Background

Zsuzsanna Budapest was born on January 30, 1940 in Budapest, Hungary. Her mother, Masika Szilagyi, was a medium, a practicing witch, and a professional sculptress whose work reflected themes of Goddess and nature spirituality. In 1956, when the Hungarian Revolution broke out, Zsuzsanna left Hungary as a political refugee.

Education

Zsuzsanna finished high school in Innsbruck, graduated from a bilingual gymnasium, and won a scholarship to the University of Vienna where she studied languages. Budapest immigrated to the United States in 1959, where she studied at the University of Chicago, with groundbreaking originator of the art of improvisation, Viola Spolin.

Career

Zsuzsanna was on the staff of the first Women's Center in the U.S. there for many years, and became the Founder and High Priestess of Susan B. Anthony Coven #1, the first documented women-only coven. She also organized the International Goddess Festival.

Achievements

• Zsuzsanna is the founder of the Susan B. Anthony Coven, the first feminist, women-only, witches' coven. She is the founder and director of the Women's Spirituality Forum, a nonprofit organization featuring lectures, retreats and other events, and was the lead of a cable TV show called 13th Heaven. She had an online autobiography entitled Fly by Night, and wrote for the religion section of the San Francisco Examiner on subjects related to Pagan religions. Her play The Rise of the Fates premiered in Los Angeles in the mid-seventies. She is the composer of several songs including "We All Come From the Goddess".

Works

More photos

• book

  • The Holy Book of Women's Mysteries: Feminist Witchcraft, Goddess Rituals, Spellcasting and Other Womanly Arts ... Complete In One Volume
  • The Grandmother of Time: A Woman's Book of Celebrations, Spells, and Sacred Objects for Every Month of the Year
  • The Goddess in the Office: A Personal Energy Guide for the Spiritual Warrior at Work
  • Grandmother Moon: Lunar Magic in Our Lives--Spells, Rituals, Goddesses, Legends, and Emotions Unde
  • The Goddess in the Bedroom: Passionate Woman's Guide to Celebrating Sexuality Every Night of the Week, A
  • Selene: The Most Famous Bull-leaper on Earth
  • The feminist book of lights and shadows
  • Summoning the Fates: A Woman's Guide to Destiny
  • Celestial Wisdom for Every Year of Your Life: Discover the Hidden Meaning of Your Age
  • The Rise of the Fates, A Woman's Passion Play

Religion

Zsuzsanna is an adherent to contemporary Pagan new religious movement Dianic Wicca. In 1975, she was arrested for "fortune telling" at her candle and book store in Venice, California.

Views

Quotations: “I saw how naturally women pray to the moon, light candles, dance, make music, break bread, improvise. I realized that this is our female religion, what we used to do for millennia.”

"The purpose of ritual is to wake up the old mind in us, to put it to work. The old ones inside us, the collective unconscious, the many lives, the divine eternal parts, the senses and parts of the brain that have been ignored."

"Mythology is the mother of religions, and grandmother of history."

"Religion controls inner space; inner space controls outer space."

Membership

She is a high priestess of Susan B. Anthony Coven No. 1.

Interests

• Goddess movement

Connections

Zsuzsanna married and had two sons, Laszlo and Gabor, but later divorced. She realized she identified as a lesbian and chose, in her words, to avoid the "duality" between man and woman.

Mother:

Masika Szilagyi

child:

Laszlo

child:

Gabor

Friend:

Viola Spolin