I have a few stories of interest before we dive head-first into our Samhain celebrations, starting with an Omaha World-Herald story about a Wiccan inmate who had his request granted to change his legal “Christian” name to his chosen “Witch name”.

“Just in time for Halloween, former Fremont resident Billy Joe McDonald has received a judge’s permission to change his “Christian” name to his “witch” name: Hayden Autumn Blackthorne. In requesting the change for religious reasons, McDonald — er, Blackthorne — wrote that he is “a lifetime member of Witch School,” a “recognized Wiccan Priest” and a person who has “successfully completed Correllian Wicca — First Degree.” And, oh yeah, McDonald also noted that he is a sex offender who has been successfully convicted of sexual assault — first degree.”

While the Wiccan angle makes it newsworthy, the event itself isn’t all that uncommon. Prison inmates request to change their names, often for religious reasons, quite often. That said, these requests aren’t always granted, a Heathen inmate in Nebraska who wanted to change his name to “Sinner Lawrence Bilskirnir” was denied on grounds that it didn’t satify “legal requirements”. Blackthorne’s request was most likely granted because he had letters of support from local clergy, and proof of long-time religious activity within the prison.

Turning from prisons to the world of “adult” film, The Sydney Morning Herald interviews porn star Monica Mayhem about her new book “Absolute Mayhem”, which apparantly mentions her adherence to Wicca.

“It helps me to stay grounded and it helps me to cope with things a lot better … it’s not like you see in the Hollywood movies, it’s actually just a more free and naturally way of living … it’s all about mother nature and the universe.”

Considering how many “stars” in the adult industry are treated, I sincerely hope that Wicca really does help her cope, and ultimately brings her a deeper connection to the earth around her.

In a final “we must be doing something right” note, both Pravda Online (a remnant of the once-mighty official organ of the Communist Party) and The Vatican have warned against celebrating Halloween due to its pagan and occult origins!

The Holy See has warned that parents should not allow their children to dress up as ghosts and ghouls on Saturday, calling Hallowe’en a pagan celebration of “terror, fear and death”. The Roman Catholic Church has become alarmed in recent years by the spread of Hallowe’en traditions from the US to other countries around the world … The Vatican issued the warning through its official newspaper, L’Osservatore Romano, in an article headlined “Hallowe’en’s Dangerous Messages”. The paper quoted a liturgical expert, Joan Maria Canals, who said: “Hallowe’en has an undercurrent of occultism and is absolutely anti-Christian.”

So there you go! Celebrate Halloween properly and you’re defying both The Vatican and members of Russian Orthodoxy who write for post-Communist propaganda tabloids. Talk about rebellion!

That’s all I have for now, have a great day!

Word has come to us that well-known spiritual teacher and author Ted Andrews passed away on October 24th. Andrews is perhaps best known among Pagans for his 1996 book “Animal-Speak: The Spiritual & Magical Powers of Creatures Great & Small” and many other animal-themed works. He also authored books on Qabala, divination, and other psychic and occult practices, many for Llewellyn Worldwide.

Ted Andrews

“Ted’s books on animal magick are some of the best loved in the Wiccan community and are some of the most often used references for animal correspondences and animal magick … Ted was so respected for his writing and work with animals that he was invited to speak at the United Nations in New York in 2007. On October 24, 2009, Ted Andrews crossed the veil and returned to the Great Mother. His passing will leave a great void in many ways, especially because of his ability to bridge the gap between the Pagans and non-Pagans through his work with animals.” – Rowan Pendragon

In addition to writing books about connecting spiritually with animals, Andrews also worked in wildlife rescue and rehabilitation, and engaged in animal education and storytelling programs in school classrooms. He was, if you’ll forgive the expression, a truly rare bird in the field of New Age and occult literature, someone who walked their talk. For a fuller bio of his accomplishments, check out his page at Dragonhawk Publishing. May he find rest and peace.

Just a few items to start off your week, beginning with a rather tragic update on the James A. Ray sweat-lodge death controversy. Chas Clifton alerts us that a third victim has succumbed to injuries sustained while in the sweat-lodge.

