Green Paganism

Fern has a nice blog post on green living, and how what we consider low impact is in fact “lower” impact, and our society still uses a ton of resources:
http://fernsfronds.blogspot.com/2012/04/whos-green.html?m=1

She brings up a great point. But there is an implication in her connection between green living and paganism that has always bothered me.

I flatly reject the notion that pagan have a religious obligation to be “green.” In fact, throw that whole nature worship crap out the window. That does not define my religion.

I worship the gods of ancient Rome. Those gods rule over the forces of nature, and entreat with spirits immanent in that nature. This is not “nature worship.” I don’t really think that qualifies what I do as an “earth religion.” I acknowledge and honor the spirits and cycles of nature, but as with most ancient pagan religions, the goal is to win their favor and/or hold them at bay, so they don’t kill me.

That is not to say I don’t have a connection with nature, or revere it and the spirits that live in it. But my gods place much more of an emphasis on furthuring civilization and improving the standard of living. I like those earth-killing things like a warm home, clean clothes, modern medicine, and fast transportation, and everything I know about my gods says they do to.

Conserve. Follow your need to advocate environmental reforms. That’s fine, even if I think what you are advocating is a return to more primitive lifestyle we have struggled to leave behind. (And I should emphasise I’m not picking on Fern, as I respect her opinion, and agree with a lot of what her post says). But please don’t take what is essentially a political position and conflate it with a religious one. I like my modern life, and I’m no less pagan for it.

Settling In

I have a lot of Cancerian influences in my natal chart. I don’t take geographic relocation easy. And distance and insanely high gas prices make visiting familiar faces and places nearly impossible.

Yesterday I had my first day off in three weeks. My significant other, why grew up nearby, took me to a local site. Large hills are not overly common throughout most of Kansas, and this one happened to have many challenging trails for the hiking. There I found use of a fallen branch, which has become a new staff in my collection.

The land has reached out to me. I am finally home.

This summer I will begin a pretty intensive magical project. It will start on that hill.

Time to start getting ready.

Slacker

So I haven’t done any magic for months.

Well, not “real” magic. No ritual work. No spells. No sigils. Nothing beyond my regular devotional work to the gods and prayers whispered over candles.

And it’s okay. Because I’ve been damn busy, and this is a whole new kind of magic I’ve been using.

I got a new job. It required me to move to a new place. I now manage a moderate crew without direct supervision. I handle everything from customer service to building maintenance. And I’ve been working for months to undo years of neglect and incompetence by previous managers.

This is one of the most magical things I’ve done, far beyond any ritual work. Having concrete, real world results that directly improve people’s lives is a way better rush than good ritual work.

And now I understand what Phil Hine meant when he said magic should be a means of better engaging the world, not escaping from it.

Well Then …

I hereby resolve to never again …

… make a post excusing not posting for a while.
… promise a timeline of when I will get back to posting.
… promise new content unless it is ready.
… allow the fact that my desktop is unaccessibile to prevent me from posting.
… allow the limitations of my smartphone prevent me from posting.
… allow the demands of life to keep me from posting at least once in a while.

Life, Interupted

School and job are too things that have popped up as topics of discussion here on occasion (usually as excuses), although I try to keep from spilling too much of my personal life on this blog. I tend to save personal stuff for my more personal blogs targeted toward people who know me, well, personally. But certain things insist on intruding into other things that you might not want them to, and I figure this might be a good place to at least offer an update on Why I’m Not Posting, or: Another Cheap Excuse

School is not going well. I have had no time or energy to devote to my studies as I have needed. I may not finish, and though it pains me, I may write it off. The academic environment is hostile to me for reasons that don’t need to be discussed here, and the demands of working 60 or so hours a week at night have not been conducive to my progress. Plus, I’m a vicious procrastinator, and this combination did not serve me well. As a very dear friend of mine often reminds me, sometimes victory costs more than defeat (and as I remind her, a tactical retreat is not always a defeat).

My job sucks. So I’ve gotten another one. I don’t talk about work here much, but I’ve been in the restaurant business for some time, and since I’ve already mentioned the overnight hours, you can guess that I’m not in the fine dining end of things. I am high enough in things that I’m paid a yearly salary instead of by the hour, so I’m not doing to bad, but greener pastures have called. But those pastures lie about 100 miles away.

