Light

New Blog?

2005-03-27T16:54:00.000-08:00

I've set up a new blog.

http://mysticheart.blogspot.com

Folks, update your links.

I'm not at ease writing here if I know there's another UU writer calling herself ChaliceChick out there; we might confuse people. I felt the need to create a different identity, and one that seemed a little more personal.

Kinda hard to explain, but there it is.

Lots of Stuff

2005-03-27T09:40:00.000-08:00

There's been a lot of goings-on I should be blogging about, particularly Terri Schiavo.

I have written some things and posted them on other sites. I'll post them here soon enough. I'm exhausted these days.

Hmmmm...

2005-03-20T16:28:00.000-08:00

The Darkness Drops Again

By WilliamPitt,

Thu Mar 17th, 2005 at 09:48:45 AM EST :: Activism ::
"In a time of chimpanzees, I was a monkey."

- Beck, 'Loser'

So...to recap:

Neocon warlord Paul Wolfowitz will head the World Bank;

The White House illegally puts out fake news reports, and the Justice Department does nothing;

Another $81 billion of your money and mine is to be poured onto the Iraqi sand;

The GOP majority in Congress is preparing to trash 200 years of Senate tradition in order to post a number of certifiably insane people to the bench;

Kevin Martin, a conservative Christian activist for the GOP, will now chair the FCC;

The Alaskan National Wildlife Reserve, one of the most ecologically pristine areas remaining to us, will be paved and drilled for its tiny amount of petroleum.

And that was just yesterday.

The list of appalling and abominable and flatly criminal acts perpetrated by this administration is literally becoming too long to manage. I suppose this is what happens when the entire government is owned by one party. I suppose this is what happens when that one party is owned lock, stock and barrel by a cancerous combination of oil companies, weapons manufacturers and Rapture-happy fundamentalist Christians who think God put dinosaur bones in the ground to mess with our heads.

This is what happens when the "opposition party" sells its people down the river.

Let us be clear: The Alaskan National Wildlife Reserve is about to be ravaged for one reason. Three Democratic Senators jumped the fence and voted with the drill bits, undoing a twenty-year-long fight to preserve the land. Senators Landrieu, Akaka and Inouye were the reason this went 51-49 the wrong way.

Advocates for drilling in ANWR have said the issue is nobody's business but the Alaskan people?s, so there is some irony in the fact that one Senator from Louisiana and two from Hawaii -- the three of whom are a combined 20,000 miles away from Alaska - made the difference here. Mary Landrieu's constituents include a bustling petrochemical industry out there in the Gulf, and I guess Akaka and Inouye somehow think drilling in Alaska will make Hawaii's expensive gas a little cheaper. Seems worth it, don't you think?

This isn't the first time Ms. Landrieu has gone sideways on an important vote. She voted in favor of cloture on the ruinous bankruptcy bill, and then voted for the bill itself. In a statement about her ANWR vote, Landrieu said, "My colleagues and I have been encouraged in recent days that a revenue-sharing measure is forthcoming that will benefit our coastal oil- and gas-producing states. Hopefully, we'll be able to get this done this year, just as we have helped Alaska today."

Yeah. Thanks for the help.

Here?s the thing, Mary: Democrats from all across the country contributed to your campaign in 2002. A lot of people worked very hard for you. Oour victory was one small bright spot in the debacle that was the 2002 midterm elections, a debacle that included the death of Paul Wellstone, a man whose eyes you could not now meet were he alive today to see how you've been voting. A lot of people helped you, and ANWR belonged to all of us. Your betrayal here is epic in its proportions, yet sadly all too common these days.

As for the Hawaii boys, well...A small, dark, treacherous, venomous, vindictive little corner of my soul is devoutly hoping they find a few barrels of oil nestled in the ground under Pearl Harbor, or under Pu'uhonuo O Honaunau Historical Park, or under Honokohau Harbor, or right where the water hits the ground at Moanawaiopuna Waterfall. Even one barrel will bring the petro boys running with pickaxes and a gleam in their eyes, and hey, what's good for Alaska is good for Hawaii, right? My Massachusetts Senators can vote to drill in Hawaii's most beautiful spots even though our state is something like 92 time zones away. After all, we?re in this together.

This weekend, a global protest will be taking place. Here in America, there will be demonstrations in 574 cities and towns in all 50 states. Ostensibly, this protest is to be aimed at the anniversary of the invasion and occupation of Iraq. It needs to be about more than that now. It needs to be about public, vocal citizen action in and of itself. It needs to be about We The People reaching out to the one recourse we have left while we still have it: The streets, our numbers and our voices.

Yesterday was a bad, bad day. Today and tomorrow will probably be worse, and next month isn't even to be contemplated. You are running out of options, so you?d better make use of the few arrows left in the quiver: Economic boycotts and the streets. Put your boogie shoes on. In the meantime, I leave our three stalwart ANWR Senators with some words to mull over.

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all convictions, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

- W.B. Yeats, 'The Second Coming'

Fat Phobes & Terry Schiavo

2005-03-20T08:16:00.000-08:00

OK folks, I figured there was something behind all this..

TAMPA (AP) — Before she was the severely brain-damaged patient at the center of a legal dispute over whether she should live or die, Terri Schiavo was a young woman who desperately wanted to be thin.

At 26, she was strikingly beautiful with delicate features. But she had spent her childhood and high school years as a chubby and shy girl, standing just 5-foot-3 and weighing 200 pounds at her heaviest.

When she finally lost 65 pounds in her late teens, men started to pay attention — including the man who would become her husband, Michael Schiavo, who was tall and handsome.

But keeping the weight off was a struggle for Terri Schiavo, and years later — after her heart stopped briefly, cutting off oxygen to the brain — a malpractice case brought against a doctor on her behalf would reveal she had been trying to survive on liquids and was making herself throw up after meals. The Schiavos' lawyer said her 1990 collapse was caused by a potassium imbalance brought on by an eating disorder.

It is a cruel twist lost on no one close to the case: A woman who is said to have struggled with an eating disorder is now in the middle of a court battle over whether her feeding tube should be removed so that she can starve to death.

Gary Fox, a lawyer who represented Terri and Michael Schiavo in the malpractice case, said the disease is the "lost lesson" in the Schiavo case.

"While there is no cure for bulimia, there were things that could and should have been done for her that would have controlled it," he said in a recent interview.

Terri Schiavo, 41, is now locked in what some doctors say is a persistent vegetative state, with no hope of recovery. In one of the nation's longest right-to-die disputes, her husband is fighting with her parents to have the feeding tube removed; a court order preventing its removal expires at 5 p.m. Friday.

Like almost every element in the case, whether Schiavo really was bulimic is in dispute. Her father, Robert Schindler, said he does not believe his daughter had an eating disorder and thinks her husband had something to do with her collapse. Michael Schiavo has denied hurting his wife.

During the malpractice case, at least one of Schiavo's friends testified they knew she was bulimic because after meals out, she always immediately excused herself to go to the bathroom. Her husband also knew she had peculiar eating patterns but did not realize they were dangerous, Fox said.

Medical records from the hospital where Schiavo was treated after her collapse note that "she apparently has been trying to keep her weight down with dieting by herself, drinking liquids most of the time during the day and drinking about 10-15 glasses of iced tea."

Fox said that in the months before her collapse, Schiavo went to the doctor because she had stopped menstruating. It was a silent "cry for help," the lawyer said. But the doctor did not take a complete medical history that might have revealed an eating disorder.

The jury put the damages at $6.8 million but reduced the verdict to about $2 million because it felt Schiavo was partly at fault for her collapse.

Fox said Schiavo was a victim of medical negligence, but also a victim of societal pressures to be thin. "She didn't want to go back to where she was from," he said. "This was the only way she could do this in her mind and be able to eat as much as she did."

Eating disorders have long been known to cause heart failure. According to the National Eating Disorders Association, the binge-and-purge cycles of bulimia can lead to chemical imbalances that harm major organs.

David Herzog, a Harvard psychology professor and founder of the Harvard Eating Disorders Center, said medical science is only in the early stages of tracking the long-term effects of eating disorders and there are no good statistics on how many people are killed or permanently disabled. Herzog said that even when someone dies from an eating disorder, medical examiners often do not list it on the death certificate.

Experts say the serious health risks exist long before a victim looks sick. In Schiavo's case, Fox said, she was not excessively thin when she went to the doctor.

Psychologist Doug Bunnell, president of the National Eating Disorders Association, said while he could not comment on the specifics of the Schiavo case, it is often impossible to predict which sufferers are in immediate danger.

"Paint me a picture of an eating disorder — it's an emaciated woman," he said. "But that's not the reality. They don't get down that low. The face of eating disorders is your next-door neighbor's daughter or maybe your own."

Would you idiots who want to preserve her life look at this?? SHE DID THIS TO HERSELF!! She was bulimic! She was EATING AND THEN THROWING IT ALL UP!! Don't you see the irony in this? She didn't WANT FOOD! She hated food! She blamed food for making her "fat and unattractive" and me personally...

I BLAME EVERY PERSON OUT THERE WHO HAS EVER MADE FUN OF A FAT PERSON AND HATED FAT PEOPLE FOR BEING FAT FOR HER CURRENT CONDITION! YOU ALL ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR THIS, YOU DID THIS TO HER, YOU CREATED A SITUATION WHEREIN A WOMAN CANNOT BE HAPPY WITH HERSELF AT WHATEVER WEIGHT SHE IS! FUCK YOU ALL! EVERY LAST SCREAMING STINKING ONE OF YOU!

That's why she's in this vegitative state! She wanted to be thin! Well, she's thin now, that's for sure! Are you fat phobes happy now? You'd better not be screaming to preserve her life and feed her because you fat phobic people didn't want her to eat before she developed the eating disorder! Oooh, can't have a fat woman, can we? Oh how horrible, that she weighed 200 pounds! *hiss hiss snarl*

I hope you're fucking happy now. If she dies, no matter what from, her life is on your heads.

The Ostarablot

2005-03-20T06:31:00.000-08:00

Well, we did Ostara last night and it went just fine. I had different people reading the parts of the players in the Skirnismal. Chip was Freyr, Anne was Gerd, I was Skadi (she only had one line at the very beginning), Joe was Skirnir (because he had a lot of lines with a lot of weird Norse words in them that most other people could not pronounce) and Peter was the watchman (who only had 2 lines).

The only part where I thought, "Oh dear, this is a bit much," was the comment about the goat urine.

Well, Skirnir is sent to woo Gerd for Freyr. He offers her lovely gifts, but she refuses. He threatens her with death and she refuses. Only when Skirnir threatens her with baneful magic that will render her forever barren and ugly, does she relent -- and that includes leaving her to a life of drinking goat urine.

Eeeeeeeeeeeeeewwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww.

I'd relent too. Sex with a God is far better than goat's urine.

I rather hope I didn't piss people off by doing this. See, at the beginning of March, at the last Mystic Grove meeting, Tom said, "So who's going to do Ostara?" and there was complete silence. So I said I'd write up a ritual.

This was apparently ignored, because later an email went out saying everyone should bring something and prepare to improvise a ritual. I then sent out an email saying, "I've written one AS I AGREED TO DO AT THE LAST MEETING, and here it is," and I inserted the blot. Apparently this went ignored too. Is this some weird game of "let's ignore Tracie and she'll go away" kind of thing? Are these people getting tired of Joe and I doing blots, and they don't want to do the same thing twice in a row? As Jarred commented to me on chat, are they just ravens looking for the next shiny? WHAT IS IT people have against consistency and REAL RITUAL??

I think there's this huge push for CREATIVITY amongst Wiccans, and they think, "Oh, if I do the same thing every Ostara, it's not being creative," and they feel obligated to write a new ritual for every ceremony, every year. Can't do what we did last year for Ostara, that's being stagnant. We have to be creative and do something new!

And sure enough, by the time Joe and I got there last night, an altar was already set up for ritual. GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR.

But here's the thing...

I DID SOMETHING...I WAS PREPARED TO DO A BLOT, AND NO ONE ELSE VOLUNTEERED TO DO SHIT!

They all sat there like a bunny in the headlights when Tom said, "Who's doing Ostara?" And I didn't want to volunteer, because I ALWAYS DO THAT! I think I'm the only one, besides Tom and Mary, who has a clue how to do ritual! Hell, getting people to volunteer to read parts was hard enough, AND IT WAS ALL RIGHT THERE IN PRINT!

SO WHY ARE PEOPLE PAGANS? ARE THEY JUST PLAYGANS AND INTO IT BECAUSE IT'S THE LATEST FASHION?? SO THEY CAN BE SHOCKING AND WEAR OCCULT JEWELRY AND BE POSERS??

The single most important bit of jewelry I have, and it isn't even occult, is my gold claddagh ring (for those who may not know what a claddagh is, click here). I bought that back in 1989 when I committed to the Pagan path, and it is something that speaks to my Irish ancestry. I've worn it every day since then as a physical sign of my decision to be Pagan. That ring means more to me than anything else I have.

Well, like I said, I hope I didn't want to piss anyone off by being prepared, but if they don't like it, let them step up and deliver.

During the sumbel (the part where you pass the horn and drink toasts and sing a song or say an oath or whatever) our Panda/Shannon decided to take the floor and talk about her late mother, and the minni hof (basically an altar to her memory) that she'd set up in the west. She got rather emotional about it, and Joe (who at the moment was passing the horn around and also the blessing bowl so people could pour a tiny bit of tea into the bowl - I decided to go with tea this time because it was quick and easy) had to stop and give her a hug so she could get her equilibrium about her again.

I'm very glad she did that.

That's what the sumbel is supposed to be. Emotional. Passionate. Intense. If you're going to sing a song, sing with a firm voice, even if it's not very good. No one cares if you're good or not, just that there was some passion in your song. If you're going to get all misty-eyed about your late grandmother, bawl your eyes out. If you're going to say a boast or make an oath, do it with fireworks. Have some BALLS about it! Ironically, it's exactly like what Steven Curtis Chapman sings about in one of his songs:

Everyone around creation
Is a living declaration
Come join the song we were made to sing
Wake the neighbors
Get the word out
Crank up the music
Climb a mountain and shout
This is LIFE we've been given
Meant to be lived out
So la la la la LIVE OUT LOUD!

It's ironic because Mr. Chapman is a Christian musician. I think he's even an ordained minister as well. But I do really like that song and what it talks about; how can one be all small and quiet if one has the love of the Gods in one's heart? He says "God" in the song, of course, but it's still a lively, upbeat song.

Most of the time when I do a blot and a sumbel, people are very shy and quiet about drinking to something. I want high emotion. Tell you what - the Einherjar who even now sit in Valhall waiting for the Ragnarok are not being meek, quiet heroes. They're noshing on juicy pork, they're quaffin' ale (quaffin' is sort of like drinking only you spill more) and they're getting busy with the wenches and boasting of their battle exploits, the whole nine yards. They go out and fight every day, and those who are "killed" are alive again at the end of the battle, and they go back in at eventide and feast all over again. Feasting! Drinking! Boasting! Nookie everywhere! Battle! Tests of strength and courage!

Seems like a sweet afterlife, eh? This is where Joe hopes to be after he dies; those who die in battle have an E-ticket to Valhall. Those who don't, have to make their own way from Hel to Asgard, where Valhall is.

And no, Hel is not an afterlife of punishment. It's more like...a quiet misty autumn evening. That's about the worst of it.

Well, there it is. The Ostarablot. Tom is doing Beltane, and I think Chip will be doing Midsummer, and Midsummer is when we can have an alfablot, and do a sumbel to the male ancestors such as Chip would like to see. He's far more identified with his alfhar than the disir (female ancestors). So, since the Winter Solstice is the time to drink to the disir, the Summer Solstice is the time to drink to the alfhar. But he may be in Ireland by that time, and we may have to work something else out; I don't know.

Update

2005-03-19T08:35:00.000-08:00

It's finally Saturday. This is a good thing.

Tonight we will be doing the Ostara festivities. But I am going to have to tweak the blot. Hmmmmm. I may focus on Freyja and Her aspect as a spring maiden sort. I may also do a bondage thing (snicker) -- breaking the bonds of winter and all.

I did not wear green on Irish Heritage Day. I wore red & white...the colors associated with the Otherworld, the world that was driven underground when St. Patrick brought the Gospel to Ireland. A lot of people at work asked me that. I said, "I'm not wearing green because I am not and never have been Catholic, and this is a Catholic holiday." They said so what, everyone's Irish on St. Patrick's Day and I said, "I'm of Irish ancestry EVERY DAY. But I'm HEATHEN." At which point they giggled. No, people, when I say I'm Heathen, that doesn't mean I live a wild, godless life. I think a lot of people take "heathen" to mean just that.

*sigh*

But we did go over to Susan's house (Tom's current girlfriend, not the Susan that is Joe's ex) and had some lovely Irish stew and colcannon and various other nibblies, as well as plenty of ale and Guinness. A lovely time was had by all.

But, since I will be doing a blot this evening, I'll be wearing Frigga's colors, blue and white. I always do when I do blot.

There's been some interesting developments in the news. Terry Schiavo's feeding tube was removed yesterday. I say it's about time. Let her go. Let her have some peace. I can't understand why they are focusing only on her and not every single person in this country that is on life support...surely she's not the only one in this whole nation right now. I do believe she had a living will, in which case that indicates she didn't want to be kept alive artificially.

I'm hungry. I need to chase down some breakfast.

My Big Fat Fat Rant

2005-03-15T17:07:00.000-08:00

From the blog of RuPaul:
"i love "camp" because it blows the lid on self-righteousness and reminds me to not take life so seriously. it also makes tolerable the rampant hypocrisy that stains our culture like a 500 year old cum rag."

I wanted to make a passing comment about an entry I saw on another site that complained about big people wearing skimpy clothes. The writer did say "people" but any time gender was mentioned at all, he used the word "women".

I've seen lots of rants very similar to that about fat people. And I did leave him a note saying that yes, I am a big woman, and yes, I have noticed that when people rant about this, 99% of the time the only people who are taken to task for this fashion faux pas are women. I think that says a lot, that overwhelmingly people automatically picture women in their heads when thinking about this particular topic.

I think it goes to show that there is some level of serious sexism inherent in Western culture, and I think it needs to be consciously combatted if the human race is going to evolve intellectually and socially.

People need to stop and think about these things before making generalized comments. They need to ask themselves if they are being truly equal and fair even in their most personal of thoughts...and while that may sound like being "thought police" I say it's utterly necessary if there's going to be a halt to the automatic, unconscious stigmatizing of women for various stupid sins that are completely pointless anyway.

It all starts with each individual person -- social revolution is not going to come from outside. No one is going to come along and save us from ourselves, and teach us how to better relate to each other and build a better world to live in. We are responsible for where we are right now, and if we don't like it we are responsible for doing something to change it.

Period.

Therefore if I do not speak up and call attention to these unconscious thought patterns that can be made conscious, and can be changed, then I am partially responsible for people continuing to mentally punish women like me for the "sin" of being big and possibly dressing in a way that people don't like.

Not that I do. I'm very conservative in my personal style. I always have been, even when I was 18 years old, weighing literally 91 pounds soaking wet. (I'm short, ya see.)

But people should be free to dress as they like and not have to consider whether or not they ARE going to be stared at. The person doing the staring CAN make the choice NOT TO DO IT. Imagine that! It's like George Carlin said about the minister who got offended at the "Seven Words You Can't Say On Television" routine that Carlin does, so he wrote an ugly letter to the radio station that broadcast Carlin's show and protested. Carlin's response?

"Pastor, if you don't like what you hear on the radio, there's these TWO KNOBS on it that a: change the station and b: turn the radio OFF! Oh, but I suppose a PASTOR wouldn't be all that COMFORTABLE with something that has TWO KNOBS ON IT!!"

Hahaha! I've always loved Carlin; he kills me.

But basically it always, always comes down to freedom of choice.

A person, no matter their weight or skin color or age or whatever, should be free to express themselves even in the clothes they wear and not have to put up with ugly repurcussions. Those who would stare and riducule and whatnot -- well, quite frankly it's THEIR problem. If they do have issues with it, maybe they need to ask themselves why. Maybe a trip to a therapist would be in order if it bothers them so much.

Reminds me of a story told by Jack Kornfield, a meditation teacher out of Barre, MA. He said that he knew someone who lived in a noisy city for some years, and was having problems with his meditation practice. "The cars are bothering me," he'd say. Well, his meditation teacher finally asked him one day, "Is it the cars coming in to bother you -- or are you going out to bother them?"

I'd say that's an eyebrow-raising question. And it made the meditation student stop in his tracks....and the next time he retired to his room to mediate, keeping this query in mind, he found his meditation went a lot better.

Funny how that happens. *wink*

See, here's the thing...if people did not wear things because they are "gross" or whatnot, then people would not do things like get tattoos. I'm sure LOTS of people out there think tattoos are really disgusting, and that only bikers and GIs get them. Well, my sister has several tasteful tattoos, and she's not a biker or a GI. If people didn't do things because of the fact that SOMEONE OUT THERE might think it's "gross" or "not right" then people wouldn't even come out of their houses.

And let's not even go into the beauty that I've seen in pictures from the fabulous WIGSTOCK festival in NYC! Drag queens EVERYWHERE, darling, looking beyond divine! Looking 100 times hotter than I EVER WILL in things like sequins and wigs and high heels and satin and lame and makeup and whatever it is they can get their hands on to make of themselves a walking work of art. But men aren't supposed to wear dresses; that's gross, right?

Oh no honey. Them's GODDESSES. They've busted boundaries in people's minds - they've had the balls (ironically, sort of) to say a big old "fuck you" to the expectations of society and REALLY go all out -- to which I say, YOU GO GIRLS! I ADORE drag queens and have known a couple here in Orlando. I've also known (biblically speaking) one person who was going through a sex change, from male to female. I damn near fell madly in love with her too. She was very, very good to me indeed.

Oh, but I shouldn't do that, because that's REALLY GROSS. That's grosser than anything, right?

Piffle.

It's all in the mind, folks.

USATODAY.com - Italy will begin Iraq troop withdrawal in September

2005-03-15T15:50:00.000-08:00

ROME (AP) — Premier Silvio Berlusconi said Tuesday that Italy will start withdrawing its 3,000 troops in Iraq in September, Italian news agencies reported.

"Already in September we will begin a progressive reduction of the number of our soldiers in Iraq," Berlusconi was quoted as saying during a taping of a state TV talk show.

Withdrawing Italian troops "will depend on the capability of the Iraqi government to give itself structures for acceptable security," the ANSA news agency quoted Berlusconi as saying. "I've spoken about it with (British Prime Minister) Tony Blair, and it's the public opinion of our countries that expects this decision."

Italian government officials already indicated that if Iraq can handle its own security, Italy would consider withdrawing. The Italian contingent is the fourth-largest in the coalition.

In Washington, White House spokesman Scott McClellan said, "We certainly appreciate the contributions of the Italians."

Opposition to the war and to Italy's involvement in Iraq is strong here. Berlusconi faced renewed pressure to pull troops out after the March 4 killing in Baghdad of an Italian intelligence agent, Nicola Calipari, as he escorted a recently released hostage to freedom.

Calipari was killed by U.S. troops, who mistakenly opened fire on his vehicle as it headed to the Baghdad's airport with freed hostage Giuliana Sgrena.

The government made it clear it was not considering a pullout following the agent's death.

When asked whether the shooting played a role in Berlusconi's decision, McClellan said, "I'm not sure I'd make a connection there. I haven't heard any comment to that effect from Italian officials."

On Tuesday, the Italian contingent suffered its 21st casualty in Iraq when a soldier accidentally shot himself in the head during target practice, officials said.

In a separate development, Italy's lower house of parliament approved the extension of financing for troops in Iraq through June. The Senate already voted to extend the mission last month.

All righty then.

Get Yer Irish Up!

2005-03-13T21:59:00.000-08:00

I would like to point out that this is the same group that banned the Seattle Ancient Order of Hibernians and any other nationalist group associated with justice in the North of participating in the Irish Festival at the Seattle Center. They do allow them to march in parade. I feel they allow that because it boosts the numbers. This group is also well known for being anti-republican so this really does not surprise me in only that it took this long for something like this to happen when they invite yearly a Loyalist politician to this event.

British Union Jack disrupts St. Patrick's Day Parade

By Tan Vinh
Seattle Times staff reporter

At the start, it looked as if the 34th annual St. Patrick's Day Parade would provide the usual afternoon of family fun, with marching bands and dancing leprechauns to honor the patron saint of the Emerald Isle.

