Early Fall is upon us, and the year’s Wheel turns from harvest into the darkening time leading to Samhain. This reminds us that one great distinction between modern NeoPaganism and most contemporary religions is our different relationship to death. For the monotheistic traditions death entered into the world as a consequence of sin. As I understand Buddhism, death is one of many forms taken by suffering, and suffering is evidence something is amiss with embodied existence. The secular modern ‘religion’ of scientism hopes someday to enable us to achieve immortality, perhaps as consciousness encased within a computer.
Today many of the deceased are painted to look as if they are still alive, ‘sleeping,’ and their bodies buried in ornate caskets with comfy cushions to protect them for as long as possible from finding physical oneness with the earth. We mourn the loss of loved ones but we mourn from within a different context than do those who see death as a misfortune.
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Gus - couldn't agree more. Humans were built to eat meat, too much evidence to go into here, but in a nutshell, we wouldn't be hum -
Hi Alan: Thanks. Congenital honesty, a flaw esp in wicca and online. Usually when there's an option of "username", that's what get
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The arguments you brought up about farming are also maintained by Jainists, who do not plow for exactly that reason. Good articl
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Theresa- That is why I used "scientism" - the faith/ideology that all knowledge comes from science and can be demonstrated or disc -
Nice of Witches and Pagans to use my real name after asking for a username...ok... Here's my comment: I wish those of us concerned
