Naturalistic Paganism
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No Nonsense Paganism: The baby and the bathwater
One of my perennial concerns is why liberal and naturalistic religion often seems to lack transformative power. I think at least part of the reason for this is because of its ambivalent attitude toward ritual.
Read MoreNo-Nonsense Ritual: What ritual really does
We don’t use ritual to turn the Wheel of the Year outside of us. But we can use ritual to turn the Wheel inside of us. As the seasons change, we do ritual to acknowledge the change and to prepare ourselves emotionally and mentally for the change.
Read MoreNo-Nonsense Paganism: Daily Spiritual Practice (part 2)
For me, the goal of daily spiritual practice is the “re-enchantment” of my everyday life, restoring a sense of sacredness to our experience, which has been stripped away by reductionist positivism, consumer capitalism, and transcendental religion.
Read MoreNo-Nonsense Paganism: My Winter Ritual
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 MoreNo-Nonsense Paganism: Creating a Ritual (part 2)
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.
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Pagan Coming Out Day – May 2nd
Naturalistic Paganism 