Archives For Brendan Myers

Pagan Community Notes: Pagan Living TV, Idle No More, and More!

Jason Pitzl-Waters —  January 8, 2013 — 13 Comments

Pagan Community Notes is a series focused on news originating from within the Pagan community. Reinforcing the idea that what happens to and within our organizations, groups, and events is news, and news-worthy. My hope is that more individuals, especially those working within Pagan organizations, get into the habit of sharing their news with the world. So let’s get started!

Pagan Living TV Launches: Pagan Living TV, a non-profit media organization that seeks to create a world “where Pagan spirituality and philosophy is an influential voice in mainstream culture,” has launched their weekly video news program “The Pagan Voice.”

“Pagan Living TV is a charitable non-profit organization that produces a weekly news program that discusses the issues of today from a Pagan perspective.  This is the first professionally produced broadcast program that is produced in a multi-camera television studio, and is distributed on both the internet and on local cable channels in some major cities.”

As you can tell from watching the video, the production values are considerably higher than previous Pagan video-news efforts (no insult to those worthy efforts, merely an observation) showcasing Pagan Living TV’s ambition in raising the bar. As Pagan scholar Chas Clifton notes: “Although it’s still just talking heads in the studio at this point. At least there is a studio, not a sheet tacked to the wall.” I’ll be watching the growth of Pagan Living TV, The Pagan Voice, and future shows with interest.

Pagan Involvement With ‘Idle No More’: Last month I posed the question of whether modern Pagans should involve themselves with the growing indigenous/Native activist movement known as Idle No More. Since then, some high-profile figures within modern Paganism have visited the camp where where Chief Theresa Spence, of the Attawapiskat First Nation, is holding a hunger strike, or gotten involved with Idle No More actions. First, Pagan philosopher Brendan Myers, who lives near Victoria Island in Canada visits Chief Theresa Spence’s camp and share’s his observations.

Chief Theresa Spence's Camp

Chief Theresa Spence’s Camp

“Of all the many social groups which comprise Canada’s social fabric, the First Nations, the Metis and the Inuit have a special place in our identity.They gave to “us”, the visitors on this land and their descendants, a gift so precious and so valuable it’s likely that nothing we could give them in return could possibly compensate them. That gift was the land on which this country was built. Without one or two other ethnic groups in our history, we would have a different country, for better or worse; without the First Nations, we would have no country at all. Therefore, Canada has special responsibility, it seems to me, partly arising from the various treaties which the Crown signed with the First Nations, but also arising from the ‘economy of honour’ that surrounds gifts of that magnitude. Canada’s moral obligation, at minimum, to ensure that the living standards of First Nations people are at least as good as that of the average middle-class non-native Canadian person – and that’s not impossible, and that’s perhaps only the least of what Canada should do.”

In addition to Brendan Myer’s impressions, Shelley TSivia Rabinovitch, co-author of “An’ Ye Harm None: Magical Morality And Modern Ethics,” and co-editor of the “Encyclopedia Of Modern Witchcraft And Neo-Paganism,” has also been visiting Chief Spence’s camp and attending Idle No More actions urging Pagan solidarity with this movement: “I feel wonderful. And I will do it again. And again. AND UNTIL STEPHEN HARPER HEARS that he cannot sell out this country.” Also of note, author and teacher T. Thorn Coyle attended an Idle No More solidarity action in Oakland, California and shares her thoughts:

“On Saturday, I joined a couple hundred people in solidarity with Idle No More. Chief Theresa Spence has been on hunger strike for more than 25 days now, challenging the Prime Minister of Canada to a meeting regarding the sanctity of the earth and indigenous sovereignty. Idle No More is standing up – singing, drumming, dancing, and blockading – for the rights of free waterways, and land unpolluted by dangerous fracking. I want to support this challenge, this attempt to afflict the closely held privilege of the short sighted governments and corporations that are only seeing the immediate need for profit or even more insidious: an upholding of a level of comfort that we’ve come to think of as a need. We don’t need to use as much fossil fuel or natural gas as we currently do. We could instead adjust our lives to use less, or more wisely. But most often we don’t, because we – as a society – like our comforts. Idle No More has the ability to challenge, not only the governments and corporations, but to challenge our own assumptions about what it is we need. They are doing the job of comforting the afflicted of the land and the people and creatures on the land, and afflicting the comfortable – the prime minister and those of us who want to consume all the things we are used to.”

For the latest updates on Idle No More, check out their website. I will continue to monitor Pagan responses to, and solidarity actions with, this movement.

In Other Community News:

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

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(The Crime of) Pretending to be a Witch

Jason Pitzl-Waters —  November 29, 2012 — 35 Comments

Canadian papers are paying a lot of attention to newspaper owner Gustavo Valencia Gomez, who is charged with using all of the old tricks to convince a client that she was under supernatural attack, and that a large influx of money was necessary to remove the danger.

Gustavo Valencia Gomez

Gustavo Valencia Gomez

“The most frightening point, she alleged, was when she was told to bring pictures of her two children to an appointment. When eggs were cracked over them, there was blood in the yolks, she recalled, adding she was told this meant her children were marked for death. [...] Another ritual involved putting lemon oil on her body. The oil turned black another sign of a curse, she said she was told. [...] On another occasion, worms were used to scare her…”

This isn’t unique, it is, in fact, a pretty common con. Usually, when someone is caught running such a con they are charged with fraud, but Gomez’s case is garnering additional attention for an additional charge under Canadian law: Pretending to practice witchcraft.

