Honestly…I didn’t really set out to find a pantheon.
Ok, well, I did. But those searches became dead ends. At first I thought I might go Hellenic, but then I didn’t, and gave up on that path — until the Hellenic gods came into my life and were like HELLO, CAN WE BE PART OF YOUR RELIGIOUS LIFE? And I was like, sure, I guess? I thought you guys didn’t want me…. WE WANTED YOU. YOU WERE NOT READY.
Ok, well. I guess that makes sense.
Before Them, Thoth was in my life for a bit and I kinda thought I might go Kemetic. But I didn’t seek out Kemetic gods until after Thoth had left and the Morrigan and Brighid and Manannan had appeared, at which point I reached out to Nut and got a very firm SORRY KID, YOU’RE NOT OURS.
It took me a while to realize that pantheon didn’t have to refer the worship of one culture’s entire gamut of gods. It could be a personal designation. At that point, I realized that the Three — tM, Brighid, Manannan — were my main pantheon.
When I refer to the Hellenic pantheon as being among the pantheons I honor, I’m not talking about the entire gamut of Hellenic gods. I’m talking about the ones that I specifically honor, who get a shared shrine (mostly due to space, and Hestia actually gets Her own spot in the kitchen, because then I will actually remember to give Her daily offerings). There are gods who are, yes, Hellenic, but They are not part of my personal Hellenic pantheon and some never will be.
So you could put it this way: I worship gods in the Hellenic pantheon, but when I refer to “my worship of the Hellenic pantheon” I’m only talking about the gods within the broader pantheon that I actually worship.
Which made a lot more sense in my head.
Anyway. Soon I realized that two pantheons wasn’t enough; I needed to include the D’Angeline pantheon as well — and even that is a misnomer, as some of the gods from the Kushielverse that I’ll be exploring in my own brand of fictional recon are not actually D’Angeline. For example, Asherat-of-the-Sea is not from Terre D’Ange, yet She is a goddess within the fictional universe created in the book series, and so could become part of my D’Angeline Recon work.
And then a little bit later, I discovered that yes, I’m joining the Otherfaith. I am an Other person now. And that means exploring the Otherfaith pantheon more fully — which includes not only gods, but spirits as well. I still have a lot more reading to do on them all and it will take me a while.
In the end, I guess you could say my overall personal pantheon includes these 4 groups — but I’d rather look at it as having 4 different pantheons that I interact with/worship/read learn or write about. Saying I have one big personal pantheon that includes deities from 4 different ones makes it seem like they have relationships with each other — which is clearly not always the case. (Yes, there seems to be some overlap and at least friendships among them — see Aphrodite-Naamah or the strong sense I get from Manannan that He and Hades are spiritual brothers — but mostly, They have their own separate groups and I feel I really shouldn’t mash them all up into one.)
But yeah, finding a pantheon? I don’t know. They kinda just fell into my lap, one after another, and then I was like “Ok I guess I have 4 pantheons now. shrug”
~Morag