*Update* Pagan Bloggers Network

Back in April I set up the Pagan Bloggers Network in hopes of connecting with other Pagan bloggers. Well it's been a success in the past three months we have gotten 19 pagan blogs together and interconnected. I'd encourage all of the readers to take the time and visit each of them. Read a couple of the enteries you never know when you might just find some hidden gem, also be sure to comment as well. You all know how much we bloggers love the comments.

Blogs

1. Between the Ticks
2. A Heathen's Day
3. Bringing Up Salamanders
4. Meta Pagans
5. Howling Hills
6. Another Ravan Perch
7. Coffee House Studio
8. Upstream From Lethe
9. Where I am, Knitting is also
10. tinkerbell
11. Centaur Cunningman Journey
12. Stir the Claudron
13. Owl's Wings
14. The Scared Space
15. Confessions of a Pagan Soccer Mom
16. Whisperings on the wind
17. The Holy Dark
18. Hedge Raven
19. Flight of the Fnordomancer
    

An updated life and recommitment to Blog

It’s been an interesting weekend, in a sense it was kind of a restart weekend for a number of different reasons. First we celebrated my wife’s BLANK birthday oh and it’s blank because she would likely shoot me if I posted her age without asking first not because I don’t know how young she is. Much fun was had at the small party and much Rock Band was played.

As presents she received three different cards of Microsoft for the Xbox. All of the points have no been spent getting new songs and the like. Nothing beats getting a set with multiple Metallica tracks I think they are the hardest songs in the whole game. I often wonder how the real band members would do at some of there own songs. I’ll have to remember to search Youtube or something and see if I can find some videos of it.

I mentioned restarting at the beginning of the Blog and am not really sure if that is the best world for it. It does work though it was the first time I had done ritual with a group in far too long and it was a wonderful experience for me. I led the guy’s side of the ritual, and leading up to I found myself thinking back about the people who had done that type of thing in our community before me. It was big shoes to fill but I think I did alright all in all. Am not going to go in to details about the ritual and the like, after all that would take away the mystery and well Wicca is a mystery religion

Saturday evening was a BBQ with friends and family. A number of them were at the ritual in the morning as well. If you ever get the chance to greet the Sun on Solstice morning and then say good by to it with the same group of close friends. Go for it is well worth it.

I’ve been working on a couple of new writing projects, I won’t give away to much in the way of details at this point as I have some amount of hope of getting them published. The first is about the life of the embodiment of a God in modern day earth. The working title is ‘Among Us’. While the second is a horror novel and the details for that one are still being sorted out in my head.

The podcast I’m working on with Tamile is going great we are currently working on our third episode. It is called SMOFCast and focuses sci-fi and fantasy fandom. Stop by and give us a listen. At this point we have had over 70 downloads. #:o) Another podcast is also being worked on but you will have to wait on the details for that one.

The God Delusion By Richard Dawkins - Closing thoughts

So despite how much am enjoying the new book and really want to write about it I felt I had to offer some closure to the God Delusion. As I look back at the various topics it raised and thoughts it provoked I have to say am very glad that I read it and would recommend it to others as a book to read as well.

As someone who reads a fair amount of religious and spiritual books this was a drastic change for me. The majority of the book focused on Christianity and Islam after all they are the largest part of his target audience so it only seemed fair that they received the lion’s share of the attention. That being said he didn’t leave others out completely he did offer a few references to Zeus and his fellow Greeks. The closest he comes to touching on things like magic is a section on the power of prayer and some studies that were done on the subject.

Richard Dawkins offers up a well laid out argument against religion (any religion) through out the book. He builds on points that he as already made in the book and from time to time refers to points that he will be discussing later in the book. Any argument he that makes are also backed up by science or historical facts. So it makes it very difficult to dismiss or ignore any of points he brings up.

Through out the book a fair amount of devoted to the problems caused by being religious or by religious people. He also shines spot lights on the various and numerous inconsistency that dominant the Christian and Muslim. As I read often found myself having to remind myself of one of the tenants of my own practice, that being “I honour your god” It’s easy when you reading a book like this to forget that. After all if my worship is to be respected and accepted I must in turn accept theirs. (Shame this doesn’t work both ways for the most part)

I haven’t lost my faith after reading it, I have no desire to rush out and become a Humanist. My faith in the God and the Goddess is unshaken and strong as ever, what did leave me with was a much deeper understanding of the Christian faith. It also left me with a strange desire to stop at my local Christian book store and buy an Anti Wicca book just to give it a read.

