Just a quick comment to explain that I began to write this article immediately after the news came out yesterday afternoon. As a result, I may not have caught all of the references to “today,” referring to the 6th of September as I post this now on the 7th. My apologies. I want to get this posted before more time goes by. Thanks for your understanding.

In the midst of my effort to complete my annual analyses of India’s and Pakistan’s Solar Returns yesterday morning, I caught the news that made me drop everything and headed to “search” for the headlines from India.

As it happens, I’d been waiting for the 6th since I’d done India’s Lunar Return as part of my analysis and had wondered where the unexpected would hit. I’ll leave the following paragraph in my analysis for India’s Solar Return although I’ll include it here too. The chart is below:

The September 6 Lunar Return with the 8th house rising in a chart with no quadrant dominance, but a clear above-the-horizon emphasis highlights a tight Cardinal T-square between the 1st house anaretic Mars in Saturn-ruled Capricorn, its opposition to India’s Moon, and a 10th house square from Venus in a 46-minute partile to the Moon. Be aware, however, of 4th house Uranus Rx, still well within orb of the opposition to Venus–offering a view of the Grand Cross from out-of-sign Uranus in Venus-ruled Taurus. Saturn Rx in its own sign in this chart forms a conjunction to the Ascendant from the 12th house, a point that can be especially effective now since Saturn stations Direct on the 6th, two hours after the Lunar Return (LR) takes place while the Sun, a little over 2° before it perfects at the opposition to Neptune. This promises to be another highly important LR in which tempers could get heated. While LR Mars opposes the Moon, natal Mars opposes LR Saturn.

I’m sure we’ll be seeing this momentous decision splashed globally in newspaper headlines. In the USA, the news was already hitting CNN and The Washington Post.

In India’s The Wire, the opening paragraph revealed both the news and what appears to be controversial indicators that we’ll be seeing protests perhaps on the wording of the decision. “A Supreme Court constitution bench on Thursday pronounced a unanimous verdict – in four concurring judgments – scrapping the provisions of Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code, which criminalise ‘unnatural sex’ between consenting adults, and was effectively used to criminalise homosexual relations in India for more than a century.”

But the decision doesn’t come without its controversial commentaries that are almost guaranteed to spark more protests. Here’s where that Grand Cross I mentioned and the Moon-LR Mars in houses 1 and 7 and natal Mars-LR Saturn oppositions in houses 6 and 12 will all come into play. At 3:19 PM IST, the follow-up comment, “Gay sex not a crime but is unnatural: ‘RSS’ [editing detail: ‘RSS’ is ‘Rashtriya Swayam Sewak’] on Supreme Court verdict” appeared in the live feed from India Today, roughly three hours after the Supreme Court had said, “History owes an apology to LGBT people.”

Zee News had followed up with a story on the ‘RSS’ comment, “Section 377 verdict: Homosexuality not a crime, but same-sex marriages against nature, says RSS. Though it does not consider homosexuality as a crime, the RSS says same-sex marriages are against nature.“

The Zee News story offered a clearer picture for the global audience in the first three paragraphs that began, “NEW DELHI: The Rashtriya Swayam Sewak (RSS) on Thursday said that same-sex marriage and relationship are neither natural nor desirable which is why it does not support such relationships.

“BJP’s parent organisation said his shortly after a five-judge constitution bench of the Supreme Court unanimously decriminalised part of the 158-year-old colonial law under Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code which criminalises consensual unnatural sex, saying it violated the rights to equality.

The RSS, however, said that like the top court it also does not consider same sex as a crime.“

I can’t help but share two more. While not all of the follow up comments were negative, this next one was as well. I hope readers will take time, in fact, to read this entire article. SC verdict on Article 377: It’s a genetic disorder, like someone having six fingers, says Subramanian Swamy. Subramanian Swamy believes that the verdict will give rise to HIV and the next government will move a seven-judge bench to rule out the judgment. I realize not everyone in the world appreciates the West or Western thought (much less that of the United States); but with all due respects, I found his thoughts downright hilarious, my sincere apologies to those who disagree with me on that.

In contrast to Subramanian Swamy’s thoughts, party MP Shashi Tharoor offered his firm support of the decision, SC verdict on Article 377: Government has no space in bedrooms, says Shashi Tharoor. Tharoor said that the SC ruling on gay sex was a big slap on BJP which opposed it.

The Times of India highlighted several powerful quotes from the Supreme Court, including the following: “Progressive and pragmatic view should be taken by the court to come to the rescue of the oppressed section of society. The law must be interpreted as per the requirement of changing times…”

I had several slightly conflicting times coming in and finally went with India Today’s live blog for 11:38 AM. But the view of the shift in times from decision to Lunar Return to negative comment on the decision was telling on its own. At the time the decision was released and in the midst of being read, the Moon was approaching Mars in its opposition when Mars had just moved into the 3rd house and the Moon was about to move into the 9th house, each squared by 11th house Venus and out-of-sign Uranus in Venus-ruled Taurus in the 6th. Consider the houses involved as we go through those involving this Cardinal Grand Cross. The third generally speaks about daily life. Prime Minister Modi’s government asked the Supreme Court not to rule on gay marriage rights. I don’t believe Saturn’s being Stationary Direct in the 2nd house of values (yes, it’s also about money, but in a case like this, the value system–or values–are the more important consideration) was a coincidence. There are, after all, no coincidences in astrology. And as if even the MC wants to tip us off to the heightened significance of this event, note the perfected trine in the chart between 2nd house Saturn and the MC!

