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Go ahead and belove

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jlhopgood - His Hand

“Excuse me,” the voice said from off to my side. “Can you help me?”

She was an old woman, perhaps in her 80’s. Her bones looked small and fragile. She wore a dirty coat. For some reason the coat really bothered me. This woman shouldn’t have been out there in the cold. She should have been in a home; in a warm, clean place. She should have been cared for. But instead she was on the sidewalk beneath the Sur la Table, calling me to her.

“Yes. How can I help you?”

Perhaps she wanted money. I would have given it to her, no questions asked.

“Could you help me stand up? I need to get turned around so that I can walk up to Whole Foods.”

She was sitting, hunched over the walker about half a block from the grocery store. I placed my hands under her shoulders as gently as I could and lifted her up. She moved as though my speed might break her, so I let her set the pace. Once she was standing and redirected she thanked me, and headed on her way. It was a simple goodbye. All she wanted was that small bit of help and nothing more.

I turned to see my husband with tears in his eyes. That’s his natural response to seeing people in pain, or dogs without homes, or whenever he thinks about kids so poor that they might not ever get a gift from their parents.

I pulled him close to me.

After a few minutes we made our way back toward our original destination, Powell’s Books. We were just a few feet into the store, climbing down the stairs towards the bookshelves when it happened. Into my head came the thought,

“I’m just going to go ahead and believe in God.”

My first response was to think,

“What? What does that even mean?”

The thought felt like it was mine but also not mine, as though there was something outside of me motivating it. It’s like the thought happened to me. It didn’t feel like some kind of clouds-parting conversion experience. It was just a calm, still voice making the declaration that I was going to believe in God.

In the Patheos article, What Is A Christian, Marcus Borg unpacks the etymology of “believe” in a way that sheds light on what this unexpected thought may mean in my life.

He writes:

… The language of “believing” has been part of Christianity from the first century onward. But it didn’t refer primarily to believing the right theological beliefs. It meant something like the English word “beloving.” To believe in God and Jesus was to belove God and Jesus. Namely, it meant to commit one’s self to a relationship of attentiveness and faithfulness. Commitment and fidelity are the ancient meanings of faith and believing.

Even the two most frequently heard Christian creeds, the Apostles’ Creed and the Nicene Creed, reflect this understanding. They both begin with the Latin word credo, most commonly translated into English as “I believe.” But the Latin roots of credo mean “I give my heart to.”

(emphasis mine)

Looking at it now I think that this is what happened in the moment those words came into my mind: I gave my heart to God. It was hardly an altar call experience. In fact, it didn’t feel like something I was making a choice about at all. It was just the natural response to this encounter on the street.

My heart has not been the same since that woman reached out to me. Something inside me feels differently, as though my capacity to feel was just increased exponentially. The thought of people in pain, people without food, people without the feeling of love in their lives — these things have been affecting me in a way that they never have before — even during my pre-Paganism Christianity.

God likely doesn’t need my help, but this woman did. And others like her do. The lesson I take from this experience (perhaps the first lesson of many) is that through serving others I experience the love of God. Through giving freely of myself I come to better understand Christ. When I serve, I experience the Divine within myself and in others.

This woman called me back to beloving God by allowing me to serve her. It’s a calling I cannot deny or easily dismiss.

 

Photo by Jlhopgood

Overwhelmed with Thoughts of Jesus

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I’m overwhelmed with thoughts of Jesus.

Jesus and God and Christianity and the Lord’s Prayer and compassion and forgiveness and hope and judgement and freedom from judgement and all of the things which made (and make) me feel connected to the Sacred.

I don’t know what to do with all of this.

andormix _ Jesus

It started when I saw a woman sitting on the sidewalk next to her shopping cart. She was filthy and small, and she looked deeply tired. Bringing her food I asked,

“How are you?”

She looked up at me, a bit surprised at having been spoken to or asked after. She thought for a moment.

“I’m recovering,” she said somberly.

My heart broke a little. It wasn’t the response I expected. It was so vulnerable, and honest. Her statement felt unfathomably large, as though she was recovering from all of the things that had ever been done to her.

She seemed grateful for the attention, and for the food.

“God bless you,” she said, sincerely.

My heart broke some more.

I headed off, feeling heavier in my boots.

Further down the path, I heard the call of a crow. I looked up and saw it sitting on top of a telephone pole. I thought of the Morrigan.

“Remember me.“

I felt a bit jarred. The crow seemed to take notice, and then began to fly.

I walked in the direction of the crow, uncertain. Walking in the other direction on the opposite side of the street was a man holding a book under his arm. There was a yarmulka on his head. He looked at me, probing. Are you a part of my tribe? I looked similar to many of the Orthodox men walking through the neighborhood, but not an exact match. Close, but not close enough.

The words sink a little deeper.

Am I a part of his tribe?

There is this dialogue running in me that keeps returning to the religion of my youth and young adulthood; to the man who was the subject of so many of my conversations. There is also my Paganism, built and cultivated over the past four or five years. It is young and lacking the same kind of deep root system I developed in my Christianity, but it is still a part of me now.

