St. Joan of Arc is the patroness of soldiers and of France. On January 6, 1412, Joan of Arc was born to pious parents of the French peasant class, at the obscure village of Domremy, near the province of Lorraine. At a very early age, she heard voices: those of St. Michael, St. Catherine and St. Margaret.
“You Lied!” Some Thoughts on Honesty and Pagan Practice
Author: Bronwen Forbes
When I first began to formally study Paganism, it was drilled into my head over and over: “A witch is only as good as his or her word.” In other words, there is a direct relationship between the quality and effectiveness of your magick and how good you are at telling the truth and keeping promises.
Which makes sense, when you think bout it, because say, for example, you are doing a working to find a new job and you promise Hestia that if you get a job you will volunteer so many hours a week a the local soup kitchen in Her name. Then suppose you promise your friend that you will meet her for lunch and something better comes up and you break your promise to your friend. Why, then, if you don’t keep your word to your friend should Hestia have any reason to believe you’ll keep your promise to her? Odds are you won’t get that new job if Hestia has anything to do with it.
This is partly a matter of will. If magick is, as some say, “change in accordance with will, ” this implies t hat a person’s will is pretty important. And a major component of will is the strength to do what you say you will do – no matter how hard that may become. If your word is good, chances are your will and your magick will be pretty strong.
I was also taught that it’s okay to lie if it’s a matter of life and death. I would say: evaluate the situation very carefully before choosing to lie “for the greater good.” Let me give an example. About eight years ago I was a very busy volunteer with a local no-kill animal rescue organization. I was also – and still am – totally, utterly and completely smitten with beagles.
So when I saw a miserable shy little beagle on our town’s high-kill Humane Society’s web page, I leapt into action. I tried to adopt Joe the Shy Beagle, stating openly that I was a volunteer with the no-kill rescue group. The folks at the Humane Society wouldn’t let me have him, stating that they were afraid I’d just turn around and adopt him out to someone else. We went back and forth on this issue for a few days while Joe cowered in the back of his cage. Meanwhile, the clock ticked down to the day that Joe was scheduled to be euthanized. And since no one wants to adopt a dog that’s literally paralyzed with fear (except me, apparently) , I was running out of time if I wanted to save Joe’s life.
So I lied.
I told the staff at the Humane Society that my husband had completely fallen in love with Joe and we now wanted to keep him. And a day later I brought Joe home. Within a month I’d sent him to live with my mother after he freaked out because the neighborhood kids had gone a little overboard with Fourth of July fireworks. He’s been with my mother ever since.
Did I do the right thing? On the surface, yes I did. I deliberately lied – and made my husband lie – in order to save an animal’s life; an animal, I should add, that my mother loves very much. For years I used this example to teach my students to think about their actions and the ethics of those actions. I was actually proud of the fact that I’d saved Joe’s life and cited the whole incident as an example of “harm none; all life is sacred.”
Except there’s more to the story. My family currently lives with my mother, which means we live with Joe. Beagles are, in general, cheerful, outgoing, friendly, cuddly, happy little dogs. Eight years after I pulled him out of the back of his cage at the Humane Society, Joe is still none of these things. He cowers, snarls at the other dogs, and (most disturbingly) if startled by motion four or five feet away, snaps at my five-year-old daughter (who was raised with dogs and knows how to behave around them) . It’s only a matter of time before he bites her. Joe is also slowly dying of stress-related health issues.
Had I not lied to the Humane Society staff all those years ago, Joe would have lived a few more days and been humanely euthanized by a painless overdose of barbiturates. But I did, and now I get to watch a desperately unhappy dog take years to die by inches – and possibly do serious damage to my child before he goes.
Did I ultimately do Joe any favor? In my opinion, no. Have I done him harm? Absolutely. And that, gentle readers, is bad magick.
There are also less painful, more practical spiritual reasons to keep your word and live as truthful a life as possible. For example, if you aspire to join a British Traditional or a British Traditional-based coven, you’re going to be expected to swear at least a few oaths. And these groups take these oaths pretty seriously. In other words, if you’ve developed a reputation in the community for being flaky about commitments or gossiping (breaking your word) spreading wild stories or inventing training/lineage credentials (lying) or you’re just generally an all-around unreliable person, you’re not going to be invited to join an oath-taking group. Of course, even if you’re not interested in joining a traditionally-minded group, it would still be nice not to have a bad reputation in the community, wouldn’t it?
On the other hand, and completely tongue-in-cheek here, the “white lie” rules that apply outside the Pagan community apply here, too. In other words, if anyone of any gender asks you, “Does this robe make me look fat?” your best option is, of course, to say no!
But in all seriousness, being as truthful as possible can only make you a better practitioner, a better covener, a better community member, and an all-around better person. We need more of those. I think Joe the Beagle would agree.
