Category: Unitarian Universalist

The Spirit of Beloved Community & being in Beloved Community with Spirits

On By PaxIn Community Building, everyday, Gospel Pagan, Modern Pagan, My life with (some of) The Holy Powers and The Spirits, Notes on the Journey, Pagan Ponderings, Unitarian Universalist3 Comments

Dear Friends,

Today’s post discusses more of the U.U. side of my spirituality but also, like so many things in my life, crosses over into the cross-roads of my Pagan roots.

So with some fluctuations in my schedule recently I actually got to sleep the Saturday night before Church, instead of hoping to grab a nap after getting off of work from the overnight shift.   I was eager to explore the novelty of the Church Service experience having had a full nights sleep beforehand.  I was slow in waking up, even with having set my alarm early but not only felt the personal need to go to church… I also felt a bit unsettled about the idea of missing it that day.

So I got my things for my work shift together, quickly ran through some of my Daily Practice, gave Jonathan a kiss, and headed over there.

As I was driving up to the driveway I usually use, I could see that folks were there waving signs, at first I wondered if there was a car wash or something going on that I had missed reading about in the weekly 1U Email…  bright colorful signs and folks milling about the sidewalks and the side-driveway, so I pulled past the Robinson Street driveway and got ready to turn on North Hampton to what I think of as the Main Driveway.   It was as I was waiting for the oncoming traffic to let me turn that I realized that the signs were condemning abortion and homosexuality, and some of them were the extreme close-up pictures of dead babies that the far right and fundamentalists are so very fond of.

It says something about the spirit that my beloved community engenders within me that my first thought was a cheerful and almost eager…

“We’re being protested… how exciting!!”

On some strange level seeing those folks out there preaching down a storm on us, and the signs about how awful and false and without Jesus we were and how we would mislead folks into thinking Homosexuality (because we are an Affirming or GLBT friendly Congregation) or Abortion (1U Congregation members were instrumental in forming Planned Parenthood of Orlando) ….. somehow those folks protesting us confirmed deep within me my conviction that this Congregation was a force for good in the world.

I pulled into my usual parking spot, having arrived early despite getting briefly lost in the maze of streets between this mornings 408 exit and the Church, and set out to track down Rev. Kathy to see how I might be of help.  As I walked through Campus I could see members & friends of the Church also milling about both Gore Hall (our social hall) and the Sanctuary.  I found Rev. Kathy, and asked her..

“Shall I help make copies of lyrics sheets for We Shall Overcome?!”

She laughed and then in a slightly distracted manner reminded herself to change the closing hymn and talk with our Music Director…

Rachel, whom I know from around Church and from Worship Committee, came up and told me how some of the protestors were going to be leaving their signs and slogan-bearing t-shirts behind and join us in the Sanctuary for Services… and how there was also a Plain-Clothes Police Officer going to be in the Sanctuary today in case there was any problems during the Service.  I touched base with a few friends and felt the tension on the campus.  The overall mood of our folks seemed subdued, some folks were tense or nervous… there was a sense of dread and controlled anger and even fear in the crowd milling about waiting to start Services…  given the sad fact of some of Unitarian Universalism’s recent historyI suppose I can’t blame them.

I took a few moments to touch base with the coordinators of our newly formed Social Hour Team and discussed my sketchy schedule for July and August, said hello to a few more folks and ran into Rev. Kathy again.  I asked her if I should see if the Protestors needed any water or if they needed a restroom or something… it’s called Radical Hospitality, and I am a practitioner of it… she pointed out that they probably already had their needs covered (and that some of our co-congregants might not be as ready to extend Radical Hospitality as am I…).  She seemed a little nervous, so I reminded her of those Six Breaths she had once talked to me about and let her get going to the Sanctuary.

At some point in all of this, the part of Geoffrey that chose the name Pax, that now goes by other more secret names, the part of me that has danced Deosil round Rowans in the Rain, that has thrown offerings of Grain and Rum out to the many Holy Powers and to the Spirits and Ancestors, the part of me that has tried to self-train as a Priest to the Holy Powers for most of the last 20 years sat up and took notice.   I breathed into my Center and my Chakras and to my Connection to the WitchFather, and took another look around.

There were a couple of members sitting in outdoor chairs by the Robinson Street driveway to keep an eye on the protestors and make sure they didn’t come onto Campus with their signs or t-shirts… which since it’s out property we have the right to deny folks entry if we wish, though its sad that we have to make that choice.  Somehow, it was the realization that we had members on guard pushed both my Witch/Pagan buttons and my Usher/Greeter/Multiple Committee Member buttons.  I took another deep breath and asked the Spirits of the Church, the dryads and other nature spirits of the campus and Genius Loci and the Congregational Egregore, to lend a hand.

