Tori's thoughts on Spirituality Well, the good place where I'm going is, I finally understood that I didn't understand what spirituality is. After being around people that have done a Jungian study, the sweat lodges, the this, the that - and we're not talking about just a new age fanaticism. We're talking about very educated and passionate people, whatever, again, that you could sit down and have a conversation with. And yet, some of these people, who I got to know very well in New Mexico, were the most bitter, negative people that I've ever met. Now, they had a lot of information, but that's a whole different thing than knowledge. So it's very different. There's loads of information, and yet the heart connection was gone. Just the acceptance of, well, this is OK that I don't have it resolved. It's OK that I don't have an answer to this, and it's OK that I don't really know what I'm feeling right now. I'm a bit confused. Those things are OK. That's been a new place where I am where I wasn't before, where I thought that there had to be a resolve. [Baltimore Sun - January 1994] I think you conjure up energy, you go to the vortex. That's why certain events happen in certain places. There are reasons why certain breakthroughs happen in certain countries. There are reasons why certain darkness or evil gets generated over and over again in a certain spot. And so I don't assume to know why that is, but I trust it, and go with it. [B-Side - May/June 1996] With Poppa, there was Spirit in all things. You have a relationship with the spirit world or you have nothing. People try and make other people feel bad about getting in touch with their souls and their spirit. You get it a lot, especially in the cynical media. When people cut themselves off from everything except what they can touch, they are cancerous. The sad thing is, that's really evil… evil to yourself. You become the fascist. [Details - August 1998] Those people are waiting on the Apocalypse. But it already happened. The best proof of it are the bad haircuts in the `80s. No kidding: the people are totally alienated from their spiritual and emotional side. That is the real Apocalypse. We're all very close in front of the abyss. In my case it's only some inches. I am that close on the edge of insanity. My only fear is that my fear is bigger than my faith. [Oor (Dutch) - September 18, 1999] t o r i p h o r i a www.yessaid.com
Tori's thoughts on Mythology Even if you don't read history or you aren't interested in anything that happened before the `60s, there are reasons why we think the way we do. There are reasons why people are going crazy right now. (Paraphrasing Joseph Campbell) A culture that doesn't know its mythology is powerless. Some kids show up at my shows crawling out of their bodies. They'd turn their power over to anything; that's 'cause they don't know the tools to go in. [Spin - March 1996]
Tori's thoughts on
Christianity
There has to be a part of us that's either in alignment USTAWIENIE or not alignment with some kind of Divine Law. Now, who am I to quote CYTOWAĆ Divine Law? It's not anything that we have written down on the planet. But we all know that if you take ODBIERAĆ another person's choices away, we've crossed the line. That is the line. And you know, we all know it. Anybody on the street knows it. If they take somebody else's life, or if I slap you for no reason, I've just crossed, I've just taken your choices away. And instinctively INSTYNKTOWNIE we know that. Now, I think a lot of it depends on - no matter how Viking I can get, you know, with my battle axe and stuff, there's something innate WRODZONEGO in my upbringing WYCHOWANIE in this lifetime that was, as far down as it may be, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” The karma that that brings you. If you break divine law, you go against the harmonic structure. [Baltimore Sun - January 1994]
…I think God needed a babe and I wasn't busy. And yes, I feel capable ZDOLNA of telling him a few things because I don't buy the “I'm not worthy” concept. I respect that he was a master teacher, but I'm walking my path. Most people, especially most fundamentalist Christians, don't have their own light. I think I understand very clearly what being your own master is. I haven't mastered that but I thought that's what Jesus was talking about. Any of these organized religions are not teaching about being your own master; they're teaching you how to be mastered. I'm not here to take away what gets them off. I'm like, “Go knock yourself out. If you want to go speak in tongues and shake, hey go for it. But I've got a date with big G, and I think he's got some problems, so we're going to talk about it.” I don't see myself as unworthy of having disagreements with the structure at all. I think it's necessary and I think all the sexual guilt that has been put in Christianity is debilitating. OSŁABIAJĄCY That's how you keep a people divided....
