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Guest Post: My Atheopagan Life (Pt. 2)
by Holly H. Weekly In my kitchen I have five bins; one of general recycling and one for glass recycling, both of which are picked up by my council, one compost bin of food waste that I compost myself for the garden, one general bin which normally contains bread or fat food waste and is rarely used. The final bin contains all the plastic or foil film packaging that food producers are still insisting on wrapping around various foods. This last bin is something I created in the last couple of years, having discovered that my local supermarket now has a big cage in which you can recycle everything from…
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Guest Post: My Atheopagan Life (Pt. 1)
by Holly H. I began taking a meandering path towards Atheopaganism when I left Protestant Christianity in my early teens. As a thirteen year old who had recently become alienated from the concept of deities following the death of my grandfather, I took a walk along a canal tow-path in rural Wiltshire, UK. It was a sparkling early summer day, the kind where the world around you seems to be dancing with the joy of living and I became suddenly aware of the glory of nature around me. Being a quiet and introspective young person, this soon turned into thoughts about the wonder of the ever-stretching universe, the fragility of…
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GUEST POST: Playing with the Senses During Ritual
by Eloise Martel Something I find useful to immerse into the ritual experience (especially when you start and you don’t really know what to begin with) is playing with the 5 senses: Sight, Hearing, Touch, Smell, and Taste. Playing with the senses can trigger specific memories and help you achieve your goal during the ritual. You can find correspondences (herbs, days, colours, stones etc.) in almost all the 101 witchy books, but don’t forget to ask yourself what associations make sense to you personally. If the goal during the ritual is to make yourself feel certain things, what you are going to use has to speak to you. Sight: Many…
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GUEST POST: Just Talk to Each Other (About Sex)
by Alexandra Palmer Information about and illustrations of heterosexual cisgender vanilla sex are all many of us have in regards to formal education about sex. It is touted by some as the only sex one “should” be having unless they are at the very least a “pervert”. This hetero-cis-vanilla language we are given with which to explore our needs and desires leaves many of us feeling unwelcome and without a voice. The pressure we are under from cultural norms that disregard some sensations as valid forms of pleasure has been longstanding and influenced by history’s major religions. Attitudes are changing, however, and people are beginning to see beyond their own…
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GUEST POST: Relating to Silk Moths and Dying Stars
by Emily Ryan In the corner of my living room, in a white mesh enclosure the last of my hyalophora cecropia nears death. Tattered, her once swollen abdomen is emptied of her precious eggs and the stores of fats and lipids that nourished her is depleted. Even tattered and dying, she is heart wrenchingly beautiful. Her red and white body is furred and fluffy. Her six inch wingspan is painted with strata of orange, red, and white. She is the largest and most spectacular species of moth in North America. The small flame of her life puffs out, but the cycle continues ever on. A few feet away from where…
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GUEST RITUAL: Annual Lascaux Cave Rediscovery Celebration
This ritual was proposed by Michael Halloran of the Atheopagan Facebook group and perfected through input of other members of the group. Perform this ritual every September 12 to commemorate the accidental finding of this French cave in 1940. Objective: Celebrate the rediscovery of this impressive prehistoric cathedral as a community. Since most people can’t visit caves like this, and it’s often actively discouraged in order to preserve the works of art, this is a way to learn a little history, connect with the past, and have some fun as a community or family. You could use this as a lead up to your autumnal equinox celebration, since it takes…
