“His surgery was on Friday and it went well; they removed a large section of his descending colon and adjacent mesentery, his doctor is confident that he took out all the cancer and any pre cancerous lymph nodes. He said that he did not see any swollen or discolored nodes. The tissue was all sent to Pathology and we should have the results later this week since the Lab is shut down for the holiday. We will know that the surgeon successfully removed all the cancer when we receive that report. Until then folks the coin is, magickally speaking, still in the air.”

Meanwhile McCollum, who suffered from complications after back surgery, is now out of the hospital and beginning the slow recovery process.

“Patrick was released from hospital this evening, with brace and cane and orders not to leave the house for two days minimum. He will have a long recovery. He remains heavily medicated to relieve intense pain. In spite of these difficulties, Patrick’s recovery has been amazing, no doubt helped in great part by the workings and prayers of many Pagans.”

The friends and family of both McCollum and Zell-Ravenheart request continued prayers and healing work as they recover.

Starhawk and the RNC Police Raids: Since I first reported, more information on warrantless police raids and arrests has emerged in the Twin Cities (including the arrest of journalists). While the RNC has been muted due to Hurricane Gustav, around 20,000 people are protesting outside (and yes, occasionally damaging property). Starhawk continues to post updates on her web site about the protests.

“All day we’ve been getting news that the police have been raiding houses, breaking down doors, arresting people, with or without warrants or warnings. We hold the morning meeting in a public park, because our Convergence Space has been raided and closed the night before. Someone says, “We’re a community that includes children—we can’t clear them out of their own living spaces. Remember if the police raid your space it’s important to have someone negotiate with them to get the children out.” I am a tough person. I’ve been through a lot of these things and in spite of all my efforts to stay open I’ve grown something of my own protective scales. But those words pierce through them, and I find tears welling up in my eyes. It just hits me, that we’re standing here in the United States of America, in the liberal city of my birth, talking about how to protect children from armed police.”

For continuing updates about this issue, check out the Coldsnap Legal Collective web site, their Twitter feed, the Twin Cities IndyMedia site, and Pacifica Radio.

Ellinais Acropolis Protest: Since I first mentioned it a few days ago, Ellinais’s planned (illegal) ritual to Athena at the Acropolis has made international news. Being covered by CNN, ARTINFO, The New York Times, The Guardian, and several others.

“Dressed in crisp white apparel, the pagans gathered before the east wing of the temple’s imposing Corinthian columns and prayed to Athena, the ancient Greek goddess of wisdom and patron of Athens, asking her to protect the Parthenon from further destruction. “Oh, goddess,” roared high priestess Doretta Peppa, her hands extending over an offering of water and olive oil. “We are ready to defend your grounds. “[But] we ask of you to protect this site, this city and its civilization, and to rid it of all evils such as the deconstruction of the Acropolis.” The Greek Culture Ministry forbids ceremonies of any sort at archeological sites. But in January, the pagan revivalists used a second century temple of Zeus in Athens to stage the first known ceremony of its kind in 1,600 years.”

In perhaps a sign that the gods approved, Athena’s father Zeus provided a thunderstorm for the 13-minute ritual. The protest-prayer comes in the wake of plans for a massive new Acropolis Museum which the remaining Acropolis statues will be moved into. Ellinais priestess Doretta Peppa calls the new structure an “architectural monstrosity” that will erode Greek culture.

“The new museum,” Peppa said, “is a monumental eyesore, an architectural monstrosity within the most traditional and archeologically-rich part of Athens. It is an insult to our heritage, and if we start deconstructing our monuments for the sake of filling up a museum, then what will we be left with?”

Greek officials are hoping the new space will boost tourist income and pressure the British government to release the Elgin Marbles, which they claim were obtained illegally, back to Greece.
]]> http://wildhunt.org/blog/2008/09/updates-on-recent-stories.html/feed 0 http://wildhunt.org/blog/2007/01/pagan-news-of-note_29.html http://wildhunt.org/blog/2007/01/pagan-news-of-note_29.html#comments Mon, 29 Jan 2007 15:44:00 +0000 Jason http://wildhunt.org/blog/2007/01/pagan-news-of-note-17.html My semi-regular round-up of articles, essays, and opinions of note for discerning Pagans and Heathens.

For those of you who have been missing pioneering acid-house band The KLF since their retirement, it seems that “New Rave” act The Klaxons are here to pick up the slack.

“Pogoing behind the banks of synthesisers is, instead, a band steeped in art rock, soft pop and science fiction…That old rascal Aleister Crowley gets exhumed once again. ‘Do what you will,’ urges ‘Magick’, abetted by an irresistible on-beat.”

You can find the lyrics to their Thelemic ode, here. For some samples of their musical wares, try The Hype Machine.

Cambridge Classics scholar Mary Beard criticizes the Greek Pagans who made the news recently for their lack of blood sacrifice.

