Scripture reading and a problem.

I have a side project that I've been working on for a few months now as I have the energy for it. I've been copying over the sacred scriptures of Filianism/Déanism into a hardbound notebook as a devotional practice and meditation. I am only partly through the Gospel of Our Mother God and one thing keeps standing out to me as I consider it all very carefully. That it does not address whom has any mantle of authority upon them by way of Dea's grace.

There are some who follow that if their ordination comes by way of an unbroken faith tradition (i.e. Christian, Buddhist, or Hindi) that it had the authority that would come from Dea as in antiquity (so claimed by scholars who have since been shown to be questionable sources). There are some who argue that their authority is given to them by way of divine grace and should be accepted upon the basis of their word. And then there are the more mercenary of those who would be clergy that argue that priesthood is recognized by humanity through pieces of paper and acquire ordination from unconventional but publicly recognized sources to support the ordination given by way of divine grace at an earlier time.

It is a question that I sit and try to make sense of on a regular basis. I look at myself in the mirror and ask how I can expect anyone to think I have the authority to speak on any of this? At the same time, I can not help but ask questions. Questions of myself and my own work as clergy, questions of the role of any clergy in society, and what exactly that relationship is. This has lead me to reading philosophical texts, instructional books, and the writings of many different faith systems (holy texts and those written by lay people of deep insight). In all of my reading, I have a general idea of how the concept of clergy is supposed to work for the Christian faith, for example, and the social contract that goes along with it. I struggle to suss out what that social contract is for clergy of other faiths, simply because they are not the dominant faith practiced in my region so it is harder to get information.

Three questions keep coming back. The first I just mentioned: how can we tell whom is clergy and has the mantle of authority upon the by way of Dea's grace? The second question is what are the responsibilities and duties of said clergy? And the third question is what is the scope of their authority? Are all clergy equal or is their a hierarchy we are not aware of? In many ways, the answers to the second question are parallel to those for when this question is applied to Christianity. But the first and third questions are far more fuzzy. It frustrates me because if one is clergy or somehow a vowed person (monk, nun, godspouse, spirit-spouse, child, etc.), the questions about how we relate to the rest of humanity is just as important as those about how we relate to deity.

Is there an abbey structure in place, for example, for nuns of Loki? Do they have a rule to follow and a Mother Superior to answer to? (From the pagan nuns I have been in contact with, there is not a Mother Superior and they instead have a council of sorts where decisions are made upon debate, discussion, and collective discernment of the will of deity. And these nuns are godspouses as well. Because I don't wish to have their arrangement be the model of what I am proposing, I will not elaborate on it.) And there are the people who would be like pagan anchorites in the world, living a life of solitude and meditation and communion with their gods. Who helps them? Because the Christian anchorites were supported by the faith community and under the direction of spiritual advisers who were trained in their faith's precepts to high degree (theoretically) and the needs they could not meet on their own were provided for them. (In antiquity, there were anchorites who lived in a walled chamber of a monastery with a small window whereby they could communicate with others and receive the necessities for life (such as food and drink) but otherwise were completely isolated from the world.)

These are important questions to find answers to. If we can not find answers, we must make them or happenstance and folly will make them for us. As a student of history, happenstance and folly are not the gentlest of teachers and can lead to utter ruin, snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. So, I ask my friends who are clergy within the Filianic/Déanic community specifically, what are the answers to:

• What is the signs of spiritual authority? How do we recognize them?
• What are the responsibilities that come with spiritual authority? What are the duties required of clergy and they who are avowed to a devotional relationship with Dea?
• What are the things that are in this world they have authority over? What in the realm of spirit do they have authority over? Where are the limits of this authority?
• Are all clergy equal despite differing traditions/sects of worship? 

Pop Culture Paganism?

If you have been keeping abreast of the turbulence in the pagan blogosphere, you may have seen some turmoil over something called pop culture paganism. A fairly popular figure in the Lokean community is presently in the middle of a good deal of chaos over her involvement in pop culture paganism, actually. (It is a dramatic mess and it rather gives me a headache to watch the contortions people are putting themselves into over this matter. That is all I have to say on this specific case.) There is a significantly loud portion of the pagan community that is insisting that pop culture paganism is not a legitimate thing. It really is rather maddening to have that going on when the rest of us are trying to figure out what it exactly is.

Pop Culture paganism is, in a nutshell, belief systems that operate involving figures from pop culture. As such, one could argue that the church of the Jedi is technically a pop culture pagan church. (Some people, however, would contend that it is a philosophical movement and has more in common with belief systems like Buddhism. I leave that fight to the Jedi community to hash out.) There has been a slow rise over the last two years of people having publicly declared spiritual relationships with figures that are from different media franchises. It ranges from the Marvel version of Loki to the Joker from DC Comics and the Valar from the Middle Earth world of Tolkien or the deity figures of popular games such as Skyrim. Many people are quick to insist that these people are simply engaged in flights of fantasy and are possessed of exceptionally over active imaginations.

