Letters Please address letters to New Moon Rising or otherwise make it clear that your letter is available for publication. Please let us know how you would like it signed. Opinions of authors in New Moon Rising and especially in the Letters section certainly do not necessarily reflect those of New Moon Rising. Regarding Burning Questions I can't help but wonder why any Wiccan would be concerned with acquiring legitimacy within the community you call mainstream America. By implication you are referring to the Christians as they and the Islamics are the only ones who have such a lively interest in others religious beliefs. Agnostics and Atheists have dealt themselves out. Other major and smaller religions have sense enough to respect other people’s beliefs. And with the Christian/Islamic folks you can be in league with the Devil just for disagreeing over how many Angels can dance on the head of a pin! So you want the sanction of these people? Every one seeking Initiation knows full well that Wicca is an initiatory, mystery religion; secrecy comes with the territory. If someone has a problem with that, then that person should in my view, reassess their involvement with Paganism. You're never going to gain the acceptance of people who specialize in any and every form of bigotry imaginable. Again, why would you want their acceptance? It seems to me, that such acceptance would be the death of your own spiritual life. And if that isn't enough, how does your or my religious beliefs rate as anybody else's business in the first place? It is my opinion that questions such as you are posing comprise a significant threat to Wicca or Paganism in as much as the issue is truly a red herring, sidetracking our energies and thus blunting the natural maturation process of the religion itself. Want to really come out of the broom closet? Volunteer some time registering new voters or some such community activity. Voter apathy is the greatest friend the religious right has, hence the greatest danger to our religious freedom. Or if political activism isn't your cup of tea, donate time on some other activity that benefits the community. Manifest the energy of the Goddess in this way, as action speaks louder than words. Amairge We should be concerned with the legitimacy question because it is a reflection of the greater issue of Pagan acceptance in continental and global society. We should be concerned with that, because we don't have a choice. We have to live together. If we are xenophobic and insular we do no one and no religion any good. Xenophobia and insularity are some of the very sins that inspire such a response, and thus we become part of the feedback loop that perpetuates these sins. When we cling to the bigotry that crams so many people into that pigeonhole labeled enemy (no matter how compelling our reasons may be), then we make those people enemies more effectively than any God could. No one can be so hostile that labeling them an enemy won't make things worse. This has nothing to do with foisting our religion on others or revealing secrets or being untrue to our religion and ideals. This is all about living together. That will mean some changes—in ourselves and in others—but if we fear those changes, they will control us instead of us shaping them. We stand to lose far more by trying to remain the same than by working toward change. Certainly, the things you mention are great ways of improving things. We should be open to all actions and all words that can improve things. Just as important, we should be careful to avoid those actions and words that make things worse. Claiming that certain people are unworthy of us, no matter the reason, helps no one. A Reason to Work Toward Acceptance I want to take this opportunity to bring up an issue that Scot Rhoads and Don Kraig discussed in previous issues, and take it a step further. Discussing the Pagan/magickal way of life with passersby is difficult enough, but when they go away, or log off (whatever, I haven't got a computer) it's over. What about your family and loved ones? They don't go away, and you don't necessarily want them to, at least most of the time, anyway. I am, as a Pagan/magickal person, for the most part out, but whereas with the general public, I don't care!!! (Incidentally, most of my encounters with the `general public' are positive), with family, however, I am guarded. I was raised Catholic, and my only sister recently went back to the Church, having her 10 year old daughter baptized, and prepared to receive the rest of the sacraments. She left because they wouldn't marry her and her (now ex-) husband? He was a divorce. (Naughty, naughty) I've gotten into it with my mom (Everyone raised Catholic always returns to the Church, no matter what.) my uncle and cousins (We know someone who's being `brainwashed' into Paganism. (How do you do that?)), put on the proverbial rack for the modest pentagram I wear. The logical and reasonable explanations we use for the public do not work with people I have grown up with. I am thirty, with a husband and a child, a nice home and bitchin' garden. I have been a Pagan/magickian since I was thirteen? I hid it for so long, do I need to hide it further, and lead my son to believe it is something to hide and be ashamed of? Or should I blow them off? Hey, they're still my family and I love them, and don't knock their philosophy, and I don't cram mine down anybody's throat. I don't bring it up unless someone else does, but damn it, do I have to take off my ring and my crystal to visit family? Does anyone else have to deal with this? Love, Peace and magick to New Moon Rising and all its staff—the community that I don't have! Bronwyn