...You know, the greatest problem in Christianity has been the division PODZIAŁ of lust and love - the division of passion and love. People have a very hard time having their baby suck their breast and then sucking their man off later. They have a very difficult problem of being whore and mother in the same household RODZINA, GOSPODARSTWO. There shouldn't be a division of the Magdalene and the Mother Mary. You know, Mary had other kids after Jesus. She “did it.” God forbid, she spread. People have a hard time with these truths. [Nuvo - July 1994]
Let's be honest, religion has not supported women and men exploring all sorts of their sides, their unconscious. It has not been supportive of, you know, go into the places without shame, without blame, without judgment, and just let yourself really see what's cooking in there. [WXRV, Boston - January 30, 1996]
Some people think I need to be arrested. In general, there are extreme responses ODPOWIEDZI to metaphorical works because there's so much room for interpretation. You know, I come from a heavy theological background, my father having his doctorate in theology and both his parents being ministers. Christianity is just one of many mythologies - and it is one of the homecoming POWRACAJĄCE DO DOMU queens, let's face it - so you'll find that within most of us. Whether it's commercials or Disney or whatever, people use mythology to get you to feel guilty or ashamed or strong or afraid. Because I work from that place, it stirs PORUSZA people's innate WRODZONY belief systems. Sometimes they hate me for it, because it's much easier to blame me than admit that they're a pig. [The Georgia Strait - July 18, 1996]
The whole idea about religion is it's an institution that makes you feel like a group, but actually fosters ROZWIJAĆ separateness and hierarchy. So that if you're not part of this, then you don't have anything. America does that. British football does that. Being an Italian male. Being Islamic. So many people have a belief. Almost every culture, every `group' - quote, unquote - has a way it wants to perceive POSTRZEGAĆ things. And when I write songs, the Christians feel that because I'm not speaking the way they would like me to, that I don't believe in God, that I'm not part of the Christian formula. But being a minister's daughter, I know it very well. If you're brought up with parents who are painters, you probably see everything in light and shade. I can smell a rat real quick when someone tries to tell me their way is the way. And see, I don't think my way is the way for everybody. [Rochester Democrat & Chronicle - August 28, 1996]
I think the institutions teach you what to think, not how to think, and I'm a big believer in a person having a choice in how they express their belief. I run into Pentecostals all the time … a lot of them are my friends, and they say, “Tori, I hope you find Jesus.” I say, “How do you know I'm not having a margarita with Jesus tonight at 10 o'clock?” [Roanoke Times Online - October 8, 1996]
You can't change what's made you. Religion is a huge part of why I write the way I write, and why I think the way I think. There are people I know who have become Christians from a different place - because they believe in Christ's teachings. Well, I have no idea what it's like to come through that particular door, because I know the shadow of the Christian church. I can't see Christianity like someone else. [Highlife - May 1998]
Basically, the church is saying that a woman doing the real stuff, the stuff we do, doesn't create special boy prophets. What does that say? Christianity has no penis. Think about it. If we're saying that this deity BOSKOŒĆ gave life through Mary, there's no semenNASIENIE. Where's the penetration? Where's the insertion WPROWADZENIE? Where's the union? There's no man and woman to create this Christ being. Christian men have got to talk about the penis because they've got one, and they're using it. But that's the problem with Christian men - they haven't known where to put it! The shame that they cast on women - “You tempt KUSIĆ us to do this” - that's because they don't think they have the right to put their penis somewhere. So they've taken the sword and gone from country to country, slaughtering people to believe in Christianity. I don't see a lot of “Love your neighbor” when I look at the last 2000 years of Christianity. [Alternative Press - July 1998]
The Christians think they're the only ones - when they say God, it's their God. I don't see the divine force as these religions. I think these are all demigods… I don't hate Christians. I just have a problem with what they haven't claimed - the dark side of Christianity. If Jesus were alive today, he certainly wouldn't be a member of the Christian church, because, in the name of God, there's a lot of blood on the ground. And correct me if I'm wrong, but that isn't exactly “Love your neighbor as yourself.” [Jane - October 1999]
Sometimes I think the Christians really misunderstand. They think I don't like them and… it's not that at all. It's that there has to be a place where you don't dishonor my spirituality and I don't dishonor yours. And this need that a few of the religions have had to no matter what take over, even if they kill - That really isn't “Love your neighbor as yourself” as far as I'm concerned. This is
Tori's thoughts on
Jesus
Doing it with a priest never got me off, they wash it so often. But doing it with Jesus, now that is something else. Most Christian women would be trained to think that even this thought is blasphemous. But I say that's a load of bollix. That's how women are paralyzed, disconnected from the source of their own power, by religion. I've nearly always believed that Jesus Christ really liked Mary Magdalene and that if he was, as he claimed to be, a whole man, he had to have sexual relations with her. So in my deepest, most private moments I've wanted Christ to be the boyfriend I've been waiting for. And a lot of Christian girls have a crush on Jesus. I may have felt guilty at the thought of wanting to do it with Jesus but then I say why not? He was a man. [Hot Press (Ireland) - 1992]
The concept is that Jesus Christ, through the Father, Son and Holy Spirit experienced life - the human form. Well, what I find quite inexplicable NIE WYTŁUMACZALNY is that he could suckle at a woman's breast yet not soil his dinky by having sex! How's he supposed to experience life at the level of his dick, for Christ's sake! That's the Church's core denial of sexuality, right there, alongside OBOK the idea that Mary could give birth without “doing it.” It's absurd. So when I say I want to “do it” with Jesus Christ it's not just that I want to sexualize Jesus, bring him down to our level, I want to breathe the earth into his lungs. He came from Heaven and we, as women, come from the earth. So it's the idea of soil beneath the fingers, the notion of, “If this blood is sacred, then drink it.” That's what it's all about. [Hot Press (Ireland) - February 23, 1994]
What Jesus was really saying was, “It is within you.” There are things that I would disagree with Jesus about - and I feel really good about that. That's how it should be. Respect Him to go His way and I'll do my thing. I mean, if you want to go and sit out in the desert for 40 days, knock yourself out. But I'm going to go and get some pizza. And I'm not less of a person because of it. I'll help old ladies across the street, too. There is a level where humans have been taught that they are so unworthy and incapable. What I try to inspire in my work is that we are capable. That energy force is within, and we're all connected to it. I believe completely in the Great Spirit. I'm not a part of institutionalized religion because it's a controlling force that just keeps you powerless, and it keeps you away from what's really going on. You're just plasma walking around making a lot of noise. [Illinois Entertainer - August 1994]
Oh, it's all so damn silly. What, like we're supposed to believe Jesus didn't have sex? Come on. And his teachings are supposed to be less valid PRZEKONUJĄCE because his dinky had a sleeping bag somewhere. It's ridiculous.
