Pagan Corner

[gypsywitch]

wo

he's hot



So I stopped by to say that I'll be giving a Yule presentation at a local pre-school.

Also, ritual last year gathered about fifty people and this year it will be more.

How about you?

 

[VelvetHeat]

Winter Solstice Ritual

For the Solitary Practioner.
I'm a solitary witch and figured that this may come in handy for others.

Yule/Winter Solstice Ritual (around Dec.21)
You will need:

Your tools
Some nice Lavender incense
A compass

Setup:

Set-up your altar, place the ice in the cauldron and the incense anywhere.

Perform a meditation.

Cast your circle.

Hold your hands up in the air saying:

"GREAT WINTER I WELCOME YOU,GODDESS OF NGHT."

Place your hands in the cauldron and move them around in the ice while saying:

"I WELCOME YOUR MIGHT,YOUR COLD."

Light the incense. Take aa sip from the chalice. Take the athame and point it toward the west while saying:

"GREAT WINTER I CALL YOU,COME FORTH,I WELCOME YOU."

Close your eyes and visualize the winter in all her fury. At this point you may end this ritual,or continue with a spell.

"SO MOTE IT BE"

Close your circle.

~*~Goddess Kisses and Blessed Be ~*~

 

[hurtme]

a yule talk, at a preschool, what i want to know is, how the hell did you pull THAT one off?

 

[Enodia]

Velvet Heat: Why Lavendar incense?

Image: What Trad are you? That ritual looks rather familiar... (the pieces, not the entire thing...but the layout )

 

[gypsywitch]

a yule talk, at a preschool, what i want to know is, how the hell did you pull THAT one off?

They are being taught by a teacher who is going to do a full on Hannukah in class.

I suggested a Solstice presentation and she agreed, claiming she knew nothing about it.

The presentation is going to be about why we only use white lights in the windows, and about the longest night of the year. I will talk about the gradual return of the SUN and about how we get to have Christmas trees. The term Yule, meaning wheel will be introduced, and we will sing Deck The Halls.

Keeping it simple for the tots of course.

 

[ruminator]

I don't mean to hijack or interrupt, but I just found something I thought should be in this thread. I'm not familiar with many religions. I've not seen this kind of negative attitude among pagans and I don't want people misrepresented. I have many friends who are pagan (hope I got the phrasing right) and those have been good caring people.

Just wanted others to see this.....

H. James Towey, director of the White House's Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives, has stirred up a pot of trouble by suggesting that pagans don't care about the poor.



Wiccans, Druids and other pagans across the country, along with the Washington-based advocacy group Americans United for Separation of Church and State, are demanding an apology from Towey for his remarks in a White House-sponsored online chat Nov. 26.

According to the official transcript, Towey was asked by someone in Centralia, Mo., whether pagan groups "should be given the same considerations as any other group" that applies for government funds.

"I haven't run into a pagan faith-based group yet, much less a pagan group that cares for the poor!" Towey wrote.

"Once you make it clear to any applicant that public money must go to public purposes and can't be used to promote ideology," he wrote, "the fringe groups lose interest. Helping the poor is tough work, and only those with loving hearts seem drawn to it."

Outraged pagans have since bombarded the White House and Internet chat rooms with scores of examples of their charitable activity. Particularly common, they say, are food drives in conjunction with Pagan Pride Day celebrations from New York to Wyoming, Arkansas and Nebraska.
<clip>

.....more......http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A43967-2003Dec7.html

 

[gypsywitch]

Love that Ruminator.


I am Pagan, but not Wiccan, if that makes any sense. I'm also a Doula and an Herbalist. If I were to step into a "church" for council, learning, or community, it would be Unitarian.

Many, many Pagans send care packages to the miltary people over seas, because they are poor.

There are Pagans in the military that have their religion on their dog-tag as Pagan.

We also do a tremendous amount of environmental work which is becoming a very bleak cause.

Mr. Bush made it very clear earlier this year that Paganism/Wicca is not a "real" religion and is not to receive any Govt. funding like other religions do.

Unfortunately, modern times and an angry society has prompted the rise of a very dark side to all this. Pagans are not devil worshippers. Devil worshippers are Devil worshippers. Some Gothic Rock bands and other groups have taken on a way of being that is very prominently being exposed to the regular masses. I respect everyone's right to express themselves freely, but am unhappy about being lumped into the dark side due to fashion.

Nothing like this crap from Towey surprises me anymore, but I'm proudly out of the closet about my religion.

.02

 

[ruminator]

Love that Ruminator.


I am Pagan, but not Wiccan, if that makes any sense. I'm also a Doula and an Herbalist. If I were to step into a "church" for council, learning, or community, it would be Unitarian.

Many, many Pagans send care packages to the miltary people over seas, because they are poor.

