Official Pagan Thread!

[farmerlor]

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I have a Book of Shadows that I put "finished" spells, dreams, recipes, thoughts, etc.... I also have a binder that I put all of my studies in and spells that I'm working on. The binder is HUGE and I need to get another one and transfer some of my info from it into my BOS.

 

[Katy]

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I feel very much the same way. I've always been drawn to what I think of as more nature based "religions".

I work at a retirement community that is run by the American Baptist Association, we are a community that embrasses all faiths, and or lack of. . . and we have a wonderful minister who is appalled that (so called) Christians can be as intolerant as they sometimes are. Being a non-christian myself, it is comforting to know that people like that exist in the world.

I was raised Christian and I think now I consider myself a christian/with pagan tendencies.

 

[debilorrah]

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Amen to that one.

 

[Kanchii]

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Your book of shadows is a book that you keep privately to yourself, practically a diary where you keep records of your thoughts, dreams, spells you're working on, and you keep logs of your rituals (moon phase, what the ritual was for, your thoughts during it, etc). Your Grimore is more a recipe book you can share wth others of spells.

 

[saddina]

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We, here at least, each keep a book, my apprentice brings hers with her when she studies with me, and inside is kept off of the things someone would write in a notebook instead of saving a computer file like we do now. Some of what's in hers (and mine):

That recipie for the wassil punch for yule
The egg dish for ostera
The words for songs and chants
pratical notes on things like how much firewood, and how many cups to have handy for people who come to circle without them.
Notes on herbs, and how to grow them
A somewhat cheeky prayer to the Swiss miss, maiden of chocolate (we do believe that the goddess in her many forms, has a sense of humor)

As I teach her things, she writes, if she needs exact wording, I photocopy off a page (say for the song to bring forth the sun at Yule). The idea is for it to be a collecting and a useful book of what you have learned.

 

[LizFM]

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That can kind of depend on the people

some of it might be "company manners" (not wanting to disagree in public).

A LOT of it is from hard-won experience...learned that that type of fighting accomplishes nothing. Some of it comes from having learned that there's just no point in trying to reason with some people

Trust me, we do not always all get along.

There are ideological disputes in Paganism too. But since we don't have any one single text (like the Bible) that we all agree on as being generally correct, we tend to be too diverse to fight a Whole Lot. (You always react the worst to someone who is "almost like you, but not exactly" rather than someone who is totally different)

Some of the disagreements can be attributed to 'leftover attitudes' - coming from one of those branches of Christianity (or another religion) that feels it's important for there to be "only 1 right, true answer" and needing to Have all those answers (those arguments over every verse you mentioned). Some people take a while to come to the realization that there is no need to have 'the 1 true right correct answer', or even that one exists! Some people never learn

There are hard-line doctrinal 'my way is the right way' folks in paganism. I tend to just let them go their way while I go mine. One of the biggest challenges of being Pagan (and why there are so many solitaries) is that it can feel like it's downright difficult to find other grown-up, responsible, normal people to join with. The flakes and weirdos and marginal people are by far the easiest to find - you know, the ones who think you have to have a high "bizarre factor" to be Pagan, or it "doesn't count"

 

[cybercat]

I know someone asked about recipes for our holidays. I would like to recomend a pagan cookbook called Goddess in the Kitchen 201 Heavenly recipes by Margie Lapanja. It is not holiday specific but it does contain them.

 

[cybercat]

Kuan Yin poem #88

The Face of Power

Carve a wooden tiger to guard your door:
It's teeth are bared, but actually it hsrms no one-
It seems to do thr trick, but doesn't stop anyone else-
So you can relax and be youself while you're out being human.

 

[deb1]

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Thank you!

For anyone in NC, here is a list of some pagan groups


http://cncpaganpride.org/2009/index.php?page=local-groups

The Church Of The Earth has a couple of funny articles on their site. They don't seem to take themselves to seriously and I like the tongue in cheek quality of a couple of their articles.

Apparently, NC had a Pagan Pride Day Celebration. I didn't know that.

 

[feathersnuggles]

Church of the Earth, what a great name! I don't attend any "church", in the usual sense of the word. But, on this very wet grey northwest day, I definitely take off my shoes to walk barefoot on the Holy ground of mother Earth...my church. Fellow parishoners are a couple dozen robins, who pull fat worms out of rain-soaked soil. "Drip, drip, drip" goes the choir.