“An Arizona homicide investigation now includes three deaths after a woman died more than a week after participating in a sweat lodge ceremony that hospitalized nearly two dozen people. Liz Neuman of Minnesota died Saturday at a Flagstaff hospital, Yavapai County sheriff’s spokesman Dwight D’Evelyn said. The 49-year-old suffered multiple organ damage during the Oct. 8 ceremony at a resort near Sedona, a resort town 115 miles north of Phoenix that draws many in the New Age spiritual movement. Authorities were treating all three deaths as homicides, but no charges have been filed.”

According to the report, Neuman was a true-believer in Ray’s teachings, attending several of his workshops and leading a local Ray-centric discussion group. One wonders how long before Ray’s time gallivanting to speaking engagements and describing these deaths as a “test” for him will come to an end, and he’s brought in for questioning.

Turning to something a bit more pleasant the Pagans for Archeology blog interviews scholar Susan Greenwood concerning her upcoming book “The Anthropology of Magic”.

“When Berg first invited me to write a book on anthropology and magic I didn’t initially think much about it as a project, but after a while I realized that as an undergraduate, and as a postgraduate doctoral student, I’d really struggled to find anything that tackled the issue of the experience of magic. Since childhood, I had always felt a sense of magic – the thrill of a thunderstorm, the fascination with being in nature, and the ‘make-believe’ of creating stories in my head. When I was older I had explored witchcraft and went to university as a mature student to find out more about my magical experiences. During a final year anthropology and sociology project on women’s spirituality I realized that I wanted to explore magic through PhD research (this ended up as Magic, Witchcraft and the Otherworld). During my time of studying I found books that were helpful in some ways but nothing that really dealt with the issues of studying the experience of magic. I wrote The Anthropology of Magic in the hope that it might help students and others to think about magic as an aspect of consciousness – it was the book that I’d wanted when I first started studying anthropology.”

The whole interview is well worth a read, and you may also want to check out Greenwood’s previous works “The Nature of Magic: An Anthropology of Consciousness“, and “Magic, Witchcraft and the Otherworld: An Anthropology“.

In a final note, we have yet more crazy from our favorite Australian crazy, Danny Nalliah, head of Catch the Fire ministries. I’ve indirectly mentioned him a couple times recently, but this one deserves full credit.

“Media reports of this “prayer offensive” have become the darling of the off-beat section, ridiculing the event and its prayer vs. black spells premise. But this being the age where you can be believe in spells and be totally in touch with media and the interwebs, Catch the Fire has cottoned on to the rest of Australia’s mocking pretty quickly (see here).  In response, Pastor Danny went on radio to explain this act of “spiritual warfare”. He said witches have cast spells on our politicians to make more liberal laws about homosexuals and abortions and if we don’t do something soon (like a mass prayer to ask God to get back on our side) we’re going to have more natural disasters, including bush fires.”

As for his spiritual warfare? Don’t worry, his fifty-member team was vastly outnumbered by protesters sporting slogans like “I am what you are afraid of”, easily counter-acting his malfeasance (though they claim to have The Holy Spirit accomplished “great and mighty things”). So the liberal laws (and brush fires I suppose) will no doubt continue!

That’s all I have for now, have a great day!

If there were a Pagan blogging ecosystem I would be near the top of that food-chain. I don’t say this to brag, but to explain that because of this I’ll often receive complimentary items from folks interested in reaching my audience. This is a standard practice. People with stuff to sell send out free copies to media outlets and taste-makers hoping that their (hopefully) positive reviews will generate increased revenue. Similar principles apply to movie reviewers, radio and club DJs, and other media professionals. It is so prevalent that it is, for the most part, simply assumed that Roger Ebert didn’t pay to see “Transformers 2″, and the New York Times doesn’t have to take a trip to Borders to buy Dan Brown’s new novel. But according to the Federal Trade Commission I can no longer assume you know that I got my copy of  “Grimoires: A History of Magic Books” for free (I did), and could risk hefty fines if I don’t reveal the “compensation” they gave me.

“Today the Federal Trade Commission revised their “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials” (click here to download), urging bloggers who review products, from a book to a video game system, to disclose if they received the product for free when giving an endorsement. According to the Washington Post, breaking these new guidelines could generate up to $11,000 in fines.”

What’s causing a controversy about these new rules is the double-standard in which bloggers have to obey these new rules, but newspapers and other traditional media outlets do not. In a revealing interview with FTC official Richard Cleland, Edward Champion lays bare the undistilled ignorance and bias of the people making these new guidelines.