I'm not interested in anybody on this planet who wants to scare me into thinking that my soul is in jeopardy. It has absolutely no effect on me… You know, Paul Bowles's writings, he reduces a person to his barest, he breaks them down to their most human level, and shows you how easy it is. Anybody can make you do stuff to yourself. But if there's an acceptance of yourself, then no matter what anybody does to you, you can say, “I'm doing the best I can,” and of course I'm gonna scream if you stomp on my toe, but so what? What have you proved?
I can't have discussions about it anymore, I just can't. When someone asks me if I've found Jesus, I say, “Yeah, I saw him at a Nirvana concert a couple of years ago.” It's like, Jesus has got things to do, he's got a ten o'clock. He's not going to fix things for me, I have to fix things for myself, so I try and have a sense of humor about it and nobody finds my humor very amusing. We've just got to lighten up on the savior bit, folks. You know, get off the cross, we need the wood. [Spin - October 1994]
I was sitting there with my parents last Christmas Eve, hearing all these songs about Jesus. I began to see how the world has viewed his birth - with that came the death of the goddess. To me, he was part of the goddess - peace, love. Christian mythology is so rich. Before they changed the Catholic ceremony there was much more metaphor, but the whole idea of the `son' of God came and there was no place for the Goddess. Yet with what Jesus taught, there was a complete balance of male and female in his being. [Making Music - January 1996]
If I weren't a preacher's daughter, I could see myself starting the New Order of the Nazarenes. But I saw the shadow of the Christian Church, and the problem with all religions, especially the big four, is they don't choose to look at their shadow, their dark side. So I'm a real little vigilante against all that. And it's something so deep within my being, it's in every cell of my body. I think there are some really great things in Jesus' teaching, but Jesus is nothing to do with what has been created. [Request - June 1998]
The Christians think they're the only ones - when they say God, it's their God. I don't see the divine force as these religions. I think these are all demigods... I don't hate Christians. I just have a problem with what they haven't claimed - the dark side of Christianity... If Jesus were alive today, he certainly wouldn't be a member of the Christian church, because, in the name of God, there's a lot of blood on the ground. And correct me if I'm wrong, but that isn't exactly “Love your neighbor as yourself.” [Jane - October 1999]
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Tori's thoughts on the Virgin Mary & Mary Magdalene I do believe that we all are, fundamentally, divided creatures. Emotions split from intellect, spirit from flesh and far too often sexuality is disconnected from what we feel, and are, as total human beings. But how, for example, can anyone have an understanding of the virgin if they don't also have an understanding of the prostitute, the saint and sinner in one body? Attempting to reconcile these opposing forces in my own nature is my goal and what I write about in songs like Precious Things, and all the songs on Little Earthquakes… I do have a real commitment to the female, the feminine, the goddess side of my own nature. I am Mary, the mother of god and the Mary Magdalene figure now. [Hot Press (Ireland) - 1992] Of course, I believe they [Jesus & Mary Magdalene] were together. Of course, I believe they were a couple and she understood things. She represents the goddess, the female, the feminine, the joining, and the equality. [Access - February 1994] Mary was our role model in the Christian church, and we're talking about a woman that was a sexless being in the teachings. I think we can see what that's going to do to a whole culture. Pieces get cut out so that certain cultures can control it, and what got cut out in the Christian church was the sexuality and the passion. The shadow side of that was Mary Magdalene, who we've always been taught was a whore because that's the camp I was in. But why did I have to be divided from the two Marys? Shouldn't it be about the balance? It should be about a wholeness, but it's about division. [Creem - March 1994] Some women have said to me, “I can't believe you've made God a woman,” and it's like, “OK genius, leave the room, think for five minutes, go over your history, come back in the room and you tell me who has been the pope for the past few years. You tell me who's been ruling institutional religion: males, patriarchy and a male God.” The female Goddess who has been our role model has been the Virgin Mary, a sexless being. Now even though the Virgin Mary had kids later on, nobody wanted to talk about that when I was growing up, nobody wanted to talk about the Magdalene. Nobody wanted to talk about Mary's true role. And people don't really think about how that affected an entire planet, to have the most populated religion worshipping a sexless being! [B-Side - May/June 1994] There's this denial that the Magdalene was as divine as the Virgin Mary. I absolutely believe that she was the sacred bride of Christ. She was a high priestess and they joined houses. If that had been passed down this would be a different planet right now because the world of women would be so different. [Dazed & Confused (UK) - 1996] I went back to the bloodline of woman, to the Magdalene [to understand what it would take to become a whole woman]. I wanted to know why the blueprint of the Magdalene was not passed down. What was passed down was the whore that wiped Jesus' feet. We skipped the whole phase of the woman - having sexual desire, wisdom, passion. Being an equal to Jesus, in truth. I truly believe that there was a unification there, a representation of the wholeness. Man with his masculine and feminine in balance; woman with her feminine and masculine in balance. Two whole beings, joined together. The blueprint. There's work from the past from other writers that have gone into this, particularly when you go back over a hundred years ago. And that was the beginning of the journey. [The Baltimore Sun - January 21, 1996] When I would ask about Mary Magdalene, it was very clear that she was not a respected figure. And that always felt kinda weird to me, like, what are these guys so afraid of? And what are these old bags, these old women, so afraid of about the Mary Magdalene? What did she have that scares the poop out of them? And as I got older, I started to understand. She had, I really believe, this wholeness. You know, she wasn't about the Virgin or the Divine Mother -- bless her -- but it was about being a woman. You know, maybe a high priestess. Not the whore, but in her own right very much an equal to Jesus, more than some kind of, you know, "He saved her butt." I get so tired of that because I think