Our Monday morning was lit! So lit, in fact, that I sprang into everything I needed to for the week and didn’t post the message. But, we know spirit’s always right on time!

As some of you know, I had a moment of intense righteous anger on last Friday. I found out that the sacred space we create here at Ase Ire has been violated by certain men messaging women behind the scenes and harassing them during and after Orisa Prayer and Meditation. I’m not talking about the fake profile scammers, which is bad enough, I mean real people who are known to others in the community.

Y’all already know that is not something I will ever, EVER stand for. So I took to FB live to speak on it. And then I cried and asked Olodumare why. Why does it have to be like this? Why does nowhere seem safe? Why even as we are cultivating community are there those who would seek to violate? Why don’t the good men stand up to the violators, tell them these behaviors are wrong, and help protect us?

As I prayed on this and reflected on what I would share with you on Sunday in light of the heaviness I was feeling, I was inspired to tell the story from the odu Ifa Ose Otura. It speaks about 16 male irunmole (divine beings) being sent to earth by Olodumare along with one female, Osun.

When they arrived, the males dismissed Osun, shunned her, and rejected her help. Slowly the world began to die and nothing they did to try and fix it would work. No plants would grow. The water stopped flowing. The children stopped being born.

They males went back to Olodumare and asked what was happening, he looked among them and asked one simple question: “Where is Osun?”

Olodumare explained that he sent Osun with them because her input was VITAL. Nothing they tried to do would work without her. He told them to go back and BEG her forgiveness and pray she agreed to help them because otherwise the whole earth project would fail.

When they came back to earth, Osun was pregnant. When they begged her forgiveness and help, she told them she would only help if the child she was carrying was male. If it was female, she would not as she wouldn’t bring another female to be treated this way in the world.

The child was female. On seeing this, Obatala reached into Osun’s womb and changed the child to male. And that child who was born was Esu, who is sometimes called Ose’Tura in honor of his birth odu. The owner of the center of the crossroads, the portal to all possibility.

What struck me here is that out of 16 male divinities NOT ONE considered that their mistreatment of Osun was the root of the issue. Not one said to the others, “This isn’t right! Olodumare sent Osun with us and we should include her.” Not one. So, while disappointing, we cannot be totally shocked when mortal men behave in similar ways.

Note that in the story it was Olodumare himself who had to impart Osun’s importance to the males. And it was Osun who had to recognize her own worth in the face of rejection and mistreatment. As one of our beloved Family members noted during our Monday meeting, Osun offered her help but she did not beg to be included. She didn’t force herself into the males’ midst. Once rejected, she sat back and built her own life because she knew eventually, they’d have to come back. Begging. As those who fail to recognize our worth often do.

Our card for the week aligns with this message so well! The Reflect card from my new favorite oracle deck, Chalks of Kikongo, encourages us to reflect on the past to find the lessons, but not to get stuck there. It encourages us to understand what happened in the past, not to excuse present bad behavior, but to provide insight into it’s roots so as to nip it in the bud. It asks us to understand the true meaning of sankofa, and to know that just because something is old doesn’t make it good.

This week’s crystal ally came to me intuitively, and it is petalite, known as the stone of intent. As we glance back and connect with our ancestral past, it’s important to know what our intention is. Why are we seeking connection? What are we hoping to learn and/or understand? How do we plan to process the tough lessons we find there? If we fail to plan, we plan to fail, and petalite asks us to look deep into our hearts and make a plan for our own connection, elevation, and healing.

We give thanks to the messengers in all their forms, and for the messages from all their various sources! I’ll look forward to seeing you around the temple. Ire gbogbo! All blessings!

~Iya Funlayo

PS: Don’t forget to register for Communiversity, we start August 3!