Then a dignitary from the British territory of Northern Ireland - invited by parade sponsors to help lead the procession through downtown - raised the British Union Jack, and several spectators got their Irish up, hurling objects and expletives at him during the milelong march.

To Irish Americans who object to the British rule of Northern Ireland, carrying that flag was considered the equivalent of "waving the Confederate flag at a Martin Luther King march," several Irish American community groups said yesterday.

Lisburn Mayor Cecil Calvert, appeared unfazed, even as passers-by got in his face and yelled in his ears. One woman tried to knock the flag out of his hands.

"This is a slap in the face. That flag represents the military occupation of Ireland," said Jenna Stephens, who paraded with the Committee for Truth and Justice in Ireland.

Calvert said he was merely celebrating St. Patrick's Day like everyone else. The holiday, he said, "is not just for the nationalist community."

The Irish Heritage Club traditionally invites dignitaries from Ireland to join in the parade.

The Seattle-based club invited the mayor from Lisburn last year without incident and had no indication that the new mayor would carry the Union Jack flag until the day before the parade.

Parade organizers tried to talk him out of it, but according to Calvert's aides, "He felt it was important to demonstrate his British roots," said John Keane, a spokesman for the Irish Heritage Club. "We felt we did not have the right to censor him."

"I was disappointed in him," Keane said of the mayor. "But I was also disappointed in the reaction of some people. They allowed him to provoke them."

Many cursed at Calvert but no fights broke out, and the Seattle police made no arrests.

The pre-parade events were a clue that this year's would not be the usual St. Patrick's Day celebration. During the Irish and the American national anthems, dignitaries, by tradition, stand on the second floor of a building at the corner of Fourth Avenue and Jefferson Street with the Irish and the U.S. flags.

Among them were parade co-grand marshal Rob McKenna, the state attorney general, and Mayor Catherine Connolly of Galway, Seattle's sister city in Ireland. Calvert was a no-show.

Then Calvert appeared at the start of the parade with his flag. Some passers-by taunted him, but the mayor ignored them. Later, Calvert emphasized he was not making any political statement, merely carrying the flag of his people.

"It is not our intention to have any confrontation. We are here in the spirit of friendship," said Lisburn Chief Executive Norman Davidson, who marched with the mayor.

"I am very upset. They [parade organizers] should have taken the flag from him," said Bernadette Noonan, who was in the parade with another group.

(Now come on...who in their right mind even BRINGS a Union Jack to a St. Pat's parade? Can ANYONE say Oliver Cromwell???)

Stuff

2005-03-13T08:24:00.000-08:00

Yesterday was the 6th annual Acorn Community Goddess Faire. Mystic Grove had a table there and did a little fundraising. Joe sold 5 sets of runes. It was nice out there yesterday. It was held on someone's land...I think it's Shawna's home and land. Anyway, it was enjoyable. Joe and I have two sand chairs that we use when we go to events like this, and they have seen a lot of mileage out of our buns!

I did find myself scratching my head and wondering about the fashion show, however. No, it wasn't a literal fashion show, but there were a lot of people there - mostly women did this - who were dressed in layers upon layers of medieval clothing, and in FL at this time of year it's quite warm. Not blazing hot, but enough to where layers would be terribly uncomfortable. And no one was removing said layers as the temperature climbed during the day. People just wanted to look like medieval peasantry, I suppose, and so they did. But brilliantly colored medieval peasantry. Kym Dragon showed up swathed in pink and cream, for example, with dark blue petticoats underneath her pink dress and cream bodice. Someone else did something completely different and dressed in black vinyl pants, which is hotter than hell. And just about everyone of both genders wore some kind of tall boots, not to mention the full capes and cloaks I was seeing. You'd think it was winter!

No, for me, when I go to outdoor events like this, it's plain jeans & a T shirt all the way. And I'll bring a sweater if I get cold once the sun goes down. Oh, and let's not forget comfortable, sturdy shoes that will protect my feet against "curse burrs" and fire ants. My moccasins did just fine for that purpose. I wore long pants yesterday for that very reason - protection from sun, burrs, ants and mosquitoes. This IS Florida, after all. Yeah, I got slightly warm, but not unbearably so. I also had my golf umbrella to shade me from the sun -- I'd forgotten my sunscreen, so I just opened my umbrella over my head and made do with that. Worked just fine - I only got slightly pink in my face and that's it. Heather wore a spaghetti-strap top and no sunscreen and didn't sit in the shade - and got burned. She's very fair.

Saw Stacey/Morgaine at the Goddess Faire. She ignored Mystic Grove completely. I chose not to do ritual with her, because I can't stand in circle with her. I just don't see how it's possible to stand in a religious ceremony designed to strengthen community with a person I have a lot of anger towards, and whom I feel has wronged me and owes me an apology. Of course, she was being her usual snotty-ass self and talking only to those people she thought were cool enough for her attentions. Thankfully, no one else in Mystic Grove participated in that circle either, including Joe. I was hoping at least he would sit out the ceremony in solidarity with me.

Besides, I'm doing the Ostarablot next weekend anyway. No sense in doing two rituals for one holiday. I reserve that kind of activity for Jul.

Joe did make an interesting comment, however, on the drive home. As we watched the Ostara circle from our table, he noticed that Kym Dragon had people kneeling during the invocation. Joe has serious problems approaching the Gods on his knees. Even if he didn't have knee problems from having run track in his youth, he wouldn't kneel before the Gods. Esp. considering they invoked Odin and Ostara during that ritual, and Odin is the God he's specifically dedicated to!

When I write up a ritual or blot, there's no kneeling or even sitting involved. People are on their feet for the whole rite. Dignified. Of course, I don't keep them there for very long, as I know feet get sore from just standing around.

I'm debating on how I'm going to write up the Ostarablot. I'm considering using a particular story from the Eddas, the Skirnismal for this blot. Last year I did the theft of Idunna's apples, which seemed to me a perfectly good myth for this time of year. I'm going to try this one this year and see if I like it better. Joe had commented that the Idunna story didn't seem quite right for the season, and I can't figure out why, so I thought to myself, "Well, there's no harm in trying something different to see if it works; it's the only way to find out" and going with the Skirnismal this year. If I don't like it, I'll go with the Idunna story instead from here on out. Hey, I offered that rite to Mystic Grove to put it into a book of rituals, sort of like a Book of Shadows. Why not use it year after year? That's what a RITUAL is, after all!

Pity there's little lore on Ostara Herself. I just can't find any stories about Her and what She does and how She interacts with other Gods or the Jotun or whatever. Oh, I know what Her symbols are - rabbits, hares, eggs, flowers, all that spring stuff. Everything you see for Easter are Ostara symbols. But, because there's not much out there on Ostara Herself, that's why I'm considering enacting the Skirnismal or doing it as a guided meditation. I'm leaning towards guided meditation, myself.

Yesterday during the ritual at the Goddess Faire, there was a lot of emphasis on balance, because this is the Vernal Equinox coming up. Night and day are equal, balanced. But the thing is...balance does not lead to progress. Progress is controlled imbalance. Just watch what happens when you walk. Taking each step is an exercise in controlled imbalance. Even the Tao Te Ching says, "If you would be whole, let yourself be partial." It's something of a paradox, that's for sure. Balance means standing still, going nowhere, stagnation. I've noticed that the word "balance" is such a buzzword among Pagans, yet have most of them really examined balance?

Ah, but if you ask someone like Morgaine, that snotty wench, I don't know what I'm talking about. I'm a dumbass and not worthy to be listened to or even given the time of day.

Hah. I made a damned impact on her. I got her pissed off, I got her to lose control and flame me, and I still have enough of an impact for her to make it a point to ignore me -- so in a sense, she's not ignoring me. She's silently validating me and acknowledging that I'm enough of a problem to her for her to ignore me. *evil grin*

There IS a dark and perverse part of me that asks, who's pulling the strings here, then? Who is the REAL power here? Of course, I didn't talk to her either. No one in Mystic Grove spoke to her. But she's the one who took herself out of our group. She's the one who threw her hands up and flounced out in a puff of drama. No one asked her to leave. No one told her not to come back. In fact, Chip sent her a welcoming email inviting her to change her mind, but she refused. Ever since then she's pointedly refused to speak to ANYONE in Mystic Grove when she sees us around. This should get interesting, given that Mystic Grove is looking to do a lot more work with WRCF, and she's very into WRCF. (Wiccan Religious Cooperative of Florida - and personally I think they should consider changing their name if not everyone in that organization is Wiccan...and not only that, it goes to show a tiny bit of that Wiccan arrogance, assuming that Wicca = Pagan and all other forms of Paganism aren't valid...I think that having an organization that calls itself "Wiccan" anything yet is open to non-Wiccan forms of Pagan spirituality only reinforces attitudes like Stacey's so she feels she CAN throw "perfect love and perfect trust" up in faces of people like ME who don't bother with it...)

Ah well, I'd better get on with writing the Ostarablot. It's being held next Saturday, and it's not likely I'll have a lot of time during the week to do this.

Hi Folks

2005-03-10T18:32:00.000-08:00

Very tired redhead checking in. Haven't had a lot of time to blog.

I do want to, though. I have a lot of topics in my head to blog about.

But, Joe is making sets of runes for selling at the Goddess Faire this weekend. I'm writing up a ritual for next weekend's Ostara festivities.

I'm considering telling Mystic Grove that I want Jul permanently, that I want to do the Jul blot every year. This thought was brought on by the death of a member of First Unitarian Church, and I thought a sumbel was a nice opportunity for the whole church community to remember her, along with other "disir" or female ancestors. We'll see.

I'm also going to work out when we should do Alfablot, for the male ancestors. There doesn't seem to be a fixed date for that.

A brief note for those who don't know: Sharon Hiett, one of the most active members of FUCO, was killed in a bicycle accident Monday night. It's a serious blow to our church family.

That's why one of the topics I wanted to blog about was the effect that real ritual (and by that I mean something done repetitively, something most Wikkans can't understand because for some reason they feel compelled to do something different every single year and have no concept of TRADITION - ok I'll calm down) has in binding a community closer together and strengthening ties. It's really amazing.

But I'm exhausted. More on this another time.

Loss

2005-03-09T19:21:00.000-08:00

I just found out from Carie today that one of the people from church was killed in a bicycle accident Monday night.

Here is the text of the email Marni sent out on Tuesday, that Carie forwarded to me:

Members of our beloved community:

It is with the deepest sadness that I send you this email. Throughout the day, we have been attempting to contact as many people as we can so that as few of you as possible will have to learn this sad news by email.

Last night (Monday), Sharon Hiett was riding her bicycle and was hit by a car, falling from her bike and hitting the back of her head on hard pavement. She has not and will not regain consciousness. Many difficult decisions were made today. Sharon had signed an organ donor card; the process of evaluation and matching has begun and will likely be complete within 24 hours.

A memorial service has been scheduled for 2pm this Saturday at the church. In lieu of flowers (which Sharon would have considered a waste of money!), the family has asked that donations be made to the church, with the designation "Sharon Hiett Fund" on the check. Money collected will be earmarked for capital improvements in the Religious Education complex.

Many of you will want to do something. Cards are, of course, always welcome and helpful. I would also invite you to bring food to share for the reception after the service. Sharon would never want people to leave hungry!

Please hold Russ, David and Jonathan in your hearts during these difficult days.

I knew Sharon but not well. Mostly my heart just utterly breaks for her family. But on the other hand I'm so deeply thankful that there is going to be a huge, huge wave of support from the church for them. This is the kind of tsunami that is good...an outpouring of love and support and comfort during this period.

Woman's Day!

2005-03-08T14:34:00.000-08:00

PARIS (AFP) - Women's groups were to embark on a global march for equal rights, International Women's Day, amid fresh reports which paint a fairly grim picture of their plight in many parts of the world.

The world tour for a charter for equal rights gets underway in Sao Paulo, Brazil and will come to an end in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, in October after passing through over 50 countries in between.

The Women's Global Charter for Humanity was adopted by women's rights groups in Kigali, the Rwandan capital, in December.

Organisers expect 30,000 women to attend Tuesday's start of the tour. Ouagadougou, the Burkina Faso capital, was chosen as the final destination because of its poverty and low level of protection for women.

The charter proposes "to build another world where exploitation, oppression, intolerance and exclusion no longer exist, and where integrity, diversity and the rights and freedoms of all are respected."

The Montreal-based World March of Women which authored the document "views patriarchy as the system oppressing women and capitalism as the system that enables a minority to exploit the vast majority of women and men".

Some of the worst problems experienced by women around the world were highlighted in a new report by the World Organisation Against Torture, published to coincide with Women's Day.

"Gender plays a major role on the type of torture used, the circumstances in which torture is used, the consequences and the availability and access to justice," the worlds largest coalition of non-governmental organisations fighting against arbitrary detention, torture, summary and extrajudicial executions, said in its report.

The anti-torture group in particular denounced the fact that women continue to be denied legal protection against the flaunting of national and international rights, with the effect of offering impunity to the transgressors.

The World Organisation Against Torture (WOAT) denounced the rape, and other violence against women and girls, perpetrated in Bangladesh, Colombia, Greece, Sri Lanka, Nepal and Sudan.

Meanwhile the UN food agency said Tuesday it was committed to reducing additional burdens often put on women in developing countries, as children have a better chance of growing up well-nourished when women are in control of food.

"While women's access to food is all important, it is vital that we minimize the impact of the additional burden that this may create," said James Morris, executive director of the World Food Programme.

Practice had shown that ensuring women's control over food often adds to an already heavy burden of responsibility, the agency said.

Women are also increasingly in the line of fire from the multi-billion-dollar international trade in small arms, according to a report released on Monday by Amnesty International, Oxfam and a third group.

In South Africa, a woman is shot dead by a current or former partner every 18 hours, while in the United States, two out of every three women killed by their husbands are shot, said the report released on the eve of International Women's Day.
"Women are silent sufferers in the proliferation of small arms. This is the scandal against the human race," said Judy Bassingthwaite, a representative of the South African-based International Action Network on Small Arms which also authored the report entitled: "The Impact of Guns on Women's Lives".

In Asia, women trail well behind their male counterparts in terms of social-economic advancement although the gap is closing in some countries, a regional survey released Monday said.

The inaugural MasterIndex of Women's Advancement measuring the social-economic success of women in 13 regional economies, MasterCard International said. A score below 100 indicated gender inequality in favor of men.

It used four key indicators -- labor force, tertiary education, managerial positions and median income. Of the 13 markets surveyed, gender inequality was highest in South Korea with a score of 45.5 followed by Indonesia at 52.5 and Japan at 54.5.

Women in Thailand fared best with scores of 92.3 followed by Malaysia at 86.2, China at 68.4 and Australia at 67.6.

It's not all bad news for women, however.

A new women's political party is set to emerge in Sweden, a country already considered a world-leader in women's rights.

And in Kuwait on Monday the parliament agreed to a government request to speed up moves to look into a bill that would grant women political rights, but did not set a date for the proposed debate.

However the European Union voiced shock and concern at the "disproportionate" use of force by Turkish police to clamp down on a demonstration in Istanbul ahead of International Women's Day.

Cyberbullies

2005-03-07T05:43:00.000-08:00

SAN FRANCISCO — When Joanne had a row with a longtime friend last year, she had no idea it would spill into cyberspace.

But what started as a spat at a teenage sleepover swiftly escalated into a three-month harangue of threatening e-mails and defacement of her weblog. "It was a non-stop nightmare," says Joanne, 14, a freshman at a private high school in Southern California. "I dreaded going on my computer."

The bullying eventually stopped after her parents and school officials intervened. But Joanne remains shaken by the experience.

The incident reflects the latest way technology is altering the social lives of children at an age when they are especially vulnerable to insults. The emergence of cyberbullying has intensified adolescent angst. It allows bullies to unleash put-downs, nasty rumors and humiliating pictures in e-mail and blogs that can strike victims at home and at any time. The damage can be devastating, psychologists say, even as it is not always obvious to parents and teachers.

Cyberbullies, mostly ages 9 to 14, are using the anonymity of the Web to mete out pain without witnessing the consequences. The problem — aggravated by widespread use of wireless devices such as cell phones and BlackBerrys — is especially prevalent in affluent suburbs, where high-speed Internet use is high and kids are technically adept, says Parry Aftab, executive director of WiredSafety.org, an online safety group.

"Some kids can't wait to get home so they can continue taunting," says Aftab, who is also an Internet lawyer.

"Maybe we need to protect kids from one another online as much as we shield them from dangerous adults."

Often, the social cruelties escape the notice of schools, which focus on problems on campus, and of parents, who are unaware of what their kids are doing online.

Many victims don't tell their parents, out of fear they'll be barred from using the Internet, Aftab and others say.

Several parents agreed to have their children interviewed by USA TODAY, but only if their last names were not used and a parent monitored the call. They feared their children would face another round of taunting if they were publicly identified.

"What happens online, stays online. There is a code of silence," says Nancy Willard, a tech lawyer and executive director of Center for Safe and Responsible Internet Use in Eugene, Ore.

'No one can help you'

"You feel as if no one can help you," says Alyssa, 14, who waited two weeks before telling her mother she was being bullied by a boy who called her a "loser" and "stupid" in instant messages. "It's a lonely, scary feeling."

The problem appears to be growing, as more kids chat on the Internet. Half of 3,000 U.S. children surveyed the past six months said they or someone they know have been victims or guilty of cyberbullying, WiredSafety.org says.

In Louisiana, a 15-year-old girl was arrested in January and accused of "cyberstalking," posting photos of a male student on a Web site.

At Oak View Elementary School in Fairfax, Va., last year, sixth-grade students conducted an online poll to determine the ugliest classmate, school officials say.

Cyberbullying is so pervasive in Westchester County, N.Y., that officials held a half-day conference last month for students, parents, teachers and law-enforcement officials. Six hundred attended.

When 200 students were asked how many had been a victim or perpetrator, or had a friend who was either, all but six raised their hands, county officials say.

The Internet has changed the dynamics of schoolyard bullying, counselors and teachers say. Before, a big, intimidating boy typically pushed people around or stared them down. Now, the technically astute — boys and girls — harass for different reasons.

Victims and bullies

According to Aftab, there are those who fancy themselves "vengeful angels" who come to someone's defense but go too far; "mean girls" who gang up on others as a glorified social activity; the "power hungry," a direct descendant of the classic bully who tries to assert control over those considered weaker; and inadvertent bullies, who don't realize they've hurt someone's feelings.

"Two burly kids can take an issue outside and settle it with their fists," says Teri Schroeder, CEO of i-Safe America, a non-profit that teaches Internet safety to children."Cyberbullies can turn tormenting into a long-pitched battle involving dozens of people."

Victims are often targeted because they are considered different — usually those considered overweight, small, with a learning disability or overly sensitive. Many face dirty digital tricks that range from derogatory comments about them online to embarrassing e-mail attributed to them intended to insult friends and crushes.

Boys and girls are both bullies and victims. MindOh Foundation, an e-learning company for kids who have trouble in school, found widespread online bullying by 5,502 U.S. boys and girls it surveyed in January.

There is a pattern to their meanness. While girls generally mock others for their physical appearance, boys tend to make more sexually explicit comments, says Mary Worthington, an elementary-education counselor for Network of Victim Assistance (NOVA). The non-profit group offers prevention-education programs to students and parents.

Ashlee DuPont,a former elementary school teacher in Birmingham, Ala., says she was "sickened" by the manner girls manipulated one another with instant messages. "I grew to hate that," DuPont says.

Excluded from buddy lists

Sometimes, excluding a classmate from buddy lists and online communities can be as damaging. "What used to happen with cliques, with kids making others feel they don't belong, is part of the Internet experience," says Donna O'Brien, coordinator for curriculum and instruction at Lake Zurich Community Unit School District near Chicago.

She says it is common for middle-school girls there to dictate who can wear what the next day. "A typical exchange is, 'Only the cool girls wear leopard-skin pants, and you can't,' " O'Brien says.

"Kids without empathy are getting sucked into posting derogatory comments to be part of a group," Worthington says. "There's no malice aforethought."

Bullies called griefers even lurk on multiplayer gaming sites.

Michael, 11, a fifth-grader in the Los Angeles area, stopped using his computer for six months after a brush with a griefer. After he beat another boy in an online game, several of the boy's friends threatened Michael in a chat room.

"If I find you, I will beat you up," one message read. Frightened, Michael blocked their IM addresses but didn't tell his parents for two weeks. "It scared me," he recalls. "It was the first time I was bullied."

Michael's mother, Patty, encouraged him to use his PC again — but with limits. He and his 16-year-old sister are barred from chat rooms and limited to one hour a day online, unless homework requires more time. "Cyberbullying is a scary thing, but kids need to keep up with technology," she says.

Most cyberbullies are unrepentant, but some insist their remarks were in retaliation and may have gone too far.

When Gerald, 14, was accused by another student of using a racial slur to describe a female friend, he went on the attack late last year. He spread a rumor that his female accuser was a prostitute.

His instant message ended up on a Web site popular among students at his high school in Tampa. He apologized to the embarrassed girl, and she told him she was sorry for starting the online exchange.

"This is so common at our school," says Gerald, who spends about three hours a day exchanging instant messages.

Fighting back

School officials walk a tightrope to protect victims without trampling the free-speech rights of bullies — many of whom operate anonymously.

If schools harshly discipline alleged cyberbullies, they risk litigation from angry parents.

"It's a delicate balance of free speech, child protection and parental supervision," says Andrew Spano, county executive for Westchester County, N.Y.

A lawsuit filed by Stuart and Laura Beath on behalf of their son, a former student at a private school in St. Louis, claims he was wrongfully expelled. School officials say Matthew Beath, 17, was booted for his role in circulating sexually explicit photos of a freshman girl over the Internet.

A trial is scheduled for July in St. Louis County Circuit Court. The school had no comment. Gerard Carmody, a lawyer representing the Beaths, says Matthew is "a good kid" with no disciplinary history.

To minimize the threat of lawsuits and take pressure off school administrators, at least one lawmaker — Washington state Sen. Jeanne Kohl-Welles, D-Seattle — has sponsored a bill that would add an electronic component to a state law prohibiting traditional bullying. Under the bill, cyberbullying would not have to occur on school property, during school hours or with school equipment, as long as it has an adverse effect on a student or school. Punishment would be up to each school.

Until new rules are in place, however, many schools are holding anti-cyberbullying assemblies. "Kids are willing to openly discuss their problems if you put them in a group setting," says former victim Alyssa, who now helps others by speaking about her experience at schools nationwide. "When you do, they're pumped and want to help each other."

Kids need to be sensitized

Experts in face-to-face bullying, meanwhile, are devising new strategies to cope with the Internet's impact. They advocate workshops for education and community leaders to detect and respond to the problem, tutorials on how technology influences behavior, and a grounding in legal issues.

Ultimately, they say, kids need to be sensitized to the sting of being bullied. "There are ongoing ways for kids to hurt each other," says folk singer Peter Yarrow of Peter, Paul and Mary, and founder of Operation Respect, a non-profit that teaches tolerance in schools. "If it isn't the Internet, it's reality TV or something else."

The best advice for cyberbully victims is to get parents and school officials involved as soon as possible and not suffer in silence, NOVA's Worthington says. Fighting back only engages bullies, who want a reaction. "Handling bullying online is different than staring down someone in the schoolyard and asking them to stop," she says.

The encouraging news is that more students, parents and administrators are learning about — and coping with — the newest form of bullying.

"Maybe we're less tolerant of people being pushed around," O'Brien says. "We used to tell kids to get over it, that boys will be boys. But there can be long-lasting scars that sometimes result in violence if we ignore this."

Emails

2005-03-06T09:04:00.000-08:00

Here I'll post the two long emails I sent to Mom, coming out to her about my involvement with the Craft and the UU church...

EMAIL 1:
As I have mentioned before, I have an involvement with a local church -- a Unitarian church, not a Methodist church. I don't want to be associated with the Methodists any more. In fact, I'm not very happy with Christianity as a whole and haven't been for many years now.