It’s a take charge day in which you should rely on yourself. Thanks to your focus and independence, a project may finally reach completion, or you may start on a new challenge. You may have an important introduction to someone new. Material losses are likely, however, so make sure to remember your keys, wallet, etc.
About the Number 1
Theme: Masculine, Creative, Independent, Aggressive
Astro Association: Mercury
Tarot Association: Magician
Your Animal Spirit for Today
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LoonLoons mate for life, and their medicine is about loyalty, family, and deep caring for one another. If you’re experiencing a relationship fraught with power struggles, you are NOT practicing Loon medicine. If your relationship has BECOME a power struggle, Loon has appeared to remind you that this is a time of equal sharing and equal happiness. Something is amiss and Loon thinks you already know what it is. |
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The early autumn air lay cold and damp around me as I tried to find a comfortable spot in my blanket. I had been in this pit for two days with no food and no water, but no vision came despite hours of singing and praying. I leand up against the wall and rested my back. I was tired and hungry and very thirsty, but I remained standing and stared at one of the fruit wood poles that my prayer ties were hung on. A little black spider started to spin a web between the pole and the string of my ties. It worked very quickly. I watched the operation, entranced by the beauty of the design and the opalescent colors that danced off the thread in the early morning light. It was beautiful when it was done. Then she crawled up the web and waited at the place where it was attached to the pole.
I stared up at the sky, and as the morning progressed the air warmed the dirt around me. The pit transformed from a cool retreat to an earthen oven. I pulled my star blanket over my head to keep off the biting deer flies. Only my blanket-clad head could be seen above ground by the helpers who periodically came to check on me. They did not speak to me, and I supposed they just came up to make sure I was still breathing.
Every once in a while I would look down at the web, but the spider had not caught any breakfast that I could see. A rabbit, unaware of my presence within a circle of prayer ties, hopped out from behind a rock and started to nibble on the fruit I left for the spirits. Crows called to each other, and butterflies, attracted by the bright colors of the prayer ties, would light on the string, searching futilely for the way in to the nectar of this strange, red cloth flower.
A large vulture soared on the warm updrafts above until it spotted a potential meal and disappeared over my diminished horizon. An hour or so later he was circling above me again. I kept thinking he was just waiting for me to die so I could be the next blue plate special. I held my pipe in my hands and sang prayer songs one after another in a high keening voice, begging for a vision.
As evening approached, bats performed amazing acrobatics above my head, hunting the wretched mosquitoes that had plagued me for nearly four days. I welcomed them and watched them dance in the gloaming. Even with all the mosquitoes in the air, the little spider still waited at the end of its web for a meal.
Stars lit up the prairie sky one at a time as darkness descended. I heard the scuffle of some ground animal behind me, though I never saw the passing porcupine. Only her tracks in the dust attested to the visit.
I woke that morning to a vision of diamonds suspended from the spider’s web. Morning dew and gray light formed a beautiful sculpture. Still the spider waited, and nothing disturbed the perfect form of the web. When the helpers came to take me out of the pit, I was weak with hunger and angry. In four days I had not been granted a vision. During the sweat lodge afterward the medicine person asked me what I had seen.
“Nothing,” I replied.
I could hear the smile in his voice as he asked, “So you were sleeping with your eyes open?”
“No, grandfather, what I meant to say was that I didn’t have a vision.”
“Oh,” he said across the darkness, “So you did see something while you were up there.”
Then I talked about the spider and the crows, the rabbit and the porcupine, the butterflies on the line. I described in detail how I felt and what I was thinking about, but I am sure he could hear the bitterness and disappointment in my voice. I had prayed and fasted for four days for a vision and spirit helpers, and it felt like it was all for nothing.
“Did the spider ever catch anything?” he asked.
“No.” I replied. It was the only part of my time “On the hill” that he asked about.
When we were all done and I was readying to leave, a woman helper came up and said that it takes a long time for most human beings to understand why things happen the way they do.
“We don’t really live in a fast food world, you know.”
Months later I began to understand that my time on the hill had given me everything I asked for.
*************
The above story is a parable, pure fantasy, a modern re-telling of an old Lakota story designed to teach something about the error of expectation and the need for patience when seekers are trying to learn from the natural world.
The reason I chose to write this parable in this way is because most white people walking the red road (learning about Native American spiritual beliefs) have a similar experience when they start out. I certainly did. More importantly, speaking in detail about personal visions and spirit helpers is a little like talking in detail about your sex life. It is usually more information than anyone has the right to know about you, or wants to know.
