I got some galley proof copies of ROUND WE DANCE: Creating Meaning Through Seasonal Rituals, and it looks and feels great! It is always a real thrill to hold a first copy of one of my books in my hands, and this is no exception.
ROUND WE DANCE releases on April 8–the same day as the impending solar eclipse. You can read more about it and pre-order your copy by clicking here.
Today is the midpoint between what I term Midwinter (the winter solstice) and High Spring (the vernal equinox): thus, Brightening. Or Imbolc. Or Brighid. Or–my choice–Riverain, the Festival of Water. Depending on where you live, you might have different names or associations with this point in the Wheel of the Year.
(or, in the Southern Hemisphere, this could be Dimming or High Summer for you)
It is raining torrentially today, so we have good thematic weather this year. And I find myself thinking about the disparate pieces that make up my traditions for this Sabbath: bits of themes from back when I was practicing (if not believing in) theistic Paganism, and then the more modern elements under Atheopaganismbo
Around the region where I live, the common Pagan term for this holiday is Brighid. Just grabbed the name of an Irish goddess and slapped it on the holiday, we did. And the thematic associations with this time of year were largely about the things she is supposed to symbolize: midwifery and birth, the forge and hearth, poetry and smithcraft. Pretty broad spread of concepts there, but Brighid was apparently all of them, and more.
I still incorporate aspects of “celebrating Brighid” into my Riverain rites, even though things like the ring of a sledge on an anvil don’t really have anything to do with the watery, flowy, emotional and cyclical associations I carry for the Water Sabbath. But there is just something so powerful about swinging the hammer and hearing that sound. Once upon a time we would pound open links shut to make chain loops and festoon them with celebratory ribbons, but now I’m not so sure what the forge and hammer are doing in my waterfest. Yet I still need them there, so I keep them.
This is okay. Our rites don’t have to make complete logical sense–that’s not the modality that ritual works in. Riverain would feel incomplete to me if I didn’t have that ring of steel on steel, and so I keep it.
Today is also the day I clear the Midwinter/Yule symbols from my Focus for the year. Afterwards, it will look a bit stark and less festive, but this is a severe time of year, and that is apt. It won’t be long before flowers and colored eggs take their seasonal places, but for now, clearing the decks and preparing to dive into doing as opposed to planning is the thing of the moment. My ritual chalice–which is always on my Focus, filled with rainwater–holds the special coin I cast into it to make a wish for the year, and when I see that as I contemplate the layout of sacred and meaningful symbols, I am reminded again of the station of the year.
Hmm. I wonder if a ritual could include “forging” a “magic coin” by pounding metal flat, and then using that to cast in the wishing well?
Maybe next year.
Happy Brightening, everyone.
In Atheopaganism, we don’t believe in gods, and as a result we don’t have revered beings that embody the Sacred feminine, masculine or other genders. Rather than gendering the Sacred (or, as we see it, the Sacred Universe), we understand it as unconscious and without gender. Insofar as we can tell through the analytical lens of science, the Universe has no personality; it simply is, evolving and unfolding over billions of years in accordance with the laws of physics.
But the idea of the Sacred feminine was a revelation not very long ago: it had been erased by the world’s large institutional religions for thousands of years until reintroduced by Pagans, at least in the English-speaking world.
When I was first getting into Paganism in the late 1980s, the Sacred feminine was revolutionary. I was in graduate school in Gender and Politics, and the Women’s Studies department where I took some of my classes was alive with feminist Paganism, discussion of Starhawk’s The Spiral Dance, and talk of the Sacred feminine: an idea which empowered and inspired millions as it grew.
Now, that was a long time ago. Many changes–some positive, some negative–have taken place. Among them, Women’s Studies has evolved on many campuses into Gender Studies.
And American Paganism has grown. A lot.