In 1989 or so, I started reading about Wicca or Witchcraft. My views on it have changed since then, and the actual Wiccan "scene" has changed. The way I see things, over the past 16 years, the Wiccan world has degenerated into what is known as "fluff bunny" nonsense. "Fluff bunny" nonsense means things like

1. Viewing Goddess as all sweetness and light and purity and gentleness and a Barbie doll in a medieval dress
2. Not accepting certain unpleasant aspects of life, such as death (be it of a relationship or a relative or a pet or whatever) but paying shallow lip service to it anyway
3. Buying a lot of paraphernalia that is utterly unnecessary, such as wands, crystals, robes, tons of cheap sterling silver jewelry, Tarot cards and/or runes and/or Ogham staves (methods of divination) and special crushed velvet bags in assorted colors to hold said cards/runes/etc.....things like that

The only really useful things I've ever seen in a metaphysical bookstore are the herbs, and even then it depends on what they're used for -- herbs have healing properties, of course, but there's also the magical properties and many people make special sachets that are supposed to be magically effective with herbs and certain colors of cloth and ribbon, etc. For example, a sachet made with dried rose petals and wrapped in pink or red cloth and tied with a pink or red ribbon would be used for "attracting love" or something like that. Included in this sachet would be a small chunk of rose quartz (pink in color, naturally) as well as a drawing of a heart, or anything that suggests love, that can fit into a tiny bag.

Sometimes being a "kitchen witch" has its advantages. Many witches I know are quite handy with things and make their own natural soaps, incenses, candles, bath salts, shampoo, etc. Some of them sew as well.

Me, I went in a different direction. I studied theology (from the Greek "theo" meaning "God" and "ology" meaning "study"). Only more properly, I should say "thea-ology" ("thea" meaning "Goddess").

I felt more drawn to feminist theology. This is something that seems farfetched, but isn't; many women in the most prestigious universities have made a life out of feminist theology.

Some of these women theologians did not leave the Christian faith - one woman, Elizabeth Schussler-Fiorenza, comes to mind. She teaches at Harvard Divinity School and is a feminist Catholic herself, and had her daughter baptized as a Catholic, even against the protests of many of her feminist colleagues.

Some did leave the Christian faith and walk with the old Goddesses - Carol P. Christ of San Jose State University (and a Yale graduate) comes to mind. In her personal spiritual path, she walks with the Greek love Goddess, Aphrodite. She wrote a book about her experiences coming to women's spirituality, titled "Laughter of Aphrodite." I have this book and I like a lot of it, but I do disagree with certain things in it.

In my own personal life, I have had my own mystical experience with a Goddess. As you know, I participated in a women's spirituality group for three years here in Orlando. I became a fount of Goddess information, and very practiced at conducting different rituals for various holidays and whatnot.

A word, before I continue - these rituals are really not anything dark or horrible. Most people hear the word "ritual" and think it means something bad. When I use it, "ritual" refers to a brief celebration that ties in with the seasonal cycles.

For example: I led the Yuletide ritual this past December. I created the whole thing, start to finish, and wrote the liturgy/invocations, even spoke some of it in Old Norse, and basically acted as a minister would during the Christmas Eve service. I basically led a worship service.

"Yule" (or as I prefer to spell it "Jul") is the Germanic New Year and is held around 21 December, the winter solstice. It's the longest night of the year. There are certain folktales/stories that are associated with Jul, and a few songs have survived into the modern times, the most obvious one being "Deck the Halls".

"See the blazing Yule before us - fa lalalala, lalalala..." or "Troll the ancient Yuletide carol - fa lalalala, lalalala"

The word "Jul" means "wheel" and Jul is regarded as that time of year when the Year Wheel turns, the old year gives way and the New Year is born from the darkness of the year's longest night.

Another ritual I have created and led was the Feast of St. Bridget. This is usually observed around 2 February...do you remember me calling and commenting about finding things in red & white, because they are Bridget's colors? Bridget wasn't always a Catholic saint. She was the Irish Goddess of the hearth and smithy, of poetry and inspiration, and medicine and healing. The Irish people loved Brighid (as Her name is spelled in Gaelic) so deeply that the Catholic church decided to canonize Her and make Her a saint. They call Her "Mary of the Gaels" meaning Mary of the Gaelic-speaking people. She was said to have been Mary's own midwife at Christ's birth, and even was foster-mother to Christ. (The Irish never lacked for imagination and creavitity when it came to storytelling.)

Coming up later this month is the Spring Equinox, but I have opted not to lead this particular ritual. I could do so, but I have to give other people an opportunity to do it so they can learn how.

All of this is done via a group I am part of at First Unitarian Church of Orlando. Unitarians are very open-minded people, and are quite tolerant of people who follow a Pagan path. Unitarians can be a little difficult to explain. They do not require one to believe in a certain God - or in God at all - to be a Unitarian. Given the history behind the UUs (short for Unitarian Universalist) that's a little odd, but hey. It takes all kinds to make a world.

The Unitarian Universalist Association was formed in 1961 from two different denominations: the Unitarians and the Universalists. There is no creed. There ARE the Seven Principles, and I'll have to go through that another time. All people of any color or age or gender or lifestyle are welcome in the UU church. There are many people who are Pagan-identified within the Unitarian church, and there is an associated group, the Covenant of Unitarian Universalist Pagans or CUUPs. The group I do most of my Pagan events with, like Yule, started out with the intent of being a CUUPs chapter.

We're not a very big group, so we sort of gave up temporarily on the idea of being a CUUPs chapter, but First Unitarian is happy to have us there, doing our thing and educating and contributing to the spiritual life of the church as a whole.

The name of the group is Mystic Grove. I suggested the name, it was put to a vote among other names, and this is the name they chose.

Some of the things Mystic Grove does include conducting rituals such as the ones I already described - teaching classes on things like ritual-craft, divination (Tarot cards/runes, etc), spellcraft, kitchen witchery, Goddess lore, etc etc.

Some of these are things I can teach, esp. the Goddess lore or "thea-ology" as I mentioned earlier in this email. Or Irish traditions.

EMAIL 2:
I think this might be another long email. Oh well. I do want to finish what I started yesterday.

So anyway, I wanted in this email to describe a little bit about who these Unitarians are. There's too much information to put in here about the ** history ** of the Unitarian Universalist Association and how it came to be, but I can briefly put something in here about UUs today and what forms the backbone of the UU faith.

I'll just dive right in and put right here the Seven Principles & Six Sources of the UUA (I am taking this straight off their website, www.uua.org, so there is no misquoting)...interpretation to follow...

We, the member congregations of the Unitarian Universalist Association, covenant to affirm and promote:

The inherent worth and dignity of every person;
Justice, equity and compassion in human relations;
Acceptance of one another and encouragement to spiritual growth in our congregations;
A free and responsible search for truth and meaning;
The right of conscience and the use of the democratic process within our congregations and in society at large;
The goal of world community with peace, liberty, and justice for all;
Respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part.

The living tradition which we share draws from many sources:
Direct experience of that transcending mystery and wonder, affirmed in all cultures, which moves us to a renewal of the spirit and an openness to the forces which create and uphold life;
Words and deeds of prophetic women and men which challenge us to confront powers and structures of evil with justice, compassion, and the transforming power of love;
Wisdom from the world's religions which inspires us in our ethical and spiritual life;
Jewish and Christian teachings which call us to respond to God's love by loving our neighbors as ourselves;
Humanist teachings which counsel us to heed the guidance of reason and the results of science, and warn us against idolatries of the mind and spirit.
Spiritual teachings of earth-centered traditions which celebrate the sacred circle of life and instruct us to live in harmony with the rhythms of nature.

Grateful for the religious pluralism which enriches and ennobles our faith, we are inspired to deepen our understanding and expand our vision. As free congregations we enter into this covenant, promising to one another our mutual trust and support.

OK, I'll just do the first of the 7 Principles for now. The other ones can come later.

"We, the member congregations of the Unitarian Universalist Association, covenant to affirm and promote the inherent worth and dignity of every person."

So what does this mean?

Covenant is defined as formal, solemn, and binding agreement.

Affirmation means to validate, to assert, to declare something as valid.

Promotion means, among other things, to advance or put something forward, to bring something into being or awareness.

Inherent means it's part of the essential character of something; it's "built into" it.

Worth indicates value, and dignity means the state of being worthy...hmm, there's that worthiness idea again.

So what that leaves us with is that these congregations have agreed to assert/declare and put forward every person's essential worth and right to that worth, their dignity. It is not based on money or prestige or whatever. A person's worth and dignity are a part of their very being...people are born with worth and dignity.

That's just the FIRST Principle. I could go into the others....another time. I'll tackle the first of the 6 sources next.

The living tradition which we share draws from many sources:
Direct experience of that transcending mystery and wonder, affirmed in all cultures, which moves us to a renewal of the spirit and an openness to the forces which create and uphold life;

I've personally experienced this myself. Most people have and don't even know it. It's one of those moments when perhaps a person stands before the ocean, or looking at a mountain or sunset, and pauses and goes "Ah" and feels totally at one with not just the earth, but the very life force that most people call "God" and which sustains all life. Sometimes it's referred to as a mystical insight or something like that.

Most traditional Christian churches, such as the Methodist and Baptist and Lutheran churches, etc, are NOT all that open to this "direct experience of transcending mystery and wonder." Methodists and Baptists, etc, believe you should ONLY look to the Bible for spiritual information. These traditional Christians have the attitude that if it's not the Bible, it's totally invalid. Wrong. Demonic. Evil. Not to be messed with.

I strongly disagree, and one of the reasons I disagree is because first of all, there's more than one version of the Bible. At the very least, there's the Catholic Bible (the St. Joseph's) and the Protestant Bibles (of which, the King James Version or KJV is but one of probably hundreds of translations).

Unitarian Universalists are more welcoming of my perspective, and they have even spelled it out in the first of their six sources or foundational ideas.

I think I'll take on the third and and sixth sources next:

"Wisdom from the world's religions which inspire us in our ethical and spiritual life" and "spiritual teachings of Earth-centered traditions which celebrate the sacred circle of life and instruct us to live in harmony with the rhythms of nature."

This is where the whole Pagan thing comes in. Because UUs value teachings from the world's religions as well as Earth-centered traditions, they are open to having Pagans be part of the spiritual life of the church as a whole.

And this is how I come in. As I mentioned before, Mystic Grove is a small group within First Unitarian that focuses on Pagan or Earth-centered spirituality, and with them I have created and led seasonal rituals/celebrations like Yule, which introduce people to a different type of tradition and open them up to a different side of spiritual life. Last October Mystic Grove led an entire service one Sunday, talking about "Pagan perspectives in the 21st century" and I led the congregation in a Goddess chant and I sang the Postlude for that service as well. The chant goes like this:

"We all come from the Goddess - And to Her we shall return - Like a drop of rain - Flowing to the ocean"

And there's a second part, a harmony part, that goes like this:

"Isis - Astarte - Diana - Hecate - Demeter - Kali - Inanna"

These are Goddess names, of course. Tom Cook, someone I have known here for a long time and who is part of First Unitarian and Mystic Grove, and I have led chant/song workshops, teaching people how to harmonize and sing in two and three parts, because many chants have two and three parts that harmonize. Tom is quite musical, as is Chip (another person I know from Mystic Grove and First Unitarian).

ALL this stuff I've included in these two emails is PRECISELY why I think most people think of me as weird, strange, not normal. I do know that I have a reputation amongst some of my coworkers as a significant intellectual force; one day when I was sitting in the break room with a few other people (this was at work) Dan W. who works with me was telling a new employee to never get into a theological debate with me, because I WILL win. I'm too good. And Dan is no intellectual slouch himself, not in the least.

I got this way by my extensive studies in religion, sociology, feminist theory, Pagan spirituality, etc. I think I've put a significant dent in the basics for a degree in theology. Some of the reading material I have are:

Women of the Celts by Jean Markale
The Celts by Jean Markale
King of the Celts by Jean Markale

The Masks of God (a series of 4 books) by Joseph Campbell
Myths To Live By by Joseph Campbell
Thou Art That by Joseph Campbell
The Power of Myth (on DVD and in print) by Joseph Campbell and Bill Moyers
Historical Atlas of World Mythology by Joseph Campbell
World Mythology published by the Joseph Campbell Foundation

Goddesses in Everywoman by Jean Shindoa Bolen

Women Who Run With The Wolves by Clarissa Pinkola Estes

Pagan Meditations by Ginette Paris

Laughter of Aphrodite by Carol P. Christ

In The Beginning by Karen Armstrong

A History of God by Karen Armstrong

Womanspirit Rising by various authors (a collection of feminist essays)

A History Of Pagan Europe by Nigel Pennick

Egil's Saga, Laxadaela Saga and The Vinland Sagas -- all Icelandic sagas/stories that have no specific author, but date back several hundred years

The Poetic Edda & The Prose Edda - no authors, but translations of very old Icelandic works (Iceland is considered the world's most literate country)

Various Celtic myths & stories, such as the Mabinogion and the Ulster Cycle and the likes

Women in Celtic Mythology by .... oh I've forgotten her name now

The Dhammapada (Buddhist Scripture)

Peace Is Every Step by Thich Naht Hanh
The Sun My Heart by Thich Naht Hanh
The Diamond Sutra translated and interpreted by Thich Naht Hanh (this is a Buddhist teaching story)

The Art of Happiness by His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama and an American psychiatrist whose name escapes me right now
Ethics for the New Millennium by His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama

Crossing the Threshhold by the Holy Father, Pope John Paul II (the current Pope)

Sources of Strength by Jimmy Carter
Living Faith by Jimmy Carter

The Upanishads (Hindu Scripture)

The Baghavad Gita (More Hindu Scripture, and probably the single most amazing spiritual document ever produced by the human race - it's my favorite, it was Gandhi's favorite as well, and if there was a way I could convert and become Hindu I'd do it, but that's not possible because of the way Hinduism as a religion AND an Indian way of life are so closely braided together)

Tao Te Ching (again, a translation of very ancient Chinese wisdom; my favorite translation is by Stephen Mitchell, who also did a brilliant translation of the Baghavad Gita)

Europe: A History by Norman Davies
The Isles by Norman Davies

Myths and Symbols of Pagan Europe by H.R. Ellis Davidson
Gods and Goddesses of Northern Europe by H.R. Ellis Davidson

The Germania by Tacitus

The City of God by St. Augustine
Confessions by St. Augustine

Confession by St. Patrick

Some of Thomas Aquinas' works, such as Summa Theologiae (but he's a REAL challenge to read)

Martin Luther's 95 theses that were nailed to the church door in Wittenberg, Germany, some 1500 years ago and which sparked off the Protestant Reformation, and thus led to a complete revamping of all Christendom

I would also LIKE to read the Koran, which is Muslim Scripture. I ** refuse ** to give in to xenophobia (fear of other people) and stay away from it just because at this juncture in history some Muslims have done some really bad things. There is transcendent knowledge there, and the only way to know for sure what it says is to read it myself...not go on hearsay.

Anyway, much of this would come under the heading of either history, mythology, or theology. There are certain authors I avoid like the plague because I feel that what they publish is worthy only of the privy...Silver Ravenwolf comes to mind. She's one of the writers who I think has contributed to the terrible scholarship currently seen all across the Wiccan world. It's so awful, and I actually DO have a lot of material to compare it to and see WHY it's so shameful. Most of the people I read, unlike this Silver Ravenwolf woman, have degrees and tenure at the world's best universities. Silver Ravenwolf is all show no go, as they say in the car show industry. She has no degrees and probably little education beyond high school. I've caught her in a few different errors in her books, and if people come to me asking questions about what they should read in order to learn, I NEVER recommend her.

Some of the awful scholarship I'm referring to include thoughts such as:

1. Wicca is the world's oldest religion.
2. Jesus Christ was a witch.
3. The ancient Celts were Wiccans.
4. Wiccans were burned at the stake during the Inquisition and the Salem Witch Trials.
5. Wicca is a "make it up as you go" religion.
6. The Wiccan tenet of "an ye harm none do as ye will" applies to ALL Pagan religions
7. Karma is a universal force and it means what you put out will return to you - and is the same thing as the Threefold Law (what you put out will return to you three times over).

All this is complete garbage. The problem is, many people in the Wiccan world now are teenybopper drama queens who can't bear to be told they're wrong and their precious Silver Ravenwolf got it wrong and doesn't know what she's talking about. There is a preponderance of "don't think, just feel" among most Wiccans, meaning it's more important that you just do/believe whatever "feels right to you" and scholarship has nothing to do with religion. The "don't think, just feel" people value intuition and subjective emotional experience over objective, hard-and-fast scholarship.

I think that's utter balderdash. "Don't think, just feel" indeed. All those points I just listed above are complete balderdash. Rubbish. Fiddlesticks. "Jesus Christ was a witch" indeed. I have my theories as to why someone would believe such nonsense. It's justification for walking away from Christianity.

The thing is, given that I have been doing all this studying and learning and researching and whatnot, both inside and outside a classroom, I feel I have a responsibility for correcting this nonsense when I come up against it. If someone tries to tell me that "the Celts were Wiccans" I say, "Oh no, that's not true" and procede to prove it. I can't just let it proliferate. Sloppy thinking twists my tail.

And is not good for society as a whole. I think it was Andrew Jackson who said that an educated and armed populous is the only defense against tyranny. *smile*

Whew. I'm rather running out of steam here at the moment. I know it's rather a lot to assimilate....but it has been a fascinating journey for me over the past 16 years or so. I've put a lot of effort into this. I don't think I can just...let it go as if it was nothing. Esp. not given what I see in this world today, America of 2005, from this perspective. This is one of the reasons why Joe says I should write, write, write and publish my essays. He thinks I could be a significant force in the world of religion & spirituality, if I just took some of my raw scrawlings and refined them and put them together in book form.

OK. I haven't had a response from her regarding these emails, even on the phone! I guess she's too flabbergasted to even know where to start.

I sent a third email that was rather brief:

Well, the thought I had that I was going to close that email off with was, I seem to recall one day, long ago, you'd commented that you had always pictured me as one of those worldly, sophisticated women who communicated well and knew about different cultures and yada yada...

And I suppose in a way I've done just that, sort of. I haven't been able to travel except in my mind. The only way I have been able to do so is the little window to the outer world that is books.

The Irish practically invented books as we know them today, for they used to scribe upon long pages of sheepskin and bind these together to form "choirs". Previous to the bound book, people read from scrolls.

I got this from a lovely book I have on audio tape called "How the Irish Saved Civilization." The Irish always have been a highly literate people. Poems and books and stories and scriptorium and whatnot have always been part of the Irish cultural life. The Irish were copying the great works of Europe during the Dark Ages when the Vikings were plundering and looting and whatnot. They would steal a bound book to melt down the silver and gold that decorated the leather cover, not because the literature within was inherently valuble to them.

Bloody Sassenachs (a Gaelic word for "Saxons" but not a very nice word) probably couldn't read at all, and sacked a beautiful monastery called Lindisfarne in the 800s for the gold on the altar....grrrrr....

Anyway, one of the most gorgeous pieces of literary art is the Book of Kells, located at Trinity College in Ireland, and it's handwritten and hand -- illustrated Scripture, in Latin, and the overall beauty of its pages are just unbelievable. It's a true Irish treasure.

The way I see it is this: beta and VHS and DVD and whatnot all eventually become obsolete. The modest book has never become obsolete. It's portable, it never crashes, it works in all countries with all different power cords, one doesn't have to wait for it to load like on a webpage...I say there are many advantages to reading! Yay for reading!

Mom doesn't like to read, she doesn't comprehend what it means to be a bibliophile. And she's happy just being a Christian. I haven't told her why I became unhappy with Christianity.

Yes, one has to do a certain amount of "coming out" when one is part of a different faith. I think it's really sad that Christianity has such intense hold on the minds of most people, esp. here in the American South, that when someone LEAVES that faith, a lot of the time they feel they have to be on the defensive about it. Pity, that.

And bear also in mind that Mom is just a simple country girl from West Virginia. She REALLY has that German practicality knit into her very bones. She's not one to waste time with dreams and visions and whatnot...she wants to know what will work to support her life, her household, that kind of thing. Theories and concepts and abstractions are meaningless to her. She's very much a powerhouse when it comes to "what works, what will get things done" kind of thinking. In her youth, she would have been unstoppable had a heart attack at 41 not put a severe dent into her professional life.

Ma has her strengths. But I have mine. Ma is no academic, but given her personality she wouldn't have needed to be. I am an academic, and it's my thing. It's what I do.

I notice something. She always says, "You sound just like your dad" when I say things that irritate her.

Who am I supposed to sound like, Ma? He's my father! What, should I sound like the woman down the street? Should I sound like YOU and come up with reasons why I can't do something?

No, Ma. BOTH of you are my parents. BOTH of you are the people I sound like.

And that is what makes me who I am.

"You sound just like your dad." Thanks, Ma. Oh, did you mean that's a BAD thing?

One of these days she'll figure it all out. I'm not her and I'm not meant to live the life she wanted to live.

Beware the Groove!

2005-03-06T08:07:00.000-08:00

Well, naturally, Zephyr is entitled to his/her opinion.

Maybe I AM arrogant.

Good. Bloody hell, it beats the dog shit out of the alternative, which is groveling and apologizing and trying to justify my entire existence (which pretty much describes my life until very recently...after Dad died, I decided that I am not going to waste what years I have left to me by trying to be what I think other people want me to be, acting in whatever way I think will cause the least offense...I will be ME and if people don't like it, too bad).

As soon as someone starts using words like that to describe me...well, it says a lot more about that person than it does about me, and how they feel about themselves.

And as soon as someone feels the need to use words like that to describe me, then I've done my job.

I have made an impact. I threw off someone's groove (to borrow a phrase from one of my favorite Disney movies, "The Emperor's New Groove").

BEWARE THE GROOVE! Hahahahahaha! And of course, I get thrown out the window (or told I'm arrogant, basically the same thing) for throwing off someone's groove. ROFL!!!

Believe me, there are far worse than me out there, in terms of arrogance. I'm actually pretty mellow, compared to SOME of the drama queens I've seen out there. I think it's great, that I've elicited that kind of response.

I'll borrow a phrase from Joe. I'm not arrogant. I'm just confident. I know what I know and I won't apologize for what I've accomplished in terms of religious research over the past 16 years. I HAVE learned a thing or two. I COULD very well do Harvard level coursework, if I only had the money to attend that school. I've SEEN their course listings. I AM just that good.

If anyone finds that attitude threatening, oh well.

Yes, better arrogant and confident than -- having oatmeal for backbone. Wait til I post the text of the 2 emails I sent Ma. I let go, both barrels, and described all the things about my spiritual life that I'd been hiding from her all this time, because I thought she'd not appreciate it or understand it.

I think I'll address that for a moment here. No more covering up or hemming and hawing about it to her. At least she knows the whole truth now. If she still doesn't like it, fine. She can decide that after reading it all. If she still doesn't quite understand it, now she can ask some informed questions.

But I'm out now. No going back. Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead. BOOYA!

USATODAY.com - Scientists think they found remains of first human

2005-03-06T04:20:00.000-08:00

Scientists think they found remains of first human
ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia (AP) — A team of U.S. and Ethiopian scientists has discovered the fossilized remains of what they believe is humankind's first walking ancestor, a hominid that lived in the wooded grasslands of the Horn of Africa nearly 4 million years ago.
The bones were discovered in February at a new site called Mille, in the northeastern Afar region of Ethiopia, said Bruce Latimer, director of the Cleveland Museum of Natural History in Ohio. They are estimated to be 3.8-4 million years old.

The fossils include a complete tibia from the lower part of the leg, parts of a thighbone, ribs, vertebrae, a collarbone, pelvis and a complete shoulder blade, or scapula. There also is an ankle bone which, with the tibia, proves the creature walked upright, said Latimer, co-leader of the team that discovered the fossils.

The bones are the latest in a growing collection of early human fragments that help explain the evolutionary history of man.

"Right now we can say this is the world's oldest bipedal (an animal walking on two feet) and what makes this significant is because what makes us human is walking upright," Latimer said. "This new discovery will give us a picture of how walking upright occurred."

The findings have not been reviewed by outside scientists or published in a scientific journal.

Leslie Aiello, an anthropologist and head of the Graduate School at University College in London said, however, that the new finds could be significant.

"It sounds like a significant find, ... particularly if they have a partial skeleton because it allows you to speculate on biomechanics," Aiello, who was not part of the discovery team, told The Associated Press by telephone from Britain.

Paleontologists previously discovered in Ethiopia the remains of Ardipithecus ramidus, a transitional creature with significant ape characteristics dating as far back as 4.5 million years. There is some dispute over whether it walked upright on two legs, Latimer and Aiello said.

