“Richard wrote and lead open circles for each of the Eight Sabbats of the Witches Wheel for over 20 years. He was the High Priest of the Coven of Akhelarre, and served as the Grand Master of his Kentish Witchcraft Line in America, training and initiating suitable students and chartering covens of the Wicca.”
A true magickal polymath, Ravish was an active Freemason, Rosicrucian, and Hermetic Initiate, in addition to his Witchcraft and Thelemic leadership roles. He was a strong advocate for Pagan Rights, lending aid in several Lady Liberty League endeavors.
“Remembering & Honoring Richard, his life, his friendship, his magic, his service, his legacy. Support to Gypsy & all his friends, family, & supporters. May all of us who mourn his passing take comfort in our memories of Richard & take solace in knowing that his magical sacred spirit continues to be in this world & the New Aeon through his good works & the many lives & organizations he blessed. Hail & Farewell to your life now passed, Richard & blessings on your journeys in the Ancestral realm.” – Selena Fox, Circle Sanctuary
Ravish is survived by his wife, Amy “Gypsy” Ravish, a popular Pagan singer-songwriter known for her albums “Enchantress” and “Spirit Nation,” his daughter Asherah Aphrodite Ravish, step daughter Kitoto Von Hebb, sister Sandra McCandless, cousins, nieces and his familiar, Cosmo Skyrocket Ravish. Funeral arrangements are posted below.
“The highest are of us. Wednesday, September 19, 2012 e.v. Starr King Masonic Lodge, at 70 Washington Street in Salem with whom Richard shared his spiritual light as Chaplain for 25 years, will host his final rites. All friends of the Ravish family are invited to an open casket final Blessed Be commencing at 11 am and ending at 1:30 pm followed by a Rite of Passage and Masonic tribute. At 4 pm a blessing will take place at Greenlawn Cemetary with an interment at 4:18 pm. The Ravish family and friends will host a reception at Masonic Hall after the burial as a celebration of Richard’s. Please contact Murphy Funeral Home 978-744-0497 (www.murphyfuneralhome.com) for further details.”
What is remembered lives. May he find rest and return to us again.
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.
Noted early-music performer Owain Phyfe, a long-time fixture on the Renaissance Faire circuit, science fiction conventions, and Pagan festivals like Pagan Spirit Gathering, passed away this week from pancreatic cancer. Selena Fox of Circle Sanctuary, who knew Owain, had this to say about the musician:“Thank you, Owain, for good times, friendship, & carrying on the bardic tradition with old & new songs & stories! Thank you for being part of the Pagan Spirit Gathering & Green Spirit Festival! Blessings of our Welsh ancestor Owain Glyndwr, upon you as you make your way in Annwn, the Otherworld!” You can find out more about Owain at his Wikipedia page, or this article from Renaissance Magazine. What is remembered lives.
How do you stop a witch-hunt from happening? In rural India, groups of women who met through micro-loan programs are banding together in solidarity to resist the hysteria that can come with an accusation of witchcraft, and have met with some success. Quote: “In one case, a woman was accused of causing disease in livestock and an attack was planned. Members of the self-help groups gathered in a vigil around the woman’s home and surrounded the accuser’s home as well, stating their case to the accuser’s wife. Eventually the wife intervened and her husband recanted and ‘begged for forgiveness.’” So how do stop witch-hunts? Empowering women seems an important first step.
The Vancouver Sun has more on the unfolding controversy over Public Safety Minister Vic Toews’ move to stop the issuing of new contracts for minority-faith chaplains, including a Wiccan chaplain, because he’s “not convinced” that it is needed. Quote: “For the past six years, Wiccan priestess Kate Hansen has been visiting federal inmates across British Columbia who follow the pagan religion, guiding them in meditation and leading them in prayerful chants [...] ”If they choose to scrap this, they’re denying the rights of all of these people – their access to spiritual advisement of the religion of their choice,” Hansen told Postmedia News.” For more on this situation, read my post from yesterday, and be sure to check out the comments section, which features input from a Canadian Pagan prison chaplain.