“Early Tuesday afternoon, Mr. Gomez was arrested and charged with fraud over $5,000, false pretences, possession of the proceeds of crime and pretending to practice witchcraft, a summary (less serious) offence that carries no minimum or maximum penalties under the Criminal Code.”

Pretending to practice witchcraft? Yep. Here’s what the criminal code says about that.

365. Every one who fraudulently

  • (a) pretends to exercise or to use any kind of witchcraft, sorcery, enchantment or conjuration,
  • (b) undertakes, for a consideration, to tell fortunes, or
  • (c) pretends from his skill in or knowledge of an occult or crafty science to discover where or in what manner anything that is supposed to have been stolen or lost may be found,

is guilty of an offence punishable on summary conviction.

In recent years, some Canadian law enforcement agencies have taken a liking to this law, reviving it when dealing with fraud cases involving fortune telling and related services. However, its recent revival has been controversial, with some Pagans worried that these charges could be abused in the future.

“Brendan Myers, a pagan and philosophy professor at the Cégep Heritage College, worries that the law could be used against law-abiding pagans. “It may put people in my community at risk of not being able to practice their faith,” he said, adding that although the law has not been abused in the past, but he worried it could be in the future. The law only targets people who purport to practice witchcraft, but there are no equivalent laws for charlatans that abuse other faiths, he said.”

When I first reported on this relatively obscure statute, Myers explained why he found the law deeply problematic.

“The key word in the legislation is the word “pretending” (in subsections (a) and (c).) As pointed out to me by my friend in London via private correspondence: the word “pretending” here suggests that the State does not believe that witchcraft could be real: anyone who says they are practicing witchcraft is only pretending. That can potentially include those who say that they are practicing the religion. With this in mind, it’s not difficult to imagine a religiously conservative or puritan judge ruling that anyone who practices the religion of Wicca is “pretending” to practice witchcraft.

Our religious practices are already protected by the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which is part of our constitution and thus trumps the Criminal Code. But a lot will depend on the eye of the beholder here. It is not difficult to imagine a future government much more conservative than our present one, declaring that witchcraft and wicca is not a religion, and that anyone who practices it is “pretending”. Remember, it doesn’t matter if you think it’s a religion: it matters if the law thinks so. I do not know if any judicial precedents have established wicca and witchcraft as a religion in the eyes of the law. So I’ve written to a lawyer that I know, and I await his response.”


Of course, not all Pagans are opposed to fraudsters being charged with pretending to be a witch, Ariana L’Heureux told Metro Toronto that she feels the law helps separate genuine Witchcraft from the con-artists.

Police will often lay fraud charges, but L’Heureux said the witch law aids them in their investigation by helping them narrow in on that specific kind of fraud from the beginning. The law separates witches, like herself, who use the power of the nature and universe and offer spiritual advice, from charlatans who “pretend to be something they’re not for monetary gain, exploiting people’s weaknesses.”

Perhaps, but I’m troubled that the open-ended nature of the law’s language could invite abuse. Also, do we really want to open the door into deciding who is and isn’t a “real” Witch? Back in 2010 I made clear my reservations with this law’s revival. 

“It should be stressed that all the accused perpetrators were caught and charged with existing laws against fraud, so why has this little-used witchcraft charge been dug up again? What real purpose does it serve other than to sensationalize, muddy the waters of religious freedom, and create potential problems for ethical practitioners of magic and witchcraft who happen to charge for various services? How long before an otherwise ethical magic-worker gets charged due to a vindictive former client? It doesn’t seem so far-fetched a scenario considering the recent frequency this law is getting invoked.”

Fraud needs to be punished, but in a Canada where the rights of Witches and Pagans aren’t always treated with respect and dignity, do we really want to simply trust that this law will always be used fairly? Laws that create blurry boundaries can be problematic even in the best of times, and I’m uncomfortable with any government body deciding when someone is really a Witch, or if they’re merely pretending.

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Guest Post: Humanist Paganism on the Rise?

Jason Pitzl-Waters —  August 18, 2012 — 246 Comments

[This is a guest post by Brendan Myers. Brendan Myers, Ph.D, is the author of eight books on environmentalism, ethics and social justice, and spirituality. He has taught philosophy at six different universities in Canada and in Europe, and provided policy research for the Government of Canada, the Canadian Union of Public Employees, and various private clients. His work has been featured by the Pacific Business & Law Institute, the Scottish Environmental Protection Agency, the Order of Bards, Ovates, and Druids, as well as numerous cultural societies, environmental groups, interfaith groups, and humanist societies around the world. And he's a decent songwriter too.]

About a year ago, I was attending a semi-private gathering of pagans in eastern Ontario, Canada.  One of the people there was an atheist and we were talking about why she enjoys attending pagan events. At one point, intending to be cheeky, I called out to the group, “How many other atheists have we got here?” Eleven people, out of twenty, put their hands up.

Now, my little observation that evening is nothing like a scientific study of changing opinions in the pagan world. But that was not the only place where I’ve observed this trend. Not all of us join the pagan world because of an interest in magic, or because of a transformative spiritual epiphany, or because of a traumatic experience with some other religious group. Call it a case of observer bias on my part, but Humanist Paganism seems to be an emerging option for those who want to be part of the Pagan community, but who want to be a little more intellectual about their practices, and they really don’t care about the “woo” anymore.

The Vitruvian Man by Leonardo da Vinci.

The Vitruvian Man by Leonardo da Vinci.

