NMR ISSUE 44

Astrological Forecast 44
Celtic Perspective on Samhain
Editorial 44
Empowering Your Imagination
Esoteric Symbology of the Tarot
How to Vote for Your Kids
Jaguar
Letters 44
Murry Hope
Namaste, Part II
Other Editorial 44
Pagan Safety
Ritual for Samhain
Spirit's dance
The Angel's Kiss
The Corn Wolf
Things That Go Bump in the Night
Wasp, Bobwhite & Barracuda

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Pagan Parenting: How to Vote for Your Kids

Reasons to vote that are hardly annoying at all!

By Amanda Cummings

We are coming into the election season this fall. This is the time when we as grownups exercise our rights and fulfill our civic duties. It is our opportunity to let our voices and opinions be heard. And boy, do we! I've often wondered what our election system looks like from the outside. Thirty second sound bytes, mudslinging, name-calling, hatred, fear, superiority, racism, and self-aggrandizement. Then we all go back to the way it was before, pretending to be a tolerant, open society. How do we behave as responsible citizens and show our children how to be responsible as well?

Most important is being informed and active in our communities. In my community, we are looking at a sales tax increase to fund basic things like libraries. What if we as Pagans volunteered an hour a week at our local library? Here in San Diego, the Republican convention is coming. Operation Rescue is waging an all out attack on health clinics, doctors' offices, patients, and doctors' homes. They are threatening violence and disruption of services. Not just abortions, but basic health care, birth control, and emergency treatment. The San Diego police have asked places like Planned Parenthood and other private doctors' offices to remain closed for the week these terrorists are in town. We need to write letters when things like this come up. We need to go down to the clinics and help them stay open. They aren't the ones breaking the law. The United States has one of the greatest disparities of income and resources between rich and poor. We need to be coming up with creative alternatives to living in a dollar-obsessed system. These are only a few ideas.

Why is it important for us to do this? Because this is the world we are going to leave our children. The one in which they will have to try to survive. If we do not find ways to bring about harmony, peace and cooperation, we will continue to see divisive factions, war, and ruthless competition in our children's future. And if we want to bring these things to an end, we must give our children the tools to avoid buying into such a hateful, frightened system. We as parents have an obligation to create a culture and society where our children can thrive. We have to impart to them values radically different from the status quo. We, as Pagan parents, cannot be about money; we must be about quality. We cannot play the games of putting things (and people) down in order to validate ourselves; we must be able to see the inherent validity of what is. We cannot be about war; we must be actively, conscientiously peaceful.

What on earth do I mean by all this? Good question! Unfortunately it is difficult to give a good, articulate, succinct answer, but here goes. First, let me define a few words, so we are on the same wavelength.

Harmony: living in balance in relation to ourselves (such as mentally and emotionally), to each other, and to the world (that is, nature). This requires participation. We must constantly attempt to be balanced. It must be a goal. How else can we expect to foster this skill in our children? Harmony requires the ability to look at things from many perspectives and find the center, the point upon which all depends.

Peace: the ability to take all those different perspectives and relate them to each other and to yourself.

Cooperation: the ability to negotiate with others to create mutually desired outcomes.

OK? Enough of the glossary. Let's have some action! To bring about harmony, peace and cooperation, we need to set those examples for our children. We have to actively pursue these things, if we value them. We have to do everything we can to eradicate fear, punishment and hatred.

That's a pretty tall order. How can we do this? We must do everything we can to see that our children learn to deal with us without being afraid of us, without being threatened with punishment (called extortion and coercion when adults do it to each other), and without learning to hate us. It means we treat our children the way we want to be treated; respectfully, honestly, and kindly. Then we not only have the benefit of having relationships with our children, but we give them the tools to relate to other people.

Learning good ways to relate is a big step toward harmony, peace and cooperation. When children learn to relate out of fear, they are manipulative. When they learn to operate out of a need to avoid punishment, they lie. And when they are motivated by hatred, they are violent. Look at the adults in our world. See how we relate. Our leaders play on these ideas in order to carve us up into neat little demographics. We must not let our children grow up to be vulnerable to this kind of disempowerment. Respect, honesty and kindness foster harmony, peace and cooperation, respectively.

Creating culture and society is an important goal for all of us, Pagan or not. It is the atmosphere where our dreams and values take root and bloom. A culture of tolerance and a society of value is not only achievable, but also imperative. We cannot be about money. It would be in our own best interest and that of our children to find ways to become less dependent on cash. It is too restricting; our society in is so dollar-obsessed that it sinks to defining our accomplishments and our personal worth only in terms of a bottom line figure. What would happen if we didn't pay our family doctor, but saw to it that she had plenty of food, her home was repaired, her offices maintained? What if housework was as valued as college teaching? What if what you did wasn't tied to a dollar amount? How would that change the way we would live? Would it change your quality of life? How about that of your children? These are the avenues we need to explore as we try to create a society that is not materialistic.

Our children need to be exposed to the idea of inherent worth. We as adults cannot afford to indulge in the one-upmanship that is so socially acceptable. We learn to make ourselves look good by making everyone else look bad. It's called competition. It's called mudslinging. It comes from a deep-seated feeling of insecurity and inadequacy. When we see the world as inherently valuable and the people in it as inherently valuable as well, we are no longer able to use devaluation to control those around us.

What would happen to politicians then? What would our children learn from us if we refuse to indulge in this destructive behavior? And I'm not talking about the politically correct socio-speak so common now. I'm talking about a completely different way of looking at the world, where everything has value simply because it is.

These are the things that change the world around us. When we no longer operate out of fear and hatred, and don't contribute to a system that operates out of fear and hatred when we decide that harmony, peace, and cooperation are attainable and behave accordingly we put the lie to the system's rhetoric. When we operate out of perfect love and perfect trust, we set the example for the world. But most important, we set the example for our children, and in them, the future.

Blessed Be!