The BAPS Shri Swaminarayan Mandir in Houston

“Our parents had to build everything from scratch to make a united Hindu community in this country,” said Tejas N. Dave, 17, a high school junior who volunteers with a project bringing yoga to unprivileged Americans. “Now we’re trying to reintegrate it back into society,” he said, “to make people realize that Hinduism is a religion and a way of life and a philosophy that’s not too different from what a lot of others believe. We’re all trying to make a better society.” Some young Hindus are envious of the attention that American Muslims and Mormons have received in recent years – even if not all of the attention has been positive – and are trying to raise Hinduism’s national profile.

The article mentions the Hindu American Foundation and its work, an advocacy group that has done outreach to the Pagan community in recent years, and profiles younger Hindus who want to take their faith “outside officially Hindu spaces.”

Yet [Kavita] Pallod, 23, has spent a good deal of time thinking about how to apply her faith to her life. “I believe that karma is the principal that guides the universe,” she said, referring to the Hindu concept of cosmic justice. “It’s one of the reasons I joined Teach for America.”

In my recent interview with historian Kevin M. Schultz, he mentioned that Catholics and Jews in the early 20th century worked to “present a positive and forceful image of what it meant to be an American” using the “languages of good Americanism to show they belong.” This article makes it quite clear that this process is well underway for American Hindus. That said, despite Hinduism’s many successes in building infrastructure and mainstreaming some of their practices, there still remains a lot of distrust and hostility, as evidenced by the comments section of the CNN profile. American Hindu organizations will also have to decide, ultimately, how they are going to present themselves to other faiths. Hinduism’s theological diversity has allowed proponents to engage with Pagans, noting their common ground, while also (sometimes vociferously) portraying themselves as monotheists. It’s a complex subject, but American politics hates complex subjects, and the process of “Americanizing” a diverse decentralized umbrella faith may present roadblocks in the future.

In Other News:

• The Washington Post looks at a struggle in rural Virgina over a proposed interfaith center that is being blocked by Christian opposition who call the The Oracle Institute “anti-Christian, a cult and a threat to the community.” The sheriff of Independence, Virginia said in an email that it “looks like it may be another Branch Davidian compound.” Litigation is now pending.
• It seems like just a couple days ago I was writing about how evangelicals have largely made their peace with Harry Potter, I forgot to include the broad exception of Christian leaders who have loads of anti-Harry Potter merchandise to move before the final film fades into memory. Religious schlock-meister Steve Wohlberg is already preparing for whatever comes next, warning of a “third wave” of popular entertainment that will continue to fuel the “global teenage increase in Wicca and the occult.”
• Patheos colleague Eric Scott talks about handing down Pagan traditions to our children, and how it’s a bad idea to not teach them about our faiths. As Scott puts it: “The problem is not in exposing a child to religion, but in refusing to accept that children aren’t going to grow up to be exactly like their parents.” Religious education doesn’t have to be a cage, no matter what our own upbringings may have taught us.
• Scrutiny is growing for Rick Perry’s upcoming Texas faith-rally “The Response,” with his handlers already scrambling to establish deniability for Perry, saying he has “nothing to do with the website” and that there is no vetting of the endorsers (Really? None?). Right Wing Watch is having a field day working their way through the list. Will this all matter should Perry run? My own take on this will be coming up this week at The Washington Post’s On Faith site.

That’s all I have for now, have a great day!

Sacred Paths Center’s Fiscal Crisis: As I reported on Friday, Sacred Paths Center, a Pagan community center serving the Minneapolis-St. Paul area (aka “Paganistan”), sent out a message that they were in dire fiscal straits and needed over 7000 dollars immediately if they were to avoid closure. Now one of the SPC’s board members, CJ Stone, has been interviewed by PNC-Minnesota about the situation.

“We were working from a membership model. A Pagan Community Center has been the dream of several Twin Cities groups, working for the past thirteen years. You would think if the idea of a Pagan Community Center, supported by members, was possible, it would have happened by now. Thirteen years is a long time. When Teisha (Center Executive Director) said , “We have a problem, we have to solve it”, we finally asked, “Are we even using the right model?”