“In the case of books, Cleland saw no problem with a blogger receiving a book, provided there wasn’t a linked advertisement to buy the book and that the blogger did not keep the book after he had finished reviewing it. Keeping the book would, from Cleland’s standpoint, count as “compensation” and require a disclosure. But couldn’t the same thing be said of a newspaper critic? Cleland insisted that when a publisher sends a book to a blogger, there is the expectation of a good review. I informed him that this was not always the case and observed that some bloggers often receive 20 to 50 books a week. In such cases, the publisher hopes for a review, good or bad. Cleland didn’t see it that way. “If a blogger received enough books,” said Cleland, ‘he could open up a used bookstore.’”

So if a newspaper receives a book, gives it a good review, and posts a link to purchase it, it isn’t compensation. But if I get a book, post a link to Amazon, and give it a good review, I’m being “compensated” because the publisher has the “expectation of a good review”. It’s simply ridiculous. As if the publisher doesn’t have the same expectation from the newspapers and magazines it sends comp copies to. Do they really think that newspapers were simply keeping these free books in a underground library or returning them to the publisher? It’s a well-known industry “perk” that reviewers get to keep the book/movie/cd they review (and just as often those “pro” unbiased newspaper reviewers sell their comp-copies to used bookstores).

Media critic Jeff Jarvis notes that the new regulations were supposed to target hated pay-per-post “sploggers”, but instead regulates speech and is a “monument to unintended consequence”.

“…the FTC assumes – as media people do – that the internet is a medium. It’s not. It’s a place where people talk. Most people who blog, as Pew found in a survey a few years ago, don’t think they are doing anything remotely connected to journalism. I imagine that virtually no one on Facebook thinks they’re making media. They’re connecting. They’re talking. So for the FTC to go after bloggers and social media – as they explicitly do – is the same as sending a government goon into Denny’s to listen to the conversations in the corner booth and demand that you disclose that your Uncle Vinnie owns the pizzeria whose product you just endorsed. Insanity and inanity. And danger. The regulations raise no end of questions. For example: How much do I have disclose? Before I say anything nice about anyone, do I need to list every advertiser I’ve ever had? Every possible business relationship? You think my disclosures are comical now, just wait.”

So from now on, under the FTC’s assumption that I would be so tickled by Llewellyn sending me a copy of “Priestess of the Forest: A Druid Journey” that I’d have no choice but give it a positive review (when in reality I left it to gather dust because I thought it just wasn’t that good) I will be posting a disclaimer with every review stating whether I received a promotional “compensation” copy. As for the many blogging Pagan book reviewers out there who receive promotional copies, you better start crafting your disclaimer statement now. This, along with plans in congress to exempt citizen journalists and bloggers from the shield law protections is quickly creating a journalism class-system that privileges money and institutions above content and context.

For the three or four of you who don’t read Boing Boing, that compendium of wonderful things is currently in the midst of hosting guest-blogger Mitch Horowitz author of “Occult America: The Secret History of How Mysticism Shaped Our Nation” (which I mentioned recently here). So far he’s blogged about what the occult is exactly, classic esoteric texts, the American spirit, and the popularity of Saint Expedite.

“One of the most interesting aspects of folk religion in America is the enduring figure of Saint Expedite … Simply put, Saint Expedite is the patron of those who need help in a hurry: with jobs, relationships, money, etc. In Brazil, he is the venerated helper of people looking for work; in America, so says Wired magazine, he is the “patron saint of the nerds,” i.e., a figure who can help untangle internet connections and the keep communications networks flowing; to church authorities he is merely an icon of “popular religiosity” who never historically existed.”

While this certainly isn’t Boing Boing’s first foray into all things occult, it does seem to be the first time they’ve approached the topic in such a enthusiastic and sympathetic manner, so kudos to them. To keep track of Horowitz’s posts, you can follow Boing Boing’s guest-blogger tag. As for Mitch Horowitz himself, he’s been just about everywhere promoting his new book, from The Washington Post to NPR. I guess releasing your book about America’s occult roots right around the same time a mega-popular fiction writer is tackling some of the same subjects does pay off.