Scientists know little about A. ramidus. A few skeletal fragments suggest it was even smaller than Australopithecus afarensis, the 3.2 million-year-old species widely known by the nearly complete "Lucy" fossil, which measures about 4 feet tall.

Scientists are yet to classify the new find, which they believe falls between A. ramidus and A. afarensis. The fossils would help "join the dots" between the two hominids, said Yohannes Haile-Selassie, an Ethiopian scientist and curator at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History as well a co-leader of the discovery team.

"This discovery will tell us much about how our 4-million-year-old ancestors walked, how tall they were and what they looked like," he said. "It opens the door on a poorly known time period and (the fossils) are important in that they will help us understand the early phases of human evolution before Lucy."

The specimen is the only the fourth partial skeleton ever to be discovered that is older than 3 million years. It was found after two months of excavation at Mille, 37 miles from the famous Lucy discovery.

"It is a once in a lifetime find," Latimer said.

Nice Hammer!

2005-03-05T05:12:00.000-08:00

I may change my little icon for the Heathen links to a Thorshammer or a valknut. I like this hammer.

TY Heretic

2005-03-02T21:04:00.000-08:00

Very sweet note you left me. I'm so glad someone appreciates the things I post about.

I know that my blog probably isn't nearly as impressive as most other blogs are because I mix the personal in with the...more worldly topics.

But, what can I say? It's because I'm a whole human being. My life is not in little pieces.

I have to admit to being not entirely comfortable with accepting compliments. It's hard for me. I hope I can just continue doing what I'm doing and not let any kind of praise OR criticism affect me. I want to just be me, do what I do, and that's that.

If people like it, fine. If they don't, fine.

This reminds me of some things I've become aware of in my life. One is the fact that my mother doesn't comprehend the first thing about my spiritual life and how important it is to me. I hadn't told her anything about it because waaaaaaaaaaay back in the day, when I first began exploring Wicca back in 1989 or so, I didn't come out to her because I thought she wouldn't take it well.

Therefore she doesn't know WHY I'm such a voracious reader. She knows that I am, but she has no clue what I've been reading.

And it is rather a -- lonely thing, not being able to share a part of your life with someone who is so important to you. Believe me, I wish I could. I have longed for support from my own family, and now she's all I have, really. Oh I have other people, but one of them is Doug...Republican, former State Department employee, believing Christian. I don't always feel as connected to them as I do the people I know at the UU Church.

*sigh* Well, as Christ said, "These are my mother and brothers..."

While I'm at the whole introspection thing, I just finished reading Terry Pratchett's novel "A Hat Full Of Sky." I have to highly recommend ALL of his books, because I can't count the number of times his books have rendered me completely helpless with good hard belly laughter, the kind that has you gasping for air and wiping tears and clutching your sides in pain and damn near literally falling out of the chair howling. I mean his books are just that bloody funny. I haven't seen mental visuals that funny just from reading a novel since...well, ever.

But beyond that, I think it should be required reading for EVERY so-called Witch or Wiccan out there, and especially for those who are teetering on the edge and not sure if they want to get involved or not.

Because Mistress Weatherwax sets people straight in this book, but it's done with humor. There is something to be said for making the sky your hat...

One part of "Hat" got to me. The part about the 91 year old man, and the women who took care of him. It reminded me sharply of my father, and how once again, his end wasn't as happy and funny as the story.

Such is life, really. Sometimes I think I talk too much of Dad, but then again he's the only Dad I'll ever have had. And I think that his loss is something that will affect me forever. One never really gets used to it, I think. It's in how one walks with it that makes a difference.

Sure I get sad sometimes. But I also laugh at certain good memories too. And I always remember that I was his "Peanut" and he would want me to keep on keepin' on.

I was writing in one of my other blogs (a Heathen blog I keep) that 29 January is going to be a significant date in my life. It's the day Dad died, and the day of his father's birthday.

I find it significant that Dad died on that day.

But that's part of building a REAL tradition. That's exactly the stuff it's made of. It's what makes it so much more personal. It brings it home, the progress of life and death and new life...that flowing thread that gets woven into wyrd by the hands of the Beloved, Frigg Herself.

See my Heathen links for Frigga's Web and go there for information on the Heathen Goddess Frigg. She is the one I believe "tapped" me many years ago. I'll have to go into it later.

I should probably crash. This has been a bit of a ramble, but sometimes it's nice to just get it out there and off the ol' DDDs.

10 Commandments Article

2005-03-02T02:40:00.000-08:00

Check THIS out:

Court enters debate over display of Commandments

By Joan Biskupic, USA TODAY

WASHINGTON — The Ten Commandments are a recurring symbol in American government: carved into granite monuments at state capitols, framed on the walls of county buildings and painted on murals at courthouses. At the U.S. Supreme Court, a depiction of Moses holding the Commandments is etched into marble, part of a frieze on history's great lawgivers.

But in a nation that prohibits government from endorsing religion, do some public displays of the Commandments — the principles of behavior for Christians and Jews — violate the Constitution? It's a legal question that has been brewing for years, and one that now is the focus of a national debate over religion's role in government.

Today, the Supreme Court will hear arguments in two cases that test whether displays of the Commandments on public property are unconstitutional under the First Amendment. The disputes come from Texas and Kentucky, where federal courts have issued conflicting rulings. (Analysis: Court unlikely to make more historic moves)

In the Texas case, a U.S. appeals court ruled that a 6-foot-high, 3-foot-wide granite monument erected in 1961 on the Capitol grounds in Austin could remain standing because it is part of a larger presentation commemorating state history and culture.

In the Kentucky case, however, a federal court ordered McCreary and Pulaski counties to take down framed copies of the Ten Commandments that had been put up in their courthouses in 1999. The court said the displays were blatantly religious — and therefore unconstitutional — even after officials twice added other documents, including the Declaration of Independence and the Magna Carta.

The cases have drawn intense interest from across the nation. Sixty "friend of the court" briefs have been filed by groups representing religious interests, civil libertarians, historians and state governments. This morning's hearing is expected to draw long lines for the few visitors' seats in the ornate courtroom.

The disputes come to the court three years after an Alabama judge, Roy Moore, gained national attention by installing a 5,300-pound granite monument depicting the Commandments in the state's judicial building in Montgomery. Moore's defiance of a federal court order to remove the monument cost him his job as chief justice of Alabama's Supreme Court.

The monument was wheeled away in 2003. Many of the issues raised by Moore's efforts haven't gone away, however.

Some evangelical Christians are casting the debate over the Commandments as a significant part of their increasingly aggressive efforts to have government recognize religion. That's led to a backlash by the ACLU, Jewish organizations, atheists and others who say the efforts by evangelicals threaten America's secular heritage.

"The real issue is the right to acknowledge God," says Jody Hice, a Baptist pastor who is leading a fundraising effort in Barrow County, Ga., to help the county defend its display of a Ten Commandments plaque in the local courthouse against a lawsuit filed by the ACLU.

"Everyone has a right to have a religion and to practice it — but not in our public buildings," counters Pat Cleveland, an atheist in Talladega, Ala., who protested Moore's monument.

"This is not a Christian nation. ... I'm not a person who hates religion. It's not about atheists vs. Christianity. It's about what government can do."

The Supreme Court has not ruled on public displays of the Ten Commandments since 1980, when it struck down a Kentucky law that required public schools to post the Commandments. Much has changed since then: The Supreme Court is more conservative, and the evangelical Christian movement has become a significant political player in Washington.

Religious president in office

President Bush often refers to his relationship with God. Bush — whose administration supports the displays of the Commandments in the Texas and Kentucky cases — was overwhelmingly backed by evangelical Protestants in last November's election.

Meanwhile, public support for Ten Commandments displays is strong. A USA TODAY/CNN/Gallup Poll taken last weekend indicates that only 20% of Americans believe that such a monument would be inappropriate on the grounds of their state capitol.

David Friedman, a lawyer for the ACLU of Kentucky who has been involved in local church-state disputes for 20 years, says that community officials are becoming more willing to challenge the traditional divide between church and state by posting the Commandments.

"I think they are more emboldened," Friedman says. He notes that legal groups associated with prominent television preachers Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell have been at the forefront of defending Ten Commandments monuments.

Herbert Titus, a Virginia lawyer who wrote a court brief on behalf of seven conservative groups that support Commandments displays, says Christians are fighting for such monuments because they believe their values are being threatened by judicial rulings such as those endorsing same-sex relationships.

"People feel as if they lost something," Titus says.

In Georgia, the Rev. Hice says he believes his religious values are under assault more than at any other time in his 20 years in the ministry. He criticizes a federal judge's ruling in January against a Cobb County school district that had begun putting stickers on science textbooks stating that evolution was a theory and not a proven fact.

John Green, a political science professor at the University of Akron who studies religion and politics, says his polling indicated that 25% of Americans considered themselves evangelical Protestants in 2004, up from 22% in 1980. During the same period, he says, the percentage of those with no religious affiliation rose from 12% to 16%.

"Evangelicals are excited about wanting to keep the Ten Commandments," he says. "But you have a vocal group of non-religious people against it."

Meeting O'Connor's standard

Disputes over freedom of religion are as old as the USA. The First Amendment's mandate that government "shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion" flowed from the colonists' experience with religious persecution in England.

In 1980, when it struck down the Kentucky law that required the Commandments to be posted in schools, the Supreme Court rejected state officials' assertion that the purpose of the law was merely secular: to promote moral values.

"The Ten Commandments are undeniably a sacred text in the Jewish and Christian faiths," the court said, "and no legislative recitation of a supposed secular purpose can blind us to that fact."

Since then, however, the court has allowed displays of some religious symbols on public property, as long as they were mixed with secular symbols. In a 1989 case involving two holiday displays in Pittsburgh, the court allowed a menorah to stand next to a Christmas tree at a government building. But the court rejected a crèche scene that stood alone near a staircase in the Allegheny County courthouse.

The court's general test for whether to allow such a symbol on public property was devised by Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. It asks whether a "reasonable observer" would believe from the display that government was supporting religion. If so, according to the test, the display should not be allowed.

The dispute from Texas was brought to the Supreme Court by Thomas Van Orden, who once was a practicing lawyer but who is now homeless. Van Orden sued Texas in 2001, saying that the Commandments monument on the grounds of the Texas Capitol favors the Christian and Jewish faiths.

The monument was given to Texas in 1961 by the Fraternal Order of Eagles, which wanted to provide troubled youth "with a common code of conduct." Adorned with Christian and Jewish symbols, it features large type of the Commandments, beginning with, "I am the Lord thy God. Thou shalt have no other gods before me." It stands alone, but is among 17 monuments around the Capitol.

A U.S. district court ruled against Van Orden. It said that, "viewed in the proper context, and in light of its history, this passive monument cannot be said to advance, endorse or promote religion." An appeals court agreed.

In Van Orden's appeal to the Supreme Court, Duke University law professor Erwin Chemerinsky notes that the monument "is the only expression of a religious message on the Capitol's grounds." He says a display could be permissible if it were part of a presentation about the law, like the one at the Supreme Court.

The Kentucky case stems from the posting of privately donated, framed copies of the Commandments in the two county courthouses. After the ACLU of Kentucky challenged the displays, officials in the counties added copies of documents and said the Commandments were part of historical presentations.

Two federal courts sided with the ACLU. In their appeal to the Supreme Court, attorneys for the counties say a reasonable observer would be "aware of the historical influence" of the Commandments.

More on this later...

Ministry Titles!

2005-02-25T02:47:00.000-08:00

Pinko Feminist Hellcat: President-for-Life Sheelzebub announces new competition for ministry titles

I applied for Ministry of Religious Education. I'll be adding Pinko Feminist Hellcat to my sidebar because anyone who comes up with such a kickass name like that has GOT to be way cool.

Ask a Pagan

2005-02-23T19:11:00.000-08:00

Yes, methinks I am just a little bit crazy, but here goes nothing.

Q: I have a question.....Do Pagans believe in a G-d?? What happens when man/woman dies? Do we go to another world?

A: There are some Pagans and Heathens who actually do not believe in deity at all. They might be thought of as sort of humanist Pagans and Heathens. As far as what happens when a person dies...each tradition has their own response to that. The Asatru have a response to that, the Wiccans have a response to that, the Dianics have a response to that, the Kemetic Orthodox have a response to that, the Celtic Reconstructionists have a response to that....I could go on.

Q: How do you worship?
A: Once again, that answer depends on the tradition of the person you're talking to. My man is an Odinist, and there are ceremonies called "blots" that the Asatru participate in ("blot" rhymes with "boat"). Wiccans have circles. I'm sure the Celts and Kemetics and others have different ceremonies they participate in.

I feel I should pause and indicate that there is a branch of Pagan life known as the "reconstructionist" religions, and what this means is that the people involved in this are looking into as much of the history and source material as has survived and are trying to "reconstruct" the old worship/religion/values as closely as possible to the way it was originally done. Examples of reconstructionist religions would be Celtic reconstructionism or Aurrad or Senistrognata - Asatru or Heathenry or Forn Seid or Rites of Odin - Kemetic Orthodoxy to name a few.

Wicca is NOT a reconstructionist religion, please note. (There is a very good article online about the differences between Asatru and Wicca called The Pentagram and Hammer and you'll find it on my blog, which is at h t t p colon slash slash chalicechiq at blogspot dot com)

The things I go through to get the address of my blog on a post. Sheesh.

To continue: there are those Pagans and Heathens out there who feel they have a connection to a particular deity; in some cases the person believes that the deity in question came to them in vision or meditation and "tapped" them or chose them as their own devotee. I believe this happened with Frigga, the Norse Queen of Asgard and myself, many years ago. She came to me in vision while I was doing the wash one day. I wasn't expecting it at all.

Q: What percent worships Goddess?
A: Hard to say, but I do know this much...some years ago the EarthSpirit community did a "Pagan census" and they found that the American city with the highest Pagan population per capita is right here in my own back yard: Orlando, FL. Odd, isn't it? But then again, consider the weather and all. Perfect place to do outdoor rituals year round.

Oh, and a word about the word "ritual." Bear in mind that attending Sunday morning worship at the local Baptist church is attending a religious RITUAL. Going to Mass - going to receive the ash on Ash Wednesday - receiving communion - all these are religious RITUALS. "Ritual" seems to have acquired this horribly negative connotation (probably thanks to Hollywood, mostly) that involves something dark and evil and harmful to either babies or small furry animals. Rituals are simply things that are done with regularity; on Wednesday evenings it is usually my habit to attend a Journal Group at the local Borders bookstore. That's a ritual too. So it is probably best to clear the mind of negative connotations associate with that word, thanks very much.

Q: Now this is the part that gets me. You say you know what pleases the divine and the divine's will but with so many gods and such how to you have a clue?

A: This is why it's important to develop a relationship with a particular deity, in my mind. This way you get to know the way the deity in question communicates with you, and when you see certain things going on in your world, then you know that this deity is imparting a message to you. For example, with my sweetie and his relationship with Odin, he knows there is some kind of message going on when he starts seeing ravens (not crows or other corvids, but specifically ravens, for these birds are closely associated with Odin) all over the place.

Q: Another question, would you consider the golden calf the hebrews made an aspect of the divine?

A: Yes, I would. Look up "Hathor" sometime. I believe that's Her.

"And just a side note. God said not to have any gods before Him because He does not want us following things that dont exist."

I'm not going to go there with a ten-foot cattle prod, and don't give me a hard time about "it's because you know you are following the wrong deity anyway." Do. Not. Start. With. Me. On. That. Level. Understood? No comments about whose deities really do and really don't exist, have I made myself crystal clear? Thank you.

A note on the Wiccan Rede (usually quoted as "An it harm none, do as you will"). This is an ethic that I have been trying to tell people does NOT apply to ALL PAGANS because not all Pagans are Wiccan. I would say the same thing about the concept of "perfect love, perfect trust" and the threefold law. These are WICCAN ideas and have no place in reconstructionist religions like Asatru. So for those who are very unfamiliar with this world, let me say this: NEVER confuse an Asatruar (specifically) with a Wiccan, and NEVER treat Asatruar as if their religion and Wicca are basically the same thing. They aren't. There does tend to be a certain amount of very bad blood between many reconstructionists such as the Asatru and many Wiccans, and there are reasons for this. See the above mentioned article for further information on this.

I also have never liked the way many Wiccans have hijacked the concept of karma from the Hindus, and they don't even have a proper understanding of the word and how karma works. Myself personally, since I am of Northern European ancestry and a Norse Goddess has tapped me, I go in for the ideas of "wyrd" and "orlog" and am learning about them. In some ways they are similar to karma (and bear in mind that the cultures that gave rise to these ideas are all descended from Indo-Europeans that migrated out of the Russian steppes many many thousands of years before the birth of Christ) but in many ways they are quite different.

Q: What is your claim in creation of mankind because not all claims Adam was the first creation of Mankind?
A: Different traditions have different creation myths/stories. Bear in mind, by the way, that I am not using the word "myth" in the perjorative sense. I've studied far too much of Joseph Campbell to ever do that to such a noble word. The Asatru have a specific creation myth that talks about the Ginnungagap, the primordial worlds of fire and ice, a cosmic bovine named Audumbla (I hope I spelled that correctly) and the first being, a giant named Ymir, and how things progressed from there. I'm not going to retell the story right now; I'm too tired for that. Look it up online sometime.

RE: Why Wiccans Suck webpage
As for me, I think it's hysterical. I included it in the links on my sidebar on my blog. Oh, there's also a ** recommended reading list** on the sidebar too. Someone asked about that. I laughed til I almost fell off my chair when I saw it. Of late, I must confess to losing a LOT of patience with Wiccans in general, and I have my reasons for it. Most of them have made of Wicca something that I don't believe Gerald Gardner (whom as far as I'm concerned, pieced Wicca together well over 40 plus years ago) intended. I'm not going to argue about this because my mind is made up on this matter and I like it this way. It suits the information that is out there to be found and read and learned about.

One thing about anyone who has walked a reconstructionist path - you learn to question your sources, and you learn to look to real scholars who have tenure at real universities for your information, not the weak stuff that Llewellyn Publishing tends to put out there. As far as I'm concerned, it's all candyfloss. I am NOT one to recommend writers like Silver Ravenwolf or Raven Grimassi or their ilk at all.

Q: What valid reasons are there that you follow your faith and not the faith of Prophets?
A: Read the Voluspa sometime. That is Norse prophecy. The Voluspa is found in a document called the Poetic Edda. Those who engaged in prophecy and seeing were called "volva" in the North.

"All creation stories cannot be correct"
Sure they can. They're called "myths" and aren't meant to be interpreted literally or read like the Dec. 7th 1941 edition of the New York Times.

"a religion must be accurate in its claims"
Yup. And they are. You're just not looking at it the right way.

"When you believe in Allah then you have to educate about the commands of Allah - The very first command is taking "Shahada" which is testifying there is one Allah without any partners and Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah."
Got a point there. This is why I wish more people would develop a strong, deep relationship with ONE deity and learn to see the uniqueness of each deity, not treating them like interchangeable parts and getting into this business of "all love Goddesses are the same" because as far as I'm concerned, there are whole worlds of difference between Freyja and Aphrodite and Venus.

ARGH....I'm just too exhausted to continue this...I have to go to bed.

I'm sure Pensive thinks I've just totally lost my ever-loving mind, and that's OK. He'd be completely right.

Goodnight everyone.

http://www.christianforums.com/t1265533-ask-a-pagan.html&page=18

What place for God in Europe?

2005-02-23T02:40:00.000-08:00

Why the Continent is debating what role, if any, religion should play in public life.

By Peter Ford, Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor

PARIS - As he urged closer ties with Europe Monday, President Bush played down the current political disputes. "No power on earth will ever divide us," he said.

That may be true when it comes to Iran's nuclear program. But his remark ironically hints at a transatlantic chasm over US and European values, and the role each side assigns to a fundamental facet of human life: religious faith.

Two events last year neatly frame the challenge: In the United States, a California man tried to remove "One Nation, Under God" from the Pledge of Allegiance. Americans cried foul - roughly 90 percent wanted to keep the phrase - and on June 15, the Supreme Court halted the bid on procedural grounds.

Three days later, in Brussels, officials agreed on the final text of the European Union's new Constitution. The charter made no mention of God, despite calls that it recognize Europe's Christian roots.

Indeed, its secularism has led to jokes that Europe is one big "blue" state. But Europeans aren't laughing. Buffeted by the crosscurrents of secularism, Christianity, and Islam - and mindful of a history of religious violence - they are wrestling with their values and identity as never before.

"The clash between those who believe and those who don't believe will be a dominant aspect of relations between the US and Europe in the coming years," says Jacques Delors, a former president of the European Commission. "This question of a values gap is being posed more sharply now than at any time in the history of European-US relations since 1945."

Religion's role in public life, and its influence on politics, have been center-stage questions worldwide since Sept. 11, 2001. But the debate in Europe has been complicated by the continent's difficulty in integrating its fast-growing Muslim immigrant minority. It has been sharpened by tragedies such as the bombing of a Madrid train station last March, and the brutal murder of Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh by an Islamic extremist last fall.

Those incidents "will reinforce secularism" in Europe, predicts Patrick Weil, a sociologist of religion at the Sorbonne in Paris. "The tendency now in Europe is to say we have to be clear on the limits to religious intervention" in public life. "We are not going to sacrifice women's equality, democracy, and individual freedoms on the altar of a new religion."

Secularists who think like that are swimming in friendly waters in Europe, where religious convictions and practice have dropped sharply in recent decades, and where mainstream churches - especially the Catholic Church - continue to lose members and influence.

Today, just 21 percent of Europeans say religion is "very important" to them, according to the most recent European Values Study, which tracks attitudes in 32 European countries. A survey by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life found that nearly three times as many Americans, 59 percent, called their faith "very important."

Although a Gallup poll found last year that 44 percent of Americans say they attend a place of worship once a week, the average figure in Europe is only 15 percent, although the picture varies widely across the Continent.

Godless secularism?
For some Europeans, that slump marks a defeat for moral values at the hands of godless secularism.

"The new soft totalitarianism that is advancing on the left wants to have a state religion," complains Rocco Buttiglione, the Italian politician whose ambition to become the European commissioner for justice was thwarted last year by the European Parliament, which objected to his description of homosexuality as a sin.

"It is an atheist, nihilistic religion - but it is a religion that is obligatory for all," Mr. Buttiglione adds.

Luis Lopez Guerra, the Spanish government's point man in its campaign to wrest from Catholic influence social legislation on questions such as abortion, divorce, and gay marriage, sees things differently.

He wonders why, in a country where less than half the population ever goes to church, he should have found a Bible and a crucifix on his desk, along with the Constitution, when he was sworn in as undersecretary at the Ministry of Justice a year ago.

The Spanish government's plans to legalize gay marriage this spring, to liberalize divorce and abortion laws, and to permit stem-cell research, do not represent an attempt to impose an atheist state religion, he insists. Rather, he says, they "extend civil rights and make the law independent of Catholic dogma.

He adds, "The government has a responsibility to represent the majority of the people. Our policy has to depend on the people's will, not on the preferences of the Catholic church."

Spain is currently the front line in the Vatican (news - web sites)'s rear-guard battle to retain church influence over public policy in Europe. But with public opinion ranged firmly on the government's side, there seems little it can do but make its displeasure known.

Pope John Paul II lashed out at Madrid recently, accusing authorities of "restriction of religious freedom" and "relegating faith to the private sphere and opposing its public expression."

The changes in Spain, Catholic church leaders worry, are part of a broader trend. Cardinal Renato Martino, head of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, recently attacked "a new holy inquisition ... motivated predominantly by prejudice toward all that is Christian."

Other traditional churches have felt the same cold winds. The president of the French Protestant Federation, Jean-Arnold de Clermont, warned Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin last December of a climate of "secularist zeal" that was undermining all faiths.

Such zeal has known peaks and troughs over the centuries, but it is not new to Europe, where political leaders and ordinary citizens experienced religion and felt its weight in ways quite unknown to Americans.

The differences are rooted in the 18th century, when the Enlightenment, the philosophical revolution that laid the foundations of the modern Western world, was interpreted quite differently by Americans and Europeans in one crucial respect.

Enlightenment divergence
In Europe, says Grace Davie, an expert on religion at Exeter University in England, "the Enlightenment was seen as freedom from religion ... getting away from dogma, whereas in the [US] it meant freedom to believe."

In America, a country founded in part by religious dissidents fleeing an oppressive government, "religious groups are seen as protecting individuals against the interference of the state," says Mr. Weil.

