Catherine Ishara de Garis

Ishara's formal studies in childbirth education complement her innate spirituality and strongly intuitive nature, and combine with over ten years of practical experience in designing and facilitating ritual.

Her priestess path began in her late teens, as a fascination with questions about what it means to be a woman, a curiosity about spiritual healing, and a growing resonance with earth-centred, pagan spirituality. "I remember reading Starhawk's Dreaming the Dark and thinking, as I experienced bells ringing for me on every page, I must be a pagan!" In the early morning of the summer solstice in 1992, a small dedication ceremony witnessed by friends, she formally committed herself to a life of service as a contemporary priestess of the Great Mother. Since that time she has been actively engaged in finding new ways to live out her vocation within her community.

In 2001, Ishara co-designed and -presented the inaugural Community Childbirth Educator training for Birthplace Support Group: a three month intensive process of reflection, sharing and personal growth centred on women's own experiences of pregnancy, childbirth and early motherhood. The aim of the program was to empower women who were mothers to take their experience and passion about choices in childbirth back into their local communities to share their with women just beginning on the motherhood journey. Many of these women have gone on to successfully develop or extend their own work as doulas and/or educators.

To explore more of Ishara's priestess journey... au.geocities.com/priestess_of_the_mother