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UPDATE: The Atheopagan Society. Also, Please Stay Home.
Well, the new nonprofit has a name! The Working Group selected The Atheopagan Society (TAPS) as our monicker. We hope to move relatively quickly in developing the documents we need to file for incorporation in California and federal tax exemption, but there are a lot of policies and details to be worked out. The Working Group is meeting by Zoom on Saturdays, though we may move around so members who haven’t been able to participate can attend. Meanwhile, I have been working on stuff for the new Society. TAPS will need a website, so I am building one; I have bought the domain “TheAPSociety.org” to ensure we have a good…
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Blue-Skying Under Quarantine
We are the people of the future, and we are organizing. So, there is going to be an Atheopagan religious nonprofit. As the working group (composed of Atheopagan scientists, Facebook group moderators, and other key supporters) comes together to work on this, I’m trying to dream really big for what the organization can do and be. I know a lot of what I don’t want it to be. I don’t want it to be a “church”, with a hierarchy and a doctrinaire approach to spirituality, and a rapacious thirst for money. You won’t have to “join” it to be an Atheopagan. It won’t even have a membership. Or membership…
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UPDATED: A Concept for Your Consideration: The Atheopagan Foundation (or something)
We have a discussion thread right now on the Atheopaganism Facebook group about “institutional religion”, and in it, I have made very clear that I don’t ever want to see Atheopaganism incorporated as a “church” or a legal religious institution. Atheopaganism is for everyone who wants it, and it is fundamentally free. It is a set of IDEAS, and religious ideas cannot be owned. That said, I’ve been thinking for awhile that it is becoming cumbersome and perhaps somewhat inappropriate that pretty much all of the Atheopagan materials production rests with me. I’m gratified that people are finding my ideas helpful and compelling, but I’m only one person and we’ve…
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Protected: Benediction and Graduation for Atheopaganism U.
There is no excerpt because this is a protected post.
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Two Thousand and Counting
Atheopaganism started out with me talking to myself. Fifteen years ago, after two appalling experiences in the Pagan community, I quit. I retreated from the community and my friends, I let my altar gather dust, and I abandoned my rituals and observances. But soon I missed my ritual life, and so I began an exploration into the meaning of religion, how it serves the various appetites of the human brain, and how a religion can be based in the real world as described by science, and yet still meaningful, moving, and life-enhancing. The story is told in the essay that grew out of that period of exploration, and in my book.…
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A Walpurgisnacht/May Day Vigil Ritual Menu
As we collectively shelter in place to slow the advance of the novel coronavirus COVID-19, the world and the Wheel continue to turn. Spring is rolling around into summer (at least, in many places in the Northern Hemisphere), and we have come to that major pillar of the annual celebrations of many Pagans, May Day or Beltane, and the night before, which is known by many as Walpurgisnacht. While we may not be able to conduct the usual festivities, we can still observe this Sabbath in all its richness while sheltering in place. This ritual is a vigil: staying up all night either alone or with a partner or family. If…