In Europe, on the other hand, the post-Enlightenment state "is seen as protecting individuals from the intrusion of religious groups," Weil argues, after centuries during which the official church, be it Catholic or Protestant, had always been closely identified with temporal powers.

While religion and democracy have always been intertwined in America, where churches were at the forefront of battles against slavery and in favor of civil rights, this has by no means been the case in Europe. There, estab-lished churches in countries such as Spain and France long opposed political reform.

European mistrust of public religion is heightened even further, however, when it is mixed with patriotism in the kind of rhetoric that President Bush often uses.

"God and patriotism are an explosive mixture," cautions Nicolas Sartorius, an éminence grise of the Spanish left who spent many years in jail during Gen. Francisco Franco's dictatorship. The dictator's guiding ideology, he recalls pointedly, was known as "Catholic nationalism."

After a tortured, centuries-long history of wars fought over religion, in whose name millions died, Europeans are deeply skeptical today of patriotic exhortations infused with religious meaning, says Karsten Voigt, German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder's adviser on relations with Washington.

And nowhere is this truer than in Germany, he adds. "The mixture of patriotism and religion is anathema and heresy in German religious life because it was misused and went too far in the past," Mr. Voigt explains. "Remember, German soldiers in World War I wore belt buckles reading 'Gott Mitt Uns' [God With Us]."

Dominique Moisi, one of France's most respected political analysts, agrees. Viewed from this side of the Atlantic, "the combination of religion and nationalism in America is frightening," he says. "We feel betrayed by God and by nationalism, which is why we are building the European Union as a barrier to religious warfare."

How values affect policy
EU members have gone further than any other group of nations in pooling their national sovereignty in the interests of collective security. It's a concept completely foreign to the US, where Bush has repeatedly insisted that he will do whatever he sees fit to protect Americans.

That divergence "is a matter of principle, a matter of values," says Martin Ortega, an analyst at the EU's Institute for Security Studies in Paris. "Europe's history has led Europeans to a more cosmopolitan worldview, which tries to understand 'the other,' " he suggests.

One of the implications of this approach, Mr. Ortega argues, is that a ban on the use of force except in extreme circumstances has become a European value, just like its corollary: reliance on international law.

That, too, sets Europe apart from America in a fundamental way when it comes to coping with world crises.

The differences were stark over the war in Iraq. They persist with regard to Iran, where Europe's three largest nations are pursuing diplomatic efforts to prevent Iran from enriching uranium - efforts the US has refused to join.

The values gap is evident in Washington's wariness of multilateral approaches to world affairs: The US has rejected the Kyoto treaty, designed to slow global warming, which came into force last week, while the EU embraced it. And Europe supports the International Criminal Court, which the US opposes.

Some European leaders, eager to mend diplomatic fences with the US, fear that such different perspectives could tempt Washington to dismiss Europe as an unreliable ally.

"In some segments of conservative US opinion, anti-European feeling is on the rise," worries Mr. Voigt. "They see us as soft on terrorism, or as simply immoral."

On the contrary, retorts Ortega, who describes himself as a Catholic believer, "I interpret my religion in a more modern, humane, and universal manner. I find the American manner quite antiquated. For example, I'm sure that when President Bush applied the death penalty in Texas, or decided to use force in Iraq, he felt it compatible with his religious beliefs."

In fact, the fundamental values that Europe and the US proclaim are almost identical.

Few Americans would quibble over the proposed EU Constitution's declaration that "the Union is founded on the values of respect for human dignity, freedom, democracy, equality, the rule of law and respect for human rights." It goes on to promote "tolerance, justice, solidarity, and equality between women and men."

Philosophical differences
These shared sentiments, however, flow from different metaphysical head waters. In his inaugural address last month, Bush founded his commitment to human rights on the belief "that every man and woman on this earth ... bear[s] the image of the Maker of Heaven and Earth."

That thinking does not sit well in Europe, where human rights are rooted in a tradition of secular humanism, which holds that mankind is capable of ethical conduct and self-fulfillment without recourse to the supernatural.

In Europe, secularism is not understood as necessarily hostile to religion. In France, the term denotes a level playing field, on which the state allows all religions to operate freely, but stands aside. Elsewhere, it means an indifference to faith. More generally, secularism refers to an approach to life grounded not in religious morality but in human reason and universal ethics.

At the same time, European governments have chosen to adopt a broader set of moral values in setting their foreign policy than they see apparent in US policy, which to them often seems wholly focused on "the war on terror."

That leads them to attach more importance to issues such as the en-vironment and poverty, as British Prime Minister Tony Blair and French President Jacques Chirac stressed in speeches to the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, earlier this month.

Though the broad moral values at the foundations of public policy in Europe draw clearly on Christian inspiration, the established churches are equally clearly losing their grip on social attitudes to personal moral questions.

A look at the dramatic fall in birthrates all over Europe reveals how faithfully couples are following Catholic teaching on contraception. And as religion's importance fades in people's lives, their permissiveness increases, the European Values Study found.

For example, of the 10 countries where religion is most important to people's lives, eight are among the 10 least tolerant of euthanasia. An increasing number of European governments are following Britain's lead in legalizing stem-cell research, with public support, despite opposition from Catholic leaders.

But even if churches are emptying across Europe, and citizens are reluctant to imbue policy with religious significance, that hardly makes the Continent atheist, pollsters and religious leaders say.

Rather, suggests Archbishop John Foley, the US head of the Vatican's Council for Social Communications, "many people in Europe consider it poor taste to mention your beliefs. It is perceived as rendering other people uncomfortable."

While only 41 percent of Europeans say they believe in a personal God, another 33 percent believe in a spirit, or life force.

It is on that reservoir of spirituality that religious leaders of several faiths hope to draw, in order to bring religion back from the margins of public life in Europe. And they are finding encouragement from some unlikely sources.

In France, perhaps the most militantly secular society in Europe, and which this year celebrates the 100th anniversary of a law separating church and state, one of the men most likely to succeed Jacques Chirac as president broke a strict political taboo late last year.

In a book-length series of interviews entitled "The Republic and Religion: Hope," Nicolas Sarkozy, the president of the ruling conservative Union for a Popular Movement, broached controversial subjects such as state funding for religious institutions.

He was motivated by a feeling that would be banal in the US, but which for a French political leader is almost revolutionary: "That the religious phenomenon is more important than people think, that it can contribute to peace, to balance, to integration, to unity and dialogue," he wrote. "The Republic should debate this, and reflect on it."

On Certain Feminist Theologians

2005-02-22T20:07:00.000-08:00

Well, I'm really thinking of Carol P. Christ (click here for information) specifically, because I'm re-reading one of her old books, "Laughter of Aphrodite."

And I'm seeing it with entirely new eyes, after a certain amount of time as a reconstructionist. Oh man...what a difference it has made. I read with FAR more critical eyes than I did when Dann first got me this book, almost 20 years ago.

I'll just dive into it, shall I?

One of the BIG beefs I have with Ms. Christ is her outright rejection of ALL deities, Gods AND Goddesses, who are warlike and violent. In one essay, she explicitly names Ishtar and Athene as being two Goddesses that she rejects, because of their associations with war. Ms. Christ seems to want to define Goddess spirituality as being only concerned with pacifistic Goddesses.

Now, this is coming from a woman whose personal ancestry includes Germans, Swedes, Irish, Scots and Anglo-Saxons. Obviously she has forgotton a great deal of the history of her own people, who were inclined to very bloody sacrificial rituals, headhunting, Goddesses who wore armor and carried swords and knew how to use them, women warriors like Freydis who (at 8 months pregnant) did not hesitate to snatch up a sword and fight even when the men were in hiding as the homestead was being attacked...

Her own ancestors were violent, bloody people. Yet in her theology (or as she calls it "theaology") she completely and totally ignores ALL Northern European mythology and Goddess lore, and focuses instead on the deities of Greece and Crete and the Mediterranean.

That's all well and good, but their Goddesses weren't all light and fluff either.

I say that she cannot speak of introducing women to spiritual wholeness if by doing so she's introducing them only to the Goddesses that she likes and approves of. She has no FAITH in Goddess to let Goddess be what Goddess must be, and if that means a very violent Goddess like Kali or the Morrigan or Skadi or Freyja or Oya or whatever, then so be it. She's *analyzed* it to death, and she's letting her personal ego get in the way of just letting sheer spirit speak.

She forgets that Athene, for example, could provide a girl with a very strong archetype or model or whatever to look to...because Athene is a Goddess of wisdom and insight, as well as a Goddess of the domestic/civilized arts. And Athene isn't a simple battle Goddess in the same way that Mars is a fair brute when it comes to warfare. Athene was a ** strategist ** not just a warrior. Ties in with that wisdom thing again. Athene would show a girl how to use her mind to get what she wants, to be intellectually competitive, and how to use the brain to win. Ms. Christ dismisses Athene a little too easily for my taste.

I think that in ignoring the war Goddesses, this really robs female military personnel of their dignity, and teaches that this part of a woman's soul, that may very well feel the call to defend country with life and limb, is somehow bad and wrong. I can just see an Army woman looking at this and thinking, "So there's no place for me here at this table? I am woman, but I am rejected because I serve my country?"

No thanks. I won't have that kind of exclusion going on in MY Goddess spirituality. I may not have chosen that road for myself, but damned if I'll tell another woman that she shouldn't do so if she truly feels that call.

Ms. Christ's vision is far too limiting to women, and since it is so limiting (to the soft gentle compassionate mothering sort of woman), how on earth can she write about something she calls "liberation theology?" It doesn't seem to me like her vision frees women from anything, but in fact continues the sentence that patriarchy has placed upon women, only giving it a fresh and more attractive coat of paint. "Oh, it's GODDESS spirituality teaching me that I should be a sweet gentle stay at home mother and not have any ambition beyond the kitchen and the nursery! That's OK then, as long as it's not those nasty male Gods telling me this."

Ms. Christ also writes that she has a problem with monotheism that leads to religious intolerance. Oh, don't make me laugh...because that is what she herself seems to engage in. I have a feeling she would not be very open to or respectful of the religious insights found in Asatru, because Asatruar do not hesitate to use violence when it is necessary. That, and they also worship male Gods, so I guess that renders them completely useless. Please.

Joe and I had a conversation about something similar just yesterday. He couldn't understand why so many people in the women's spirituality movement didn't include ANY Northern European Goddesses. MY response was, "Would you really want to see it commercialized and cheapened and fluffed out in this way?" The closest thing to a response to this question that I put to him was, "Well, there's something perverse in me that would enjoy seeing the fur fly."

OK Joe, you're a weirdo. But I suppose he does have a point...people tend not to mess with Skadi when She's standing at the gates of Asgard demanding weregild for the death of Her father Thiassi.

Anyway, another thing about Carol Christ that proves to be beyond irritating is the fact that she and people like her go around complaining about how "oppressed" they are as women. People like Joe come along and say to people like her, "When was the last time you had to go dumpster diving just to have something to eat? When was the last time you lived on the street? When was the last time you had a choice between instant popcorn and powdered biscuits for dinner beacuse that was the only thing in the kitchen to eat and no money to buy anything else? When was the last time you had to live on food stamps and public aid? And WHAT exactly have YOU DONE, in all your enlightened Goddess spirituality, done to HELP RELIEVE THE BURDENS OF THE POOR AND NEEDY IN YOUR OWN COUNTRY?" As far as he's concerned, her happy-ass little trips to Crete are a complete, complete luxury and are totally pointless and a total waste of time. Let Carol Christ contribute something to reliving the needs of the poor right here in the US, before going charging off to Crete for a weekend to bathe in the sun and pat herself and other women on the back and tell each other how fabulous they are then go home to their upper-middle and upperclass lives with their big houses and sparkling pools, their expensive personal trainers and their Prozac and therapists - therapists they have because they themselves are like high strung little poodles themselves who can't cope with too much reality.

It's just so much more fluffy bunny feelgood crap.

Ya know, Lexa, I'd volunteer to be Rhiannon's Goddess-mother...but I think I'm a little too "out there" to do that for ANY kid. *blush*

Article on Ruth Barrett

2005-02-20T14:18:00.000-08:00

I have a few reservations about this article:

To say that Ruth Barrett is a witch who performs magic in Evansville and has a new book about Wiccan traditions is an accurate but cheap way to get your attention.

It also may well turn you off to knowing more. Witches are devil worshipers, magic is sacrilegious and nobody accepts Wicca as a religion, right?

Barrett, 51, has spent most of her adult life celebrating and demystifying her nature-based faith, which is recognized by the Parliament of the World's Religions. That means dissolving the myths. The devil is a Christian concept, she notes, and thus "outside of our cosmology," which finds divinity in the cycles of life, the four seasons and four natural forces: earth, water, fire, air.

The magic? It's been a bit sensationalized.

"Anytime you send something into motion while wishing, it's magic," she says. People practice it every time they blow out the candles on a birthday cake. (It might feel more significant if each person would express a wish for the guest of honor as the candles are lit.)

"I'm not pulling a rabbit out of my hat," notes the high priestess, ordained in 1980. She and life partner Falcon River are co-founders of the Temple of Diana, a tax-exempt denomination within the Wiccan faith that is more of a female monotheism, an offshoot of the feminist movement.

Barrett contends that you don't have to be a witch to benefit from "Women's Rites, Women's Mysteries: Creating Ritual in the Dianic Wiccan Tradition" (Author House, $21.75 in paperback), her new and self-published book.

"This book was written for anybody who wants to create their own rituals for their own life," Barrett says. "It is written for women because that's what I know, and our rites of passage tend to be invisible" -- the basis for shame or concealment instead of celebration.

She is talking about menstruation and menopause, plus using terms like "old crone" and "hag" as respectful references to old women, although rituals can and should be attached to passages not associated with gender, too.

"They are for any moment that we understand as significant -- getting a divorce, starting a new career, adopting a child. When we don't intentionally mark these things as important, then we move through life without a deeper consciousness."

So a croning ritual, for a woman in her mid 50s, "acknowledges a woman's value as a woman of wisdom, and as a person to be cherished and respected." What should this, or any other, ritual involve? Barrett's book provides more concepts than directives, because "each woman's needs are different."

The croning might be a multigenerational gathering of women who recall significant events during each decade of their lives. The older women speak the most. A celebration of menstruation might prompt participants to dress in red or light red candles, or for the mother to give her daughter a ruby ring.

Raised as a Reconstructionist Jew in southern California, Barrett is concerned about the trivialization of life, particularly on television, and self-centeredness.

"We need to stop and notice the miracles in the everyday world," she says. "That helps us make better decisions about ourselves, and the continuation of humanity."

In her Evansville home is a personal altar that changes with the seasons. There is a Brigid's Cross, because the Celtic goddess's holiday is this month, plus sprouting tulips and photos to symbolize the coming of spring. Other items are a tribute to the natural forces: a cup for water, stones for earth, a candle for fire, an incense burner for air.

Regardless of the reason for celebration, a "ritual altar is created to visually focus your consciousness and energy on the ritual purpose," Barrett writes. "It is a physical space in which the ritual work will take place. The items on the altar symbolize your intention, so you must consider how the building of the altar can best reflect the purpose or nature of the ritual."

She talks about "natural magic' and "sympathetic magic," using the garden as an example. The planting of seeds can represent the intent to grow something else in your own life; the nurturing of the seedlings is a reminder to nurture the more intangible goal, too.

"You enact something that you want to see happen" in another arena.

Attitudes about paganism in general, and witchcraft in particular, have softened in the last decade, Barrett says, but the rise in political intolerance worries her.

She notes that it has only been since 1954 that witchcraft laws were repealed. "We are interested in a world where women have rights," she says of her faith, which is goddess worship and for women only. Although Barrett is a lesbian, she says the majority of participants are heterosexual.

"We are not man haters -- this is just not about them."

Why concentrate on women? "Metaphorically, people in many religions decide what the divine looks like and feels like," she says. "The fit best for me, even as a child, was a female form. To me, it was just common sense."

I suppose on a certain level, it's not that big a deal...but on another it is. There are more than just the four classical elements. But I s'pose it's in the article this way because Barrett is a Wiccan, and that's the way she learned things.

Admittedly, there's a part of me that would say, "Ah, hell, might as well just go along with the four classical elements. It's as good as any." And just at least be aware that (for example) the Celts did things very differently, with three elements (Land, Sea and Sky).

REALLY UPSET about this

2005-02-19T07:08:00.000-08:00

Mom is still in denial, it seems.

She just will not take responsibility for the way her choices have had a negative impact upon my life.

I talked to her on the phone yesterday, and I commented that I was feeling VERY pressured by her into taking the Beaufort, SC property -- and that if I did not, she'd never let me live it down. And she'd treat me like I was so stupid for letting it go.

There are reasons why I think I can't keep that property.

I told Mom that I was feeling like I should take it just because she basically has tried to push very hard for me to do it.

She didn't want that...she said I should do what I want to do.

I said, "Mom, I've never done anything in life that I have WANTED to do. I've always gone along with what other people want me to do, just to keep the peace."

She said, "You went to Florida because you wanted to be with Dann, right?"

I grudgingly agreed - and here's why it was grudging agreement.

I REALLY went to Florida to get away from her and Denny and their drinking. I did it because I did not want to live with them because I felt unsafe in their household.

My father lived in Baltimore at the time, and he'd already shown a complete lack of respect for my privacy by reading my diaries to my mother on the phone when I was 16. That's a serious breach that I didn't want to subject myself to again.

If Mom hadn't divorced Dad -- if my parents had just done whatever it took to JUST FUCKING STAY MARRIED and provide a normal home for me LIKE OTHER KIDS HAD -- then maybe I would NOT be in Florida right screaming now, struggling like I am!

Mom didn't divorce Dad because he was abusive or whatever. She divorced him because....she just didn't love him any more. There were a lot of reasons for that, one of them being Dad's tendency to allow the Holladays to dominate their life. For example, Dad's aunt Mary owned the house we lived in, on South Springwood Drive in Silver Spring. Mom wanted to buy it. Mary wouldn't sell. Mom then wanted to look for a home to buy, but Dad wouldn't move out of the South Springwood Drive house. Mary assumed a level of control over our lives that she thought she was entitled to because she owned that house. Whenever she was in town and would come to see us, Mary went through our mail. She would stay with her sister Martha, who lived across the street from us, and watch from Martha's dining room window everything that went on in our house. Every day when I'd go out to school, she'd meet me at the end of the walk and do a 20 Questions thing about my life, our lives, etc.

THIS is why I NEVER want to live in the house in Bithlo that Joe's friends Sue and Lucky own. Sue is Joe's ex girlfriend. I don't want her having control over our lives in this way.

Anyway, there were a lot of factors that went into my mother's decision to leave. Father had a habit of writing checks to buy things like records, but not entering it into the check register and not telling her about it -- so when she was trying to balance the checkbook and pay bills, she was wondering why the figures weren't coming out right.

She would then go look in the record collection a few days later and find a new album. Oh, so that's where the money went. Instead of paying bills or buying groceries, he bought a new album. And didn't tell her about it, didn't consult her, didn't make sure there was money to cover everything...just did it.

That sort of thing.

So they wound up divorcing...which I suppose in and of itself wouldn't have been a problem if either of them had married again, and married decent people.

Dad never remarried.

Mom married a redneck she met in a bar who would get drunk, stay out late, she'd be at home drinking her sorrows away....and he'd come home drunk and once with a venereal disease from some whore he'd schtupped (and didn't even know her name)....and one time he came home late and I was there (unbeknownst to him) and he thought I was Mom, asleep in the front bedroom (as she sometimes did when she was mad at him) and he crawled into bed with me and began molesting me.

I had to wiggle out of that one and wake Mom up to get him out of my bed.

Then there was the time I'd gone over there for dinner, and was leaving to go to Dann's house. Mom wanted Denny to walk me to my car. I didn't want him to, because they were both drunk (but at least this time it was a happy drunk). He wanted to kiss me goodbye at my car -- and he attempted to slip some tongue in there.

Then there was the time both he and Mom had been out somewhere, I was in their apartment, and Mom had walked to the back bathroom to use it. Denny wanted to hug me goodnight, and as he was hugging me, he squeezed my ass and started probing my girl parts (over my pants of course) with his fingers while hugging me. Naturally he was drunk again.

DOESN'T ANYONE THINK THIS GETS A LITTLE TIRESOME AFTER A WHILE????

If it was only the one time he'd made the mistake, when he didn't realize I was there because I'd just come in from being out of town all week and when I'd arrived he was out drinking with his buddies (of course, what he was doing out with them when he had a wife at home I don't know), that'd be one thing.

BUT IT WASN'T JUST ONCE!!!

And not even Mom is willing to admit this. I have told her about these occasions. I think she's in such shock that her brain just blacks out the memory of the other occasions I have described above, and she just refuses to own up to the fact that she married a man I felt NO safety around at all!

AND THAT'S WHY I WENT TO FLORIDA!!!!!

And that's why for the longest time I REFUSED to put alcohol to my lips. And I didn't want to date anyone who drank even socially. I wanted a teetoaller boyfriend.

Because I can't trust someone who leaves their self-control in the hands of their good buddy Jack Daniels.

I love Mom dearly, but there are times when she's just SO DAMN STUPID about this kind of thing.

Why didn't she just tell Denny "NO MORE DRINKING" a long time ago?

Why NOT ban alcohol? Because SHE wanted it.

I guess IT was more important than having ME around, and providing a safe, secure home for her kid.

As long as there was drinking going on, I was NOT going to live in that house.

This was determined one night in January of 1990. Mom and I got into a physical brawl over something....she was drunk, she was singing loudly and poorly, keeping me up, and I was getting so sick of ALL of this drunken bullshit I'd had to live with for two years, since graduating high school in 1988 and attending Montgomery College. I just could NOT TAKE ANY MORE. Why couldn't she have just SHUT THE FUCK UP and gone to bed at a normal hour like normal parents do? Noooooooooooooooooooo, she couldn't do that. She had to be up, on the phone, singing songs, drinking and drinking and drinking. I saw her drink for 15 hours straight one night, and then drive Denny to work the next morning!! She cleaned out a WHOLE CASE of beer! When I told Dad that, he was shocked. He'd never seen ANYONE polish off an entire CASE of beer in one night.

Anyway, Mom and I got into a fight, and I called Dad at 2am screaming, "Mom's beating me!" into the phone. Dad lived just over half an hour away, but inside of about 20 minutes he was there with two cops in tow to get me out of that apartment.

Way to go, Dad. On THAT count, you did so right. I'll never forget that. Never.

I went to his house in Baltimore that night to spend the night there. But because I was a student in Montgomery County, I could not live in Baltimore County and receive the financial aid I was getting to continue my classes there.

So I went to stay with Dann.

BUT IF MOM HAD JUST NOT MARRIED A FUCKING WEST BY GOD VIRGINIA HILLBILLY -- IF SHE'D JUST MARRIED SOMEONE WHO HAD SOME SENSE AND COULD BE A DECENT HUSBAND -- IT'S STILL POSSIBLE I WOULD NEVER HAVE COME TO FLORIDA!!! I WOULDN'T HAVE HAD TO RUN FROM THEIR HOUSE TO PRESERVE MY ASS!!!

A long time ago, when I still lived with Dann, I'd sent her a letter telling her about all this. But she STILL chooses to ignore it.

She won't listen to me.

Mom doesn't listen to her own kid.

She just thinks I am in Florida because Dann came here. Well, Dann and I broke up in 1996. I could have gone back to Maryland.

But I didn't. Why?

THE DRINKING!

I knew they were not capable of having a child in their household, even an adult child. Life would be MISERABLE for me. And I didn't go back to my dad's in Baltimore because I couldn't trust HIM either. I could just see him going through my things while I was out of the house.

Dad never owned up to reading my diaries to Mom over the phone. I never told him I knew about that.

WHY COULDN'T MY PARENTS HAVE JUST BEEN NORMAL PARENTS???? THEY FUCKED UP MY LIFE!!! BECAUSE OF THEM I WAS UNABLE TO GET THE COLLEGE EDUCATION I NEEDED TO SURVIVE IN THIS WORLD! BECAUSE OF THEM I HAVE TO STRUGGLE TODAY!!

When is at least Mom going to own up to the way her choices have fucked up my life???

Article from Planned Parenthood of Greater Orlando

2005-02-19T03:43:00.000-08:00

Access to reproductive health care can save the lives of women and children, advance development and preserve the environment -- but under the Bush administration, access continues to be denied in the developing world.