Few living modern Pagans have had as much influence on our interconnected movements as Starhawk. Author, outspoken activist, and co-founder of the Reclaiming Tradition of Witchcraft, she, along with several others, helped shape threads of modern Paganism that were more explicitly feminist and eco-activist in nature. She is perhaps most famous for her 1979 book “The Spiral Dance”, a work that synthesized elements of spiritual feminism, Wicca, environmentalism, and the teachings of Victor Anderson into something entirely new. This year we not only approach the 30th anniversary of that book, but of the yearly Reclaiming-sponsored Spiral Dance Samhain ritual, which has evolved from a small Bay Area community-based ritual into an international event that draws nearly 2000 people. I was lucky enough to recently conduct a short e-mail interview with Starhawk about both of these anniversaries, and her vision for the future.

This interview will be part of a larger piece about the 30th anniversary of the Spiral Dance to be published by the Pagan Newswire Collective in late October/early November.

Starhawk

What started out as a release party for your book “The Spiral Dance” has evolved into a massive multi-day ritual pageant, complete with original art, music, and dance, that draws people from far outside the San Francisco area. To what do you attribute this success, and what do you think the Spiral Dance represents to the hundreds who attend?

Let me just start by saying that the Spiral Dance has always been, first and foremost, a ritual. Although the first one was also a book release party, uppermost in our minds was the desire to create a powerful, public ritual on a scale that we had never tried before. And I wanted to involve friends of mine who were artists, musicians, poets—to honor the arts as sacred activities. In retrospect, we did crazy things. We had Goddess dancers in porcelain headdresses sculpted by Medea Maquis, and wearing macramé costumes all hand-made by my dear friend Kevyn Lutton. Another sculptor, Eleanor Myers, made sixteen porcelain headpieces for the chorus. They were all beautiful—and you can see them in the video that’s on our new website. But they were incredibly hot, heavy, and breakable!

But that was the spirit in which we approached the ritual—let’s go all out, over the top, and see what we can create. And I think that’s why it has become a tradition.

Now, the Spiral Dance is many things. It’s a performance, that we hope moves people both esthetically and spiritually, and that serves as a vehicle for many, many people to express their creativity in different ways: building altars, creating dances and invocations, singing in the chorus. It’s a place where we can come together to mourn our dead and reconnect with their spirits in deep meditation. And again, beyond everything else, it’s an amazing, participatory ritual where over a thousand people dance together and raise focused power for our vision of healing and renewal.

Your book is also seeing its 30th year in print. In those intervening years you’ve become one of the most visible modern Pagans, acting as a panelist for the Washington Post’s “On Faith” project, and making international news with your activism. Has your notoriety changed how you view The Spiral Dance – the book, and the event?

I don’t know if ‘notoriety’ is actually the word that fits—that, such as it is, and a quarter might get me on a bus. Actually, these days it would probably take a couple of dollars.

Thirty years ago, books had more impact than they do today. Merlin Stone’s book When God Was a Woman came out in 1976. In 1979, three important books came out: mine, Margot Adler’s Drawing Down the Moon, and the anthology edited by Carol Christ and Judith Plaskow, Womanspirit Rising. Together they helped to take what was really a tiny movement of a few of us in our living rooms doing circles, and boost it up into a major movement—really several intercepting movements—the womanspirit movement, the earth-based spirituality movement, the Pagan movement.

Throughout the eighties, Harper SanFrancisco was looking for books on feminist spirituality to publish. They saw it as a niche, but a large enough one that they could do well by serving it. In the nineties, sometime perhaps around the time Harper Collins was bought by Rupert Murdoch, they shifted focus. They dropped a huge number of contracts—not mine, but many other quality books, and like publishing as a whole, moved away from serving specific communities and toward a general mass-market focus. Harper SanFrancisco now publishes mostly Christian books. And publishing overall is in turmoil, losing readers to the Internet.

So, while its easier than ever to publish—all you have to do is set up a blog and you can publish yourself—it’s harder than ever to find publishers for deeper, more thoughtful works or for them to find an audience. HarperSanFrancisco did a tenth anniversary edition and a twentieth anniversary edition of The Spiral Dance, but they didn’t want to do a thirtieth unless I significantly rewrote the book, which I decided I didn’t want to do. I think the book still stands on its own, especially with the commentary I’ve added in the later editions. Perhaps because I wrote it when I was young, fervent and in the first throes of my love affair with the Goddess, it has an energy of its own that I didn’t want to mess with. If I were going to rewrite it, I’d rather write something new, which I did a few years ago, The Earth Path.

