Psychic Wars in Livingston: It looks like a legal battle over a religiously-motivated Livingston Parish ordinance banning fortune telling will be headed to court. Despite being warned by their lawyer that they would most likely lose a lawsuit, the Parish Council decided to not address the issue at their most recent meeting, much to the dismay of some Parish residents.

“Taxpayers might question the council’s insistence on spending public money to fight a lawsuit on an issue that has no purpose other than to pacify a particular religious group. The council’s attorney, Blayne Honeycutt, has advised that it probably would lose the Wiccan suit if it persists in defending the ordinance. When no member of the council would offer a motion to repeal the soothsaying ordinance, Honeycutt advised the council it needs to hire special counsel to handle such a case. Parish government, which has a history of being strapped for funds, could be putting that money to proper uses on roads, drainage, water and sewage rather than waging war for or against particular religious groups. Instead, the council will spend money it says is in short supply defending a lawsuit against a problem its attorney told council members apparently doesn’t even exist in the parish.”

The Parish is being sued by local businessman and Wiccan Cliff Eakin, who wishes to offer fortune-telling and divination services at his store, Gryphon’s Nest Gifts. Eakin maintains that the ordinance is an attempt to promote Christianity over Paganism.

Thelemites Fight Pedophillia Charges: Australian couple Vivienne Legg and Dyson Devine have been released from prison after apologizing to a judge for defying an order to remove material from their website that groundlessly implicated a local O.T.O. organization in an underground pedophile ring. The couple served two months of a nine-month sentence for contempt of court.

“Yesterday both apologised to Judge Harbison and the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal, and undertook not to repeat, or help anyone else to publish, the vilifying material about the Ordo Templi Orientis (OTO). But David Leggatt, for the OTO, complained that the vilification had a “grapevine effect”. It had been removed from the pair’s website, Gaiaguys.net, in December, but soon appeared on Adam Dodson’s site. Simon Moglia, for Mr Devine and Ms Legg, said they had not helped the new website. He said they at first saw their non-compliance as individuals standing for their beliefs. But when they realised that resisting the tribunal encouraged others to disobey the law, they closed down their website.”

While the OTO in Australia have certainly won this battle, they may find themselves pestered by dozens (if not hundreds) of conspiracy theorists who see Legg and Devine as martyrs in the quest for “the truth”. The original actionable paper written by Dr Reina Michaelson inflated in importance and virally spread across the Internet.

Fighting For (Christian) Religious Expression: Arizona joins Oklahoma in trying to pass a “student religious expression” law similar to the one recently passed by Texas.

“On Wednesday, the Arizona House Education Committee narrowly approved, and sent on to the full House of Representatives, HB 2713, a bill that would prohibit public schools from discriminating against students on the basis of their religious belief or expression. It permits students to engage in prayer and religious activity on an equal basis with other activities, but does not permit the school to require participation in religious activities. It includes provisions prohibiting banning of religious attire and jewelry when similar secular items are permitted and another section that prohibits discrimination for or against a student in grading coursework in which the student expresses a religious viewpoint or religious content.”

While these laws may sound innocuous enough to some, they ultimately benefit the religious majority, a point driven home by the Texas House’s own research organization who stated: “the bill could serve as a tool to proselytize the majority religious view”. These proposed laws claim to protect a student’s freedom to express religious viewpoints, but I fear they instead encourage a hostile environment towards religious minorities, dis-empower teachers from keeping order in their classrooms, and give Christian students a sense of immunity from consequences. I encourage Pagan groups in in Arizona (and Oklahoma) to send a message to their representatives ensuring them that Pagans, Witches, and Heathens oppose this legislation, but will gladly use their new “rights” as often and as loudly as possible if it is enacted.

A mess is brewing in Louisiana. On Tuesday, Farmerville High School was sent into lock-down after rumors of a “big war” between two groups of students reached school officials. Making the matter even more complicated is the fact that one of the rival groups (allegedly) claim to be a Wiccan coven.