that, you know, in the Christian side of things, in other religions, it's never about, you know, the women having that kind of wholeness, the women being able to explore these different sides. So I really think the Magdalene represented that, and nobody talked about that, so there were a lot of wars over chicken Sunday dinners, yeah. [WXRV, Boston - January 30, 1996] I looked inward for answers - and to find the female. I was looking for the blueprint of women that wasn't in Christianity. You see, the Magdalene's blueprint wasn't passed down. The blueprint of the Virgin Mary - and the Mother Mary - was passed down, but not woman as independent prophet/priestess on her own. Strike the word prophet - woman/priestess, passion, compassion - that's how I view the Magdalene, not the whore who wiped Jesus' feet. any scholars believe that her true role was never acknowledged because of the threat that it would cause. Christianity - and other religions, but I'm speaking of that right now because I grew up in it - did not pass this down. Naturally, I think there's a fragmentation in the Christian myth - there is no myth of the woman without being associated through the man - or through the sex - whether she's a virgin or a mother. She's a virgin before the son of God is born and then she's a mother after he's born. Whether Mary Magdalene was the wife of the son - to me, Mary was truly the female representation of God. [Aquarian Weekly - February 21, 1996] People make statements about “this unicorn shit” and don't realize that “this unicorn shit” was a secret code that millions of people were killed for. The gangs could learn a few things. [She's referring to history that survived through symbolism in tapestries and literature.] If you weren't toeing the Catholic line at the time, then you were a heretic. I'm trying to reconstruct some of these falsehoods. One of the greatest lies that has been told, the lie about the sacred bride and the sacred bridegroom. [Originally, Jesus was the sacred bridegroom, but the bride - goddess - was wiped out of the history by the founders of Christianity - making Mary Magdalene a whore instead of a priestess and taking away the Madonna's sexuality.] There's not a sacred bride in our culture. We kind of skulk off into the darkness to fulfill these sides of ourselves. We get tied up or defecated on because we've judged our true desires as women so harshly. If the bride had been acknowledged, there would have been honor of the Feminine. There wouldn't have been patriarchy as we know it or matriarchy. There would have been balance. There are reasons why we think the way we do. There are reasons why people are going crazy right now. A culture that doesn't know its mythology is powerless. Some kids show up at my shows crawling out of their bodies. They'd turn their power over to anything; that's because they don't know the tools to go in. [Spin - March 1996] I was really drawn to the bloodline of womanhood. Mary Magdalene, the idea of the Magdalene having been a blueprint; not the Virgin or the Divine Mother but Woman - high priestess, not just the chick that washed Jesus' feet with her tears. I've been reading some books that figure she was a high priestess of the Isis cult in Jerusalem. It became a major journey, going into the shadows and playing with those different sides of woman. [Keyboard - April 1996] They hold this in a secret way, but you know, Mother Mary had other kids besides Jesus. She was enjoying herself. She had a life that no one wants to talk about. [Shift - April 1996] A lot of scholars believe that she was, in her own right, a High Priestess. People believe that Mary Magdalene became the High Priestess when Jesus was being crowned “King” of the Jews. The weave of Magdalene represented woman. Not virgin, not mother, but woman - which wasn't passed down. Certain fragments have been lost, theologically. There are secrets in the blood that get passed down. [Vox - May 1996] I was singing in Christmas services [in 1994]; I was with my parents. I was watching the Nativity, and after a while I said to myself, “Wait a minute. There's something wrong here.” We were singing Away In A Manger … I started to wonder who, with everybody speaking of the baby Jesus, should come up to the cradle. And I found that, of all people, I wanted to have a chat about it with Mohammad, because the Prophet is the one who supposedly knows the Law. So I decided that they needed to talk about the Law - the Law of the Feminine that had been castrated with the birth of Christ. I believe that Magdalene was the Savior's bride, the High Priestess. And that blueprint - the compassion/passion, wisdom, wholeness. But this blueprint was not a structure that one could relate to Woman - until now. Think about it. It's just been uncovered in the past twenty-some years. Even though women have been given power to be heads of corporations, we're talking about not just power within the hierarchy but access to the different fragments that make up the whole of Woman. Sometimes I kind of chuckle to myself when I hear some girl saying, “Who cares about Mary Magdalene? That's over and done with.” And I'll watch her as she needs to seduce the men in the room and play the little girl, do the pedophile dance, do the things girls have done for centuries to get power from the outside instead of power from the inside. Yet so many of these girls will come to me with tears in their eyes and scratches all over their wrists from self-mutilation, and I'll say, “I actually do understand the obsession to be difficult.” … You know you will not gain strength from this path. You just need energy from an outside source because you don't know how to access it for yourself. [Musician - May 1996] Many scholars believe that Mary Magdalene was a high priestess who came from the cult of Isis. She wasn't this “anything for a fiver, honey.” She was a peer to Jesus. [Curve - September 1996] I always felt attracted to Mary Magdalene, with her mystical, “sinful” and unbelievable power. The separation between the two Marys in Christianity always fascinated me. The mother Mary, the virgin, is cut off from her sexuality. She stands for the spiritual. Mary Magdalene is cut off from her wisdom. She stands for sexuality. And I remember the ministers around our table at Sundays. When the name Mary Magdalene fell, a shiver went through them. They didn't know how fast they could change the subject to Mother Mary. Cause the fact that a woman can be holy and a horny cunt couldn't get through the minds of those Calvinists. That's why I try to combine those two Marys together. I marry the Marys, so to speak. That's my part of my alchemy. [Oor (Dutch) - September 18, 1999] …The two Marys were divided, the Magdalene and the Mother Mary - divided in the psyche. So, the Mother Mary… the way I see it and the way I think a lot of mythology people that I respect see it is that she was severed from her sexuality, the