There’s been a lot of chatter online about Naomi Wolf’s (author of “The Beauty Myth”) upcoming book “Vagina: A New Biography, “ specifically concerning language that explicitly (and implicitly) points towards a Goddess consciousness for women connected to their vaginas. One example:“Despite the repeated invocations of cutting-edge scientific research, the smell of patchouli pervades throughout: there are sentences such as “the vagina may be a ‘hole’, but it is, properly understood, a Goddess-shaped one”. Brace yourself.”A Guardian reviewer called it “dumbed-down feminism” that acts “lesbianism never happened, nor class, nor vast swaths of feminist theory.” You get the idea, the scorn is rising on this one, has Naomi Wolf jumped the shark?
Over at his Witches & Pagans blog, Sam Webster asks: “do we really want to be using this kind of Belief-language?” Quote: “It’s the Christian mode for thinking about religion. (We’ll talk more about them in a future post.) Do we want to model our religious thought on theirs? I don’t. I think it poisons our view of Paganism if we uncritically adopt the belief-oriented Christian view of religiosity and supports their distorted understanding of the rest of us.”
Three personages who’ve had an impact on our interconnected communities passed away recently: one a Wiccan Elder, and two scholars whose works have been cited repeatedly by Pagans, and indeed helped shape how many of us perceive ourselves. All three should be honored and remembered for their contributions, for what is remembered lives.
Mike Gleason (1951 – 2012): A beloved Elder within his community, Mike Gleason was an Alexandrian High Priest who distinguished himself as an early supporter of pan-Pagan festivals in the 1980s, and as a strong advocate for Pagan rights. This included serving as the head of WARD’s (Witches Against Religious Discrimination) Massachusetts chapter, the Witches Education League, and the Lady Liberty League. In addition to this, Gleason was co-editor and publisher of the now-defunct THINK! Magazine (1996-1999), and contributed to a number of print and Internet publications. You can read a selection of his recent book reviews, here.
“May those of us who mourn Mike’s passing take comfort in the memories of our good times with him and in knowing that his legacy within Paganism continues on in his writings and the many lives he enriched.” – Selena Fox, Circle Sanctuary
Mike Gleason is survived by his wife Cindy (Cynthia), his daughter Sheri Lynn, and his son Ed (Edward). Memorials are still in the process of being planned. His ashes are being interred at Circle Cemetery at Circle Sanctuary Nature Preserve in Wisconsin. His family invites memorial gifts in his memory be made to Circle Sanctuary. May his spirit rest and return to us once again.
“Through his work Nicholas expressed his great love for the history, culture and peoples of both England and Germany, and in the course of a distinguished academic career he brought his considerable intellect to bear upon their respective esoteric traditions. With his passing we have lost a wise and much-loved teacher, an incisive scholarly mind and a jovial and kind-hearted friend.” - Hereward Tilton (University of Exeter), Wouter Hanegraaff (President of ESSWE)
Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke is survived by his wife, Clare Goodrick-Clarke, also a professor at the Exeter Centre for the Study of Esotericism. In closing, Sasha Chaitow says that“my fellow-Exeter graduates and I have already concluded that the best tribute we can pay him is to try to live up to his expectations and continue his vision of bringing the study of esotericism more firmly into academia.”
Anne Ross (1925 – 2012): While no official obituary or notice has been posted, I have received word from scholarly sources I trust that famed Celticist Anne Ross, author of “Pagan Celtic Britain” and co-author of “Life and Death of a Druid Prince” passed away recently. A former Research Fellow in Archaeology at the University of Southampton, and teacher of lecture courses at the University College of Wales in Aberystwyth, Ross spoke Gaelic and Welsh, and her work had a huge effect on modern Druidry and reconstructionist Celtic traditions. Interviewed many times due to her theories regarding the famous “Lindow Man,” and oft-remembered for her brief appearance in the television documentary series “The Celts,” her work on the Celtic “cult of the head” is still the primary starting place for study on the subject.