Being a non-theistic religious path, Atheopaganism views deities as ideas, stories, or archetypes, as opposed to supernatural beings. But in the way of addressing the empty space where gendered god/desses exist for theist Pagans, we do have this:
The myriad forms and identities of people all over the world are Sacred. They aren’t abnormal, nor dirty, they aren’t “sinful”, and they aren’t wrong. They’re beautiful and valid just as they are.
Atheopaganism affirms for each person the rightness of being exactly themselves. Our work is both to rise to our best selves and to elevate others, to affirm their truest selves. Certainly not to judge, denigrate or accuse.
So if it’s meaningful to you to put a symbol of Aphrodite (or Freya or Isis or Hecate or Ishtar or…) on your Focus, go ahead and do that. Or Loki, Hermes or Hermaphroditus. Or Frigg or Osiris or Apollo. If it resonates for you, it’s right for your practice.
As an egalitarian path, we don’t buy into patriarchal ideas of men as doers and actors and women as “helpmeets”. Nor that men and women are the only genders.
For many, gender isn’t a given–it’s a journey. As Atheopagans, we must affirm people on their paths to self-discovery, and that includes seeing however they identify as Sacred and worthy.
It’s bitter here in the Northern Hemisphere right now, but I’ve been thinking about the South and the heat they are experiencing.
Seems as though we are rich with ritual traditions and activities for the colder, darker half of the year, but after the Maypole there is very little until Hallows rolls around again. So…what do you do when it’s hot out, ritually speaking? Midsummer and Dimming want to know!
So I’m blue-skying activities here, and the classical Greek concept of “four elements” seems to offer itself as a way of organizing them.
First, water. This is a basic and human response to heat–we flood (ha ha) to beaches, lakes, rivers, waterfalls…anywhere that cooling, rejuvenating magical fluid pours and flows. We can honor bodies of water, and by extension, the Earth itself with biodegradable offerings. We can dip and swim and soak our feet and stave off the desiccating blaze of that raging Sun. We can daub our bodies with symbols in mud. We can pour libations on the Earth or in the water in honor of ancestors, of the Earth, of our fellow Atheopagans and our community.
After dark can be a wonderful time in the summer, with the air temperate and comfortable. Those are good times to celebrate with fire. Bonfires, campfires, beach fires…in every case, you will find humans gather around fires, because they have been our guardian and aid after dark since long before we even evolved to be modern homo sapiens. You can make offerings to the fire in the name of a ripe impending Harvest, or burn symbols of what didn’t serve you in the first half of the year. You can dance wildly around the fire, which is an experience I wish for everyone–so joyous and primal (no gauzy flammable clothing, please). Protip: if you throw a handful of powdered coffee creamer into a fire, it makes for a nice fireball–a perfect effect for banishing rituals or invocations of new things in your life.
You can warm water by the fire and drink herbal infusions, healing teas, or even entheogenic infusions like psychedelic mushroom tea (presuming they are legal where you are, of course). Be sure to be safe around fire: have buckets of water or lots of sand and a shovel available to put it out if something goes wrong.
In the summer, the air can feel delicious: warm but not hot, liquid on the skin. So when you have the opportunity, strip down as much as possible and feel it! Feel the sun glowing on your skin, and the blessed cool of the shadows when you duck out from under it. Cast leaves to the wind, shouting “thank you!” Burn incense or cast it into your fire.
As for earth-enjoy the bounty! Fruits and vegetables are plentiful now. Berries and melons are juicy and sweet. If there are agricultural fields near you, or you have a vegetable garden, adopt the custom of wassailing the crops, singing songs to the growing plants and pouring water around their roots.
Heat can be its own kind of challenging environment (particularly with humidity), but the warm times of the year can be magical, even if you have to wait for sundown to enjoy them. These are just a few ideas–what are yours?
It’s that time of year again, and I thought I’d share my opinions about how our community is coming along. To be clear: this is just my take, and not “official” in any way. But I like to reflect at the beginning of the year on what’s happening and what I expect to happen in the coming year. Comments welcome, as always!
Our community, between Facebook and Discord members, podcast listeners and YouTube subscribers, is now well over 5,000 members, even if we assume heavy overlap between those channels.