“True, the worshipers last week poured a libation of wine and incense over a copper tripod. But where was the animal sacrifice? As almost everyone who studies ancient Greek religion insists, the key centre of the whole religious system was sacrifice: it was the ritual of killing and sharing the animal that was, if anything, the “article of faith” that defined the ancient community of worshipers. And it was through sacrifice (rather than ecology) that ancient Greeks conceptualized their own place in the world – distinct from animals on the one hand and the superhuman gods on the other. Until these eager neo-pagans get real and slaughter a bull or two in central Athens, I shan’t worry that they have much to do with ancient religion at all. At the moment, this is paganism lite.”

Pagan scholar Chas Clifton fires back with a resounding “so what”?

“Her slightly patronizing tone aside, so what? Religions do change–even while their adherents insist on continuity with the past. I have great respect for Beard as a Classics scholar–I own one or two of her books–but I suspect that she has not given much thought before to new religious movements until she decided to give her opinion on this new development in her blog.”

This caused Mary to get a tad defensive in the comments…

“I think I was really responding to the claims made by this group that they WERE reviving ancient paganism. I am absolutely OK with the idea that religions change. I was reacting to their claims to be a modern version of ANCIENT ‘paganism’.”

For quite a bit more debate on if blood sacrifice is a necessary component of a revived Greco-Roman paganism, check out the comments on Beard’s blog.

In case you were wondering, supermodel Naomi Campbell is not a witch.

“Naomi Campbell called the other day — no jokes about flying cell phones, please. The supermodel was a perfect lady, even as she made her complaints about newspaper stories in Brazil, England and here that she is interested in Brazil’s African-based Candomble religion, which has rituals some have likened to witchcraft.”

I was going to bring forward a witness who said she turned him into a newt, but sadly he “got better” before I could alert the tabloids. No word on if she weighs as much as a duck.

If you can make it to Santa Cruz, I couldn’t think of a better activity than attending Robert Anton Wilson’s Cosmic Meme-Orial & Lasagna Levitation Celebration on February 18th.

“Celebrate the life, work and continued multi-dimensionality of Robert Anton Wilson by joining us in a giant, jammin’ Translation Celebration and 8th Circuit Soiree! Be a part of Bob’s Raucous Processionary Send-Off as his ashes sail out of the cove and rejoin his beloved’s in the Pacific!”

Organizers are still accepting contributions for their media presentation. Send your photos of Wilson or creative graphical tributes as 300 x 600 jpegs to the e-mail address listed here.

Finally, the newspaper of my old hometown in Champaign-Urbana Illinois covers the possible Witch School reality program in Hoopeston.

“The witch school that moved into Hoopeston’s elephant building three years ago may soon be the site of a reality TV show on the Sci-Fi channel. “We’re pretty excited even though we don’t know that much about it yet,” said Don Lewis, who is the Witch School’s chancellor…A spokeswoman for the network confirmed that a reality series to be filmed in Hoopeston is in development. “We don’t have a production timetable as of yet, nor do we have additional information on the details of the production,” Adrienne D’Amato wrote in an e-mail.”

Doesn’t sound like anything is in stone at this point. You wonder if they’ll insist on a photogenic cast of teachers and students?

That is all I have for now, have a good day!
]]> http://wildhunt.org/blog/2007/01/pagan-news-of-note_29.html/feed 0 http://wildhunt.org/blog/2007/01/covering-greek-pagans.html http://wildhunt.org/blog/2007/01/covering-greek-pagans.html#comments Mon, 22 Jan 2007 16:40:00 +0000 Jason http://wildhunt.org/blog/2007/01/covering-the-greek-pagans.html As hinted at two days ago, the Greek Pagan group Ellinais have defied the law and held a ceremony at the Temple of Olympian Zeus despite the lack of permission from Greece’s Culture Ministry. Unexpectedly, this has been picked up by the Associated Press and the BBC and made international news.

Greek Pagans dressed as ancient warriors.
Photo: Reuters/Yannis Behrakis

“I feel very emotional. We have been persecuted for 16-and-a-half centuries but now we are here. This is our human right. And we shall carry on worshiping at our temples. They have now been put to proper use…We want to be able to hold ceremonies at ancient temples … This obsession of treating them as mere monuments must stop.” – High Priestess Doretta Peppa

“If we really want to say that we are democratic and we have freedom, then we have to be allowed to practice our religion.” – 12 Gods follower “Artemis”

“Our hymns stress the brotherhood of man and do not single out nations.” – High Priest Giorgos Alexelis

“Our message is world peace and an ecological way of life in which everyone has the right to education. To the Greeks, ecological awareness was fundamental.” – High Priest Kostas Stathopoulos

It should be interesting to track the future growth of the Greek Pagans, Greece’s Culture Ministry wasn’t happy at the outcome of this “illegal” meeting and has promised that they will crack down on future illegal meetings. Obviously, officials from the Greek Orthodox Church were apoplectic.

“They are a handful of miserable resuscitators of a degenerate dead religion who wish to return to the monstrous dark delusions of the past” – Father Efstathios Kollas, the President of Greek Clergymen.

So it won’t be smooth sailing as Ellinais tries to obtain legal permission to perform marriages and other clergy functions. In a culture that is dominated by the Greek Orthodox Church, attitudes towards a growing Pagan religion could easily shift from scorn and ridicule to outright oppression.