I found myself entering Usher/Greeter mode, greeting Church members and looking around for member needs and ways I could help.  Rev. Kathy mentioned she needed a glass of water for the pulpit, so I went and got one…

“I Bless thee and consecrate thee oh, Creature of Water and cast out of thee all impurities, that we might work wonders…”

~I spoke the words of consecration as I walked from Gore Hall to The Sanctuary…

…by the time I returned Services were beginning so I placed the glass of water on the table to the side of the pulpit area where the book of Joys and Concerns was waiting to be fetched by the Rev. when she was ready…

I returned to the back of the Sanctuary by the doors to the Foyer, and Rachel came up again and reminded us all of the Evacuation plan for the building and as she and her partner Nicki went to Gore Hall they shared a few key Cell Phone number’s with me in case some of the protestors who were observing the Service caused trouble.  I watched the beginnings of the Service, but was already feeling a part of it yet standing apart from it, with my Acrostic eye viewing things through both a Pagan headspace and that of an Usher… so I took my leave of the Sancuary and walked through the Fountain Courtyard, past various Memorial Plaques and plantings and made sure that the protestors weren’t planning on disrupting things by marching through on that end.

I am realizing my time-sense of the day is a little off, partly because the usual Order of Service was adjusted and there were no Words for All Ages, the children were already in the Religious Education building… probably to insulate them from the protestors.  When a member  parent and child arrived late the protestors started shouting at the mom about how the child was endangered from our Churches false teaching.  Some comments the Director of Religious Education had made a little while ago made more sense, and I realized that this also insulated them if there was violence from the protestors.  They probably had the RE complex locked up tight…

I stopped at the back of the Sanctuary, facing Hampton behind the back wall of the Pulpit/Altar area,  where some of the most recent memorial plaques are and where I had poured offerings of water to the Congregational Ancestors when my friend Sandi joined Them this Spring, and sent a few breaths to the Honored and Beloved dead of the congregation asking for their guidance and guardianship and aid.  The protestors did not look to be trying anything on that score, so I returned through the Fountain courtyard, and briefly thought about turning the fountain on… but I decided against it and went back inside to listen to the remainder of the Service.

The Services, or rather the Sermons, are podcasted at a couple of different sources and it rather rocked!  (now that I’ve had the chance to listen to the whole blessed thing… 😉  )

The Service went well and there was no disruption, I thanked the Reverend and gave her a hug and went over to Gore hall.   I turned on the fountain as I headed out to Gore Hall.  The social hour was a little restrained at first… I think that I was not the only person who was hesitant to speak to folks who were unfamiliar to me (of course given my poor memory for names and faces that can be a long list from even longtime members of the Church)…  I think there was also an element of waiting to see if some sort of disruption or attack occurred at this point.   The usual joyous tumult of social hour was also a bit subdued because there weren’t as many kids roaming and running about… I guess many of the parents had taken them home.

Here is where things got a little interesting.

First off, one of the ladies of the Alliance came up to me as the worshipers were wandering in and gave me an apron that had been part of the goods from my friend Sandi’s house-hold goods donated to the Alliance for resale, she had seen it and set it aside for me since Sandi and I shared a culinary connection in our friendship.  Then some of the conversations with folks after Social Hour started to wind down revolved around how many of us either just happened to go by Church early that morning and saw the protestors setting up, or woke up unusually early and looked at e-mail and got the message about the goings on, or simply felt especially drawn to Church that day.

Were the Ancestors present?   Did the Genius Loci and the Congregational Egregore send out some sort of “Hey!  All hands on deck!!” to those particularly attuned to their frequencies?  Did the many and diverse Holy Powers of the world here the prayers of some of the Congregants?

Personally, I believe so.

Whatever the details of the explanation, we handled it with dignity and Grace, as U.U.’s have sought to handle difficult times in the past.  I know we can carry the lessons of that day forward as we strive and sometimes struggle to be within Beloved Community with one another even as some of us are trying to widen the scope of that Beloved Community in some uncommon directions.

Peace,

Pax

6 Breaths and making the time…

On By PaxIn An Important Message..., Food for Thought, Meditation, Notes on the Journey, Unitarian Universalist2 Comments

Dear Friends,

I have been having a LOT of synchronicities go on lately around Writing and Meditation and Practice…

One of those moments and one that is sticking with me is a conversation I had with my Minister from Orlando’s 1U, a U.U. congregation.  We were talking about how incredibly busy things are, and will be for a while, at our Church.  Rev. Kathy is our newly settled Minister and our Church is growing from what is called a Pastoral sized Church into a Program Sized Church, meaning that the number of people is greater than any one person can know or intuit the state-of-the-congregation…. in such a situation you need strong governance and a solid organization and sense of what group and activity relates to/reports to whom… basically there is a LOT going on…

After a meeting/discussion with her earlier this week I made the comment that it was a very lucky thing she was already a practitioner of meditation…

“I take a lot of inspiration from the fact that Science has proven that you can change your body chemistry with just 6 breaths…” she said, as she related how synchronicity had played an important part in her own journey when she had just finally committed to meditation shortly before facing a nurological illness that mimicked M.S., that was cleared up with Antibiotics (given for something else) after 3 years… as she related it was a good thing she had discovered Meditation right before that!

