Pagan Community Notes

Pagan Community Notes: Pagans Join Protests, PEN Proposed Conference, Wreaths Across America and much more!

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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. Our 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! Protesters continue to fill the streets of cities, large and small, across the county.

News

An overview of the debate on animal sacrifice in modern practice

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TWH – Many modern Pagans and Heathens shy away from — or are downright horrified by — the idea of animal sacrifice. Arguments against the practice generally come from a place of concern for the animals involved, or a fear that it would result in an “othering” by mainstream society. On the other hand, the sacrificial priests say that the practice is rooted in compassion and community, and that criticisms of their work reveal a fundamental disconnect with the food system, and perhaps a smoldering of racism as well. In recent weeks, a debate has heated up around this topic. It is clear that the very idea of killing animals in a sacred ritual evokes strong emotions among proponents and opponents alike, which can obscure the arguments and factual details as well as the religious reasons for carrying it out.

News

Polytheist.com Adds a New Voice to Online Dialog

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“It’s a damn fine time to be a Polytheist.” That’s an unofficial tag line of polytheist.com, a web site launched on September 8, 2014 as “a safe online hub devoted exclusively to the topics, issues, discussions and news of the growing Polytheist movements.” With the official tag line of, “honoring many gods,” the site promises to give voice to the perspectives of a population that occasionally feels silenced by the wider Pagan community — or who bristle at the idea of being identified as Pagan at all. They most frequently are described as devotional or “hard” Polytheists, and are generally characterized as relating to their gods as external beings that were not created by human thought or deed. The idea for creating a site dedicated to the Polytheist movement was the brainchild of Anomalous Thracian or, as he explained, “My gods made me do it.”