“Two departments took protective measures at Farmerville High School on Tuesday after hearing rumors of a “big war” and that some students had formed a Wiccan coven, officials said … “Farmerville police received information over the weekend that threats of violence had allegedly been made against a group of students at Farmerville High School.” Those threats were to be carried out Tuesday, according to a news release from the sheriff and chief. Detectives from both agencies determined a student had allegedly said a “big war” would occur. They also learned that a group of students had allegedly formed what they referred to as a “Wicca” and had carried out “certain ritualistic ceremonies that included self-mutilation of their arms and legs,” the release stated.”

Who threatened who? Good question! According to School Superintendent Steven Dozier, it was the Wiccans who threated a rival group of teens at the school.

“A student said “war will begin Tuesday.” School Superintendent Steven Dozier says the students involved with the threat practice Wicca, a form of witchcraft. This alone had school leaders and police concerned.”

But a subsequent news story doesn’t make that claim, and a story filed the day after the lock-down noted that the “big war” rumors have been floating around for nearly eight months.

“But these rumors began much earlier than a few days ago. The sheriff’s office says that these rumors go back to as far as eight months ago. And they say some parents and students knew about the threats of violence…but never came forward … Rumors at the high school began spreading like wildfire. Authorities say one child told a parent that their name was on a list to be killed. Tuesday was the day the ‘big war’ was supposed to happen…but it never did.”

During the lock-down, no weapons (connected to the alleged threats) were found. After a series of interviews, two students were hospitalized pending a mental evaluation after expressing thoughts of suicide (though an earlier report claims they were involved in the Wiccan group). So far, no physical evidence of any sort has surfaced pointing towards a “big war” or any other sort of violence.

Since we are dealing with (escalating) rumors, it is hard to tell what was really going down, and who instigated what. School officials, rather than trying to engage the (alleged) ringleaders of this ongoing conflict, instead went into a post-Columbine panic and terrified the entire school. Painting the “Wiccans” as scapegoats in the process.

“…we were not going to take any chances of anybody getting hurt whether it being a true or false rumor. We simply hit the campus and hit it hard.”

Are schools now going to be “hit hard” by police whenever a rumor about a groups of outsiders surface? What are the chances that this groups of kids will receive fair treatment at the school now that the Superintendent has publicly incriminated them? There is a good chance that any “big war” that arises from this will come in the form of lawsuits if the school isn’t very careful about what it does next.

My semi-regular round-up of articles, essays, and opinions of note for discerning Pagans and Heathens.

As if sensing that the recent Pew Forum study of America’s religious landscape would show that modern Paganism continues to grow, while Christianity’s majority status is eroding, a growing number of anti-Pagan articles have appeared warning the faithful of our growth. One comes from Janice Crouse, a senior fellow with Concerned Women for America, who warns of the growth of Wicca and “Earth Worship” among the Christian youth.

“Janice Crouse, a senior fellow with Concerned Women for America, says it’s disturbing that many young people in evangelical churches are experimenting with the Wiccan religion. Church leaders and Christian parents, she warns, must be ready to counter that growing interest among their youth. Crouse cites an article in Religion Journal which said youth pastors in the Southern Baptist Convention were worried about large numbers of evangelicals taking part in Wicca, a religion that involves nature worship, stresses moral autonomy, and includes remedies and spells … [Crouse] says the interest in Wicca can be traced to recent books featuring witchcraft and similar topics.”

Meanwhile, WorldNetDaily prints the cover story from their recent Whistleblower magazine issue dedicated to the growth of Witchcraft in America. Besides including a strange obsession with author Neale Donald Walsch, it is your typical anti-Wiccan piece, complete with the “feminism/lesbianism encourages Wicca” argument.

