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I worry about the sissy-boys of the Earth.

Call us whatever you like (gender non-conforming, non-binary...), it used to be that sissy-boys got shit from bullies, and from those who, when the world outside doesn't match the world inside their heads, respond with hate.

We still do, of course. But now, I fear, sissy-boys face yet another—if different—kind of violence.

I was a sissy-boy. I liked dolls and dress-up and imagining. I wanted to be a dancer. My friends were mostly girls. If you had asked me, Would you rather be a boy or a girl, I could easily have told you.

Goddess bless them, my family (mostly) let me be me. It was only outside the home that I learned that it was wrong to be who I was. Believe me, sissy-boys get shit from pretty much everyone, adults included.

That kind of opprobrium is in itself a motivator.

Now I worry that sissy-boys are facing a new kind of social pressure: not the pressure to conform, but the pressure to transition.

If, as a child, they had offered me hormones and the prospect of surgery, I would probably have taken them. Goddess help me, I would probably have taken them; and that decision would have ruined my life.

Why in the world does anyone care so much? Why are they so insistent that we change our bodies, or our souls, to meet their stupid expectations? We're part of the natural variability of things. Why can't they just let us be as we are?

The world is cruel to sissy-boys. Many of us don't survive.

But let me tell you something about sissy-boys, and what I tell you is true: those of us that do, somehow, manage to survive the hatred, the bullying, and the well-meaning but ill-considered attempts to “fix” us, are some of the strongest people that you will ever meet, anywhere.

We are, because we have to be.

By building a stone shrine, altar, or power center in your home, you can create a place for daily conjuring, rituals, and thinking. This will set the stage for you to focus your ideas and make them grow. Having a shrine in your home allows you to rid yourself of personal obstacles and invite friendly spirits. Your shrine will spark your inner flame and bring daily renewal. The more use an altar gets, the more energy it builds, making your spells even more effective.

Create your shrine on a low table covered in a white scarf. Set rainbow candles in an arc and then add black and white candles. Place a heatproof bowl containing amber incense (good for creativity and healing), and place it in the center of the rainbow, surrounded by quartz. You should also keep a stick of sage or a seashell on your altar for cleansing the space every day.

In some ways, the new paganisms and Evangelicalism have a lot in common: they're brash, impetuous, young religions, inexperienced, with poor impulse control and a strong Do-It-Yourself ethic.

So in these Latter Days, as Evangelicalism shows its true colors, what lessons can we learn from our successful, but callow, neighbors?

Be for, not against.

In the old days, I always say, Christians used to fight about whether the Spirit proceeded from the Father, or from the Father and the Son, or about whether or not the Son was equal to the Father.

Now they fight about gay sex.

Evangelicalism started out in the early “20th” century as a protest movement against modernity. A hundred years on, they're still reacting.

When you let yourself be defined by what you hate, rather than what you love, you become—by definition—a monster.

Q.E.D.

Embrace history.

Having largely rejected the historic Christianities, Evangelicalism's time-depth is shallow. For the Evangelical, there are two important times: Bible Times and Now.

A people without a history is a people without a memory, without identity. Lacking the lessons and precedents that history cannot fail but provide, we make the same mistakes again and again and again.

Support the arts.

Just look at all the great art, music, and architecture that Evangelicalism has produced.

After a number of years of theory and practice, it was fun to share some of these ideas with the good folks of the growing and international Christian Animism Network. Enjoy!

In use since medieval times, magic bottles, or spell bottles, can function as protectors of your home. Called witch bottles in the 1600s in England, they were originally used to hold objects for magical uses. They have largely fallen out of use, but you can customize magic bottles for yourself with crystal stoppers for a variety of reasons. You can put one in your garden for healthy plants, on the mantel to protect your home, next to your bed for love and happiness, and in the kitchen for good health. These magic bottles are mostly used for protection, but you can also place into them symbols of your dreams and desires, such as a white rose for peace, the herb rosemary for remembrance, and cinnamon for the spice of life.

For a calm and peaceful home, take a teaspoon of soil from outside your house (or the closest park) and place it into a bottle with some smoky topaz or brown jasper. Place the bottle into the pot of a plant near the entrance of your home. Every time you water the plant, think about the sanctity of your home. As your plant grows, so will the tranquility of your residence. 

Joy is sacred, too, you know.

Those of us who grew up surrounded by the fundamentalist Christian concept that humor, laughter, and fun are somehow inherently evil - that the only way it's possible to worship or show reverence is by being deadly serious - sometimes have trouble with the idea that it's OK to laugh as part of our spiritual practice.

Surely thine hour has come, thy great wind blows,

Far-off, most secret, and inviolate Rose.

(William Butler Yeats, "The Secret Rose")

In order to understand what I'm about to tell you, you need to know that the Witches' Goddess is known among witches, somewhat cryptically, as “the Rose.”

(If you can't see why that would be, then what kind of a witch are you?)

Hence the phrase sub rosa, “under the rose,” meaning confidentially.

When someone tells you something “under the rose,” it's not to be shared with outsiders. When told this, by listening, you thereby accede, as if you had sworn an oath.

The Craft is hedged about with roses. (I mean here, of course, the original rose, the rose of five petals.) The pentagram, of course, is known as the “witch's rose.”

Some things are of the Rose, not meant for others' ears. You may be told “This is under the Rose.” In season, a rose in bloom may be held up silently, and laid upon the table. A rose may be drawn with the finger in the air, or over the lips. All these forms are binding.