May Eve

Happy May Eve!!

My little one is due any day now (actual due date is in the middle of May, but she's ready). I find it odd that she's due right around May Eve, typically this is the time of year for fertility and I've heard people say that there are a lot of babies born in Jan and Feb because of conception right around this time of year. I haven't looked into this, but I guess I could check out some archives to see if there is any truth to that. Anyway, since she's due pretty much any day now, unfortunately I haven't had time to put anything together for this holiday to share so I'll just leave you with a happy holiday wish and hope you have a fun filled day.

Take a moment to enjoy the life that is growing around you, and if you have time plant some seeds or take some time to do a ritual to celebrate the holiday.

Blessings
PrariePagan

Druidism link

I found this website on Druidism, which I don't know a whole lot about. I reviewed quite a bit of the information found here and I must say it appears to be credible...keep in mind I said appears. The copyright shows only until 2006 and I could not find any references to back up the information. There is a comment regarding Wicca being the sister religion to Druidism, which I'm not sure I agree with without more information. My main concern with that comment is that Wicca is about 60 years old and I don't even want to begin to guess how old Druidism is, also Wicca is not Celtic in nature, however some Wiccans do follow a Celtic pantheon.

I would recommend this site as a general information place to get you started, but definitely use only as a springboard for ideas to research further. Not to say that this information is not accurate, however he does admit that he was eclectic enough in his practices to sometimes believe he may not be Druid at all, also that there are many different Druid traditions each with their own practices. Not only this, but as mentioned before I didn't see any reference material for your own research.

If you have any interest in this site I hope you enjoy it, and if you are Druid I would love to "hear" some comments on what you think of the site.

Blessings
PrairiePagan

Was the US founded on Christianity?

Found this website and thought it had some interesting history to it. While it may not be the most academic, it does give an overview and some ideas to think about, as well as a springboard for more research.

Flying Spaghetti Monster

While talking with some friends awhile ago we somehow briefly touched on the Flying Spaghetti Monster (FSM) and I have been unable to remove thoughts of his noodley appendage from my mind. I thought that perhaps by sharing some of the knowledge inspired by the FSM you too may become a Pastafarian, or at least have a better understanding of this great religion.

This religion was brought to the public when Bobby Henderson, an Oregon State University physics graduate, sent an open letter to the Kansas School Board in 2005 protesting the decision to teach intelligent design along side biological evolution in science classes. You can check out the actual letter by clicking here. However on the Churches official website there is an archive dating back to December 2003. The letter was designed to argue that because the decision was regarding “intelligent design” rather than something specific, such as Creationism, the designer, by their definition, could be anything and in his “belief” it was the Flying Spaghetti Monster and should be considered just as valid as Darwin and Creationism. Many letters were sent by FSM members to the school board identifying the FSM as a valid religion arguing that it too should be taught. With all of these letters, the one sent by Bobby Henderson received some feedback, including four board members who also were unhappy with the decision and said they would be submitting the FSM issue to be voted on (humorously with a point of course).

It is difficult to say exactly what the purpose of this religion is because it is different for every member, as it should be for the members of any church. However, the official website for the Church of FSM reluctantly does make this statement regarding the religious purpose: “We are pursuing a religion that makes the world a better place. It means something different to each of us. We don’t need to analyze it.” For some people this religion is a sign of religious diversity and a following to keep religion out of politics. With that said it is obvious that while this is a satire religion of sorts, there is some good that comes from it. Many don’t understand the religion even after it is explained, while others catch right on to the comically addressed political and philosophical ideas that come along with it. A statue of the FSM was placed in front of a courthouse in Tennessee, the creator of the statue had this to say during the installation,

“The Flying Spaghetti Monster is a pile of noodles and meatballs, but it is meant to open up discussion and provoke thought. Being able to put up a statue is a celebration of our freedom as Americans; a freedom to be different, to express those differences, and to do it amongst neighbors — even if it is in a noodley way.”

The religion does poke fun at other religions, such as from the Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster you can find the Eight “I’d rather you didn’ts.” This is all done with the idea that if there is a god out there, s/he must have a sense of humor. It is in no way intended to be an attack on any specific religion. I highly recommend checking out the official website, however you will find that it is more of a community than information sharing. While I would love to give you more specifics on the religion I am unable to as I do not own the proper piratey headdress to teach therefore I will leave you with a link to the Pastafariani Guide. Enjoy!!

