All Our Relations: Pagans and the more-than-human world.

For aware Pagans the Sacred encompasses us all, rivers and mountains, oceans and deserts, grasses and trees, fish and fungi, birds and animals. Understanding the implications of what this means, and how to experience it first hand, involves our growing individually and as a community well beyond the limits of this world-pathic civilization. All Our Relations exists to help fertilize this transition.

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Gus diZerega

Gus diZerega

Gus diZerega DiZerega combines a formal academic training in Political Science with decades of work in Wicca and shamanic healing. He is a Third Degree Elder in Gardnerian Wicca, studied closely with Timothy White who later founded Shaman’s Drum magazine, and also studied Brazilian Umbanda  for six years under Antonio Costa e Silva.

DiZerega holds a Ph.D. in Political Science from UC Berkeley, has taught and lectured in the US and internationally, and has organized international academic meetings.

His newest book is "Faultlines: the Sixties, the Culture Wars, and the Return of the Divine Feminine (Quest, 2013) received a 'silver' award by the Association of Independent Publishers for 2014. It puts both modern Pagan religion and the current cultural and political crisis in the US into historical context, and shows how they are connected.

His first book on Pagan subjects, "Pagans and Christians: The Personal Spiritual Experience," won the Best Nonfiction of 2001 award from  The Coalition of Visionary Resources. 

His second,"Beyond the Burning Times: A Pagan and a Christian in Dialogue" is what it sounds like. He coauthored it with Philip Johnson. DiZerega particularly like his discussion of polytheism in Burning Times, which in his view is an advance over the discussion in Pagans and Christians.

His third volume, "Faultlines: The Sixties, the Culture War, and the Return of the Divine Feminine," was published in 2013 and won a Silver award from the Association of Independent Publishers in 2014. The subject is obvious, and places it, and the rise of goddess oriented spiritual movements and our "cold civil war" in historical context.

His pen and ink artwork supported his academic research in graduate school and frequently appeared in Shaman’s Drum, and the ecological journals Wild Earth, and The Trumpeter. It now occasionally appears in this blog.
The Occult, Science, and NeoPaganism

 

As NeoPaganism has grown and flourished, the paths taken to get here have multiplied from those taken by a relatively few serious spiritual explorers initially engaged in occult studies to include people attracted by dissatisfaction with monotheism, a feeling of finally finding a spiritual home, our music and culture, curiosity about the off-beat or forbidden, and increasingly, their family’s beliefs.   This is not a bad thing.  It is in fact a good thing. But it is a complex good thing.

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Recent Comments - Show all comments
  • Gus diZerega
    Gus diZerega says #
    I have just learned many W&P readers read from mobile devices where longer articles might be a problem. A question to those who ha
  • Karena
    Karena says #
    That was very thought-provoking- thank you!

 

I write this on March 8, International Women’s Day. In America today is a day of painful paradoxes.  During last year’s electoral campaign women’s issues received greater attention than ever before, and for the first time ever, a major candidate for president was a woman.  She also received millions more votes than her opponent. Were our system like other democratic nations she would have been our first woman president. However, a constitutional quirk gave the office to the most aggressively misogynistic president we have ever had.

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Women and the feminine were a major but not decisive thread in the presidential campaign that elected Donald Trump Nov 8. Not only was his behavior and words regarding women execrable, he was running against one. In terms of the popular vote, she won. In terms of the electoral vote, which gives the advantage to small rural states because they elect two Senators and so have two additional votes no matter how tiny their population, she lost. More specifically, Clinton won in the cities and lost in rural areas. She won the most votes but not in the countryside.

And the nature of this difference is a clue to one of the most important long term trends this election revealed.

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  • J'Karrah
    J'Karrah says #
    Fascinating article. Thank you
  • Anthony Gresham
    Anthony Gresham says #
    I'm slowly making my way through "The Coming of the Cosmic Christ" by Matthew Fox. He writes a lot about mysticism and the divine
The Old Gods are with us always: Mictcacícatl, Santisima Muerte, and Day of the Dead

One November 2, the Day of the Dead, I went to the Taos Inn to hear a talk by local Taos artist, writer, and all around remarkable woman, Anita Rodriguez. It was fascinating and I asked whether I could reproduce it here at Witches and Pagans, She graciously agreed, and asked whether I could also share her website, where people can see and perhaps purchase her work. (I love her work- she did two paintings for me a while ago.)

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Day of the Dead, Samhain, and Halloween: cultural appropriation or something wonderful?

 

Taos, where I recently moved, is famous for its celebration of Day of the Dead.  Not surprisingly Day of the Dead themes have been integrated in to Halloween celebrations here.  Day of the Dead also shares many points of overlap with Samhain.   For the previous two years I worked with Mexican friends to organize a joint celebration of Samhain and Day of the Dead in Sebastopol, California. We had side by side altars and people were encouraged to light votives honoring their deceased loved one, and to place them on the altars of their choice.  My Wiccan altar had marigolds on it, and the skull was a colorful one in keeping with Day of the Dead symbolism. Otherwise it was very traditional.

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The Green Album: a Pagan treat for all who love the Earth

A wonderful new CD of Pagan songs honoring the sacredness of Nature has just blessed us. I have enjoyed it immensely and hope many of you will as well. That’s the elevator speech. Here’s why.

The Green Album is a collection by many of our best contemporary Pagan musicians contributing their original music to honor the earth. At a time when the fate of the place we love is being threatened by greed, ignorance, and fear, music can strengthen those of us who feel powerless given magnitude of the forces we oppose and even penetrate minds and hearts closed to argument and evidence.  This collection does so for me.

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Posted by on in Culture Blogs

 

My book Faultlines argued our country is going through on of the most divisive periods in Western history, at three progressively deeper levels. First is the cultural split rooted in the divergent paths the North and South took over slavery, a split reignited with the Civil Rights movement and the Republican Party’s “Southern Strategy.” 

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Recent Comments - Show all comments
  • Jön Upsal's Gardener
    Jön Upsal's Gardener says #
    "A free society depends on recognizing people will disagree politically and NOT BE ENEMIES." So your answer is to label people wi
  • Gus diZerega
    Gus diZerega says #
    Just got to your comment as in July I was packing and much of August has been spent getting settled in New Mexico. That said, you
  • Jamie
    Jamie says #
    Mr. diZerega, I am conflicted about Trump's candidacy. I dislike him. But if he wins, it will be the last hurrah for his politica
  • Gus diZerega
    Gus diZerega says #
    Trump is a man with a long record of fraud against those weaker than himself. In his speeches he urged violence against demonstrat

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