Buck Wolf from ABC News interviews Phyllis Curott and Fiona Horne about “The Wicker Man”. While the bulk of the article deals with the (amazing) original film, he also gets a quote from Horne about the remake.

“Horne says she met with director LeBute and had dinner with Cage three years ago, when they were first making plans for the movie, to share her views on the film and how it should be updated but had no formal role as a consultant. “I really respect the work of both those guys,” Horne says. ‘So it should be interesting to note what they will produce.’”

Horne’s (former star of the reality program “Mad Mad House”) comment seems hardly a “blessing” of the remake. Meanwhile Curott takes the opportunity to compare some stores not stocking her book with book-burnings!

“But Wicca remains a controversial subject. Even the ‘Harry Potter’ book and film series have come under attack from some religious groups for its depiction of witchcraft. Curott says that some publishers have been pressured not to stock her latest book, ‘The Love Spell’ “You don’t see book burnings today,” Curott says. “But things are going on that are, in effect, the same thing.’”

I looked into these claims of Curott’s some time ago, and several comments from my readers debunked her not stocking/book burning theory. Frankly I’m not sure what that comment was even doing in an article about a film with Pagan themes. There are plenty of real troubles in our community without worrying about distribution for a book of love spells.

Anyone who has been reading this blog long enough knows that I’m a huge fan of the 1973 film “The Wicker Man”. The film (wrongly billed as a “horror” picture) pitted two religious world views against each other, Christianity and a revived pastoral Paganism (lead by the amazing Christopher Lee). It has become a cult hit since its initial release and still enjoys a large fan following. So to say I have been dismayed over the coming remake (produced by and starring Nicolas “Con Air” Cage) would be more than fair.

The remake (which opens in theatres tomorrow) has not allowed advance review of the film (usually a bad sign). But since they are targetting it towards horror fans, Nomad from Dread Central (a horror-film fan site) got to see an advance screening. If his reaction is typical of most fans of the thriller/horror genre then this ill-advised project may be going to the video stores faster than I thought.

“First off, I’ll say straight away that I haven’t seen the original. After reading some text on the film and talking to friends, it’s clear this is a sort of neutered version of the cult classic. Words like “chilling” and “disturbing” were used for the original. The same can not be said for the new incarnation with its dead pan pace and endless flashbacks to the fateful car crash, which you’ll be sick of by the third time. Where the original hoped to reflect organized religions while questioning their usual puritanical nature, the remake only offers cryptic imagery and 300 scenes of Nicolas Cage doing his confused face. In the past we got naked women dancing in a sort of pagan ritual. Today, we get LeeLee Sobieski in Quaker Summer Wear. Not a fair trade at all!!”

Early vindication? I’ll be checking the Tomatometer for the film as the reviews come pouring in. In the meantime, I urge everyone to see the original film (the uncut version if you can get a hold of one).

Dare I say only in California? Gwen Todd is running for a seat on the Washington Hospital board of directors on the Libertarian ticket. What is so unusual about that? Well, Todd, (in addition to being a politcal newbie) is a participant in several religious and social subcultures.

“Todd may be the most colorful of the candidates. A former Republican and Democrat, Todd now is a registered Libertarian. She belonged to the Mormon church for 10 years before she became involved for a time in Wicca, a naturebased philosophy loosely associated with witches 1. She now attends the Universalist Unitarian Church.”2

In addition to that, Todd is also involved in a polyamorous marriage
and that notorius cult Toastmasters International! If this dark-horse candidate wins (the other candidates are all doctors) it would certainly show that voters (at least in California) are willing to look at the character of the person instead of their religious preferences (I won’t be holding my breath or anything).

1 It cracks me up that Wicca is decribed as “loosely” associated with Witches, perhaps the traditionalists are on to something after all.

2 Its Unitarian-Universalist. Also, the reporter (and most likely Todd herself) fail to mention that you can be Wiccan and a UU with little trouble.

Harvard biologist Edward O. Wilson, author of the forthcoming “The Creation: An Appeal to Save Life on Earth” publishes a plea to evangelical Christians concerning environmentalism. In the process he explains that you can indeed be an environmentalist without being a Pagan or a leftist.

“To be sure, some leaders of the religious right are reluctant to support biological conservation, an opposition sufficient to create a wedge within the evangelical movement. They may be partly afraid of paganism, by which worship of nature supplants worship of God. More realistically and importantly, opposition rises from the perceived association of environmental activism with the political left. For decades, conservatives have defined environmentalism as a movement bent on strangling the United States with regulations and bureaucratic power. This canard has dogged the U.S. environmental movement and helped keep it off the agenda of the past two presidential campaigns.”

Wilson closes with an appeal to the wider shared goals and aspirations most people living in America and Western civilization share (a common humanism).