As for the ritual—I still love it! I work on it every year in some capacity, as part of the ‘cell’ or collective that puts it on. People join the cell by taking on a coordinating role, whether that’s directing the chorus or directing the cleanup—a truly vital role! We have a visioning meeting early on, and invite a large group of people who have a connecting to the ritual. From that, we draw our theme and intention and imagery for the year.

Reclaiming works collectively, and we try to pass around roles of leadership and responsibility. So—I’ve done many things for the Spiral Dance, from writing or rewriting parts of it, to unloading the storage space and hoisting the platforms for the altars. Some years I lead the trance—other years I’ll take a smaller role in the ritual itself and let someone else take the central roles.

One change—for many years we did not allow photography at any of our rituals. We felt there was a power in the ritual happening at the moment, and that photographs were intrusive and made people feel paranoid. However, in recent years we’ve changed that policy for the Spiral Dance. The world has changed—and communication now is visual, on the web. We found we couldn’t get calendar listing without good photos. So we experimented with asking a couple of the photographers and videographers in our community to shoots some photos in a limited and respectful way. They did an amazing job—and we learned that photography, too, can be a sacred art when it is practiced in the right spirit. I’ve put together two short videos that have let over 20,000 people catch a glimpse of our ritual. They can be viewed on our website.

This year our theme is ‘the next generation’, and we’re bringing many of our teens and youth into ritual roles, together with some of our elders. I’ll be co-leading the trance with my dear friend Rose May Dance, one of our early Reclaiming members, and with a young teen, Julian Litauer-Chen, who has also sung in the chorus for many years.

Reclaiming, the Witchcraft tradition that sponsors the annual Spiral Dance, has become a vibrant international presence within the modern Pagan movement. How do you think this growth and evolution have changed the event?

Bay Area Reclaiming used to be Reclaiming—now we are just one community among many. The Spiral Dance used to be the Big Event for all of Reclaiming—now it is one ritual among many, including other rituals in the Bay Area and all the rituals people are doing in their home communities. I’m thrilled that Reclaiming has grown, and our vision has always been one of many linked, decentralized communities with their own identities and characters.

But people still love The Spiral Dance—and many people come from far away to participate. This year, our house is full with visitors from Vermont, Boston, Montreal, L.A. and San Diego. We’ve had guests from England, Australia, New Zealand—all over the world.

What are your personal feelings on this 30th anniversary?

I’m thrilled at what we’ve accomplished, excited for this year’s ritual, and a bit shocked to think that I wrote the book thirty years ago!

How have your visions for the future shifted during the first 30 years? What do you envision the 60th annual Spiral Dance will be like?

I see two roads for the future—and that’s part of the theme and imagery of this year’s and previous Spiral Dances. On one road, we continue to pump fossil fuels into the atmosphere and pump the poisons of fear, racism, hate, and war-mongering into the psychic atmosphere. By 2039, we’ll face a world of drought, famine, endemic war, potentially a loss of our civil liberties, hundreds of millions of deaths, oceans rising…

Then there’s the other road, the good road, the road of life…where we make the tremendous shifts we need to make, where we recognize the sacred in every human being and in the interconnected web of all life, where—as our litany says—“we draw our power from the wind and sun.” “May the old ones and the young be loved, and all the forms of love be blessed, and all the colors of our skin be praised, and all the cycles of life be saved.”

That’s the vision we raise power for at The Spiral Dance, that’s what we dance for and sing for, and what we work for all the other days of the year. It is my deepest hope that, thirty years from now, we are walking firmly on the good road, and that a new generation is still dancing the Spiral.

Previous Wild Hunt interviews: Gus diZerega, Jeff Sharlet, Brendan Cathbad Myers, Rita Moran, Janet Farrar and Gavin Bone, Phyllis Curott, Tim Ward, Lupa, J.C. Hallman, Margot Adler.

As George W. Bush’s administration fades away into history more details about its character are starting to see the light of day, perhaps some of the most revealing so-far come from former Bush speech-writer Matt Latimer’s new book “Speech-less: Tales of a White House Survivor”. Filled with embarrassing quips from George W. Bush and other top administration officials, it also seems to confirm a sneaking suspicion among modern Pagans that Bush and his administration had a unique obsession with Witchcraft and the occult.