The answer is NO. We have already gotten the members we are likely to get. Even with a tremendous response, say 500 members, it would be barely enough. We just can’t do it. We made the mistake thinking the members would support it. We learned you can’t support a Pagan Community Center just on membership, at least not without years of work to build it up. We just have a month. We need some big donations now, to get off the membership model as a primary source of income, and continue. Then we can get on to better retail, more targeted retail, better service to our teachers and students. Finding a community that needs what we have got, and then serving it clearly and directly.”

The SPC board has estimated that they have to raise $7,500 immediately, and $12,000 by the end of July to remain open and viable for the longer term. So far 20% of their goal has been raised, this includes matching funds from an anonymous donor. We’ll keep you posted on this story as it develops.

James Arthur Ray Aftermath: After the negligent homicide convictions for New Age guru James Arthur Ray, Mitch Horowitz, author of “Occult America: White House Seances, Ouija Circles, Masons, and the Secret Mystic History of Our Nation,” ponders whether we should regulate retreats and rituals. While Horowitz acknowledges that Ray-inspired regulations “could be valuable,” he ultimately opposes government intervention.

The public should be alert to such situations—but not at the expense of the free exercise of spiritual experiment that has long characterized our religious culture. When considering crackdowns on ersatz sweat lodges or extreme rites, Americans ought to take guidance from what Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson wrote in 1944: “The price of freedom of religion . . . is that we must put up with, and even pay for, a good deal of rubbish.”

Horowitz endorses better education, something the new not-for-profit organization, SEEK, (Self-help Empowerment through Education and Knowledge), endeavors to do. Meanwhile, the story of Ray’s deadly sweat lodge ritual doesn’t seem to be going away, the Guardian just did a lengthy write-up about Ray, anti-Ray activists (and cult observers) are not letting him slip out of the spotlight, and you can bet there will be appeals once he’s been sentenced.

Winnemem Wintu Postpone Coming of Age Ceremony: Back in April I mentioned that the Winnemem Wintu Tribe in Northern California was coordinating a petition drive to close a small section of the McCloud River so they can hold their coming-of-age ceremony in peace. In previous years a “voluntary closure” was ignored by local power-boaters who shouted racist and threatening epithets at the Tribe. Now, the Winnemem Wintu have decided to postpone this year’s coming of age ceremony because the US Forest Service refuses to enforce a mandatory closure.

“For more than five years, we’ve asked the Forest Service to enforce a mandatory river closure for the ceremony’s four days in order to give us the peace and privacy we need for a good ceremony. They have continually refused to honor this request, even though it is within their power to close the river. Because Marisa is the young woman training to be the next leader, our Chief decided the risk was too great and the indignity of holding a ceremony without complete privacy could no longer be tolerated.”

The Winnemem are planning to try again for a mandatory closure next year, and are considering filing a complaint with the United Nation’s Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. You can keep up with this story by following the tribe’s Facebook page, and their blog dedicated to this issue.

Harry Potter and Witchcraft: Over the years I’ve looked at conservative Christian responses to the ever-popular Harry Potter books and movies. How they “glamorize the power of evil,” inspiring opposition that bordered on parody. Even the Bush administration worried over the demonic powers of Harry. But it looks like the great battles over Harry Potter seducing children into the practice of Witchcraft have finally burnt out, with former critics starting to admit they might have overreacted a bit.

“William Brown, president of Cedarville University, an evangelical college east of Dayton in Greene County, agreed that Christians’ opinions of Harry Potter have changed. “The world did not come apart and children did not immediately become witches and warlocks because of Harry Potter,” he said.”

That’s a big admission from an evangelical heavyweight. It really shows how the oxygen has gone out of this issue (author JK Rowling essentially admitting it’s a Christian allegory probably helped). Not that there won’t continue to be those who find it evil, but the Harry Potter culture war may finally be ending.

That’s all I have for now, have a great day!

Latimer writes that administration officials objected to giving author J.K. Rowling the Presidential Medal of Freedom because her writing “encouraged witchcraft” (p. 201): “This was the same sort of narrow thinking that led people in the White House to actually object to giving the author J.K. Rowling a presidential medal because the Harry Potter books encouraged withcraft.”

This newly-revealed “Harry Potter encourages witchcraft” attitude, along with Jim Towey’s misguided comments, the VA interpreting old anti-Wicca Bush quotes in order to make policy, and the snubbing of a Wiccan military widow (that Bush later apologized for) seems to confirm at the very least that Bush’s people (like the VA) either broadly interpreted his past anti-Witchcraft comments, or that conservative Christian attitudes towards minority faiths were pervasive.