Speaking from my own experience, I know that her work was deeply influential during a time that I was immersed in Celtic scholarship and voraciously pored over “Pagan Celtic Britain” looking for clues to unlock the mystery of the past. Modern Pagan oriented works like “The Isles of the Many Gods” owe a direct dept to her scholarship. No doubt many obituaries and remembrances will be forthcoming, and I will post them here once they emerge.
May all these spirits be remembered, may their wisdom and work endure, and may they return to us again.
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.
With Olympic fever at full pitch National Geographic weighs in on the ancient pagan Olympics, reprinting an interview with Tony Perrotet, author of “The Naked Olympics: The True Story of the Ancient Games,” about the “Woodstock of antiquity.” Quote: “Today’s Olympics is a vast, secular event, but it doesn’t have the religious element of the ancient Olympics, where sacrifices and rituals would take up as much time as the sports. And there were all these peripheral things that came with the festival: the artistic happenings, new writers, new painters, new sculptors. There were fire-eaters, palm readers, and prostitutes. This was the total pagan entertainment package.”
A Good Morning America report conflates Satanism with Palo in reporting on a grave robbery in New Jersey, and Palo is only mentioned because a relative of the deceased did “a lot of research” into who might want bones. Reporter Alyssa Newcomb manages to find an actual expert of sorts, Rick Ross, who says that “the likelihood they would go into a mausoleum and drag out a body seems remote.” Too bad they didn’t talk to an actual expert on Palo, or Satanism for that matter, but I guess it’s better than nothing.
Dead animals show up in a Utah park, and for once, they don’t blame it on Santeria! It’s progress of a sort, though undermined by the fact that they ruled on Santeria because these chickens didn’t match other dead animal that they thought WERE left by adherents to that faith. The misinformation on Santeria (and related faiths), often disseminated by “cult experts” (usually conservative Christians masquerading as experts), is something I’ve written about here again and again.
Neoshaman Kelley Harrell, author of “Gift of the Dreamtime,” writes at HuffPo about the “shamanic narrative of Tigger’s bounce.” Quote: “Pooh then deduces that Tigger’s bounce had been startled out of him. Having an aspect of the soul leave in times of duress is a classic feature of soul loss. Often in trauma one can articulate the feeling of a part of self leaving, afterward feeling fragmented or that something is missing. In this case, Tigger’s bounce was missing. In being faced with a deep fear, his power had left him.”Is there anything that can’t be explained with Pooh?
I recently reported on the plight of Chico Goddess Temple, which has been struggling to regain the necessary permits to stay open after complaints over noise, building without permits, and an illegal festival held on the grounds. Now, the Butte County Board of Supervisors has rejected owner Robert Seals’ appeal on the matter, and he is now planning to move the temple, sell the land, and relocate to Santa Cruz County.
PNC-Minnesota has an interview up with Andras Corban Arthenof Earthspirit, a guest at next week’s Sacred Harvest Festival. Quote: “In the modern world, when people talk about Paganism, they typically frame it as part of a dichotomy between polytheism and monotheism. That’s certainly one way of looking at it, but it isn’t the only way. And it is actually a Christian construct, it’s how Christianity, as it came into power, defined Paganism, particularly in reference to the Romans and the Greeks. But the older, original definition of Paganism placed it in the context of a very different dichotomy, one between rural and urban cultures.”
Finally, do check out Devin Hunter’s Modern Witch podcast, where he interviews Michael Lloyd, author of “Bull of Heaven,”and yours truly. If you wanted an hour+ of me talking about Pagan media and The Wild Hunt’s role in the Pagan community, there you go. If not? Well, check out Michael Lloyd’s segment, he wrote a really great book.
That’s it for now, have a great day! Feel free to discuss any of these links in the comments, some of these I may expand into longer posts as needed.
