The Role of Belief in an Orthopraxic Religion

December 8, 2020 By John Beckett

My Paganism begins with experience. It is a religion of relationships, and it is orthopraxic not orthodoxic – it’s more important to do the right things than to believe the right things.

But that doesn’t mean belief is unimportant. There’s a place for belief in Paganism, even if it isn’t at the center of our religion(s). In this post, I want to look at the matter of belief: what it is, how it arises, and how we can develop beliefs that are meaningful and helpful without falling into false and harmful certainty.

What is belief?

Merriam-Webster lists three definitions of the word “belief.” All three are intertwined and all three are good, but it’s the third that’s most relevant here: “conviction of the truth of some statement or the reality of some being or phenomenon especially when based on examination of evidence.”

Too many people think that belief means accepting something uncritically and without evidence, that it’s mindlessly repeating what you’re told instead of thinking for yourself. There are other, better words for that: “indoctrination” “mind control” “unresolved trauma” and all too often “intellectual laziness.”

Done right, belief is an interpretation of our experiences and the experiences of others. All we know with certainty is that we saw, heard, and/or felt something that defied conventional explanation. We use the process of discernment to try to figure out what happened, and more importantly, what it means for us in our lives. That interpretation becomes a belief.

Over time, beliefs that are robust are affirmed by other experiences, whether our own or those of others. They grow stronger and deeper as we become convinced that they really are meaningful and helpful, even if we can never be sure they’re true.

Foundational assumptions provide context for beliefs

We can only believe what we think is possible. And what we think is possible is controlled by our foundational assumptions: our basic, gut-level ideas about the world and the way it works.

I think that some of our foundational assumptions are an orientation we’re born with. But many come from what we were taught as very small children: from what we picked up by observation as much as anything we learned in kindergarten or Sunday School.

If you’re convinced that nothing exists except matter and the product of its interactions, you will find it difficult if not impossible to believe in the reality of spirits. If you are convinced there is only one God and that polytheism is a “primitive” superstition, it will be very difficult for you to relate to one of the Many Gods.

If you’re convinced people who aren’t like you are always trying to “take what’s yours” it will be very difficult for you to practice good hospitality.

Most people aren’t even aware that they have foundation assumptions. They think that’s just the way things are – it’s “common sense” or “what everybody knows.”

Identifying and challenging your unstated assumptions is very, very hard. It’s also very important, because our foundational assumptions control what we can believe.

The order of belief

I’ve shown this diagram multiple times over the years – a version of it is in The Path of Paganism. Practice, experience, and belief form a “virtuous circle.” One leads to the others, and over time it leads to an ever-deepening cycle of meaning. When I first drew this diagram I said you can enter at any point and travel in any direction. In general this is true.

But in an orthopraxic religion we begin with practice. When we do the practices (properly and consistently) we have experiences. When we interpret our experiences, we form beliefs. And those beliefs inspire us to keep practicing, which continues and deepens the virtuous circle.

An orthopraxic religion never asks its followers to believe mindlessly. Rather, it says to do these things because they’ve proven helpful. The practices lead to experiences (which, to be clear, are often ordinary and not otherworldly), and the experiences lead to beliefs.

Belief comes third.

Common practices lead to common beliefs

You can have your own individual beliefs and practices, but religion is what we do together. It’s how we form sacred relationships with our Gods and ancestors, with the natural world, and with each other.

We practice together. We observe the same cycles of the moon, we sing the same songs, we pour similar offerings to the same deities. These common practices naturally lead to shared experiences. And especially if they’re grounded in a common culture and common foundational assumptions, we’re likely to interpret them in very similar ways. Common practice leads to common beliefs.

Over time, this runs the risk of turning into orthodoxy – of shifting from “these are our most consistently helpful interpretations” to “this is the only valid interpretation.” But if we keep our primary emphasis on action rather than on interpretation, we can remain open to unorthodox interpretations that may be helpful for an individual, or for many individuals.

And more importantly, we can avoid becoming stagnated in beliefs that may have been helpful at one point but that are now outdated and harmful.

Beliefs are necessary to explore the world of spirit

So why even bother with belief? Why not just practice, experience, and leave it at that?

I don’t know about you, but I can’t just leave it at that. If I have a spiritual experience – from the very ordinary to the deeply mystical – I can’t help but wonder what it means. In part, I wonder what it means for me. But I also wonder what it tells us about the nature of the universe.

I experience the presence of another person who I cannot see or touch. I interpret that as the experience of a God. What does it mean that there are Gods? What does it mean that this God is called the Morrigan? What does it mean that She wants me to prepare for a time of upheaval? What is changing? What is changing that I cannot see? What does that tell us about the nature of the Otherworld?

All these questions demand answers. Maybe you can decline to answer them – I can’t. And every answer leads to yet more questions.

Taken in total, these questions and their tentative answers form a model of the worlds (two? nine? many?) and how they work. They tell a story that provides context and meaning. They help us orient ourselves in the big picture.

Good beliefs don’t shut down curiosity – they encourage it.

Good beliefs require humility

Whatever we learn through this process of exploration, it’s important to remember that our conclusions are beliefs, not facts.

Science doesn’t have all the answers, but the answers it has are generally reliable, and we ignore them at our peril. We make further mistakes when we assume science tells us something it doesn’t – bad science makes for bad religion.

Multiple experiences over time lead to confidence in our interpretations, especially when they align with the experiences and interpretations of others, and with the stories from our pre-Christian ancestors. This is a good thing. When I say I know there are many Gods and some of Them want certain things from me, I am expressing a confidence that comes from years of consistent practice and experience and from interpretations that have been affirmed over and over again.

And I still recognize that our understanding of the Gods is like cats’ understanding of humans.

Whatever confidence we may have in our beliefs, whether individually or collectively, ultimately they are our best guesses.

They might be wrong.

While we explore our beliefs as deeply as we can, we must hold them loosely. If we discover or are presented with evidence that our beliefs are wrong, or that a different belief is more meaningful, more helpful, or more accurate, then we must have the integrity to change our beliefs.

Practice remains primary

When your religion is centered on beliefs, what do you do when those beliefs are shown to be untrue?

Christian fundamentalists deny the reality of evolution, the age of the Earth, the equality of women, and the dignity of LGBTQ persons because their religion is centered on the belief that the Bible is the literal and inerrant “Word of God.”

When you build your religion on belief you build a house of cards. Without a historical Adam and Eve, the whole doctrine of original sin falls apart. And so fundamentalists reject reality rather than change their beliefs.

Meanwhile, in one of our CUUPS Imbolc rituals everyone made offerings to Brighid. Some offered to the Goddess, some to an aspect of the Divine Feminine, some to the saint, and some to the ideals of poetry and smithcraft. What we believed about Brighid was less important than the fact that we all made offerings to Brighid.

Practice leads to experience. Experience leads to belief. Belief motivates us to practice more deeply. There is a place for belief in a religion centered on practice and on right action.

It’s just not at the center.

My Biggest Mistakes as a Pagan

November 26, 2020 By John Beckett

Thorn Mooney of the Oathbound blog has a very good post and video titled My Biggest Mistakes as a Witch. It’s quite good and well worth the 13 minutes it takes to watch it. And, as good blog posts usually do, it got me to thinking about my own mistakes as a Pagan.