From what I have seen so far, Humanist Pagans tend to be uninterested in ritual, or energy work, or developing psychic powers. Some still practice magic (you don’t have to be religious to do that), but will approach the matter with a critical, scientific eye. And speaking of science, they tend to be interested in astronomy, quantum theory, evolutionary biology, and the like, and will take inspiration from Neil DeGrasse Tyson and from Bill Nye right alongside Starhawk or Crowley. Those whom I have met tended to be in their 30′s or older, educated, earning a lower-middle class income, and raising small families. (As an aside, a lot of them are cosplayers too!) Social, political, and moral causes tended to be more important to them than supernatural ones. For instance, an associate of mine who recently declared himself a Humanist Pagan told me that avoiding genetically modified food improved his health more than reiki treatments and aura cleanings. And he felt afraid to admit that to his pagan friends! Finally, many of the humanist pagans I’ve met tend to think of themselves as artists and musicians (or whatever) first, and as pagans second – as THW has observed about artists like Austin Osman Spare, or Dead Can Dance.

But they love folklore and mythology, they love going to pagan festivals, and they subscribe to pagan moral values like the Wiccan Rede, and the Heroic Virtues. They’re perfectly happy to shout “Hail Thor!” with an upraised drinking horn. They don’t care whether the gods exist or do not exist: for as they see it, the existence of the gods is not what matters. Rather, what matters is the pursuit of a good and worthwhile life, and the flourishing of our social and environmental relations. They are a kind of pagan that perhaps has not been seen since classical Greece and Rome, and their place in the modern pagan movement may still be marginal and unclear, but they are a kind of pagan nonetheless.

(This isn’t a recruitment drive, by the way. I just thought the pagan world might like to know that these people exist, and that if you haven’t met one yet, you probably will soon.)

For those who struggle with anti-pagan prejudices and stereotypes, Humanist Paganism might be a powerful educational tool. It can show that a pagan can be a sophisticated, cosmopolitain, and enlightened person, and that a pagan culture can be artistically vibrant, environmentally conscious, intellectually stimulating, and socially just. Remember, the Acropolis of Athens, Stonehenge, Newgrange, and the Pyramids of Egypt, were built by Pagans. Complex astronomical instruments like the Antikythera Mechanism, and the Nebra Sky Disk, were made by Pagans. Our Pagan intellectual heritage includes poets and scientists and literary intellectuals of every kind, especially including those who wrote some of the most important and influential books in all of Western history. Homer, Hesiod, Pythagoras, Plato, and Cicero, just to name a few, all lived in pagan societies. Some of the greatest political and military leaders of all time, such as Alexander the Great, Pericles of Athens, Hannibal of Carthage, and Julius Caesar of Rome, were all pagans, or else living in a pagan society. And speaking of Pagan societies: some of today’s highest social and political values, like democracy, secular republican government, freedom of speech, and trial by jury, were invented by pagans. Even the Olympic Games were invented by pagans. Yet that fact is almost always ignored when people study the origins of western civilization. In the face of anti-pagan prejudices, it might be better to point to accomplishments like these, than to something mostly amorphous like “freedom”.

Finally, if I may speak personally, I also noticed that some pagans have treated me as a spokesperson for humanist paganism. Perhaps that is because my books are about universal philosophical problems like loneliness, fear, global warming, and social justice. Also, I don’t write about magic or ritual or how to talk to the gods (although I do write about Druids). The role of main spokesperson for humanist paganism probably belongs to B.T. Newberg, more than to me, because he manages the Humanistic Paganism blog and FB page. But for my part, I find that human rationality is profoundly spiritual; an instrument not just of practical knowledge but also of enlightenment. I study Druidry to be a better philosopher; I don’t study philosophy to be a better Druid. Perhaps that makes me a humanist pagan. But if so, I will still toast the Great Queen with my drinking horn. Hail!

See also:
http://humanisticpaganism.com/
http://btnewberg.com/
http://www.facebook.com/humanistic.paganism
http://paganhumanist.com/

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Pagan Community Notes: Gender Press Conference at PSG, Pagans at NY Pride, Free Pagan Music, and More!

Jason Pitzl-Waters —  June 26, 2012 — 13 Comments

Pagan Community Notes is a series focused on news originating from within the Pagan community. Reinforcing the idea that what happens to and within our organizations, groups, and events is news, and news-worthy. My hope is that more individuals, especially those working within Pagan organizations, get into the habit of sharing their news with the world. So let’s get started!

A Breakthrough on the Issue of Trans Inclusion? In Friday’s Unleash the Hounds, I reported that questions over transgender inclusion at women-only rituals had become an issue at the then in-progress Pagan Spirit Gathering festival. A situation that echoed incidents at PantheaCon in the past two years. Yesterday, newly returned from the festival, Cara Schulz from PNC-Minnesota reports on what may be a historic press conference held on Saturday, featuring Rev. Selena Fox of Circle Sanctuary, Dianic High Priestess Ruth Barrett, and festival presenter and transgendered activist Melissa Murry.

“Both women said the transgender community is trying to find their voice, similar to the feminist movement in the 60′s and 70′s.   Like the feminist movement, they speak of suffering, pain, and violence.  Murry and Barrett also spoke of the value in claiming mysteries and rituals specific to their sacred journey as women.  “Within my Tradition, which is about the female body and the journey of being born female and the journey through the bloods and birth and menopause,” said Barrett.  “That is a different journey for transgendered women who come to womanhood through a different path.”

