2017 Wild Hunt retrospective

TWH – Now that the season has turned and we are nearing the end of the 2017, we look back, one last time, to review this historic year. What happened? What didn’t happen? What events shaped our thoughts and guided our actions? In our collective worlds, both big and small, what were the major discussions?

Pagan Community Notes: Dana Eilers, Oroville Dam, Holli Emore and more!

CAPE COD, Mass. — Word spread quickly this weekend that Pagan and Witch Dana Eilers had died unexpectedly. Born Sept. 15, 1956 in North Chatham, Mass, Eilers spent much of her adult life using her knowledge and skills to assist the growing Pagan community in its quest for religious freedom. Eilers held a law degree from the New England School of Law and spent more than 17 years practicing in the states of Missouri and Illinois.

Religious accommodation or discrimination in health care services

PATERSON, N.J. – It was announced Jan. 5 that Lambda Legal had filed a federal lawsuit against New Jersey-based St. Joseph’s health care system, after “the hospital refused to allow Jionni Conforti’s surgeon to perform a routine hysterectomy because he is transgender.” St. Joseph’s maintains four top-ranked teaching facilities in northern New Jersey, but it also is “a Catholic faith-based institution” founded in 1867 by the Sisters of Charity of Saint Elizabeth.

Pagan Community Notes: Columbia Grove, Many Gods West, David Suhor and more!

TROUT LAKE, Wash. — Over the weekend, Columbia Grove, ADF hosted its first Pan-Pagan camping festival at White Mountain Druid Sanctuary in Trout Lake, Washington. The festival, called Beyond the Gates, was attended by 35 people, and featured a variety of workshops and rituals. For example, ADF Archdruid Emeritus Reverend Kirk Thomas, who co-owns and operates Trout Lake Abbey on which the sanctuary is located, offered two lectures: Celtic Arthur and The Ancient Celtic Religion. Phaedra Bonewits was there to host a workshop on Ritual Participation and the Life and Times of Isaac Bonewits.

“Bern the Witch” slogan angers voters

The month of October is notoriously famous for eliciting kitschy slogans and glossy advertising inspired by Halloween. So it might not be that peculiar for a New Jersey pizzeria owner to use a Halloween-inspired theme for a political event supporting Democratic hopeful Bernie Sanders. While that “debate watch” party, titled “Bern the Witch,” was considered successful and well-received, the slogan itself has generated an entirely different, and perhaps unexpected, reaction. “As a witch, I find this form of supporting Bernie particularly outrageous. Do they not know the history of the witch killings?