“We used to spend a lot of time in our yard, and now there’s bongos and loud singing, and we just don’t feel good about it anymore,” he said. “We’re not prejudiced. We’re very fair. Take that stuff outside of town.”

Meanwhile, another neighbor has contacted PETA (People For the Ethical Treatment of Animals) who called the cops on their behalf, and is “staying in contact with authorities” concerning the matter.

“Of course we’re against religious sacrifice,” Martin Merserau said. “We’re against animal abuse in many forms, whether you’re dragging a knife across the throat of an animal for quote-unquote religious purposes or not.”

PETA, perhaps feeling that their racist, sexist, sizeist, anti-Semitic, misogynistic, and transphobic campaigns haven’t been going far enough, they now feel the need to attack minority religions as well by getting involved in a local spat. Never mind the sheer hypocrisy of calling animal sacrifice “abuse”, while they “humanely” euthanize thousands of healthy unwanted animals, and have even had employees charged with illegal disposal of animal corpses. I guess context is king. All I know is that I’ve been a vegan for years, and I’ve never supported this group. As for Marquez, considering the recent win for Jose Merced in court, it’s going to be increasingly hard to enforce animal slaughter laws against Santeria practitioners.

More Fodder for Sharkey’s Ever-Hungry Ego: Joseph Laycock, author of  “Vampires Today: The Truth about Modern Vampirism”, decides to give more attention to Jonathon ‘The Impaler’ Sharkey for an essay at Religion Dispatches. Why? To make the point that Sharkey’s buffoonish extremism now seems almost normal in today’s ultra-polarized political landscape.

“The Impaler” arose during the Bush Administration, seeking popular appeal by promising to kill an unpopular president. And while he has continued this strategy during the Obama era, sadly he no longer seems nearly as crazed and peripheral next to the extreme fringes of the Tea Party movement. Simply put, violent rhetoric has become more acceptable. Progressives have criticized Sarah Palin for a political “hit list” on her Facebook page that features gun crosshairs over the home states of targeted Democrats. Sharkey and Palin are in effect both catering to the same sentiment. While Palin has never called for the impalement of Harry Reid, her supporters might not take offense if she did.

I suppose I see the point he’s trying to make, but I object to giving this criminal, who has shown a pattern of having inappropriate, and sometimes threatening, interactions with young girls, any more media-driven oxygen. I almost didn’t comment on this story because I want nothing more than to see Sharkey fade off into obscurity until he’s finally imprisoned for stepping too far over the line. Of course he’s calling for Witch-hunts! He is desperate for our attention, because without it, he’ll be forced to face the life he’s created for himself. So barring some truly newsworthy event involving Sharkey, the topic will no longer come up at this blog, and I urge everyone in the Pagan and Vampire communities to follow suit. As for Laycock, check out the interview with him about modern Vampirism at the always-excellent TheoFantastique blog.

Starhawk and Social Justice: In the wake of the Glenn Beck/Jim Wallis spat, author, activist, and On Faith panelist Starhawk weighs in on “social justice” in the context of modern Paganism.

“While Pagans do not have a set creed or unified code of beliefs, our traditions hold in common the understanding that we are all deeply interconnected, all part of the sacred weave of the world. The Goddess is immanent in this world and in all human beings, and part of our service to the sacred is to honor one another and take care of one another, to fairly share nature’s bounty and to succor one another in facing the hardships of life. We must create justice in this world, not wait for redress of grievances in the next. No one person or group has the right to commandeer nature’s resources, which are the underpinnings of all wealth. Generosity, justice and fairness are old Pagan virtues…”

I’m personally all for social justice, but then I’ve never been all that offended when people called me a socialist because of it. Which I suppose makes me one the 36% of Americans who have a favorable opinion towards the ideology. Not that social justice has to be equated with socialism, but I’m not the one blurring those lines in order to score political points.

South African Pagans and Inclusion: The Richmark Sentinel focuses on South African Pagan Council’s (SAPC) quest for representation at the country’s national multi-faith organizations.

The South African Pagan Council says its being ignored by the Moral Regeneration Movement (MRM), National Religious Leaders Forum (NRLF) and National Interfaith Leaders Council (NILC) … Asatruar Charles van Bergen, the representative of the South African Pagan Council (SAPC) tasked with negotiating the inclusion of Pagan religious leaders to both the NILC and its forerunner the National Religious Leaders Forum (NRLF), thinks South Africa is not achieving its stated intention to facilitate cooperative inter-religious participation. “Organizations such as Home Affairs and SARS have been forced to abide by the laws pertaining to such things, but other than that an active policy of passive-aggressive exclusion of Pagans is the status quo countrywide.”

