The next edition of “The Sacred in Suburbia,” my monthly column for No Unsacred Place, is now up.  It’s titled “Tree Communion” and it talks about how communing with the trees nearest to us can help us form and maintain connections with Nature and the Spirits of Nature.  I hope you’ll check it out, and while you’re there check out some of the other Pagan views on spirituality and the environment. Read more

When I heard Osama bin Laden had been killed my reaction was “finally.” He was personally responsible for the deaths of thousands of people and he had the will and the means continue killing unless he was forcibly stopped. It was absolutely necessary to constrain him, and if he refused to be captured then killing him was necessary and right. I’m glad he’s dead, and I’m glad this country had the ability to insure he will never kill again, even... Read more

Normally we would have held our Beltane circle last night, but because Easter was so late this year, the Denton Arts & Jazz Festival was this weekend… and we’ve learned not to try to compete with Arts & Jazz Fest.  So our Beltane circle will be next Saturday night.  If you’re in the North Texas region you’re invited to come out and celebrate with us.  We’ll have a Maypole dance and a circle dance, plus two songs from Vocal Magic.... Read more

On an drizzly 50 degree day, 35 people came out to celebrate Beltane with the new Arlington CUUPS group, part of the Arlington, Texas UU Church. The afternoon began with a drum circle led by El Lobo. If Lobo isn’t the best drummer in North Texas (and he very well may be, but we have a lot of really good drummers in the area) he’s definitely the most dedicated. He was a regular attendee and drum-provider back when Denton CUUPS... Read more

“I felt the Earth. It’s all connected, it is, but… it’s not all good and pure and rootsy. There’s deep… deep black. There’s… I saw… I saw the Earth, Giles. I saw its teeth.” – Willow, from the episode “Lessons” in Buffy the Vampire Slayer Over the past few weeks we’ve been reminded over and over again that the Earth has teeth. There was the earthquake and tsunami in Japan. We’ve seen flooding in the Midwest. Now we’re in the... Read more

There’s a guest post on the Patheos Pagan blog titled “It is time for Pagans to stop being Pagan.” It’s another attempt to find a unifying principle for the community that loosely uses the label “Pagan.” The writer clearly – and understandably – has some frustration with our lack of unity of belief and practice and the occasional attempts to claim unity where none exists. He suggests we rally around “the conscious decision to defend everyone’s right to practice our... Read more

Happy Earth Day, a day when we honor and celebrate our Mother and our home. Christian theologian Paul Tillich spoke of God as “the ground of being.” The Earth is literally our ground of being – we grew out of the Earth, we are sustained by the Earth, and we can only leave the Earth (at least physically) by taking the Earth with us. Along with the Sun, we are totally dependent on the Earth for our survival and sustenance.... Read more

Just in time for Easter, TIME magazine has a cover story asking “Is Hell Dead?” It’s inspired by and largely focuses on Evangelical pastor Rob Bell and his new book Love Wins. TIME does a fair job of presenting Bell’s case for Christian almost-Universalism as well as touching on traditional arguments for Hell. And now the Dallas Morning News’ “Texas Faith” feature asks this question to its interfaith panelists, which is dominated by liberal Christians but includes others such as... Read more

my campsite at CMA Beltane I’m back from a 4-day weekend trip to the Council of Magickal Arts’ Beltane festival at Spirit Haven, CMA’s group-owned land near Flatonia, Texas. This was my first large Pagan festival – it was quite an experience. I don’t know how many people were there – I didn’t get an official count, and the orientation leader said they vary from 500 to 1500. My best guess would be somewhere in the 1000 range, but that’s... Read more

It matters what we believe. As above, so below. As within, so without. Bolivia is set to enact a law recognizing that Nature has inherent rights. From an article in the Guardian, these include “the right to life and to exist; the right to continue vital cycles and processes free from human alteration; the right to pure water and clean air; the right to balance; the right not to be polluted; and the right to not have cellular structure modified... Read more