There is one problem with this assumption, the people in the pop culture paganism group are clearly interacting with something. Their relationships have a great deal in common with those of the mainstream pagan community. There is some sort of spiritual exchange between the practitioners and the ones they revere. And the ones they revere appear to have some type of effect upon the world that is similar to that which would be seen by 'true' spiritual beings. Something is clearly going on here.

Some people declare that the pop culture pagans are going to make the rest of us pagans look crazy. Honestly, I can appreciate that concern. No one is exactly comfortable with the idea of having the world at large looking at you and telling you that you are insane. There's just way too much negative garbage attached to that judgment. At the same time, we can not push this aside. We can choose to ignore it, but it isn't going to go away. At one point, the general overculture that we are in tried to ignore paganism into non-existence. You can see how successful they were with that.

Yes, pop culture paganism looks strange to the folks who do not practice it. Honestly, all forms of religious belief are going to look strange to the people who don't practice said belief system. It doesn't mean that the system doesn't work. It may not work for you but it is serving a real set of needs and helping the practitioners accomplish their goals in a fashion that holds true to their spiritual understanding of the world. We should not be worrying about respectability politics. All of this talk about how pop culture paganism makes the rest of us look is respectability politics.

It may be trite, but there is a maxim that I have seen thrown around that I think would be really useful here.

The lion does not concern himself over the opinions of sheep.

There have been so many variations on this expression, I'm not sure if I am using the iteration that G.R.R. Martin used in his books or not. (It would be poetically ironic if it was, though.) Worry about how other people would look at us is only going to hinder us in our efforts to build our own spiritual lives and the cultus of worship of the deities (and beings) we follow. The experiences of the people who practice pop culture paganism has very little real effect on our own worship. Let us focus on what we are doing and leave them in peace to do what they are doing.

Only worry about the matter when there is actual conflict. I suspect, however, the incidents of conflict between the pop culture pagans and everyone else in the community are not going to come from differing views on the meanings of the beings they are involved with. I suspect that the conflicts will arise as they have been thus far, with people attempting to dictate another person's spiritual path. If you want to point at things as problems, I humbly suggest that this issue should be the one upheld, not if some one is worshiping a god from a novel.

Now, several people have been asking how pop culture paganism works. There are several different theories out there on what is going on. My best guess is that the concept of the character became 'animated' after a significant amount of mental, emotional, and spiritual energy was fed into it. Some would say that means the character becomes an egregore. Other people may say it is something different. I don't know what the correct term would be. I don't know if this mental and emotional energy is something that must come from the practitioner themselves or is something that can arise after a collection of people have built up that thought form.

It is also possible that there is something entirely different going on. It may be they are in communication with a deep part of their spirit and this is all a case of the anima and the animus of a given person interacting. It may be a case of a spiritual entity wearing the pop culture figure as a mask of sorts to communicate with the practitioner. It is also possible that the figure existed before they were written down and 'created'. There are so many possible explanations for what is happening it is nigh on infinite.

And, to be honest, it really is not of our concern as long as no one is getting harmed or harming anyone else. The Nine Worlds are too large, too strange, and too inexplicably complex for us to sit down and say we know all of the facts about something. So, yes, pop culture paganism is a thing. And I think it is going to stick around. I'm of the opinion it is an ideological child of mainstream paganism. I don't think this is a bad thing. Diversity gives us strength and adaptability.

Call for Questions!

There is no questions in my inbox to answer right now. I invite you all to send me some. You can leave them here in the comments on this post or you can email them to me. I look forward to hearing from you.

Question Time: Snood pattern.

I have been asked several times for the pattern to my snoods. There is one that I used which comes from a video on Youtube. This has a mesh to it. My solid snood pattern is essentially a large circle with a few inches of depth made before crocheting on an elastic hairband. For my blue silk snood, I used one ball of Patons Silk-Bamboo yarn. This is really soft and feels nice against my scalp. You can use acrylic but it will be a bit scratchy against the skin unless you have killed the yarn before hand. I used a size H hook.

Starting round: Chain 5, slip stitch final chain to first chain stitch. Ring made.
Round 1: Half double crochet twelve stitches into ring. Slip stitch stitch twelve to stitch one.
Round 2: Half double crochet twice into each stitch. Slip stitch 24 into stitch one.
Round 3: Half double crochet twice into first stitch of each pair of the increases. Stitch one double crochet before doing next increase. Slip stitch stitch 30 to stitch one.
Round 4 - 12: Half double crochet twice into first stitch of each increase. Stitch one double crochet into each stitch until next increase is reached. Slip stitch final stitch to first stitch of the round.
Round 13 - 16: Half double crochet once into each stitch. Slip stitch final stitch to first stitch of the round.
Round 17: Single crochet each stitch over a narrow elastic headband (hold the headband against previous round of stitches. complete single crochet as per usual, which will cover the headband with each stitch). Slip stitch final stitch to first stitch. Bind off and break yarn. Weave end in to single crochet stitches.

Reminder - the first half double crochet in the round will be a chain of two stitches.