I don’t dwell on mistakes – I obsess over them. In the moment that can be devastating. But after they pass, I’ve learned to examine them, evaluate them, and figure out what I need to do differently next time. I advocate being compassionately honest, but I have an easier time doing that with other people than I do with myself. I expect perfection from myself, even though I know that’s not possible.

So this wasn’t the easiest blog post for me to write. But I saw value in Thorn’s post, so I decided I should do one of my own.

Here are my biggest mistakes as a Pagan.

Refusing to start at the beginning

In school I was a quick learner and I got bored very easily. I made a habit of skipping around, looking for something new, and assuming I already knew all the basics.

That worked really well in elementary school. It worked OK in junior high and high school. It didn’t work well at all in college. But the habits I picked up as a small child were hard to break – particularly when “the beginning” was something I didn’t want to deal with.

When I discovered Wicca I wanted to dive right into the magic. That was understandable – so do most people. But I was trying to work magic while still dealing with the impact of growing up in a fundamentalist church that said magic was evil and coping with it by relying on scientific skepticism that said magic was a delusion.

Is it any wonder I spent eight years going nowhere?

I had to begin at the beginning and wrestle with basic questions about the nature of the universe, the Gods, and life itself. Once I started that, things began to pick up in a hurry.

When I wrote my first book The Path of Paganism, I made sure the first chapter was on Foundations – the things I avoided when I got started.

Trying to ignore the Gods

At the core of refusing to start at the beginning was trying to ignore the Gods. Part of that was not dealing with my fundamentalist baggage. But even after I started doing that, I still clung to the idea of one almighty divine being. Old ideas die hard.

I gradually exchanged the angry God of the fundamentalists for a loving Mother Goddess, but I continued to ignore the many Gods. That didn’t change until I spent nine nights in meditation, each one with a different deity of Egypt. My experience of Isis was very different from my experience of Nut or Tefnut or Osiris and very different from my experience of Set. And it finally hit me that if I experienced the Gods as unique individuals then I should relate to Them as individuals, even if I could never be entirely sure.

I still had a long way to go. But when I began to understand the Gods as individuals, my work with and for Them began to grow, and things have never been the same since.

Waiting too long to start attending Pagan gatherings

I got serious with my Paganism in late 2001. In early 2003 I realized I needed a group and I went to Denton CUUPS – that worked out well. In 2004 I attended the CUUPS Convocation, my first large Pagan gathering. It was a great time and a great learning experience.

And then I didn’t attend another overnight Pagan gathering for five years.

There are reasons, that may or may not be excuses. I was busy with the OBOD course. My paying job was stressful, and I didn’t have as much vacation time as I do now. My travel budget was less. But I really could have used the experiences, the conversations, and the relationships that I’ve gotten from attending Pagan conferences and conventions. They certainly helped once I started going to them.

I feel bad recommending Pagan gatherings when we don’t know when we’ll be able to have them again. But eventually we will, and when we do I encourage you to go to one or two if at all possible.

Not working more magic

I’ve had a life-long interest in magic and witchcraft – it’s one of the things that drew me to Paganism in the first place. When I first discovered real magic I started practicing and experimenting. But that didn’t last long.

If I had a need I would work a spell. But doing magic for the sake of practicing magic? I never did much of that.

I think part of it was that since I knew how to do magic I assumed that was all I needed. But magic is like any other skill: you get better the more you practice. And if you don’t practice, your skills start to fade.

Eventually I incorporated magic into some of my daily devotions. And a while back I started working deliberate spells at every full moon. I’ve continued that practice and my magic is stronger for it.

Assuming other people shared my vision

The first four items in this post are mistakes on my spiritual journey. This one is a mistake in my spiritual leadership.

Those of us who are tolerant and of good will sometimes say “deep down we all want the same things – we just disagree about how to get there.” That’s a nice sentiment, but it’s not true. It’s not true in politics – some of us want a democratic society where everyone is equally valued, while others want an authoritarian society where straight white Christian men rule and everyone else knows their place.

Our differences need not be so ethically opposed to be just as real.

I want a religious community with a strong public presence, one that reaches out not to proselytize but to be visible and available for those who are interested in what we do. Some people in my community prefer a closed group that’s focused internally. Neither of these approaches are inherently better than the other, but they’re very different. I haven’t always recognized that.

That’s one example – there have been many others where I assumed everyone was on board with my vision. In some cases they said they were but either didn’t fully understand what I was proposing, or they got into it and changed their minds (which they were certainly entitled to do). And other times I made assumptions I had no grounds to make.

This has happened at many levels: in person, online, and otherwise; in formal organizations and informal associations. I’ve learned to be very upfront about my goals and expectations, and to listen carefully for other people’s goals and expectations.

This remains a challenge for me.

Learning from my mistakes

The only person who makes no mistakes is the person who never does anything.

Modern Paganism is a new religion and we don’t have it all figured out yet. And we won’t, because Paganism is a human religion and a living religion. Even where we have a pretty good idea of what works and what doesn’t, we’re all living our own lives. What works for me may not work for you, and vice versa.

My Gods do not expect perfection. But They like it best if I don’t make the same mistakes over and over again. So do I.

These have been my biggest mistakes on my Pagan journey. I’ve learned from them. I hope you will too.

Reading the Current Omens and Signs (and there’s a lot of them)

October 29, 2020 By John Beckett

Have you had an ominous dream lately? Not a bad dream or a strange dream, but a dream where you woke up thinking “there’s something more to this.”

Seen unusual signs in Nature? I like to remind everyone that most times a crow is just a crow doing crow things, but sometimes a crow really is the Morrigan. Or Odin. Or Someone else trying to get your attention.

From what I’m reading on social media, a lot of you are seeing, hearing, or feeling things that have gotten your attention. I’ve seen several reports from people who are experienced in these things and who don’t jump to unwarranted conclusions. And I’ve seen many more reports from people with less experience, who still get the point that yes, sometimes dreams are more than your brain’s routine sorting and filing.

Add me to that list. My dreams lately have been unusual. None of them rise to the clear and unambiguous prophetic level I get once a year or so. But I can’t explain them away… at least not all of them.

So I did what I advise everyone to do when you’re hearing an unclear message – divination. I broke out my oldest Tarot deck (oldest to me, that is), the Robin Wood Tarot.

I’m convinced that Whoever or whatever is at the source of what I’m hearing is also at the source of what everyone else is hearing. So while some of this is specifically for me, most of it is applicable to all of us.

I drew one 10-card reading and one 3-card reading. The arrangements you see here were done afterwards, to make for a more clear and straightforward presentation. But my reading of the cards hasn’t changed since I first laid them out.

The Nine of Swords: thank you for your keen sense of the obvious

This card came up very early in the reading. This is the night terrors card, the card of crippling anxiety. While I’m convinced that some of what I’m hearing – and some of what I’m dreaming – is Otherworldly in nature, let’s not overlook the obvious mundane situation. This is a time of high anxiety.