So pick this book up and give it a read you will be glad that you did.

Misleading News

Here is the link to the article but rather then generate hits and links for them I've included the full article as part of the blog.

http://newsblaze.com/story/20080511092314tsop.nb/newsblaze/OPINIONS/Opinions.html

Eighteen year-old Samantha was like any other person, and her life was far from
perfect.
Her parents divorced when she was 3-years-old. Finding God three
years after the divorce, Samantha's father became very strict and legalistic.
"We weren't allowed to go out with our friends very often. We never went to
the movies," Samantha remembers. "Everything had to be monitored."
Even her
dad's church seemed "cult-like" to her with their regulations. In her eyes,
Samantha's father lived as a hypocrite and she began to resent Christianity as a
whole.
Wanting a religion with fewer rules than the legalistic Christianity
she had been exposed to, Samantha discovered Wicca at age 12 when introduced to
the religion by a friend.
The main rule of the Wicca faith is "Do as thou
will, and it harm none," Samantha says. So as long as she did not hurt anyone
else, Samantha could virtually do whatever it was that she wanted.
As a
nature-based religion, the foundation of Wicca is the gathering of power from
the main elements- Air, Fire, Water, Earth and Spirit.
"I loved it," Samantha
says, "When I physically gathered the Elements' energy, I felt powerful and
calm."
But even with that power she claimed to experience and although she
loved being a part of this rule-less religion, Samantha felt alone and
unsatisfied.
"I just eventually realized that I need rules in my life. I need
some sort of structure, some 'being' that I know is always there," she says.
"And I needed that above all else."
With home life not getting any better,
all Samantha wanted was to be loved. When she was 16, she got involved with her
boyfriend, Nate.* However, Nate was not the prince charming Samantha had hoped
for.
Abusive and controlling, he would get whatever it was he wanted from
Samantha with force.
At first, Samantha tried to fight back, but she
tolerated the abuse. All she ever wanted was to be loved.
"I didn't have that
at home or at school or anywhere, and I knew that even though Nate was going to
beat me up when I was with him, I also knew that there would be a period where
he'd apologize and give me flowers and kiss me and tell me he loved me," she
says. "That's all I really wanted."
But life continued to spin out of
control.
As a result of being raped, Samantha developed a detachment when it
came to sexual intimacy, which is not an uncommon side effect for women who are
rape victims.
At first, it was a way for Samantha to try to regain control
when she voluntarily slept with random men.
"I was telling Nate, in not so
many words, 'Screw you, I have control over my life, and I have people who still
want me,'" she says.
But her addiction only escalated as she began to sleep
with men she only met that night and did favors for men thirty years
older.
Her attempt to take back control over her body only caused her to lose
even more control of her life.
Feeling even emptier, Samantha found a new
boyfriend and new escape- drugs. Her new boyfriend, Derek,* was a cocaine addict
who helped her get involved with the drug and alcohol scene by supplying her
with the drugs that he was taking himself.
"My favorite drug was Ecstasy. It
made everything feel better. Every physical touch was amplified by a thousand,"
she says. "It just made everything happy."
Samantha says she turned to drugs
because it helped her forget everything; but, that turned out to be the biggest
problem of all. Not wanting to deal with the problems of her life, Samantha
continued her downward spiral of sex and drugs in hopes of forgetting the life
she led.
"It's a scary feeling when you wake up the next morning and hear
stories of what you did the night before and you don't remember any of it," she
says. "Especially when the stuff you did isn't even close to who you are or what
you stand for."
Samantha emancipated herself from her parents when she was
17 and became engaged to her druggie boyfriend, Derek. But when Derek went to
jail on drug charges, she says she felt herself reach another dead end.
She
says Derek having gone to jail broke her down completely to give her life over
to God. In the past, it was the fear of being viewed as a hypocrite like her
father that kept her from taking the leap of faith.
But as her adult life
began, she realized she had reached the end of her rope, so she began her new
life with Christ, she says.
"I knew what I had to do, and my life was in such
shambles that I knew that if I didn't turn my life over to God, I was going to
get hurt. I was going to get an STD or die in a drunken car crash or overdose or
something like that," she says.
Now a new Christian, Samantha finally found
the love she has been searching for all along. As a result, her relationships
began to change as well. She is now friends with her parents. Her father, rather
than being judgmental, is now a person she can go to when she's
struggling.
Samantha says she now has the strength to deal with her past. She
recently has been able to come forward about being raped."God has given me the
courage and the strength to come forward and say 'This happened to me. But it is
not who I am,'" she says. "I don't let it define me anymore. I can face it
head-on and am learning to move on."
Samantha is turning her life around as
she is currently getting her GED in the hopes of being able to go to college and
become a counselor for abused women or rape victims.
"I want people to know
that they're not alone in their struggles. I remember feeling so isolated from
people and from God, and that is the worst feeling that you can imagine," she
says. "If I could save one person from staying in an abusive relationship or
turning to drugs and alcohol or being raped, it would be worth every ounce of
pain and humiliation. And, if my life brings one person to God, I would do it
all over again." *Name has been changed to protect the privacy of person.