I have been working at my regular practices for, well, months now…   Centering and Grounding and Breathing Into my Chakras and Prayer  …at the same time I have danced back and forth with both my professional development, my spiritual development and Practice, and the many many shiny things that call to my A.D.D. blessed self for attention.  That comment about 6 breaths has stuck with me.

“If all you have time for in a day is those 6 breaths, then that’s what you do…” was the observation Rev. Kathy made…

We tell ourselves we don’t have time, we tell ourselves we will get to it tomorrow; and we lie to ourselves, and undervalue, and undermine ourselves all too damn often!  So I am continuing in my journey to breathe, to sit in silence for 10 minutes.  To do what I desire, and need to do and deal with, each day even if its baby steps.  Take time, dear friends, on your own journeys to dive deep into yourself and your practice … even if some days its just those 6 breaths!

Peace,

Pax / Geoffrey

Crafting through my Acrostic Eye

On By PaxIn everyday, magick, Unitarian Universalist, witchery2 Comments

Hello Dear Friends,

In her writings Starhawk, and I suspect others, have discussed the idea of the Acrostic Eye…. how a Witches explorations in the worlds of magick and symbolism can change how we look at things.  This has happened to me  recently as I have decided to start using a U.U. Flaming Chalice as my Tool of Center upon my Altar.

Now there are many, many ways in which Pagans deal with sacred space and with Fire and with sacred fire. However,  Unitarian Universalist’s have all at least once dealt with sacred fire in the Lighting of the Chalice ceremony, which is also both a very poetic and magickally powerful declaration of Sacred space and time.

As some of you already know, the U.U. Chalice is a symbol inherited by Unitarian Universalists from the Unitarian Service Committee, a charity founded in the 1940’s by a Unitarian Minister who sought to help refugee’s flee Nazi occupied Europe. The agencies symbol was designed by an artist who had been helped out of Nazi Europe by the USC. He was inspired by both the ideals and compassion of the agency and by the oil lamps that sat upon the altars of Ancient Greece (which part of the story, I love) and came up with the first of the many stylized images that have become known as the Flaming Chalice.

As a Pagan and Witch joining the 1st U, family, this caused me a little consternation. The Chalice as any Witchlet could tell you, is a tool of Water. If it’s based on an oil-lamp, why not call it the U.U. Lamp…or Lantern?  Well, I have adjusted, and I like to think that instead of being merely inspired to use the word “Chalice” by the looks of some of the stylized designs being particularly, well, chalice-ey; that some of those Unitarian and Universalist forebears of ours knew a thing or two about the Western Mystical and Magical Traditions and Symbolism.

Let’s look at it magickally and symbolically for a moment.

The Chalice is a tool of water, and relates to things like spiritual and psychological healing and nurturance and transformation and intuition and the emotions, especially love and compassion.

Fire is associated with vitality and passion and will and True Will and creative inspiration.

You can’t of course have fire without air the fire naturally draws in the qualities of intellect and communication and spiritual inspiration.

And to have a chalice, you have to craft the container from some form of earth… either wood or clay or metal or glass; Earth thus bringing it’s strength and stability and balance and nurturance to the mix.

So in lighting the U.U. Chalice we can, if we choose, call upon some of the fundamental Holy Powers of Creation to create a sacred space and sacred time.  Things get even more magically interesting, for those of us who are really into Magick and Theurgy, and who like me use the alchemical or Aristotelian triangles for the elemental symbols.

(image found online here)

We bring together the triangles of Fire, and Water and this creates the Hexagram or the Six-Rayed Star of Ceremonial Magick. Visually and symbolically the interlacing of the two triangles also references the horizontally bisected triangles of Earth and Air, signifying the union of the primal elements of creation. The Hexagram also symbolizes the union of Spirit and Matter and both the invitation of the Divine into the Material. The upward pointing blue triangle representing the desire of the magician to reach up towards the Divine, downward pointing red triangle represents Divine power and presence flowing down into the world, which meet at the moment of magick.

The six-pointed star, or hexagram, is the Qabalistic symbol of initiation and spiritual illumination. The upward-pointing triangle represents the aspiration of the magician to the Gods, and the downward-pointing triangle represents the divine power, flowing down to the world. These meet at the moment of magick and the interlaced triangles forming the hexagram symbolize the power of this meeting.

This is especially interesting when you consider that in most of the Traditions of Witchcraft that use the Rite of the Chalice and the Blade to symbolize the union of the Divine Masculine and Feminine resulting in all of Creation and Magick, many of them associate Blades and the Athame with the element of Fire. So once again the union of Fire and Water brings together all the Holy Powers of Creation.

So, when we light the U.U. Chalice we are able to not only call upon all of the elemental powers we are reaching up to the Divine and opening ourselves and our gathering to the Holy Powers.

So I will be working with that.
As for a Cauldron, I did bless and consecrate my Cast Iron Dutch Oven recently and will be using it where a Cauldron belongs… in the Kitchen for some hearth and health magick…

Peace,

Pax

…

Interestingly enough I find the above ideas about combining elements of ritual acts and symbols seems to have resonance when applied to acts like burning incense (fire + air = Hexagram), or the burning of food offerings (earth + fire + air = Hexagram) … I feel like I could be onto something here but am not sure where to take it or how to use this, any ideas out there?