We’re now less than a week away from a critical election in the United States. We’ve managed to survive four years of Trump – we don’t want to have to survive another four. Even after the election is over, we have no idea when we’ll know the winner. And even if Biden is the clear winner, a lame duck Trump can do a lot of damage in the next two and a half months.

Oh, yeah – we’re also in the middle of a worldwide pandemic that has killed almost 1.2 million people and shows signs of getting worse, not better.

Plus all the usual stresses of trying to live in late stage capitalism and Tower Time.

A lot of what people are hearing and seeing – and especially what they’re dreaming – is ordinary stress and anxiety ratcheted up to extraordinary levels. We need to recognize this and do the kind of ordinary and spiritual things that help us cope with life’s difficulties.

But that’s not all there is in the omens and signs.

The Eight of Wands: rapid change is coming

I’m very reluctant to read a specific meaning into this card.

It’s tempting to interpret it as predicting a Biden win. But it could also be interpreted as a contested election leading to a complete governmental collapse (something I think is highly unlikely, though not impossible). It could be interpreted as the pandemic suddenly fading away, but also as it becoming more widespread and more lethal.

In the context of our current omens and signs, I don’t see a specific literal meaning to this card. I didn’t when I pulled it and I still don’t as I write this post.

What I see is “be ready.”

Which is something some of us have been hearing for quite a while. Let’s hope more of us pay attention this time.

The Eight of Wands directly preceded the next two cards, and I think that’s very important.

The Ace of Wands and the Ace of Cups: creative force

The aces are cards of creation and new beginnings. They represent the elemental forces of everything in their suits. They were two places apart in the original reading, so I’m inclined to read them together.

If rapid change is coming, we’re going to need something to guide and power our response.

What are you feeling right now – besides the anxiety? What spark is flickering deep inside you, waiting to be fed so it can burst forth into a flame that enlightens everything around you?

Your opportunity – our opportunity – will be here soon. Be ready.

The Star and The Moon: remember who you are

One of my daily prayers is that I will do what must be done. And for most of this year, I have.

So have the vast majority of you. You’re dealing with Covid, and you’re doing everything you can do to make this country and this world a better place. Sometimes that means spreading love and light. Sometimes it means something decidedly not.

Friedrich Nietzsche famously said “if you gaze long enough into the abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you.” I’ve spent more time gazing into the abyss this year than I like.

And also, while I have always dealt with both religion and with politics on the blog and in my life, this year has seen a strong push toward the political. It was necessary – I’ve done what must be done.

But at my core I’m not a political activist, I’m a Druid and a priest. No matter how the election goes, no matter how the pandemic goes, I have to get back to the deep spiritual work I’ve largely set aside the past several months. I have to remember who I am.

Have you gotten so caught up in current events you’ve forgotten what’s most important to you? Have you ignored your deepest calling?

There is no shame in doing what must be done. Quite the contrary, it’s both honorable and necessary.

But at some point, the greater necessity is to remember who you are, and what’s most important to you.

The Knight of Pentacles: it’s time to go to work

As with the Waite-Smith deck, the Robin Wood Tarot depicts the Knight of Pentacles mounted on a draft horse in the middle of a plowed field. This is not a card of flashy combat, but of hard work. Some of it has already been done, but plowing the ground is only the first step.

Whatever happens in the next week and in the coming weeks, there is much work to be done.

I have two general outlines for what I need to do, depending on how the election goes. They are very different plans, but they both involve returning to my higher callings. And they are both long-term endeavors that depend more on perseverance than on anything quick and flashy.

This was the last card I drew. The context of the reading doesn’t allow me to label this as “the final outcome” but it is where this particular “look down the road” stops.

It stops with us working toward a better future.

The Knight of Pentacles isn’t The Sun or The World or the Ten of Cups. It’s also not The Tower or Death or the Ten of Swords.

I’ll take it.

Embrace the Art of the Possible, not Accelerationism

September 23, 2020 By John Beckett

Otto von Bismarck – who unified Germany in the 19^th century – said “politics is the art of the possible, the attainable, the art of the next best.”

As we approach Election Day, most of my friends seem to have embraced the wisdom of Bismarck. Very few of us supported Joe Biden in the primary (I voted for Elizabeth Warren), but Biden is the Democratic nominee. Biden is possible and attainable. He won’t fix all our problems, but he’ll make a far better President than Trump.

A few are still holding out. Some are clinging to ideological purity – Biden doesn’t share their position on this issue or that so they don’t want to vote for him – as though Trump is more likely to deliver what they want. A few claim there’s no difference between Biden and Trump. I can’t comprehend the amount of naivety or willful ignorance it must take to think that.

But some are just fine with a Trump win. Not because they like Trump but because they think four more years of him will make things so bad that people will finally revolt and destroy capitalism and create an anarcho-communist society or some similar utopia.

I learned a new word a short while back: accelerationism. It’s the idea that rather than trying to reform the system and make incremental progress, it’s better to accelerate the system’s “inevitable” demise. The term originated with Marxist thinkers, but in recent years it’s been adopted by white supremacists and others on the far right.

Whether from the left or from the right, I find accelerationism to be intellectually bankrupt and morally repugnant.

Accelerationism is apocalyptic thinking

The attraction of accelerationism is the wishful thinking that if we can just blow everything up, a perfect society will emerge from the ashes. This is a form of apocalyptic thinking.

An apocalypse is not a great destruction – the word means “revealing.” The important part isn’t what happens, it’s what comes afterwards. Some apocalyptic prophecies say that after the revealing everything will be perfect. Others say we’ll all be dead. Either way our problems will be over and we won’t have to worry about them anymore – we won’t have to build a better world ourselves.

Some apocalyptic thinking is obvious. Many fundamentalist Christians support Israel and their violent policies toward the Palestinians, but not out of any love for Jewish people or even a respect for the Jewish religion. Rather, they believe that a strong nation of Israel located in Palestine is required for Jesus to return to Earth and end the world.

Leftist accelerationists believe that if we make things bad enough – if we allow people to be hurt enough – the common people will rise up in revolution, or at least they’ll finally elect a real socialist as President. Right wing accelerationists believe that if we make things bad enough – if we hurt people enough – white people will rise up and put other people in their place. Whether that place is “somewhere else” or “in the ground” depends on which white supremacist you talk to.

To be clear, these two “utopias” are not even remotely morally equivalent. I would gladly vote for a democratic socialist, and I find the idea of a classless society intriguing, though ultimately unworkable given human nature. A society based on racial purity and segregation is simply evil.

But apocalyptic prophecies have a 3500-year track record of being wrong every single time, and the accelerationist versions of them are no different. They are dreams of something that will not happen.

What – and who – are you willing to sacrifice?

So you want Trump to win so things get so bad people are finally willing to embrace revolution? Who are you willing to sacrifice to get your revolution?

It looks like Trump is going to get another Supreme Court pick so Roe v. Wade can be overturned – shall we give him Stephen Breyer’s seat too? Shall we allow him to continue gutting environmental regulations and denying climate change? Continue encouraging and enabling the “very fine people” who drive cars into protesters?

And let’s say things got so bad there actually was a revolution. Revolutions are violent things – how many people are you willing to kill? We joke (or perhaps, fantasize) about guillotines, but do you really want another Reign of Terror? Are you sure we can manage to kill only those who deserve to be killed?