“More protests came from religious groups although not to the extent they had when the law, Section 377, was originally decriminalized about ten years ago when they’d first protested,” said The Wire. “‘Suresh Kumar Koushal, who had unexpectedly won the re-criminalisation of Section 377 after the Delhi high court had de-criminalised it, also took his opposition to the court. ‘As a logical person, I can understand there is some problem with this section. But will the cure be worse than the disease, we have to see,’ his lawyer, Soumya Chakraborty, said. He gave the example of ‘group sex’ and said, ‘To what extent will they ask for liberty?'”

The Moon in the 8th house while still close enough to be called a 9th house Moon reflects the reference to the law itself. Venus in the 11th house might ask us to see the context of Uranus’ rulership over this house, but I’m more focused here on the natural 7th house context where Libra would be–showing the long-term relationships on which the Supreme Court was ruling–as well as the reference to the symbolic scales of justice we recognize for lawyers themselves. Now some might question this since the 9th house deals with the courts; but lawyers, long-term partnerships, agreements, contracts and lawsuits begin in the 7th house, not in the 9th. And then we come to Uranus in Venus-ruled Taurus in the 6th house. This particular placement makes me wonder if, in addition to the perhaps expected argument about “group sex” (see the reference in the paragraph before this), I suspect the obvious question of AIDS was likely to have been brought up too. From what I’ve read in the news in the last several weeks, however, AIDS is not as prevalent as it had been, say, 20 years ago. That’s clearly a blessing for everyone, not just for the LBGTQ community.

I briefly touched the 8th house rising in the Lunar Return, but now the Cardinal Grand Cross with that out-of-sign opposition from Uranus to Venus moves to the angular houses (students: 1/4/7/10), a telling sign that the decision had been earth shaking. As I mentioned earlier, this is included in India’s Solar Return which I’m still trying to finish; but this news was so important, I didn’t want to waste time in developing this article first.

I changed my mind, however, following a brief discussion with John Davenport before closing out this article. In the September 6 Lunar Return, the natal Ascendant forms semisextile to natal Mars and resolves in a Resonant Blooming Undecaquartisextile (UQSXT) at 15 Sagittarius 44. This particular UQSXT initially seems to be less important, but it falls in 37-minute partile square to transiting Neptune at 15 Pisces 07. For my tastes, it feels far more significant since there was a transiting Sun-Neptune opposition on the 6th, and the Cardinal Grand Cross involved Mars in opposition to the Moon while natal Mars was received a 2° opposition from transiting Saturn.

I decided to broach the subject of this particular UQSXT and asked John Davenport his thoughts. He mentioned having seen transiting Mercury moving over natal Mercury’s antiscion (23 Leo 12), through the transiting Uranus antiscion (27 Leo 47), keeping the semisquare alive as it makes ingress to Virgo and immediately develops its sesquiquadrate (135°) to transiting Neptune. The entire pattern fit my thoughts on how the transiting Sun-Neptune opposition had fit in so well, like those puzzle pieces you know belong in that puzzle and aren’t random at all.

Not ironically, but perhaps uncannily so, John additionally mentioned a book he had picked up in London some 25 years ago. It was published by the American Federation of Astrologers (AFA), and lo and behold, I discovered it on Amazon in ebook format after he mentioned it: Homosexuality in the Horoscope by Karl Guenter Heimsoth, M.D. John added, “[Heimsoth] attributes Uranus and Neptune alternate states of consciousness, indicating male and female homosexuality.” With this thought in mind–and those I added in the next paragraph for you, dear readers, to consider as well–I’ve tossed out one more thought: “I wonder if consciousness is enough. I mean we have sub-conscious and un-conscious too… Doesn’t it then beg the question about at which point one realizes one is L or G or B, or T, or Q or any others?”

While neither John nor I have intended to start a hot debate on the subject of homosexuality, we each felt it important to bring out in this article, and I plan to include it as well in the Solar Return article for India since it’s related to what I had seen in the September 6 Lunar Return. “Perhaps this is not just about homosexuality as much as it is alternative lifestyles that may conflict with day to day societal perspectives of life,” I told John a bit spontaneously, and I admit his agreement with this thought slightly surprised me. “I made the same conclusion exactly,” he said. “I greatly consider them in all the ‘isms’ going. This is what I was seeing in the issues over Novichok.” Interesting thought even though it obviously can be deadly at times… I have one final thought that bears mentioning, and that’s of transiting Saturn, which you can see clearly in each of these charts. But in the one where I shared the Lunar Return with the natal outside, you’ll see Saturn is within orb of a square to natal Neptune, thanks to the natal Mars-Neptune square assisting in the formation of the Cardinal T-square with Neptune as the arm. Again, we take note of the Peeling of Life’s Onion, not to be missed.

Moving on, although perhaps it’s not that major at this point where I did mention the other two times earlier… Take time to scroll almost to the beginning of this article again, and examine that “SC neg comment” chart, and you’ll see the conjunction of Pluto to the Ascendant while Mars remains in the 1st house in opposition (1°45′ orb) to the Moon in the 7th in 18-minute partile square to Venus intercepted in the 9th while still being within orb of the conjunction to the MC in opposition to the 8-minute partile conjunction of 4th house Uranus to the IC! The dynamics and precision are uncanny.

Time to return to the Solar Returns now; but I hope this gives a brief look to this 150-year-old law that hopefully has said goodbye to India as it did in the United Kingdom years ago.

On that note, until next time…

Namaste, I love you,
Michelle

©2018 Michelle Young