Considering the newly hyper-partisan anger among conservative “values voters”, it could certainly be read as a movement in turmoil over being removed from the access to the executive power they felt was their right. Looking at the preferred candidates of conservative Christians over the years, we see a certain evolution (if you’ll pardon the term) in preference. From Ronald Reagan (who now looks moderate by comparison) and George W. Bush to Sarah Palin and Mike Huckabee. Conservative Christian activists are increasingly demanding adherence to troubling strain of charismatic Christianity that isn’t afraid to engage in a little malefic prayer-warring to get the job done. If Bush’s mild (by comparison) anti-Wiccan comments and subsequent reliance on folks like James Dobson were enough to color the executive branch as it did, imagine if someone the “values voters” really love got into the president’s chair.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=k4zkoOXDlng

“Directed by Harry Potter veteran Chris Columbus, the film is a fantasy based on the first book in Rick Riordan’s popular series. In the story, a young modern-day boy named Percy Jackson learns that he’s the half-human/half-god son of Poseidon and embarks on a journey of adventure and self-discovery that also involves warring gods.”

You can see the official film web site, here. It is scheduled for release February 12, 2010. Can a film tied so deeply to the pre-Christian Greek mythos find the kind of mega-success that Potter did? One thing’s for certain, if you thought certain Christians went nuts over a bunch of English boarding-school kids casting spells, wait till their kids want to see a film about the children of pagan gods.

“The fans’ fight not just with Warner Bros. but also the religious right is also included, via occult researcher Carol Matriciana, who had made an anti-Potter film called “Witchcraft Repackaged.” “Her work has inspired a lot of Christian activists,” Koury said. “If doesn’t help anyone’s case if you’re going to show someone who rants and raves on either side, so I wanted her because she can make a sound argument.””

If Matriciana is the “reasonable” voice of Christian opposition to Harry Potter, then it just shows you how far out of the mainstream these people are*. You see, her documentary “Witchcraft Repackaged” is sold by hate-literature mavens Chick Publications!

“This video explains how Scholastic Inc., the largest publisher of children’s books in the world, is supplying Harry Potter materials to millions of schoolchildren. Scholastic Inc. is using its unrivaled position in the educational system to flood classrooms and libraries with wizardry, repackaged as ‘children’s fantasy literature.’”

In addition to falsely equating fantasy depictions of magic with the religious practice of modern Pagans, Matriciana also takes time out to spread slurs about Hinduism as well and is apparently a “ex-New-Ager” turned to Jesus.

“But years ago Chuck Smith and Carol Matriciana who had been in new age for years did a video on Hinduism, and in that exposure of an ashram up in Washington or Northwest somewhere, you saw people chanting demon names, then getting possessed, and writhing on the floor as demons entered them.”

Sadly, people like Matriciana aren’t some fringe element, but merely the “dark” side of anti-Harry Potter arguments by Christians. The flip side of a coin. Even “nice” Christians seem to lose their cool when discussing the boy wizard and his successful books.

“There were a few things in the book that I found problematic – the authors start on a tirade about the Harry Potter series… and while I do hold issue with the Harry Potter series, I do not think its the singular cause of the rise in Wicca in our country. First of all, it was on the rise well before the series came out and second of …well even the book goes into more details as to the rise of Wicca, but at first the book feels like its a condemnation of all things Potter… and they never quite make a conclusion, which is bothersome…”

The fact is that, despite attempts by some elements to ban Harry Potter, it has become a cultural phenomenon that will resonate for generations to come. Not a phenomenon of occult recruitment, but one of a shared story, a unifying world of fantasy and possibility that has united people across cultural, economic, and racial lines. I think the real problem for Christians is that Harry Potter, despite being written by a Christian, espouses a secular-based harmony at odds with the “safe” Biblical allegory (or “supposals”) of C.S. Lewis. It isn’t that Harry Potter makes Pagans, its that Harry Potter doesn’t exclude or demonize Pagans, allowing them to fully insert themselves into the story alongside the Christian readers.

“We Are Wizards,” opens in New York on November 14.