May all of you reading this be touched by his noodley appendage.

Ramen!

Kilauea volcano offers rare sight

To read the Yahoo article please click here.

The there are a couple of reasons this article caught my attention,
the first is GEOLOGY. I'm an amateur (very amateur) rock collector.
The other is the mention of Pele (Peh-leh), who is a Hawaiian goddess and this particular volcano is her home. I view this as Pele coming out to greet those who wish to see her, whether they realize it is her or not...but that's just me :)

**Just a side note: One specific type of volcanic rock, which just
happens to be the type Kilauea produces is called Pahoehoe
(Pa-hoa-hoa), aka rope lava. As this lava cools it hardens to what
looks like a ropy surface, this surface is said to be the hair of
Pele.

Sorry, science mixed with religion...I just had to share :)

Rain

This morning we had our first thunderstorm of the season. I thought I'd take a pagan look at it, which in reality combines several different views. The first is that of the seasonal changes. We are moving into Spring if you don't already consider us there (I do because the weather has been warming nicely and we passed the equinox last week). In my neck of the woods the rain is extremely important due to the type of crops we grow here, mainly corn and soybeans with alfalfa on the side...yummy. Nebraska has been considered to be in a drought the last 10 years, but hey I look at this as the larger picture of the weather moving in cycles ranging thousands of years with a little mix of global warming. Just something we have to fix what we can and accept the rest. Anyway, as we move into Spring, our fertility season, growing crops is on the minds of many individuals around here, and rain doesn't always mean dreary, a lot of times its much welcomed, unless we get too much and the farmers can't get out to the fields. Anyway, seasonal change and everything that goes with it is important to the growth of crops providing food for us humans as well as livestock and it also is main ingredients in so many products we use daily that even a slight decline in the crop production can hurt all of us on so many levels.

Next I wanted to condense down from the big picture and look at my own personal view of the shower from the sky. My immediate reaction to the rain storm this morning as I lay there in bed was a smile on my face. My husband loves thunderstorms so I had to nudge him awake a little to let him know it was going to storm this morning. For myself, I don't mind the thunder and lightning, unless the lightning gets to be too dangerous...not a fan of that. I focus more on the rain. I'm one of those people who can stand outside in a rainstorm and just dance, shortly after my husband came home from Iraq he danced with me in the rain. I kind of look at it as a cleansing. We are preparing for a new baby to arrive in the house in about a month so we've been cleaning like crazy. I just look at this as another kind of cleansing. Not only is the rain settling the dust and cleaning up the roads a bit from all the sand dropped by the snow plows in the winter, but it is also a spiritual cleansing for me. Later on today I will probably sit down and meditate a bit on those things in my life that need cleaned up, physically, spiritually and emotionally. I can just sit here and imagine the rain washing over me letting mother earth bathe me. It's really a comfort to me. I could go out and just sit in the rain, but since I was ill last week and I'm still getting over that a bit, I probably should stick with my imagination, or maybe a warm shower to give me the effect.

Speaking of the shower, I will often say cleansing prayers in the shower in the morning. It's a great way to imagine the divine washing away all worries and negative energies that are lingering around you. Just another way to incorporate your practice into your everyday life.

Now another thing I don't want to forget to mention here is the symbolism of the water flowing. I live on a hill so it's easy for me to watch the rain water travel down the road, but you can also notice it either as a flowing from the sky, maybe watch the way it flows down the window, if you live by a creek or stream you can even just watch it there. But for me it is a reminder to keep my life in check and make sure that everything is flowing as it should. I'll probably incorporate a bit of this into my meditation today. Just a little something to see if there are any issues in my life that are putting a bump in the road. Even though there is an obstacle in the way, the water will find a way to get around it, but if the obstacle is too big it may end in a flood, my goal is to avoid that happening, because for me it usually ends in an emotional flood, or too much at one time that I get overwhelmed. So I like to keep an eye open for those little obstacles in the beginning that may become big in the end. It's sometimes easier to fix a little one than a big one, and it may be just a matter of changing course a little.

It's amazing how much rain can make me think in the morning.