“You and I are both humanists in the broadest sense: Human welfare is at the center of our thought. So forget our disagreements, I say, and let us meet on common ground. That might not be as difficult as it first seems. When you think about it, our metaphysical differences have remarkably little effect on the conduct of our separate lives. My guess is that you and I are about equally ethical, patriotic, and altruistic. We are products of a civilization that rose from both religion and the science-based Enlightenment. We would gladly serve on the same jury, fight the same wars, and sanctify human life with the same intensity. Surely we also share a love of the Creation–and an understanding that, however the tensions play out between our opposing worldviews, however science and religion wax and wane in the minds of men, there remains the earthborn yet transcendental obligation we are both morally bound to share.”

While there has been a shifting of positions amongst evangelicals (and other more conservative Christians) regarding the welfare of our biosphere, one wonders if the changes can happen fast enough so that environmental concerns cease being a partisan issue and become instead a human issue.

Michael Luo reports on the new documentary by Andy Deemer, “My God”. The film focuses on how new religious movements start and take hold and follows some would-be prophets as they try to take their personal beliefs to the next level (with the help of five thousand dollars starting capital). In the process Luo crows about all the faiths that New York has spawned.

“The New York City area has long been a hotbed for new religions, as well as the staging ground for overseas religious movements trying to make the leap into America, Dr. Melton said. New religions tend to form in urban areas, where it is much easier to gather an initial group. Some of the movements that began in this country in the New York City area include Hare Krishna, modern incarnations of Wicca and an array of guru-centered groups.”

All fine and good except that this statement isn’t true. Both Wicca and Hare Krishna are deliberately imported faiths, the first from England (read all about it in “Her Hidden Children”) and the second from India. While both faiths got their initial American toe-holds in New York neither “formed” (evolved, changed, and experienced schisms perhaps) in America. Furthermore what does the phrase “modern incarnations of Wicca” even mean? Considering we have no solid proof of “ancient incarnations of Wicca” all permutations of Wicca are “modern” in one form or another.

While I admire Luo’s propensity towards civic pride in his home state, he should do a little more research before making claims that are easily disproven by a google search. The documentary seems interesting at any rate.

When you turn a culture’s gods and spirits into it’s devils and demons it is only inevitable that something like this happens.

“Canada’s only major Arctic petroglyph site — a 1,500-year-old gallery of mysterious faces carved into a soapstone ridge on a tiny island off of Quebec’s northern coast — has been ransacked by vandals in what the region’s top archeologist suspects was a religiously motivated attack by devout Christians from a nearby Inuit community…Daniel Gendron, chief archeologist with the Inukjuak-based Avataq Cultural Institute, the key promoter of indigenous history and identity in Nunavik, said the latest vandalism at Qajartalik follows the pattern of previous attacks by members of what he called “a very strong movement” of conservative Christians in Kangiqsujuaq and several other Inuit communities in northern Quebec.”

The saddest fact is that this didn’t have to happen. A community can become Christian (or any other faith) without destroying the past (Ireland for example). This is the work of the men who converted them, and the teachings then passed down from generation to generation. We here in the west like to think we are so superior to those Islamic fanatics who destroyed the stone Buddhas in Afghanistan, but when things like this happen you have to wonder if the ideological distance* is so great after all.

* I’m not comparing radical terrorists to Christian vandals, I’m only pointing out that both of these roads to the destruction of ancient sacred art started out with the demonization of the ideological “other”. I suppose we should consider ourselves’ “lucky” that our secular culture of tolerance keeps the evolution of such expressions here in check.

Ellen Leventry at the Idol Chatter blog wonders if Sesame Street’s newest Muppet Abby Cadabby is a stealth Pagan!

As she wills so mote it be?

“Abby Cadabby, a fairy-in-training. Abby, who hails from Fairyside Gardens, Queens, is young, eager to learn, and has been described as a feminist who also likes being a “real girly-girl.” Looking different than your typical Muppet, Abby was conceived as a strong female character who is “someone from a different culture, without having consciously to introduce somebody from Indonesia or India.” According to the Muppet Wiki, “Her design was originally very earthy.” Earthy? Could that be a code word for Pagan? Certain Earth-based sects hold a belief in fairies, or the Fae, as they are known. And, like Abby, they work magic, although Abby’s repertoire is currently limited. Plus Abby embodies the strong feminist message often espoused by pagan groups.”

Leventry also wonders if the “feminist” fairy could be a stealth homosexual. Despite mentioning both Paganism and homosexuality in regards to a children’s program it seems the commenters aren’t too worried about the hidden messages of the Muppet.

“As an extremely active member of a Baptist church and a mother of two kids under the age of 4, one might assume that I may have a problem with Abby’s paganism. Give me a break! I can’t imagine a more ridiculous notion than caring what religion/origin/preference (of any kind) a Muppet is. Sesame Street has a vampire (as noted before), main characters who are monsters, Wanda the Word FAIRY (by the incomparable Andrea Martin), and a 7-foot-tall bird of heretofore undisclosed classification! The biggest threat to our kids is NOT Sesame Street. Anyone who would attack a puppet instead of addressing poverty (which, by the way, Jesus had a LOT more to say about than people who weren’t like him!) and the lack of preschool programs for ALL our kids should be ashamed of themselves.”

Which I suppose says it all, really.