Pagan
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Growth is Change
Paganism generally—and Atheopaganism specifically—comprise intersecting sets of growing communities. And as we grow, we change. Generally, for example, the Atheopaganism Facebook group has been a very kind, warm context, but there has been more friction lately, and a need for more hands-on moderation. This is inevitable. When we were a group of 300 people, it was easy for people to know one another and for norms and conduct standards to be implemented organically. But now, there are nearly 2,000 people in the group, with about 20-30 coming in each week. Those folks don’t know the group vibe yet, and some of them are used to an Internet that is pugnacious…
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I’m Gonna Go There: A Rant.
Paganism is a very broad category. It includes a tremendous range of traditions, practices and paths. Which is as should be: people are diverse. They should do what gives them joy and meaning. So it can be about many things. It can be about rituals and “magic”. It can be about the Earth. It can be about gods. It can be about principles for living. It can be about activism. But you know, one thing we can say with confidence is that at its heart, Paganism is not about owning witchy clothes, or fancy tools, or other trappings. It’s not about Harry Potter or goth aesthetics or LOTR or Renaissance…
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More on Community Transition
Recently, I wrote an optimistic piece about the evolution of the Pagan movement. Some insightful commenters were not so sanguine as I, and I’d like to address their contentions here. Their arguments fell into several general buckets: The Internet is not a substitute for in-person contact and relationships. Rigid ideologies and fundamentalism are tearing us apart, and newcomers seeing this will be alienated and flee. We cannot have kinship and a culture—and, therefore, a cultural impact—unless this divisiveness ends. Paganism has reached the end of a 40-year cycle common to spiritual movements and, having not gained much social traction, will now fade. People are leaving Paganism and “occult” practice, even…
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The Pagan Community in Transition
Once upon a time, there was a deeply oppressed minority whose very existence was illegal: the gay community. And though we* are far from winning the fight for full equality for LGBTQ folks, it is fair to say that much progress has been made, and the LGBTQ community has made transitions as a result. For one thing, it isn’t as necessarily committed to secrecy, to clandestine gathering in obscure locations like dive bars and bathhouses to avoid police and the general, critical public. I believe the Pagan community is arriving at a similar crossroads, and is changing as a result. Recently, two major announcements have discomforted the North American Pagan…
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The Point of Friction
Once upon a time in the mid-80s, few of the Pagans I knew ever even talked about what they believed. We just did rituals together and enjoyed one another’s company. Sure, there were shout-outs to various gods and goddesses in most of the rituals, but those were easily understood as metaphorical (as I did). When the subject of beliefs did come up, they were all over the map: there were those who believed in everything, from gods and magic and fairies to alien abductions and Atlantis…and then there were those like me who saw our rituals as meaningful but ultimately symbolic and metaphorical practices. And no one cared. We were…
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In Which I Have Nothing of Value to Say
As I have noted previously, I am a white guy. Really, really white. 23andme.com tells me that I am 99.4% northwestern European in derivation. I get that this limits my perspective in a variety of ways, and so the following may be of no value other than for the questions. I lead with this acknowledgement because often, the perspective of (straight, cis-gender) white guys is considered the “baseline” from which all other perspectives are variations. And that’s just nonsense. It isn’t logical and it isn’t moral. Even in Anglophone countries, those people aren’t even in the majority; it makes zero sense that their views should be considered the norm. Recently, we…