Mother Mary, and the Mary Magdalene was severed from her spirituality and her wisdom. So, there's a division here - of almost this circumcision of women - Christian women have had to work through for the last 2000 years, and I feel the control that's really gone on. You know this whole thing of “divide and conquer,” it's a joke really. Divide and conquer what, a village? No, divide and conquer a person with themselves, that's control. Then, you think you have to go through these people for some kind of soul purification, some kind of acceptance and forgiveness, and I'm like, “no, no.” The Christian god can sit over there, and we can have a chat, and he can do stuff I can't do, I'm only a woman. But no, there's got to be respect that I'm a woman, he's multi-dimensional. But, I don't see the Christian god for me as the Divine Being. I think there are a lot of gods in a lot of cultures that have things to say, and some of them I disagree with, and some of them I think have a lot of deep truth. [Charlie Rose (PBS) - October 19, 1999] I have a lot of love for witchy stuff. I do have a lot of friends, especially in New York - you know that whole North-East thing going on - that are very involved in Wicca. But I'm just a woman who believes in a lot of mythologies. There's a lot of truth in what a lot of my witch-friends talk about, and I hold them to be truths. I'd be a Dionysian waitress - that's my scene. I am into all of that, and I have a lot of time for Jesus, but I think he probably was turned out by Mary Magdalene, and I think from the things I've read it seems as though she was more akin to a High Priestess in the Isis tradition. So, if we go into that side of it, I believe that there are a lot of things that have been hushed up and hijacked by the big three - Judaism, Christianity and Islam. And I don't want to talk about the Buddhists, because I don't know enough about them to talk about them. I just know that anybody who had the little women, wrapping their feet and breaking their feet, they should eat the toe-jam from that. Literally. I think everyone has a shadow, and the pagan side really believes in the shadow, but it gets so convoluted and mixed up in the Satanic thing, when - as we know - a lot of people conjure at the dark side of the moon, which is what I talk about in “Suede.” I do a bit of my own conjuring, but not to take somebody's power away. It's to not take somebody's power away… I don't believe in Mary the Virgin - I do believe that that's what they needed to do, to take her sexuality away. I believe in her, but I don't believe that she was a virgin who had a child. It's not a dirty thing to bust your cherry. Do you know the word “virgin” originally from the Latin, does not exactly mean “no sex” - it's a different word, it was brought to the sexual. When you talk about the pagan or religious side of it, some of the scholars that I have read believe that Mary, the Mother, was a Virgin priestess who had a wedding to the Godhead, who was represented by a male from a different sect, and that he was killed so the blood was given to the land, so there wouldn't have been a male there. So, she would have got pregnant by the sperm, by seed, and my argument to everybody is, is she any less pure if she weren't a virgin? …The Christian religion, you know, it's dickless, it has no penis, because when a penis didn't create Jesus, that really takes a lot away from you guys. I think whatever people's spiritual beliefs are, the whole sexuality/spirituality issue, that is my passion. Marrying the two Marys, the Magdalene and the Mother. The Mother Mary's sexuality was stripped from her in the myth, and Mary Magdalene's wisdom and spirituality were stripped from her, and so we're divided into these two Marys in the Western Christian world. And it has really been my passion to unite the two Marys, inside my own mind, inside my own heart, inside my own pussy. [Record Collector - November 1999] t o r i p h o r i a www.yessaid.com
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Tori's thoughts on God Within the Christian/Muslim/Islamic/Jewish/Buddhist/Hindu structure, there are truths that I believe in. But I come much more from the Native American matriarchal thing. I don't belive in God in the way it works all over the world. [Q - February 1996] He, the concept of God, my concept of the creator, isn't male or just female. “Just” is the key word here. It's an energy. It's a force that doesn't exclude any kind of gender. You know, I think it's so beyond gender. But what we've been taught to believe is that God, whether in Christian or Judaism or Islamic or many of the others, it's a very male, patriarchal system. And you know, this patriarchal system hasn't done so great in the last few thousand years. I mean I don't know how we can say that it's succeeding. I think that we've got to kinda look at really where we are. Things aren't getting better. I don't know. I don't see why people are uncomfortable just to speak the truth. And if God did want to send his - quote unquote - “only son,” which is a joke. What do you mean, “only son?” It's like, so he picks a certain race and a certain kind of color to be his only son, and yet created all of us. No, that's not gonna happen. That's how the story goes, but I don't believe the story. I call that god the little g. Because the god that we've been - quote unquote - “worshiping” is not, to me, the supreme creator. Anybody who needs to control and make people feel shamed and, you know, has to... This is the whole thing. It's like, “I send my only begotten son.” Well, you know, that concept of sending a son, where we, as women, could, like, breastfeed him and give him milk, but he's not gonna soil his dinky with us. What's that all about? That really bugged me. The whole concept that Jesus was, you know, not gonna make it with a babe. What, that's gonna make him more holy? [Tea with the Waitress - Promo interview cd, 1994] The notion of God as a male force is definitely not how I see things. Because that male force is the Christian God who says, “We are Christians and we love our neighbors as ourselves as long as they believe in our God. If you do, we won't rape your women, slaughter your children or cut your nuts off” - which was basically the culture of Christianity, with a male figure as its God-head. The God-force must be feminized, perceived more as a God-Goddess. Jesus, his mother, “His church” all must be redefined. Especially a figure like Mary Magdalene, who I and so many Christian women were taught to despise, because she was a prostitute. Because of that we had great problems coming to terms with the prostitute in ourselves, which again, is something the Church teaches us to deny. That prostitute in woman is someone who is worthy of honor and respect because she comes from a long line of Goddesses who understood the balance between the sexual and the spiritual, who carried the Blood Royal. But