* Check out “Hogwarts Professor” for a pro-Harry Christian perspective.
]]> http://www.patheos.com/blogs/wildhunt/2008/09/harry-potter-haters.html/feed 4 http://www.patheos.com/blogs/wildhunt/2008/09/brunswick-board-is-back-in-news.html http://www.patheos.com/blogs/wildhunt/2008/09/brunswick-board-is-back-in-news.html#comments Fri, 26 Sep 2008 13:24:00 +0000 Jason Pitzl-Waters http://patheos.com/blogs/wildhunt/2008/09/brunswick-board-is-back-in-the-news.html Some of you may remember our old friends on the Brunswick County School Board of North Carolina. Back in 2006 they tried to allow Christian groups to hand out religious literature on school campuses, a plan that was scuttled when Pagan publisher Llewellyn Worldwide told the board they would provide free books for local Pagans to hand out in schools.

Brunswick County Board of Education considering Pagan books.

“Board member Shirley Babson says she’s not afraid of potential lawsuits. She’s afraid of giving the appearance that the board approves of the literature groups would show the kids. “If I put something like this on the table, kids are going to say ‘Mrs. Babson thinks that’s alright. Mrs. Babson thinks that’s fine,’ ” Babson said.”

Then, in 2007, the Brunswick Board petulantly threatened to ban Harry Potter books from their libraries in seeming retaliation against the Witches.

“Brunswick County school officials will consider a procedure for students’ parents to challenge books available at school libraries … Board member Shirley Babson said some parents have expressed that books such as the Harry Potter series represent witchcraft and promote the practice of Wicca. Board member Jimmy Hobbs said he sees the importance of reviewing the policy. ‘The issue is a valid issue,’ Hobbs said. ‘I’m not attacking Harry Potter. When the issue of Bibles in schools came up last year, the ones that raised the most opposition was the group known as Wicca. Does this policy give them a free pass to get their materials into the schools? When distributing materials, we should be careful by not being biased. Is Wicca being allowed, in other ways, to the exclusion of Christian literature?’”

Now our old pals are back again, and this time they want to “teach the controversy” by introducing creationism into their curriculum.

“Articles in the Wilmington, North Carolina Star News on Tuesday and Wednesday report that the Brunswick County (NC) School Board is looking for a way to teach creationism in the schools. The issue was raised at Tuesday’s board meeting by parent Joel Fanti who told the board that it was unfair for evolution to be taught as a fact. Fanti said: ‘I wasn’t here 2 million years ago. If evolution is so slow, why don’t we see anything evolving now?’ School board member Jimmy Hobbs responded: ‘It’s really a disgrace for the state school board to impose evolution on our students without teaching creationism. The law says we can’t have Bibles in schools, but we can have evolution, of the atheists.’”

Sadly, while their hearts want to teach children that people were hanging out with dinosaurs, state law prevents them from teaching religious dogma in science classes.

“But neither creationism nor the related “intelligent design,” which says life forms are so complex only a higher power could have created them, may be taught as a required course of study, Edd Dunlap, science section chief for the N.C. Department of Public Instruction, said Wednesday. These are considered religious teachings and may not be taught in science class or as fact, although they may be included as part of an elective, such as a course on religion or philosophy, he said.”

Looks like the Brunswick Board has been foiled again! You know, maybe they should turn their attention to actually improving the schools they oversee instead of constantly hatching plots to insert Christian religion into the school district. If they truly feel that the only good education is a Christian education, maybe they should move into the private sector.
]]> http://www.patheos.com/blogs/wildhunt/2008/09/brunswick-board-is-back-in-news.html/feed 1 http://www.patheos.com/blogs/wildhunt/2008/07/pagan-news-of-note_25-3.html http://www.patheos.com/blogs/wildhunt/2008/07/pagan-news-of-note_25-3.html#comments Fri, 25 Jul 2008 13:13:00 +0000 Jason Pitzl-Waters http://patheos.com/blogs/wildhunt/2008/07/pagan-news-of-note-65.html My semi-regular round-up of articles, essays, and opinions of note for discerning Pagans and Heathens.

The recent arrest of Bosnian Serb war criminal Radovan Karadzic, who was posing as a New Age guru named “Dragan David Dabic”, has sparked some eager pundits to form a link between the New Age movement and mass murder!

