Culture

Witch recasts Barbies as goddesses and Pagans

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RIVERVIEW, Mich. — Oberon Osiris walked into a Detroit CVS pharmacy in 2001 and found himself spellbound by the witchy female vision before him. Osiris himself had been a witch ever since, as a 12-year-old in the late 1960s, he checked out Sybil Leek’s Diary of a Witch from a library. “I read it voraciously and said, ‘That’s what I am – I’m a Witch, I’m Wiccan, I believe in nature and I believe in the other gods,’ ” he recalled. Osiris consecrated his path as a 15-year-old when he lit a candle in his small upstairs bedroom and “did the whole scary initiation thing” detailed by Paul Huson in his book Mastering Witchcraft – which required an initiate to recite the Christian Lord’s Prayer backwards phonetically three nights in a row.

News

New women’s workspace uses Wiccan terms to empower its members

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MINNEAPOLIS — A woman-focused shared workspace called “the Coven” has been opened in this city. Despite members being addressed as “witches,” it does not have a specific Wiccan or Pagan religious identity and appears to be completely secular. The Coven was opened March 8, International Women’s Day, by Alex West Steinman, Bethany Iverson, Erinn Farrell, and Liz Giel. It is a membership-based workspace for female and non-binary-gender identified people. All four women had worked in advertising, and elected to use the term “coven” to attract female entrepreneurs with whom, they felt, the term would resonate.

Paganism

Column – How Legit is Studying Magick Online?

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Mat Auryn is our guest columnist this week. An initiate of Sacred Fires tradition, Mat lives in New England. Find him at his Patheos Pagan blog, For Puck’s Sake as well as his personal website. As someone who has studied with various traditions and taken many courses on magick over the years both in person and online, I’m constantly asked what the difference is and how it’s possible to learn magick online, especially when it comes to the idea of initiations. While there are a few differences between learning online and offline, it’s important to clear up some misconceptions about learning the craft from a teacher online.

Paganism

Column: Voices from Ice and Snow

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There is no denying that the north has always played an important role in the worldview of Europe and the Western world in general. From the Romantics that sung the praise of the wild, Nordic nature at the turn of the 19th century to the current popular entertainment craze spawned by media franchises such as Frozen, Vikings and the like, the north is as relevant as it has ever been. This influence is even more noticeable in regards to the world of contemporary Paganism. Not only has Heathenism experienced a noticeable revival and growth in the past couple decades, but Nordic deities, practices and iconography are routinely found within more eclectic movements as well. However, all things considered, the Nordic countries (Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Iceland, Finland and the Faroe Islands) are all relatively small and somewhat isolated.

Pagan Community Notes

Pagan Community Notes: Circle Sanctuary, solstice and appropriation, April Cotte and more

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BARNEVELD, Wis. — Circle Sanctuary has officially “been accepted as a religious endorsing organization member of two important national chaplaincy groups: the Association of Professional Chaplains (APC) and the Coalition on Ministry in Specialized Settings (COMISS) network. At a Jan. 7 annual meeting, COMISS officials announced that Circle Sanctuary had been accepted into its network, joining another Pagan organization: the Sacred Congregation. One day later, Circle got word that it had been also been accepted by APC, as the first Pagan organization in that roster.