Hate is NOT a Pagan Value

On By PaxIn Food for Thought, Highest Ideals, Modern Pagan, Pagan Ponderings, Unitarian Universalist8 Comments

(note simul-posted to the Pagan Values blog)

Sadly, prejudice and bigotry are nothing new within the Pagan movement.

Over the years we have, in our many Traditions and communities, wrestled ~sometimes quite publicly and messily and nastily~ with racism and misogyny and misandry and patriarchy and religious intolerance (aimed both at other Pagan faiths AND at religions outside the Pagan community) and with homophobia and with radicalism at both ends of the political spectrum.

I remember a discussion with some friends once where we had been discussing the history of the U.U. congregation I am a member of.  We had discussed both the Sexual Revolution and the current struggles around GLBT rights and we had also discussed the U.S. Civil Rights movement and ‘America’s’* struggles with racism and sexism. In the U.S., as befits the once boundless optimism of our Nation, the dominant discussion or idea is that “we dealt with that….”. My friends and I came to the consensus in our conversation that bigotry and homophobia are not things that you wrestle with once and are done with. These are things that peoples of conscience must continually look at and wrestle with and that each generation must have its own showdowns with.

So too must Pagans continue to wrestle with the hostile spirits of intolerance and fear and bigotry and hate, again and again.

Lately I have been encountering, within some forums and blog comment sections, some Pagans being extremely vocal regarding the “evils” of Christianity and Monotheism.  Now, I would and do not mind criticism of Christianity or other religions.  There is no denying that any religion, ANY religion, is capable of injustice and fanaticism fueled evils.  Especially when those religions are tied to a State or are wielding social and political power akin to a State.  A reasoned and reasonable critique of any religion is not out of order.

But these so called ‘defenders of polytheism’ have been crossing the sometimes hazy line from criticism into bigotry with the advocacy for violence against Christians, with the active and regular denigration of other faiths if they are Monotheistic, and the extremely toxic levels of condescension and insult that those who voice objections to the above are subjected to.

Our Pagan ancestors were, by and large, extremely tolerant of other religions.  Some of these same voices of intolerance look to the history of Pagan Rome and mutter “too tolerant…”

When one tries to point out that there are Christians and Jews and Muslims who are active in Interfaith work and doing good in the world and working for a fair and just society for ALL regardless of religion; these ‘critics’ will immediately try to equate all Christians and all Catholic Priests and all Christian Clergy with child molesters, or all Muslims with terrorist extremists or the Taliban, OR they will try to suggest that when monotheists are engaged in good works and in Interfaith work and work for justice and tolerance that they are somehow FAILING as monotheists in accordance with Christian or Jewish or Muslim doctrine?!

When attempts are made to point out the injustices and deep wrongs committed within the Ancient world when various forms of Paganism were the dominant cultural and political forces, these wrongs are brushed aside by these fanatics as merely the result of complex historical and social and political forces as having nothing whatsoever to do with the religions or religious values of the Ancient Paganisms;  whereas when someone tries to use similar arguments about more recent history or current issues as they relate to Monotheistic religions these same fanatics brush aside such arguments as missing the point or as fueled by their critics ignorance of the true evils of Monotheism or the particular Monotheism under discussion.

The tragic irony here is, of course, that in embracing such an Us Vs. Them mentality, they have embraced some of the very same and very worst of the Dualistic mindset that is admittedly of monotheism’s problematic legacies in our world.

Many Pagans, and many of the ones I most deeply respect, would tend to agree to varying degrees with Deborah Lipp’s excellent essay Putting the “poly” in polytheism…

Fundamental to our values, I believe, is pluralism. Everything we believe, even the lines we draw in the sand, must be rooted in plurality. There are many gods, many paths, many truths.

Monotheism has “mono” as a root value. One God, one Truth, one Right with all other things Wrong. This is a net negative for culture, I believe.

Polytheism allows us to worship many gods, few if any of whom are “jealous Gods.” None of them seem to demand that we worship Them and Them alone. Kali has never asked me to cease worshiping the gods of Wicca, and vice versa. Doing one thing fervently, wholeheartedly, with body, mind, heart, and spirit, does not prevent Pagans from doing another, very different, thing with the same wholeheartedness.

One can disagree with some of the more extreme and fundamentalist forms of monotheism WITHOUT wishing them ill, and without painting all Christians or monotheists as being either fanatics or fools, one can criticize Christians without cheering on the prospect of violence against them, and without constantly trying to stain ALL of a particular form of monotheism with the blemishes of one portion of the whole.

If some group of Pagans were to employ some of the same tactics and attitudes about another of the current Pagan religions that these critics employ against the monotheistic faiths, especially Christianity, one would probably be banned from lists and comment sections quickly and the posts would be widely decried as intolerant and bigoted and not even worth discussing.

Hatred, unlike anger, serves no useful purpose.

Anger can give one energy to get something done, provided you actually engage in some careful thought how to harness it, and provided that you are actually doing something useful and productive with it.  Hatred just lashes out, repeatedly and endlessly, often at the nearest available target with no regard to reason or logic.