“The New Age Dr Karadzic was not a disguise; it was a peep at what could have been, an alternative history. If Pol Pot had come to Britain, he might have opened a respectable stall at the Stoke Newington farmers’ market. If Dr Karadzic had moved to Camden market he could have become a quiet and harmless guru. As it was, he butchered half a country. The lesson is: keep an eye on those health stores.”

Igor Toronyi-Lalic’s correlations become ever-more perilous, performing mental acrobatics to link organic farming to murder because Pol Pot liked it, and claiming that New Age stores readily carry copies of “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion”. If this extended Reductio ad Hitlerum points to any conspiracy theorist, it must be the author himself.

Speaking of conspiracy theorists, want to dig up the “Harry Potter leads children to the occult” argument again? No? Too bad! Joe Max e-mailed me a link to a dazzlingly tunnel-visioned editorial from 2003 entitled “Heresy in the Hood II: Witchcraft among Children and Teens in America”. Heresy in the hood! Gods that tickles me. That should be the title of a movie.

“Any Web–savvy child can be indoctrinated into a pagan worldview and start casting spells before a parent catches on to this new interest.”

And they are probably downloading their records for free! Truly Satan is powerful! But why am I mocking an article from five years ago? Because the Christian anti-abortion hub LifeSiteNews references it extensively in a recent editorial by Hilary White.

“As of June 2008, the seven book Potter series has sold more than 400 million copies and the books have been translated into 67 languages. The phenomenal success of the books has made their British author, J.K. Rowling, the highest-earning novelist in history. Three years after Harry Potter, Harvey writes, a review of television programs, major children’s book publishers, and popular youth websites, ‘should more than confirm our initial warnings.’”

Blah, blah, blah, Harry Potter, blah, blah, Buffy, blah, blah, Satan, blah blah. Really I can’t even muster the energy to debate this stuff any more. Especially if they don’t even go to the trouble of writing a new piece, instead of simply paraphrasing one from five years ago. Perhaps both sides are stricken with Harry Potter outrage fatigue?

The Richmond Times Dispatch features a column from A. Barton Hinkle that looks at a recent decision by the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upholding non-sectarian prayer in the town of Fredericksburg (it was challenged by a Christian pastor who wanted to say the “J-word”). Hinkle explains how the ACLU could press for non-sectarian prayer in this instance, yet fight for the inclusion of Wiccan Cynthia Simpson in a different public prayer case.

“There is a defensible rationale for the stance the ACLU has taken, and it goes like this: Governmental bodies should not allow invocations, period. But given the fact that Chesterfield had done so, then it was obliged to treat all religions equally by allowing prayers from other faiths: Buddhist, Shinto, Wiccan, or Spaghetti Monster. Having opened the door to Abrahamic faiths, it couldn’t slam the door on non-Abrahamic ones. In the Fredericksburg case, the ACLU doesn’t want the door opened at all.”

In other words, if you want sectarian prayer, you have to invite the Pagans.

Paging Llewellyn! Remember your hilarious moral victory in North Carolina? Well, you just might get your chance to repeat it in Arizona.

“Alliance Defense Fund yesterday announced that it had filed a lawsuit in federal district court in Arizona on behalf of the First Baptist Church of Maricopa and its pastor, Jim Johnson, challenging Maricopa County school district’s policy on distribution of literature by nonprofit groups … School policy permits nonprofit groups to have their literature promoting various events and activities made available to students in schools. However the policy excludes literature from any sectarian organization or literature that promotes a particular religious belief or participation in religion.”

Network with some Arizona groups now, contact the local media and tell them that if First Baptist Church of Maricopa wins, you’ll be happy to distribute Pagan books and flyers to the kids. As I mentioned earlier, if you include sectarian religious content, you have to let everyone in!

In a final note, Technoccult points to an amazing in-depth look at the relationship of Throbbing Gristle/Psychic-TV founder Genesis P-Orridge, and Lady Jaye Breyer P-Orridge, who tragically passed away last year due to an undiagnosed heart condition.

“If we can be with this woman as lovers, as partners, for the rest of our lives, thought the front man of the legendary bands Throbbing Gristle and Psychic TV, who’d easily piled up enough experiences and enough identities to justify that royal “we”—it’s all we’ll ever want in the universe.”

A true tale of magick, love, gender, music, and the art of becoming one being.

That is all I have for now, have a great day!
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