Why does the SAPC want a voice in predominately socially conservative and anti-pagan multi-faith organizations? To remind the leaders of the dominant faiths in South Africa that other opinions exist and should be respected.

“I believe the SAPC’s presence on both the NILC and the NRLF will ensure that religious policies and dialogue maintain respect for the rights of minorities who do not necessarily agree with the conservative views and positions expressed by members of these organizations. We’d like the right to participate and contribute constructively to our Nation’s spiritual and moral values.”

The SAPC is currently involved in supporting the 30 days of advocacy against witch-hunts campaign, and is one of three legally recognized Pagan organization in South Africa (along with The South African Pagan Rights Alliance and the Correllian Nativist Tradition S.A.). I wish them luck in trying to change opinions concerning modern Paganism in South Africa.

Ongoing Tensions in Haiti: Reporters from the Miami Herald look at the ongoing tensions and deteriorating relations between faiths in post-earthquake Haiti, and mention that a human rights lawyer went before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights last month, calling for an investigation into anti-Vodou attacks.

Last month, Mario Joseph, a Haitian human rights lawyer, went before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights seeking an investigation of attacks against Vodouists after several were stoned by Evangelical pastors in the Cité Soleil slum. “In other zones of the country,” he told the commission, “particularly in the commune of Verrettes in the Artibonite, literal witch hunts have been launched against priests and practitioners of this religion.”

This news of “literal witch hunts” is deeply troubling, and there seems to be no real investigation of this by the press, many of whom have moved on now that the initial disaster is over with. In the chaos, with international eyes turned elsewhere, and the government still powerless, is there a quiet campaign of violence and intimidation against Vodou practitioners under way?

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

“In an e-mail to the Red Wing (Minn.) Republican Eagle newspaper, Brewer insisted the decision to join Sharkey was her choice. “I pretty much told Jonathon either he come meet up with me or I would walk to New Jersey on my own,” she wrote, referencing Sharkey’s native state. But Collins said police do have some concerns about the man who in 2009 was convicted of harassment in Olmsted County after a Rochester, Minn., teen broke off an online relationship with Sharkey. “Anytime you have a 44-year-old man hooking up with a 16-year-old, there’s a concern,” Collins said.”

Yes, men in their 40s trolling the Internet looking for under-age brides is “concerning”. Sharkey posted a video on Youtube that accused Paige Brewer’s mother of hitting her, and detailing their plans to marry and have kids as soon as Paige is of age.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihenS2VMaz4

However, despite the threatening montage of Sharkey hitting a punching bag, and detailing his plans of judicial revenge once he’s “king” of Minnesota, Brewer was taken into custody yesterday after an arranged meeting with social services. No charges are currently being filed against Sharkey, but he is being questioned by police.

I think we’ve reached a point where those covering Sharkey’s exploits need to acknowledge that he’s not some jokey vampire-witch punchline any longer, but a criminal who has shown a pattern of having inappropriate, and sometimes threatening, interactions with young girls.  A rational man, when confronted with a teenager who claims to have been abused, would go to social services first, not try and marry them. A sane man would understand that this behavior is the behavior of a predator, not a loving individual. I can only hope that something is done before yet another troubled teenager falls into his all-encompassing delusion.

In Other News:

Post-PantheaCon Ponderings: It’s been a few days since PantheaCon in San Jose, and we’re starting get some reflections and round-ups from participants. First, Thorn Coyle discusses the blurry distinctions between “serious seekers” and “party Pagans” at the event, finding that perhaps such divisions aren’t productive.

We all have our own journey to the sacred within. Who am I to say that one person’s journey is less serious than my own? Trust me, I’ve done my own fair share of carping about people whom I want to respect but who’s methods, outlook, or “fruits”, I don’t quite understand or may even disagree with. But I simultaneously have to admit to myself that I simply cannot know the core state of their hearts and souls. Unless they come to me for advice, I simply must say, “their path belongs to them” and then decide whether or not I want to lend time and energy to that relationship or not. What I cannot do is decide definitively whether or not their search is “serious.”

Meanwhile, Gwion Raven explored what the “back to basics” theme really meant this year, Cosette gives a first-timers perspective and says some nice things about me, Lupa discusses her Bear Performance Ritual, the COG NPIO blog says some nice things about my talk, Frater Barrabbas discusses some of the more ritual magic-focused events, Frater POS discusses his class at Pantheacon, Stella of Revealing had some interesting insights concerning my talk, Donald Michael Kraig has a few interesting Pantheacon-related posts you should read, and Erynn Laurie has several posts concerning her PantheaCon adventure. If you have some PantheaCon related thoughts or wrap-ups you want to share, please leave a link in the comments.