Salinas, CA Everything changes when we have to deal with family. It's like switching from euclidean to noneuclidean geometry. Trying to work with your family is often like trying to do your own dentistry—no matter how good a dentist you may be, it's better to let another dentist do it. People will listen to others in ways they won't listen to family. So it's important for us to deal with others and try to improve attitudes toward Paganism not just because we may help those with unfortunate prejudices, but also fellow Pagans who may have to live with them. History and Religion Your comments in NMR vol. 7 no. 2 about the signs at Yule stating Jesus is the reason for the Season have a counterpart here in Canada. The Canadian Bible Society put up ads in the Toronto Subway which show a Bible and state OVER A HUNDRED THOUSAND WEEKS ON THE BEST SELLER LIST. Well, if one does the math, 700,000 days takes us back to the Year 79 C.E. The book known to us as the Bible had not yet been compiled into the canon of the Church, as some of the books of the New Testament had not yet even been written. They appeared between 90 and 150 C.E. As far as I know, there were no best seller lists of books in the Roman Empire. What I find objectionable is the use of falsehood and fabrication to tout the Xtian holy book and everyone just allows that kind of deception to go by unchallenged. I feel modern Paganism must rely on History and not myth, so I apply the same critical attitude to books put out by Pagan authors and writers in our Time. Falsehoods get laid off on us through our celebrity Pagan authors and authoresses especially in the Celtic crap one finds coming off the press each Season. I suppose this uncritical approach to History stems from most modern Pagans having been raised Xtian first. Bible History is myth, yet many still repeat those tales as historical fact. However, when one points out the History of the Bible, which is fact, one receives a blank stare from people who are engaged in preaching the Bible. I often wondered how could someone push a book and not know how, when, where and why the book was written. And by whom! Mostly one is just considered a kook by individual fundies trying to lay Bible off on you when you point out the time, place and reason and author of a particular biblical manuscript. They roll their eyes and their heads swim because they have never been told those facts. The historical reality does not sink in and they refuse to accept the truth. It destroys their illusions. Occasionally, one runs into a clergyperson who knows what is being said and one ends up being considered subversive and a danger to religious thinking. Oh well. Again I wonder why clergypeople want the public to continue believing myth as fact and resent anyone with the knowledge of where all the bones are buried in the History of the Bible. When someone pushes the Bible in my face, I drag out all the facts documented in History showing the rather mundane origins of the whole thing and why one can not accept the scriptures as divinely inspired. Then one becomes demonized and one is attacked on a personal level. If the message is unsettling, attack the messenger and discredit him/her so one can continue feeling superior and secure in one's illusions. You probably will not receive sufficient response from Pagans to put up a sign saying Sol Invictus is the reason for the Season. Truth and historical accuracy are in short supply among those who are products of Late Twentieth Century school systems. If a subject can not be reduced to a sound byte or a thirty-second promo on the tube, people will just not bother their heads about it. Pagan Classics were removed from the Elementary and Secondary School lesson plans in the 60's, so we have a couple generations of people with no grounding in ethics and community responsibility. Is this not why North American society is reverting into barbarism? Sad to say your idea will probably be met with indifference and apathy and the Bible pushers will be able to preserve their precious delusions and deceptions. Try to find Classical Studies at a University level. They may be offered, but on the basis only of sufficient students signing up for them. When not, they don't run any particular Semester. Without the reality of History and Classical Literature we get this feminist Herstory and all the fanciful, wishful thinking SCA approach to Wicca and Paganism. Is there not enough bunnies and light sprinkled around the New Age as it is? Oh well. Tarostar,
