Editor’s Note: The following is the second of a three-part article written by Eric Francis. It was originally published on Nov. 3, 2006, two years into Bush’s second term as president. Today, it’s part of the archives, accessible to Planet Waves Astrology News subscribers. –RA
Faster, Pastor
A few days later, the sex thing came to the surface of American life again, this time in the person of The Rev. Ted Haggard (Pastor Ted), who shepherds over a flock of 30 million American fundamentalist Christians. Haggard stepped down from his post Thursday after a male prostitute said that the minister had been paying him for sex for the past few years.
The prostitute, Mike Jones, 49, of Denver, told the Associated Press that he came forward after learning that Haggard was a hypocrite: Jones found out that the minister’s organization has been leading the fight against gay marriage, where the issue is currently up on the Colorado ballot.
“It made me angry that here’s someone preaching about gay marriage and going behind the scenes having gay sex,” Jones said, quoted in Associated Press article yesterday.
Here is a bit from Haggard’s Wikipedia entry:
Haggard is a firm supporter of President George W. Bush, and is often credited with rallying evangelicals behind Bush during the 2004 election.[11] Author Jeff Sharlet reports that Haggard “talks to… Bush or his advisers every Monday” and opines that “no pastor in America holds more sway over the political direction of evangelicalism.”[12]
In a June 2005 Wall Street Journal article, “Ted Haggard, the head of the 30-million strong National Association of Evangelicals, jokes that the only disagreement between himself and the leader of the Western world is automotive: Mr. Bush drives a Ford pickup, whereas he prefers a Chevy.“
Okay so is this guy running the country? Well, don’t answer please. But since I’ve done and gone down this road, let’s look at his chart. I only have a noon chart for him, which I have not seen as of this paragraph, but let’s have a look.
Well, the first thing that jumps out of this chart for me is his conjunction of Jupiter and Pluto. Contacts between Jupiter and Pluto tend to have a spiritual and socially crusading feeling. They connect individuals to collective consciousness in a big way, and in particular, the conjunction can put people in touch with the golden thread that connects all spiritual traditions. So far so good. In Leo, ’tis extremely charismatic. He is a real charmer. Add a cuddly Cancer Sun (family man) and Mercury and Venus in Gemini (the gift of gab) and the guy is ready to go; he’s on his way from churches based in strip-malls to presiding over a flock of 30 million.
But Saturn in Scorpio squares his nifty Jupiter-Pluto conjunction, weighing it down a bit and lending a desperate feeling (related to the square from Saturn). It’s a nice tight-fitting square. These 90-degree-type aspects between Saturn and Pluto almost always are like the arm and hammer of moral dictatorship. Those who do not suffer from moralism and have such aspects tend to be highly responsible types who take on (internalize) the burdens of society, sacrificing greatly in the process.
In the less altruistic models, we tend to get people who make others out to be evil while they themselves are holy. Individual qualities of people often extend their energies into society with this aspect, affecting the ‘personality’ of civilizations. The square and the opposition have similar traits, and we may recall it was the Saturn-Pluto opposition of 2001 that crystallized a world of hatred and religiousioty, with nonstop war and fear in its wake. Richard Nixon rose to power under the prior Saturn-Pluto opposition, promising to end the Vietnam War, but really escalating it wildly, and blaming antiwar activists for the debacle. To really handle Saturn-Pluto contacts, one must possess actual integrity, otherwise the whole thing gets projected onto others, often with catastrophic results.
Also included in the aspect structure is a Jupiter-Saturn square, from Leo to Scorpio. What is interesting about Haggard’s transits now is that currently there is another exact Jupiter-Saturn square going on, occupying very close to the same degrees. So, he’s got a Jupiter-Saturn square being activated by these same planets, in the same signs, in the same aspect, though transiting Saturn is conjunct his Jupiter-Pluto conjunction, and Jupiter is conjunct his Saturn. Is that cool? Well, not for him.
If you like asteroids, note that Haggard has Sappho (an asteroid associated with both homosexuality and with popularity) closely conjunct his Sun. He has, at the very least, made quite a name and national reputation for himself as an opponent of homosexuality.
Of note to those interested in Centaur planets, Pastor Ted has a Chiron-Pholus conjunction in early Aquarius, which is now taking a transit from Chiron (as well as from Nessus). In other words, Ted is having his Chiron return, and Pholus and Nessus are directly involved.
And the square setup that I described earlier (Jupiter/Pluto squared by Saturn) is actually a grand fixed cross: the Moon is in late Aquarius shows up, and the Centaur Nessus (associated with potentially inappropriate sexual contact) completes the square from Taurus. Tantalus fits the picture exactly, also in late Taurus: the endless torment of wanting what you cannot have.
All a sad story indeed, particularly as the message to so many millions of people is that who they are naturally, as God made them, is wrong.
We all learn fast that the best way to get what you want is hypocrisy. In other words, if you open your mouth and state plainly who you really are or what you really want, generally the reward is having your opportunities closed off. This is particularly insidious in personal relationships, where the relationship is maintained on the pretense of being someone else. Because we all must play by these rules to some extent, we become increasingly tolerant of hypocrisy, assuming it’s just one of those things that exists, which we must live with, and which has the virtue of allowing us to conceal ourselves with a measure of impunity.
There are two parts to getting out of this, I think. Part one is allowing people a lot of space to be themselves, which means not rejecting them purely for the violations of our particular moral or purity standard. The other is doing the inner work to resolve what might cause us to do just that. Unfortunately, it’s easier to project and condemn than it is to allow, and for that ease we pay the price of often being blinded by the walls of our own inner compartments, many times ending up clueless about what is real and what is not, or worse, deciding that it really doesn’t matter.