You’d think that for someone who has worked with Chaos Magic for so long, I’d be more adaptable to change. (Of course, you’d also think I’d have done some ego magic to fox that procrastination thing. I should get to that. Well, later …) But I am a Scorpio, with a Cancer Moon and ascendant, and I like to be settled in my home territory. But I am moving nonetheless, far from my family, friends, and community. I’ll deal with it, but I won’t like it much.

But there is opportunity.

There is a gap between when I leave Current Job and start New Job. I will be packing, but should also get to do some writing. This will make me at least a little happy.

New Job will involve at least two months of training at a location Not Here. Which means living in a hotel room sans mate or offspring, all by my lonesome. This means a lot of free time, and since I’ve given up the internet porn, I need to find something else to occupy myself with. An intensive magical training session should do the trick!

So, no more unusual than normal, my writing could be erratic, probably a large burst of productivity interrupted by a few spots of nothing. Hopefully people out there still remember me and will take a look at anything that I churn out. And if you’re new to things, please take the time to look over my older writings and blogs posts, on the off chance that you find something you didn’t know was there but you like, and because site hits make me happy, and the happier I am the less likely I am to destroy everything.

Cheers!

Appropriation and Tresspassing

Cultural (mis)appropriation among pagan and magical traditions is a pretty hot topic, and attitudes range from take what you will to don’t touch anything you weren’t born into. A middle ground of some kind is usually inhabited, but rarely solidly defined.

Gordon at Rune Soup, has a rather interesting take on the matter:

My uncertainty continued until university where I studied cross cultural film making, indigenous writing and all manner of topics that sat at the intersection between Anglo-academia and traditional cultures.

What I learnt was, essentially, non-engagement isn’t an option. You can’t just put cultural studies in the “too hard” basket for fear of being racist or insensitive. That’s ultimately more damaging because valid worldviews and modes of thought would be sidelined and forgotten.

What you needed were guidelines. Rules of engagement.

And so it must be for magic, also.

When I shot my underwater documentary in Micronesia I became aware that there were places I was allowed to go and places that I was not allowed to go without the permission of the Nanmwarki (chief).

The places I was allowed to go without permission were those places any lay person could go. Anything beyond that required a title or the permission of someone with a title. I was fine with all this because it’s a very familiar concept to us magical folk.

I was getting closer.

[...]

There is a little statue of Ekeko, the Andean abundance spirit, on my mantle piece. (If you live in London, I bought it here. Warning: World’s worst website.)

Now, it would be hard to find a tradition in the world I knew less about than the indigenous folk practices of the tribes around Lake Titicaca. (Not ‘curing cancer’ hard, but you know what I mean.)

And yet I have no problem housing and feeding Ekeko.

Why?

Because Ekeko statues are even given as gifts. They represent a very simple form of magic that absolutely anyone within that culture has access to.

Here then, is the golden rule I had been looking for:

Do not go further into a magical practice than a layman from within that culture is allowed to go without invitation or initiation.

If non-engagement isn’t an option, if cross-cultural magical practices are unavoidable in our global society, then this seems to be the best way to manage it.

Each culture has its own boundaries between what is initiatory and what is not. Culture belongs to the world. Initiation belongs to initiates.

An interesting take on the problem, although I’m not sure I’m totally convince. I think that part of the problem lies in the fact that for some cultures, even the laymen are initiates, and the cultural knowledge itself is initiate-level knowledge. Culture does not belong to the world: it belongs to the society it defines. Perhaps a better boundary would be going no further in a practice than a guest to that culture would be permitted without invitation?

Divining the Law

This is an interesting case:

In Moore-King v. County of Chesterfield Virginia, 2011 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 112205 (ED VA, Sept. 30, 2011), a Virginia federal district court rejected  constitutional challenges to Chesterfield County, Virginia’s regulation of the business of fortune telling. Patricia Moore-King, a “spiritual counselor” who operated under the name of “Psychic Sophie” claimed that the county’s zoning, business license tax and fortune teller permit ordinances violate her free exercise of religion, free speech and equal protection rights. The court held that plaintiff’s predictions and counseling services are inherently deceptive commercial speech, and that the regulation of them is reasonably drawn. The court rejected plaintiff’s free exercise and RLUIPA claims, finding that she is not engaged in religious practices. It also rejected her equal protection claims.

Where I live, the understanding is that my status as an ordained minister allows me to do readings as such a religious service. On one hand I see how one could argue that extra protections need to be in place for divinations. On the other hand, why should I need to hide behind religion to do a damn tarot spread? This sets a nasty precedent to target pagans doing readings, divinations, and healing services to be targeted as frauds.