Astrologers take star billing at this gathering

By James B. Meadow, Rocky Mountain News (Contact)

Published May 15, 2008 at 11 p.m.

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Linda McConnell / Special To The Rocky

The conference opened with a Poi Spinning Fire Dance onThursday. Susie Cox represented the sun.

Linda McConnell / Special To The Rocky

New Mexico astrologer Sat Siri Khalsa tries out an infrared sauna, which helps detoxify the body. The sauna was among a number of products vendors were hawking at the United Astrology Conference.

Mercury may be about to retrograde on May 26, and, sure as shooting (stars), Pluto has begun doing its duet with Capricorn. But that's no reason to pass up a little sweat therapy in a Far Infrared Sauna, or rejuvenate your home's air with a Crystal Salt Lamp from the Himalayas, is it?

At least that may have been the mind- set of the 2000 or so astrologers who have aligned themselves at the downtown Sheraton Hotel for the United Astrology Conference 2008: Rockin' the Universe, an event that promoters are touting as the "Olympics of astrology and our own academy awards all rolled into one."

Whether or not that's a bit of astral hyperbole, the fact remains that "This will be the largest gathering of professional astrologers in over 30 years," insists Ray Merriman, president of the International Society for Astrological Research, which is one of the four organizations collaborating to bring about the conference.

And if you don't think that's a big deal, well, think again.

"That these groups could combine their efforts and put this event on is like the Democrats and Republicans putting something on together," says conference spokeswoman and Boulder astrologer Sandra- Leigh Serio.

Of course, it's doubtful that the donkeys and the elephants could conjure up a six-day confab featuring 170 speakers from 45 countries, more than 300 classes/workshops, a musical spoof, a documentary film, or a marketplace chock-full of crystals, clothing, healing products and books.

Even better, while the two political parties are mucking around trying to run an election, come Tuesday eight eminent astrologers will be ready to announce the likely winner more than five months before Election Day.

What's more, do you think either political party bothered to consult the planetary charts before scheduling their conventions?

Well, the UAC brain trust did.

"This particular week we're having is probably the most harmonious combination in the heavens going on within the five-year period 2005 to 2010," says Merriman, explaining that it only made sense to pick the most propitious time - planetarily speaking - to hold the conference.

Go ahead and scoff. C'mon, go ahead. The astrology community expects it.

"We know that astrology is misunderstood, by a lot of people," Serio says. "It still has that kind of voodoo connotation to it."

'Seeing the river of life'

Like most astrologers, Kelly Lee Phipps is resentful of the popular stereotypes that insist he and his colleagues are fortunetellers, charlatans who claim to predict the future. Nothing, he says, could be further from the truth.

"Astrology isn't about predicting the future with a bunch of old hippies burnt out from too many drugs," he says. "It's about seeing the river of life and learning how to flow with the current."

Furthermore, Merriman says, if astrology is so much mumbo jumbo, how come psychiatrist Carl Jung was a devotee?

"All the great astronomers were astrologers," he insists. "Kepler, Copernicus, Ptolemy, Galileo."

So is one ex-football player. That would be Phipps, a 6-foot-3, 265-pound mesomorph who played football at Lafayette's Centaurus High School and one year at the University of Colorado before he decided that he was more interested in planetary alignments than defensive formations.

"It's a rush being here," he says of the conference. "You get to share ideas and be near the brilliance and creativity of so many great astrologers."

Phipps knows a thing or two about brilliant astrologers. Sunday night, the conference will host the premiere of his documentary, The Return of the Magi, in which he interviewed 48 of the world's top astrologers.

Maggie Walker and her veddy British accent will be in the audience for that film.

"It's really an isolating profession," says Walker, who is in her third year at the London School of Astrology, although she's been involved in astrology for 37 years.

"Oh, it's fantastic to be here," she enthuses. "Just imagine the mystical energy that's in this building."

Sat Siri Khalsa sure can. A Sikh who lives in Espanola, N.M., Khalsa says, "It's humbling to be here. I'm honored to be able to share ideas, to network with so many gifted people here."

Cosmic marketplace

But if you think 300 programs and workshops are a great bounty, just stroll through the "marketplace." Here you will find 51 vendors hawking products that range from high-tech software programs to Tamara Designs jewelry in which "your cosmic identity is manifested." From Thirteen Moons' collection of Shiva Lingam sacred stones from India to the aforementioned sauna that Phillip Wilson - a mathematician turned astrologer - says will not only help cleanse you of "heavy metals" and "dioxins," but offer "the closest energy in the physical world to divine love."

Of course, if you think the collection of crystals, jewelry and clothing is substantial, just check out the book section.

Among the 2,000 different titles, you will find spined specimens like Astrometeorology, Sex and the Outer Planets, Forensic Astrology, Astrology of Childbirth, Astrology of Death, Mundane Astrology, Galileo's Astrology, and even When Chimpanzees Dream Astrology.

If you don't want to read and you're trying to figure some optimal dates to hold that family reunion picnic, you might want to lay down $59 for Long Range Weather Forecasting CD.

Hey, it might give you something to do with all the time you won't be wasting on the election once you find out who's going to be president on Tuesday.

meadowj@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-2606

United Astrology Conference

An estimated 2,000 astrologers from 45 countries - plus several hundred locals - are expected to attend the conference, featuring 300 seminars and 170 speakers.

When: Thursday-Tuesday

Where: Sheraton Hotel, 1550 Court Place

Cost:

* Daily workshop/ lecture passes: $135

* For astrology newbies, a special available Saturday: $45.

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