Blessings
PrairiePagan

Inspiration in the Strangest Places

So I've been sick all week, violent coughing, fever, all kinds of the yucks. While I was lounging, practically immobile in front of the TV, watched a commercial for the Venus razor. Yes, the inspiration I'm referring to in the title came from a razor commercial, sounds cheesy I know, but it worked for me. In the commercial they were referring to finding your inner goddess, the goddess of friendship, etc. So I was thinking, maybe there is a Goddess we find ourselves connected to more based on our most prominent personality traits. That may be the particular Goddess we may find ourselves attracted most to because of the attraction of those things familiar to ourselves. This would be a great way to look into ourselves to find a patron/matron deity. And then to take it even further, look at some of the personality traits we have that might be weaker or not quite so appealing. If we wanted to work on those traits this may be a good method to find a deity to help boost us up in areas we feel we need more work on.

Just a thought, and an odd one at that considering it stemmed from a razor commercial. But anyway, I think I'll tuck this little idea away and use it in the near future for some soul searching and deity research.

Update: Recreating my Lifestyle Ritual

Back in December of 2007 I wrote a post regarding my daily spiritual routine. I ran across this post so I thought I'd give a bit of an update. Unfortunately there isn't an uphill one. I still consider myself to be very spiritual, but I'm having a bit of trouble incorporating that with my pregnancy. I am trying to maintain a spiritual connection with my baby, and aside from the bi-weekly group rituals I attend that is the most spiritual time I get to myself. As you can tell from my lack of posts (hopefully to change once the baby is born and my routine gets going again), I haven't had a lot of time to work on my spiritual side. This is mainly due to the massive amount of changes our household has undergone in the last 7 months.

I'm very excited to become a mother and I've done a lot of thinking about my transition from the "maiden" state to the "mother" state. I'm hoping to have more time in the future to read up on the triple goddess aspect, specifically Robert Graves "The White Goddess" which is where the triple goddess mythology associated with the phases of the moon got started. So I guess, I have done some thinking, just not a lot of actual work.

I do say short prayers in my head when I get the chance, and I spend some time in bed meditating, mainly because I'm at that point where the baby is sucking up my energy so bed is my favorite place. All in all, I think I'm maintaining and learning a bit when and where I can. I just hope to have more time in the future to continue on more educational advancement and especially to post more on this blog.

Blessings
PrairiePagan

Saint Patrick's Day

Today is St. Patty's day, and due to the religious background of what is considered to be a secular holiday I thought I would share some information. I personally do not care much for this holiday both in it's secular and religious backgrounds, however I have gotten word from many different pagans who have a different take on the holiday and have found ways to fit it into their practice in a more acceptable way, while ignoring the traditional background. This can include anything from celebrating on strictly the secular way, celebrating as an ethnic celebration rather than a religious one, and also learning more about the culture and how it falls into their own practice. **(In these cases the pagans I have corresponded with are very aware of what the holiday is about and choose not to celebrate in the traditional (religious) ways, but rather have found a way of their own to enjoy the day without dragging on about negative stuff. This is a much better approach than playing ignorant and following blindly with the crowd)

I in no way consider myself a historian, so I'll leave that to the experts. Here is a link to articles related to St. Patrick from www.history.com.

There is a lot of great information found there, and I think it will give you enough of an overview to help you make your own decision on how you want to rate the importance of the traditional background of the holiday.

The next thing I'd like to point out is incorporating the culture into your own celebration. I caught up with one person who uses the image of the leprechaun in her practice. For more information on the background related to this please check out this site.

For those of you who celebrated today, in whatever form, I hope you had a blessed and fun day.

Ism's

One thing I’ve noticed when reading Pagan and/or other religious texts is that many authors will talk about “ism’s.” This can range from monotheism to polytheism and everything in between. For some reason I can never keep the more obscure “ism’s” straight, and I always have to run for a dictionary in hopes the word will be there; often it is not. So I thought I would put together a little something for quick reference if you ever run across an “ism” you are not familiar with. You might find more ism’s out there, but this should get you started with some of the main concepts I have run across in my research.

Deism is a philosophy that says the world was set into motion by a god, but that god does not interfere in the things that happen or in any natural laws. This is a philosophy similar to theism, but there are no known religions focusing on deism.

Theism is “1. Belief in a god or gods. 2. Belief in a personal God as creator and supreme ruler of the universe.” (Webster’s Dictionary) Pretty much this means that theisms are how we, society, deal with the concept of the divine.

Atheism is the belief that there are no gods.

Monotheism is a view that there is only one god. Some Pagan religions, including Wicca, have been viewed as monotheistic because of the view that all gods are one god. Most Wiccans do not follow this belief, but some do.

Polytheism is a view that there are more than one god.