Why then should we continue to dignify with our attention the venomous ravings of people who have nothing better to do than spit on another faith tradition rather than speaking and singing praises to their own?  When this spleen venting is the only response they can come up with to the injustices of the world and they cannot come up with so much as ONE useful, or constructive, response, why should we as communities continue waste our time  upon them?

* (as we U.S.-er’s of a certain generation are still wont to refer to our nation… sorry Canada, Mexico, and Central and South America old habits die hard…)

So there’s this guy at Church sometimes, and I am a little weird-ed out by him…

On By PaxIn Blame Sannion, Bouncing off the Gods, Food for Thought, Highest Ideals, Love Unto All Beings, Notes on the Journey, Pagan Values Blogging, Unitarian Universalist, witchery5 Comments

Dear friends and readers of all sorts,

Today’s post is, well complicated, and says some things that may be uncomfortable to read or to think about or discuss, but it’s something I have been wrestling with as of late… so here goes….

“Unitarian Universalism is a non-creedal religion.”

That’s one of the things one often hears when U.U.’s are trying to explain our religion to others.  This is usually followed up by a discussion of the Principles and Sources.  But the U.U. faith was born out of the complex intermingling of (very) liberal Christianity from Unitarian and Universalist streams of Christianity over the last 200 or so years,  and intermingled in the 30’s through the 50’s with  Humanism, then the U.U. faith was born in the 60’s and was then invigorated in the 70’s and 80’s with the influx of Paganism.  We U.U.’s are a complex new people with some very diverse and ancient roots.

But, Christianity is there, sometimes waiting to be dealt with.

I am not the only Pagan to be wrestling with the big C lately, there were some rather virulent comment streams over at the Wild Hunt that led Jason to institute a Comments Policy…  Cat at Quaker Pagan Reflections has mused a bit on Christian ways of viewing history through a rosy lens…. and Kayliegh at Kalisti: An Apple in Pandemonium recently mused about the persistence of ancient Paganism despite Christianity’s coming to power in ancient Rome…

For YEARS I have been decrying the knee-jerk anti-Christian bigotry one sometimes hears or sees expressed in Pagan community spaces.  Over all, when it comes to those Pagans who can’t stop talking about their Christian pasts or upbringing and especially who cannot let go of or move past anger or grievance with Christianity, I have to agree with Cat Chapin-Bishop,

“But when you take the time and trouble to write, not of your encounters with the gods, nor even of your personal journey from Christianity to Paganism (for I note that most of the offenders on this one are ex- but not post-Christian) to give me news bulletins about how uniquely terrible the religion of Christianity is, perhaps I may be excused for wondering how much room you have in your spiritual life for your own gods, if you must spend so very much of your time howling at the gods of others?” ~ Cat Chapin-Bishop from her post Turning our Backs on Jesus: a humble request

Of course some of this is influenced by the fact that I wasn’t churched as a kid.  My family prayed at the holidays but there wasn’t really any serious involvement with Christianity or a particular denomination.  So I came to Witchcraft and Paganism with as clean a slate as it is possible to have living in a dominantly Abrahamic culture.

I was, as a Pagan and a Gay man, wary of the more radical and angry elements within Christianity but I also had dear friends who were Christians through whom I could see that there was goodness and decency to be found within the core message and practice of that faith if not in the words and actions of some of it’s loudest proponents and largest organizations.  It was after reading Bishop John Shelby Spong‘s excellent books including Rescuing the Bible from Fundamentalism, that I could acknowledge that had my life taken other directions I could have happily become a Christian.  Reading that book was, at the time, a truly revelatory experience for me as it not only opened my eyes to the detailed history of the Bible as a text/tradition.  It also opened my eyes and heart to a true understanding of how one could actually be a Christian and live a life of love and decency and compassion actually engaged with the Teachings credited to Jesus.  Sadly, despite a number of both dear and decent friends who are Christians, I had somehow always viewed them as the rare exceptions.  Especially in the face of the angry and narrow and hateful words and actions of so many many prominent Christians observed over the course of my lifetime.

Lately, I am realizing that a part of my spiritual journey in the moment is to explore my relationship with Jesus and his teachings. They from one of the Seven Sources of Unitarian Universalism after all, and have had some influence on contemporary Western culture as well.

This has been highlighted again and again for me in the last few months at moments in the services at F.U.C.O where a particularly Christian hymn is sung or where Christian teachings are being referred to in the Sermon.  The need to explore and meditate on my relationship to Christ and Christian teachings was brought to the surface most strongly at the Solstice Service that the Pagan group at church Mystic Grove sponsored, it’s actually something like the 10th annual Solstice Service, but it was only recently taken up by the Grove, it was originally started by our previous minister!  Gotta love a U.U. church!