For many Pagans, Vidal’s most beloved work is his 1964 novel “Julian” which sought to reframe the Roman emperor Flavius Claudius Julianus (aka “Julian the Apostate”) as a heroic, intelligent, humanistic leader, one who experienced first-hand the violence and ignorance of the (perhaps inevitably) rising Christian wave. As a Christian-turned-Pagan, Julian was perhaps the first “Neo-Pagan” of note, and was quickly adopted by many modern Pagans as a venerated ancestor to our own movement. Journalist and author Margot Adler, while writing what would become the seminal 1979 book “Drawing Down the Moon: Witches, Druids, Goddess-Worshippers, and Other Pagans in America,” was heavily influenced by Vidal’s “Julian.”
“I was totally obsessed with Julian at the time I was [writing] DDTM, so much so that I read all of the Emperor’s essays and even thought of including a chapter about him in the book, although realized it was sort of off topic, even if he tried to restore Paganism to Rome. Loved Vidal’s Messiah, Kalki, and interviewed him once for 45 minutes over his less successful book, Creation. And of course loved his ascerbic comments on the fate of American Democracy. All our best critics have died this summer.”
“The great unmentionable evil at the center of our culture is monotheism. From a barbaric Bronze Age text known as the Old Testament, three anti-human religions have evolved–Judaism, Christianity, Islam. These are sky-god religions. They are, literally, patriarchal–God is the omnipotent father–hence the loathing of women for 2,000 years in those countries afflicted by the sky-god and his earthly male delegates. The sky-god is a jealous god, of course. He requires total obedience from everyone on earth, as he is in place not for just one tribe but for all creation. Those who would reject him must be converted or killed for their own good. Ultimately, totalitarianism is the only sort of politics that can truly serve the sky-god’s purpose. Any movement of a liberal nature endangers his authority and that of his delegates on earth. One God, one King, one Pope, one master in the factory, one father-leader in the family home.”
It’s a paragraph that could have come from the mouths of many prominent Pagans, but because it was Vidal saying it, the message was heard and reported in ways we could not have accomplished in 1992. The“thoroughly pagan, materialistic, unforgiving eye” of Vidal served, in its time, to help shape our own responses to the dominant Abrahamic faiths. To remind us that we were reviving something worthwhile, even if the dominant religious lens thought our mission folly. Vidal was a complex and often controversial man, but his contributions to our revival should not go unsung or unheeded.
“[T]he Nazarene existed as flesh while the gods we worship were never men; rather they are qualities and powers become poetry for our instruction. With the worship of the dead Jew, the poetry ceased. The Christians wish to replace our beautiful legends with the police record of a reforming Jewish rabbi…. They now appropriate our feast days. They transform local deities into saints. Thy borrow from our mystery rites, particularly those of Mithras.” – Gore Vidal, “Julian.”
Yesterday, word quickly spread that David Grega, perhaps best known for his prominent role on the Pagan Centered Podcast, passed away after a sudden cardiac arrest. In addition to co-founding PCP, an irreverent podcast that garnered a large and appreciative audience for its no-holds-barred style, Dave also helped in the running and development of the Proud Pagan Podcasters, was an important early voice in the formation of the Pagan Newswire Collective, and co-founded Lonestar Pagan, the Texas bureau of the PNC. Dave was a key figure in Pagan new media, constantly tinkering, trying out new ideas and technologies in order to more effectively do the work at hand. He had a personality and energy that was almost impossible to ignore, and we are all poorer for his absence.
Dave Grega
“If there’s something you’ve been meaning to do for a while, start planning to get it done. If there’s something you don’t want to do – find an honorable way to stop doing it. If someone needs something and you like them and you can more than afford it (and they’re not a needy do-nothing)… give it to them. And for gods’ sake – don’t forget to tell people how much you value them before they keel over and die. Funerals are not a particularly useful time to tell someone how much they meant to you.I notice most people’s fears about death have more to do with regrets than anything else.” – Dave Grega
“It’s hard to know what to say when a friend passes, let alone where to start. I remember the first time I met Dave it was way back when he had a pagan group at Clarion Campus in Pennsylvania. Even then, Dave was someone who was beyond outspoken. He would pull new visitors into conversation and loved the idea of friendly debate. Even our very first interaction started with me trying to observe from the background and him pulling me into a conversation with, “Well YOU look like you have some interesting stories”, and then dragging thoughts from me. It seems like such a small memory to focus on, but it was the beginning of such an important part of my life.