The great progress of the women's rights movement has made many of us forget that it was once illegal for women in this country to buy contraceptives and that American women once gave birth to an average of six children. It's important to remember that our progress isn't shared by many women in other parts of the world. Nearly 350 million people in the developing world lack access to contraception, and 52 million unplanned pregnancies were reported worldwide in 2003 alone. U.S. policy restrictions, such as the Mexico City Policy, deny women in developing countries the freedoms that women in the United States often take for granted -- and the consequences have proved to be both societal and environmental.

First imposed in 1984 by the Reagan administration and reinstated by President George W. Bush four years ago, the Mexico City Policy prohibits the U.S. government from providing foreign aid and supplies to family-planning organizations overseas that engage in any activity that could be construed (according to arbitrary U.S. guidelines) as being abortion-related, including counseling or referral.

The policy was purportedly designed to reduce the incidence of abortion, yet there is no evidence that such a reduction has occurred. Also known as the Global Gag Rule, the policy has closed scores of clinics in some of the world's poorest countries and drastically impaired other clinics' abilities to maintain adequate levels of staffing/supplies, including condoms needed for HIV prevention. In Africa, for example, there are only enough condoms for every adult male to receive four condoms per year.

Here at home, Florida's teenage pregnancy rate ranks sixth nationally, and, as nearly 80 percent of teen mothers go on welfare, stopping the teen pregnancy cycle is crucial. According to two studies in AGI's Perspectives on Sexual and Reproductive Health, individuals between the ages of 15 and 24 account for 50 percent of all new cases of sexually transmitted diseases in 2000. We must recognize that the problems we face locally are also occurring globally but on a much larger scale.

Roughly one-sixth of the world's population lives in environmentally fragile hot spots where the unmet need for family planning is often highest, and that population is growing nearly 40 percent faster than the world as a whole. The largest generation of young adults in history (more than 1.3 billion) is entering its reproductive years, and the number of people facing critical fresh water and crop-land scarcity worldwide is rising rapidly. We must engage our community and encourage our elected officials to help the United States keep its promise to support family planning and reproductive health-care services -- for women, for children, for the planet.

From Troy....

2005-02-18T02:42:00.000-08:00

...on a liberal Christian list I'm on...

I'm enjoying Phillip K. Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? The book was the basis for the film Blade Runner. The novel follows Deckard, a special-ops cop in San Francisco, whose job is to "retire" renegade androids built by the Rosen Association. The androids were built as "help" for humans colonizing other worlds. A few humans remain in post-WWIII San Francisco and its oppressive dust and slowly dehumanize. Deckard rises each morning and uses his "mood organ" to program whatever appropriate "moods" into his brain for the day. Humans refer to androids condescendingly as "andies". The movie refers to them as Skin Jobs. So perfect in design and flawless in execution are these droids that their only "glitch" is the inability to completely empathize with humans and animals. Empathy Tests are used to weed out droids and exterminate them. Deckard is looked down on by his neighbors in the apartment building because they all have real pets and he has an electric sheep fenced into a grazing pen on the rooftop.

The enmity and outright hostility toward andies is quite clear. The androids become more and more human while the people, with their "mood organs", become less and less human. Droids are programmed with finite lifespans. They want quantity of life. Humans in San Francisco want quality of life and envy the droids their exotic adventures on colonial planets.

Deckard dreams of replacing his electric sheep with a real one. The converse question is, would androids dream of having electric sheep? Both sides, humans and droids, seek greater humanity from two different thrusts, the humans craving better quality of life and the droids seeking greater quantity of life. The lines between android and human quickly blurs.

Now---I know this isn't the sci-fi board, LOL.

But look at the clutter of technology that daily programs us. Advertisements on t.v., radio, billboards, in schools, on buses, in school buses, on the internet, in magazines. We're told what the "current trends" are and conditioned to accept those trends so the commercials can further tell us what to wear, what to drink, how to diet, who to watch on t.v., which politicians to believe, who to trust, who to hate. We're being slowly programmed into "electric sheep". How would Jesus go about tending his flock of "electric sheep"? Sheep who see material trinkets as more humanly comforting than other humans can be? We see the commercialization of Jesus, stores that sell Testamints and dashboard saviors and lip balm in a cruciform box called Cross Gloss, we see Jesus theme parks. A wonder they don't call these parks Six Flags Over Salvation. All that's missing is an actor, as Jesus, doing a commercial-break promo for an upcoming movie on the life of Christ, who stabs a finger at the t.v. audience and says, "Tonight on NBC! Be There!"

I'm not suggesting a complete "technology fast", though many go this route with no regrets. But some impurities need to go. The internet can be either a great tool of learning and connection with others or can fast become our only connection to others, connection to people who are known only as log-on names and writing styles, in essence, electric sheep. I avoid t.v. as much like the plague as I can unless t.v. offers an occasional good documentary. I'm sitting here at my computer armoire and wondering---how in the hell did I surround my walls with 5,000 VHS and DVD movies? Oh, gee, here's one I haven't watched since the Earth cooled. There's seven more I've never watched. There's another fifty I'll never get around to watching.

Technology is like border-line junk food that still has nutritional value but must be ingested in moderation. This world is becoming so fast-paced that suicides rise, footprints on the backs of others become our stepping stones, and none dare to stop and savor a rare moment. Jesus is all about "human connection", about family fellowship around the dinner table in place of a Hungry Man XXL in front of NBA basketball. It's easy to see how we become electric sheep when the attempts to commercialize Jesus try to turn him into an Electric Messiah.

I guess all I'm saying is slow down now and then, savor a moment with all five of the senses, experience life in place of brushing past it. Find new human connections. Restrengthen old ones. It is within those connections we'll find Christ waiting, and where we'll find peace.

I'd say "we'll find Goddess waiting" but the sentiment is the same. I do agree that in so many ways, technology has really started to strip humanity of its -- well, humanity.

I don't have a cell phone.

I don't have TiVO.

I don't even have cable TV.

I don't have a dishwasher. (My apartment didn't come with one.)

I don't have an iPod.

And I like it this way.

PC but non PC

2005-02-17T16:55:00.000-08:00

Would we act any different?

I’m staring at a photograph of me and my father at my high school graduation. I’m in a white cap and gown, he’s in summer blue slacks, a white short-sleeved shirt, and a pink tie with navy blue circles on it. His hair is grey, but he still looks very fit and healthy at this time.

I was 17 when that picture was taken.

I’m 35 now, so that means 18 years had passed between now and the day that picture was taken.

If I had known my father only had 18 more years to live…how different would I have acted?

I knew his time here was limited. He was an apprentice undertaker in his youth, after all, and he told me all the weird stories that he had acquired from working in the funeral industry. I knew about mortality.

It just didn’t seem so immediate to me at the time.

Look at your families, people. They may have 18 years yet to go – or only one year. They may only have til next week. No one knows. “Life is very short and there’s no time for fussing and fighting, my friend.”

That said, my mother and I are rather baffled about Father naming Debbie co-owner of the house with me AND making her executor of the will. Let me explain.

See, here’s the thing about my sister – she didn’t grow up with me. I had NO contact with her, and neither did Father, until about 1995 when HE sought HER out. She didn’t go looking for him at all, even once she turned 18. Debbie is in her late 30s now, I think. She’s not much older than me. By the time my father contacted her, my great grandmother Katie (and please note that grandma Katie wrote a poem called "Larry" about my father, and she mentioned my mother Billie and I in the poem, but not Nancy or Debbie at all) and my aunt Mary and grandfather Fred and grandmother June were all dead. Debbie is the product of my father’s marriage to Nancy, his first wife. I am the product of his second marriage to Billie. Nancy remarried and the man she married adopted Debbie, so he was not allowed to have contact with her.

So she grew up completely apart from the rest of us Holladays. By personal “culture” she isn’t a Holladay at all – only by genetics is she my sister, really, and I don’t quite mean that as cruelly as it probably sounds. Granted, it’s not her fault. It’s just a statement of what is. But as a result of not having grown up as a Holladay, she knows nothing of our family’s in jokes, for example. She doesn’t know why it’s the biggest HOOT that I got June’s “throne” and her organ that she used to play the world’s worst versions of “Silent Night” on you’ve ever heard in your life. LOL!!! Debbie does not know any of this -- our family’s power plays/struggles, what things have meaning to us and what doesn’t, how the Holladays think, she isn’t familiar with our family traditions (such as serving dessert at Thanksgiving on the beautiful blue/white Copenhagen Christmas plates, or the fact that those Christmas plates were actually purchased by aunt Mary as a gift every year for my family, those being Dad and my mother Billie and me).

This is why it’s shocking, completely shocking, to me that he willed to her the yellow-pattern china that had once belonged to aunt Mary and grandma Katie. And Debbie said she wanted the bedroom furniture in the blue bedroom for her son Bruce, because he has no bedroom furniture. The thing is, we’re talking a very elegant antique bedroom set that belonged to June’s mother, Mrs. Hoban. My family had a THING with antiques that were kept in the family, and she doesn’t know how we Holladays value those things that have been in the family for so long – and Bruce, I feel, wouldn’t treat them with the care and respect they are due as real family heirlooms. She also wants the dining room set…but she never sat down to a Christmas dinner at that dining room set with Fred and June in West Orange, New Jersey. I have. My first birthday was celebrated on that dining room set with the family. I have pictures of it. I think I also celebrated my fourth birthday on it too – I remember the Pooh cake I had.

I suppose there are a lot of levels to this. One is, Debbie was able to get to see him more frequently than I was these last few years. She also took him up to PA for the holidays a couple of times. Second, I think he wanted her to feel as much part of the family as possible, to make up for lost time.

But Mom and I believe that everything should have gone to me for this very reason – she just isn’t a Holladay. I don’t know why, as soon as she turned 18, she did not attempt to find him, knowing that she was adopted by the man she called “Dad.” She never called Father “Dad.” She called him Larry.

I called him “Doc” as in Doc Holiday/Holladay. Even my former boyfriend Dann knows more about the family than Debbie did. He’d know why it’s so hilarious that I got June’s throne (and what that is is simply a beautiful upholstered lounge chair that she ruled her roost from – you’d have to have been there to get it).

I know this isn’t politically correct, but I had to get it off my chest.

Quick Post

2005-02-16T22:07:00.000-08:00

Before I crash...

I'm being my usual tossed-up self again. I think I may want to be a Goddess woman again.

No particular trad. Just women's spirituality. Well, maybe with a hint of Celtic flavor, but Goddess nonetheless.

I never felt so confident about myself and what I was doing in life as I did once I found women's spirituality, Goddess spirituality.

For if I am made in HER image, I am divine. I can handle anything.

It's hard to explain.

I may start wearing my Goddess pendant again. I'm sure I drive people nuts with this, but hey....as Billy Joel said:

I don't care what you say any more, this is MY LIFE
Go ahead with your own life, leave me alone!

Telephone Conversation

2005-02-15T17:00:00.000-08:00

I talked to Doug today, - probably the single most successful person in the family. He's in NY working with an investments firm. And he travels and does guest speaking and all that stuff. He is supposed to be in West Palm Beach at the end of next month.

Anyway, Doug was his usual effusive, lovely, wonderful self. He did make a comment about talking to June many years ago about leaving something in the will to my father. Sandra too believed that June was completely awful to my father. I bet the whole family saw it, and I just NEVER realized it.

I can see that Doug is still committed to God all the way. *wistful smile* I do not know if he'd really be happy with my mystical turn of mind. But I can't hide it. I saw what I saw, back in 1996. Blinded by the light, as it were.

I'm telling you...this business with my father dying has really made me look at a lot of things differently. Odd as it may sound, it has brought home to me very forcefully that I'm a Gael in ancestry. It has also whacked me with my Christian identity. Suddenly everything in the Wiccan world looks so very -- self-centered to me. I'm seeing, from this perspective, far too much of the "look at me, I'm different and I'm so persecuted" attitude. A lot of my desire to be anything RESEMBLING Wiccan just evaporates in the face of my real family.

I might get over this eventually.

Then again, I might not.

I have to admit, and I know this isn't cool, but sometimes I could just KICK MYSELF for where I am now. When I look at how I live, compared to how Doug lives, I'm so bitterly ashamed of the mess I have made of my life. I don't want any of the family coming to my apartment and seeing the poverty and ugliness I live in. I could just cry. I could just absolutely scream.

Then again, as Clarissa Pinkola Estes put it in her book "Women Who Run With The Wolves," I am one of the Scar Clan. I wear the scars on my soul of the abuse I suffered in my college years, and they know nothing about that because I never told them. They'd be shocked if they heard what happened to me when I was 21. Hell, so would Dad...he's the one who turned up at Mom's apartment with two Montgomery County police officers at 2am when I called him shrieking "Mom's beating me!" because she was drunk and we had argued about something. And thankfully Dad never found out in THIS life about what Denny did to me. I wouldn't even want to know what would have happened, had I told him. He knew I didn't like Denny much, but he thought it was because Denny just drank too much. He didn't know it was because Denny laid hands on me...

Yes, I've been initiated in another way, a very painful way, but initiated nonetheless. I'm an initiate in the Coven of Hard Knocks. LOL!!

I guess I've earned the grey hairs that are coming in at my temples now.

I'm so very sorry that Dad never got back in touch with Doug and Sandra. I believe he wanted to. And I did search frantically for information on where Doug was. I have the Bible Doug gave my father many years ago; it is the Bible that I read the 23rd Psalm out of when we scattered his ashes to sea.

I'm finding myself spending a little more time in the Word these days. I'm reading the Psalms and just basking in the beauty there.

And while I think about that, I'm seeing in these things wisdom that I never saw there before. I see the wisdom in the Scriptures teaching how awful a thing divorce is. I see what happened to my life after my parents' divorce. And how not putting Godly values first cost a great deal.

Doug put Godly values first, and look at how successful he is. And happy.

I see people putting things like Wiccan values first, and I don't see anyone nearly as successful or happy as he is.

The proof IS in the pudding, after all, isn't it? Doesn't Scripture say that ye shall know a tree by its fruit?

Yes, I have a LOT of happy memories of Woodside United Methodist Church. I'm so proud that my family is associated with that church.

But over the years I have come to see things and learn things that make me question. Yet, questioning aside, I do feel something soothing in my heart when I read the Psalms, as I mentioned I was doing.

Funny. I find myself thinking back to the time when I visited Aloma United Methodist, right up the street, right before the holidays year before last. It was when Joe and I were apart. I walked to the altar to receive communion, and something in me snapped and it was all I could do NOT to weep upon receiving the bread and wine. I had to struggle to keep it in.

I guess I felt the grace, and somehow didn't feel worthy of it. But it was so tenderly gifted to me, so freely...how could I not be moved? Mystic that I am, how could I not feel something sing in my heart?

So why did I want to cry?! I shouldn't have felt that!! I should have felt...elation! But I felt misery, as if I wasn't deserving of it and I didn't belong with those people and at that church and I felt so wrong. Like I was doing something wrong and I'd be found out and thrown out soon. Like I was lying.

Yet, what on earth was I lying about? I was just a seeker kneeling there, trying to understand. I'm just one person.

There are times when I sit in meditation and just open myself, and I allow myself to become aware of the grace, gently showering down upon all of us here, and all we have to do is open to it and smile and say a simple, humble thanks for it.

All I know is that conservative or liberal, Catholic or Protestant, white or black, male or female, the grace IS there. We are never, ever separated from it. We might claim to be. We might think we are. But it's always there. If it wasn't, we simply wouldn't exist. Galatians 3:28.

"It's all about serving God - It's all about Saving Grace!"

What I take that to mean is that this grace, poured out upon us like a shower of golden light so softly and sweetly, is the healing balm for the soul. "Salvation" means "to heal" and that is what I remind myself of when I see that word.

Yes, I suppose I am rambling. I should stop.

Lent

2005-02-15T02:56:00.000-08:00

I read this entry on another site:

"What did I give up for Lent..................

L E N T ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !

The Lord says he desires OBEDIENCE not SACRIFICE.

Yes we are called to give up something. I think Romans says it best...

I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God. (Romans 12:1-2 KJV)

Do want to sacrifice....Give him YOUR ALL, EVERY PART OF YOU. Not just for 40 days, but for your life. That is his desire and nothing else. Did you notice it said REASONABLE SERVICE (The least your can do)."

Hmmmm. "Present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God." Reading this, I'd say this sums up the thoughts I've always had about recreational drug use. I can't fathom putting that stuff into my body, which is a temple of purity in my eyes. Isn't that odd?

I originally gave up sodas for Lent, but fell off of that within two days. Ooops!

Attempting to think of myself as Christian in this hyperconservative world is really awkward. I get funny looks and people tell me that my more liberal interpretation of Christianity is wrong, and they are the ones who are right.

Perhaps BOTH parties have missed something.

But since reading "Original Blessing" I don't think so.

I can't help but think that, despite the first of the Big 10, God loves variety. I just can't see myself following a God that feels so weak and threatened in the face of other deities.

I wonder if I have not so much Jehovah in mind as the Elohim, whenever I think of God. I think of God as the benevolent Creator, in whose image all people are made.

I should not be afraid to express the mystical vision I had, very similar to Saul of Tarsus on the road to Damascus, similar to Hildegard of Bingen, Julian of Norwich and so many other mystics.

Sometimes I pity the writer who posted the entry above. He hasn't really seen the dynamic, living God. He's a little too similar to the Pharisees if you ask me. Worried about the LETTER of the Law rather than the SPIRIT. He just...doesn't get it.

Drove To Beaufort

2005-02-13T18:57:00.000-08:00

9.58pm Sunday

Joe and I just got back from driving up to Beaufort, South Carolina. It was the first time he'd ever seen anything up there.

He was really amazed at the size of the house, he says it's in better shape than what he expected, and he would like to see me keep the house, and keep it in the family.

I also took him around downtown Beaufort and let him see some of the gorgeous antebellum homes that are still there.

It's hard, very hard, to walk away from Beaufort. It's so relaxing and beautiful there. It's so wonderful. And the house IS gorgeous.

But sadly I don't think I have the job skills necessary to get a job that would support that house.

I don't know what else to do but let it go. Much as I WANT to live in it, and live there, I don't think I CAN.

I feel like I screwed my life up totally.

Unity : Daily Word - Forgiveness

2005-02-08T16:27:00.000-08:00

Unity : Daily Word - Forgiveness: As I forgive, I move forward to brighter days and better times.

I give thanks for what I gain and also what I am relieved of when I forgive myself and others. Expressing forgiveness, I gain peace of mind and more harmony in my relationships. I give up hurt feelings and angry thoughts. How good I feel, for I have opened a way for love to flow within me and among others and me!

Forgiveness is a daily practice of choosing to avoid harsh judgment and resentment and to give love and acceptance. As I forgive, I move forward to brighter days and better times. Leaving the mistakes and misunderstandings in the past where they belong, I free myself to live in a fresh atmosphere of harmony and love.

Then Peter came and said to him, Lord, if another member of the church sins against me, how often should I forgive? As many as seven times? Jesus said to him, Not seven times, but, I tell you, seventy-seven times.
Matthew 18:21-22

I have a lot of things to forgive people of.

I was perusing another diary site (*coughbloopdiarydotcomcough*) and I saw this note appended to another diary entry:

"Yup we rock because we aren't following the lemmings. And as with being Wiccan (or in your case, satanist) we get a LOT of flak from the general public because they all think in binary. White or Black. Hot or Cold. Good or Bad. They can't understand someone who likes it BOTH ways. And they can't understand someone who is not a Fucking Christian, either. Can you tell I'm sick of people right now?"

The same noter also left this note further down on the same entry: "If there is nothing I hate worse than mindless sheep, I don't know what..."

There are a couple of problems I have with this.

One is just the fact that it's assumed that all Christians are sheeple. I'm not quite halfway through "Original Blessing" yet but I can already see that there are a lot of people out there such as Matthew Fox who are NOT sheeple.

BTW I'm thinking that I may start hanging out with the Quakers for a time. And George Fox was certainly not any of the sheeple, that's for sure.

I really, really like their idea of simplicity in life so as to better hear the voice of Spirit speaking, not letting clutter get in the way.

Anyway, another problem I have is not exactly politically correct, but I bristle at the idea that this young girl is putting out, that Wiccans are the only original thinkers out there...when in so many ways, I've SEEN Wicca become herd mentality over the years. It's conforming to nonconformity any more. That's what most of the teenybopper Wiccans have turned it into. And there's NOT a lot of deep theological inquiry in Wicca.

*sigh*

I just wanted to get that off my chest. It doesn't REALLY matter that much, I suppose, but it's just something I observed and wanted to blog about.

Mutterings

2005-02-06T18:43:00.000-08:00

I just thought I'd post a few thoughts I had.

I got a silver Celtic cross today.

And I picked up Matthew Fox's book "Original Blessing."

This looks like it will be a very interesting read -- yet on the other hand, nothing all that new to ME, who has spent the last 15 years in the Pagan world.

But it IS nice to see Christian mystics like this writing books and speaking up and NOT letting the fundamentalists have the final say in Christian spirituality.

There's a part of me that does want to own a mystical form of Christianity, like Creation Spirituality and whatnot.

This whole business with losing Dad has made me think of a lot of things. He's my ancestor now. And he was a Christian...specifically, a Methodist. This is part of my own personal spiritual history. I have a lot of positive memories of being a Methodist.

And somehow I'm feeling a bit more courageous in claiming the path I was born to and just doing it MY WAY, not the way Brother Jim or Stace or Walabe or any other Christian would do it. Not that I am saying they are clueless. They have found their "groove" with Christ. But the fact remains that, like so many other things in life, what works for them may not work for anyone else. Including me.

My relationship with God is MINE, not theirs.

I'm also coming to the realization that things like runes, Tarot, I Ching, whatever -- none of that really matters. It's almost a distraction from just living in a constant state of prayer and ecstatic thanksgiving. That's where we should be. Looking at the beauty all around us and going nuts because it's crazy, it's awesome, it's wonderful.

All this business with different Gods and Goddesses -- well, what comes to mind is the Zen idea of "don't confuse the finger pointing AT the moon FOR the moon". I'm coming to the conclusion that they are fingers pointing at the moon, but they are not the moon. And even the very idea of God in and of itself -- that's a distraction too.

I guess the Buddhists put it best when they teach to be fully present in the eternal now. That's where one experiences God as a verb, as a dynamic process. Just be open and present.

And that's why it doesn't really matter whether I wear a cross or a hammer or a pentacle or anything else. The Spirit is not limited to one path.

This Is Amusing

2005-02-05T10:29:00.000-08:00

I kept a few things that I found in Dad's house...

One is an old, unopened pack of True 100s cigarettes. No, I don't smoke. There's a reason these smokes were kept unopened.

When you look on the back of the pack, you find the Seal of the President of the United States and a statement in script below it that says "Welcome Aboard Air Force One."

I also have some of the ration books from the war -- and they still have some stamps in them.

Old newspapers (mostly the Philadelphia Inquirer) with headlines from the war and that era, such as when Hitler died, the war ended, Roosevelt died, etc.

I find these to be amazing things. It really brings the war home to me personally in a way that studying it in a history book does not.

I have also acquired the habit of keeping old newspapers of significant events. The Challenger and Columbia disasters are things I've kept newspapers of. Princess Diana's death. I'm sure I'll keep the papers when the current Queen dies and Charles ascends the throne. And probably when William gets married.

I've kept TIME magazines of the 9-11 attacks. I've kept all kinds of things like this...because someday someone will look back on all this and go, "Wow..."

I got a lot of the black/white family pics into an album last night. I guess there's only so much of the pics I can take before I get overwhelmed and I have to put it down.

I should shower and get out of here. I'm hungry.

I'm Back

2005-02-04T22:00:00.000-08:00

...and I think I'm changed.

I'm looking at my little life here and thinking how unimportant it all is. I mean stuff like my computer and just......stuff.

I want to clean my life out.

I want to start over.

I'm absolutely terrified what this will mean.

And there's no one here any more to call me "Peanut." No one but Dad was allowed to call me that.

Not even Mom calls me that. Joe doesn't call me that. Dann didn't call me that.

That was strictly Dad's nickname for me. Now he's taken it to his grave...

...which is actually his favorite fishing hole in SC. We had him cremated and released his ashes to Mother Ocean.

I read the 23rd Psalm over him. He'd read it for Grandma Katie. So I read it for him.

I'm so glad I have these pictures. I also have the flag that was over my grandfather's coffin at his burial; he had a military funeral, as he was a Navy officer.