Anyway, the Winter Solstice…

Somehow, in the busy rush of the Season, and with everything going on I had missed out on the fact that the Service was being held in our Fellowship Hall and not the Sanctuary.   (Reasons of tradition and logistics at work there, although it’s gotten to be such a big event there is discussion of getting the Sanctuary for next year…)  So I turned the corner into Gore Hall and saw that the Service was in the Fellowship hall and not the Sanctuary and at first I felt a disappointment.   This disappointment kept getting deeper…

As I realized it later, that disappointment mingled with the general stress of the Holidays, and the stress of being my first Holiday season after the break up with The Big Guy, and somewhere along the way that sinking mood plumbed into some of my emotional depths… to where I have, over the years, stuffed a lot of anger and resentment over a lot of things…

At the time, all I knew was that I was seethingly angry!  Full of opposition and resentment, I could not look across the courtyard to the Sanctuary without feeling a simmering resentment that Solstice was in Gore Hall (despite my later, confirmed, intellectual knowledge that there were probably good reasons of Tradition and Logistics for this…) and NOT the Sanctuary.  I was in NO head space for ritual or services, and so I left and went over to the R.E. building to help set up for the potluck and the Solstice  Bonfire Vigil.

I ended up having a good time that night, but I also knew I had to do a lot of thinking about that night.

Not a few days before I had thanked Reverend Roberta for her lovely sermon and how it had given Christmas to me as a religious holiday as a U.U., yet in the face of this strange dark and mercurial mood I was wrestling with I decided to forgo Christmas Eve Service.

It took some time for me to un-knot and untangle my feelings and thoughts, but I realized that I had pushed aside but not actually faced or dealt with my  feelings of resentment and anger at Christianity and how some of it’s more fanatical branches attitude towards other religions and towards some segments of the population; and even more anger at how the more liberal branches don’t ever seem to me to be nearly loud enough in their condemnation of the bigotry and intolerance being perpetrated just as much in their name and their Gods name as in the name of the more fundamentalist and Talibanesque branches of Christianity….

In setting aside these strong feelings and opinions over the years, as “not fair” or “not worthy” or …something…, I wasn’t allowing myself to really feel the anger and the upset, I wasn’t really letting it go I was just stuffing it away somewhere where it could sit and fester and lurk within my mind and heart.

If there’s one lesson I have learned in the last few months as I have thrown myself back into spiritual practice and meditation like a drowning man for the shore, it’s that if something comes up, be it a thought or a feeling or whatever then you need to BE with it for a while before you can truly let it go.  There can be something very important in those fleeting thoughts and feelings.

So I have been thinking about my own ambivalent feelings about Jesus and the Churches that have come from his teachings, the Unitarians and the Universalists had many things quite  right even before some of them joined into this sea-changed something rich and strange that is Unitarian Universalism, in my humble opinion.

A kind a loving God would NOT send anyone to Hell.

Jesus need NOT have been divine in order to bear his God’s Message.

Christ’s teachings, of love and compassion are much more to the point of Christianity than any literal bible verse.

As far as I am concerned the only Word is Love, and everything else is a story or an allegory or a metaphor; so I guess I would have been a VERY liberal Christian had my life taken another path.  If I would have gone to Christianity.

Yet still, I find myself feeling a little awkward about my own feelings and thoughts about Christianity.  In a lovely and thoughtful post recently, Cat reminded folks that many if not most of those Christian ancestors of ours converted at the point of a sword.  As a Pagan and a history buff and as an intelligent person I cannot deny the sad simple fact that one seldom discussed aspect of the history of the spread of Christianity is that it is a centuries long history of genocide against any and all who dissent or disagree or who stood in the way of whatever The Church and then later The Churches wanted.

Pagans and Christian Unitarians and Christian Universalists, all good heretics all in a row…

At the same time I must in fairness and honor admit that Christianity also brought us Bach and C.S. Lewis and Shakespeare and the U.S. Constitution and so many, many, wonderful things along with the baneful.  One cannot, and SHOULD not, ignore the contributions of Christians in the efforts to end slavery, encourage women’s suffrage, stand up for civil rights, and to stand up for GLBT rights, to stand and fight for the separation of Church and State and Religious tolerance…

Lately, as I mentioned above, there have been some virulent and extreme and in some cases breathtakingly bigoted and hateful comments about Christianity made on some of the Pagan blog comment streams.  Folks making sad and disturbing jokes about killing “ash-zombie’s”  (as in Catholics observing Lent), and others who have discussed the evil and bigotry of Christianity and how Jesus and Jehovah are false Gods and Islam and Christianity are false religions… you know the exact same sort of stuff that they whine and freak out about when OTHER religions say the same sort of things about THEM?

So I spoke up…with only a touch of my usual (and in some circles and Circles infamous) zen-like calm…

“Wow,
Thanks ______ and ____________!
This whole comment thread has it all!
Ignorance (in behavior if not in education) and hatefulness and bigotry!
The complete dismissal of the validity of another religion.
The complete dismissal of the divinity of another religions god.
Even casual jokes about killing other people because of their religious beliefs!
Could you two PLEASE go vomit forth your hatred and bigotry elsewhere?
Thanks again,
Pax”

(Can you believe that people have called me, ME, reactionary?!  I should turn the marrow in their bones to boiling lead…*)

So anyhow after a LOT of heated back and forth drama of the type that has erupted all to often on that forum lately someone asked…

“Pax, I don’t know much about you. I wonder if you’re chagrined, though, that your post opened up another of the running battles that, frankly, are getting kind of old here.”

