write about how as long as Earth Day exists, (a once-a-year only event to stop and consider, hey, maybe we should care about our planet,) we have no business developing and exploiting outer space. I hope you understand.
Artemis II astronauts just completed a slingshot around the Moon and while we celebrate their successful return, I mourn what this means for us. Because although they experienced the overview effect, the state of awe that arises from seeing Earth from space where you suddenly recognize that we all belong to a small, fragile, interconnected home planet, I don’t need to go to space to feel this transcendence every day. Humanity abuses, pollutes and pillages Earth, and now we seek to do the same to the Moon.
The Moon is Magic
Did you know the Moon’s cratered surface is a record of billions of years of impacts from space rocks, a witness to our solar system’s impact history that Earth has largely erased? The Moon is a record keeper.
Did you know that in the distant past, the Moon and Earth sometimes formed a shared shield against the young Sun’s harsh solar wind, helping our planet maintain its atmosphere? The Moon was our early protector.
Did you know in many earth-based cultures, the Moon, Grandmother Moon, Sister Moon, is honored as the feminine eye watching over us, lovingly helping to guide our way?
When the Moon is full, she brightens our nights, so we have no need of light. The Moon is not lit from within but a reflection of our Star. She reflects light back to us in the dark. She reflects our own cyclical nature. She reflects our psyche. She reminds us that the living world is not all light, it is darkness too and when she pauses from reflecting, we are left to reflect on our own. She disappears from night. She is with us during the day when we are unaware of her presence, she is still there, ever revolving.
Humans are Connected to the Moon
Did you know that some evolutionary theories suggest that women’s menses are linked to the lunar cycle because our ancient ancestors mated in the moonlight and bled in the dark when they could hide from predators? The word moon shares an ancient root with the words menses and month.
Across the world and throughout history, countless cultures have used lunar or lunisolar calendars systems that count months by the Moon’s phases, tying festivals and ceremonies to her changing light.
The Moon pulls on the oceans with her gravitational leverage, so the tides rise to meet her cycles like water bellies bulging from the Earth. Did you know she subtly pulses the groundwater and aquifers too, so that many traditions attune to her rhythms when planting and tending food? Did you know our own bodies are 60% water and so we must be drawn closer to her too, energetically, in ways we may not know?
The moon is witness and protector, cycles and growth, tides and gravity, culture and ancient roots, reflection and introspection, darkness and light, mystery and intuition, she is the liminal beloved of our lives and we barely notice. Well, some of us do.
Moon Worship
I honor the moon most prominently twice a month. I honor her yin and her yang, her fullness and her depth. On the new moon, I find my quietest center, the center of my center, and I pray for medicine to carry with me until the next cycle begins. On the full moon, I celebrate in circle with drums, song, friends, meditation and manifestation. I promise her I will act on my prayer for she has returned to light and so we all must eventually.
Colonizing the Moon Changes Everything
But now, Man wants to build space stations for people to live on her surface. There is talk of space industry and the optimistic say it will relieve the Earth’s congestion. (Send AI data centers to space!) But many of us know better. We have not learned our lesson, and we will only repeat our crimes. We will not reduce pollution on Earth; we will add our pollution to the Moon.
Once upon a time, the Earth was a wild place, but Man colonized her and now she is coughing, sputtering, relinquishing. We are killing our own habitat like the most ignorant animals in the galaxy.
Perhaps some will gaze in wonder at the modern Moon with humans living upon it, but I know I will never see the Moon the same again—naked, unpolluted, raw wilderness. Some may say, she’s only a rock! But they don’t know what I know, what so many of us know, that she’s so much more. The moon is pure, strong, mystical, mythical, shapeshifting beauty.
I will always love her, always honor her, but I will never see her the same way again.
Moon Rituals to Practice Twice a Month
Below are rituals for the Moon and how I practice honoring her cycles. Working with the rhythm of the moon will change the way you function in the world for the better. They allow you to honor your own internal cycle and phases in tune with the natural world.
I lead both full moon and new moon ceremonies in my community in different capacities and have done so religiously for the past five years. It has become a beautiful essential part of my eco-spiritual practice and if this calls to you, here is a starter kit to practice your own moon worship.
