What in the world is going on?

Astrology is a study of cycles and we are currently at a critical point in one of the most intense and significant cycles there is for planet Earth and her inhabitants, the Uranus-Pluto cycle involving two of the outermost planets in our solar system. What is interesting about cycles, is how themes repeat.

As I write this on March 16, 2015, Uranus and Pluto are forming the last in a series of seven exact squares, the first of which occurred on June 24th 2012. When two planetary energies like Uranus and Pluto form such an angular relationship with one another, it marks that as a very significant period in our history.

Because these planets are so far from the Sun, their cycles are very long. It takes Uranus 84 years to complete one turn around the Sun and Pluto takes 248 years. From an Astrological perspective, the outer planets, due to their slow movement and the length of their cycles, tend to have far-reaching influence that affect human history. When two of them form an aspect, we tend to feel the effects several years before and after the aspect is exact.

The last major aspect between these two planets was a series of three exact conjunctions during 1965-66. This marked the entire decade of the sixties as a period of revolution, rebellion and transformational change.

Anyone who was alive during this period will remember the dramatic events. In the U.S. alone, protest marches, riots, the civil rights movement, feminist movement, the 'hippies', with their call to “make love, not war”....and, of course, the assassinations of JFK, RFK and Martin Luther King. Anti-war protests were often met with violence as happened at Kent State University in 1970. Without the many marches and protests, the Vietnam war likely would have gone on even longer.

The current Uranus-Pluto cycle began with that conjunction in Virgo in 1965-66. Interestingly, the small planet, Chiron, discovered in 1977, has a cycle of approximately 50 years and so it is now in the same part of the zodiac, in Pisces, as it was during the first of those three Uranus-Pluto conjunctions. At that time, Chiron was opposing the Uranus-Pluto conjunction and as Chiron symbolizes deep wounds and issues that need to be healed holistically, much of what happened in the '60s revealed the deep wounds that were suddenly being brought to our conscious awareness.

Echoes of the sixties can certainly be seen in the current period of this Uranus-Pluto square as the issues that were prominent then are again confronting us in no uncertain terms. We have just seen the 50th anniversary of the famous march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama that led to the law ensuring voting rights in the US. While many try to pretend that racism no longer exists, the issue hasn't gone away. Many would point to the fact that there is a black President in the U.S as proof that racism is a thing of the past. However, we will know it is a thing of the past only when there is no mention of the race (or gender) of the Commander-in-Chief if it is something other than white (and male).

In the early '60s Rachel Carson's book, Silent Spring came out warning about the disastrous effects of the use of DDT and other chemicals on our natural environment. It was the first book to raise awareness of the effects of our human activities on the natural world. In the intervening 50 years, we have ignored the warnings in her book and are now reaping the results.

In the 1960's we were just beginning to become aware of environmental issues and now we seem to be on the brink of environmental disaster. People today are marching and protesting the use of pesticides, herbicides and GMOs as well as wars and issues of race and gender equality. Although online petitions seem to be more common than actual rallies, marches or protests, the internet also makes it easier to organize such gatherings and when they happen they draw huge numbers of people. continue to be issues in the headlines.

In light of the current climate of fear that is being used by governments to justify legislation such as the information gathering being done in the US by the NSA and the proposed Bill C-51 here in Canada, which seem to be moving us more and more towards a 'police state', it seems particularly relevant to note that the last time Uranus and Pluto were squaring each other was in the early 1930's, coinciding with the rise to power of Adolf Hitler and his Nazi Party in Germany. That series of five exact squares, the first of which was on April 21, 1932 (the day after Hitler's 43rd birthday), and the last on January 8, 1934.

Like the current Uranus-Pluto square, that one followed very soon after a major economic meltdown, the stock market crash of 1929, which led to the great depression, affecting the global economy. Ben Bernanke (who served two terms as head of the Federal Reserve) is quoted saying the following (in a statement filed on Aug. 22, 2014 with the U.S. Court of Federal Claims): “September and October of 2008 was the worst financial crisis in global history, including the Great Depression...”. While the 'bailout' of the banks may have given the appearance of avoiding a 'great depression', for the many people who are struggling globally as a result of the economic meltdown, there is little difference between the current financial situation and what was happening in the 1930's.

While I was writing this came across this quote from Winston Churchill (House of Commons, 2 May 1935, after the Stresa Conference, in which Britain, France and Italy agreed—futilely—to maintain the independence of Austria):

“When the situation was manageable it was neglected, and now that it is thoroughly out of hand we apply too late the remedies which then might have effected a cure. There is nothing new in the story. It is as old as the sibylline books. It falls into that long, dismal catalogue of the fruitlessness of experience and the confirmed unteachability of mankind. Want of foresight, unwillingness to act when action would be simple and effective, lack of clear thinking, confusion of counsel until the emergency comes, until self-preservation strikes its jarring gong–these are the features which constitute the endless repetition of history.”

So true.