Want to accelerate the demise of industrial society so we can create some eco-primitive future? That’s a death sentence for people who are dependent on insulin and other drugs to keep them alive. People talk about everyone returning to subsistence farming. I’m 58 with a bad back – I don’t like my life expectancy under those circumstances.

Who are you willing to sacrifice in the name of revolution?

Beheading of nine people during the Reign of Terror, 1793. Public domain image via Wikimedia Commons.

Triggering events spark change, not revolution

Police have been shooting black people at a disproportionate rate for many years. But there was something about the murder of George Floyd that got the attention of people who had been ignoring it all their lives. The hard work of changing police policies, training, and practices is still in front of us, but at least we’re finally having the conversation.

The fact is that the vast majority of people – including those who are oppressed – do not want revolution. They just want to be able to live their lives in peace – and stop being oppressed. It’s easy to talk about revolution. But people revolt violently when they feel like they have no alternative – and the vast majority of us have alternatives, even if they’re less than ideal.

Burning it all down is easy – building it back up is hard

If you want me to help you burn it all down, you’re going to have to show me your plan for building something better in the aftermath. No one ever has a plan for that – just an assumption that whatever replaces it has to be better than what we have now. History says that not only is the aftermath of burning it all down rarely better for ordinary people, it’s often worse. Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.

So much of what accelerationists of all stripes dream about are simply fantasies with no substance to them.

Embracing the art of the possible

Revolution almost certainly isn’t going to happen and even if it did it wouldn’t bring what most of us want. So let’s embrace what’s possible instead.

Let’s elect a President – and a Congress, and state and local officials – who will move the country in the direction we want. It won’t be as far as we want or as fast as we want, but it will be in the right direction. Take what we can get today, then work for more later.

Let’s keep the pressure on them to reform the police and our criminal justice system. Let’s stop building prisons and embrace restorative justice.

Let’s elect people who respect science. Donald Trump is not responsible for Covid-19, but he is absolutely responsible for the weak response to it that has resulted in 200,000 American deaths. If any reasonable person had been President that number would be considerably lower.

Let’s elect people who understand that climate change is real and that human activity is making it worse. And then let’s support them when they make political moves to reduce its impact, even though that won’t be as far as some of us think necessary and also much farther than others would prefer.

Let’s keep fighting to treat refugees and immigrants with dignity and compassion, to respect people of all religions and of no religion, and to insure that human rights and civil rights include everyone.

These aren’t the only issues. Whatever issues are important to you, I encourage you to vote for candidates who will lead the country in a positive direction – not further down the wrong direction.

Democracy is messy and it requires work

Democracy only works when we do. It’s not enough to vote for a progressive President once every four years. We have to vote in every election, and then engage with our elected officials on a regular basis.

And perhaps more importantly, we have to build the kind of society we want on the ground, with our friends and neighbors, without waiting on government to do it for us.

I know – most of us just want to vote and then go back to living our lives the way we want to live them. But there is always someone trying to take advantage of others, using either the power of government or the power of wealth or both. Someone has to keep them in check… that someone can only be us.

Most of us intuitively understand this. That’s why we’re voting for Biden, even though we’d rather be voting for Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren or one of the other 20 or so candidates who ran for the Democratic nomination.

But if you think that four more years of Trump will finally bring the kind of cataclysmic change you’re hoping for, I urge you to abandon accelerationism and its apocalyptic thinking.

Instead, embrace the art of the possible and the attainable, and help us move in a better direction.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg: We Will Fight On

September 19, 2020 By John Beckett

I screamed “NO!” when I heard the news.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is dead.

We thought she would live forever… or at least for another five months. And why shouldn’t we? She beat colon cancer in 1999, then beat pancreatic cancer in 2009 and again in 2019. But it returned this year. She willed herself to stay alive until her replacement could be appointed by someone more in line with her philosophy of the Constitution.

Her will was strong, but she was still human.

She was 87.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg in 2016. US Government photo – public domain.

A brief biography

Joan Ruth Bader was born in Brooklyn on March 15, 1933. Her father was a Jewish immigrant from the Ukraine; her mother was from New York, part of a family of recent Jewish immigrants from Europe. Both worked blue collar jobs during her childhood.

Ruth graduated from Cornell University in 1954, then married Martin Ginsburg. She moved to Oklahoma with him when he was in the Army. She started Harvard Law School in 1956, one of nine women in a class of 500. When Martin graduated from Harvard and got a job in New York City, she transferred to Columbia Law School, where she graduated first in her class in 1959.

Ruth and Martin had two children: Jane (born 1955) and James (born 1965).

She worked as a law clerk, a research associate, and a law professor. In 1973 she became the general counsel for the Women’s Rights Project of the ACLU. She was appointed to the U.S. Court of Appeals by President Jimmy Carter in 1980, and to the U.S. Supreme Court by President Bill Clinton in 1993. She was confirmed by a vote of 96-3.

The Senate was a very different place in those days.

60 years of legal excellence

USA Today has a list of Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s most notable opinions as a Supreme Court Justice. The first is United States v. Virginia (1996), where the court struck down Virginia Military Institute’s male-only admissions policy as a violation of the 14th Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause. In it she said

A law or official policy that denies to women, simply because they are women, equal opportunity to aspire, achieve, participate in, and contribute to society, based upon what they can do … is presumptively invalid.

Last year she wrote the opinion for a unanimous decision that the 8^th Amendment’s prohibition against excessive fines applies to states and local governments and not just the federal government.

The protection against excessive fines guards against abuses of government’s punitive or criminal law-enforcement authority. This safeguard, we hold, is fundamental to our scheme of ordered liberty.

Ginsburg is perhaps best known for her dissents, especially Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. in 2007 (on pay discrimination on account of gender), Gonzales v. Carhart in 2007 (on abortion restrictions), and the infamous Hobby Lobby case in 2014, where she wrote

Approving some religious claims while deeming others unworthy of accommodation could be perceived as favoring one religion over another, the very risk the Establishment Clause was designed to preclude. The court, I fear, has ventured into a minefield.

She was known as a brilliant jurist and was respected even by arch-conservative Justice Antonin Scalia. She worked tirelessly for the rights of all, but especially for those who have long been denied them.

She will be missed.

This shouldn’t matter so much

Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s story is inspiring and her service to her country was outstanding. Right now we should be pausing to honor her life, not crying in despair. A judge – even a great judge – shouldn’t be this important. As Chief Justice John Roberts said during his confirmation hearing, the job of the judge is to “call balls and strikes, not to pitch or bat.”

But the history of American government has been one of saying and writing noble ideals and then failing to live up to them. It falls to the judiciary to hold politicians accountable to their commitments. Sometimes they have (Brown v. Board of Education, Obergefell v. Hodges) and sometimes they haven’t (Dred Scott v. Sandford, Citizens United v. FEC).

Congress has abdicated its responsibility to lead. No one wants to go on record voting for something controversial; most are more interested in getting re-elected than in actually getting something done. Congress’s inaction has left a power vacuum that the courts have filled out of necessity.

