There are a couple of configurations formed by this Lunar event, and a smattering of other combos worth noting as contemporaneous influences, all under the sensitive Cancer Moon. The Moon ‘meets’ the Earth at 27 Cancer 50 on the 17th at 3:48 PM PST. A Full Moon in Cancer should be a culmination of feeling or intuitive knowing–but of course, once one knows what one feels, one must act.

How do we see that energy channeled? For one, it may scoot along a somewhat loose Finger of God, with Full Moon sextile Sedna-Ceres in Taurus, apex Mars in Sagittarius. This may seem odd, but this suggests to me revelations about what we care about/ how we feel that are prompted or induced by diet of sustenance availability/ weather/ natural events and our intuitive understanding of the message they carry. This pushes us to act on what we know, on ‘the facts’, or on our beliefs–so the emotions and intuition power a kind of engine of faith that drives our inner knowing out into the world so that we may do what it urges us to.

The Full Moon opposes Pluto, Juno, and of course, the Sun, and this is part of a Mystic Rectangle, with the Lunar end as noted sextile Sedna-Ceres, and the Solar end widely sextile the South Node–and so drawing the North Node into the Sedna-Ceres end of the configuration. A Mystic Rectangle promises that the various components are in position to work exceptionally well with one another, and so offers a sum greater than its individual parts. Here we may see that the ‘caring revelations’ we receive with the Lunar event are directly 1) opposite of the matters where we’ve been putting our attention (the Sun), 2) not as destructive or transformative as we may have been telling ourselves, 3) and not as empowering or disempowering as we’ve believed. What we’re shown is the way our fresh understanding under the Full Moon liberates us from certain notions we’d previously carried; things are not as scary, intimidating, debilitating, or serious as they seem, and they either allow us more agency, or at least don’t take our current agency away, as we’d feared.

The Mystic Rectangle employs all the knowledge we’re not conscious of, especially what we’ve gleaned from the past, marries it to our sense of personal authority and responsibility, and gives us power that will effectively shape the future. Now that’s not scary at all, is it? We’re in charge–if we are comfortable with taking on a role that accepts our own power, particularly the power to direct our own course.

We also should note the close conjunction of Neptune and Pallas in Pisces=the ideals, creativity, and spirituality are the conduits for both what’s wise and what’s practical–listen to that inner voice. There is also a T-square with Eris in Aries opposed Zeus in Libra, the arm Juno in Capricorn=when we don’t understand our own potential for authority and power (whether we over- or underestimate our capacity), we end up attracting all the sh*t stirrers every time we go after what we want–so if people seem to be popping out of the woodwork and giving you problems, it’s time to reassess your own abilities and roles. Both these situations offer context and influences active when the Lunar event occurs.

All other contacts are not only past, they’re well past, so we need to look at one other thing: the Sabian symbols. For the Full Moon in Cancer we have: ‘An Indian Girl Introduces Her White Lover To Her Assembled Tribe’. This is more than just an image of a couple from two different worlds, creating a bridge via personal relationship, with one side having first contact with the larger world of the partner, the one from which she came, the one that shaped her; this is an image that emphasizes status differences we may not at first recognize or think of. We’re instead attuned to Love, to see them as two individuals, viewing it as a ‘Love conquers all’ scenario. But, we must consider when the Sabians were delivered in order to decode this image successfully–and the society into which they were delivered was white-controlled and male-dominated, a social order based on the assumption of cisnormativity, and the inferiority of other races and cultures. When viewed through that lens, there might be a belief that the Indian girl is moving up in the world, or maybe even that this is the very reason for the relationship at all–and that only the white lover is being genuine in his feelings–after all, why would he want to be with someone ‘lesser’, except for his emotional involvement? This is all very ugly, viewed from a 21st century position–but we must be clear: there are still plenty of people who would make these assumptions, would read into the image in this very way–or in other ways, such as believing the white lover was superior for leaving the white world and joining a group they might characterize as living a more ‘natural’ way of life. Possible assumptions and judgments abound and are just waiting to be made by the observer.

I’m interpreting the girl of the image as a Native American. Her entire culture was overrun, decimated, changed forever with the arrival of white invaders. And yet, she falls in love, and brings him home to her family (tribe). But we must ask, how much does the white lover’s superior power position affect the interaction? Is a genuine relationship possible between individuals who have unequal power, autonomy, or privilege? We don’t know if her white lover is a male or a female, but considering the era in which these symbols were formulated, I believe the assumption was definitely that the lover is male. Now, it’s not at all fair to assume that the inherent power imbalance between a member of a subjugated group, who also happens to be of a sex that is also viewed as inferior at the time the image was formulated, and a member of the invaders will necessarily infect the relationship–but each individual will undoubtedly bring lots of assumptions and beliefs and reactionary material into the interaction, at the very least.

So, the symbol brings two ‘messages’ to mind: that it’s not enough to know how all the parties to an interaction feel, we also need to be cognizant of the context in which the interaction is taking place. What’s the bigger framework? The social underpinnings and potential assumptions by the parties? And most important, who holds what power? Does the power imbalance require varied things from the parties? Does it confer privileges to some, penalties, pressures, or restrictions to others?

The other message is this: that there’s always a danger of us superimposing our own framework, beliefs, and assumptions onto a situation, ones that spring from our own cultural teachings, experiences, and ideas about others. We have to be aware of what we’re bringing into our interpretation of any situation. If we are, we’ll have a much better chance of truly understanding what’s really happening before us.

All this suggests the Sabian, in the most general way, is a Rorschach for our own assumptions and beliefs, a warning to make us aware of the lenses we use to view the world. For a Full Moon we also look at the Sun’s degree, as this provides the light of the Moon in the first place. This one is, ‘A Large Aviary’. An aviary is, first and foremost, unnatural, in that it’s a human-created place to keep a creature plucked from Nature. No matter how benevolent, it’s still captivity, a system imposed overall in which living things are expected to function–a lot like the social order and the larger cultural context in which we live, and which provides potential frameworks for interpretation of events, come to think of it.