Like most people raised in a Christian culture, I came to the ceremony of “hanblecia,” crying for a vision, with all kinds of preconceived notions about what a vision was and how it would come to me. My pagan ideas also came into play, as I imagined animal spirit helpers as more like familiars that I could command than teachers I could learn from. Perhaps the most limiting expectation that I had was that I would be given an “important” animal spirit, like an eagle or a wolf or a bear. So, when my spirit helpers showed themselves to me, I didn’t see them, because I was not looking for them in the context in which they appeared.
My day-to-day world is bound by “clock time,” which is faster than Nature’s time, and “computer time,” which is so fast that I can’t even perceive it. As I contemplated my own hanblecia I began to see that time is a key to being able to listen to the animals. Lots of questions came to mind in the weeks following. Does a stone live on the same time as a hummingbird? Do daytime animals perceive time in the same way that nocturnal animals, like bats and porcupine, do? Why is it that most vision seeking ceremonies impose such difficult physical demands? What the Elder lady was trying to say, at the end of my story, was that Unci Maka (Grandmother Earth) has no respect for human concepts of time. We do not really live in a fast food world, and a real connection to Nature’s spirits requires that the human being accommodate them, by slowing down and focusing.
As in the Christian tradition, Lakota stories say than humans were the last thing to be created. But rather than being superior to everything, man was decidedly inferior. All the animals stood around First Man and First Woman and laughed and cried at how pitiful these naked things were. They had no fur to keep them warm, no teeth and no claws to feed themselves and they had nothing to offer the other animals in return for knowledge. Coyote laughed so hard at the sight of them that he died of it. Almost by accident, First Woman stepped over his prostrate body and brought him back to life. In his gratitude, Coyote begged the Great Mystery to do something to help these pitiful creatures. He thought that if they just died it would be better than the miserable short existence that they were in for.
Wakantanka had another idea. He created a plant, tobacco, and gave it exclusively to human beings. He also made the every spirit in nature long for the taste and smell of it, but the only way they could get it was if human beings offered it to them. So it was that human beings learned from animal spirits and other spirits in the world how to live.
I love this story because it clearly says that we needed the spirits in order to live. They did not need us. It is only with offerings of tobacco and a certain amount of humility that they are willing to reveal themselves to us. This was the purpose of the hundreds of red prayer ties I made in preparation for my ceremony.
In my fable, though, I did not have a vision in the way I expected. Rather the actual animals appeared in my world and demonstrated through their actions what I needed in order to live. The spider demonstrated careful construction and patience. The rabbit showed a certain amount of courage to come out into the open when it knew predators were still around, that there is a certain risk involved in really living. The porcupine taught me that I could figure out what was going on around me by simply opening my eyes and seeing the evidence. The vulture spoke to me of the opportunities to grow and change that death sometimes represents. The crows talked to each other and helped each other by sharing information. The butterfly reminded me that there is beauty in persistence. Even when it won’t get you what you want, it makes you stronger. The bats taught me flexibility and the immense power of listening carefully.
None of this interpretation came out of a book and the holy person who was assisting me did not even attempt to interpret what happened to me on the hill. He did stress, by his silences and later his questions, that while I could not control the things that happened, I certainly did control what they meant. It was my responsibility to find the meaning in the ceremony, not his. On reflection, I could tease out the lessons that all these helpers had given me. None of them were glamorous or particularly powerful medicine, but each brought me a lesson I needed at that time.
He also brought the spider back into my awareness with his question. “Did the spider ever catch anything?” When I thought about it later, I came to understand that just because I had done all the ceremony in the right way, at the right time and with the right materials, it did not guarantee that I would “catch” anything. And in another way, my answer had been wrong. The spider did catch something. It caught my attention. In those few minutes that it was spinning its trap, I was transported. I felt no hunger and no thirst. Time stopped as I gazed in awe at the beauty of the thing. I was listening and they were speaking in the language of symbols. Those moments, when time was suspended — that was my vision.
Dharma
The Meditation Tip of the Day by Deeshan
Good afternoon and Happy Sunday! I hope everyone is having a fantastic weekend. It is in the hottest part of the day here. The heat index is 115 degrees. So its to hot to get out and do any yard work (which I actually planned on doing). I was in the kitchen yesterday and something hit the side door hard. I was cooking and hot, I flew to the door. To come to find out it was my neighbor weeding my fountain area. I quickly shut the door. I had a beautiful rose-bush which was in sort of a garden honoring cats. Well I had bought a few pieces of lattice. I put them in the yard were it needed fixing. Well my lovely neighbor came over and picked up the lattice and put it right on top of my rose-bush were he could mow. All the beautiful red roses died and I am nursing the plant to keep it from dying. My husband told me we would have to start mowing the day after he got through to keep him from being so helpful. My neighbor and I had a discussion and I told him how I loved to do yard work. He told me he knew how I hurt due to my back. Also I had no business on a riding lawn mower. I told him I appreciated his concern but I felt better when I had been mowing and getting fresh air. I just never dreamed of moving to the boonies and having neighbors like this. I told my husband I thought they were normal when we moved in. Come to find out this is the local insane asylum. I am sorry I know you all don’t give a crap about my neighbor driving me crazy. But it helps me to get it off my chest. I got out in the yard last night and actually found his footprints so you probably won’t be hearing me bitch about him anymore. But hey, you live out in the sticks there is never no excitement, lmao!
