The Zen Pagan -

Jonestown at 40: Religious and Political Lessons

November 18, 2018 By Tom Swiss

For those of us in the business of unusual religious practices, the fortieth anniversary of the Jonestown Massacre is a good opportunity to pause and reflect on how we protect against dangerous cultish behavior. And to contemplate how movements that seem to have noble ends can end up deadly authoritarian nightmares. Read more

Armistice Day, Veterans’ Day

November 11, 2018 By Tom Swiss

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What we owe our veterans is not some “thank you for your service” platitude. What we owe them is a deep apology and compensation for the way our government has used the lives of men and women as geopolitical tools for the benefit of our ruling classes. Read more

Should You Bother To Vote?

November 5, 2018 By Tom Swiss

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It is ironic and problematic that this style of republic, structured from the start to restrict democracy and preserve the power of the wealthy, has become synonymous with “democracy” in modern conversation. In general, your vote matters little. That’s how the system was designed from the start. But we won’t get better if we don’t exercise the tiny capacity we do have. Read more

The Veil And The Void

October 29, 2018 By Tom Swiss

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What if we thought of the veil between the worlds not as a separation between our physical realm and a realm made out of some more rarefied substance but as the boundary between the ordinary view of reality and that fuller view which sees that "form is emptiness, emptiness is form&quot, as the Heart Sutra puts it? Read more

Murder At The Tree Of Life

October 28, 2018 By Tom Swiss

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A few years ago, I was of the opinion that anti-Semitism was something we’d gotten past in this country. Sadly, I was wrong. Read more

Thank You For Letting Me Be Myself, Again

October 20, 2018 By Tom Swiss

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As we drum and dance and support each other around the fire, we sort of lift each other up by the bootstraps. Which is of course impossible, a logical contradiction, but such is the nature of magick. Read more

Manifest The King, Honor The Ancestors

October 15, 2018 By Tom Swiss

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The sort of King we are speaking of here truly “reigns but does not rule”; he does not command, he is not a conqueror. Instead the King is the conduit of blessings for his people. Read more

Kavanaugh, Cosby, and the Full Rashomon

September 28, 2018 By Tom Swiss

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Kavanaugh’s defenders say “he’s not that sort of man”. But we would have said the same about Cosby when he was at the height of both his rape career and his acting one. If we can see that someone is “that sort of man”, he won’t have the opportunity to commit rapes. Read more

My Labor Day Mystical Experience

September 3, 2018 By Tom Swiss

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It is the way of these things that they are ineffable. To even say “I was not in my ordinary state of consciousness” (much less to say “oh, an early migraine experience”) is to put a border around it, classify it, put it safely in a container where it won’t leak out an affect the rest of my life. Read more

John McCain, Warmonger

September 1, 2018 By Tom Swiss

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But I didn’t come here to talk to you about McCain’s misogyny or homophobia or corruption or role in destroying reasoned political discourse. I came to talk to you about the blood on his hands. Anytime there was talk of bombing or invading another nation you could bet ol’ Maverick McCain would be beating the war drums. Read more