But I feel like my whole perspective is different now. I feel like Melissa Etheridge...that is to say, "I will never be the same."

*sigh*

I don't know how "normal" my life will be from here on out. I guess I can try to get back into the normal swing of things...but I feel like some support was taken out from under me.

Pray for me. I'll need it. I guess I was more of a daddy's girl than I realized.

I'm sorry I didn't get to see him one more time, yet...my memories that I have of Dad are of him as a strong, healthy man. Not as an aging, weakening man.

I was shocked when I saw the condition of his bathroom. Absolutely beyond unsanitary. Apparently the kidneys were really going bad. And other things too.

Good thing I had industrial strength cleaner with me.

I almost feel hopeless, that I'll never have a home now. I've lost that. I can't keep that house up there.

I need to calm down and get some rest. Although I'm really amazed at myself; I drove 6 hours straight and made it just fine.

Not bad. And I get GREAT highway mileage on my car.

I must get to sleep. Maybe more tomorrow.

Dad's Gone

2005-01-30T08:51:00.000-08:00

He died Friday night, apparently.

I think I'm in some kind of state of shock, and I really don't know what I'm supposed to do.

I don't know if there's a will or anything.

I'm absolutely sick with stress. I don't want things. I don't want stuff. I can get that on my own. I can't have the house; I can't afford its upkeep.

I just want this over with, so I can move on with my life.

I know it sounds really selfish, but there is an element of practicality here.

Besides, I do have my memories of him from life. That's more valuble than anything.

I have a lot of things on my mind right now...

Oh Dear God...

2005-01-29T13:58:00.000-08:00

Check THIS out...

Unbelievable. After the 9-11 commission, ClearChannel still wants to believe that Iraq is responsible for 9-11? And that all Americans pray to that God?

*sigh*

On the Sponge Bob Controversy

2005-01-29T05:55:00.000-08:00

My comments are in red, the article in black...

Focus on the Family founder did not criticize a cartoon character, as has been widely reported, but was warning parents that the group behind a "diversity" video may put material in teachers' hands that could prompt them to teach kids that homosexuality is equivalent to heterosexuality.

Please note the use of the word “could” in that last sentence. That does not mean it WILL. It simply means it’s possible.

Dr. James Dobson set the record straight today about the onslaught of media reports mocking him for comments he is alleged to have made about the cartoon character SpongeBob SquarePants.

"I've been in the public eye for thirty-something years and I have never had my words more misrepresented than they were in this instance," Dobson said on today's installment of his internationally syndicated radio program. "I was said to be on the warpath for my dislike for SpongeBob — who supposedly has homosexual characteristics.

"I said no such thing."

Now he knows how John Lennon felt back in the day when he made his remarks about the Beatles being bigger than Jesus. Or how Johnny Depp felt when he made his remarks about the US being like a big dog that can hurt you. In addition, of course, people of Dobson’s ilk were attacking Lennon and then Depp for their remarks. Dr. Dobson, you know what they say about the shoe fitting, don’t you?

What Dobson did say, in a speech last week in Washington during an event sponsored by the Family Research Council, was that Sponge Bob is one of 100 popular animated characters that may have been co-opted by an innocuous-sounding group to promote acceptance of homosexuality to children. The group, the We Are Family Foundation, has produced a video slated for distribution to 61,000 public and private elementary schools; it features Sponge Bob, Big Bird, Barney and others singing the old disco hit "We Are Family" and spreading a message of "diversity and unity."

Once again, please note the word “may” in the statement “may have been co-opted.” This is not a definite. This is a possibility.

And therein lies the rub — albeit well-concealed.

While words like "diversity" and "unity" sound harmless — even noble — enough, the reality is they are often used by gay activists as cover for teaching children that homosexuality is the moral and biological equivalent to heterosexuality. And there is ample evidence that the We Are Family Foundation shares — and promotes — that view.

Well, I hardly think this is any reason to stop using words like “diversity” and “unity” and “family” and whatnot. Although I find it interesting that the Right becomes alarmed at the very mention of these words; it indicates a certain level of power those words have. Sort of like the word “witch” or whatever. This may be a leverage point.

"Unfortunately," Dobson explained, "the We Are Family foundation has very strong homosexual advocacy roots and biases."

For example, a tolerance pledge, which the foundation says it is "pleased to provide" on its Web site, reads in part: "I pledge to have respect for people whose abilities, beliefs, culture, race, sexual identity or other characteristics are different from my own."

What a shame that a website even has to have something like that on it. This is America of 2005; we should be far more socially enlightened than that.

And it's not the only piece of pro-homosexual content that has been posted on the group's Web site — some of it removed in recent days.

The curriculum booklet that will accompany the "We Are Family" DVD when it is sent to schools in March, for instance, is likely to contain resources for educators seeking to normalize homosexuality. Although that guide has not yet been made public, a 2003 manual, also associated with the "We Are Family" cartoon-character video, offered several exercises for educators that equate homosexuality with immutable characteristics, such as race or gender, and suggest it deserves limitless tolerance and acceptance.

Another previous curriculum posted on the We Are Family Foundation Web site, called "Writing for Change," includes exercises such as:

• Generating a Description - encourages students to discuss the definition of "lesbian."

• Talking About Being "Out" - offers worksheet questions and a discussion of "perceptions of sexual orientation."

• Uncovering Attitudes About Sexual Orientation - explores the impact of "homophobia" and "heterosexism."

• Developing definitions - presents a list of stereotypical definitions, including "compulsory heterosexuality." That is described "the assumption that women are naturally or innately drawn sexually and emotionally toward men, and men toward women; the view that heterosexuality is the "norm" for all sexual relationships."

"The institutionalization of heterosexuality in all aspects of society includes the idealization of heterosexual orientation, romance, and marriage," the guide states. "Compulsory heterosexuality leads to the notion of women as inherently 'weak,' and the institutionalized inequality of power: power of men to control women's sexuality, labor, childbirth and childrearing, physical movement, safety, creativity, and access to knowledge. It can also include legal and social discrimination against homosexuals and the invisibility or intolerance of lesbian and gay existence."

I see it happening every day. Everything the Religious Right wants to do involves all of these things; it is quite inimical to women’s rights. If the Right had their way, women would be barefoot, uneducated, constantly pregnant, unemployed, the whole nine yards. I am convinced that conservative Christian men would allow their women less personal freedom than they’d give to their dogs.

Tom Minnery, vice president of government and public policy at Focus on the Family, said reporters who have mocked Dobson for his comments have deliberately ignored these details in their quest to marginalize a pro-family leader.

I can see that happening too. I may not agree with Dr. Dobson’s attitude on homosexuality, but it also doesn’t surprise me that the media has blown things out of proportion and taken things out of context.

"The media is trying to use this Sponge Bob nonsense as a smokescreen, because they're not willing to tell the people what's really at stake," he explained. "What's at stake is the forced normalization of homosexuality in the public schools."

Ah! There's the key word: PUBLIC schools. Those PUBLIC schools are funded by the tax dollars of a diversity (there’s that word again) of citizens; it is not the job of the PUBLIC schools to cater to the moral values of a select few. Keep your moral teachings for your private schools.

Dr. Bill Maier, Focus' psychologist in residence and a guest on today's broadcast, said he didn't think the media's efforts to undermine Dr. Dobson's integrity as a national spokesman for moral values would succeed.

"Clear-thinking Americans won't buy it," Maier said. "They've trusted Dr. Dobson for 27 years and will see through the media's Sponge Bob charade."

We'll see who the "clear thinking Americans" REALLY are by the time this flap is over.

The Week In Review

2005-01-29T05:46:00.000-08:00

Urgh.

Got a call from the nursing home where my dad is.

He's not cooperating with them at all. He's been there for two weeks, and he's refusing to sleep in their bed, and he's being verbally abusive of the staff there.

He's insisting that he can care for himself at home alone, and he even lied to them and said there was someone there to help care for him.

I give up.

He has sores/ulcers on his feet, they need treatment, and he's abusing the people who are trying to help him.

This is one of those moments where I see the Buddha's point. We DO bring a lot of suffering onto ourselves. If Father would just relax and let the nurses do their job, he'd not find it so onerous.

I know what he wants. He wants me or my sister Debbie to drop everything and go live with him.

Not possible. There's no work there. Debbie has her life, I have mine. He MUST be in assisted living, but because the psychologists keep finding him mentally competent, we can't force him into it. He gets very hostile whenever these topics are brought up, and yells at us over the phone and hangs up on us...

I swear I want to disappear. I want to change my name and run away to - to Arizona with Joe, and no one will find me ever again.

Maybe then I'll have some peace in my life.

Letter to America (LOL)

2005-01-27T21:04:00.000-08:00

Letter to America
by John Cleese

To the citizens of the United States of America, in the light of your failure to elect a competent President of the USA and thus to govern yourselves, we hereby give notice of the revocation of your independence, effective today.

Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will resume monarchical duties over all states, commonwealths and other territories. Except Utah, which she does not fancy.

Your new prime minister (The Right Honourable Tony Blair, MP for the 97.85% of you who have until now been unaware that there is a world outside your borders) will appoint a minister for America without the need for further elections. Congress and the Senate will be disbanded. A questionnaire will be circulated next year to determine whether any of you noticed.

To aid in the transition to a British Crown Dependency, the following rules are introduced with immediate effect:

1. You should look up "revocation" in the Oxford English Dictionary. Then look up "aluminium." Check the pronunciation guide. You will be amazed at just how wrongly you have been pronouncing it. The letter 'U' will be reinstated in words such as 'favour' and 'neighbour', skipping the letter U' is nothing more than laziness on your part. Likewise, you will learn to spell 'doughnut' without skipping half the letters. You will end your love affair with the letter 'Z' (pronounced 'zed' not 'zee') and the suffix "ize" will be replaced by the suffix "ise." You will learn that the suffix 'burgh' is pronounced 'burra' e.g. Edinburgh. You are welcome to respell Pittsburgh as 'Pittsberg' if you can't cope with correct pronunciation.

Generally, you should raise your vocabulary to acceptable levels. Look up "vocabulary."

Using the same twenty seven words interspersed with filler noises such as "like" and "you know" is an unacceptable and inefficient form of communication. Look up "interspersed." There will be no more 'bleeps' in the Jerry Springer show. If you're not old enough to cope with bad language then you shouldn't have chat shows. When you learn to develop your vocabulary then you won't have to use bad language as often.

2. There is no such thing as "US English." We will let Microsoft know on your behalf. The Microsoft spell-checker will be adjusted to take account of the reinstated letter 'u' and the elimination of "-ize."

3. You should learn to distinguish the English and Australian accents. It really isn't that hard. English accents are not limited to cockney, upper-class twit or Mancunian (Daphne in Frasier). You will also have to learn how to understand regional accents - Scottish dramas such as "Taggart" will no longer be broadcast with subtitles. While we're talking about regions, you must learn that there is no such place as Devonshire in England. The name of the county is "Devon." If you persist in calling it Devonshire, all American States will become "shires" e.g. Texasshire, Floridashire, Louisianashire.

4. Hollywood will be required occasionally to cast English actors as the good guys. Hollywood will be required to cast English actors to play English characters. British sit-coms such as "Men Behaving Badly" or "Red Dwarf" will not be re-cast and watered down for a wishy-washy American audience who can't cope with the humour of occasional political incorrectness.

5. You should relearn your original national anthem, "God Save The Queen", but only after fully carrying out task 1. We would not want you to get confused and give up half way through.

6. You should stop playing American "football." There is only one kind of football. What you refer to as American "football" is not a very good game. The 2.15% of you who are aware that there is a world outside your borders may have noticed that no one else plays "American" football. You will no longer be allowed to play it, and should instead play proper football. Initially, it would be best if you played with the girls. It is a difficult game. Those of you brave enough will, in time, be allowed to play rugby (which is similar to American "football", but does not involve stopping for a rest every twenty seconds or wearing full kevlar body armour like nancies). We are hoping to get together at least a US Rugby sevens side by 2005.

You should stop playing baseball. It is not reasonable to host an event called the 'World Series' for a game which is not played outside of America. Since only 2.15% of you are aware that there is a world beyond your borders, your error is understandable. Instead of baseball, you will be allowed to play a girls' game called "rounders," which is baseball without fancy team strip, oversized gloves, collector cards or hotdogs.

7. You will no longer be allowed to own or carry guns. You will no longer be allowed to own or carry anything more dangerous in public than a vegetable peeler. Because we don't believe you are sensible enough to handle potentially dangerous items, you will require a permit if you wish to carry a vegetable peeler in public.

8. July 4th is no longer a public holiday. November 2nd will be a new national holiday, but only in England. It will be called "Indecisive Day."

9. All American cars are hereby banned. They are crap and it is for your own good. When we show you German cars, you will understand what we mean. All road intersections will be replaced with roundabouts. You will start driving on the left with immediate effect. At the same time, you will go metric with immediate effect and without the benefit of conversion tables. Roundabouts and metrication will help you understand the British sense of humour.

10. You will learn to make real chips. Those things you call French fries are not real chips. Fries aren't even French, they are Belgian though 97.85% of you (including the guy who discovered fries while in Europe) are not aware of a country called Belgium. Those things you insist on calling potato chips are properly called "crisps." Real chips are thick cut and fried in animal fat. The traditional accompaniment to chips is beer which should be served warm and flat. Waitresses will be trained to be more aggressive with customers.

11. As a sign of penance 5 grams of sea salt per cup will be added to all tea made within the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, this quantity to be doubled for tea made within the city of Boston itself.

12. The cold tasteless stuff you insist on calling beer is not actually beer at all, it is lager. From November 1st only proper British Bitter will be referred to as "beer," and European brews of known and accepted provenance will be referred to as "Lager." The substances formerly known as "American Beer" will henceforth be referred to as "Near-Frozen Knat's Urine," with the exception of the product of the American Budweiser company whose product will be referred to as "Weak Near-Frozen Knat's Urine." This will allow true Budweiser (as manufactured for the last 1000 years in Pilsen, Czech Republic) to be sold without risk of confusion.

13. From November 10th the UK will harmonise petrol (or "Gasoline," as you will be permitted to keep calling it until April 1st 2005) prices with the former USA. The UK will harmonise its prices to those of the former USA and the Former USA will, in return, adopt UK petrol prices (roughly $6/US gallon get used to it).

14. You will learn to resolve personal issues without using guns, lawyers or therapists. The fact that you need so many lawyers and therapists shows that you're not adult enough to be independent. Guns should only be handled by adults. If you're not adult enough to sort things out without suing someone or speaking to a therapist then you're not grown up enough to handle a gun.

15. Please tell us who killed JFK. It's been driving us crazy.

16. Tax collectors from Her Majesty's Government will be with you shortly to ensure the acquisition of all revenues due (backdated to 1776).

Thank you for your co-operation.

Astronomical Article

2005-01-26T21:13:00.000-08:00

SAN DIEGO — An exploding star in our solar system's infancy may have saved Earth from extinction.

Astronomers studying the planet-forming disks of dust that orbit young, distant stars are hoping to solve the mystery of our own solar system's youth. Why is our system so different in form and function from others they can see?

It's a difference that may have saved Earth, because the scientists suspect that Jupiter and Saturn would have collided with the planet — or slung it out of the solar system like a slingshot — if the disk surrounding our young sun hadn't been so damaged.

These "protoplanetary" disks were a hot topic at a recent meeting of the American Astronomical Society. "Something very bad happened to our solar system's disk in its early years," says Steve Desch of Arizona State University in Tempe.

An exploding star, or supernova, likely occurred within a light-year — about 5.9 trillion miles — of our sun in its infancy, he argues. (The closest star to our solar system now, Proxima Centauri, is about 4 light-years away).

First spotted by an infrared satellite in the 1980s, the disks are the swirling leftovers of nebulas, pockets of gas within galaxies that spawn new stars.

Some of this dust compresses into planets, more of which have been discovered orbiting nearby stars during the past decade. A presentation at the meeting about a Hubble Space Telescope survey of 25 nearby stars, all youngsters less than 10 million years old, provides evidence that dust disks congeal into more compact bodies over only a few million years.

Over time, the rest of the dust is blown away by solar wind or other effects. What is left behind is a solar system like our own.

Glances at nearby disks, and some leftover clues, are telling researchers how things began for our sun. And it looks like we may inhabit a solar system that's something of a runt because of the damage from an exploding star.

Only the eruption of a star 25 to 40 times bigger than our sun could have littered our solar system with the radioactive elements seen in meteorite surveys reported by Desch's team at the meeting.

Astronomers have seen just such explosions blasting protoplanetary disks in the Orion Nebula, a star-forming factory 1,500 light-years away. Rather than blowing away the disks, the supernova blasts appear to seed them with metals rocketed out of the heart of the exploding star.

The supernova that blasted our solar system may explain some of its other peculiarities:

• Planets in our solar system follow nearly circular orbits far from the sun. Most planets detected orbiting other, nearby stars follow either highly elongated orbits or circle incredibly close to their stars. Scientists suspect that a stellar explosion could have stopped these developments in our solar system.

• Dust disks seen orbiting nearby stars typically contain much more material, sometimes 100 times more, than our solar system. A Spitzer Space Telescope survey of 26 nearby sun-like stars known to have planets found evidence that six of them have comet belts. But all appear filled with about 100 times more comets than our own.

"There's good evidence the solar system had a stunted formation when the (supernova) injection happened," Desch says. And that may have been very good for Earth.

Many astronomers believe that Jupiter and Saturn formed deep in space, far beyond Pluto's orbit, and spiraled into the solar system. Why they stopped a safe distance from the sun and left Earth undisturbed — unlike the history of many other solar systems seen nearby — is the final mystery that disk studies may help answer.

Scientists also discussed the collision of planets within disks in distant solar systems. "Something big is going on in those disks," says astronomer Scott Fisher of the Gemini Observatory in Hawaii.

For evidence, astronomers can point to a collision between mini-planets within the dust disk circling the star Beta Pictoris, which was announced by Fisher's team. In a deep-freeze orbit 4.65 billion miles from its star, a pair of icy asteroids perhaps 60 miles across collided, leaving behind telltale debris.

Images from the Spitzer Space Telescope also suggest that the disk around the star Vega was probably the site of a collision of planets that were about the size of Pluto — 1,200 miles across. "It seems you can't live very long in a disk without getting crunched," Fisher says.

Besides enjoying the planetary mayhem, scientists are interested in these collisions because of similar smash-ups in our own solar system billions of years ago. The moon most likely formed in a collision between the early Earth and a planet slightly larger than Mars.

"There is a huge race to take the first picture of a planet forming in one of these disks," Fisher says. Closing the loop between dust disks and planets with that observation may answer big questions about our own origins, he says.

Truly Frightening

2005-01-26T05:58:00.000-08:00

Chip Wrote:

Greetings All,

First, this is not intended as "Christian Bashing".

When I (to the best of my knowledge) first invented the term "christiaNazi" some 17 or 18 years ago, I had not read the following. I was just reacting with great pain and anger as I saw the unholy alliance between the Christian Fundamentalists and Conservative politics endangering our nation and perverting the faith I was raised in and that my family had lived and died for into an evil force the exact opposite of what Jesus intended. World history, religious history, and military history all strongly indicated that something mortally terrible was out of the box and moving our way. The gut instinct produced old black-and-white footage from the mid-Thirties to the mid-Forties. I had hoped I was wrong. The following came up on the net in the past couple of days.

Followed by:

Adolf Hitler

I believe today that I am acting in the sense of the Almighty Creator. By warding off the Jews I am fighting for the Lord's work. [Adolph Hitler, Speech, Reichstag, 1936]

There is a road to freedom. Its milestones are Obedience, Endeavor, Honesty, Order, Cleanliness, Sobriety, Truthfulness, Sacrifice, and love of the Fatherland. [Message, signed Hitler, painted on walls of concentration camps; Life, August 21, 1939]

Woman's world is her husband, her family, her children and her home. We do not find it right when she presses into the world of men. [Adolph Hitler, quoted in Lucy Komisar, The New Feminism]

Secular schools can never be tolerated because such schools have no religious instruction, and a general moral instruction without a religious foundation is built on air; consequently, all character training and religion must be derived from faith . . . we need believing people. [Adolf Hitler, April 26, 1933, from a speech made during negotiations leading to the Nazi-Vatican Concordant of 1933]

I have followed [the Church] in giving our party program the character of unalterable finality, like the Creed. The Church has never allowed the Creed to be interfered with. It is fifteen hundred years since it was formulated, but every suggestion for its amendment, every logical criticism, or attack on it, has been rejected. The Church has realized that anything and everything can be built up on a document of that sort, no matter how contradictory or irreconcilable with it. The faithful will swallow it whole, so long as logical reasoning is never allowed to be brought to bear on it. [Adolf Hitler, from Rauschning, _The Voice of Destruction_, pp. 239-40]

My feelings as a Christian points me to my Lord and Savior as a fighter. It points me to the man who once in loneliness, surrounded by a few followers, recognized these Jews for what they were and summoned men to fight against them and who, God's truth! was greatest not as a sufferer but as a fighter. In boundless love as a Christian and as a man I read through the passage which tells us how the Lord at last rose in His might and seized the scourge to drive out of the Temple the brood of vipers and adders. How terrific was his fight against the Jewish poison. Today, after two thousand years, with deepest emotion I recognize more profoundly than ever before the fact that it was for this that He had to shed his blood upon the Cross. As a Christian I have no duty to allow myself to be cheated, but I have the duty to be a fighter for truth and justice... And if there is anything which could demonstrate that we are acting rightly, it is the distress that daily grows. For as a Christian I have also a duty to my own people. And when I look on my people I see them work and work and toil and labor, and at the end of the week they have only for their wages wretchedness and misery. When I go out in the morning and see these men standing in their queues and look into their pinched faces, then I believe I would be no Christian, but a very devil, if I felt no pity for them, if I did not, as did our Lord two thousand years ago, turn against those by whom today this poor people are plundered and exposed. [Adolf Hitler, speech on April 12, 1922, published in My New Order, quoted in Freethought Today April 1990]

I believe today that my conduct is in accordance with the will of the Almighty Creator. [Adolph Hitler, Mein Kampf, pp. 46]

What we have to fight for...is the freedom and independence of the fatherland, so that our people may be enabled to fulfill the mission assigned to it by the Creator. [Adolph Hitler, Mein Kampf, pp. 125]

This human world of ours would be inconceivable without the practical existence of a religious belief. [Adolph Hitler, Mein Kampf, pp.152]

And the founder of Christianity made no secret indeed of his estimation of the Jewish people. When He found it necessary, He drove those enemies of the human race out of the Temple of God. [Adolph Hitler, Mein Kampf, pp.174]

Catholics and Protestants are fighting with one another... while the enemy of Aryan humanity and all Christendom is laughing up his sleeve. [Adolph Hitler, Mein Kampf, pp.309]

I am now as before a Catholic and will always remain so [Adolph Hitler, to Gen. Gerhard Engel, 1941]

Any violence which does not spring from a spiritual base, will be wavering and uncertain. It lacks the stability which can only rest in a fanatical outlook. [Adolph Hitler, Mein Kampf, p. 171]

I had excellent opportunity to intoxicate myself with the solemn splendor of the brilliant church festivals. As was only natural, the abbot seemed to me, as the village priest had once seemed to my father, the highest and most desirable ideal. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 1]

I was not in agreement with the sharp anti-Semitic tone, but from time to time I read arguments which gave me some food for thought. At all events, these occasions slowly made me acquainted with the man and the movement, which in those days guided Vienna's destinies: Dr. Karl Lueger and the Christian Social Party. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 2]

...the unprecedented rise of the Christian Social Party... was to assume the deepest significance for me as a classical object of study. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 3]

As long as leadership from above was not lacking, the people fulfilled their duty and obligation overwhelmingly. Whether Protestant pastor or Catholic priest, both together and particularly at the first flare, there really existed in both camps but a single holy German Reich, for whose existence and future each man turned to his own heaven. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 3]

Political parties has nothing to do with religious problems, as long as these are not alien to the nation, undermining the morals and ethics of the race; just as religion cannot be amalgamated with the scheming of political parties. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 3]

For the political leader the religious doctrines and institutions of his people must always remain inviolable; or else has no right to be in politics, but should become a reformer, if he has what it takes! [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 3]

In nearly all the matters in which the Pan-German movement was wanting, the attitude of the Christian Social Party was correct and well-planned. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 3]

It [Christian Social Party] recognized the value of large-scale propaganda and was a virtuoso in influencing the psychological instincts of the broad masses of its adherents. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 3]