And nowhere has this been more important than with individual liberties and basic human rights.

But it matters a lot

When Mitch McConnell stole President Obama’s appointment of Merrick Garland, at least the judicial mix of the Supreme Court remained the same. But then Anthony Kennedy retired and was replaced by Brett Kavanaugh. Kennedy was very pro-business, but also progressive on social issues – he wrote the majority opinion that established marriage equality as the law of the land. John Roberts tries to be a centrist and sometimes delivers, but sometimes not.

If Trump is allowed to fill Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s seat with another conservative, the mix of the court will shift, likely for at least a decade. Conservatives are anxious to overturn Roe v. Wade, but they’d also like overturn rulings on marriage equality, decriminalization of same sex conduct, and the ruling that underpins them all: Griswold v. Connecticut (1965), which legalized contraception and established the right to privacy.

Plus we haven’t just lost Ginsburg’s reliable progressive vote. We’ve also lost her legal reasoning and advocacy skills. Her voice was sometimes enough to persuade a more moderate justice to abandon Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito’s thinking and join with hers.

Ginsburg’s position as senior justice on the liberal wing now falls to Stephen Breyer, who is 82. Her role as the most visible female jurist in the country falls to Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan. They all have huge shoes to fill.

First we mourn

The outpouring of grief since last night is far more than the fear of a remade Supreme Court. We didn’t just respect Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s legal work, we loved her as a person. We called her “the Notorious RBG” – she loved the name. We loved her intellect, her determination, her wit, and her humanity.

And so we mourn.

My Jewish friends tell me that comments referring to an afterlife are considered inappropriate at times like these. Contemporary Judaism is rather ambivalent about an afterlife, preferring to focus on our actions in this life. We do not know what Justice Ginsburg believed or expected, if anything. We should honor her Jewishness and respect that tradition.

Instead, the proper words are “may her memory be a blessing.”

I am confident it will be.

And then we act

Mitch McConnell has already said that Trump’s nominee will get a vote. He has some twisted logic as to why that’s right even though he denied a vote to Merrick Garland, who was nominated almost 8 months prior to the 2016 election. His clear goal is to put as many conservatives on the Supreme Court as possible, principles and logic be damned.

The Senate has 53 Republicans, and Vice President Mike Pence breaks any ties. We need four Republican senators with the integrity to insist that the precedent McConnell set in 2016 is respected in 2020.

If you live in a state with a Republican senator, write and call them and insist that no confirmation vote take place until after the inauguration in January.

It is unlikely a vote could be held prior to the election. Expect McConnell to try to ram it through in the lame duck session in November and December.

Vote – elections have consequences!

This was the #1 reason I voted for Hillary Clinton in 2016. Donald Trump has put 200 conservatives on the Federal bench, out of about 800 positions. He’s already put two young conservatives on the Supreme Court and may very well get a third.

Will Stephen Breyer live another five years? I don’t even want to think about the damage a 7-2 conservative court would do to the country.

Vote for Joe Biden for President. Whatever your misgivings about him, at least he’ll stop the bleeding.

Work to flip the Senate. I donated to Amy McGrath, who’s running against Mitch McConnell in Kentucky. That’s a tough race. CNN lists eight seats more likely to switch from red to blue, plus two more in danger of flipping to the Republicans. If you have money to contribute to an out-of-state candidate, pick one of these.

Vote for progressives in state and local elections. Government is so much more than the President and the Supreme Court. Most of the regressive laws passed in recent years have come from Republican state legislatures.

I’ve seen several people saying that if an 87-year-old judge was the only thing holding our system together, it wasn’t a very good system to begin with. I won’t argue with that, and I’m open to suggestions to make things better.

But making things better begins with stopping the bleeding.

Vote.

Become the legacy of Ruth Bader Ginsburg

I am distraught over yet another significant loss in this year from hell, losses exacerbated by injustice and misrule.

Still, I cannot help but be inspired by the life of Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Defending our rights was her life’s work and she kept fighting until the very end.

I said it’s the job of the judiciary to hold politicians accountable for living up to the ideals of this country, and that is true. But first and foremost, holding them accountable is our job as citizens. If there was ever a time to take that job seriously it’s now.

Democracy only works with an engaged citizenry.

I do not know if I have the resiliency and determination of the Notorious RBG – I’ve never been challenged to the extent she was challenged. She had a strength few of us have.

But what strength I have I will use to fight on, for justice, fairness, and compassion.

Let’s make RBG proud.

Trump is Fundamentalism’s Battle of the Bulge

August 11, 2020 By John Beckett

A quote misattributed to Mark Twain says “history doesn’t repeat itself, but it often rhymes.” History is rhyming right now. It’s telling us that while things are difficult and dangerous, those of us who believe in freedom and justice for all and not just for a few are on the verge of a victory that will be monumental… if we will seize it.

We begin with this excellent story from Sunday’s New York Times by religion writer Elizabeth Dias. It’s titled Christianity Will Have Power (NYT articles are often behind a paywall, but I was able to read this in its entirety). The title comes from a campaign speech Donald Trump gave in 2016.

“I will tell you, Christianity is under tremendous siege, whether we want to talk about it or we don’t want to talk about it,” Mr. Trump said.

Christians make up the overwhelming majority of the country, he said. And then he slowed slightly to stress each next word: “And yet we don’t exert the power that we should have.”

If he were elected president, he promised, that would change. He raised a finger.

“Christianity will have power,” he said. “If I’m there, you’re going to have plenty of power, you don’t need anybody else. You’re going to have somebody representing you very, very well. Remember that.”

Too many people dismiss Evangelical and fundamentalist Trump supporters as naïve simpletons who fall for his con game. That’s simply not the case. They know exactly who and what he is. And they recognize him as one of their own.

Fundamentalists recognize Trump as one of their own

I say this over and over again and I still don’t think I say it enough. Religion is far more than which set of supernatural propositions you affirm and which ones you reject.

The English word “religion” comes from the Latin word religio, meaning “to bind together.” Christians in general and Protestants in particular claim that what binds them together is a set of beliefs. But that’s never been entirely true, because religion is about far more than belief.

Certainly, beliefs are an important part of any religion. But so are rituals like worship services and how communities celebrate holidays and holy days. Religion is about culture: music, dress, and hair styles. It’s about language – in this case, not just “English only” but also what’s derided as “political correctness.” It’s about expectations around sex and gender.

And it’s about political philosophies. Trump and the fundamentalists share a deep belief in hierarchy and patriarchy. The strong should rule the weak. The rich are blessed by the Christian God and should be respected while the poor are lazy and must be punished. “Law and order” is more important than justice. Rebellion against any authority is a sin that cannot be tolerated.

Donald Trump doesn’t share the theological beliefs of the fundamentalists. And he thinks their code of sexual morality doesn’t apply to him (neither do most fundamentalists, because it goes against the core of human nature – but that’s another post for another time). But he shares their political philosophies, and they admire him for being strong and rich. They recognize him as one of their own.

Fundamentalism is a reaction to discredited myths

Despite their claims of being the “New Testament Church” and the “Old Time Religion” fundamentalist Christianity is a relatively new thing. It began in the late 19^th century as a reaction against Darwin’s theory of evolution and the beginnings of higher biblical criticism. The first showed that humans are not categorically different from other animals. The second showed that the Bible is not the literal and inerrant “Word of God.”