“In many ways, the interest in Wicca among women (at least two-thirds of Wiccans are female) parallels the growth in feminism and lesbianism – all fueled by disillusionment with and alienation from men. Indeed, sociologist Helen Berger, who spent 10 years researching and writing the authoritative book “A Community of Witches: Contemporary Neo-Paganism and Witchcraft in the United States,” reports the astounding conclusion that at least 40 percent of Wiccans and neopagans are homosexual or bisexual. Clearly, Wicca has become the spiritual home for many feminists, including lesbians. It’s also the most graphic, in-your-face example of a much more universal phenomenon – the increasing feminization of the Christian church and of Western culture.”

Articles like these (and others) seem to point to an increasingly nervous conservative Christian population. A group of believers concerned with their looming irrelevance. A future where politicians no longer feel the need to pander to them, and where they are just another voice in diverse chorus of religious voices.

The blog Newspaper Rock links to an article put out by the United Methodist Church discussing their problems ministering to Native Americans, and the long history of (justified) distrust among Native peoples towards the Christian religion.

“No more than 6 percent of the 2.7 million Native Americans in the United States identify themselves as Christian–a statistic often blamed on mistrust of the church. Mission schools operated on Indian reservations from the late 1800s through the first half of the 20th century, many of them founded by Methodists. Children were forced to adopt Anglo-European culture, abandon their tribal languages and convert to Christianity. Today the Native American Church, an indigenous denomination that mixes elements of Christian faith with tribal sacraments, thrives in Native communities where mainline churches don’t.”

Newspaper Rock blogger Rob Schmidt says that there is another very good reason, aside from distrust, why Christianity has problems making inroads into Native Country.

“I suspect most Natives eschew Christianity not because they mistrust the church but because they already have perfectly good religions.”

A point not often conceded by the missionary-minded.

In the wake of a woman being sentenced to death in Saudi Arabia for “witchcraft”, the European Union is criticizing a draft penal code in Iran that would order death for anyone convicted of “witchcraft”.

“The European Union has called on Iran to drop provisions in a draft penal code stipulating the death penalty for apostasy, heresy and witchcraft. “These articles clearly violate the Islamic Republic of Iran’s commitments under the international human rights conventions,” the Slovenian EU Presidency said in a statement.”

Are Muslim nations ushering in a new era of witch hunts? How will the international community react once innocent women are being put to death for the “crime” of witchcraft?

Diane Slawych travels to Catemaco, Veracruz (in Mexico) and surrounding areas to witness the annual Congreso Internacional de Brujos, a convention of shamans, witches, Brujos, Santeros, and other traditional healers in the region.

“Another local tells me witches can be found in more than a dozen towns in the area and are often consulted by locals seeking a spiritual cleansing or help with various life problems. But why have all the witches congregated in the same region I wonder. One guidebook offers a possible explanation. Until the 1940s the area was dense jungle and so folk traditions survived longer here than elsewhere … the witches festival isn’t heavily promoted, though many Mexicans, who make up most of the visitors, seem to know about it. The weekend event begins this year on Friday, March 7. Ask for details of shows and other activities on arrival. And if you want to meet a practitioner of folk medicine, keep in mind you don’t have to come during the festival. In the towns of Los Tuxtlas you can meet a witch at any time of year!”

Its too bad the article is written as a light piece of “spiritual tourism”, instead of actually taking an interest in the indigenous and syncretic faith practices of the area.

The Interfaith Alliance has compiled a video outlining the “Top 10 Moments in the Race for Pastor-in-Chief and the unholy use of religion in the presidential campaigns.”

Number one? Mike Huckabee tells a crowd: “What we need to do is to amend the Constitution so it’s in God’s standards rather than try to change God’s standards”. With all the Christian rhetoric flying this primary season, its hard to know which candidate will really hear the concerns of minority faiths in America.

In a final note, Slate.com reports on the growing popularity of mead, a drink made from fermented honey, popular throughout the ancient world.

“…the recent interest in fermented honey has morphed it from an esoteric item that only a few bearded Dungeons & Dragons players indulged in to a small yet legitimate commercial enterprise … Is mead, last popular around King Arthur’s table, poised for a comeback?”