Toronto, Ontario I certainly agree with being honest, with one's self and with others, but we must be circumspect in how we apply this. What is untrue on one level, may be true on another. Our society's obsession with the physical world and positivism has, unfortunately, been at the expense of everything else. We are in great danger of dismissing important spiritual information when we demand that it correspond to the Facts, as we understand them. Just as we are in danger of losing that spirituality when we insist that the Facts correspond to the superficial aspects of a spiritual text. History as we know it, as a science, is a very recent invention. Even Christianity predates our idea of history by many centuries. The science of History has a very important place, but to apply it to a religion is hardly a spiritual act. If people try to do so, that's their loss. It doesn't invalidate their religion, but it narrows their religion, and thus narrows their life. It doesn't matter if history in a religious context is True or not! Did Jesus come back from the grave or not? That's an important question from a scientific/historical point of view. It makes no difference from a spiritual point of view. Nor does it make any difference if you believe it or not. Either way—the world is still the way it is, we are still the way we are, religion is the way it is. Sure, most people get them confused these days. Many have a faith so weak and spirituality so tenuous that they demand that science conform to their desires and support them. But if we pay attention to the feelings and changes within us, we find they are independent of anything so ephemeral and mercurial as historical truth. Again, this is not to say that historical truth is unimportant, rather to say that it plays no role in spirituality. And this does not say that history in its broader sense does not play a role in spirituality! But is plays its role as myth and tradition, not as a science. Suppose it is handed down to us, or we read in an old Encyclopedia Britannica, that the Druidians used left-handed gallium plated tongue scrapers to harvest mistletoe, and we take up the practice. If we get nothing out of it, it doesn't matter how true it is. If we do get something out of it, it should not matter if we learn that there never were any Druidians, there's no such thing as a left-handed tongue scraper, and gallium is a recent discovery. If a religion was started on a bar bet, it doesn't matter as long as it suits our spiritual needs. When we are searching for something to fill a spiritual need, then the science of history can serve us well. It can offer choices we might otherwise miss. In recent publications, there is a serious scholastic burden to document any claims of historical accuracy. But if we insist upon historical accuracy in that which has proven to hold spiritual meaning, we hamstring our vital myths. And we do the same if we allow fraudulent claims of historical accuracy to prejudice us against myths. To be true to modern scholarship, a writer should be scrupulous and circumspect when presenting something as historical truth. But, ironically, since Paganism (vastly) predates our modern notion of historical accuracy, to be true to Paganism, we must not restrict ourselves to historical truth. Two of my favorite quotations spring to mind. My hero, Joseph Campbell, said, There is no reality, only experience. And Black Elk, regarding the historical accuracy of a myth, said: This they tell, and whether it happened so or not, I do not know; but if you think about it, you can see that it is true. One person's falsehood is another's myth and metaphor. We must understand and respect this or we will frighten those who cannot distinguish mythic reality from social reality and thus exacerbate the problem. The Sol Invictus is the reason for the season billboard has indeed met with resounding apathy, but I find it hard to read much spiritual or profound into that since so many secular ideas of mine have met the same fate. Finally, I'd like to come out in favor of Bunnies and Light (in my lexicon, Rainbows and Unicorns). I've spent a lot of time excoriating Rainbows and Unicorns because they represent a Pollyanna attitude, dismissive of serious problems. They seem to be an escape for the pathetic and weak. I stand by that analysis, but I still favor Rainbows and Unicorns because they also represent the most challenging and rewarding attitude of always insisting upon the positive. It is as weak and superficial to dismiss Rainbows and Unicorns as nothing but hiding from adversity as it is to use them to hide from adversity. But it is the greatest triumph of human spirit to stare down that adversity and always aspire to the positivity that Rainbows and Unicorns represent. This is the alchemical Great Work, it is true dedication to the Goddess, it is taking charge of your destiny, of your reality. It is incredibly difficult. But we only make it more so by deriding the obviously oh so sour grapes that represent this triumph. Rainbows and Unicorns are not for the wimpy and pathetic. They demand every once of dedication. But if you give it, you will find that the overwhelming adversity that derides them is just the buzzing of flies. | 