I hope you enjoy today’s postings. Have a great one!
Lady Abyss
Good afternoon everybody! I hope you are having a fantastic Tuesday. It is hot as heck here. The temperature is 95 degrees but the heat index is 105. Who came up with this heat index thing anyway?
I think you all know I am always trying to do things different were you won’t get bored. Today, while playing with the kitten and thumbing through some old books I can across something that is seldom talked about. It is handfasting. Few sites feature this topic at all. Then when you run across a site that does have it, it is just the sermons. So today I am going to do the basic dailys then the rest of the day will be devoted to handfasting. I believe we will all find it interesting. I hope you enjoy!
The Sacred Symbology of Trees
Author: Eldyohr
Trees have been sacred for as long as we have had the written word and probably long before that. The sorcerer of Trois Ferrois was depicted next to a tree and is one of the oldest known glyphs of in mythico-religious iconography.
The Hebrew Goddess, Asherah, who was later known as Ishtar, Astarte, or Inanna, had as her sacred symbol the tree groves. The druids long held trees, especially the oak, ash, and yew, to be sacred and divine symbols and their bardic schools were located within the heart of the forests.
In the dying/resurrecting God myths, the tree plays a prominent role. Christ was sacrificed on a cross made from a tree, Odin hung himself from Yggdrasil to gain the secret of the runes, and Osiris’ maimed body was recovered by Isis from the root of a tree and later resurrected. The most ancient cross-cultural symbolic representation of the universe’s construction is the world tree.
For instance, the Norse considered Yggdrasil, a giant Ash, to be the central structure of their various worlds and, in essence, it contained all of the worlds within it. Other examples of trees featured in mythology are the Bodhi tree in Buddhism and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in Judaism.
In folk religion and folklore, trees are often said to be the homes of tree spirits. The tree plays a central role in world mythology and religious iconography, but why would its inclusion be of such importance to religions with such widely different belief systems?
The tree is powerful for human beings because it mirrors, symbolically, the way we should be living our own lives. First of all, the tree is rooted to the earth; it is grounded. Just as the Muladhara chakra at the base of the spine, grounds all of our spiritual energy, so the tree is grounded to the earth.
Grounding is as important as reach enlightenment. If we are always trying to spiritual and focused on the heavens, we will not be able to care for our physical needs. As pagans, we celebrate our physical life so grounding is especially important and almost sacred to us.
The tree is rooted in the earth, but it grows upward and its branches constantly stretch out and reach towards the heavens (for sunlight) . Just as it is important for us to be grounded, it is equally important to strive towards something greater than our physical selves, or at least to have recognition of it.
Pagans meditate, pray, celebrate the sabbats and commune with their Gods. All of these actions move away from the strictly physical and open us up to the spiritual. Thus the tree is grounded in the earth, but reaches towards heaven. Like the trees, we should be rooted in reality, but striving towards the spiritual until we unite the two in the dance of life, symbolically represented by Shiva’s dancing form.
The tree, like the pentacle, also represents the elements of the world in which we live. The pentacle has four points representing earth, air, fire, and water while the fifth point represents the spirit that binds them all. The tree also symbolizes these qualities. The roots of the tree draw up the water from the deep earth for nourishment. The tree is rooted in the earth and the soil provides nutrients for its continued development and growth.
The tree takes the carbon dioxide exhaled by humans and uses it to assist with its energy requirements. It is interesting to note that the tree exhales, as it were, oxygen. Thus we live with the trees in a symbiotic relationship proving the tree with the carbon dioxide it needs, while they provide us with the oxygen we need. Finally, the tree uses the sunlight for photosynthesis to create its own food via internal chemical reactions (fire) . As discusses earlier, the model of the tree being grounded, but reaching for the heavens is a symbol of spirit. Thus, the tree shares the major symbologies of the pentacle.
The tree is also symbolic of the cycle of death and rebirth. Some trees follow the natural cycles of the seasons. They blossom in spring and thrive in the summer. The light of the God brings them renewal and life. The leaves begin to change and the trees symbolically begin to die in the fall and meet their death in the winter when the light of the God resides in the womb of the mother. This cycle repeats itself every year and we can see in the trees the truth of our being. On the other hand, some trees are deciduous and thrive the entire year and this, too, is symbolic. Our true selves, the essence or soul, never dies, but lives on after death in a different form. So while certain trees provide a reminder of physical death and rebirth, other trees serve as a reminder of the eternity of our spirit. In many of the world mythologies, the tree is central to the dying/resurrecting myth of the Gods, such as Odin, Osiris, and Christ.