Rev. Fox announced that at next year’s PSG they would offer a mystery ritual and rites of passage for transgendered persons if Ms. Murry would lead them.  After Murry agreed to do so, she asked Barrett if she would assist her.  Barrett was unsure if she would be able to attend PSG next year due to changes in her personal life, but said she would help Murry however she was able.”

In a release sent to various Pagan media outlets, Barrett said that she couldn’t “express enough how happy and hopeful I am from the work accomplished at PSG,” and that the work accomplished at this festival will be “a model for other pagan festivals that are dealing with female-born space and trans inclusion/exclusion issues.” While not all concerns about ritual inclusion were solved, there did seem to be some important shifts taking place at PSG, including the acknowledgment that trans women are women by a prominent Dianic leader. You can listen to, and download, audio of the entire press conference, here (note, the PNC is looking for volunteer transcriptionists so we can make the content more accessible) .

Pagan Pride at NY Pride: Earlier this month I reported on the involvement of Christopher Penczak‘s Temple of Witchcraft in the 2012 Boston Pride Parade, now we have a photo from another Pagan group in a LGBT Pride Month parade.

New York City Pagan Pride at Pride (photo: Gary Suto)

New York City Pagan Pride at Pride (photo: Gary Suto)

As you can see from the photo, that’s a contingent from the New York City Pagan Pride Project at the New York City Gay Pride Parade, showing their support for LGBTQ rites. This NYC Pride Parade marked the first anniversary of same-sex marriage becoming legal in New York. Also involved in the parade, carrying their own banner, was the NY Gay Men’s Open Pagan Circle. Zan Fraser, a contributor to The Juggler, was there, and plans to post about his experiences soon.

Songs of the Goddess: The blog Songs of the Goddess, where Draeden Wren diligently reviews Pagan and Pagan-friendly music, has released a free sampler of Pagan music entitled: “A Pagan Music Collection (Volume 1).”

“I am truly a fan of these artists, and I am so grateful they accepted my proposal for them to be a part of this project.  More important than that, I am so happy to be a soundboard for these artists.  They need people to know about them!  We are able to listen to brilliant Goddess/Nature-based/Tree-hugger music because of these creators.”

Artists on the compilation include Sharon Knight, Damh the Bard, Wendy Rule, Kenny Klein, Deborah “DJ” Hamouris, Amelia Hogan, and many more! It’s a nice round-up of the bigger names within Pagan music, and you certainly can’t beat the price. You can find the download link, here. You can also find Songs of the Goddess at Facebook.

In Other Community News:

That’s all I have for now! Are there blogs, podcasts, or other Pagan news sources you think I’m missing out on? Please leave links in the comments, and if there’s news in your community be sure to share it!

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Pagan Community Notes: Vivianne Crowley, Odroerir Journal, Sacred Harvest Festival, and more!

Jason Pitzl-Waters —  August 15, 2011 — 155 Comments

Pagan Community Notes is a companion to my usual Pagan News of Note series, more focused on news originating from within the Pagan community. I want to reinforce the idea that what happens to and within our organizations, groups, and events is news, and news-worthy. My hope is that more individuals, especially those working within Pagan organizations, get into the habit of sharing their news with the world. So lets get started!

Vivianne Crowley joins Cherry Hill Seminary: Pagan author, former Pagan Federation secretary, and Jungian psychologist Vivianne Crowley has joined the faculty of Cherry Hill Seminary, a distance education institution for professional Pagan ministry. In a recent news update sent to supporters of Cherry Hill, Crowley, the author of works like “Wicca: A Comprehensive Guide to the Old Religion in the Modern World,” expressed excitement at joining CHS.

“I am excited about teaching for the first time Master’s level programmes with groups of Pagan students. I hope that the programmes that I teach at Cherry Hill will help students to deepen their understanding of religious practice and the dynamics that influence Pagan groups. Psychology of Religion is an important discipline for religious leaders and clergy of all faiths in understanding their own spiritual journey and that of those whom they serve, and the issues of Death and Dying are some of the most sensitive and important that we care called upon to deal with in our ministry.”

You can read more from Crowley about joining CHS, here. Vivianne Crowley will be teaching the class “Call of the Dark Mother” with Jennifer Bennett for the Fall semester. Congratulations to both Crowley and CHS!

The Rise of Óðrœrir: A new journal of interest to Pagans, particularly Heathen reconstructionists, has just launched. “Óðrœrir” is “a fully downloadable journal dedicated to developing, fostering, and distributing scholastic literature solely regarding the reconstruction of the various pre-Christian religious traditions and cultures of Northern Europe.”

“It is our firm belief that while much of these traditions are completely viable in a modern setting, understanding and implementing them must be achieved through a thorough understanding of their original context.  We also believe that there is too much literature available that falls very short of this mark.  Thus,Óðrœrir is intended to serve as a bastion of literature that is evidence based and consistent with modern standards of academic accuracy and quality.  Articles are peer reviewed by a board ranging of individuals with over forty years of experience in reconstructing “heathen” traditions, to scholars who are currently leaders in the fields of Old Nordic Religion, and Old Nordic Culture.  It is our hope that with these high standards, and with the range of experience that exists on our board, that Óðrœrir will be able to bridge the gap between scholastic wisdom of ancient heathen traditions and the implementation and practice of ongoing ones today.”

The first issue is available for download now, featuring articles on the state of modern Heathenry, reconstructionism in modern Heathenry, Frankish Heathenry and more. You can also network with the creators at the journal’s Facebook page.