Latimer writes that administration officials objected to giving author J.K. Rowling the Presidential Medal of Freedom because her writing “encouraged witchcraft” (p. 201): “This was the same sort of narrow thinking that led people in the White House to actually object to giving the author J.K. Rowling a presidential medal because the Harry Potter books encouraged withcraft.”

This newly-revealed “Harry Potter encourages witchcraft” attitude, along with Jim Towey’s misguided comments, the VA interpreting old anti-Wicca Bush quotes in order to make policy, and the snubbing of a Wiccan military widow (that Bush later apologized for) seems to confirm at the very least that Bush’s people (like the VA) either broadly interpreted his past anti-Witchcraft comments, or that conservative Christian attitudes towards minority faiths were pervasive.

Considering the newly hyper-partisan anger among conservative “values voters”, it could certainly be read as a movement in turmoil over being removed from the access to the executive power they felt was their right. Looking at the preferred candidates of conservative Christians over the years, we see a certain evolution (if you’ll pardon the term) in preference. From Ronald Reagan (who now looks moderate by comparison) and George W. Bush to Sarah Palin and Mike Huckabee. Conservative Christian activists are increasingly demanding adherence to troubling strain of charismatic Christianity that isn’t afraid to engage in a little malefic prayer-warring to get the job done. If Bush’s mild (by comparison) anti-Wiccan comments and subsequent reliance on folks like James Dobson were enough to color the executive branch as it did, imagine if someone the “values voters” really love got into the president’s chair.

In 1913 Carl Jung, the founder of analytical psychology, experienced a prolonged “confrontation with the unconscious” where he daily wrestled with visions, heard inner voices, and explored his own vast dream-scape for six years. Beginning just before World War I, and ending shortly after its close, his inner turmoil echoed the chaos erupting all around him. During this time Jung didn’t merely experience these events, he rose to meet and catalog them, and created a legendary never-printed (and never-finished) chronicle of his underworld journey called “Liber Novus” (”New Book”) in the process. “Liber Novus”, or “The Red Book” as its become known due to the work being done in a large red notebook, became legendary amongst Jungians, described alternately as holding “infinite wisdom” and being “psychotic” by the few who ever got a glimpse of it. Now, after many years, the heirs of Carl Jung have agreed to allow this lost text to see print for the first time.

“Anytime someone did ask to see the Red Book, family members said, without hesitation and sometimes without decorum, no. The book was private, they asserted, an intensely personal work. In 1989, an American analyst named Stephen Martin, who was then the editor of a Jungian journal and now directs a Jungian nonprofit foundation, visited Jung’s son (his other four children were daughters) and inquired about the Red Book. The question was met with a vehemence that surprised him. “Franz Jung, an otherwise genial and gracious man, reacted sharply, nearly with anger,” Martin later wrote in his foundation’s newsletter, saying “in no uncertain terms” that Martin could not “see the Red Book, nor could he ever imagine that it would be published.” And yet, Carl Jung’s secret Red Book — scanned, translated and footnoted — will be in stores early next month, published by W. W. Norton and billed as the “most influential unpublished work in the history of psychology.” Surely it is a victory for someone, but it is too early yet to say for whom.”

This October (when the veils between the worlds are thin) you can purchase a deluxe scanned, translated, and footnoted copy of “The Red Book” by Jung for 195.00 dollars (or 105.00 dollars through Amazon.com). What can the reader expect after they shell out for this tome? Well, in a mythological and archetypal sense, a little bit of everything.

One of the many illustrations by Jung in “The Red Book”.

“The footnotes map both [Jungian Sonu] Shamdasani’s journey and Jung’s. They include references to Faust, Keats, Ovid, the Norse gods Odin and Thor, the Egyptian deities Isis and Osiris, the Greek goddess Hecate, ancient Gnostic texts, Greek Hyperboreans, King Herod, the Old Testament, the New Testament, Nietzsche’s Zarathustra, astrology, the artist Giacometti and the alchemical formulation of gold. And that’s just naming a few. The central premise of the book, Shamdasani told me, was that Jung had become disillusioned with scientific rationalism — what he called “the spirit of the times” — and over the course of many quixotic encounters with his own soul and with other inner figures, he comes to know and appreciate “the spirit of the depths,” a field that makes room for magic, coincidence and the mythological metaphors delivered by dreams.”