And I responded…

Dear ____,

You ask…
“Pax, I don’t know much about you. I wonder if you’re chagrined, though, that your post opened up another of the running battles that, frankly, are getting kind of old here. ”

Yes, yes they are getting old.

Though I am not a Wiccan, I have chosen to base my faith and life as a Witch in large part on the ethical and moral teachings to be found within Doreen Valliente’s Charge of the Goddess. I strive to live a life of Beauty and Strength, Power and Compassion, Honor and Humility, and Mirth and Reverence. I strive and struggle, all the blessed time, to follow Her law “Love unto all beings…’ As She counsels in (what I personally consider to be) Divinely inspired poetry, I strive ever towards my highest ideals letting nothing stop me or turn me aside.

I would LOVE to not have this sort of thing going on here.

But when I see people making casual jokes about killing “ash-zombies” meaning Catholics and other Christians observing Lent (comment mercifully deleted, I would like to think because of my request); when I see people making casual comments about how Christians are all deluded or evil or hypocrites, or how Jesus and Jehovah are false Gods (which puts the Jewish people where exactly I wonder…), or how or how anyone who believes otherwise is also deluded or a fool…

How can I NOT stand up?

Especially believing in the power and Power of Words, to touch and transform minds, and hearts, and to touch and transform the very atoms and cells of all the worlds; when I see people wielding words of anger and encouraging the worst sort of casual bigotry… with the sort of jokes and comments that, were they directed at Pagans on a Christian forum would (and frequently do) result in outrage and apoplexy…

How can I NOT stand up against these things?

… Even as I wrestle with my own ambivalence about Christianity…

Peace,
Pax

A lot of evil has been done in the name of Christianity over the centuries, and a lot of evil has been done by Christians.  Does this truly balance the good done in the name of Christianity and by Christians.  I believe so.

I know that even as militancy and extremism and fundamentalism run rampant in both Christianity and Islam, I know and can see that there are also Christian and Islamic people of decency and open-mindedness and tolerance and compassion and faith standing up against these tides.

There is good and bad in every faith, in every person.  There is good and evil done in the name of all Gods at some point or another, people of every faith have done wrong unto another in the name of their faith or with the conviction that their faith somehow justifies it.  I know these things and try my best to stand against intolerance, and ignorance, and hatred when I am confronted with them.

Yet still, there’s this guy at Church sometimes, and I’m a little weird-ed out by him…

Peace,

Pax

* A fairly obscure reference, for those not familiar with him, to the improving works of Sir Terry Pratchett

I am officially a Unitarian Universalist.

On By PaxIn Cross-roads, Day One, everyday, Unitarian Universalism, Unitarian Universalist4 Comments

Hello Dear Friends, Pagani, U.U’s, and all other readers….

So this last Sunday, 2/07/10, I formally signed my name in the membership book for the First Unitarian Church of Orlando, my Church!

It’s funny how it can change things when it’s your Church.

This event was preceded by a couple of new member classes and a potluck dinner for new members and their sponsors and various Church and Board of Trustees members.

So the new members were, at the appropriate point in the service, called up to sign their name in the book and shake hands with members of the BoT and Membership/Fellowship committee and to accept our membership cards and a flower (which is now sitting upon my altar) and to swear to our part of the Bond of Union..

“We associate ourselves together

for the study and practice of morality and religion

aas interpreted by the noblest lives of humanity,

hoping thereby to prove helpful to one another

and to promote truth, righteousness, and love in the world.”

I really hadn’t had much time to read or contemplate this oath, I read it during the early part of the service before the new members ceremony took place.  It was really incredible to be swearing this oath, which speaks to my highest ideals in the company of others who feel similarly.  Then members of the BoT and various Church groups stood and swore various oaths to us, and then the congregation as a whole stood and swore some various oaths, and then we all sang the Song of Dedication, which is a part of all of our Congregations services…

“Love is doctrine of this church,

the quest for truth is its sacrement,

and service is its prayer.

To dwell together in peace,

To seek knowledge in freedom,

To serve humankind in fellowship,

Thus do we covenant with each other,

Thus do we covenant with each other.”

I am still beginning my journey as a U.U., yet similarly to how I felt when I found Paganism, it feels like coming home.

Peace,

Pax

Prayers & Work for Haiti…

On By PaxIn Activist Alert, An Important Message..., Highest Ideals, Pagan Values Blogging, Prayer, Unitarian Universalist, Witches VirtuesLeave a comment

Dear Friends and Pagani,

As you doubtless know a 7.0 earthquake has hit the island nation of Haiti.

(Stories on CNN, The New York Times, and New Jersey(dot)Com’s coverage of Wyclef Jean’s calls for donations to the Haitian charity Yele, on his Twitter feed)

In the midst of my everyday and my crazy schedule, my heart has been going out to the people of Haiti and I am trying to figure out how best to help.