her positive energy-force has been re-appropriated by the Church and denied. The idea that god is sexless is a brilliant form of control because it means we can never be in the image of God unless we're sexless, too. So, from birth your sexual organs are ripped off in terms of self-respect. The message is “you're scum” if you partake in sex. But we, as women and men, are not “scum” and we are not sexless beings. We are a blend of the spiritual and the physical and to deny either aspect of our nature is like trying to walk on one leg. Nor are women, in particular, simply incubators for patriarchal power structures such as marriage, society, the Church. Patriarchy isn't working. Any fool can see that. And, again, it all comes back to the question of being divided within ourselves. The Church depends on our sense of dislocation from ourselves because the spiritual body is made to feel ashamed of the physical body. That was part of my problem, even before the rape. But now I question this concept of “purity.” What does “loving purely” mean? To me, now, “pure” is all things. It means the deepest, darkest, dirtiest concept with that flashlight on it, with no judgment being made. Whereas when I, as a “good Christian girl,” judged part of myself to be “bad” I cut it out, as I explained earlier. So I have been severed from the physical side of myself in that sense too, as have many Christian women. But now I'm trying to realign myself in a way that reflects the true life-force from here to here [her hand moves from her head through her heart to her vagina]. People may say I'm obsessed with sex, but what I'm really obsessed with is this idea of realignment of making myself whole again. [Hot Press (Ireland) - February 23, 1994] I think Grandma [Addie Allen Amos] was looking for what I'm looking for, which is wholeness. But her way of going about it was to try to make other people acknowledge their sin, and take out parts of themselves that she thought were sinful. To get to God. But what I want to get to is every part of myself. Because god/goddess is in everything that makes me up. And I don't believe for one minute that we can't heal ourselves. We can. Jesus even said that. [Creem - March 1994] People see God as they want to, then use the controlling boundaries… laid down the law when it suited them. Burn the witches when it suited them, make a woman feel bad about herself when it suits you because maybe other women in the church are jealous of her… or a man who doesn't feel like he can get her, so he slanders her and makes her feel terrible. [B-Side - May/June 1994] Hey, God's my boyfriend. Don't you think He totally loves that? Come on - the patriarchy's doing a terribly rotten job, and I don't know anyone else who's willing to cut God up a cantaloupe and say, “Hey, sit down, put your feet up, you need some advice.” You have to have a bit of confidence to do that. You have to stop a minute and say, “I'm not buying this trip that humans aren't worthy of talking to the gods.” [Illinois Entertainer - August 1994] Do you believe in organized religion? No. Why? There has to be a hierarchy. I'm not interested in hierarchy. I'm not interested in being a part of it on either level - the controlling side or being controlled. It's about no control. What's your spiritual belief? I believe in life force and that we can all tap into it. It's there for anybody and everybody. We're all a part of it. [KSCA 101.9FM, Los Angeles - February 9, 1996] The feminist part of God has been circumcised out of all religions. God is a patriarchal force, a very masculine energy, with the feminine having been subservient; either being the mother, the lover, the virgin, but never the equal, never to have the whole. [Miami Herald - April 12, 1996] Presently I'm looking very hard for the gold in God. If you take a look at his career, he's got some rather nasty things to answer for. If I would meet a little crying boy I would tell him a story about dragons, take him outside to play. If that same boy is fifty years old, I would do exactly the same. In short, it would be good if God one day heard my story about dragons and came out to play with me. Maybe this brings me closer to the gold in God. At the same time I'm enormously fascinated by the dark side of the human spirit. My own spirit that is, because it's the only one with an Access All Areas sticker on it. [Oor (Dutch) - April 18, 1998] I believe in the Great Spirit. I believe Mohammad exists; I believe in Buddha; I believe in Aphrodite; I believe in Rhiannon. All these beings exist. But the Christian God - he's a bit cheeky. I do hang out with him a lot, and I bring my grievances to him. Everybody has their relationship with the divine, and all these beings are part of the divine. But we are, too. We're all trying to learn our gig. A god is only a god. They're not a woman, and they don't know what a woman feels. Of course, I think gods can desire human women, and I think goddesses can desire human men. There is that need for exchange. The hierarchy is the problem - even with deities. This is just that deity's gig. They're a deity, and they might know more stuff, but what I'm feeling at this moment in this girl's body is valid. [Alternative Press - July 1998] When people talk about God, then most western people mean the Christian God. And when you're being raised in a family that just is convinced that this God is the only true one, then it really exists to you. So, to me He exists. God is drinking a margarita up there at this moment, I'm sure of that. But I don't think of Him as divine. I believe in the spiritual world. To me that world is as real as you sitting in front of me. This is mostly because of my Cherokee grandpa, who had an enormous influence on my life. I find the divine mostly in non-western and age-old cultures, especially from the Native Americans. [Oor (Dutch) - September 18, 1999] t o r i p h o r i a www.yessaid.com
