Religion and Play<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The Dallas Morning News Religion Blog is a shadow of its former self. It\u2019s been de-staffed \u2013 about all that\u2019s left is the weekly \u201cTexas Faith\u201d forum. But\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/johnbeckett\/2009\/08\/religion-and-play.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Religion and Play\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The Dallas Morning News Religion Blog is a shadow of its former self. It\u2019s been de-staffed \u2013 about all that\u2019s left is the weekly \u201cTexas Faith\u201d forum. 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{"id":510,"date":"2009-08-06T16:05:00","date_gmt":"2009-08-06T16:05:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/johnbeckett\/2009\/08\/religion-and-play\/"},"modified":"2009-08-06T16:05:00","modified_gmt":"2009-08-06T16:05:00","slug":"religion-and-play","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/johnbeckett\/2009\/08\/religion-and-play.html","title":{"rendered":"Religion and Play"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

The Dallas Morning News<\/em> Religion Blog is a shadow of its former self. It\u2019s been de-staffed \u2013 about all that\u2019s left is the weekly \u201cTexas Faith\u201d forum. But this week\u2019s question gave me a perfect opportunity to introduce some explicitly Pagan material. You can read the whole thing here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The question was: \u201cWe live in society where so much attention is devoted to work. But we\u2019re headed into August, the vacation month. What do your spiritual paths say about the role of play?<\/strong>\u201d<\/p>\n

Some of the responses were good, but many confused \u201cplay\u201d with \u201crest\u201d or \u201creflection\u201d (both of which are important, but different from \u201cplay\u201d). My answer:<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s another view, from the modern Pagan tradition. This is an excerpt from The Charge of the Goddess<\/a><\/em>, usually attributed to Doreen Valiente. It is the words of the Mother Goddess to us, her children:<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cSing, feast, dance, make music and love, all in my presence; for mine is the ecstasy of the spirit, and mine also is joy on earth. For my law is love unto all beings.\u201d<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

In these moments of what Larry Bethune calls \u201cjoyful, self-forgetful celebration\u201d and Amy Martin says is \u201cto be like a young child, in a natural state of joy, capable of wonder, seeing only love\u201d, we are free from judging and being judged. We can experience the joy of being part of the human family, and the \u201cecstasy of the spirit\u201d that comes from experiencing Goddess \/ God \/ Ultimate Reality. The free association of play also has the practical benefit of stimulating our creativity, helping us to see old things in new ways.<\/p>\n

The secret, as always, is balance. We have to work or we\u2019ll starve. And we have to work more than just enough to survive \u2013 that\u2019s the reason our species moved from hunter\/gatherers to 21st century civilization. But we don\u2019t have to be \u201cproductive\u201d all the time.<\/p>\n

Because when we try, we lose our souls.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"