Today (in the U.S.), Venus will be seen to pass in front of the Sun. It will start just after 5 p.m. Central Time and last through sunset. You can find out when it starts where you are at this website. I bought special sunwatching glasses for the event. If you haven’t planned ahead, you can watch with a homemade pinhole projector. The transit can only be seen twice every century. The last time was 2004, so this is the... Read more
Okay, not quite. I overstated my title for dramatic effect. But that’s how shocked I was to read Star’s post today. Just when I had finally given up my pretension of being “more Pagan” than [fill in the blank], Star Foster has drawn the battle line again. In a recent post here on this blog, I confessed that I had been guilty of a kind of Pagan fundamentalism, presuming to define my form of Paganism as the Paganism par excellence. ... Read more
This post is Part 3 of a 3-part series on my evolving sense of Pagan identity. In Part 1 of this series, I admitted to being guilty of a kind of Pagan fundamentalism in my conception of the Pagan community. In Part 2, I envisioned a Pagan community consisting of (at least) three centers with overlapping areas: earth-centered Paganism, Self-centered Paganism (intentionally capitalized), and deity-centered Paganism. From Self-centered to earth-centered Paganism “There is a fine old story about a student... Read more
C. Luke Mula is the author of The Way to Actuality blog, which was “founded to foster the discussion and discovery of Purpose wherever it can be found, regardless of religious or secular context”. In this essay, Luke shares his experience of a liberating loss of belief and discusses the role that spiritual practice continues to play in his life. “When thinking leads to the unthinkable, it’s time to return to the simple life. What thinking cannot solve, life does.” –... Read more
This post is part 2 of a 3-part series. In the first part, I discussed how I had come to realize the ego-centrism of my earlier view of the Pagan community. Celebrating Nature, Working Magic, and Honoring Deities Imagine that the Pagan community has not one, but multiple “centers”. Imagine each of these “centers” defines Pagan identity and authenticity differently. To begin with there is what I will call “earth-centered Paganism”. I realize this is a problematic term, because “earth”... Read more
Next week I will be sharing a guest post by C. Luke Mula, author of The Way to Actuality blog. Luke will be sharing his experience of his liberating loss of belief and the role that spiritual practice continues to play in his life. Stay posted for more! Read more
This post is part 1 of a 3-part series. Previously, I posted a 3-part series about my vision of Neopaganism when I came to the movement. The previous series was a kind of retrospective. This series will be more forward-looking. I have a confession to make. I have been guilty of a kind of Pagan fundamentalism. Here on this blog and on the website I maintained (AmericanNeopaganism.com) for the last several years, I have tried to define Paganism in a... Read more
I’ve always thought we needed a memorial day for the burning of the Great Library at Alexandria. On that day, we could mourn all the instances of book burnings over the centuries, from the accidental ones like the Alexandrian library to intentional ones like the recent burnings of Harry Potter books and the Qu’ran by Christian extremists. I’m not exactly a bibliophile. I know a real bibliophile. He collects rare first edition hardbound books. I buy used paperbacks so I... Read more
Eclectic Neopaganism is criticized by anthropologists and other academics who condemn the removal of religious symbols and practices from their cultural context as trivializing, as well as by feminists and race advocates who condemn the theft of the traditions and practices of another culture as another form of Western colonialism, and finally by other Pagans. Hard Polytheists in particular may claim that the gods themselves don’t appreciate being appropriated. Setting aside for the time being what the gods want, I... Read more
Peter Dybing, former first officer of the Covenant of the Goddess, has quit Paganism. Well, sort of. He has left public Pagan life, resigning all of his leadership positions, to focus on his relationship and on being a “simple dirt worshiping Pagan.” Over at the Wild Hunt, Michael York has written a guest post in which he decries Dybing’s resignation as a harbinger of doom: the decline of Paganism and the concomitant destruction of human life on the planet. Honestly,... Read more
The Allergic Pagan
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