I feel a much closer connection to the divine feminine than I ever did to the divine masculine, my patriarchal Mormon upbringing notwithstanding. I guess either it just didn’t take, or it just wasn’t true. Or both, probably. I feel an intimacy and closeness with the overwhelmingly feminine divinity of Aphrodite that I have never felt with a masculine god. Not even Dionysus, whose reality I do not doubt, and who has made his presence known in my life unambiguously, has so powerful a hld on my spirit. But Aphrodite, whose divinity in many ways merges into a general, all-encompassing feminine divine presence that is firmly rooted in the human universe, has a power over me that in it’s own way is more intoxicating than Dionysus’s ever has been. Aphrodite is soft and visceral, erotic and frightening, gentle and savage, warm and comforting: she is truly both the beginning and the end, both the womb and the grave.
When I touch my wife, I touch this river of female divinity in a way that is at once overwhelmingly universal and beautifully particular. She is not somehow channeling Aphrodite, because in a very real way she IS Aphrodite, although she is at the same time thoroughly, passionately, and intensely herself.
Although I think for practical purposes, the gods and goddesses are individuals that can be approached and entreated individually, I also think you do not have to go very far into their divinity before their individuality gives way to universal principles and an ultimate divine unity. The gods and goddesses are closer to the ultimate unity of all things than we mortals are, and that is precisely what gives them so much power and makes them at once so intoxicating and terrifying.
And that is the powerful divine experience that I feel: behind and within my beautiful wife is a beautiful goddess; behind and within that beautiful goddess is a beautiful universal divine female principle that flows through birth, sex, and death; and behind and within that beautiful divine feminine is the intensely beautiful and ultimate unity of all things, the divine center.
I am glad to be a pagan, because it means I am free to experience the incredible intensity and ecstasy of this powerful divine feminine fully, unreservedly, and without excuse, shame, or qualification. I am proud and unashamed of my spirituality, because I know that I am living a life that is authentic and full. To me, this kind of reckless and dangerous spirituality is an essintial part of what it means to really be alive.
Sailing to Byzantium 
Beautifully said.
Nice. Love your zestiness!!
For Mormons who wonder about the female aspect of the divine you might find two articles on my web site of some surprising interest.
The explanation of the Mount Olympus revelation that repudiates the LDS Church. This affirms the Restoration and opens the door of its escape to the next prophesied phase.
The NEW MORMON THEOLOGY is the first complete attempt to fill in all the holes ignored in traditional LDS theological thought.
I do not know if my web address will show up so here it is:
http://www.fireark.org
James
YES! When I look back on my heavy handed catholic upbringing, I can remember a longing for the Goddesses. Even as a little kid. The universe just makes sense as a pagan. I am fulfilled. I am in love with everything! As far as I am concerned Dan Brown type conspiracies…wife of Jesus etc..are too little too late.
Interesting. Well then why not just find fulfillment in good old-fashioned Mariolotry? Too stripped of sexuality?
The adoration of Mary is a good example of the desire to worship the Goddess. The church is pretty clear that Mary is no Goddess though…even if things get a bit blurry in say, Mexico for instance. So I guess I think she is too stripped of divinity, not as you suggest sexuality.
Actually I think Mary is sexy. I always did fall for Jewish women.