Posted on by John Halstead
It’s really not a complicated ritual. There’s a a simple but powerful gesture–passing the flame–and a recitation of poem that resonates deeply with me and gestures to something bigger than I can easily explain. And there’s a little deliberate structuring to give it shape. And that’s it.
Read MoreCategory: John Halstead, Latest Posts, The Naturalistic Pagan Toolbox, uncategorized Tags: candles, Christmas, Natural Pagans, poetry, ritual, solstice
Posted on by John Halstead
Ritual is the product of a conscious form applied to unconscious content. The most evocative rituals I have created came from somewhere other than my rational mind. They combined intuitive bodily movements with what W.H. Auden called “privately numinous words”, words that I had read or heard which had a talismanic-like effect on me.
Read MoreCategory: John Halstead, Latest Posts, The Naturalistic Pagan Toolbox, uncategorized Tags: body, gestures, light, listening, movement, Natural Pagans, nature, poetry, ritual, solstice, unconscious
Posted on by John Halstead
Ritual is the product of a conscious form applied to unconscious content. The most evocative rituals I have created came from somewhere other than my rational mind. They combined intuitive bodily movements with what W.H. Auden called “privately numinous words”, words that I had read or heard which had a talismanic-like effect on me.
Read MoreCategory: John Halstead, Latest Posts, The Naturalistic Pagan Toolbox, uncategorized Tags: body, gestures, light, listening, movement, Natural Pagans, nature, poetry, ritual, solstice, unconscious
Posted on by John Halstead
What naturalistic (small-p) pagan books have been an inspiration to you?
Read MorePosted on by NaturalisticPaganism
Even under the influence of the narcotic draught, of which songs of all primitive men and peoples speak, or with the potent coming of spring that penetrates all nature with joy, these Dionysian emotions awake, and as they grow in…
Read MoreCategory: emotion, humanism, John Halstead, Paganism, ritual Tags: adoration, devotionalism, Dionysian, group ritual, letting go, life, metaphor, nature, poetry, rationality, revelry, ritual, veneration, worship
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