PNC-Minnesota Rolls Out Sacred Harvest Festival Coverage: The week-long Sacred Harvest Festival in Minnesota has just wrapped up, and PNC-Minnesota has begun posting personal reflections and reactions from attendees. However, my favorite thing so far from them is this picture of the founding coordinators of PNC-Minnesota: Heather Biedermann, Nels Linde, and Cara Schulz.

As a co-founder of the Pagan Newswire Collective, just knowing that there are a mixture of citizen and professional Pagan journalists starting to take an active interest in covering what happens in our community gives me hope for our collective future. Good job folks, this is only the beginning! Keep an eye on PNC-Minnesota for more Sacred Harvest Festival coverage rolling out this week.

Spirit of Albion Update: The upcoming independent film The Spirit of Albion, a story inspired by the music of Damh the Bard, has just posted its latest production diary.

You can follow Damh’s Bardic blog for updates, as well as the movie’s Facebook page.

Brendan Myers on Pagan Existentialism: Here at Patheos, Star Foster interviews author Brendan Myers about his most recent book “Loneliness and Revelation: A Study of the Sacred,” existentialism, and the value of suffering within modern Paganism.

“I think that any worldview that might deny, or ignore, the suffering and oppression in the world is profoundly immature and unrealistic. Thus if the pagan movement is a mature one, its question is not whether the acknowledgement of human suffering has value, but rather the question concerns what that value is. In the Christian worldview, the notion of Original Sin, and the crucifixion of Christ, put suffering at the very center of the Christian story. Christians, I am sure, would add that the resurrection is equally important. To this I would only comment that Pagans have a fine collection of dying and resurrecting gods who can act as our role models in our own struggles with the “negative.” Mithras, Osiris, Adonis, come to mind as examples, as well as any number of heroes who made an underworld journey, such as Inanna, Persephone, and Orpheus.”

For more on Myers’ work, check out the guest-post he did for this blog last year that touches on some of the same themes.

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

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Resurrection Sunday and Links

Jason Pitzl-Waters —  April 24, 2011 — 28 Comments

Today is Easter/Pasha/Resurrection Sunday, when it is said that Jesus rose from the dead on the third day after his crucifixion. Rather than give a barrage of “how pagan is Easter” type stories, I thought I’d leave you with a few non-Easter related links to look over today when you’re not busy finding eggs, eating candy, or dressing up like a witch.

Easter Witches in Sweden.

The Ganges in New York: The New York Times reports on how Hindus near Jamaica Bay in Queens, New York have turned the body of water into a local Ganges, a place to leave offerings for a variety of rituals. The problem is that the large number of offerings are disturbing the local habitat and creating an eyesore for park officials.

“We call it the Ganges,” one pilgrim, Madan Padarat, said as he finished his prayers. “She takes away your sickness, your pain, your suffering.” But to the park rangers who patrol the beach, the holy waters are a fragile habitat, the offerings are trash and the littered shores are a federal preserve that must be kept clean for picnickers, fishermen and kayakers. Unlike the Ganges, they say, the enclosed bay does not sweep the refuse away. The result is a standoff between two camps that regard the site as sacrosanct for very different reasons, and have spent years in a quiet tug of war between ancient traditions and modern regulations. Strenuous diplomacy on both sides has helped, but only to a point. “I can’t stop the people and say, ‘You can’t come to the water and make offerings,’ ” said Pandit Chunelall Narine, the priest at a thriving Ozone Park temple, Shri Trimurti Bhavan, who sometimes performs services by the bay. “We are at a dead end right now.”

The article does a good job of capturing the tensions as both sides try to find a workable compromise. I feel that as religions that engage directly with nature grow these tensions will continue. I anticipate that this will not be the last story I read about religious groups and law enforcement confronting how offerings impact a particular area.

A Queer Theology: In his latest Patheos.com column, P. Sufenas Virius Lupus confronts the “queerness” of theology within modern Paganism.

“I mentioned in an earlier article in this column that some modern Pagans have suggested that theology doesn’t really have a place in modern Paganism, and that Paganism as a religion isn’t really appropriate to the concerns of theology.  It was mentioned on that earlier occasion, though, that ancient Pagans in Greece and Rome invented most of the vocabulary of theology—including the term itself. The reservations of some modern Pagans on theology are understandable, and the ways in which Christianity has dominated the discourse on theology for the past several millennia are certainly a concern and something of which any Pagans actively engaged in theological work should be aware. Nonetheless, it is an area that is not only historically relevant to Paganism and polytheism, but one that is quite necessary to confront for modern Pagans.”

As always, Lupus is thoughtful an well-worth reading. Be sure to also check out his wonderful personal blog.

Who Gets Their Religious Freedom Protected: There’s a general election being held in Canada on May 2nd after the conservative government collapsed in a no confidence vote. It is in this context that Canadian Pagan and philosopher Brendan Myers looks at Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s plan to create an Office of Religious Freedom, and wonders whose freedoms it will work to protect.

“…given the Christian fundamentalism that dwells in the Reform Party’s agenda (pardon me, the Conservative Party’s agenda), therefore you can bet that this office will almost certainly not be used to help voudouisants in Africa, Tibetan Buddhists in China, Jews in Palestine or Muslims in Israel, or for that matter any religion at all which is not Christian. The only exceptions, the only non-Christian religions which this office might support in other countries, would be religious communities that are wealthy and well-organized enough in Canada to pressure the government to help their co-religionists in other countries.”

It seems that conservative Christian outlook in Canada isn’t too dissimilar from their brethren in the United States.

That’s all I have for now, have a happy Sunday, no matter what your activities or beliefs.

