Events Schedule

Lecture 1: Savage Breast: One Man's Search for the Goddess

What the ancient Goddesses reveal about modern men's unconscious need for, fear of, and anger towards women: how this poisons relationships, and how to begin to heal them.

Presenter: Author Tim Ward (Savage Breast, Arousing the Goddess, What the Buddha Never Taught)
Length: 60-90 minutes

What would it be like for a modern man to encounter ancient goddesses? To find out, author Tim Ward traveled to the cradles of Western Civilization: to Greece, Crete, Turkey, Israel, Romania, Bulgaria, Ukraine, Yugoslavia, France, Cyprus and Malta. Ward walked through the ruins of the goddesses’ temples, and gazed at her statues and icons, searching for a resonance. He writes: "Just as a harp string will vibrate if another instrument strikes an identical note, I hoped the images created by his ancestors could bring to life a corresponding echo within me."

In the lecture, Ward recounts his encounters with ancient goddess, and shows color images of his photographs of goddess statues, icons and temples. He explains how he came to understand these goddesses as powerful archetypes of the feminine. He writes: "Facing the goddess allowed me to unleash emotions so threatening and painful I never could have imagined expressing them directly to a real woman. It opened doors that I had long nailed shut. It’s one thing to contemplate the goddess as metaphysical idea or a Jungian archetype, but when the feminine divine took shape inside my psyche, she often terrified me, evoking desperate longing, hostility, fear, shame — and also incredible beauty."

Ward discusses what his encounters with Goddesses revealed to him about modern men's unconscious need for, fear of, and anger towards women: how this poisons relationships, and how to begin to heal them.

Questions for discussion:

• Is "Goddess" any different from "God in a skirt"?


• How is the anima activated and affected by goddess archetypes?


• How has Western culture changed when the Church outlawed goddesses, and how has this affected relationships between men and women?


• Some writers and social commentators have discerned "a pervasive fear, hatred and contempt towards women in our culture." If this is so, how can we change it?