A Simple Life, part I

This post will also be a bit long, about one subject, and divided in two parts.

But believe me when I say you will not be disappointed.

This is the birth chart for a lady named Marie-Pierre Normand.

She was born in Rumily-en-Cambrésis, France, in February the 27th, 1961.

First, a quick overall look*. Unfortunately, we don’t have feedback of any of it, not much is known about her, except for one very important event, which is the reason I am showing this birthchart.

Her temperament is definitely cold, but not much; and the difference between dryness and moisture is negligible.

Her manners… Well, she’s Mars in Cancer conjunct Propus, the foot of Castor. Toliman, the front hoof of the Centaur, is on the Ascendant, and Algol is on the Descendant. Denebola, the tail of the Lion, is on the Midheaven.

A cold person, but not an easy-going one, and definitely active. But this is not reckless action.

Propus, the foot of the mortal twin, is about consequences of action, and practical handling or things (it has the nature of Mercury and Venus, and the feet is what connects the person to the ground). Toliman also has the meaning of consequence, of practical action, for the same reasons, and being the hoof of Pholos (Chiron is Sagittarius, according to most sources), it is also related to creative problem-solving, applying knowledge to the concrete world.

Denebola, the tail of the Lion, is also related to consequences of action. But, of course, we have Algol on the Descendant, with the symbolism of losing one’s head, and the possibility of learning from battling desires. But it’s not a nice thing to have on the house of the others, especially with that Mars.

What about her wits?

Well, we have Mercury, in a fixed air sign — interested in air, reason, discourse, the intelligible part of the world, in a fixed way. Moreover, it’s retrograde, running away from the terrible (from Mercury’s point of view) sign of Pisces, the mutable waters of desire.

The Moon is in the second phase — fire, action, and, in a cardinal sign, quick… but in the water sign of Cancer, desires again. It has just passed a nasty Saturn-Jupiter opposition, and is about to leave Cancer.

If we could ask her, the Moon would say that staying exactly where she is, not moving forward, nor going back, is an excellent idea.

Mercury would be very clear about not wanting to move forward.

One hates desires, the other loves it, but neither of them wants to leave where they are, they don’t want to move forward.

This peculiar combination must reverberate very strongly in the native, because Mars, the ruler of the Ascendant, is also in Cancer, the sign of desires, but, conjunct the eighth house cusp and in its fall, it would like very much to go back.

A cold temperament with a surprisingly active behaviour, but not reckless, with “consequences” marked all over the chart.

An ambiguous relation to phlegm, a strong tendency for staying where she is, or moving back, and not very confortable in dealing with relationships. An active mind, but not interested in changing.

Besides the positions of the Moon, Mars, and Mercury, other testimonies stand out in her chart.

That close Jupiter-Saturn conjunction, for example. Besides they, together and in Capricorn, meaning a bad thing for the Moon, Saturn rules the second and the third, Jupiter the fourth; they can signify a lot of things, and it’s not easy to decide which is relevant without context.

But I want to talk about another testimony, which has more to do with what made me select this chart.

The Sun is, of course, conjunct the South Node and opposed Pluto. Venus, on the other hand, is conjunct Fortuna and the fifth house. One in the exaltation of the other…

But, by antiscion, Venus falls on Pluto. Which means that these two planets are, by antiscion, opposed each other on the Nodes.

Venus rules the sixth house of diseases, small animals, and servants, and the eleventh house of friends. The Sun rules the ninth, of religion, higher knowledge, and peregrinations.

This woman became a nun. Sister Marie Simon-Pierre entered a monastery early in her life (Mercury, the ruler of the tenth, running away from the desires in Pisces seem fitting)

So, maybe, the Sun means Faith or Religion. But no way to know for sure now — not to mention what Venus might mean.

Anyway.

I chose her because she became famous (sort of). So, let’s take a look atthe previous Eclipse, and note down the points highlighted by the eclipse — the points which, if the native will be famous, are the easiest pathways to notoriety.

There was a Solar eclipse on February the 15th. Here’s the chart:

As it happened so close to her birth, many similarities are not important — for example, the positions of Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn — but there are some interesting things.

First, the position of Mars in the Zodiac is not relevant — but the IC highlighting natal Mars is. It also highlights where Mars is in the natal chart — the eighth house (or the second, hit by the Eclipse MC).

Again, the nodes in the same position are to be expected, and they’re not relevant per se… but Mercury’s there. It does not emphasize the nodes, but what was on them in the birth chart, the antiscial Sun-Venus opposition.

Mercury is itself emphasized by the Eclipse, which falls onto it.

The Ascendant and Venus of the Eclipse highlight the tenth house of the career (and of something else, what we’ll see below).

So: the Sun/Venus opposition (I said the Sun may mean religion or faith), Mars (which may mean either her body, the first house, or her self-undoing, the twelfth), Mercury (we’ll get back to it later), either the eighth or the second, and the tenth.

A thing that unites the eighth, Mars as ruler of the first (her body), and one signification of Venus is: difficult or life-threatening diseases.

Mercury might mean many things, but there are many mercurial diseases, such as things that affect the nerves, and/or impair the hability to speak and move properly.

It is more probable because of one testimony.

The Arabian Part of Necessity and Despair — related to Mercury — is at 10 Virgo, that is, involved in that convoluted Venus-Sun-Fortuna-Pluto-Nodes situation.

So….

If she would become famous, one possibility would be due to an opposition between faith and a mercurial disease that could very well kill her.

And that’s what happened — she suffered from Parkinson’s, prayed for (then just deceased) Pope John Paul II’s intervention, and the disease disappeared.

That’s when the tenth house becomes clearer. It might mean, of course, the tenth house of authority — a miracle from above. But it was a miracle through St. John Paul II’s intervention — a gift (second house) from a ninth-house figure.

This was the (documented) miracle used in his Beatification process.

This is it for now. In the next post, let’s take a look at what happened in that year.

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*Throughout this post, I use the method my teacher, John Frawley, taught me, which is not difficult to find out online in general outline. I am not going to go over the details here, or this post will never end. But I plan on writing more about Temperament, Manners, and Wit at some point.

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I told the astrologer Goritza Svortsan about this chart, and she compared it with St. John Paul’s. I don’t know if I will have time to write about that, but it’s amazing — if you know her, ask her about it.

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A word from our sponsors: here’s the course I taught about Basic Celestial Mechanics.

I am thinking about doing a live course on synastry (Basic relationship delineation in a chart, comparing charts, examples of different kinds of relationships). If you’re interested, let me know

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