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Unleash the Hounds! (Link Roundup)

Jason Pitzl-Waters —  April 9, 2011 — 11 Comments

There are lots of articles and essays of interest to modern Pagans out there, sometimes more than I can write about in-depth in any given week. So The Wild Hunt must unleash the hounds in order to round them all up.

That’s it for now! Feel free to discuss any of these links in the comments, some of these I may expand into longer posts as needed.

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Pagan Community Notes: Pagan Relief Services Coalition, Alexei Kondratiev, Brendan Myers, and More!

Jason Pitzl-Waters —  April 5, 2011 — 24 Comments

Pagan Community Notes is a companion to my usual Pagan News of Note, a series more focused on news originating from within the Pagan community. I want to reinforce the idea that what happens to and within our organizations, groups, and events is news, and news-worthy. My hope is that more individuals, especially those working within Pagan organizations, get into the habit of sharing their news with the world. So lets get started!

Creating a Coalition: Peter Dybing, National First Officer, Covenant of the Goddess, who recently led a successful effort to raise 30,000 dollars for Doctors Without Borders, proposes the formation of a ”Pagan Relief Services Coalition” that would respond to the needs of Pagans in times of disaster.

“Is our Pagan community prepared to respond in centralized haste when Pagans face disaster? Should the worst happen and an American city is crippled are we able to come together and sustain meaningful relief for our Pagan sisters and brothers? In short, the answer is No! Responding to disaster requires pre planning in funding, logistics and operations. Waiting for the disaster to strike to take action ensures that any effort will be short on success and long on confusion and debate.”

Dybing does not endorse simply starting a new organization, since “such an approach will lead to another ‘new’ organization competing for support of its efforts.” He instead proposes something more like, well, a coalition. An agreement by various Pagan organizations to coordinate and work together in times of crisis, to pool fundraising resources, along with a “committee made up of representatives of the involved organizations” to determine when a disaster threshold has been reached that would activate funding commitments. For those interested in engaging in such a project, or discussing it, I’d recommend heading over to Peter’s blog.

Kondratiev’s Lorekeeper’s Course: Celtic Nation has unveiled a course of study created by Celtic scholar, linguist, and author Alexei Kondratiev, who passed away last year. The Lorekeeper’s Course was originally created for the now-defunct Celtic Reconstructionist group IMBAS, and was intended for a predominately CR audience. Kondratiev died before he could oversee a test-run of the course, and two different versions of the course needed to be merged. Celtic Nation has undertaken the task of recovering, preserving, and presenting this “lost” course to the world.

“In June 2010, Luder and fellow members of the Celtic Nation Yahoo Group made appeals to former members of original volunteers for help in recovering any of the pieces of the  course outline to compare to the new material.  Graciously, DubhTine, a longtime member of the IMBAS council in its heyday, volunteered his time and efforts to discover and forward a  significant portion of the languishing course outline.  His efforts were instrumental in formatting the new outline and all those who enjoy the course going forward owe him a debt of gratitude.  Pech Raithbheartiagh, also a former volunteer on the original project, recovered several important pieces from an old hard drive to help round out the outline.  Cuardai Eolais provided continuing compilation assistance as well.  With their invaluable help and generosity,  Luder was able to begin matching the sections of the original course outline to the new work started just prior to Kondratiev’s death.   As time progresses, additional material of Alexei’s will be made available and noted as it is added.  For referencing purposes, this is “Alexei Kondratiev’s Lorekeepers Course 1.0″.”

This is an exciting development, one that should help enrich the CR community, and anyone interested in the lucid, learned, and passionate work of Alexei Kondratiev. I would love to see this material, and future additions, released as an ebook of some kind. Perhaps sold to raise funds for the continued preservation of Alexei’s work?

Myers on Pagan Ethics: Philosopher and author Brendan Myers has an essay up at Patheos.com about how thinking replaced killing as social force in the ancient world, and how the “goddess” model of civilization is ultimately superior to the Judeo-Christian model of ethics.

“What I’d like to suggest is that a society that affords real priority to the goddess, and to her way of presenting the revelation of her divine presence, is likely to be a society where the values are cast not as rules or laws. It is likely to be a society in which the values are cast in the form of character-virtues. I think this is so because her message is not a commandment to be obeyed: her message is a presence to be experienced. Her message tells us who she is, not what to do. This means that following orders and rules and laws will not be what matters. What will matter instead, is finding all the places where her presence can be experienced. I think it will also matter that we live our lives in a way that embodies the presence of the goddess.

What matters is being a particular kind of person. At the most basic level, it matters that you are the kind of person who resolves problems with force of thought and feeling instead of with the force of arms. Such a person becomes able to find the goddess within her relationships, and within herself. In the culture of the goddess, there are no rules and commandments, but there still is an ethical understanding, in which some character-values reveal the goddess within, and others do not; some kinds of habits and choices are exemplary of the goddess, and others are not. Except for a few things, like gratuitous murder, there will be little need for absolute categorical distinctions. The ethical understanding can be a matter of degree. Furthermore, since the goddess reveals herself in many different masks and disguises, there can be more than one ethically significant way to embody her presence. There doesn’t have to be only one true way; there can be many true ways. The goddess doesn’t tell you what to do; but rather she shows you different possibilities for what kind of a person you can be.”

Myers is one of modern Paganism’s sharpest thinkers, I highly recommend reading the entire essay where he brings forth examples from Greek, Celtic, and Native American cultures to make his point.