Going into 2024, we have the largest and strongest Atheopagan Society Council to date. Currently numbering twelve, the Council contains a broad range of backgrounds, skills and perspectives, which makes for a great group to work with.
We held a well-attended and generally celebrated Web Weaving online conference last spring, and plan to do one every other year, alternating with the Suntree Retreats. The conference was a great opportunity for online socializing and fun, and for sharing information and practices.
THE WONDER podcast continues to be ranked #3 among Pagan podcasts according to FeedSpot. And this year we added regular updates to the YouTube channel on a wide range of topics of interest to Atheopagans, and exceeded 1,000 subscribers.
The Atheopagan Society Council has just completed a Strategic Plan identifying 3 main goals for our next two years: Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Belonging (DEIB); Fostering Community Connection; and Supporting Volunteers. We have DEIB experts working with us to ensure that our spaces are as welcoming as possible, and in the area of fostering community connection we have multiple initiatives:
As for supporting volunteers, we are doing our best not to load too much on any one person, myself included. Two members of the Council interviewed me about the various things I do for the Atheopagan community, and the plan is to distribute some of those tasks to spread them out and lighten the load.
I’m feeling positively for 2024. My new book, a guide to rituals and celebrations for nonbelievers, will come out on April 8, which will be a source of much rejoicing on my part–it’s taken a lot time to get this one to market. The scouting program will spin up. And I can’t wait to see folks at Suntree Retreat!
So the state of the community is…exciting! There is so much to look forward to, and there are so many resources now that new Atheopagans can access to grow their practices. Thanks and kudos to everyone who has contributed and continues to work to improve our community for all.
One of the things that can be hard about moving away from the Christian Overculture is that there is a lot of beautiful art that can become meaningless to you. Architecture, painting, sculpture, music…so many centuries of accumulated human creativity and effort, all illustrating the myths of Christianity.
For many who deconvert from Christianity and other authoritarian religions, these artworks can be intensely triggering, and they don’t want anything to do with them. Others miss aspects of them, like the beauty of music that has…undesirable lyrics.
I was never a Christian, so I only know this from hearing the reports of others in the Atheopagan community. But I do find Christian art discomforting: so obsessed with suffering and death, so controlling.
But I love singing and listening to early (medieval and Renaissance) music, and most of that is Catholic and Anglican. Fortunately, it’s also nearly all in Latin, which I can pretend is a nonsense language and ignore while singing or listening to those beautiful harmonies.
It’s Midwinter, the winter solstice, and so, of course, it is also the season of the Christian Christmas.
I completely adore medieval and Renaissance Christmas music. So I listen to a lot of it at this time of year. But the contemporary stuff is hard to take.
So saccharine, and all the wrong myths.
So I rewrote two of the prettiest ones, Silent Night and O Holy Night. One for fun, and one for reverence. Here they are:
Axial Tilt (Tune: Silent Night)
Axial tilt
The way the world’s built:
Sun is north, then sun is south.
Axial precession makes seasons occur;
Sometimes bikinis and other times fur.
Insert metaphor here!
Insert metaphor here.
Evergreen tree
Holly berry
Stuff that stays alive, you see.
Meanwhile freezing and darkness reign
We’d much rather have fun than complain.
We are still alive!
We are still alive.
We’re so hoping
Soon will come Spring
Meanwhile let’s eat, drink, and sing!
Friends and family convene by the fire
Cold and darkness don’t seem quite so dire.
Pass the gravy please!
Pass the gravy please.
(repeat first verse)
O Darkest Night (Tune: O Holy Night)
O darkest night, the stars are brightly shining
It is the night of the dawning new year.
Here in the dark, for sun and warmth we’re pining
But we are cheered by our friends and family here.
The cold bright stars: a trillion worlds above us
As here on Earth we gather loved ones near.
Raise up your eyes, and see the Cosmos’ wonder
O Night sublime
O night, oh darkest night
O Night sublime
O night, oh night sublime.