In summary, the tree provides a near perfect symbol for the pagan. It is a reminder to be both earthly and spiritual, it is reflective of the elements that created and sustain life, and it is a symbol of death and rebirth. While the pentacle and other such symbols may be as equally powerful in their own way, the tree is something we see every day and they as diverse as the people who see them. We have fat, skinny, tall, short, green, and variegated trees reflecting the diversity inherent in our world.
The next time you see a tree, stop and spend a moment with it. Look at its roots and its mighty branches. Sit beneath its canopy and listen to its story for it is a story of magick and hope.
I hope everyone is having a great weekend. I am so sorry I am running late today. Today is not really a good day for me at all. I have been crying off and on since yesterday afternoon. I had a real good tear jerker this morning and then I took a nap. I know someone once said I whined alot. Today that person would be right. I know everyone knows I had three wildcats. I also had three little precious kittens and a mother cat. I went out yesterday morning and I generally holler, “where are my babies?” and the kittens come a running. I feed them, pet them and love the devil out of them. When I went outside yesterday to feed them, I hollered and nothing came. My pentagram flipped over. I knew them something was horribly wrong. I walked around the porch and I saw where the lattice had been crashed thru. This is where the momma cat and kittens stayed. There was nothing there except fur, fur everywhere. I started to cry. Then I got up and walked around the porch and found one of the wildcats dead. This like to have killed me. I picked him up and cried and cried. Then I heard a faint cry. I got up to find it. It was one of the other wildcats and he was hurt. Something had tried to kill him by get at his jugular vein. He had bites all over him. I called the vet and I rushed him to the vet. The vet did emergency surgery on him and he is going to be fine. The other wildcat I checked out before we left. He was in the barn covered in blood. I washed him off and he was all right. I have one little kitten left and two wildcats. We were talking to some of our neighbors and they have had animals that are being killed too. They decided that late in the afternoons they were going hunting. In the late afternoon is when the coyotes and the coyodogs are most active. I know I probably didn’t spell coyodog right. A coyodog is an animal that mother or father was a dog and the mother or father was a coyote. This animals are meaner than a coyote. These creatures will attack humans and anything else that sticks its head out.
The poor little kitten that managed to escape the killings, I found him yesterday afternoon. I had walked these grounds and hollered for him. Nothing! Then late yesterday, I got the idea to get a can of food and pop the top. I popped the top and here he came. He wasn’t running, he was staggering and looked very dazed. I picked him up and brought him in the house. I believe the poor kitten was in shock. Today he is doing much better. He is took up with me in my bedroom. My husband says he looks like my other cat. I don’t see it but he does. I want to keep him but my husband doesn’t want anymore cat after Stinker is gone. But I honestly believe he is leaning toward me keeping him. At least, I know he will make his mind up that way, lol! But I just wanted to tell you why it is not a good day for me. I have lost two momma cats, two kittens and a wildcat. It is a very sad day for me.
I am going to post spells today. Something I don’t never seem to have time to do during the week day. If some of them turn out to be geared toward the nasty side, now you know why.
I love you all and have a very blessed weekend,
Lady A
Some clays to choose from:
Green best for oily skin
White milder than Green, best suited for detoxification
Red all purpose for toning and cleansing
Blue for acne, anti-inflammnatory, for drawing out.
Pink soothing, cleansing, hydrating for dry, sensitive skin.
DADA DAY. First Dada soirée: “… in the presence of a compact crowd Tzara demonstrates, we demand we demand we demand the right to piss in different colours”.
PANDEMONIUM DAY. Sounds like most every other day of the week.
HUNGRY GHOST FESTIVAL: On this day, Buddhists feed the spirits of those who lived lives of hard-hearted greed & envy. They burn fake money & clothes for the use of the spirits.
It’s Elemental My Dear Wiccan: Power and Energy
Author: Marty Couch
Let’s start with a scenario. You are driving in the country. You can see clearly for miles around. You are coming up to an intersection. There are no other cars to be seen. The light is red. Do you stop?
You may be inclined to answer “no, not me”, but really think about it. If you are like most people you will stop. Even if you will drive through after stopping, almost everyone will stop first. Why?
What does this red light mean to you? How is it that this symbol of a red disc glowing can stop a vehicle? By all logic, no damage would happen. If there are no other cars to be seen, there is no chance of an accident or ticket. So, what gives a red light so much power?