The Invisibility of Vodou: Samuel Freedman at the New York Times looks at the bad and uneven press Haitian Vodou has gotten since an earthquake devastated the country on January 12th. The core of Freedman’s essay is how reporters and editorial-writers have overlooked the centrality of that faith in Haiti.

“Crude and harsh as Mr. Robertson’s words were, he deserved a perverse kind of credit for one thing. He actually did recognize the centrality of voodoo to Haiti. In the voluminous media coverage of the quake and its aftermath, relatively few journalists and commentators have done so, and even fewer have gotten voodoo right.”

It’s actually interesting how much of his column echoes a good portion of my coverage here at The Wild Hunt. I say this not to brag, but as a vindication of the fact that this issue of Vodou in Haiti is an important one that deserved more attention and understanding than it generally received from the mainstream media. I’m glad that more reporters are picking up on these threads.

Bob Barr Isn’t Making Friends: On Wednesday I mentioned how former Libertarian candidate and Republican Senator Bob Barr has reverted back to his Pagan-hating ways, with a two-faced article mocking Pagan soldiers. Now journalist Ed Brayton, the man who got him to originally recant his anti-Pagan views on-the-record, is hopping mad.

“F**k you, Bob Barr. You obviously lied to me and you are just as bigoted and stupid as you were when you were in Congress.”

Ouch! Something tells me folks, especially Libertarian folks (and military folks), won’t get fooled again.

How Often Do You Write Letters to Your God/dess? In a final note, Thaindian News reports on a little post office near the banks of the Ganga river (aka the Ganges river) in Kachhla town of Uttar Pradesh that receives dozens of letters every day addressed to “Ganga Maiya” (the goddess personification of the Ganga river).

“Today those dashing off letters don’t just pray for a cure to their ailments; they write on auspicious occasions as well. Once the letters reach the Kachhla post office, the postmen take them to the river bank and drop them into the water. “Be it any festival - Holi, Diwali, or birthdays, marriages, mundan (tonsure ceremonies) or house warming, people seek blessings from Ganga Maiya by writing letters,” Satya Pal Singh, a sugarcane farmer, told IANS. “Residents here believe the letter serves as an invitation to Ganga Maiya, who will then visit their home and bless them, in turn bringing good luck and prosperity,” he added.”

Which makes me wonder, do any of you send formal invitations to your deities? If so, where do you send them?

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

“The academy superintendent, Air Force Lt. Gen. Michael Gould, says the improvements are the result of a topdown campaign to foster respect and a commitment to accommodate all cadets, even nonbelievers and an “Earth-centered” religious group that needed a place for a stone circle so it could worship outdoors. “If we are going to have success in our primary mission of developing leaders of character, we have to do that based on respect in all things, whether we’re talking gender, race or religion,” Gould said. Academy commanders say the school has started to seek out the religious needs of its cadets and accommodate them, instead of waiting for cadets to ask. For example, a Cadet Interfaith Council with about 20 members helps identify upcoming religious holidays so schedules can be adjusted around them, when possible.”

This is hugely good news, not only for our military-bound Pagans, but for the military as a whole. Despite the insinuations by some that religious tolerance and inclusion is counter-productive to good discipline, the reality is that a trustworthy military is one that truly reflects the diversity and values of our nation. That means a military where Pagans, atheists, and other minority belief systems are given the same considerations, without threat of retaliation (or intimidation), during their service, taken care of in peace-time, and fully honored in death.

In Other News: Egyptian archaeologists have managed to raise a 9-ton pylon from the Mediterranean Sea that was a part of a temple to Isis and part of Cleopatra’s palace complex.

“The tower was originally part of the entrance to a temple of Isis, a pharaonic goddess of fertility and magic. The temple is believed to have been near the palace that belonged to the 1st century B.C. Queen Cleopatra in the ancient city of Alexandria, submerged in the sea centuries ago.”

The pylon will be the centerpiece of a new museum dedicated to antiquities recovered from the Mediterranean Sea. You can catch a pretty good glimpse of the pylon, here.