That evolution and higher criticism are true was irrelevant. It was an attack on mythology – on the stories people live by. Stories are powerful things and people will fight to the death to defend their myths.

Early 20^th century fundamentalists saw their world changing and they didn’t like it: women getting the right to vote, Black people demanding equality, Catholics and Jews growing in number and in influence. That the 1920s were the height of both Christian fundamentalism and the Ku Klux Klan is not a coincidence.

Fundamentalism isn’t just a set of theological beliefs which everyone is free to accept or reject. It’s a way of seeing the world and a demand that everyone conform to that vision. Christian fundamentalists and Islamic fundamentalists are cousins in a very dysfunctional family.

The failure of fundamentalism

Christian fundamentalism is failing. It never really took hold in Europe. In the United States it peaked in the 1920s, then had a resurgence in the 1950s with the rise of the Civil Rights movement and with anti-Communist paranoia. But it failed for the same reason religious zealotry always fails – after a while people get tired of hellfire sermons against the pleasures of life.

The women’s movement, the Civils Rights movement, and the sexual revolution were and are good and natural things that help people be who they are. They enable people to live their lives the way they want to live them. These movements have changed society in a deep and lasting way – a way that terrifies fundamentalists.

What fundamentalists could not accomplish with the power of the pulpit they have attempted to do with the power of politics. They’ve had some success, particularly at the state level. But they are losing.

We’ve gone from homosexuality being “the love that dare not speak its name” to an openly gay man – legally married to another man – running for President of the United States… and being criticized for being too conservative.

Further, they’re losing their base. For years fundamentalist churches grew while Mainline Protestants declined, but now fundamentalists and Evangelicals are declining too. This is good news for those of us who believe religious diversity is a beautiful thing. It’s bad news for those who believe their way is the only way.

The Battle of the Bulge

Now let’s take a look at a different part of history.

World War II began in September 1939 when Germany attacked Poland. With the evacuation of Dunkirk in June 1940, Germany essentially controlled the European continent and would continue to control it for four years.

But in the east, the Soviet Union stopped the Germans at Stalingrad in early 1943 (at a horrible cost in lives) and began moving west. The Allies invaded Normandy in June 1944 and began moving east. By December 1944 they had recaptured most of France and Belgium.

The Battle of the Bulge (so named because the German advances caused a bulge in Allied lines) was Hitler’s last serious attempt to win the war.

American infantrymen of the 290th Regiment fight in fresh snowfall near Amonines, Belgium. January 4, 1945. Braun. (Army) Public domain.

Whole books have been written on this battle – I don’t intend to go into detail here. For our purposes, what’s important is that the German army had significant initial success. The Allies were slow in their response for numerous reasons, including some brutal winter weather. But within a week they began a counterattack, and within a month the Battle of the Bulge was over and the march to Berlin resumed. Germany surrendered five months later.

What would have happened if Hitler had been successful? By December 1944 military victory was impossible – Germany was hopelessly outnumbered. But Hitler thought that if he could sufficiently divide the Allied forces, he could negotiate a peace treaty that would allow him to stay in power.

In reality, all he would have done is extend the war and increase the number of people killed and wounded on both sides.

Trump as the Battle of the Bulge

Do you see history rhyming here?

The fundamentalists are losing. They’ve been losing since the 1960s. The speed of the LGBTQ revolution was astonishing and the Obergefell decision establishing marriage equality nationwide was a complete repudiation of fundamentalist mythology. They’re desperate. Like Hitler they cling to dreams of victory when all they can realistically hope to do is extend the war… and the suffering war always brings.

Make no mistake – fundamentalists didn’t want Trump in 2016. They wanted Ted Cruz, who is just as committed to hierarchy and patriarchy as Trump but who is also a true believer in fundamentalist theology and doctrine. But when Trump won the Republican nomination they realized they share a common way of seeing the world, and so they supported him wholeheartedly.

Like those early days in the Ardennes Forest in December 1944, the fundamentalists have enjoyed some successes. But ultimately, Trump is a last-gasp effort at using the power of government to impose a fundamentalist worldview on the country and the world.

Joe Biden is not General Patton

American General George Patton gets much of the credit for the Allied victory in the Battle of the Bulge. He started preparing for a counterattack before his fellow commanders, and he pushed his troops relentlessly to relieve the siege of Bastogne. How much of the credit he earned and how much is due to his personality (and to the 1970 movie about him that won seven Academy awards, including George C. Scott for Best Actor) is another question that’s beyond the scope of this post.

Joe Biden is a competent moderate politician who will make an infinitely better President than Donald Trump. His presidency will halt the stream of fundamentalists and other conservatives with lifetime appointments to the federal judiciary, and it will allow Ruth Bader Ginsburg to finally retire… or just to die in peace.

But he is not marching on the forces of fundamentalism with tanks and guns, or with the political equivalent thereof. Expecting him to fix all our problems is recipe for disappointment. He doesn’t have that power – no President does.

But removing Trump from office so he can’t make things even worse will be a very good thing.

A chance to defeat fundamentalism

Winning the Battle of the Bulge did not end World War II. But it made the outcome certain.

Likewise, defeating Donald Trump will not end Christian fundamentalism – and certainly not in five months. There will always be people with fundamentalist religious views, and they will always seek power over other people.

But they are fighting against human nature. They try to force everyone into a hierarchy that abuses all but those at the top. They try to force women into narrowly defined roles and control their bodies. They want to outlaw homosexual activity and pretend that transgender people don’t exist.

They think everyone should worship only their God and not the Gods that call to them.

Fundamentalism is unnatural (which is ironic, considering how they’ve used that claim against others) and can only be maintained with constant reinforcement. They can no longer keep control by threatening people with damnation, because most people don’t believe in hell anymore. They have to maintain control by using the law, and people will only put up with that for so long.

The fundamentalists are losing. Voting Donald Trump out of office in a landslide will be the equivalent of the Allies winning the Battle of the Bulge – it will end their last desperate hope of imposing their ways on everyone else. They’ll have to be content with imposing them on themselves.

If you needed a reason to vote for Joe Biden for President, here it is.

1. There are many other societal ills that are not on the verge of losing and removing Trump will not address them. Life is complicated. But the political power of fundamentalism can be dealt a decisive blow in this election, and that’s important.

2. We’ve all heard “battle of the bulge” jokes before and they stopped being funny a long time ago. Fat shaming comments will be deleted.

What does the Coronavirus have to do with The Storm?

May 3, 2020 By John Beckett

I can’t count how many times someone has asked me – usually in a private message – “is the Coronavirus part of The Storm?” or “is COVID-19 part of Tower Time?”

My answer has been the same from the beginning. This virus is an ordinary part of the natural world. Plagues and epidemics have always been a part of life and our modern world is no exception. We do ourselves no favors when we act like the fundamentalists who blame hurricanes on gay people getting married.

And also, many persons with whom we share this world see the pandemic and they’re trying to figure out how to use it to their advantage. Some of these persons are human and some are not.