Please send success and horror stories of your Wiccan experiences to comment@newsblaze.com.

I've read through the article a few times now trying to make sure that I haven't missed anything but am positive I haven't. This poor girls experience has nothing at all to do with her turning to Wicca as a faith path. Her life went to pot when she got an abusive boy friend had she been following rede "Do as thou will, and it harm none," she would have gotten out of the relationship after all it was doing harm to her.

This type of thing happens to woman and man on any faith path. For writer to belittle her experience by tieing it to Wicca is insane there simply isn't any connection

Wicca & Triumph of the Moon

I’ve never really talked much about my own faith path and my own community. So I figured I would take some time and do that while also talking about Triumph of the Moon as well. I’m blessed to be a part of an active community of like minded pagans. There is no requirement that you follow the same pagan path as us, be part of a coven or anything like that. There druids who come out some people who aren’t sure what they are and a lot of Wiccans of different styles. A few of us are starting to use the term Gaiaist Wiccan because of strong feelings and ties towards the Earth and sustaining its future.

We get together about once a week, some weeks are Book Study night, and other weeks our Tradition gets together. Along with both of those there are also movie nights, Knit-witches and other things that get us all together. As you can see it is a fairly active real time group. We also has a web component as well, with an e-mail discussion group and a group on Facebook. Like anything online sometimes they are more active then others. And the topics can change a lot from month to month.

Am sure you’ve noticed the three books listed on side left side of the blog Triumph of the Moon is the book that we are currently reading as a book study. Basically every second Tuesday we get together as a group reading through the book as a group one paragraph at a time. It really slows down the reading process and makes you think about what your reading and helps to absorb the information. It also makes for some great discussion and sharing of ideas.

So I want to start with a bit about the book, It is a look at the history and origins of modern Pagan Witchcraft. It is written by an academic Pagan Ronald Hutton and is written like a book for academics he doesn’t hold back or pull any punches when it comes to our real history. With that being said if your one of those Wiccans who insist that millions (Or more) of Witches where burned at the stake or that you have a hand written Xeroxed book of shadows that goes back to the dawn of time you might want to stop reading here. Because you are just deluding yourself and I would hate to take that away from you.

Hutton breaks things down in to sections looking at the origins of our practices, history, and where the people who put together what is modern witchcraft got there ideas from. A good portion of the book is also spent discussion what was going on in the world at the time these things were happening and being developed. It all plays such a huge part in what people where thinking and gives a great sense of context.

I could easily go on blog after blog on this subject but am going to limit myself to the Chapter that we just finished last night entitled ‘Finding a Witchcraft’ or at least a portion of it. The chapter ended with a long section on a book published by Leland it can be found on shelves today under the title ‘Gospels of Aradia’ the so called Gospels of Witches. If you haven’t read it I would strongly recommend it, despite its questionable origins. So much of our pagan culture comes from this book, even Doreen Valiente include references to it when she wrote the original Charge of the Goddess in the Gardnerian Book of Shadows.

The problem is that we have no way of know how much if any of the book is real. Leland prime source for information was a woman from the area Maddalena who is said to have inherited a family trove of charms, spells, and other information. She shared much of it with Leland, who hired her to bring back more and more information. After a time she brought back the story of Aradia in her own hand writing, afterwards she was never seen again. There was no attempt to back these stories up with other sources or confirm them. In the end it is likely we will never know if they were real or not.

If this commentary on the book so far has gotten your interest up, then I would encourage your to listen to Ronald Hutton Speak before reading the book. The experience really leads itself well to reading him and makes it more enjoyable. You can find a speech he gave on the Druid cast pod cast

I guess in the end I have to say I would rather have some understanding of the real history of my faith. Does it matter that don’t have some direct link to ancient times? Not in the least in my opinion. Does it matter to me that a lot of it was made based on the experience of a small group of people in England in the early 20th century? Again I have to say not at all, why should it when it works.