I could talk about how kind a person Dave was, or how bright of a light he was for all of us. But instead of all the sappy memories, what comes to mind is all the debating that our friendship entailed. Dave Grega was an important friend in my life, but not because he was full of feel good conversation. It was because he wasn’t afraid to tell you what he thought. Not because he was mean-spirited (even though sometimes he had as much social grace as as a blindfolded buffalo in a china shop) but because he didn’t feel that holding observations back when they had the possibility of stirring positive change. It didn’t matter if he was talking to a “Big Name Pagan”, a friend, or a random guest on the podcast, he would speak his mind. He wasn’t afraid to question or push for change on taboo and complex issues and he encouraged others to do the same.
Life won’t be the same without post-producing his laugh to be a reasonable volume, or hearing his snarky disapproval when I was being stubborn in making a hard decision. But if I can pull anything positive out of this tragedy, is that Dave was able to pass at a time in his life where he had found happiness. He had a loving relationship with a brand new baby girl to bring light into his life. He lived his life to the fullest, and with little regret. He pushed hard to meet standards that he put himself up to without asking for acceptance or permission. He was one of the bravest people I know, I feel honored to have had him in my life as a dear friend. Not only for the times where we were able to laugh and joke, but for the all the times that he cared enough to tell me when he disagreed and pushed me past my comfort levels to become more of the person I am today…as I am sure he has done for countless others.
Dave Grega, you will be deeply missed my friend. I don’t think I can find the words to properly express the loss that we feel, but know that we’ll remember you always.”
Finally, here is a prayer from Lamyka, host of Lamyka’s Wiccan Podcast, who worked and collaborated with Dave.
Death Prayer of Dave Grega
Composed by Lamyka
Harsh rapids flow
against banks of ice.
Your life and loss
carves scars into us all.
Yet now Lord and Lady guided,
softer shores abound.
Swifter currents yield
at happy gurgling sound.
Flow now as Life, Herself.
Be at Peace.
On now western shores
all hurts smoothed and gone.
Light of the Gods
wrap you warm.
Blessed Be.
Plans for a memorial are currently in progress, as are plans to raise funds so that his mother can attend his funeral. Once I have that information, I will update this post. My sincere condolences go out to all of Dave’s friends and family, may his spirit rest with the gods and return to us again.
“I do not use my intellect to write my stories and books; I have a gut reaction to the things that my subconscious gives me. These are gifts that arrive early mornings and I get out of bed and hurry to the typewriter to get them down before they vanish.”
I have no doubt that many wonderful and heartfelt tributes will be forthcoming, and I don’t pretend that I could rival those, but I would like to briefly honor his memory by bringing up what may be one of his singular achievements: popularizing the idea of Halloween as a pagan holiday. Bradbury’s 1972 novel “The Halloween Tree” reminded its many readers that the roots of the now-secular holiday of trick-or-treating had ancient roots in pre-Christian tradition. That Christianity itself was just another layer of history on the traditions of ancestor worship, and making offerings to the spirits.
Joseph Mugnaini’s cover illustration for The Halloween Tree, by Ray Bradbury (1972)
“Anyone could see that the wind was a special wind this night, and the darkness took on a special feel because it was All Hallows’ Eve. Everything seemed cut from soft black velvet or gold or orange velvet. Smoke panted up out of a thousand chimneys like the plumes of funeral parades. From kitchen windows drifted two pumpkin smells: gourds being cut, pies being baked.”
Of course, Bradbury greatest achievement was stirring our imaginations, creating new worlds we could explore, and warning us of where we could go if we’re not careful. Still, I think his contribution to changing our perceptions of Halloween can’t be underestimated, and for that we should give special honor to Bradbury. He understood the power of imagination and wonder, how those tools can change perceptions in accordance with a writer’s will, and we are all richer for it.