Let’s take a look at another example. How much money do you have in the bank right now? How much do you have on you? How much do you make an hour? How do you feel when you receive unexpected money? How about when you are broke? So, what is this money that has such power over our lives, our thoughts and our feelings? At the core its just paper with pictures. Merely symbols for us to look at. How do these symbols gain such power?
And how about this one? What time did you get up this morning? What time is your favorite TV show on? What time is it? Time, what is it? Do you see how the change in wording seeks to find out why something that has no actual physical manifestation can have such power over our lives?
So, what gives so much power to these and many other things? How do these seemingly unimportant items gain such control over us? Well, in all these cases, thousands (if not millions) of people over the course of time have put energy plus intent toward their meanings.
The formula is simple.
ENERGY + INTENT = POWER
This is at the core of all we do in ritual. We raise energy, state intent and release it as power. What we do in a specific ritualistic way is what society does every day without realizing it. Intent is added to energy and the result is power. Sometimes this power is for the good. Sometimes it has devastating effects. The formula however stays constant.
So, let’s take a look at each of these items.
ENERGY: According to TheFreeDictionary.com energy is “the capacity to do work”. So, how much capacity do we posses? Let’s take a look at (probably) the most famous formula for energy:
E = mc (squared)
Now, for those who have had a few years elapse since physics class, energy equals mass times the speed of light square. In this famous formula by Albert Einstein, energy is measured in joules, mass in kilograms and the speed of light is 299, 792, 458 meters per second (and in the formula this gets multiplied by itself) . (Source: Wikipedia.com)
So, let’s break this down a little. For those reading in the US, we’ll start with pounds. Someone who weighs 180 pounds is about 82 kilograms. So, 82 X 299, 792, 458 X 299, 792, 458 = 7, 369, 792, 465, 641, 904, 000.00 joules. So, if we consider it takes only 1 joule to lift an apple a couple feet, think of the actual energy we posses. Remember, in Einstein’s formula was the key to the first atomic bomb. The energy released from 1 atom was enough to level cities.
Of course this is only the scientific way of thinking about energy. Let’s go a bit further in discussing energy from a spiritual point of view. In “The Creative Process in the Individual”, Thomas Troward states about the creation of the universe “At this primordial stage neither Time nor Space can be recognized, for both imply measurement of successive intervals, and in the primary movement of Mind upon itself the only consciousness must be that of Present Absolute Being, because no external points exist from which to measure extension either in time or space. Hence we must eliminate the ideas of time and space from our conception of Spirit’s initial Self-contemplation.
This being so, Spirit’s primary contemplation of itself as simply Being necessarily makes its presence universal and eternal, and consequently, paradoxical as it may seem, its independence of Time and Space makes it present throughout all Time and Space.”
What Mr. Troward is saying is that as Spirit (or God and Goddess, or Elemental Spirit) was creating our Universe, there was no concept of time or space, as there was nothing to measure it against. So this power that created all there is, is present in each and every molecule of our Universe IN IT’S ENTIRETY.
This is huge. The power that brought about the whole of creation exists in every cell in our body. Not a part of this energy, but THE WHOLE OF IT. Think about this for a second. All the energy that exists is within us. Not simply a part of it but all of it. Quite simply, our source of energy is infinite.
So, if we have infinite energy, why don’t we have whatever we want? The answer is in the other part of the equation, intent.
So, let’s look at intent. Intent is defined as “an aim or purpose…firmly fixed” (source: thefreedictionary.com) . So, our intent is our aim or purpose that is firmly fixed (as an idea) in ritual. All that we do in ritual is used to support this intent. When we choose the candle, oils, incense, herbs, symbols, quarter calls, deities, tools, etc. it is all to support this intent. Intent however is the variable in the equation. So, if we have everything, where does the formula go wrong? Why don’t we have infinite power to do what we want?
Well, we may have all the correctly colored candles, the proper herbs and oils, the full moons energy, but if we start our ritual by thinking, “This will never work” or even “I hope this works” then the intent we put in to it is doubt. So, all this energy at our disposal goes toward our ritual not working.
Think of a child. Have you ever turned your back on a child for a second and when you turn to them, they have climbed half way up a shelving unit to get to something? They have no limits. They know they can do anything. And our first reaction is to say, “No, you can’t do that”. What happens when they hear that? Usually that is the moment they fall and hurt themselves.
They were doing fine until we told them they did not have the ability to accomplish what they set out to do. This is what builds up over time and begins more and more to limit our abilities. We start out in life as infinite possibilities and almost immediately start excepting limitations.
So, let’s look at the third part of the equation. Power. Power is “the ability or official capacity to exercise control” (source: thefreedictionary.com) . So, what we are working toward in ritual is the ability to gain control over a situation. This power comes from infinite energy and our intent. If our intent knows no limits, our power to control situations (our lives, careers, health, etc) is also infinite.