Sadly this interesting article is marred by the harping on the drinks “image problem” due to its popularity with SCA members and Renaissance fairs (as if this were some insurmountable obstacle). In the end, the author admits that he just doesn’t like mead all that much, claiming mead is the perfect beverage for Winnie-the-Pooh should he ever take to the bottle. Perhaps next time an article of this nature could be written by someone who actually enjoys mead.

The Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life has released a new study of the religious landscape in America. The results, which the Pew Forum calls “unprecedentedly precise”, points towards an increasingly “post-Christian” landscape in America.

“The United States is firmly 78 percent Christian but barely 51 percent Protestant, according to a survey released Monday (Feb. 25). The findings, part of the sweeping U.S. Religious Landscape Survey produced by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, reaffirm a decades-long decline toward minority status for the family of churches that long steered American politics and culture.”

That “barely” 51% figure includes both mainline and evangelical varieties of Protestants. The vast majority of the rest of that 78 percent are the Catholics, who are the largest Christian denomination in America with 23 percent of American adults. But things aren’t looking too good for the Catholics either.

“In the marketplace of American faith, Catholicism is the big loser. Catholics have lost more members to other faiths, or to no faith at all, than any other U.S. religion, according to the new survey released by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life … Perhaps more worrisome for church leaders, while 2.6 percent of Americans converted to Catholicism, four times as many — 10.1 percent — of cradle Catholics have left for another faith or no faith at all. Roughly 10 percent of all Americans are former Catholics, the study reported.”

According to Pew researchers, Catholic numbers have only remained stable due to waves of Hispanic immigration. So Catholicism’s stability is precarious, and observers claim that as the current waves of Catholic immigrants assimilate to American culture, they too will drift away from the faith as previous waves of immigrants have.

So if Christianity’s cultural power is starting to wane, what is taking its place? Well, the number of religiously unaffiliated Americans has risen to 16.1 percent, with a large chunk of that number claiming to have no particular religious orientation. Hindus have acheived the highest retention rate among faiths in America (8 in 10 children remain Hindu), meanwhile, the study finds that religious adherence is becoming increasingly fluid, with 28 percent of people leaving their childhood faith, and a whopping 44 percent changing affiliation in their lifetime.

Finally, we have confirmation that modern Paganism is continuing to grow. The study found that 0.4 percent of Americans adhere to a “New Age” religion, broken down into “Pagan”, “Wiccan”, and “Other”. These figures don’t include those who described themselves as “eclectic”, “spiritual but not religious”, “other liberal faith groups”, or members of CUUPs who identified themselves primarily as Unitarian Universalists. Working then with the idea then that (at least) 0.4 percent of Americans are modern Pagans (according to the study), that means there are at least 1.2 million Pagans of one variety or another in America.

This is the largest scientific study that (theoretically) places modern Paganism over the one million mark. A number that could conceivably be much larger (0.8% refused to answer the survey). Previously, the largest estimated number was 768,400 Pagans in North American according to a COG poll. It is very likely that the actual number of people fitting under the umbrella of modern Paganism is much larger. Signaling perhaps that our days of being classified under “other” are coming to a close. For more data, I suggest looking through the entire study, There is a treasure trove of information here, that has only begun to be analyzed.

Author, Archdruid Emeritus of the ADF, and “polytheologian” Isaac Bonewits is opening his own online school on February 29th. The new online learning institution, Real Magic School, claims to offer “certain answers to a mysterious subject.”

“Real Magic School, named after Bonewits first groundbreaking book, begins with a purposeful program of study that offers a pathway to an Associates degree in Magic. Further, the school begins immediately the process to seek academic accreditation, a process that is both difficult and demanding but according to the school founders, worthwhile. P.E. Isaac Bonewits has chosen to take his degree, his lifetime of experience, and his driving energy to create an academy that is truly a benefit to its students and future alumni. This will be a life changing experience for everyone who gets involved.”