To say that Jung’s work is important to the later development of modern Paganism as we now know it would be something of an understatement. So much of the language and ideas we use in processing our own inner workings and journeys are touched by the terms and ideas pioneered by him. Now the world will see what is perhaps Jung’s most personal work, a psychological grimoire that has acquired such an air of mystery and wonder that it seems almost unreal that it is being mass-produced now. This could be the most important “esoteric” work to be published in decades, and while it most likely won’t shift the way things work in the world of analytical/Jungian psychology, it could end up having deep reverberations throughout the “occult” world. Makes me wish I was the kind of guy who had 100 dollars to randomly spend on a single book. Maybe I’ll put it on my Yule list.

I’m sure you haven’t heard, but there is a new book coming out tomorrow by author Dan Brown entitled “The Lost Symbol”. Brown’s last book, “The Da Vinci Code”, sold, like, a gazillion copies, made various Catholics and conservative Christians pop a gasket, and spawned a mega-grossing movie (not to mention a successful prequel/sequel) starring Tom Hanks. In anticipation of this assured best-seller James Kaplan from Parade Magazine sits down with Brown to talk about his work, whether he believes in the conspiracy theories he writes about, and why he was inspired to write about the divine feminine.

“Part of it was my mom–she is strong in her convictions and yet absolutely open to embracing a change in them. Part of it was falling in love and also looking at other religions, especially older ones, paganism, the Mother Earth concept. And some of it came from looking at the destructive force of man and saying, “Look at what we’re doing. If we spent half the intellect and money we spend on killing each other on solving problems, wouldn’t that be great?” I kind of equate that with testosterone. You say, “What if God were a woman? What if we embraced our feminine side–the more creative, passive, loving side?” It’s a gross generalization, but all those things added up to my celebrating the Sacred Feminine.”

I’ve long believed that it was Brown tapping into a deep yearning to re-connect with the feminine aspect(s) of the divine that made his rather slight novel a super-mega hit.

“It isn’t that Jesus had sex, it isn’t the mysterious gnostic sects, it isn’t about hatred of the Catholic Church, and it certainly isn’t due to Dan Brown’s skill as a writer, it’s the goddess, stupid.”

As for what Brown personally believes he remains a bit evasive, saying he’s strayed far from the Episcopalian upbringing of his youth, but that he come “full circle” and sees a “spiritual aspect” to science. It also seems that he may be done exploring the feminine divine and has moved into the realms of Freemasonry and noetic science for his latest page-turner. Still, with Brown back in the news you can expect that the heresy-hunters will be straining for a piece of the spotlight.

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

The city of Euless has had its request for a rehearing in federal appeals court over the matter of animal sacrifice rejected.

“A federal appeals court has rejected Euless’ request for a rehearing on a decision that paves the way for a Santeria priest to resume sacrificing animals in his home during religious ceremonies. Jose Merced sued Euless, saying his First Amendment religious freedoms were violated when the city banned him from slaughtering goats in 2006. The city contended that such sacrifices jeopardized public health and violated slaughterhouse and animal-cruelty ordinances.”

Short of an appeal to the Supreme Court, which Euless seems to be considering, this case is done. If it does go to the Supreme Court, and Merced wins again, it could affect animal slaughter laws across the country. Clearing the way for religions like Santeria to sacrifice animals at their rites largely free from the threat of arrest or harassment. To read all my coverage of this case, click here.

At The Nation Max Blumenthal publishes an excerpt from his forthcoming book that concerns the tragic case of Matthew Murray, a deeply disturbed young man who took a gun to a Youth With A Mission missionary training center and opened fire, killing four, then himself. Blumenthal tells how Murray grew up indoctrinated and abused by his charismatic Pentecostal parents, and how his attempts to break free of their programming led him first to the teachings of Aleister Crowley, then to drug abuse, and ultimately to a complete breakdown that led to the tragic shootings.