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Tori's thoughts on Lucifer [I went on a journey] To visit Father Lucifer, to have a moment to dance... to go down in the dark, to visit with the dude. Not these little prince of darkness wannabes. Some of them are cute, but to visit the real energy force that has held the darkness, you go there with honor. And that takes a very big heart to hold the place of shadow… When I went to Lucifer I learned many things. And I am not talking about Satanism. That's the distortion of those who can't really claim the dark so they become evil because they are not really claiming their shadow. So we claim our shadow... Then we pick up pieces as we go. [B-Side - May/June 1994] I've always said that Lucifer understands love better than anybody. You know he's done a mean tango with Greta Garbo a few times. Really understanding love is the only way you get to the dark side of things. [Keyboards - November 1994] I just want to say, I think Lucifer has a very rough job. And I think he's tired of it. That's what I've been told anyway. And what I hear is that, um, you know, he's a little tired of holding this space... for mankind/womankind. All our shit that we don't claim, he's holding it. He's like a big sewage dump. He's really bummed. [UCLA speech - March 1995] I've been taking tea with Lucifer. I mean I've truly spent time with Lucifer, the energy of Lucifer. So when I sing, “Father Lucifer, you never looked so sane,” I truly went to those places. I'm talking about the shadow side, the secrets of the unconscious. It's about claiming in ourselves what we hate in other people. [Dazed & Confused (UK) - 1996] To be 100% creative, you have to find a way to gain access to the darkest sides of your soul. It's a sort of a backward path that can lead you out of the hellfire. But to achieve this, you ought to sit down in front of Lucifer, and have a tea with him. [Musica - 1996] When I say Lucifer, I'm talking about the feelings that we hide from ourselves [not something that's twisted and evil, like during the Inquisition when they used Christianity to torture people. That's Satanism.] I went to go visit Lucifer to get my talisman, which means my little magic key that took me to the places that I hadn't let myself go... Dark is not a scary thing if you go in there understanding there is a purity in Darkness. There's also a lot of distortion in Darkness. It's a choice where you want to go, and I wanted to get to the truth, not to the drama and to keeping me from the truth. [Modern Rock Live (radio) - February 5, 1996] I wanted to marry Lucifer... Even though I had a crush on Jesus. Lucifer was the brother holding the space for mankind/womankind to act out their fears and hidden secrets, things they won't acknowledge. That's what the shadow is, the side that's been denied, and once you don't deny your shadow anymore then it's not a perversion of that energy source. I don't consider Lucifer an evil force. We can all tap into that free-running current of distorted energy. Some of my girlfriends - liberal London girls - had a problem with the idea that I was writing a song called “Father Lucifer.” One of them heard it and cried and said, “You made him so beautiful,” and I said, “What if he is beautiful?” Shadow defines light. The shadow is where I hang out a lot because I like chasing and diving with those forces... Although I think my mom would like to tag along and have a dance with him because she's been a minister's wife for so long. But this is not Hollywood's view of Lucifer. [Spin - March 1996] You ask any girl on the planet, you know, just the idea of dancing a tango with Lucifer - and he dances wonderfully, and just gives you a wonderful kiss, has a delicious honey taste of Bordeaux. I mean, come on, it doesn't get any better than that... [Fanzine (French TV) - March 6, 1996] I was taking drugs with a South American shaman and I really did visit the Devil and I had a journey. [VH1 Storytellers - October 24, 1998] t o r i p h o r i a www.yessaid.com
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Tori's thoughts on the Afterlife I think if you have any bit of intelligence at all, you have to figure that living this little life just doesn't get you to sit with Jesus and discuss. I mean, it's about soul-growth, as far as I'm concerned. You keep just traveling around and matter keeps reforming, and that just makes a lot of logical sense. [KROQ, Los Angeles - February 9, 1996] I don't know how it works, to be honest with you. I'm sure somebody's got it figured out. I'm open to possibilities. Say a truck hit me tonight. Say a Haagen Daz truck or something. I can't possibly believe that I'm ready to sit down and hang out with Jesus and have a cappuccino and chat. Nor do I think he would ever stop growing. Being able to be on this planet is an incredible gift because we can act out things. It's where you can put into a body, consciousness. When you're flying around and stuff, and you don't have to eat, and you don't have to know what a rock and roll god is like, you have a whole different set of problems. You don't have avarice. You're not jealous. Maybe you're jealous because her wings are prettier than mine. I think your whole vision is different and here when you can get lost so easily, which is so perfect because there are so many distractions: people's opinions of you, are you someone people would want to invite to a party, you know all of those things. Did your peers respect you? Those things are such great gifts because they show you if you watch and I watch how we react to things, that's where we really know where we stand. I think human beings are so much more capable of what they told us we're capable of. We're really so much more capable of... who knows? Maybe being in a few places at the same time. If time really doesn't exist, like they all say. If you can be in multi-dimensional realities, like they talk about. We go, Oh God, how can you talk about that? You know, they said that when the world was flat. And there were civilizations, the Incans, the Mayans, the Native Americans, they were existing. They didn't know about them in Italy. It's really perception, I think. [Pepperdine interview - March 22, 1994] t o r i p h o r i a www.yessaid.com
Tori's thoughts on
Emotions & Grief
Emotions are very simple. I don't find them complex at all, to be quite honest. The girl who got laughed at, or the girl who was laughing at the girl: You're one or the other, my friend. Or there is one other option: You're the girl who's trying to divert attention so you don't get laughed at, and you're trying to stay friends with the girl who's laughing at the other girl. That's where I was; I think that's where most girls are. You're trying to stay friends with the girl who's laughing at the other girl so you won't become the girl getting laughed at. That's cowardice. I write about being in those shoes, because it calls up those things in us. [Keyboards - November 1994]
Sad wears these gorgeous high-heels, and you can hang out with her, and she's got some funny jokes, too. And once you get to know her, then you're totally free. [WBCN, Boston - January 30, 1996]
I'm not afraid of grief. You might cry, you might even cry so much that there are no more tears left inside of you that you feel you've become dry, but still your grief lets you make decisions and lets you grow as a person. Everything depends upon how you handle it, if you accept your grief, your loss and your mourning or if you try to push it away. I think you have to live through it, that's my personal belief, because it has consequences. [The Inside Connection - June 1998]
Tori's thoughts on
Healing & Growing
To work through a victim situation, it's about facing the attacker in yourself, tearing away all the layers and wondering if you could have made other choices there. Other women who've been attacked will argue, but I have to look at all sides of it, and that's healing.