The new school has been built for Bonewits by Witch School, one of the oldest and largest (and some might say controversial) online schools aimed at teaching magic. Real Magic School isn’t the first online magic school to be built around a charismatic Pagan “headmaster”, Oberon Zell-Ravenheart’s Grey School of Wizardry comes immediately to mind, though it does seem to be aiming for a more academic feel while trying to avoid Harry Potter comparisons.

“While the Harry Potter Phenomenon swept the world and has offered a fictional view of a Magical Academy, Isaac is not Dumbledore and Real Magic School is not Hogwarts. Real Magic School is definitely real world and has a truly academic and educational philosophy unmatched in today’s world. Isaac Bonewits is a serious teacher, along with Phaedra, with lifelong experience, and is one of the most respected voices in the Pagan world today calling for academic truth and excellence in the study of magic and thaumaturgy, history, and Paganism.”

It should be interesting to see where this goes. Does an online school with only two teachers (so far) have a real shot at gaining academic accreditation? If they did gain some form of educational accreditation would any mainstream college or institution accept transfer credits from Real Magic School? Real Magic School’s web site doesn’t have any course information up yet, so we will just have to wait and see what sort of curriculum is planned.

The Washington Post’s “On Faith” blog asks its panelists to weigh in on if presidential candidate Barack Obama elicits “religious fervor” among his followers. Pagan author and activist Starhawk’s response is that Obama is casting a “good and needed spell”.

“If politicians hired Witches or magicians as consultants, we’d tell them that your deep mind responds to positive words and images, and doesn’t get ‘no’ … Magically speaking, then, Obama is casting a good spell. Whether he wins or loses, he’s filling the psychic and emotional atmosphere with words like ‘healing’ and ‘hope’. The effect is like a clean breeze blowing through a morass of stinking, noxious fumes. People want to believe, because they like the way he makes them feel about themselves … Obama evokes some powerfully appealing archetypes. Think of all those myths and fairy tales about the humble-seeming outsider who turns out to be the true king, throwing out the corrupt rulers and restoring health and healing. We’re a contradictory people – we love underdogs, while we despise losers – but there’s nothing we love more than the little guy who comes from behind and beats all the odds to win the pennant.”

Starhawk also takes some time to advise Hillary Clinton to drop the experienced “responsible mom” meme she has been spreading as part of her campaign, stop attacking Obama on issues of “faith and trust”, and go the route of the visionary instead.

“In the contest of archetypes, women are at a disadvantage, facing a deep, unconscious sexism that limits our collective imagination … if I were Hillary Clinton’s campaign advisor, I’d tell her, stay away from that archetype. Responsible Mom is not going to win over Aragorn the Exiled King. Instead, I would urge, be Joan of Arc. Find your vision, and be so passionately driven by it that you would stand forth and challenge kings and armies. Show us your courage, which we know you have. Tell us ‘I stood forth and went into realms where few women dared to go, because I care so deeply about the welfare of all of us.’”

As the March 4th primaries approach, it remains to be seen if Obama’s “magic spell” will hold out, or if Clinton will be able to break through with her own visionary message. But win or lose, it seems apparent that Obama’s “good and needed spell” will continue to resonate, and like all primal archetypal magic, may change the Democratic party, and America, more deeply than we may realize now.

Who vandalizes churches? Crazy people do.

“Banks-Kastrup is accused of several acts of vandalism at St. Michael the Archangel Church on Levittown Parkway in Tullytown in recent weeks. Since Feb. 9, lewd words have been carved into the church doors, a petition book on the altar of the Blessed Mother was defaced, human feces were found on the floor and the church received a threatening letter, according to police … She told three retail theft suspects who were in handcuffs on a nearby bench that she was God and her daughter was the mother of Jesus Christ.”

Who else might vandalize a church? Self-destructive teenagers.