Spirit of Albion Starts Production: The upcoming independent film The Spirit of Albion, a story inspired by the music of Damh the Bard, started production this past weekend. A video production diary has been started to allow people an inside look at the process.

Sunday was the first official production day of the Spirit of Albion movie. The entire cast gathered at the director’s house to record their performances for the film. Here is the first in what will be a series of video diaries of the making of the film. It was a great day, and the cast not look the part, but they all had great voices too! Enjoy the film, and why not subscribe to the channel?

I’ll be sure to continue checking in on The Spirit of Albion, and keep you posted on its progress.

Accessibility and Events: The Staff of Asclepius blog at Patheos.com is seeking the accessibility experiences of Pagans at festivals and events.

“This festival season, the Staff of Asclepius is seeking guest authors to write about their accessibility experiences at any event large or small. Writers will have the opportunity to share with the community how volunteers accommodated them and offer advice on what could be improved for next time. From the registration process to camping and attending workshops or rituals, what was the experience like? Was staff receptive to your needs and advice for improvement? Email masery@rocketmail.com“

The issue of accessibility at Pagan events recently came up in the Wild Hunt’s comments section, so this may be a good opportunity to broaden the discussion. You may also want to see a recent post from Ocean at Deaf Pagan Crossroads about this issue.

Final Notes: Before I go, I’d like to quickly mention that the Pagan Newswire Collective’s main site just got a swanky new redesign, the great alternative culture magazine Coilhouse is now offering its back-issues in a digital format (see also this recent io9 interview), and Grant Morrison’s book “Supergods” has a release date.

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

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Guest Post: Fundraising and Building Community

Jason Pitzl-Waters —  March 6, 2011 — 21 Comments

[The following is guest post from Brendan Myers. Brendan Myers, Ph.D., is a Canadian philosophy professor, a winner of OBOD’s Mount Haemus award for research in Druidry, and the author of “The Other Side of Virtue”, “Loneliness and Revelation”, and other titles. Find him (and his books) on the web at brendanmyers.net.]

The recent interruption to Jason’s blog service, and the generosity of the movement which raised for him the money to pay his increased costs within a single day, got me thinking about volunteerism and community building in the pagan movement.

What does it mean to ‘build’ community? Probably the simplest and broadest answer is this: to build a community is to create and sustain relationships between people. Some are the relations of teachers to students, doctors and nurses to patients, and parents to children. Some are the relations of storytellers (that includes journalists!) and their audiences. Human relationships inform the way that food lands on our table, the way books are published and distributed, the way musicians and poets and artists create things of beauty for everyone to share. The basic relationship, perhaps underlying all others, is the relation between friends: and in ancient European pagan culture, friendship seems to have been at least as important as tribal solidarity, and sometimes more so. Indeed I will argue that the sacred itself, whatever else it may be, is a function of our human relationships. But I would like to make a different point today.

All our relationships are person-to-person. They involve people seeing, hearing, touching, and speaking to each other; they involve sharing goods; and they involve moral values like generosity and compassion.

But they are also mediated and assisted by the material infrastructure: town squares, telephone networks, internet servers, farmer’s markets, schools, libraries, concert halls, and private homes. Relationships do not happen in abstraction. They need a place; they need a centre, even a home.

And infrastructure, as you know, costs money. That’s probably why there are donation drives on the Wild Hunt from time to time. A local community wants to rent a hall for regular public rituals, or rent a campground for an annual outdoor festival. An organization wants to publish a newsletter. An elderly teachers wants to talk to her geographically-distant students on the phone, or drive to visit them once in a while. These things do not come free.

I have decided, therefore, that I will donate 50% of all my book royalties, from January to June 2011, to pagan community infrastructure projects. I also invite other pagan writers to do the same.

Most people can do more than they think they can. Indeed most people can do more than they are already doing. As for myself, I volunteer my labour and sometimes donate money for various local causes, and I also write books which (I hope!) contribute usefully to the movement’s intellectual life. But it occurred to me that, like most people, I can probably do much more than I’m already doing. I would like to encourage more volunteerism. But at least some of the volunteerism has to be in the form of cash donations, for the sake of maintaining the infrastructure. This is, I think, an indirect but very important way to support the human relationships in our community, and the values which animate them.

This may not be much money. In the last six months of last year, my royalty income was less than one month of my rent. Other pagan writers are in a similar position: we write for a niche market, after all. But if people are willing to support me as a writer by purchasing my books, then I will be very willing to support the movement in return by sharing some of my royalties with projects that will benefit many others.

Some such projects are internet-based, such as the Pagan Newswire Collective. Some are pagan owned and operated campgrounds that operate year-round, such as Raven’s Knoll. Some are annual conferences that have rental costs to pay, such as the Gaia Gathering. I invite comments and suggestions from everyone about where people think I should donate the money. I wouldn’t want people to believe that by buying one of my books, they might support a project they don’t believe in. But I do hope that my position in the movement as a writer, small though it may be, can benefit more than just myself.

Communities simply cannot be built unless its members see beyond their own immediate wants and needs, and start to take care of each other in an organized way. I can do that with my book royalties. Communities simply don’t survive unless people are ready to do something selfless for others, which will benefit everyone (and yes, including themselves) in the long run. I can donate some of my money. What more, and what else, can you do? I’m curious to find out.