For those of you not keeping track of the Pagans at the Parliament blog, some great content has been uploaded to that site recently. Including audio and video from the “People Call Us Pagans” panel, audio from the “Indigenous Peoples’ Statement to the World”, and video of the “Australian Pagans Speak” community forum. In addition, I’ve also linked to a Patheos.com interview with COG representative Don Frew from the Parliament.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=OUl8ecaYO7c

There’s even more great stuff to be found at the Pagans at the Parliament blog, including my previous audio interviews with Michael York, Ed Hubbard, and Zay Speer.

From the “didn’t this happen ages ago” files, it seems that  Jonathon “The Impaler” Sharkey, that subject of documentary filmmakers, and founder of the “Vampyres, Witches, and Pagans Party”, has landed himself in jail for two years.

“Forty-five-year-old Rocky Flash, also known as Jonathon Sharkey, was sentenced in a Marion County court on Wednesday to more than two years in jail. Prosecutors say the man threatened to beat, torture, impale, dismember and decapitate Judge David Certo, who is presiding over another case involving Flash.”

Sharkey was already in trouble for harassing an underage girl, and the judge he was threatening is no doubt the one in charge of that case. Perhaps this will finally close the casket (no pun intended, OK, pun intended) on this perennial Pagan embarrassment’s fifteen minutes of fame.

In a final note, FaithWorld is looking at various picks for the top religious stories of 2009.

“It’s Top 10 time again. As 2009 nears its end, Time magazine and the Religion Newswriters Association in the U.S. have produced their lists of the main religion news stories of the year. They take quite different views. Time’s list is quite broad, the top three being the advance of secularism in Europe, Pope Benedict’s invitation to conservative Anglicans and President Barack Obama’s decision to expand the faith-based office created by George Bush. The RNA picked Obama’s Cairo address to the Muslim world as its top story, followed by the role of religious groups in the U.S. health care reform debate and the Fort Hood massacre allegedly carried out by an American Muslim officer.”

As long-time readers may know, I like to count down the top Pagan stories of the year at the end of December (here’s a link for my 2006, 2007, and 2008 picks), and you can bet I have some great ideas for this year’s list. I’d also like to hear your ideas. Which Pagan stories, in your opinion, were the most notable in 2009? Let me know in the comments.

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

He’s run for governor and president and claims to lead a nation. Now, John Alfred Sharkey, 44, is in the Olmsted County jail, in lieu of posting $125,000 bail, accused of sending harassing e-mails to a Rochester teenager in 2007. The criminal complaint against Sharkey was filed last summer, but he didn’t make his first court appearance until last month after being arrested on a warrant. During his first court appearance Jan. 12, bail was set at $75,000. He was appointed a public defender, Rick Smith, who filed a motion for a bail reduction. Last week, his bail was increased to $125,000.

Turns out, not only is Sharkey a creepy stalker into cyber-dating girls young enough to be his daughter, but he apparently has no sense of humor either.

The girl told police they began dating online. She said she tried to end the online relationship but he refused to let her. She said that “in a desperate attempt” to get him to leave her alone, she e-mailed him that she was a member of an elite vampire hunter society and for the two of them to continue their relationship would put him in danger. She said that he called her cell phone and that she answered only after he sent her an e-mail threatening to call her family. The girl told police she felt she had to follow his demands and continue their relationship. She claimed he sent and made threatening and coercive e-mails and phone calls. The girl’s father told police that he talked to Sharkey but that Sharkey continued to call the girl and write letters to her parents.

That has to be one of the best break-up attempts I’ve ever heard. It’d be hilarious if Sharkey didn’t believe this girl was “his wife and princess” and didn’t already have a long history of harassing and stalking women. Maybe some time in a jail cell will bring home to him the notion that his 15 minutes of fame are up, that he needs some serious mental help, and that if you keep asking for media attention, you should be careful what you wish for. I suppose I should know better, but I hope this is the last I hear about this embarrassment.

“He calls himself a “vampyre” (the Romanian spelling, he says) and claims he’s been drinking blood since age five. He also wants to be your next president. Jonathon “The Impaler” Sharkey is running unchallenged for the Vampire, Witches and Pagan Party 2008 presidential nomination. Most Americans would have a hard time naming the 19 more-or-less official candidates, but, in fact, there are hundreds of Americans running on third-party and independent tickets. Sharkey is running on an “impale criminals” platform.”

I suppose this is a success story of sorts, it isn’t often that a former wrestler who (possibly) tried to fake his own death achieves this much notoriety (legally). But I must confess that having read through the first wave of “Impaler” news, I’m hoping this particular “human interest” well has run dry. For more Sharkey-related material you can look at his Presidential MySpace profile.
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