So even though the Coronavirus wasn’t purposely created by Gods or spirits – or by malevolent humans – it’s now part of the wider metaphysical shift we’re calling The Storm or Tower Time. It’s one of the lightning bolts hitting the tower and helping to bring it down, because The Tower was poorly built on a weak foundation.

The meanings of The Tower, Death, and the Six of Swords should be obvious. The Seven of Swords may be less so… but I wrote about it last year. Also, the Six of Swords was the “final outcome” card in my divination for 2020. The Tower and the Six of Swords are from the Celtic Tarot; Death and the Seven of Swords are from the Robin Wood Tarot.

I still think that’s a good response to these questions. It re-emphasizes the basic animist truth that life isn’t all about humans and what happens to us. It subtly reminds us that this situation is complicated and that simple answers – whether medical, political, or spiritual – are almost certainly wrong.

But I’m starting to think it may be too narrow an answer.

Last week Ember Miller turned up this post of mine from two years ago titled What Shall We Die For? The title was borrowed from Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End and Elizabeth Swann’s speech to her fellow pirates, exhorting them to stop fighting amongst themselves and do something. Because if the wind is on our side, we might not die.

Writing almost exactly two years ago, I said:

If our collection of spirit workers, God-bothereds, and other mystics are in agreement that bad things will continue to happen at an increasing rate, we might want to rethink our priorities. Let’s spend less time arguing with our fellow Pagans and more time building the practices and institutions we need to successfully navigate this strange new world.

You don’t need me to tell you that bad things have continued to happen at an increasing rate. The pandemic is only the biggest and most widespread.

Ember reposted her own commentary from April 2018:

“The world as you know it is burning. Not in your personal lives per se, but in the country… globally. Everything you’ve grown up knowing, structures you’ve lived by, comforts and privileges are all burning away. Next year shit is going to get real so buckle up and grab your safety buddy.”

That was the omen I received from the Shining Ones during our Yule ritual. I had pulled the 10 of Fire which depicts a raging forest/wildfire. Between John’s latest blog post and the one preceding it (The Storm is Strengthening), it appears many folks are getting the same message.

The more spiritually-sensitive among us have been hearing warnings of a metaphysical storm with this-world implications since 2011. I marked its arrival in 2016. It’s only gotten stronger since.

Intuition and divination are useful even though they’re limited

I know a lot of psychics, mystics, Tarot readers, astrologers, and other prescient folks, but I don’t know anyone – myself included – who had “worldwide pandemic in early 2020” on their list. Skeptics use that lack of specificity to reject divination and prophecy out of hand. We hear their dismissals and we unconsciously discount our intuition and other foreknowledge.

I find it far more useful to accept what I get for what it is than to dismiss it all because it doesn’t lay out everything that’s going to happen like the printed Order of Service at a UU church. The Tower Time messages I’ve received have motivated me to strengthen my relationships in this world and in the Otherworld, to build a robust spiritual practice, to take care of me and mine, and to do my best to focus my attention on bigger things.

The lack of a precise warning didn’t prevent me from preparing. It motivated me to prepare in a way that was suitable for many different challenges, not just the one we got.

Has it enabled me to deal with the pandemic and its restrictions with no difficulties? Of course not. But it’s enabled me to deal with them. I have no pretentions of invulnerability, but I’m still functioning. If I had bounced blissfully along “living in the moment” for the past nine years I would be struggling to get out of bed in the mornings.

To be clear: enjoying life as you live it is a good and necessary thing. But so is planning and building for tomorrow and next year and the next decade. Not one or the other. Both. And you can plan and build for tomorrow even if you don’t know exactly what’s coming your way.

Our Gods have been warning us something was coming

And what about our Gods? If we had knowledge that something bad was coming, surely They knew more – right?

I do not believe the Many Gods are omniscient, or omni-anything else. But whatever we are, whatever we can do, They are more. I believe in free will as opposed to fate (we make our own fate, at least in part). I don’t believe the Gods can see the future, because the future isn’t fixed for Them to see. Rather, because of Their greater knowledge and wisdom, They can predict where a certain set of circumstances and actions will lead with far greater accuracy than we can.

Did Cernunnos or the Morrigan or Apollo know a pandemic was coming, or strongly suspect it? I don’t know. But enough of us heard enough warnings I’m convinced They knew something was coming.

What do we do about it?

There are four key elements to successfully getting though the pandemic and the wider Storm.

1. Survive. Do your best to avoid the Coronavirus, and to avoid spreading it. Do what you have to do to get the supplies you need. Cut yourself some slack, but know your limits and stay on the healthy side of them. The pandemic will last longer than any of us would prefer, but it won’t last forever. Your first goal is to get through this with as little damage as possible.

2. Remain flexible. The world will not go back to the way things were in 2019. Neither will we take some massive jump into a socialist utopia. I don’t know what things are going to look like in six months or two years and I don’t trust anyone who says they do. We need to be able to respond to whatever comes our way.

This is easier for the young than for the old, easier for those with money than those without, and easier for those with minimal family obligations than for those who are caregivers. Perfect flexibility isn’t possible. Do what you can to build your capacity to respond to many different futures, not just one.

3. Adapt. For me, right now adapting means working from home and dealing with the inability to plan. I keep telling people to live week to week, but I’m mainly saying that so I’ll hear it myself. I couldn’t celebrate Beltane with my local Pagan friends, so I led an on-line ritual instead.

I’m seeing some people who, because their usual routine has been disrupted, are doing nothing, or very nearly so. I don’t know their capacities – I’m not going to judge. But I am going to point out that adjusting to changing circumstances makes those circumstances far easier to deal with.

4. Find a higher purpose. What’s the purpose of life? I don’t know, but I know it’s not “work, pay taxes, buy stuff, and die.”

The one constant desire throughout my life has been to learn and grow. The subject has changed several times over the years. I’ve devoted the past almost-twenty years to learning about Gods and spirits, about magic and the Otherworld, and about how I relate to all of them. That’s why I write and teach – and why I read and practice and study so I can do a better job of writing and teaching.

For you it may be something else. That’s one of the reasons I’m a Pagan – we have the freedom to choose our own purpose… though most times that’s a matter of discovery rather than selection.

I’m going to get through the pandemic, and I’m going to navigate Tower Time successfully, because there’s a higher purpose that tells me I can’t give up.

And I don’t want to give up.

So, what does the Coronavirus have to do with The Storm?

Nothing.

And everything.

The pandemic wasn’t caused by The Storm, but now it’s part of The Storm.

It wasn’t caused by Gods or spirits, but Gods and spirits are responding to it and are trying to shape the outcome in their favor.

We were warned it was coming, but the warnings were vague and imprecise. There is still much we do not know about the Coronavirus scientifically and medically, much less spiritually. As always, the wisest course is to do the best we can with the information we have, then adjust course as we learn more.

We will get through this. When we do, things will be different on the other side. Whether “different” means “better” depends largely on what we do now and in the coming days.

Survive.

Remain flexible.

Adapt.

Find a higher purpose.