How do we avoid limitations? How to make our ritual practice more powerful? How do we tap in to and release this infinite energy that we posses? Well, how we undo the limitations we have acquired through the course of our lives is not something that can be answered in just a paragraph or two. As we travel through these future articles together we will discover how to remove these blocks and begin to fulfill our infinite purpose.
Footnotes:
wikipedia.com
thefreedictionary.com
“The Creative Process in the Individual” by Thomas Troward
We Must Hide No Longer
Author: Ryan Smith
Welcome to America, the self-proclaimed land of the free and home of the brave. The country where, at least in theory, one can practice any faith one wishes and can fully exercise as the Founding Fathers put it the “freedom of conscience.”
The First Amendment, which starts with “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, ” while plain on its face has had a lot of footnotes attached to it over the years by the Christian supermajority. Freedom of religion as long as your faith is Abrahamic in origin. Freedom from persecution as long as you kneel before the Cross. Freedom to worship openly and unhindered only if your faith is one that was thrust on your ancestors by foreign missionaries who claimed to have their best interests at heart.
As a member of what is America’s Invisible Minority, I am no stranger to what happens to Pagans when one is ‘outed’. While I have not been physically assaulted or fired because of my faith I do know what it is for people to go oddly silent when I offer a blessing. I know what it is to be mocked as “insane” and/or labeled a “devil-worshiper”. And of course, I have heard the ever-popular chastisement of, “You’re going to Hell.” I’m fairly sure that anyone whom is not Christian reading this knows what I’m talking about. I’m also fairly sure most people reading this, if they personally have not been the victims of it, at least know someone who lost their job shortly after being outed for “personality issues” or because “didn’t quite work out” or because “we no longer have need of your services.”
Then we have the worst examples: Brandi Blackbear, who was suspended from school for fifteen days in Oklahoma due to accusations of witchcraft (1) . In 1999 Tempest Smith of Michigan who, after school administrators washed their hands of the ongoing harassment by Christian students at her school, hung herself rather than deal with it any longer in 2001 (2) .
Palmdale, California, the state that is seen by many and prided as the most forward-thinking in the country, in 2002 had a local Christian group invade a Pagan store and harass, browbeat, intimidate, and threaten patrons who were honoring Ostara. The best part was when the Sheriff’s Department refused to investigate because, oh by the way, a volunteer department chaplain was at the attack and helped organize it (3) .
2004 in South Carolina saw local prosecutors state that a man accused of murder did so because he was Wiccan (4) . There is of course the infamous case of the Wiccan Nevada National Guardsman denied a pentacle on his headstone by the US government (5) .
In 2007 an Army Chaplain, in spite of his stellar record as a soldier and Chaplain, was not only denied his request to serve as a Wiccan Chaplain but also removed from the Chaplain’s Corps (6) . I’m sure there are plenty of other incidents like these that are as bad, possibly worse, that have not been mentioned here.
So what, you may be wondering, is the point of all this? The point is simple: we as a diverse group of Earth-based faith traditions are routinely disrespected and disregarded by American society as a whole.
Now I know a lot of Pagans are likely thinking to themselves, “Why should we care what a bunch of superficial ‘sheeple’ think? We’re free spirits who dance to the beat of our own drums and don’t care what other people say about us!” There is a very serious problem with that kind of thinking.
In the United States of America today there are about 300 million people (7) . Of that 300 million it is estimated only 1.3 million are Pagans of some kind or another (8) . As much as our independent spirit and willingness to question convention is probably our greatest strength it cannot be ignored that we are a tiny minority in an overwhelmingly Christian nation.
What would happen if, for example, the good people at Operation Rescue who had regularly targeted Dr. Tiller’s clinic in Kansas for protest (9) were very directly confronted in the national media and asked if their accusations of him being a mass-murderer (10) were responsible in some fashion for his cold-blooded assassination inside his own church? You would have wall-to-wall coverage of pundits, preachers, and politicians tearing their hair out and wailing about “persecution.”
Now what happens if, say, a Druid Grove is accused of human sacrifice? First off you probably wouldn’t see any media attention given to such a story unless someone decides to go and actually do something about “those dangerous cultists.” You would probably also see outrage and condemnation on the web on Pagan blogs. And just like many other instances of persecution after we as a whole vow “Never Again” and some group or foundation takes up the incident as their championed cause, it sinks back into the morass of apathy.
Why does this happen? Are we not devoted enough to our own dignity? The answer is rather more elementary than Pagans being undeserving or incapable of organizing or any of the other excuses bandied about.
With only a small handful of real victories against our persecutors and attackers, any move to do something about it is already seen by many as doomed to fail. Too many Pagans give our independent nature and notorious difficulty in being organized in any meaningful fashion as cop-outs to really having an impact on society and improving our standing in it. It is, sadly, understandable why many would do so.