“Middletown investigators are following up tips regarding the graffiti and desecrated statues and doors at Our Lady of Perpetual Help on Woodbourne Road Feb. 10 … Falls police said they’re increasing patrols at all the churches in that township after a man wearing a sweater with occult symbols warned the pastor of St. Joseph the Worker Church to get back inside the church after Mass. Police also said a woman in black goth-style clothing was begging for money in the church parking lot. And on Sunday, officers received several reports of thefts from vehicles in the church parking lot off New Falls Road.”

So try not to read too much into the “occult” sweater, since that could describe nearly forty years worth of rock/metal t-shirts. The fact is that the vast majority of vandalized churches have no connection to “the occult”, “santeria”, “witchcraft”, or a “Satanic cult”. No matter what certain over-zealous police officers may think.

My semi-regular round-up of articles, essays, and opinions of note for discerning Pagans and Heathens.

A paper in Livingston County, Michigan reports on the closing of a Pagan/Metaphysical shop in downtown Howell. The paper cites a depressed local economy and competition from larger retail and outlet stores as the primary reasons for the shop’s failure, achieving what Christian protesters failed to do eight years ago.

“Wisdom of the Ages has withstood a religious protest against the store’s Wiccan tradition and set up shop in mostly Christian Livingston County, but has fallen victim to Michigan’s struggling economy … The year Wisdom of the Ages opened, two Howell-area churches protested outside the building, praying for the souls of Lindsay and store staff. The Daily Press & Argus and television stations in Detroit, Lansing and Jackson picked up the story. Business spiked as a result, Lindsay recalled. “They wanted us shut down. It was the best thing that could have happened to us,” she recalled.”

The owner, Mona Lindsay, will be opening a smaller shop (called “Moon Magick”) in nearby Hamburg Township, where no doubt rents are cheaper and the chances for success in a struggling economy a bit better.

Student Newspaper The Appalachian explores divination, magick, and Paganism, through the lens of a new class taught by anthropology professor Dr. Gregory G. Reck.

“As an outgrowth of Reck’s anthropological interests, this spring semester he instructs a ‘Magic, Witchcraft, and Religion’ course that strives to understand different theoretical approaches to religious behaviors and beliefs. ‘We use religion and magic as a kind of prism through which we can explore questions of the nature of the human experience,’ Reck said. It is through that prism that such individuals as psychics, tarot card readers, or Pagans regard their world.”

The article also talks to James Crew, an interdisciplinary studies major with a concentration in contemporary Pagan studies, and local tarot card readers Cheryl and Sage.

The American Muslim has posted a petition to appeal the execution in Saudi Arabia of Fawza Falih Mumammad Ali, a woman who has been accused of “witchcraft, recourse to jinn, and slaughter of animals”. Among the signatories are Pagan leaders like Phyllis Curott, Ellen Evert Hopman, and Selena Fox.

“Surely it is the wisdom of God who is, as so many of the verses of the Qur’an teach, much-forgiving, a dispenser of grace, which must inspire mercy for Fawza Falih, and it is you who embodies that compassion in this realm where the least of humanity most needs your protection. In the name of God, please, halt the execution of Fawza Falih immediately and release her from the Quraiyat Prison.”

You can add your signature, here. The New York-based Human Rights Watch has also written to King Abdullah asking for clemency. I’m still wondering why Abdullah’s good pal George W. Bush hasn’t responded to this controversy.

Executive Pagan points out that two major Druid organizations now have regular podcasts. OBOD’s Druidcast, hosted by Damh the Bard, and Tribeways, the official podcast of the ADF.

“ADF’s very first podcast, Tribeways, was released into the wild on February 19, 2008! You can download the podcast directly from our host, or through iTunes … The February Feast features the following contributions: “Make Offerings, Dammit!” by Rev. Kirk Thomas … “Comparative Mythology – Why Bother?” by Rev. Jenni Hunt … “Trance Meditation” by Archdruid Emeritus Ian Corrigan”

The Tribeways podcast also comes with “liner notes”, featuring notes and transcripts from the show.

