There are lots of articles and essays of interest to modern Pagans out there, sometimes more than I can write about in-depth in any given week. So The Wild Hunt must unleash the hounds in order to round them all up.
George W. Bush speaking at a Christian Coalition gathering. (William Philpott/Getty Images)
- Is the Religious Right finished? Damon Linker argues the case that it is. Quote: “Its decline since 2005 can be traced to numerous causes: The right’s widespread disappointment with the legacy of the Bush years across a range of areas, including fiscal, foreign, and social policy; the shift of the national GOP toward economic libertarianism in the wake of the financial crisis of 2008, the election of Barack Obama, the rise of the Tea Party, and the passage of health care reform; and finally, a dramatic and rapid shift in the culture, especially among the young, away from politicized religion and toward the acceptance of gay marriage.” Meanwhile, Forbes says “not so fast” on the end of the Religious Right stuff.
- Religion News Service reports on the rise of green burials, and how the move makes different religious believers feel more in tune with their faith. “The Green Burial Council has certified nearly 400 providers in 46 states. Some of them have religious orientations. And even some that are not certified consider themselves already green because their faiths have for millennia taken an ecologically friendly approach to death.” It should be noted that there are several Pagans involved in the green burial movement, including Circle Sanctuary’s Circle Cemetery.
- A mask an American Indian curandero prescribed to a client was seized at the Arizona border due to it being marked with chicken blood and feathers. Quote: “Officers say the mask was deemed suspicious and seized because of the blood and feathers. They say the mask contained materials of a prohibitive nature that have the potential to transmit avian diseases. The mask was turned over to officials in Customs and Border Protection’s agriculture division. It ultimately was incinerated.” The statue looks pretty familiar, don’t you think?
- The bad news is you might not be psychic, the good news is that your brain might be smarter than you think. Here’s a link to the study the video references.
- The Guardian is up to bat reviewing Ronald Hutton’s “Pagan Britain.” Quote: “One of the austere pleasures of Pagan Britain lies in its frequent reminders that every age invents its own past, and that ‘it is impossible to determine with any precision the nature of the religious beliefs and rites of the prehistoric British’.” The reviewer, sadly, takes some petty rhetorical swipes at Pagan religions, something Hutton himself would never do.
- PRI’s The World spotlights Haitian artist Erol Josué, who works to preserve his Vodou faith. Quote: “Last year, he took a government job as head of Haiti’s National Ethnology Office. He’s on a mission to get Haitians to realize that they need to embrace their vodou heritage — whether they agree or not. [...] ‘Vodou has never been a religion of conquest,” he says. “We don’t raise awareness to convert people to vodou, but to educate them about the importance of the national identity, the importance of respecting the sites, of respecting the patrimony.'”
- There were/are plenty of pious pagans, and Christians can learn a lot from them. Quote: “Paganism tends to have a bad name, and surely there is reason for this. At the same time, there is a tradition, especially among Christians, of honoring and imitating the greatness of pagans. For one thing, many pagans were profoundly religious, even pious people. We seriously misjudge at least some of our ancient forebears if we do not see the extent to which their life centered on the divine.”
- In the UK, sometimes your neighbors will call emergency services if you’re too noisy about the Witchcraft. Quote: “A second call came from Holsworthy in July 2012 from a woman who was ‘convinced that her neighbours are in a witches coven type set up as she sees them night and day running around outside screaming in tongues.’ A third Holsworthy caller rang police in August 2012 accusing a man in Southampton of using witchcraft.” So be cool on the screaming folks, it scares people.
- Civil rights activist Eliyahu Federman calls the resurgence of exorcisms in the Catholic Church “alarming.” Quote: “The Catholic Church attributes the rise in demonic cases to people dabbling in paganism, Ouija boards and black magic, but my sneaking suspicion is that mental health issues, along with the rise of fiction horror movie fantasies, are a more likely cause. [...] Legitimizing exorcisms makes a mockery of religion and poses a threat to society.”
- OnFaith, once part of The Washington Post, has left the paper, and is now part of FaithStreet. Quote: “We will continue to publish some daily news and opinion pieces from top writers and other folks whose perspectives need to be heard. But we have lots of other ideas, and we hope to get to do all of them in time. Our first new initiative is to publish Weekly Issues—to have one topic per week and publish a mixture of stories, essays, videos, illustrations and more on that topic.” Another competitor in the religion portal world? Will there be Pagans?
- An international group of Dharma teachers have issued a statement on climate change. Quote: “When we come together to celebrate our love for the natural world and all of the beings that inhabit it, and when we take a stand to counter the forces of craving, aversion, and delusion, we reclaim our own inner stability and strength and live closer to the truth, closer to the Dharma. Together, we can seek to ensure that our descendants and fellow species inherit a livable planet. Individually and collectively, we will be honoring the great legacy of the Dharma and fulfill our heart’s deepest wish to serve and protect all life.”
- How do you get the “nones” to vote for you? Quote: “The other side of religious nonaffiliation, and what politicians often neglect, is that for spiritual voters the sacred strongly persists. Reading them narrowly as atheists or secularists misses out on the political rewards that come from constituents feeling seen and understood. This sacred is various, but it coheres for many in its resistance to religious enclosure and its support of certain progressive values. Politicians fire up religious blocs through careful attunement to religious values. Better attunement to spiritual values will help inspire spiritual voters.”
That’s it for now! Feel free to discuss any of these links in the comments, some of these I may expand into longer posts as needed.
