Zsuzsanna Emese Mokcsay (born 30 January 1940 in Budapest, Hungary) is an American author of Hungarian origin who writes on feminist spirituality and Dianic Wicca under the pen name and religious name Zsuzsanna Budapest or Z. Budapest. She is the High Priestess and the founding mother of the Susan B. Anthony Coven #1, the first feminist, women-only, witches' coven. She is the 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 has an autobiography, Fly by Night, online, soon to be published in book form in the spring of 2010. She is a playwright, her work The Rise of the Fates having premiered in Los Angeles in the mid-seventies. She is the composer of the song, We All Come From the Goddess, as well as others.
Z. Budapest was born 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, Budapest left Hungary as a political refugee. She finished high school in Innsbruck, graduated from a bilingual gymnasium, and won a scholarship to the University of Vienna where she studied languages. In The Holy Book of Women's Mysteries, Z claims that her maternal grandmother was born by parthenogenesis (or virgin birth).
Budapest emigrated to the United States in 1959, where she studied at the University of Chicago, with groundbreaking originator of the art of improvisation, Viola Spolin, and the improvisational theater group The Second City. She married and had two sons, Laszlo and Gabor, but was later divorced after deciding that the traditional roles and confines of the marriage structure did not resonate with her. She also realized she identified as a lesbian and chose, in her words, to avoid the "duality" between man and woman.
She moved to Los Angeles from New York City in 1970, and became an activist in the women's liberation movement, was on the opening staff of the very first Women's Center in the US there for many years, and became the Founder and High Priestess of the Susan B. Anthony Coven #1, the first documented Women Only coven.. She opened a candle and book store in Venice, California. She organized the first Anti-Rape Squad and was responsible for the conception and formation of the Take Back the Night Movement in Southern California, as well as organizer of many of their street marches. In 1975, she was arrested for fortune telling as a result of reading tarot cards, and that led to her being the last person to be arrested and tried for witchcraft in the United States. Following her trial and conviction, she engaged in nine years of appeals on the grounds that reading the Tarot was a form of women spiritually counseling women within the context of their religion, with pro bono legal representation, ultimately ending in her being acquitted and the laws against "fortune telling" being struck from the laws of California.. Her first book was The Feminist Book of Lights and Shadows, later expanded upon and retitled The Holy Book Of Women's Mysteries. This was followed by The Grandmother of Time, Grandmother Moon, Goddess in the Office, "Goddess in the Bedroom", "Celestial Wisdom" (co-authored with Diana L. Paxson)and "Summoning the Fates". In 2007, "The Holy Book of Women's Mysteries" was republished. She has published 10 books, one play, and two CDs, as well as videos. There was a major documentary of her first festival called "Gathering the Goddess" done in south central Texas, available in 6 parts on youtube, and for purchase on her website www.zbudapest.com A documentary of the "Gathering the Goddess '08", held in LaHonda, California, is in development, as yet to be released.
Today Budapest lives in Oakland, California, where she gives workshops, lectures and continues to write. Budapest is the founder of the Women's Spirituality Forum, a not-for-profit organization which promotes women's spirituality globally. She applied as the first nonprofit Dianic Wicca religious organization. She has been hired by the San Francisco Examiner and its affiliates (112 outlets) to be the writer representing Pagan Religions for their religion section. She has a page on Facebook and on MySpace, as well as Twitter.
Budapest worked as a Color Girl for the CBS Network in New York, and was later assigned to the Ed Sullivan Show. In the eighties, she created the TV show 13th Heaven, which ran on syndicated cable to thirteen channels in the San Francisco Bay Area for seven years. Today Z focuses her attentions on the development of her latest TV project called Femina Nation, which focuses on notable women. Anecdotally, Budapest was also interviewed by Johnny Carson on his "The Tonight Show" surrounding the witch trial in which she was involved.
In 2003, the California Institute of Integral Studies recognized Z's contribution to the women's spirituality movement, declaring her a foremother of the Women's Spirituality Movement.