Who wants to exhaust their time, money, and energy fighting for a cause pre-determined in the minds of their colleagues as lost? Everyone wants to be the hero riding over the hill; no one wants to be the person who makes the glorious last stand for a greater moral victory. Far better, it would be argued, to think small.
Better to gain a seat on an Interfaith Council or use of a Unitarian Church than to run for public office. Better to make small, easy victories than to organize, mobilize, and take the fight to where it matters most: the public square. Better to cede the debate to people who do not understand us and in many cases are actively hostile to us.
To take such an approach is to sacrifice the future of our faith, of our community, and of the next generation of Pagans for the sake of questionable comfort and unsteady safety in the immediate present. As Ben Franklin once said, “He who would give up a little liberty for a little security will gain neither and lose both.”
We cannot continue to “wait and see” or “let our moment come” or “try not to upset people.” We upset a sizable fraction of the population simply by breathing; staying quiet and walking small will not change that. I see no reason why we, a community that wears our free spirits as a badge of honor and believe in the importance of personal responsibility, should be afraid of standing up for what we believe. Every other group striving for rights and dignity in American history has been told the same thing when they began their push.
If all the other groups had listened then we probably would still have slavery in the South, women as property of their husbands, and only those with land of their own having the right to vote. Discretion is said to be the better part of valor, but when discretion is forced by circumstance then it is no longer a guardrail against madness but a straightjacket for the soul.
So long as we allow inaction we will remain the Invisible Minority. So long as we act in reaction to fear Pagans will continue to be harassed, attacked, fired, and forgotten. The promise of the Declaration of Independence of, “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” will remain unfulfilled for all of us. The effort will be long. It will be hard. Only a fool would promise that it would be easy. But America now is no longer the America where the Religious Right stood unchallenged in their agenda by the masses.
The time is now. We stand at a vital crossroads in history. With the power of the social conservatives, at least for now, broken and our numbers on the rise we must seize the moment and begin the long journey to respect and acceptance. In so doing we must remember, for all who join us in the cause, that we do not just do so for ourselves. We fight for each other, our fellow Kin regardless of Tradition.
Most importantly, we are fighting for the future. The future of our Traditions. The future of our community as a whole and the health, vitality, and success of our local communities in particular. Most vitally we are struggling for the next generation. We must take up the cause to demand respect and dignity and work long and hard now so that when the next generation comes of age they will not know the fear, uncertainty, loneliness, and hardship that many of us have been forced to live with.
We begin today so tomorrow we may openly stand on the mountaintops and in the public square with each other, our children, and our fellow Americans and have no fear anywhere in this nation, from Seattle to Atlanta, from San Francisco to San Antonio, from New York to New Orleans there will be no place where we must hide the truth of who we are for the sake of survival or propriety.
We must take up the cause of liberation. We can no longer let fear instilled by our attackers to keep us shoved into the shadows. We must stand up and get involved in our local communities. We need to actively participate in local, state, and federal politics whether or not it is directly Pagan related or not. To give us a voice in public offices, we need to cultivate, assist and support people to run for these offices including those within the existing two major parties.
We must aggressively dispel the lies perpetrated by our foes by coming out to the public where it is safe to do so as a Pagan, as a Druid, as a Witch, as a Heathen so they know we are not some mysterious dark cult but real people they know. We must do this for what are our natural rights as human beings of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness on our terms according to what we believe not what others say we must believe.
We have no time to wait, no time to allow our moment to come. Our time is here.
Every act we take, great or small, alone or in a group, which is one made for the good of our greater community is one worth doing. Every act no matter its impact is one more step on the road to victory.
We cannot wait for heroes to come riding down from on high to our rescue. We must answer the call and rise to the challenge that we all face.
Footnotes:
1. http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1568/is_9_32/ai_70461580/
2. http://community-2.webtv.net/FullMoonCircle/TempestSmith/
3. Rich Breault, “Wiccagate: What do Witches Grove protesters have to hide?, ” Valley Press, 2002-APR-8.
4. http://www.wistv.com/Global/story.asp?S=2347141 and nav=0RaPRIlo
5. http://archives.chicagotribune.com/2007/feb/08/news/chi-0702080027feb08
6. http://www.northcountrygazette.org/articles/2007/032907WitchTrials.html
7. https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/US.html
8. http://religions.pewforum.org/pdf/affiliations-all-traditions.pdf
9. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/national/longterm/abortviolence/stories/tiller3.htm
10. http://www.christiannewswire.com/news/8967610531.html
Did you know… |
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From Wikipedia’s newest content:
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Did you know… |
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From Wikipedia’s newest content:
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On this day… |
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July 7: Independence Day in the Solomon Islands (1978); Tanabata in Japan
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Witches Of The Craft® 
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