There are Pagans in the military that have their religion on their dog-tag as Pagan.

We also do a tremendous amount of environmental work which is becoming a very bleak cause.

Mr. Bush made it very clear earlier this year that Paganism/Wicca is not a "real" religion and is not to receive any Govt. funding like other religions do.

Unfortunately, modern times and an angry society has prompted the rise of a very dark side to all this. Pagans are not devil worshippers. Devil worshippers are Devil worshippers. Some Gothic Rock bands and other groups have taken on a way of being that is very prominently being exposed to the regular masses. I respect everyone's right to express themselves freely, but am unhappy about being lumped into the dark side due to fashion.

Nothing like this crap from Towey surprises me anymore, but I'm proudly out of the closet about my religion.

.02

I have enough knowledge to you folks are good people. I'm learning but I'm still not proficient in the differences.

That article bugged me for the unfair light it cast. That's the last thing needed. Besides discrimination, it promotes ignorance.

Maybe enough people will speak out to spur an opposite view story on the generous and caring nature.

 

[Image]

Velvet Heat: Why Lavendar incense?

Image: What Trad are you? That ritual looks rather familiar... (the pieces, not the entire thing...but the layout )

I'm not any specific tradition... I was initiated in the Wiccan tradition 10 years ago but had already discovered my path. Now I would consider myself simply pagan. I live in turn with the seasons and the natural turning of the wheel of life...

Ritually, I would say that, yes, this celebration was written in a Wiccan style. It's my roots and I still adhere to it's tenets. I just have problems with the heirarchies associated with any organized religion.

It would be blind to say this doesn't exist within Wicce as well...

So... Here I am. Just come from celebrating the ritual I wrote! It was spectacular!

I'll post later on the folly's (as every good ritual should have)

 

[hurtme]

*smirk* I for one admit that we haven't done as much "charity" work as say, the christians have...but well, we are minute in number compred to larger organizations...also, like someone mentioned some people still don't consider us a "real" relgion...they aren't exactly as confidant in donating money to a pagan organisation when they are well established xtian ones. In my mind, that doesn't mean we should give up, it means we should either join forces, or renew our efforts...
Try BEING Wiccan, AND goth, its not that much fun, let me tell you. It is a daily basis that i get asked at work if i am a devil worshipper because of my pentacle, and the fact that i am dressed in all black. Or i have been told before "I just love that dress, its beautiful" and which point, flattered, i smiled and said thank you, when the person continued on with "I know its part of your religion and all, but i just thought i would tell you" I would have corrected the person, as i was shocked...but they were about to stick a needle in my arm (I was at the doctors office)...I wonder what they thought my relgion was and what relgion is known for their awesome fashion sense? Not to mentio nthere are pagans who won't take me seriously upon meeting me because i am goth...now THAT is a shitty thing. I really feel good about the pagan community when i get treated like an outcast for not confroming to what they believe a pagan SHOULD look like (which i was told, in essence, is like aything thats NOT GOTH, because goths aren't SERIOUS PAGANS/WICCANS)
I don't get overly eccentric, i don't wear cheap whiteface, i don't draw curly designs on my face with eyeliner, i don't go around reciting bad poetry and listening to bands i don't like just because they are goth. I can go on about pain and death...because i am goth? no, becuase they are a part of life, but i don't ,becuase i enjoy life most of the time...I realize the paths that i have chosen put me sqaurely outside the mainstream...and i gracefully accpet that, normally but it can be disheartening when you face so much crap...according to certian people...I am not goth enough to be goth (I think it might be because i won't sit in dennys a 3 am picking on the normals, and i hate coffee, and i like marilyn manson), i am goth, so i obviously must be playing at being wiccan because its cool...could go on about other things, like how i am not a good subbie, but i just realized this is the general board...so i am going to stop now, and blame my rant on the fact that i have a broken limb and am chock full of pain meds...

 

[stumbo]

Congratulations on being reasonably individual HurtMe - the goths and pagans who won't take you seriously just can't see you properly on account of having their heads stuck firmly up their asses.

I've spent a lot of time being ignored or shunned because my credibility was in question amongst whatever clique it was that I didn't obviously look or think quite alike enough for.

Wether it's a religious persuasion or a fashion thing, these people are guilty of exactly the sort of judgemental behaviour that they will invariably bitch and whine about receiving from others.

Having such utterly closed minds, you can bet they're also pretty much 'mistaking the map for the territory' anyway, so there's little your likely to gain from their company, excepting perhaps reputation by association. They'll be taking themselves much too seriously, repeating their affirming little soundbite mantras to themselves to ever hear anything from beyond a very limited scope.

