The Goddess and God of the Month

February is the Love Month, a dreaded month of those people who are lonely and heart broken. Though I have never written any Goddess and God of the month for quite sometime now, I want to restart the Tradition. I do not know personally these Deities, since my connection with them is just into the reverence level, I will post here some information from the internet about them... Read On...

The Goddess Brighid is one of the most well known Deity in the Celtic Mythos... She is so popular that a Catholic Saint is named after Her to gather Her believers and convert them to Christianity.

Brighid - Hearth Goddess of Ireland

By Patti Wigington, About.com

Origins of Brighid:

In Irish legend, Brighid (or Brighit), whose name is derived from the Celtic brig or "exalted one", is the daughter of the Dagda, and therefore one of the Tuatha de Dannan. In some versions of her story, she is the wife of the Fomorian Bres, with whom she had a son, Ruadan. Her two sisters were also called Brighid, and were associated with healing and crafts. The three Brighids were typically treated as three aspects of a single deity, making her a classic Celtic triple goddess.

Patron and Protector:

Brighid was the patron of poets and bards, as well as healers and magicians. She was especially honored when it came to matters of prophecy and divination. She was honored with a sacred flame maintained by a group of priestesses, and her sanctuary at Kildare, Ireland, later became the home of the Christian variant of Brighid, St. Brigid of Kildare. Kildare is also the location of one of several sacred wells in the Celtic regions, many of which are connected to Brighid. Even today, it's not uncommon to see ribbons and other offerings tied to trees near a well as a petition to Brighid.

In Britain, Brighid's counterpart was Brigantia, a warlike figure of the Brigantes tribe near Yorkshire, England. She is similar in aspects to the Greek goddess Athena and the Roman Minerva. Later, as Christianity moved into the Celtic lands, St. Brigid was the daughter of a Pictish slave who was baptised by St. Patrick, and founded a community of nuns at Kildare.

In addition to her position as a goddess of magic, Brighid was known to watch over women in childbirth, and thus evolved into a goddess of hearth and home. Today, many Pagans and Wiccans honor her on February 2, which has become known as Imbolc or Candlemas.

Like many Pagan holidays, Imbolc has a Celtic connection, although it wasn’t celebrated in non-Gaelic Celtic societies. The early Celts celebrated a purification festival by honoring Brighid. In some parts of the Scottish Highlands, Brighid was viewed as Cailleach Bheur, a woman with mystical powers who was older than the land itself. In modern Wicca and Paganism, Brighid is viewed as the maiden aspect of the maiden/mother/crone cycle.

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Our God of the Month is none other than the Greek God of Love...Eros. Son of Aphrodite and famous character of the story of Eros and Psyche... Since this is the Love Month, Eros could hit the person for you with his love arrows.... Read On!

Eros, Greek God of Passion and Lust

By Patti Wigington, About.com

Often described as a son of Aphrodite by her lover Ares, the god of war, Eros was a Greek god of lust and primal sexual desire. In fact, the word erotic comes from his name. He is personified in all kinds of love and lust -- heterosexual and homosexual -- and was worshipped at the center of a fertility cult that honored both Eros and Aphrodite together.

There does seem to be some question about Eros' parentage. In later Greek myth he is indicated to be Aphrodite's son, but Hesiod portrays him as merely her servant or attendant. Some stories say Eros is the child of Iris and Zephyrus, and early sources, such as Aristophanes, say he is the offspring of Nix and Erebus, which would make him quite an old god indeed.

During the classical Roman period, Eros evolved into Cupid, and became portrayed as the chubby cherub that still remains as a popular image today. He is typically shown blindfolded -- because, after all, love is blind -- and carrying a bow, with which he shot arrows at his intended targets. As Cupid, he is often invoked as a god of pure love during Valentines Day, but in his original form, Eros was mostly about lust and passion.

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Thank you to About.com and the author Patti Wigington for the Articles... Brighid Picture from Peacebeads.com...Eros pic from donaldbrooks.blogspot.com