“Murray had been indoctrinated so thoroughly into charismatic Pentecostal culture, however, that even while he railed against his religious upbringing, he could not abandon his ingrained attraction to religiosity. So instead of fleeing hardcore Christian culture for secular humanism, a natural position for jaded skeptics like him, he traded his former faith for Crowley’s occultism. Crowley’s philosophy of sex “magick,” narcotic hallucination, and self-degradation (he allegedly ordered his followers to have oral sex with goats and drink the blood of cats) was forged in reaction to his parents’ Puritanism and, in fact, was first practiced in English boarding schools, where homosexual experimentation was practically de rigueur. Crowley became Murray’s new lodestar. Like Jesus, who was so impressed by the ardor of a pagan Roman centurion whom he met that he remarked, “I have not found such great faith, even in Israel,” Murray yearned for spiritual practice in its purest form. Now he practiced Crowley’s faux faith as fervently as his parents wished he had worshipped their neo-evangelical macho Christ. But the occult only led Murray into a confusing new world of cheap thrills.”

I find it interesting that Blumenthal, in damning extremist Christianity, feels the need to misrepresent Aleister Crowley, and by implication, to insult anyone who leaves Christianity for an occult practice instead of the “natural” choice of secular humanism. He ultimately blames an abusive Christian upbringing for Murray’s descent into madness, and rightfully criticizes attempts of Christian apologists to paint this as an “occult” or “Satanic” attack, but couldn’t avoid his own preconceived notions concerning what the O.T.O. and the philosophies of Aleister Crowley are truly about. In his failure to hide his disdain for an occult practice he doesn’t understand, to paint it as a sign of illness, he sounds more like the Christians he criticizes than he would most likely care to admit.

SF Gate’s In Marin blog profies Cerridwen Fallingstar on the publication of her new book “White as Bone Red as Blood, The Fox Sorceress”, a book that is “based” on Fallingstar’s past life in 12th century Japan.

“The first book, which was released in 1990, was based on Cerridwen’s past life as a Scottish witch in 16th-century Scotland.   It took a full fifteen years before she released her current book, White as Bone, a compelling read about a sorceress in the royal palace in Japan during the mid-1100s. Why so long? Cerridwen says it takes a long time to cultivate the memories and even longer to do the research.  She says she is able to enter a trance, summon the memories and put them to tape. After transcribing them, she’ll research them by conventional means; by reading as much as she can find on that particular time in history, and by visiting the locales.”

Will this new book find favor within the Pagan community? Are past-life accounts still popular, or have we grown more skeptical of such things in the twenty years since Fallingstar’s last book? I guess we’ll find out. In the meantime, if you want to find out more about Cerridwen Fallingstar and order a copy of the book, click here.

The Odinist group that was kicked out of a public park in Bakersfield, California say they are filing a lawsuit with the ACLU against the North of the River Parks and Recreation Department.

“Roger Perez, NOR public relations director, said, “I believe there was a claim that the religion was being disrespected, and we take those types of claims seriously. But in our internal investigation, that wasn’t believed to have been said, was not said, by our deputy. And unfortunately, I think it just got blown out of proportion.” But the Odinists were not satisfied. They began the process to file a civil lawsuit with the ACLU which is considering whether to take the case.”

So it looks like this one will most likely be going to court. The KERO 23 story also includes the two 911 calls from neighbors that brought the police to the scene, one of which sounds confused about what exactly is going on, and another that alleges they were shouting “white power” to non-white passerby. The Odinist group has denied that they are a racist organization.

In a final note, with Autumn on its way we are quickly approaching the Halloween/Samhain season, and that means reality television programs are skulking about Salem looking for a willing Witchy participant. This time the  snarky fashion show “What Not to Wear” (on the increasingly misnamed TLC network) has its sights set on Salem shop co-owner Leanne Marrama.

“TV fashion gurus Stacy London and Clinton Kelly were in Salem filming an episode of their show, in which they stage weekly style interventions on a victim of bad fashion. Leanne Marrama, a member of Salem’s witch community, was in their sights yesterday. Dressed in a black gown with wide lacy sleeves, a black corset, black combat boots and a black purse with a skull, Marrama is set for a complete fashion, hair and makeup makeover.”

Also in the program will be Marrama’s friend and business associate Christian Day. While I’m sure many Pagans in New England have at times wished the more flamboyant Salem Witches would get a makeover, I don’t think this is what they had in mind. Shows like this aren’t laughing with us, they are producing content so that people can laugh at us (not to mention imposing a more rigid idea of “normalcy” concerning dress and appearance).

That’s all I have for now, have a great day!