Henotheism is a form of polytheism. This is a practice where many or all gods are accepted as individual existing entities, however one or a small number are honored or worshipped. Most Wiccans fall under this category.

Kathenotheism is a form of Henotheism. It means a worship of one god at a time. This is not monotheism, it pretty much means that the focus will be on one god then switch to another as needed.

Pantheism is a belief that God IS all things.

Panentheism is the belief that God IS IN all things.

Animism is a belief that everything has a soul or spirit.

Duotheism is the belief that there are 2 deities, usually of opposite gender and all other deities are only aspects of these two main figures.

Ditheism is similar to duotheism however this belief specifies the 2 equal energies (not necessarily deities) are either good or evil. Makes me think of the superhero and the bad guy.

Resources

All One Wicca: A Study in the Universal Eclectic Tradition of Wicca by Kaatryn MacMorgan.

CFFN (Coven of the Far Flung Net) First Circle Lessons. Designed by the elders and Triad of CUEW.

The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy “Monotheism” http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/monotheism/

The New International Webster’s Concise Dictionary of the English Language

Witchcraft: A Concise Guide by Isaac Bonewits

Salt Lamps

A while ago I was given a Himalayan Salt Lamp as a gift. For me this is the ideal gift, not only is it a gorgeous addition to a rock collector’s décor, but it also boasts to purify the air and help with many conditions, including allergies and migraines, and I am affected by both. The salt lamp is a big hunk of pink halite (a sodium based rock). It can be cut into various shapes; mine just takes on the natural “hunk of rock” look. There is a wooden base and the rock is slightly hollowed out to fit a small night light bulb. The claim is that the lamp is a natural air purifier regardless if it is turned on or not, however the benefits are supposed to be greater when heated. The pamphlet I got with the lamp explains how it works; I’m no chemistry genius so I’ll just quote a little,

“When Himalayan Natural Crystal Salt is heated by a light bulb or candle flame, the ionic bonding of the salt molecule is disintegrated, resulting in the creation of sodium and chlorine ions. Upon the break up of these two atoms, the chlorine takes with it, the electron from the outer shell of the sodium. The chlorine now has an extra electron making it negatively charged. It is these negative ions that take off in flight cleaning the air by removing harmful positively charged particles, such as pollen, dust mites, animal dander, smoke, odors, mold and bacteria.”

Now before you decide to go out and get one of these beauties right away, I suggest glancing over the Skeptical Alchemist’s blog regarding these lamps. http://skeptalchemist.blogspot.com/2007/04/may-ions-be-with-you.html. The author scientifically debunks why the lamps don’t work, as well as points out some reasoning flaws in some of the statements made by its champions. Additionally it is possible the workers who mine this product from the mountains may not be working in ideal or humane conditions.

All in all, while I don’t like the prospect of owning something that may have been inhumanely obtained at some point in it’s journey, it is still a beautiful piece. I may not be benefiting from any air purification but it still looks nice in my office.

Exercises

Hey, it's been awhile. Getting over the holidays while being pregnant took me just a bit longer than I thought, but here I am again. Anyway, I wanted to share a quick exercise with you that can be altered to fit your practice in pretty much anyway you want it to. I use this practice mainly to get in touch with my own personal correspondences, but you can use it to get more comfortable with whatever area you want. The main supplies I use are candles and a journal/notebook. I'll give you an example I've done before:

No matter where you look everyone seems to have their own list of color correspondences. I look at those and think they are fine for others, but what about me. I want something that is meaningful to me. So what I did was picked a color, found a candle in that color and maybe some other items in that color also and laid them out in front of me. Then I started writing. If I couldn't think of anything to write I'd stare at the color until something new came to me. Now, the writing isn't just any writing, it's writing about the color. That way I can look back and see what the color means to me. You can alter this anyway you need to to get it to work for you. Maybe you want to visualize the color (assuming you're using this practice for color correspondences), maybe you want to write a story about the color, the choice is your's. I just thought I'd share to give you a boost, and maybe an idea. Something to keep in mind is that this can take time. Don't plan on having all of the answers after your first sit down. Maybe you want to cycle through a group of similar things, then go back later and do it again and compare your notes to see if anything has changed or if you can decipher something new.

Above all, take it seriously. If you feel like an idiot doing this type of practice, maybe the exercise isn't for you, maybe the practice isn't for you, or quite possibly it could be your mind telling you you're not ready for it and to try back later if you really are serious about it.