Naturalistic Paganism

Category: Columns


Musings of a Pagan Mythicist, by Maggie Jay Lee: “Circle Around: Individuality, Community and Creating Religion”

To me, collective religious ceremony and shared devotional practice is not something peripheral, but is the very center of religion. It is the core that holds everything together. I believe without such shared practices, religious community will fall apart, but there are still enormous challenges to developing religion centered on communal ceremony.

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“A Naturalistic Credo” by Jon Cleland Host

Evolution gives my life incredible meaning and purpose. I marvel at my family tree, which goes back though innumerable life forms, through amazing stories of survival, hope, courage, and parental love. It includes the tiny mammal, surviving through the freezing, yearlong darkness after the asteroid impact by eating, and likely hiding in, a frozen dinosaur carcass. It includes the first mother to produce milk, and the first blurry view through a newly evolved eye. I’ve grown from a long line of survivors — noble creatures of every sort, who conquered deadly challenges billions of times over. What other origin could possibly give my life more meaning?

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Postpagan Ceremony & Ecology, by Glen Gordon: “Why I Am Not Pagan”

When John asked me to revise my old blog post from PostPagan about why I do not identify as being Neopagan, I was intimidated by the idea. Fifteen years ago, I identified as a Neopagan and began to share a…

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DE NATURA DEORUM: “The Lord and Lady for the Non-Theist” by Rhys Chisnall

Today we continue our late-winter theme of “Order and Structure” with Rhys Chisnall’s exploration of the role of theistic language in non-theistic Paganism.  This post is also the first article of our new column, De Natura Deorum, where we explore the beliefs of…

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A Pedagogy of Gaia: by Bart Everson: “Always Beginning Again”

We can forget the most important experiences of all. We can and do lose touch with the most profound truths of existence. I want a reminder. I want to be nudged, shoved if need be, back to the truth. This is the trick of living, or one of the tricks anyhow. It’s easy to pay lip service to love and wonder, but I want to know it, to live it, to feel it in my bones.

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