The anti-Semitism of the new movement [Christian Social movement] was based on religious ideas instead of racial knowledge. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 3]

If Dr. Karl Lueger had lived in Germany, he would have been ranked among the great minds of our people. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 3, about the leader of the Christian Social movement]

Even today I am not ashamed to say that, overpowered by stormy enthusiasm, I fell down on my knees and thanked Heaven from an overflowing heart for granting me the good fortune of being permitted to live at this time. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 5]

I had so often sung 'Deutschland u:ber Alles' and shouted 'Heil' at the top of my lungs, that it seemed to me almost a belated act of grace to be allowed to stand as a witness in the divine court of the eternal judge and proclaim the sincerity of this conviction. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 5]

Only in the steady and constant application of force lies the very first prerequisite for success. This persistence, however, can always and only arise from a definite spiritual conviction. Any violence which does not spring from a firm, spiritual base, will be wavering and uncertain. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 5]

I soon realized that the correct use of propaganda is a true art which has remained practically unknown to the bourgeois parties. Only the Christian- Social movement, especially in Lueger's time achieved a certain virtuosity on this instrument, to which it owed many of its success. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 6]

Once again the songs of the fatherland roared to the heavens along the endless marching columns, and for the last time the Lord's grace smiled on His ungrateful children. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 7, reflecting on World War I]

The more abstractly correct and hence powerful this idea will be, the more impossible remains its complete fulfillment as long as it continues to depend on human beings... If this were not so, the founders of religion could not be counted among the greatest men of this earth... In its workings, even the religion of love is only the weak reflection of the will of its exalted founder; its significance, however, lies in the direction which it attempted to give to a universal human development of culture, ethics, and morality. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 8]

To them belong, not only the truly great statesmen, but all other great reformers as well. Beside Frederick the Great stands Martin Luther as well as Richard Wagner. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 8]

The fight against syphilis demands a fight against prostitution, against prejudices, old habits, against previous conceptions, general views among them not least the false prudery of certain circles. The first prerequisite for even the moral right to combat these things is the facilitation of earlier marriage for the coming generation. In late marriage alone lies the compulsion to retain an institution which, twist and turn as you like, is and remains a disgrace to humanity, an institution which is damned ill-suited to a being who with his usual modesty likes to regard himself as the 'image' of God. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 10]

Parallel to the training of the body a struggle against the poisoning of the soul must begin. Our whole public life today is like a hothouse for sexual ideas and simulations. Just look at the bill of fare served up in our movies, vaudeville and theaters, and you will hardly be able to deny that this is not the right kind of food, particularly for the youth...Theater, art, literature, cinema, press, posters, and window displays must be cleansed of all manifestations of our rotting world and placed in the service of a moral, political, and cultural idea. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 10, echoing the Cultural Warfare rhetoric of the Religious Right]

But if out of smugness, or even cowardice, this battle is not fought to its end, then take a look at the peoples five hundred years from now. I think you will find but few images of God, unless you want to profane the Almighty. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 10]

While both denominations maintain missions in Asia and Africa in order to win new followers for their doctrine-- an activity which can boast but very modest success compared to the advance of the Mohammedan faith in particular-- right here in Europe they lose millions and millions of inward adherents who either are alien to all religious life or simply go their own ways. The consequences, particularly from a moral point of view, are not favorable. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 10]

The great masses of people do not consist of philosophers; precisely for the masses, faith is often the sole foundation of a moral attitude. The various substitutes have not proved so successful from the standpoint of results that they could be regarded as a useful replacement for previous religious creeds. But if religious doctrine and faith are really to embrace the broad masses, the unconditional authority of the content of this faith is the foundation of all efficacy. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 10]

Due to his own original special nature, the Jew cannot possess a religious institution, if for no other reason because he lacks idealism in any form, and hence belief in a hereafter is absolutely foreign to him. And a religion in the Aryan sense cannot be imagined which lacks the conviction of survival after death in some form. Indeed, the Talmud is not a book to prepare a man for the hereafter, but only for a practical and profitable life in this world. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 11]

The best characterization is provided by the product of this religious education, the Jew himself. His life is only of this world, and his spirit is inwardly as alien to true Christianity as his nature two thousand years previous was to the great founder of the new doctrine. Of course, the latter made no secret of his attitude toward the Jewish people, and when necessary he even took the whip to drive from the temple of the Lord this adversary of all humanity, who then as always saw in religion nothing but an instrument for his business existence. In return, Christ was nailed to the cross, while our present-day party Christians debase themselves to begging for Jewish votes at elections and later try to arrange political swindles with atheistic Jewish parties-- and this against their own nation. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 11]

....the personification of the devil as the symbol of all evil assumes the living shape of the Jew. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 11, precisely echoing Martin Luther's teachings]

Faith is harder to shake than knowledge, love succumbs less to change than respect, hate is more enduring than aversion, and the impetus to the mightiest upheavals on this earth has at all times consisted less in a scientific knowledge dominating the masses than in a fanaticism which inspired them and sometimes in a hysteria which drove them forward. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf Vol. 1 Chapter 12]

The greatness of every mighty organization embodying an idea in this world lies in the religious fanaticism and intolerance with which, fanatically convinced of its own right, it intolerantly imposes its will against all others. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf Vol. 1 Chapter 12]

The greatness of Christianity did not lie in attempted negotiations for compromise with any similar philosophical opinions in the ancient world, but in its inexorable fanaticism in preaching and fighting for its own doctrine. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf Vol. 1 Chapter 12]

All in all, this whole period of winter 1919-20 was a single struggle to strengthen confidence in the victorious might of the young movement and raise it to that fanaticism of faith which can move mountains. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf Vol. 1 Chapter 12]

Thus inwardly armed with confidence in God and the unshakable stupidity of the voting citizenry, the politicians can begin the fight for the 'remaking' of the Reich as they call it. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf Vol. 2 Chapter 1]

Of course, even the general designation 'religious' includes various basic ideas or convictions, for example, the indestructibility of the soul, the eternity of its existence, the existence of a higher being, etc. But all these ideas, regardless of how convincing they may be for the individual, are submitted to the critical examination of this individual and hence to a fluctuating affirmation or negation until emotional divination or knowledge assumes the binding force of apodictic faith. This, above all, is the fighting factor which makes a breach and opens the way for the recognition of basic religious views. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf Vol. 2 Chapter 1]

Anyone who dares to lay hands on the highest image of the Lord commits sacrilege against the benevolent creator of this miracle and contributes to the expulsion from paradise. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf Vol. 2 Chapter 1]

A folkish state must therefore begin by raising marriage from the level of a continuous defilement of the race, and give it the consecration of an institution which is called upon to produce images of the Lord and not monstrosities halfway between man and ape. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf Vol. 2 Chapter 2]

It would be more in keeping with the intention of the noblest man in this world if our two Christian churches, instead of annoying Negroes with missions which they neither desire nor understand, would kindly, but in all seriousness, teach our European humanity that where parents are not healthy it is a deed pleasing to God to take pity on a poor little healthy orphan child and give him father and mother, than themselves to give birth to a sick child who will only bring unhappiness and suffering on himself and the rest of the world. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf Vol. 2 Chapter 2]

That this is possible may not be denied in a world where hundreds and hundreds of thousands of people voluntarily submit to celibacy, obligated and bound by nothing except the injunction of the Church. Should the same renunciation not be possible if this injunction is replaced by the admonition finally to put an end to the constant and continuous original sin of racial poisoning, and to give the Almighty Creator beings such as He Himself created? [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf Vol. 2 Chapter 2]

For the greatest revolutionary changes on this earth would not have been thinkable if their motive force, instead of fanatical, yes, hysterical passion, had been merely the bourgeois virtues of law and order. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf Vol. 2 Chapter 2]

It doesn't dawn on this depraved bourgeois world that this is positively a sin against all reason; that it is criminal lunacy to keep on drilling a born half-ape until people think they have made a lawyer out of him, while millions of members of the highest culture-race must remain in entirely unworthy positions; that it is a sin against the will of the Eternal Creator if His most gifted beings by the hundreds and hundreds of thousands are allowed to degenerate in the present proletarian morass, while Hottentots and Zulu Kaffirs are trained for intellectual professions. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf Vol. 2 Chapter 2]

It may be that today gold has become the exclusive ruler of life, but the time will come when man will again bow down before a higher god. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf Vol. 2 Chapter 2]

Christianity could not content itself with building up its own altar; it was absolutely forced to undertake the destruction of the heathen altars. Only from this fanatical intolerance could its apodictic faith take form; this intolerance is, in fact, its absolute presupposition. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf Vol. 2 Chapter 5]

For how shall we fill people with blind faith in the correctness of a doctrine, if we ourselves spread uncertainty and doubt by constant changes in its outward structure? ...Here, too, we can learn by the example of the Catholic Church. Though its doctrinal edifice, and in part quite superfluously, comes into collision with exact science and research, it is none the less unwilling to sacrifice so much as one little syllable of its dogmas... it is only such dogmas which lend to the whole body the character of a faith. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf Vol. 2 Chapter 5]

The folkish-minded man, in particular, has the sacred duty, each in his own denomination, of making people stop just talking superficially of God's will, and actually fulfill God's will, and not let God's word be desecrated. For God's will gave men their form, their essence and their abilities. Anyone who destroys His work is declaring war on the Lord's creation, the divine will. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf Vol. 2 Chapter 10]

In the ranks of the movement [National Socialist movement], the most devout Protestant could sit beside the most devout Catholic, without coming into the slightest conflict with his religious convictions. The mighty common struggle which both carried on against the destroyer of Aryan humanity had, on the contrary, taught them mutually to respect and esteem one another. [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf Vol. 2 Chapter 10]

For this, to be sure, from the child's primer down to the last newspaper, every theater and every movie house, every advertising pillar and every billboard, must be pressed into the service of this one great mission, until the timorous prayer of our present parlor patriots: 'Lord, make us free!' is transformed in the brain of the smallest boy into the burning plea: 'Almighty God, bless our arms when the time comes; be just as thou hast always been; judge now whether we be deserving of freedom; Lord, bless our battle!' [Adolf Hitler's prayer, Mein Kampf, Vol. 2 Chapter 13]

The Government, being resolved to undertake the political and moral purification of our public life, are creating and securing the conditions necessary for a really profound revival of religious life [Adolph Hitler, in a speech to the Reichstag on March 23, 1933]

I go the way that Providence dictates with the assurance of a sleepwalker. [Adolf Hitler, Speech, 15 March 1936, Munich, Germany.]

Today Christians ... stand at the head of [this country]... I pledge that I never will tie myself to parties who want to destroy Christianity .. We want to fill our culture again with the Christian spirit ... We want to burn out all the recent immoral developments in literature, in the theater, and in the press - in short, we want to burn out the *poison of immorality* which has entered into our whole life and culture as a result of *liberal excess* during the past ... (few) years. [The Speeches of Adolph Hitler, 1922-1939, Vol. 1 (London, Oxford University Press, 1942), pg. 871-872]

Atheist Hall Converted
Berlin Churches Establish Bureau to Win Back Worshippers

Wireless to the New York Times.

BERLIN, May 13. - In Freethinkers Hall, which before the Nazi resurgence was the national headquarters of the German Freethinkers League, the Berlin Protestant church authorities have opened a bureau for advice to the public in church matters. Its chief object is to win back former churchgoers and assist those who have not previously belonged to any religious congregation in obtaining church membership.

The German Freethinkers League, which was swept away by the national revolution, was the largest of such organizations in Germany. It had about 500,000 members ... [New York Times, May 14, 1993, page 2, on Hitler's outlawing of atheistic and freethinking groups in Germany in the Spring of 1933, after the Enabling Act authorizing Hitler to rule by decree]

"The national government will maintain and defend the foundations on which the power of our nation rests. It will offer strong protection to Christianity as the very basis of our collective morality. Today Christians stand at the head of our country. We want to fill our culture again with the Christian spirit. We want to burn out all the recent immoral developments in literature, in the theatre, and in the press -- in short, we want to burn out the poison of immorality which has entered into our whole life and culture as a result of liberal excess during the past years."

-- Adolf Hitler; from The Speeches of Adolph Hitler, 1922-1939, Vol. 1, Michael Hakeem, Ph.D. (London, Oxford University Press, 1942), pp. 871-872.

Oscar Nominees

2005-01-25T20:40:00.000-08:00

YES! Johnny Depp is up again for Best Actor!

On January 25, 2005, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced the nominees for the 77th Annual Academy Awards. And the nominees are...

Best Picture

• THE AVIATOR (Miramax)
• FINDING NEVERLAND (Miramax)
• MILLION DOLLAR BABY (Warner Bros.)
• RAY (Universal Pictures)
• SIDEWAYS (Fox Searchlight)

Achievement in Directing

• Martin Scorsese for THE AVIATOR (Miramax)
• Clint Eastwood for MILLION DOLLAR BABY (Warner Bros.)
• Taylor Hackford for RAY (Universal Pictures)
• Alexander Payne for SIDEWAYS (Fox Searchlight)
• Mike Leigh for VERA DRAKE (Fine Line Features)

Best Actor in a Leading Role

• Don Cheadle for HOTEL RWANDA (United Artists)
• Johnny Depp for FINDING NEVERLAND (Miramax)
• Leonardo DiCaprio for THE AVIATOR (Miramax)
• Clint Eastwood for MILLION DOLLAR BABY (Warner Bros.)
• Jamie Foxx for RAY (Universal Pictures)

Best Supporting Actor

• Alan Alda for THE AVIATOR (Miramax)
• Thomas Haden Church for SIDEWAYS (Fox Searchlight)
• Jamie Foxx for COLLATERAL (Dreamworks SKG)
• Morgan Freeman for MILLION DOLLAR BABY (Warner Bros.)
• Clive Owen for CLOSER (Columbia Pictures)

Best Actress in a Leading Role

• Annette Bening - BEING JULIA (Sony Pictures Classics)
• Catalina Sandino Moreno - MARIA FULL OF GRACE (Fine Line Features)
• Imelda Staunton - VERA DRAKE (Fine Line Features)
• Hilary Swank for MILLION DOLLAR BABY (Warner Bros.)
• Kate Winslet for ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND (Focus Features)

Best Supporting Actress

• Cate Blanchett for THE AVIATOR (Miramax)
• Laura Linney - KINSEY (Fox Searchlight Pictures)
• Virginia Madsen for SIDEWAYS (Fox Searchlight)
• Sophie Okonedo - HOTEL RWANDA (United Artists)
• Natalie Portman for CLOSER (Columbia Pictures)

Best Original Screenplay

• THE AVIATOR (Miramax)
• ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND (Focus Features)
• HOTEL RWANDA (United Artists)
• THE INCREDIBLES (Disney/Pixar)
• VERA DRAKE (Fine Line Features)

Best Adapted Screenplay

• BEFORE SUNSET (Warner Independent Pictures)
• FINDING NEVERLAND (Miramax)
• MILLION DOLLAR BABY (Warner Bros.)
• THE MOTORCYCLE DIARIES (Focus Features)
• SIDEWAYS (Fox Searchlight)

Best Foreign-Language Film

• AS IT IS IN HEAVEN - Sweden
• THE CHORUS - France
• DOWNFALL - Germany
• THE SEA INSIDE - Spain
• YESTERDAY - South Africa

Best Animated Feature Film

• THE INCREDIBLES (Disney/Pixar)
• SHARK TALE (Dreamworks SKG)
• SHREK 2 (Dreamworks SKG)

Achievement in Art Direction

• THE AVIATOR (Miramax)
• FINDING NEVERLAND (Miramax)
• LEMONY SNICKET'S A SERIES OF UNFORTUNATE EVENTS (Paramount Pictures)
• THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA (Warner Bros.)
• A VERY LONG ENGAGEMENT (Warner Independent Pictures)

Achievement in Cinematography

• THE AVIATOR (Miramax)
• HOUSE OF FLYING DAGGERS (Sony Pictures Classics)
• THE PASSION OF THE CHRIST (Newmarket Film Group)
• THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA (Warner Bros.)
• A VERY LONG ENGAGEMENT (Warner Independent Pictures)

Achievement in Costume Design

• THE AVIATOR (Miramax)
• FINDING NEVERLAND (Miramax)
• LEMONY SNICKET'S A SERIES OF UNFORTUNATE EVENTS (Paramount Pictures)
• RAY (Universal Pictures)
• TROY (Warner Bros.)

Best Documentary Feature

• BORN INTO BROTHELS (ThinkFilm)
• THE STORY OF THE WEEPING CAMEL (ThinkFilm)
• SUPER SIZE ME (Roadside Attractions / Samuel Goldwyn Films)
• TUPAC: RESURRECTION (Paramount Pictures)
• TWIST OF FAITH

Best Film Editing

• THE AVIATOR (Miramax)
• COLLATERAL
• FINDING NEVERLAND (Miramax)
• MILLION DOLLAR BABY (Warner Bros.)
• RAY (Universal Pictures)

Achievement in Makeup

• LEMONY SNICKET'S A SERIES OF UNFORTUNATE EVENTS (Paramount Pictures)
• THE PASSION OF THE CHRIST (Newmarket Film Group)
• THE SEA INSIDE (Fine Line Features)

Best Original Score

• FINDING NEVERLAND (Miramax)
• HARRY POTTER AND THE PRISONER OF AZKABAN
• LEMONY SNICKET'S A SERIES OF UNFORTUNATE EVENTS (Paramount Pictures)
• THE PASSION OF THE CHRIST (Newmarket Film Group)
• THE VILLAGE (Touchstone Pictures)

Original Song

• "Accidentally In Love" - SHREK 2 (Dreamworks SKG)
• "Al Otro Lado Del Río" - THE MOTORCYCLE DIARIES (Focus Features)
• "Believe" - THE POLAR EXPRESS (Warner Bros.)
• "Learn To Be Lonely" - THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA (Warner Bros.)
• "Look To Your Path (Vois Sur Ton Chemin)" - THE CHORUS (Miramax)

Achievement in Sound Mixing

• THE AVIATOR (Miramax)
• THE INCREDIBLES (Disney/Pixar)
• THE POLAR EXPRESS (Warner Bros.)
• RAY (Universal Pictures)
• SPIDER-MAN 2 (Columbia Pictures)

Achievement in Sound Editing

• THE INCREDIBLES (Disney/Pixar)
• THE POLAR EXPRESS (Warner Bros.)
• SPIDER-MAN 2 (Columbia Pictures)

Best Visual Effects

• HARRY POTTER AND THE PRISONER OF AZKABAN (Warner Bros)
• I, ROBOT (20th Century Fox)
• SPIDER-MAN 2 (Columbia Pictures)

Best Documentary Short

• AUTISM IS A WORLD
• THE CHILDREN OF LENINGRADSKY
• HARDWOOD
• MIGHTY TIMES: THE CHILDREN'S MARCH
• SISTER ROSE'S PASSION

Best Animated Short Film

• BIRTHDAY BOY
• GOPHER BROKE
• GUARD DOG
• LORENZO
• RYAN

Best Live-Action Short Film

• EVERYTHING IN THIS COUNTRY MUST
• LITTLE TERRORIST
• 7:35 IN THE MORNING
• TWO CARS, ONE NIGHT
• WASP

Some Thoughts

2005-01-24T20:45:00.000-08:00

I was just thinking of a few things.

As much as I like Unitarian Universalists, sometimes I think they go out of their way to look for oddballs they can embrace and show the world just how politically correct and inclusive they can be.

And I almost think they would invent a disability or minority group just to embrace it.

I came to this thought after reading an article in the UU World magazine...about embracing kids with disabilities. I do think it's good to do that, but the article went from physical disabilities to things like Asperger's, which to me is minor because as I understand it, Asperger's is something most people grow out of.

There are some "disabilities" or whatever you call them that I think are almost complete inventions, like ADHD or ADD. I don't ever remember anyone being diagnosed that way when I was a kid. Another one is borderline personality disorder...I've been told by a practicing psychologist that such a disorder does not exist.

I think many of THOSE kind of diagnoses are just crutches to allow people to not take responsibility for their own lives.

And it's because if anyone should have been diagnosed as any of those kind of things in her youth, it'd be me. For sure. But I never was.

I really don't think those disorders exist. It's just looking for an excuse. "Oh, he's ADHD, so don't take it personally."

No, these are not politically correct thoughts. But whenever I do have these thoughts, I picture in my head what people did with themselves before the creation of modern psychology and before we had all this luxury to sit down and think of these things. I mean back in the 1700s or earlier.

People talked things out.

Or they worked some hard manual labor and worked it off.

Small boys who were very active were just passed off as energetic boys.

Oh yes, I know there were a lot of problems with life then; I'm not really glamorizing it. I'm just thinking, those people got by just fine without a shrink telling them what was wrong with them.

I think there's far too much pathologizing and not enough mythologizing, to borrow a term.

Everyone's got to have some kind of disability or whatever. Everyone's something. Everyone's either depressed or ADD or ADHD or Asperger's or MPD or BPD or something.

No one is just normal any more...not that there's any such thing anyway. As my friend Shannon always says, "Normal is just a setting on your dryer." No one actually says, "Hey, I am what I am, I have some flaws but it's not anything that prevents me from functioning in my day to day life, so I am not going to be medicated just because everyone else is doing it and it's become like a fashion to have something wrong with oneself!"

I look at myself. I am just me. I'm stubborn. I'm sometimes lazy. I get discouraged at times about a lot of things.

But I'm not going to blame where I am in life on an imaginary mental illness that I know I don't have.

I am here because I made certain choices in my life that I felt I had to make...and did not make other ones because I did not think I was in a position to do so.

Well, there it is. I got it out.

Blah

2005-01-24T05:35:00.000-08:00

It's Monday morning and I'm getting that futility feeling again.

I'm feeling like I'll never get any further with my life than I am now.

I've gone as far as I can. I'll never have a house, I'll never have anything.

I'll just be a lowly receptionist living in a two-room apartment. I can't do anything more for myself. I don't have the education, I'll never be able to get it, and even if I could I don't know if I could handle it.

I need a day off. I need some time to think about things. I need help.

I need help doing what I want to do. I wish I knew for sure whether or not Joe would be utterly faithful to me if I were to attend classes. He knows what that includes. He knows what disturbs me.

*beats head on desk*

I was hoping that this blog would take a different tone. And it will. I just have to air this stuff out first, I suppose.

As soon as this blue feeling passes, that is. I wonder if this is just PMS.

First Post

2005-01-23T20:06:00.000-08:00

Well, I'm not really sure where to start. This is a rather private blog I have.

I'm feeling a bit blah this evening. It's Sunday night and I'm not looking forward to going to work tomorrow. Joe had to work all weekend and we didn't get to spend a lot of time together.

Well, we had some. I bought the third Harry Potter movie on DVD and we ordered a pizza last night and watched it. That was nice. The only problem is, it kept us up til 1am and now Joe's sound asleep, he's so tired.

And it's barely 8pm.

Poor thing...I didn't realize he got off work at noon today and he had to wait 3 hours before I picked him up. I was online when he called to have me come get him, and I didn't think to check the voice mail.

Poor Joe. He doesn't deal well with chilly days; his knees play up on him when it gets chilly. He wasn't feeling himself when I picked him up.

Something has come over him to where he's being incredibly sweet. He cuddled me and snuggled me and did other lovely things to me last night, before we watched the movie. I hope so desperately that he is serious about not wanting anyone else and wanting to do whatever it takes to make me happy. So far, so good.

I see so much good in him. He could be so very sweet; I know he's capable of it. He himself says that any person is capable of redemption from poor behavior; that would have to include him.

Although I have to admit sometimes I still feel that he doesn't quite take my fears and insecurities seriously. I'm sharply aware of my vulnerability before him; he could so easily play me the fool. That's where the insecurity comes in.

I wish to everything he understood and had some kind of sensitivity about it.

If he does, he's not always good at expressing it.

Makes me afraid to get involved with anyone else ever...makes me think that all men treat women that way.

Great Scott, I've got to be careful not to talk myself into believing certain things here.

I really should be working on the Imbolg ritual, but my heart's not really into it. Yet I know I'll pull it off somehow.

I like keeping rituals, esp. sabbats, fairly simple. I don't feel the need to do magic with every single rite I perform...and in fact generally don't do magic any more. I'm not in this for magic, but for religious devotion.

There are a lot of things I'd like to do, including teach online classes or something like that. One of these days I'll figure out how.

test

2005-01-23T19:45:00.000-08:00

test post