The Power of Ritual Language and the Dangers of its Misuse

April 21, 2020 By John Beckett

Last week Morgan Daimler had a Facebook comment that’s worth exploring in detail:

Even in magic it’s probably not a good idea to randomly use words from another living language you don’t understand. You don’t sound more mysterious or spiritual this way, you just really confuse people who speak that language and can’t figure out why you’re using that term for that reason.

There is power in ritual language. But too many people try to grab that power and they mistake “foreign” (to themselves) for “inherently deep and meaningful” without thinking about what they’re doing. They end up like the white folks who get Asian character tattoos that don’t say what they think they say.

This isn’t a problem that can be solved with better translations. It requires thinking through what you’re trying to do and then selecting the best method to accomplish it.

The Gods transcend language

I occasionally hear people say something along the lines of “we should speak to the Gods in their native language.” Human languages are human inventions – if the Gods have a native language it’s unknown to us. I can tell you from first-hand experience that you don’t need to be able to speak Greek (either ancient or modern) to communicate with Athena.

And what would be the native language of Cernunnos? His name may be Gaulish but He is far, far older. While occasionally He speaks to me in standard American English (because, I assume, He wants me to understand something very precisely, and that’s the only language I speak), often He speaks in impulses, urges, and feelings. What else would you expect from a God of the Wild?

If you want to speak to a deity, simply speak to Them in your native language. They’ll understand you just fine.

What about ancestors and other non-divine spirits? There are numerous reports of the dead communicating with the living in specific languages, so I’m reluctant to say the ancestors transcend language. On the other hand, I’ve never experienced a language barrier, so I assume they can understand us one way or another.

The bottom line is that ritual and magic don’t need “ancient” or “magical” languages to be effective. Speak clearly in the language you and everyone else in the room understands.

Language is part of culture – culture and religion are intertwined

This is not to say that speaking in a language from the place where a deity was first worshipped has no value. It does.

If you want to be able to read the earliest stories of the Tuatha De Danann you have to be able to read Old Irish. If you want to be able to read the works of Homer and Plato you have to be able to read Greek.

If you want to be Greek, you need to speak Greek.

I mostly worship Celtic Gods, but I do not call myself a Celt or a Celtic Pagan. I have ancestral roots in Celtic lands, but I’ve never lived there and I don’t speak any of the Celtic languages. “Celtic” is a culture, not a bloodline. I’m an American, a Tennessean, and a Texan – who worships Celtic Gods.

Learning another language helps you connect to the people and the land where that language was and is spoken. Making those connections is one of the steps to legitimately developing a cultural identity.

But you do that by learning the entire language, not by grabbing a handful of ritual phrases.

Do not use words you don’t completely understand

Have you ever started to read the instructions for something that was made in another part of the world and realized “the person who wrote this doesn’t understand English as well as they think they do”? They learned it from a book or they used Google Translate and while they may be able to get their message across, what they actually said was just wrong.

As an aside: never make fun of someone who speaks or writes a second language poorly. At least they’re trying.

But this is what happens when you try to translate a thought expressed in one language into another language that doesn’t just use different words, but that expresses thoughts in different ways. And that’s before we get into idioms, puns, double entendres, and other subtleties of language.

If you ask “how do I say this in Irish?” (or Greek or Bulgarian or any other language) you’re on the road to making a serious mistake.

Speaking of translations, E. A. Wallis Budge’s 1895 translation of *The Book of Going Forth By Day* is generally considered inaccurate. The 1972 translation by Raymond O. Faulkner (published here in 1994) is substantially better.

There is power in ritual language¹

This doesn’t mean your rituals must be conducted in 100% newscaster-approved American English (or whatever the predominate language is where you are). There is power in ritual language: the Latin Mass or the Arabic Call to Prayer. The King James Bible remains popular not just because fundamentalists think it’s special, but because even an atheist like Richard Dawkins recognizes the power of its language.

Ritual language need not be foreign or archaic. It simply has to be non-ordinary: words and phrases that say “this is special” and “this is holy.” After all the pre-ritual announcements and informal introductions, I usually say simply “let us now begin.” Four very ordinary words, but one very non-ordinary phrase.

Read through the spoken parts of one of the solitary rituals. Read the lines aloud and feel how they’re subtly different from ordinary speech. Read through Jason Mankey’s 1899 Ritual and you’ll get the same thing.

In addition to being non-ordinary, ritual language has power because of what we associate it with. When we say “let us now invite the spirits of the elements and directions to join our circle” the power isn’t just in hearing something we don’t hear in everyday life, but from our past experiences where these words were followed by transformative rituals – rituals where those spirits showed up. There is a Pavlovian effect here.

That only comes with time and repetition, but it’s absolutely authentic and valid… unlike throwing a poorly-fitting non-English phrase around because it sounds mysterious.

Use words and phrases in their original context

When you can legitimately use words from other languages, it provides a tangible connection to the lands and the people who inspire our practices. Names are easy to use properly: names of Gods and places, seasons and holy days, names for ritual tools and practices that have no equivalent in modern languages.

Be careful with titles, especially if you want to claim one as your own. In general, be careful with claiming any title in any language. Just do the work – if you need a title, someone (or Someone) will give it to you.

Where we have prayers and blessings in original languages, using them creates a powerful link to the ancients. Even then, though, I include translations for the participants who aren’t familiar with them.

In general, if you’re using something in its original context, you’re probably doing a good thing. If you write something in English and translate it into another language, you’re running a serious risk of error.

There are exceptions. Translating modern words into dead languages helps bring those languages back to life for a few moments. Best to use these for emphasis, rather than trying to do an entire ritual in ancient Egyptian (unless, I suppose, your entire group is trying to become proficient in ancient Egyptian).

Much of the power of ritual language comes from its uniqueness. If you overuse it, it loses its power.

How you say it matters as much as what you say

If you’re going to use non-English words in your rituals, put some effort into pronouncing them correctly. Now, language is a fluid thing and pronunciation varies with time and place – something I experienced first-hand when I moved from Tennessee to Indiana… not to mention when I traveled from Dallas to London. There are many right ways to pronounce a word. But it is never correct to pronounce Samhain as “SAM-hane.”

But be gentle with new people – this was all new to you at some point too.

If you want to create an atmosphere of reverence or magic, pay attention to your delivery. Many people simply don’t read well aloud – it’s not a skill most of us practice. But even with practice, there’s a difference between reading a part or reciting it from memory and performing a part. I covered this in a post last year: while ritual should never degenerate into melodrama, sacred theater has been a part of religion at least since the ancient Greeks.

Listen to good speakers, especially religious speakers. Hear and feel what works well and copy it. Hear and feel what sucks and avoid it.

Mainly, put more time into learning how to facilitate ritual and less time into trying to come up with mysterious-sounding words and phrases.

¹ James Hoscyns and Anomalous Thracian presented a paper titled “Language in Devotional and Occult Relations” at last year’s Mystic South conference that covered some of these topics from an academic perspective. Unfortunately, that paper is not currently available, and after nine months my memory of the presentation is rather vague – except that it was excellent. How much of this section is a repetition of their ideas and how much is my own thinking is impossible to say.

If you ever have the opportunity to examine their work on this subject for yourself, please do. And if there’s anything here that’s wrong, it’s safe to assume the error is mine and not theirs.