We're taught which sides of our personalities are acceptable and which aren't. The magical side, the naive side, the side that believes in possibilities other than you grow up, take a job, form a place in society and then go to heaven, except for mean old Hitler, no one wants to talk about that. [Manchester Guardian - November 28, 1991]
I think there's so much emphasis on pushing things away, instead of pulling them out of the closet. A lot of times I just notice that people try to hide their dirt for as long as possible. Monsters, dirt, whatever you want to call it, the stuff that you censor and that you don't really want to share with people. I think you can only do that for so long before you start losing your mind. I'm finding a lot of freedom right now in just looking at things that I really feel. We're not encouraged to do that, and I think that that's what makes people sick inside of themselves. You kind of want everybody else to think that you're okay. Well, you're okay if you have monsters! That's what people don't understand-everybody has many many voices going on inside of themselves. Now there is one voice, though, that is more of the ringleader, more of the innermost voice that isn't trying to beat you up, or trying to make you feel like you can go slaughter 67 people and it's okay. You know, the voice in there that goes, “hang on a minute, Tori, we're really feeling lonely right now.” That inner inner voice is, to me, the most important because it can start being a bridge between all these other voices in your head. Everybody has them.
After the shows, everybody talks to me about how they're pulled in different directions. A lot of times there doesn't have to be conflict, it's just we're not giving attention to different sides of ourselves. You see, you've got a masochist side that has to be met in some way. You need to look at why you need to be hurt, and why you get some kind of pleasure out of it. Then you need to go and give equal time to the part of you that's a sea captain, you see what I mean? The one that sails the ship, and can bring it home, and isn't needy. We have all these different sides, and they just go out of balance! That's what I meant by that. [Michael Pearce interview - 1994]
There is room for everybody on the planet to be creative and conscious if you are your own person. If you're trying to be like somebody else, then there isn't. [Q (UK) - May 1994]
Some people are afraid of what they might find if they try to analyze themselves too much. But you have to crawl into the wounds to discover what your fears are. Once the bleeding starts, the cleansing can begin. [Break - August 14, 1996]
I guess I enjoy good black comedy, and I think life is really like that. Ideas that hold people back, or ideas that become like rockets that you put on your arms and take you, take you where, I don't know. But I think that a lot of us are trapped in our limitations. But limitations come from not physical limitations but I think internal limitations. We have perceptions of ourselves that we took on from other people's opinions of us which formed the way we see ourselves. That doesn't necessarily mean that's who we are. I think most people are trapped in these opinions and wear them like a hefty bag. And we almost asphyxiate ourselves with other people's ideas of who we are. I don't know if you could call this being serious. I see it more as an explorer. I see myself as an explorer asking questions, not necessarily having many answers.
I think you have to know who you are, get to know the monster that lives in your soul, dive deep into your soul and explore it. I don't want to renounce my dark side. The truth has always held an enormous interest for me. Everything is therapeutic, no matter what you do. [The Inside Connection - June 1998]
In the end everybody wants to get rid of their demons and find inner peace? I don't want to get rid of my demons. Do you understand me? That's the difference. You only can find inner peace when you live with your demons. It is even impossible to get rid of them. Jesus wouldn't have spent 40 days and nights in the desert if he hadn't demons. Theoretically impossible. That is the lie Christianity makes. That you have to get rid of the Devil and sin. My God, then you give away all your powers! I'm just like Faust, baby, just take a seat. When you're gonna dig in your shadow patterns, you find a part of yourself you could call the Wicked Mother or the Evil Queen. Well just talk to her. Make a deal with her. Cause she's part of your life. People who think they've gotten rid of their demons are gonna do crazy things for compensation. They're gonna do weird, kinky sex games. Sniffing the underwear of little girls. And those guys think they're rid of their demons. No! You have to dance with your demons, raise them. When you get to know your demons you grow as a person. I'm beginning to know mine... [Oor (Dutch) - September 18, 1999]
There has to be a balance... I don't see dark as evil and light as good. I see it as the unconscious, things hidden that you have to see. The reason I say the Christian church has to claim its dark side is because so many civilizations have been destroyed in the name of Christ. I don't believe for one minute that his teachings were about destruction at all. People harnessed Christ's teachings. The Protestants have so much guilt to come to terms with... Those in the patriarchy making these decisions have been really terrified of holding the spiritual side and the physical side of themselves. There is a line in Zero Point, where I sing, “Take off, lift off, creaming Jesus still.” To me, if you are really in the balanced state, you are creaming the divine. [Pulse - November 1999]
t o r i p h o r i a
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