Women and water — symbols of birth and rebirth. Life first came
from water via women; the Greek goddess Aphrodite rose from the
sea foam. Worldwide, women get the water still. Susan Murcott, a
Boston-based engineering consultant and a lecturer at MIT
believes that water engineering in poor countries is an
important tool of liberating women in the developing world. Her
initiative Safe Water for 1 Billion People is a leader in global
water and sanitation projects. In 1980 the first Water Ritual
was held in East Lansing, Michigan, organized by activist
Carolyn McDade and now-deceased Lucile Schuck Longview. Members
of the Women and Religion Continental Convocation of the
Unitarian Universalists, Carolyn and Lucile organized the Water
Ritual “as a way for women who lived far apart to connect the
work each was doing locally to the whole”. Women’s connection to
water is negated and condemned by social conservatives as a
symbol of debauchery and siren-led sensuality that threatens
patriarchal civilizations. At Anne