Joy & Grief: figuring out my Samhain Advent

I completely dropped the ball on doing fire festival advents this year. In the wave of grief following the death of my friend and the death of my mentor, it seems very important to me that I actually follow through with Samhain advent. Despite living in a house that is spiritually blocking me, in which …

Lantern of the Ancestors

Sermon in church yesterday was exactly what I needed. I was late, somehow, even though I made the decision to stay up later and make the 8:30 am service instead of snatching 3 hours sleep before the 10:30 am; distraction set in, and then I’m running out the door at 8:25, which is fine as …

The Samhain that Wasn’t

Following up on a successful, if belated, Loafmass, this year I wanted to have a good Samhain celebration. I tried to get to it by October 31st, but that didn’t happen — work ate my face last month and I was supremely busy. That’s okay, I thought. Samhain season lasts until Remembrance Day for me …

Church, and other notes

It’s been a while since I posted. I kept meaning to write another post for October, but then it kept not happening. So here are some brief updates on various things. Church. I am going to church now. Specifically the Anglican church about 5 minutes from my home. Why? Well, I’d heard nice things about …

The Sacred Triad and the Wheel of the Year

Note: this post is written from the perspective of someone living in the Northern Hemisphere on the West Coast of North America. Also it is full of my headcanon about the gods. You shouldn’t take anything here as necessarily backed up by the lore or even other polytheists.  Since deciding on the four fire festivals …

30 Days of Paganism: Holidays

This post is written from the perspective of someone who has lived in the Northern Hemisphere their entire life, and as such refers to the holidays accordingly.  Building my religious calendar is an ongoing, neverending process. When I started out in NeoPaganism it was the 8 sabbats of the Wheel of the Year and all …

30 Days of Paganism: Beliefs – Magic, spellcraft, mysticism etc

Ok, it feels a bit weird for me to be tackling this right now. I haven’t done much magic lately, but I always seem to be steeped in mysticism so maybe it’ll work out. So. Magic and spellcraft. To me the practice of magic is entirely mundane. I mean, I’m doing the same stuff I …

Reading Project: The Spiral Dance and Evolutionary Witchcraft

This is probably a sacrilege for a Reclaiming witch to say, but I’ve never read The Spiral Dance from cover to cover. I think I’ve got about 3 chapters in every time I’ve sat down to read it again, then put it down for far too long so that by the time I pick it …

Beltaine and Pop Culture in Ritual (also: updates various and sundry)

Happy Beltaine! (Or Samhain, if you’re in the Southern Hemisphere.) A while ago I did a Lughnasadh ritual for a bunch of pagans (it’ll be 3 years ago this Lughnasadh, actually) at a campout. I was asked to high priestess it all by my lonesome, which made me look askance at the organizer because he …

Samhain, part 2: Embracing God the Father

Remember when I said Manannan wasn’t a thwap? I’m thinking perhaps I was wrong. He’s been very clear, the past month, what He wants from me this Samhain. He wants me to to do a ritual in which I accept His foster-fatherhood over me, and renounce my biological sire for good. Mind, I did do …