News

Pagans, pipelines, protests, and the public trust

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UNITED STATES –Despite oil prices hovering some $80 a barrel below all-time highs, the push to build new pipelines to bring petroleum to refineries, and then to market continues to make headlines. Most every major pipeline proposed in recent years has been met with some level of resistance by environmentalists, on the ground or in the courts. Two Pagans, each of whom has been engaged on one of those fronts, spoke about what they’re fighting for and the challenges faced in opposing oil pipelines. When attorney Robin Martinez was interviewed in 2015, the future of the Keystone XL Pipeline was uncertain; President Obama announced in November of that year that the pipeline was being rejected for a variety of reasons. Martinez was representing a coalition of groups in South Dakota opposing the pipeline locally.

News

Pope’s Environmental Encyclical Elicits Pagan Responses

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VATICAN CITY — Many, if not most, Pagans consider the Earth to be sacred. This has been true for at least as long as Wicca and other modern Pagan religions have been in the public eye. For many in the mainstream media, this is considered an identifying characteristic of Paganism. Pope Francis of the Roman Catholic Church has finally released his long-awaited 180+ page encyclical on the environment, called Laudato Si. This one document has been in the news for some weeks and is the strongest message about the subject ever released by that Church.

News

Guided by Beliefs, Pagan Lawyer Assists in KXL Pipeline Court Battle

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KANSAS CITY, Missouri — Attorney Robin Martinez has the cultivated voice of an old-time radio news anchor – just deep enough to be resonate, clear diction, and a confident tone. It’s undoubtedly a valuable tool when he is called upon to make oral arguments in a case, but it’s just as easy to imagine him using that powerful voice in the context of ritual magic, which is part of his Pagan practice. The values that led Martinez to Paganism are, in fact, the same ones that led him to now be involved in one of the many local court battles being fought over the Keystone XL pipeline. Over the years, The Wild Hunt has followed the proposed tar sands pipeline, which would stretch from Alberta to Texas when completed, through the eyes of Pagans, watching from afar. Most visible to them and the rest of the public is the permit that operator TransCanada needs in order to bring the pipeline over the international border and whose fate lies with President Obama and the State Department.