I will be speaking at this event at St James’s Wine Vaults, Bath, England on the 25th October 2014.

Organised by Underworld Apothecary, it will also feature Jake Stratton-Kent and Susan Leybourne.

My talk, The Death & Resurrection Show (Voudon Angels & Ancestors), is based on my essay which was published in Sabbatica (Nephilim Press, 2013).

Here is an extract from the essay:

I. Deja-Vu-Vudu

“And lo, two Angels in White apparel sitting, the one at the head and the other at the foot, where the body of the Master had lain, who said: ‘Why seek ye the living among the dead?”

Here in the Adeptus Minor ritual of the Golden Dawn we encounter the two protagonists of the resurrection engine. It is in such inner rites of many mystery schools that we can see the ritual drama of the death and rebirth of the initiate. From the Pastos of Christian Rosencrutz to the Master Mason degree can be found the allegory of rising from the pit of eternal sleep.

We can also see it in the Christian baptism ceremony where believers are born again, in the seasonal cycle of the Witchcraft celebrations and in the death and rebirth of Osiris. Nowhere is the personification of death more direct than in the exoteric and esoteric forms of Vudu. Perhaps only the Horsemen of the Apocalypse come close to this in-your-face, no-holds-barred reality.

With the Vudu Barons of the Cross and the Cemetery there is no denying the realms over which they have jurisdiction, no doubt about their nature. To walk with them is to understand the raw, brutal essence of being. The cult of death, of ancestor reverence is a major component of exoteric Vudu, but for all the possibilities of unearthly knowledge offered by such concourse, it is not the ear of these Lwa that we seek, for their work is more general in nature and it is the specific personal agents of resurrection that are our allies.

Of course many are familiar with the concept of a soul. In esoteric Vudu there is a deeper view, one which recognises a dual nature to our higher selves and the distinct arenas of influence within which they operate. The Gros Bon Ange and the Ti Bon Ange bridge the realms of matter and spirit, they are vehicles of consciousness, which act as a conduit between the unseen realms and the realms of experience. Between them is a bond that unites that self which is outside the circles of time (the Ti Bon Ange) and that which carries the experiences of many lifetimes (the Gros Bon Ange) and retains the links with the Jean-Maine Familie of Spirits as well as those other lattices of energy fields which are pertinent to the development of the individual. The Ghuedhe Lwa are particularly of benefit as they have assisted the angels of many sorcerers in their education, in the journey between the worlds and in protecting ancient instruments of illumination from the profane. Some of these lattices can only be described by multi-dimensional magico meta-mathematics because they refer directly to the pre-Atlantean, trans-Yuggothian spaces from where they came. Within these lattices are whole worlds that have been created by the activity of adepts. Due to the accumulation of knowledge and magickal sciences throughout these lifetimes, these treasuries remain between the worlds, whilst the angels act as guardians, waiting for the moment they can translate the maps to these places into the lifestream of the adept. For this reason the maps to these spaces may manifest in a multitude of forms. They can become imprinted on consciousness as a result of a reverie; a form in clouds might suddenly suggest an insight or the work of another, bound into a book may offer the map that is required. The angels are ceaseless in their efforts to reveal that which has been hidden by the incarnation into flesh, to awakening the adept to his true identity and purpose.

Tickets are £15 and available now – email Underworld Apothecary at bookings@underworldapothecary.com

Underworld Apothecary website or Facebook group

A feast to be provided on the day.

Sabbatica is available form Nephilim Press at $60