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.
Torch lighting ceremony in Greece. (Associated Press)
- In a historic first yesterday, Galina Krasskova, a Heathen, gave the opening prayer at a conference on women and indigeny being held at the United Nations. The first Heathen to ever do so. You can find the text of her opening ancestor prayer, here. I could be wrong, but I believe this conference was part of the larger 11th Session of the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (UNPFII), which I mentioned earlier. Congratulations to Galina on this achievement!
-Andrew Brown at The Guardian interviews an unnamed hip vicar who is allegedly dating a Witch, and opines on how to get the post-Christian generation back in the Anglican pews. Quote: “He said the only way was to go straight for the most improbable part of the story. If you’re teaching the virgin birth, point out at once that there were many virgin birth stories around at the time. Caesar Augustus himself was meant to have been the child of a God. So what was different about a God who chose a poor Jewish girl and not a princess for his bride? What changed if the Christian story were true and not the official one?” So, there you go? I guess?
- Peter Berger, writing for The American Interest, defends Andrew Bowen’s Project Conversion, which I’ve mentioned a few times previously here at The Wild Hunt. What I find most interesting about the article is his refutation of “secularization theory—the notion that modernity necessarily brings about a decline in religion.” Berger notes that it “should be replaced by a theory of plurality—a situation in which many religions co-exist and interact with each other.” Sign me up as a proponent of plurality theory.
- An interfaith memorial service for Pagan author, elder, and priestess, De-Anna Alba, also known as Wendy White, will be held tomorrow, Saturday, May 12, 2012 in California at the Church of the Incarnation. De-Anna, author of “The Cauldron of Change: Myths, Mysteries and Magick of the Goddess,” was one of Circle Sanctuary‘s first priestesses and was Circle Sanctuary’s first church secretary. She assisted Selena Fox with publications, events, music, networking, and other endeavors. Selena Fox will give her eulogy and will be among the officiants at De-Anna’s interfaith memorial service this Saturday. Selena also will be among the officiants at De-Anna’s Pagan memorial service and cremains interment at Circle Cemetery in Wisconsin on July 21.
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.
-A teenager in Britain was convicted of religiously harassing a McDonald’s employee who is Pagan. The youth repeatedly returned over a period of two months to engage in verbal abuse, despite being told to stop by the employee and management. Barrister Laura Austin, who mitigated on behalf of the teen, said he “did not realise paganism was a recognised religion,” and that this was “this is the first case of its kind,” so far as she knew. The teen was sentenced to community service, and a restraining order was issued.
- The 2010 U.S. Religion Census, released this week by the Association of Religion Data Archives, has some interesting data for those who are following the shape of (non-Christian) religion in America. While the data is skewed towards congregational models, it did show that “Buddhist congregations were reported in all 50 states, and Hindu houses of worship in 49 states.” All together, “the number of non-Christian congregations – synagogues, mosques, temples and other religious centers – increased by nearly a third, from 8,795 in the 2000 study to 11,572 in the 2010 census.” Meanwhile, Mainline Protestants “cratered,” Catholic numbers decreased overall (with a growing disconnect between “active” and non-active adherents), and non-denominational Christian houses of worship exploded.
- Out & About Newspaper in Tennessee profiles author Christopher Penczak in advance of his visit to the fifteenth annual Pagan Unity Festival. Quote: “I think of witchcraft, rather than just Wicca, as a vocation and tradition that springs up all around the world, not in any one culture, there is a mystical, healing, cunning tradition in most cultures. The inner experience of the mysteries is the same, and I like the hunt for all wisdom around those mysteries.”