Paraphrased from "Zen without Zen Masters": When the question of religion came up, a young man would always say he was a "Zen-Baptist" . . . some people would only respond to the 'Baptist' part, and relate to him at that level. Some would only hear 'Zen' and while generally more interesting, wouldn't hold his attention for much longer. A smaller group of people would respond to both Zen and Baptist - he found these the most interesting and rewarding folk to talk to.

Welcome to C21 - we've got a world of stuff to choose from, and more coming, make of it what you will, mix and match till your heart is content - find out what works for you. Anyone who can't appreciate you and your thoughts because they're too mono-maniacally attached to some tenet of faith (or worse, a fashion statement) to speak to anyone who doesn't look or think the same as them - well, you weren't any more likely to learn anything from them than they were from you. Their limitation.


Hope the painkillers are working and the [mystery] limb heals soon!


P.S. 'Pagan charity': "Reports of further casualties in Afghanistan came in today from Wiccan aid workers based there with the International Red Pentacle" . . . has a certain ring to it, no?

 

[gypsywitch]

cool animated av

 

[hurtme]

well, technically not a limb, a digit...andi got it all sorts of messed up...I think i might have permanent nerve damage, fun fun...thanks for asking
As far as "those people" I know i can come off as very, umm, in your face, i don't think i flaunt anything i think or believe, but i don't hide it, not one single thing...I don't see the point...either i am going to be accepted for who i am, or I am not, and there is no point in trying to pretend so that people will accept me. That said, i give people chances, upon chances...some people dislike me upon meeting me, because they think all goths are whiny like sissies, or because they think all wiccans are fluffy devil worshippers...but invaribley, it may take weeks or even months, but i usually win them over, most of the time. Because they might think these things of me, then they hear me in everyday conversation with other people and realize that i might be wierd, have some odd beliefs and practices, and have a strange idea of what is attractive...but i am polite, respectful, honest, non judgemental, open minded, and intelligent...not to mention i have a pretty decent sense of humor...and enough humility to pull it off without being overly arrogant...everyone who doesn't care to look beyond their stereotypical ideas can kiss off in the nicest way...

 

[Enodia]

Originally posted by hurtme
well, technically not a limb, a digit...andi got it all sorts of messed up...I think i might have permanent nerve damage, fun fun...thanks for asking
As far as "those people" I know i can come off as very, umm, in your face, i don't think i flaunt anything i think or believe, but i don't hide it, not one single thing...I don't see the point...either i am going to be accepted for who i am, or I am not, and there is no point in trying to pretend so that people will accept me. That said, i give people chances, upon chances...some people dislike me upon meeting me, because they think all goths are whiny like sissies, or because they think all wiccans are fluffy devil worshippers...but invaribley, it may take weeks or even months, but i usually win them over, most of the time. Because they might think these things of me, then they hear me in everyday conversation with other people and realize that i might be wierd, have some odd beliefs and practices, and have a strange idea of what is attractive...but i am polite, respectful, honest, non judgemental, open minded, and intelligent...not to mention i have a pretty decent sense of humor...and enough humility to pull it off without being overly arrogant...everyone who doesn't care to look beyond their stereotypical ideas can kiss off in the nicest way...

I always get the opposite. I'm "normal" even "boring". I would make a good librarian--I wear my hair in a bun, have bangs, glasses, and generally wear polo-type shirts (albeit fitted ones), sweaters and black dress pants with loafers, or knee length skirts. My hair is black (dyed--I've been nearly every colour--even blue and orange--and black looks best on me), but looks natural. Whenever I tell someone I'm a Witch (or Wiccan), I always get:

"But you look like such a nice girl" or "You don't LOOK like a witch."

Everyone assumes that in order to be so, you have to look like a goth or a hippie (or a dirty, "welly" as they're called here), since the Pagans in my city who are "out there" are all of the above. And most of them are scary (um, cult-like covens, fluffy bunnies, etc). It took A LOT for me to find Pagans like myself (um--"normal" I suppose, although some of them are goths, and some look like hippies, and others look like me, and others look like hoochies), and I STILL don't fit in.

Ah, well. I'm a nerd. What can ya do?

And about your hand/arm: PRAY TO THE GODS it's NOT nerve damage. I've had a pinched nerve cluster in my right elbow since I was 13 (so 11 years now), and you will NEVER feel pain like that. It's worse than carpal tunnel and arthritis put together (I know--right arm=pinched nerve, left arm=carpal tunnel, right ankle and knee=arthritis). Lots of healing energy to you.

 

[Luna_Wolf72]

Quick question:

What would You ALL consider the best combo of woods for a need fire??

Best friend has decided she wants to build one and we need woods that fit all of our beliefs...

(Shaman, wiccan, and Fairy Wicce)

that being said...

Thanks

 

[Enodia]

know what? I JUST read something about that online--now let's see if I can find it again...

