I've been out of commission and very quiet on the writing front for a while now. I had my second hip replacement surgery in February (the first having been in July of 2019) and a delay in return to work in March with COVID-19 shutdowns. The fear and loss of life has weighed heavily on me, as with everyone and the continued uncertainty of just about everything in the world as we know it looms large. These and some personal changes have given me pause to reflect on everything and the usual forward momentum that I feel has been slowed by the accompanying heaviness with this introspection and I will admit that motivation has been in short supply (something I rarely have had issue with).
It's funny how when faced with stretches of time that are unstructured your mind goes down these paths of exploration that normally go unnoticed in the busy-ness of routine. One of the things that came up for me was the chance to take a look at my spiritual practice and path and how the past 30+ years have molded my current work. I also realized that I have been missing the unmistakable feeling when everything is new, undiscovered and exciting. So, I decided to take a walk down memory lane and take the time to re-member those things that filled me with the power of newness as a tonic, if you will, of much needed joy and inspiration.......
Imagine waking in the hour before dawn, rising in the cool darkness -- no electricity, no gaslights, just the stars and what's left of the moon, and perhaps a candle to light your room. You pull on your clothes, no sound but that of your feet shuffling and the ruffling of fabric. You put on your shoes and grab a bucket and head out in the darkness. You walk down the road, the air chilled and moist. If you pass someone, you nod your head but don't dare to speak. Their footsteps shuffle away, and the scent of cold earth and dew fills your nostrils as you continue on your way. Soon, you hear the faint trickling of a creek. You come to the edge of it, and the faint light glints on the ripples as you dip your bucket down into the freezing water. You pull it up again, and it's heavier than before. The faint light glints silver on that, too, almost as if you've captured some of the stars in it. Then you head home, the water sloshing softly in the bucket, and still you don't speak until dawn breaks on the horizon.
Humans possess an innate spiritual capacity rooted in Nature, and Paganism is the natural expression of our common spirituality, arising from Nature and calling us ever back to Nature. This is my conviction.
In every place and time, before prophets gave humankind “revealed” religion, Paganism was our original faith, fulfilling our indelible spiritual needs with wisdom gleaned from our lived experience in Nature. And I hope—for the very life of our Earth and the flourishing of human persons within it—that Paganism may be not merely the ancient faith of ages past but rather our once and future faith. This hope is also my vision, and I founded the Pagan Renewal with a mission to help manifest this vision.
I’m thankful to PaganSquare for having reached out to us at PaganRenewal.org to see whether we would be interested in adding our voice to the chorus here on PaganSquare, and I look forward to writing more deeply about the Pagan Renewal here in the months and years to come. In this first post, however, I’d like to begin just by providing some background on myself and my path.
Imbolc has recently passed, a festival of warm candlelight and plans and intentions; it is the festival at which we sow our goals for the year to watch as they sprout and grow, and lead us to the change we wish to see.
My daughter and I were driving through rural Wisconsin. She was complaining about the blandness of the landscape. I said I see the potential. Spring is a Time when you can look out a crossed everything a field your life and it's a blank slate it's a blank canvas that you can decide what it will be as used take a step forward throughout the year.
What will you paint on your Kansas this year. There is a myriad of options ultimately it's about what you want to harvest at the end of the year.
Erin Lale
Fellow faculty at Harvard Divinity School posted an open letter to Wolpe in response to his article. It's available on this page, below the call for p...
Erin Lale
Here's another response. The Wild Hunt has a roundup of numerous responses on its site, but it carried this one as a separate article. It is an accoun...
Erin Lale
Here's another response. This one is by a scholar of paganism. It's unfortunately a Facebook post so this link goes to Facebook. She posted the text o...
Erin Lale
Here's another link to a pagan response to the Atlantic article. I would have included this one in my story too if I had seen it before I published it...