- In a final note, I’d like to recognize Adam ‘MCA’ Yauch of the Beastie Boys, who passed away yesterday after a years-long battle with cancer. Yauch was an adherent of Tibetan Buddhism, famously commemorated in the song “Bodhisattva Vow,” and worked for the Tibetan independence movement. However, for most members of Generation X, the Beastie Boys were a game-changing Hip Hop group that shook off their earlier party-boy lunk-headed image to release amazing albums like “Paul’s Boutique,”“Check Your Head,” and “Ill Communication.”Praised as “revolutionary MCs” by Chuck D, the Beasties helped define what Hip Hop would become, and oversaw its entrance into the mainstream. My consolation in this tragedy is that MCA has left behind a lot of awesome music, and that he’s now a Hip Hop Bodhisattva watching over all those who suffer.
That’s it for now! Feel free to discuss any of these links in the comments, some of them I may expand into longer posts as needed.
“Katrina had left the Museum and moved on to California, where she was part of a group who traveled around to help Pagans in need. Katrina and I still spoke frequently and were still working on collaborative projects. We last spoke just a few days ago, which all the more grateful for now, and in that conversation she spoke about being very happy with her new life and the directions it was taking her in. That is how I will always remember her, not as the omni-competent Museum Manager, nor as the gifted video artist, but as a passionate and idealistic young woman hurtling into a bright future that truly excited her. Her soul’s journeys will take her to a different future now than we spoke of that night, but one that I pray will be just as bright and as exciting to her in its own way.” - Rev. Don Lewis, The Correllian Tradition
Katrina Kessler, Selena Fox & Lexi Renee at PantheaCon 2012
“I am thankful that I was able to spend time with Katrina Kessler on several occasions, including as part of my speaking engagements in Salem, Massachusetts in 2010, and most recently at PantheaCon 2012 in San Jose, California this past February. Katrina was bright, caring, creative, & dedicated to helping others. Like a shining comet, she brought a beautiful brilliance to this world and was gone too quickly. May we take comfort in knowing that she lives on in the cherished memories of those of us who knew her, in the lives she enriched with her service & wit, & in her creative works. Blessed Be.” – Selena Fox, Circle Sanctuary
“In our community, leaders emerge in each generation that make a difference. In Katrina was that wonderful balance of compassion, intelligence and drive that made her a effective young leader. Her goals were to help organizations that would make a difference, and she was learning from the leadership directly. Even though she had her life cut short, as the Goddess so needed her elsewhere, she had already been a major force for creating a movement for Young Pagans, through her video and her actions. She is an example that the next generation of Pagans can be and are truly amazing. I will truly miss her physical presence and honor her spirit for what she taught me.” – Ed Hubbard, Witch School International
Author and prominent Salem-based business-owner Christian Day said that “she was a warm, kind, and magical person. Those closest to her have been blessed with a most wonderful guide in the realms of spirit.” Terry Milton, “The Stone Lady,” who worked closely with Kessler, adored her “enthusiasm for life, and her ability to inspire others.”
“During the fall, Katrina did daily postings of the “wisdom of the elders” on Facebook, and collected words of inspiration or advice or wisdom from you and I, Therese, Phaedra and “elders” associated with the museum. I often thought it was ironic that Katrina was asking for our “wisdoms” when she appeared to have so much more wisdom in her short years than all of the “elders” combined.”
Speaking personally, it is always a great loss when our future leaders, activists, and thinkers are struck down prematurely. Sometimes, I think that there is such an emphasis on our elders and “big name Pagans,” and who will inherit their mantles in the next ten or fifteen years, that we sometimes don’t see the young people in their teens and twenties who are absorbing our teachings, attending our talks and rituals, and volunteering for our efforts. The men and women who will represent us to future generations. I had heard from Ed Hubbard that Foxglove had very much wanted to meet and speak with me at PantheaCon 2012, and I now very much regret that this never happened. We always assume that with the young there will always be more time; years, decades, of time to make a connection, to pass the torch, but fortune can be fickle, and we can lose our brightest sparks in an instant.
If there is a lesson in the tragic passing of Katrina “Foxglove” Kessler, it is to always honor the contributions of the young, to make passing the torch a daily occurrence, and to ensure that “Pagan community” is always a multi-generational endeavor. May Foxglove rest in the arms of the gods, and return to us again.