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Guest Post: Loneliness and Revelation

Jason Pitzl-Waters —  November 1, 2010 — 2 Comments

[The following is a guest post from Brendan Myers, Ph.D. Brendan is a professor of philosophy at Heritage College CÉGEP in Gatineau, Quebec, and sometimes an instructor at the Cherry Hill Seminary. He is a winner of OBOD’s prestigious Mount Haemus Award for professional research in Druidry, a founder of the Order of the White Oak, and the author of five books including “The Other Side of Virtue” and “A Pagan Testament”. I've invited him to write a bit about the themes in his latest book: “Loneliness and Revelation: A Study of the Sacred”.]

Paganism can be described as a religion of relationships. We speak of magical correspondences, apprenticeships with teachers and mentors, therapy work with counselors or magical healers, initiatory group membership, relations with a totem or a patron deity, and ecological relations from local landscapes to the global biosphere. Some of our best known writers and leaders also emphasize relationships in their metaphysics: Starhawk, for instance, wrote that “the primary principle of magic is connection”.

With that in mind, consider how many people in our world are severely socially isolated, and profoundly alone. A recent study found that half of all Americans have only one close friend in the world, and one quarter have no friends at all. The last United States census found that 27.2 million households, one-fourth of the total, consisted in just one person. Half a century ago, that was the case for only one-tenth of all households. A British study found that one out of every ten adults in England sought professional help for loneliness at least once in their lives.

It seems that loneliness is everywhere. Indeed I think it likely that just about everyone feels it at some point in their lives. Yet facts like these are not spoken of very often, perhaps because loneliness is a taboo topic. No one likes to admit to feeling lonely. It’s embarrassing, and sometimes humiliating. But loneliness is painful for many people. We should ask what, if anything, a spiritual point of view can offer to people who find themselves painfully lonely, and what it can offer to the counselors and therapists who assist such people.

This month, I have published a book which attempts to do exactly that: “Loneliness and Revelation: A Study of the Sacred”. This book does not describe any spells, rituals, invocations, or magic: I think there are probably too many books already on the market which address such themes. But if you are looking for a book by a pagan author which goes well above and beyond the “101” level, and which addresses a serious social and psychological problem from a spiritual point of view, then please read on.

The first thing I discovered about loneliness was that that it has nothing to do with how physically or geographically close you are to other people. You can feel terribly isolated from others, anytime and anywhere, even while hundreds of other people rub shoulders with you in the busy shopping mall. When you go to parties, or nightclubs, or other places where people gather, you get to see all the relationships people have with each other that you are not part of, and are not invited to join. We are also individuals at heart, taught to be self-reliant. But that very self-reliance can create distance between people. You might want to reach out to others, but then you would have to admit that you need others. So loneliness is not just a social problem; it also has the character of an existential crisis.

Some people try to fill the emptiness within them with food, alcohol, gambling, video games, or shopping sprees. But the relief that such things provide is always superficial, and always temporary. When it wears off, as it inevitably does, feelings of disappointment can set in. You might go back to them anyway, to try and regain the pleasure and distraction that they can create. But this creates a vicious circle of stimulus and withdrawal which strongly resembles drug addiction. So the problem is not just isolation. The problem is that people do self-destructive things to avoid isolation.

Religion promises you that you need not ever be alone, because the gods will always be there for you. But there are reasons why the gods, themselves, feels lonely, and probably feel it worst of all. Think of the distance between where you are sitting and the nearest star beyond our solar system: Barnard’s Star, approximately five light years away. We can understand that distance mathematically, using spectroscope analysis and stellar parallax measurements. The gods, if they exist, and if they inform the universe with their presence (as we often say they do), probably feel that distance right in their bones. A Hindu holy scripture, the Bhradaranyaka Upanisad, claims that God created the universe precisely to fill his own need for companionship.

But my study of loneliness also showed me reasons to have hope. Some of the world’s best known religious heroes achieved their spiritual victories in solitude: and examples are not hard to find. Siddartha Gautama achieved his Buddha-hood alone, beneath a tree, in a deep forest, far from others. Jesus defeated the devil in the desert, with help from no one else; he also took on the despair of the world while alone in the garden of Gethsemene. The founder of Bahá’í, a mystic who took the name of Bahá’u’lláh, withdrew from his family and community to live as a hermit in the mountains of Kurdistan, in northern Iraq, for two years. Odin hung himself from the World Tree alone for nine days, and at the end of his time he discovered the runes. Because of examples like these, and perhaps also because of the prevalence of individualism in our culture, most people “on a spiritual path” believe that enlightenment can only be accomplished on one’s own. Only by looking within, and attending directly to one’s own inner self, can one accomplish enlightenment. Or so the popular wisdom goes.

But how can one gather the spiritual benefits of solitude without incurring the suffering of loneliness? My suggestion is to look to the idea of revelation: this is the experience someone has when something of existential significance appears in his life. You find it in a stone dolmen, in a windy fenland in the west of Ireland, or in an Inuit cairn in the high arctic of Canada. You find it in lighthouses, clock towers, church steeples, symphony performances, rock concerts, and holiday fireworks. It’s in your voice when you say the words ‘I love you’. It appears in any activity which reveals presence, identity, and the goodness of life, and in anything which invites others to share that life. I believe this understanding of revelation is the solution to the problem of loneliness. But more than that, I believe it is the foundation of the good and worthwhile life.

My sincere thanks to Jason for allowing me to describe my book on his blog.
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Everyone is welcome to attend the launch event at The Clocktower Brew Pub, 575 Bank St. Ottawa, Ontario Canada, on Sunday 7th November. Starting at 1pm, Brendan will read from the text, sign copies, and answer questions. He’ll also stay to share a drink or two for the rest of the afternoon.

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