The Feminist Book of Lights and Shadows, (1975) Feminist Wicca, Luna Publications
The Holy Book of Women's Mysteries: Feminist Witchcraft, Goddess Rituals, Spellcasting and Other Womanly Arts (1989) Wingbow Press ISBN 0914728679, ISBN 978-0914728672
The Grandmother of Time: A Woman's Book of Celebrations, Spells, and Sacred Objects for Every Month of the Year, (1989) HarperOne ISBN 0062501097, ISBN 978-0062501097
Grandmother Moon: Lunar Magic in Our Lives...Spells, Rituals, Goddesses, Legends, and Emotions Under the Moon (1991) HarperSanFrancisco ISBN 0062501143, ISBN 978-0062501141
The Goddess in the Office: A Personal Energy Guide for the Spiritual Warrior at Work (1993) HarperOne ISBN 0062500872, ISBN 978-0062500878
The Goddess in the Bedroom: A Passionate Woman's Guide to Celebrating Sexuality Every Night of the Week (1995) HarperSanFrancisco ISBN 0062511866, ISBN 978-0062511867
Summoning the Fates: A Woman's Guide to Destiny (1999) Three Rivers Press ISBN 0609802771, ISBN 978-0609802779
Celestial Wisdom for Every Year of Your Life: Discover the Hidden Meaning of Your Age (with Diana Paxson) (2003) Weiser Books ISBN 157863282X, ISBN 978-1578632824
Rasta Dogs (2003) Xlibris Corporation ISBN 1401093086, ISBN 978-1401093082
Selene, the Most Famous Bull-Leaper on Earth (1976) Diana Press ISBN 0884470105
Women's Leadership in Marginal Religions by Catherine Lowman Wessinger (1993) University of Illinois Press ISBN 0252063325, ISBN 9780252063329
Feminist Foremothers in Women's Studies, Psychology, and Mental Health by Phyllis Chesler, Esther D. Rothblum, and Ellen Cole (1995) Haworth Press ISBN 1560230789, ISBN 9781560230786
The Witch in History: Early Modern and Twentieth-Century Representations by Diane Purkiss (1996) Routledge ISBN 0415087619, ISBN 9780415087612
Introduction to New and Alternative Religions in America by Eugene V. Gallagher and W. Michael Ashcraft (2006) Greenwood Publishing Group ISBN 0275987124, ISBN 9780275987121
Changing of the Gods: Feminism and the End of Traditional Religions by Naomi R. Goldenberg (1980) Beacon Press ISBN 0807011118, ISBN 9780807011119
Witchcraft and Magic: Contemporary North America by Helen A. Berger (2006) University of Pennsylvania Press ISBN 0812219716, ISBN 9780812219715
The New Religious Movements Experience in America by Eugene V. Gallagher (2004) Greenwood Publishing Group ISBN 0313328072, ISBN 9780313328077
Thealogy and Embodiment: the Post-Patriarchal Reconstruction of Female Sacrality by Melissa Raphael (1996) Continuum International Publishing Group ISBN 1850757577, ISBN 9781850757573
Living in the Lap of the Goddess by Cynthia Eller (1995) Beacon Press ISBN 0807065072, ISBN 9780807065075
Voices from the Pagan Census: A National Survey of Witches and Neo-Pagans in the United States by Helen A. Berger, Evan A. Leach, Leigh S. Shaffer (2003) University of South Carolina Press ISBN 1570034885, ISBN 9781570034886
Daughters of the Goddess: Studies of Healing, Identity, and Empowerment by Wendy Griffin (1999) Rowman Altamira ISBN 0742503488, ISBN 9780742503489
New Age Religion and Western Culture: Esotericism in the Mirror of Secular Thought by Wouter J. Hanegraaff (1998) SUNY Press ISBN 0791438546, ISBN 9780791438541
Being a Pagan: Druids, Wiccans, and Witches Today by Ellen Evert Hopman & Lawrence Bond (2001) Inner Traditions / Bear & Company, ISBN 0892819049, ISBN 9780892819041
Introduction to Pagan Studies by Barbara Jane Davy (2006) Rowman Altamira ISBN 0759108196, ISBN 9780759108196
The Michigan Womyn's Music Festival: An Amazon Matrix of Meaning by Ph D Laurie J Kendall (2008) Lulu.com, ISBN 0615200656, ISBN 9780615200651
Goddess as Nature: Towards a Philosophical Thealogy by Paul Reid-Bowen (2007) Ashgate Publishing, Ltd. ISBN 0754656276, ISBN 9780754656272
Drawing Down the Moon: Witches, Druids, Goddess-Worshippers, and Other Pagans in America by Margot Adler (2006) Penguin Books ISBN 0143038192, ISBN 9780143038191
The Cambridge Companion to Feminist Theology by Susan Frank Parsons(2002) Cambridge University Press ISBN 0521663806, ISBN 9780521663809
Caretaking a New Soul: Writing on Parenting from Thich Nhat Hahn to Z Budapest by Anne Carson (1999) Crossing Press ISBN 1580910181, ISBN 9781580910187
Women's Culture: The Women's Renaissance of the Seventies by Gayle Kimball (1981) Scarecrow Press
Woman of Power (1987) Published by Woman of Power, Inc. (Original from the University of California)
The Fabric of the Future: Women Visionaries of Today Illuminate the Path to Tomorrow by Mary Jane Ryan, Patrice (INT) Wynne, Ken (FRW) Wilber (2000) Conari ISBN 1573241970, ISBN 9781573241977
Goddesses and the Divine Feminine: A Western Religious History by Rosemary Radford Ruether (2006) University of California Press ISBN 0520250052, ISBN 9780520250055
Ritual and Symbol in Peacebuilding by Lisa Schirch (2005) Kumarian Press, Inc. ISBN 1565491947, ISBN 9781565491946