Usually it is Beltaine or Midsummer that the Needfire is built. At Yule, we burn the Yule log (generally made of either pine, oak or birch).

Can't find it...but here's...

A bit of info

 

[VelvetHeat]

Velvet Heat: Why Lavendar incense?

I choose Lavender incense because of it's magickal qualities.
Lavender: Love, Protection, Sleep, Chastity, Longevity, Purification, Happiness, Peace

 

[hurtme]

Sometimes i think being normal might be nice...you know, not having everyone look at you like your a freak or a cultural oddity...just being able to walk through the grocery store without getting stares...should see it when i go to pick up my god(dess)daughter at school, you'd think i was there to torture the child or something...but the thing is, I like the way i look, i feel attractive, i feel confidant, i feel like myself...I just don't feel good in blue jeans, or what one might consider "normal" clothes, i don't feel like myself, and i don't look right, my deathly white skin (that i work very hard to keep), my choice of make-up, even my jewelry, doesn't seem to "fit in" with more normal clothes...and even if it makes some people think i am less valid, i am going to dress in the way that makes me feel the most attractive...

 

[LittleMsNaughty]

I have been studying wiccan/Pagan practices for a couple of years now and decided I was best suited to being a solitary practitioner...that way I can incorporate all my beliefs which work best for me.

But the one thing I take time to do every single day is stand amongst nature and appreciate all the beauty around me. Life can get a bit hectic at times and we don't always have time for rituals but to take 5 minutes to appreciate the beauty and complexity of nature can really ground you and bring you back to what is real - instead of getting caught up in the hustle and bustle of everyday life.

Blessed be!

 

[stumbo]

"But you look like such a nice girl" or "You don't LOOK like a witch."
<snipped>
It took A LOT for me to find Pagans like myself (um--"normal" I suppose, although some of them are goths, and some look like hippies, and others look like me, and others look like hoochies), and I STILL don't fit in.

Ah, well. I'm a nerd. What can ya do?

Errrr . . . what are hoochies?

(I've got images of prohibition era mobster's mols here!)

 

[stumbo]

I have been studying wiccan/Pagan practices for a couple of years now and decided I was best suited to being a solitary practitioner...that way I can incorporate all my beliefs which work best for me.

But the one thing I take time to do every single day is stand amongst nature and appreciate all the beauty around me. Life can get a bit hectic at times and we don't always have time for rituals but to take 5 minutes to appreciate the beauty and complexity of nature can really ground you and bring you back to what is real - instead of getting caught up in the hustle and bustle of everyday life.

Blessed be!

Merry met and bright blessings to you Ms N. Definitely with your thinking on the solitary path - leaves you with just the one tricky ego to deal with.

Spiritually I've been 'around the block' a few times (so to speak) but nothing has ever come close to being as awe inspiring as nature, and just grocking her as often as possible is the closest I have to a regular observance these days.
More divine than any thought, deed or relic of man . . .

"Jack do you never sleep,
does the green spell run deep in your heart?
Or will these changing times,
motorways power-lines, keep us apart?

Well, I don't think so . . . I saw some grass growing through the pavement today."
'Jack In The Green' - Jethro Tull

 

[Image]

I have been studying wiccan/Pagan practices for a couple of years now and decided I was best suited to being a solitary practitioner...that way I can incorporate all my beliefs which work best for me.

But the one thing I take time to do every single day is stand amongst nature and appreciate all the beauty around me. Life can get a bit hectic at times and we don't always have time for rituals but to take 5 minutes to appreciate the beauty and complexity of nature can really ground you and bring you back to what is real - instead of getting caught up in the hustle and bustle of everyday life.

Blessed be!

To me, that is the most important aspect of any path... taking the time to consciously appreciate the beauty of the natural world around us.

And to become aware that we are part of it, not just an observer... it's an awesome feeling when you understand that connection.

Gaia

 

[hurtme]

hoochies, around here, it tends to describe women who dress, act, or apply make-up (like a hoochie)...kind of like, loose women with questionable morals...some other defintions, depends on who you talk to...also, can be used to describe something...i.e. my friend has a pair of hoochie shorts (daisy dukes, short shorts), or she dances like a hoochie.

 

[Enodia]

Originally posted by hurtme
hoochies, around here, it tends to describe women who dress, act, or apply make-up (like a hoochie)...kind of like, loose women with questionable morals...some other defintions, depends on who you talk to...also, can be used to describe something...i.e. my friend has a pair of hoochie shorts (daisy dukes, short shorts), or she dances like a hoochie.

yeah! that's it...my friend dresses this way. I love her, but man--she's 27 with two kids...she's gotta dress "her age"...ya know?

 

[Luna_Wolf72]

Enodia

Thank you for the link...very informative...I am going to pass it on to the person who is collecting the info as this is her *holiday*.

bright blessings to you
pet