Charline was an Aquarius, born January 23, 1937 of deeply spiritual, intelligent, and freethinking parents who fostered intellectual discourse in an environment filled with an incredibly diverse collection of friends and family, in a time and place where that was not the norm.

 

The humility and generosity of spirit that were impressed upon and demanded of her throughout her youth would in later life work at odds with the kinds of outward success that society most often values.

 

She had a powerful intellect, but never pursued letters after her name and never covered coveted monetary entrapments. She was an autodidact who devoted her brilliant and original mind to the acquisition of encyclopedic knowledge of science, philosophy, religion, metaphysics, music, and dance.

 

Her life path was devoted to expanding her consciousness and recapturing the ancient lost knowledge that has enabled the human race to continue despite the grip of patriarchal religion that has obliterated humanity’s ability to recognize the divinity in every human being.

 

Her work in the pursuit of the Goddess and women’s religion took second place only to her continuation of the species through her children and grandchildren.

 

In the early 1980s she found a spiritual home in Darkmoon Circle and became one of that Circle’s guiding spirits as it grew, evolved, and gave birth to a wider Pagan organization, the Fellowship of the Spiral Path. She was consecrated a priestess of the Goddess in Spiral on June 6, 1986, and later took a second consecration to the Pagan God. She contributed her hard work and organizational skills to the design of the clergy training program in which a number of us here were subsequently trained and consecrated. Over the years she served for a time as chair of the Spiral board, was teacher and mentor to many, and founded a new women’s circle, Serpent’s Egg, and studied and taught the Occult Kabbalah.

 

She tirelessly poured her gifts into the Pagan community, bringing skills in leadership and ritual. She was a prolific writer of poetry, songs, stories and devotional materials.  She was a gifted seeress with deep and intuitive mastery of astrology and the Tarot, and hosted workshops in divination at her home for many years. She created a uniquely feminine rune system, the Lady Stones, that many of us have and use to this day.

 

No eulogy for Charline can be complete without mention of the little dogs, a Yorkipoo lineage of unparalleled intelligence and personality whom she and her daughter Mara bred and nurtured and gifted to others in the community. Her last canine companion, Zorro, outlived her but not for long, following her through the veil.

 Maiden, Mother, and Crone flowed seamlessly through the stages of Charline’s life, standing as witness to her faith, and ours, of the circle within a circle with no beginning and never ending.

 

In her final years, she valiantly faced the challenges of diminishing health and power, as she felt herself slipping into the night. Hers was the end that we all hope for, in peace and without pain, when the time had come.

 

We who are fortunate to have known and loved her look to meet and know and love her once again.