New Moon in Cancer 2025: Deep Immersion and enmeshment, with Saturn staring down at you
On June 25 at 6:30 am EST, the Moon and Sun will embrace in the 5th degree of Cancer, separating from a conjunction with Jupiter and also separating from squares with Saturn and Neptune, which are nearly conjoined in the first degrees of Aries. This is the first lunation of the summer season.
Cancer is the Moon’s domain in the most Fertile and Fecund part of the year, as the Summer Solstice has come and gone, but the heat grows more intense in the Northern Hemisphere. Cancer brings embodiment and bodily awareness as well as a flood of emotion and intuition; Cancer leads us toward the semiotic, to explore our preverbal animal nature and to discover what we truly feel- as it changes. To become truly in tune with our body as an adult takes self-compassion, time and attention, assets that we increasingly waste or invest in backlit screens- resulting in the divorce of our bodies and minds, and we suffer for this.
In Cancer season, the Life Force is at its peak, the Goddess is with us, her children. Childhood and parental relationships are of primary importance to Cancer, as is the comfort of home, where we are free to experience these seminal human things.
The first decan of Cancer is ruled by the Moon according to Triplicity and Venus according to the Chaldean order. The 2 Goddesses bring bonding, immersion and enmeshment, closeness and connection, like a psychic tunnel or wormhole between 2 people (or between human and the Goddess, the original template). This is natural, visceral, necessary and appropriate for the Mother and Child; this type of open nurturance lacks boundaries, and facilitates rapid development of social skills, such as trust, compassion and empathy (in good ways and in bad). It is necessary for cognitive development, and it always has psychosexual elements. Touch is a huge part of this type of bonding relationship, whether conscious or unconscious: when a person’s verbal input does not match their body’s messages, a type of cognitive dissonance occurs. The potential for dysfunction in this type of relationship is enormous, but its absence at appropriate developmental stages is also extremely detrimental.
It is a truism that children are tabula rasa, blank slates, entering the world totally innocent. On one level this is undeniable, they are like sponges taking in the world, and we do impress upon them our templates for how the world works; but it is also true that children enter with a unique nature that is anything but empty, and power dynamics are one of the first things children learn- ie, how to get what we want and need, by any and all means. If and when we are unaware of our own internalized dysfunctional power dynamics, there is a good chance the child will find it, and exploit it. Some children seem to revel in this type of manipulation, and carry this forward as an art form, a template for their interactions as adults.
An extreme example of how this relationship can go wrong is the cult leader archetype, with the childlike followers who surrender all boundaries to the guru. Jupiter in this decan has potential to fulfill this archetypal role.
This immersive environment can also be conducive to profound meditation or deep absorption into the study of an art or science. With Jupiter under the Sun’s beams, it is likely that we will be blessed more in our inner work rather than in the outer world, especially given the positioning of Saturn at this time.
Jupiter in Cancer is in his highest exaltation. Mythology tells us over and over that Jupiter/ Zeus is the golden boy who seems to have the Goddess’ protection, love and favor at all times: he is the only of Kronos’ children who is saved from the Great TItan’s maw, thanks to the intervention of his mother Rhea; he had countless children by mortal women, wood spirits, sea nymphs, Goddesses, demigoddesses and any and all other species or spirit he could manage to mate with. His lovers were usually starstruck with the beauty and power of the Sky God, and then inevitably fell under Hera’s jealous curses, becoming animals, constellations, stone sculptures or suffer countless other torturous fates, while Jupiter himself walks away without consequence… again, allegorical to the cult leader and his followers.
Jupiter does not give gifts that he produces himself, rather he charms the Goddess to give up her bounty. And the gifts may have a cost that we, the recipients, do not always see.
This scene in the sky is further complicated by the combination of Neptune and Saturn in superior square to the Sun, Moon and Jupiter, staring down from Aries in the 10th house. Saturn is of course the same as Kronos who seeks to eat his children. Saturn in Aries has a great deal of difficulty with the Martial impulse: this is, as was revealed in my last lunation report, the “get off my lawn” Saturn who has had enough of the boisterous bravado of the emergent Aries territory and may drop the hammer any time.
Saturn in Aries has a historical link to the escalation of wars that are already underway, and it is also linked to reactions and resistance to Martial violence and conflict. We tend to see “anti-war” movements or programs that seek disarmament as pure and virtuous, but there are profound pitfalls and psychological dangers to these movements. Saturn’s Capricornian side works through emasculation, diminution and rigid enforcement of the Rules, but we can also see a distinct Saturnian thread in anti-establishment movements, something much more Aquarian. The classic protest tactic of using the body as an impediment, getting in the way and going limp and heavy in the face of armed and aggressive law enforcement is very Saturnian. It should also be understood that this type of “non-violent protest” is sometimes staged or sponsored by very powerful forces that want the optics and theater.
The theatrics of war and conflict and dramatic opposition to war and conflict, whether real or staged, are a guaranteed signature of Neptune/ Saturn conjoined in Aries. This type of theater will appear utterly hollow and ridiculous to those who are not traumatized and propagandized, and to be sure, people will be injured and die in the melee.
Same as it ever was.
In November 1989, the last Saturn/ Neptune conjunction (which was in Capricorn), the Berlin Wall came down, almost overnight. 1989 also saw end of the cold war and the end of the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan.
Neptune eats away at structures, through corruption, corrosion and distraction. The fall of the Soviet Union was like a heavy rain with flooding toppling the set of a Hollywood Spaghetti Western: the people of Russia had long been pretending to work, and the government had been pretending to pay them. The economy was a joke.
The confluence of these forces- the Cancer stellium and the Aries conjunction, with all of the complexities, will serve to further divide those who have become totally jaded and black-pilled with our political situation from those who hold a glimmer of hope for any type of change. Many now believe that we are inevitably entering a full scale international conflagration of global proportions, and that may be true, but the Demiurge (if there is one) may well be a trickster. The Universe always provides pressure valves; the Zodiac tells the story of the Sacred year, first and foremost, and that is far more friendly to humanity than we are entrained to believe.