I am particularly sympathetic to this issue as someone from Anchorage, AK.  The 1964 Good Friday Quake‘s devastation is something every Alaskan school child studies.  While I now live thousands of miles away, I also live with the knowledge that what historical records we have of the tectonic activity of my hometown says that there is a large earthquake every 20 years or so.  Anchorage is nearly 20 years overdue…  so my prayers and sympathies are very much with the people of Haiti.

When I have the chance I hope to take a candle and a card to the Haitian Consulate here in Orlando, which has a large Haitian population.

In the meantime I will donate what little I can to the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee’s earthquake relief fund (here) and for the moment am just spreading the word.

(more info on the UUSC at their site, and on wikipedia)

There is also an evolving discussion of the different avenues of donation going on at the relevant article on the Wild Hunt.

It is through there that I also found a list of Green Charities operating on the ground in Haiti, if you are as minded of long term aid as well as short term relief you might consider donating to them as well.

A Witches Prayer for the Haitian People

I Pray to You oh Mighty Mother and Forceful Father

I respectfully call out unto All the Holy Powers of the Universe,

Please let all of Your Love and Compassion and Blessing to bear,

On the Island and the People of Haiti in this time of pain and suffering,

May the Holy Powers of Air inspire them and help them to communicate with their far flung families,

May the Holy Powers of Fire warm them and bring the healing of bodies,

May the Holy Powers of Water quench their thirst and bring the healing to their hearts,

My the Holy Powers of Earth feed them and lend them strength,

Blessed may You be,

Blessed may they be,

So mote it be.

Peace,

Pax / Geoffrey Stewart

An Update…

Shortly after posting this I received an e-mail from PeaceNext, the social networking site of the Parliament of The World’s Religions, with a link to a CNN(dot)com list of charities working to aid the nation and people of Haiti…

So This is Solstice….

On By PaxIn Solstice, Unitarian Universalist9 Comments

Hello Dear Friends and Pagani,

So the Solsticetide weather has had a mix of overcast and foggy and colder than usual.  Oddly enough its been quite enjoyable for me in spite of an unexpected  $2,300 car repair…  Never a dull moment here folks!

Here is a fun Winter Solstice video making the rounds…

I am looking forward to the Winter Solstice Service at the U.U. Church and the Solstice Vigil afterwards, both sponsored this year my the Mystic Grove a U.U. Pagan group affiliated with my new church.  Yesterday at the Sunday Services at the U.U. the older children of the Sunday School performed a lovely play they wrote about the Different Spirits of the Holidays … Solstice and Hanukkah, and Christmas, and New Years, and the spirits of Night and Light having a meeting to discuss the nature of light in peoples lives… it was cool.  Our interim Minister Rev. Roberta’s sermon discussed how we as U.U.’s whether Christian or not can embrace Christmas…

She discussed how EVERY night a child is born is a holy night, and that child and its potential is sacred.   Her sermon was quite lovely… as part of her reading she shared part of an essay from an op-ed piece (which of course I cannot remember the name of the author of… I will have to ask her tonight…)

This gentleman was remebering the Dominican Nun who had been his 2nd grade teacher, and how that year for the 2nd grad Christmas mural she encouraged the children to protray the birth of Jesus taking place in Japan, with Jesus and Mary and Joseph and the Angel with Asian features… the author really didn’t think about the deeper meaning of that act until years later as he did the math and realized that his 2nd grade Christmas holiday would have been in December of 1941…

The sermon also discussed how we as U.U.’s can carry our principles and ideals with us as we celebrate with our larger family’s who may not understand our religion, and how we can carry the spirit of this holiday with us as we engage our families and friends about discussions of issues like hunger and homelessness and charitable giving.  Growing up in a fairly secular family, and then coming home to Paganism I always felt a little left out in some respects this time of year, but at the end of Services yesterday I thanked Rev. Roberta for giving me Christmas as a Religious Holiday.

My thoughts are dancing with the many thoughts of Solstice.  I bought some ready-made cookie dough and will be taking a variety of cookies with me tonight to the coffee hour after Services, and to hopefully nibble on during the vigil, or at least as long as I last.

My Solstice-tide thoughts are of the many ways that hearth and home, joy and hospitality and charity, and a certain raucous decadence, all intermingle from the many Ancient Paganisms ways of honoring this time of year.   The urge to celebrate something this time of year has actually spurred the creation of new festivals amongst those Pagans whose ancient forms did not HAVE a specific festival for the Solstice… Helieogenna (two day and nine day versions) the Hellenic Polytheist Solstice observance…

We want to celebrate things this time of year.  I am unsure if this is a result of the current immersion Contemporary Paganism has within a larger Christian influenced monotheistic culture.  Sometimes I think so, but sometimes I also wonder if maybe as the nights grow long and the temperatures cool if we don’t have some deep instinct to gather around our families and dear ones and share our love somehow.

Blessed Solstice to All,

Pax

Here are a few more fun Solstice things…

Winter Sostice as Viewed from Stonehenge.. (sadly embedding disabled…)