In a final note, last week was Pantheacon, one of the largest indoor Pagan-themed conventions in America, and reports, pictures, and videos have been trickling in from the event. Cherry Hill Seminary has photos and commentary, Deborah Oak discusses embracing paradox at Pantheacon, Chas Clifton shares the news of who won the Llewellyn and BBI Media co-sponsored Pagan fiction contest, T. Thorn Coyle discusses the magic of possibility, and M. Macha NightMare leads us to some videos of the WOW Besom Brigade.

That is all I have for now, have a great day!

Thelemites Fight Pedophillia Charges: An Australian couple who posted unsubstantiated accusations of pedophilia and ritual abuse within the Ordo Templi Orientis (O.T.O.) chapter in Melbourne, Australia have been sentenced to nine months in prison. The prison stay was ordered after Vivienne Legg and Dyson Devine defied a court order to take down the material, and declined to appear at hearings.

“Vivienne Legg and Dyson Devine posted on their website claims that an occult group, the Ordo Templi Orientis (OTO), was really a pedophile ring in Victoria, and that its activities included hosting parties at which naked children served as waiters and members had sex with and murdered children … [Judge Marilyn Harbison] said the material was gross, insulting and bizarre in asserting that the OTO tortured and killed children and animals and consumed their organs in blood rituals. It also said OTO members were criminally corrupt, spoke of a culture of corruption at the highest levels of government, and identified politicians as taking part. Judge Harbison said she had to signal to the broader community that tribunal orders were not to be ignored and that breaching the Racial and Religious Tolerance Act was a serious issue.”

The offending site in question was finally taken down in January by the hosting provider. Legg and Devine now have to decide if they will apologize to the judge and hope that their sentence is commuted, or if they will appeal their case to the Supreme Court.

The First Wiccan Multi-Millionaire: A local ABC News affiliate checks in with Ellwood “Bunky” Bartlett, a Wiccan who won an estimated 33 million dollars in the Mega Millions drawing back in September of 2007. According to the report, Bartlett is keeping the promises he made back when he first realized he won the lottery.

“After Dundalk’s Bunky Bartlett hit the Mega Millions jackpot in 2007, he said he planned to help a new age gift shop expand. He also said he would continue teaching people about his Wiccan beliefs. Bartlett has been true to his word. The Mystical Voyage store in Nottingham used to occupy 2500 square feet of space. When the expanded store opens next month, it will occupy 6500 square feet — enough space for several new holistic healing rooms, and a large yoga studio.”

Bartlett continues to teach classes on Wicca at the store, as he did before the lottery win. No further word yet about the proposed Willow Springs Sanctuary and Community Center that was announced back in November.

Wicca in India: In the past I have reported on Ipsita Roy Chakraverti, a famous adherent of Wicca in India. Chakraverti, a social activist, started a “Wiccan Brigade” to stem witchcraft killings and female infanticide through a campaign of education and re-framing the practice of “witchcraft” in India. While we have heard no reports on how successful these initiatives have been, it does look like Wicca and other western Pagan imports are gaining popularity in certain Indian cities.

“New age therapies and healing through a host of skills, including hypnosis, tarot reading, astrology and witchcraft are being accepted by a majority of people in Chandigarh, the twin capital of Punjab and Haryana … Claiming to be India’s first Shaman Witch, Renu Mathur helps remove all negative energy surrounding a person through prayer and meditation. She claims that she receives the energy from Gods and Goddesses as also from the four elements of Earth, Air, Fire and Water. ‘Although this may not seem like a straight fight against superstition because what I am doing is very logical like the use of colours, use of fire, use of crystals all of which has been validated by everybody in all fields. This is just a concentrated form of using them and invocations of a Wiccan or a person like me used has a very scientific oath -’Do what will not harm anyone’. We cannot harm anyone. If we even think of doing so we lose our energies,’ said Renu.”

It should be interesting to see what the continued co-mingling of Hinduism and Indian culture with modern Paganism will produce. These cross-cultural interactions seem to hint at the promise of a post-Christian future, where theological “sisters” like Hinduism and modern Paganism can enrich one another over the longer term.

Speaking of India, today is the beginning of the Pongala Mahotsavam, a ten-day festival in honor of Bhagavathi (the mother goddess of the Malayali Hindus). Held in Thiruvananthapuram, it is the largest religious gathering for women in the world.

“Women in thousands have started pouring in to participate in Friday’s ‘Pongala’ festival at Attukal temple, famed as ‘Women’s Sabarimala’ for attracting one of the world’s biggest female congregations. The Attukal Bhagavati temple here had entered the Guinness Book two years back as a unique religious event that draws over a million women on a single day. The whole city would turn into a sea of women as sun rises on Friday with the road, pavements and by-lanes about an area of six km around being occupied by devotees with the earthen pots placed on brick hearths in front of them to prepare the ‘prasadam’ (sweetened pudding). The ritual consists of preparation of the prasadam of rice, jaggery, coconut and spices, to be offered to the Goddess to invoke her blessings for peace and prosperity.”

An estimated 2.5 million women are expected to participate this year, breaking all previous attendance records for the festival (1.7 million in 2007, and 1.5 million in 2006).

What is it with the Catholics lately? Earlier this month we see stories about an exorcism revival in Europe and Australia that seems to specifically target modern Pagans, and now we get anti-Pagan apologetics from National Catholic Register commentator Mark Shea.

“Finally, in these latter days, ‘pagan’ has taken yet another turn and is now used in some circles as a compliment. Among a growing number of people, ‘pagan’ now means ‘post-Christian religionist who is attempting to rescue reverence for Nature from the hands of evil Judeo-Christian earth rapists.’ The notion behind this version of ‘pagan’ is that there was once a magical far-off time when humans dwelt in harmony with Mother Earth, everybody was comfortable with their various Jungian archetypes, and all was well as we worshiped the ‘gods’ and ‘goddesses’ who both expressed the beauty of Nature and got us in touch with our inmost selves (and lots of libido, to boot). Who needs all that stuff about sin, dying to self and the need for redemption? The great blunder of the human race was when the old gods were swept away by the evil Judeo-Christian God.”

You can almost smell the contempt! Shea, like all desperate apologists, vainly constructs a modern Paganism from straw, inflating perceived flaws and minimizing strengths in order to rhetorically vanquish his demonic foe and claim victory for the True Faith (in this case, Catholicism). He references philosophers like Peter Kreeft and G. K. Chesterton without mentioning that both are Catholic apologists, thus building a flawless anti-Pagan feedback loop in which no opposing view can take root.

“Post-Christian paganism is, first and foremost, a search for an escape from God. It is a hunt for the blessings of heaven without the trouble of submitting to heaven. As such, it is ordered toward unreality, though much hampered in the pursuit by the work of the Holy Spirit.”

Paganism is a search for an escape from God! A rebellion against submission that ultimately leads to delusion! It doesn’t matter that no reputable scholar of religion would echo such a view, we are deep in the land of Catholic doublespeak here, a place where any un-Catholic notion is a symptom of a disordered mind. No doubt Shea’s next installment will try to link modern Paganism to nihilism and fascism, following in the footsteps of his Pope.

This new series of columns is just another piece of evidence for an increasingly hostile stance the Catholic Church has been taking towards Pagans. An intolerance that is being instilled in Catholic youth, peddled by the Churches’ highest leaders, enacted by “spiritual warriors”, and parroted by columnists like Shea. Why us now? Perhaps Pagans, being a small and disorganized lot, seems a far safer target than certain rival monotheisms. They can engage in spiritual “battle” without having to worry about criticism, reprisal, or their leader finding it prudent to apologize. What better way to boost the ego, than to pick on someone smaller than you?