My Druidic studies are calling me to look at the world as an enchanted, alive, vibrant and magical place. There’s a shortage of that perspective these days. Meditating on these ideas brings me peace. But then I see someone who is broken, or damaged, or simply doing their best to not fall apart, and I think back to the lessons of compassion and kindness I learned in the Church. I feel compelled to love other people without reservation. I feel compelled to offer them respite. I feel compelled to feed them, to care for them, to treat them with dignity and respect.

These are the desires that rise up out of my memories of the Lord’s Prayer, or the stories of Jesus. These are the principles that I valued about my Christianity.

And I don’t know what to do with all of this reflection, or how to talk about it. I don’t think I’m becoming a hard-core or born again Christian, or even a Christo-Pagan. But there is a softening inside of me that feels directly connected to Jesus and to the language of mystical and contemplative Christianity.

Just the other day, after a similar encounter with an old woman on the street in Portland, I had the thought —

“I’m going to go ahead and believe in God.”

The thought came into my head before I could censor it.

A few days later I polished a Celtic cross that I’d picked up a few years back. It’s a replica of one I saw on pilgrimage in Ireland, the place where I first found Brighid. I hung the cross around my neck beside my Awen and acorn pendants. It’s still hanging there at this moment.

So there’s this softening to Jesus, and a confusion about what that means, and — in no small way — a concern about how this occurrence will be perceived by others.

Will Pagans see this as proof that I was never really one of them? Will Christians see this as proof that God is calling me back to the Church?

 

Photo by  Isaac Torrontera

The Continued Relevance of Compassion

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This has been quite a week.

I made the choice to leave ADF. I handed over the Fellowship to an amazing person, Kristin McFarland. I left home for Los Angeles to meet Cher and write songs with a bunch of starry-eyed kids.

It’s been surreal.

Then, at the end of the week, after rushing to put together the most meaningful Solstice piece I could for HuffPost Religion, I got hit with a damning comment and it all fell to pieces. One little comment was all it took to make me feel small, and profoundly vulnerable.

I’d just written these words:

“I hold up to the sun the challenges I face in my own life; my uncertainty, my doubt, my fear, my insecurity, my righteousness, my judgment, and my shame. All those parts of me which have remained unexamined, undesired or unwanted, I hold them up to the sun.”

Then, almost immediately after the post went life, these words appeared:

 HuffPost Comment

I read this comment and I nearly forgot about the sun altogether, and the Solstice, and my sense of centeredness. All of those challenges I wrote about were staring me straight in the face, and I had a choice to make.

Was I going to offer this up to the sun, to the gods of my heart, or to that magnanimous mystery that a friend of mine calls the Is-ness? Was I going to allow this be transformed?

Nope.

I didn’t do that.

I turned to Facebook.

I asked my friends to flag this comment as abusive in order that it be taken down by the HuffPost comment police. They complied, and the comment was removed.

But I think I might have missed an opportunity here.

This voice, spouting this ALL CAPS ANGER in my direction, could have served as a teacher for me, if I’d have given her the chance. Not a teacher of theology, or of religion, or of the “real”, “right” way of doing things; no, a teacher in how to practice compassion toward even the most mean-spirited person.

I had a chance to practice what it feels like to stand in my center, to remember who I am, and to respond with kindness.

But I didn’t do that.

Broken Glass

I’m not mad at myself for tattling on this commenter. Being mad wouldn’t serve much good. I just recognize that I have some more work to do. It’s easy to practice your kindness-speak on an audience of comrades. People thrust forward their Likes and RT’s, and you get to feeling pretty good about yourself.

The real test on whether your message is legit comes when you’re forced to stand before someone who doesn’t give a damn about you.

What then? Who will you be in that moment?

I keep coming back to this sense that forgiveness is important. Crucial. I hear this voice in my head that says,

“Forgive yourself. Just forgive yourself.”

Funny that it isn’t saying to forgive the other person, isn’t it?

Forgiving myself allowed me to forgive her. Once forgiveness starts, it spreads. Now I’m no longer angry at bazooms22. I don’t feel affected anymore.

I remember where my center is.

Then, unexpectedly, a feeling of gratitude starts bubbling up.

I’m kind of glad this person was an asshole. I’m grateful that I had the opportunity to respond like a child, because it reminded me of the ways in which I am still very much a child. The fear, insecurity, and shame that exists in me is the same that exists in her, too. She held up a mirror and said, this is what fear looks like.

I felt the fear, then I let it move me to action, initiating a series of events which led me back around to around center.

It was a gift, really.

Sometimes we get lifted up and celebrated, and I don’t think those are the times when we are offered the greatest lessons. It’s when we’re humbled by the world that we are reminded of the things that really matter:

Our own capacity to forgive.

The meaning of fortitude of spirit.

The continued relevance of compassion.

 

How Do We Begin?

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Photo by YAT OP

Photo by YAT OP

Sometimes I find myself out of balance.

Today, for example, I came into my room — the place where I light my incense, still my mind, perform acts of reverence and celebration — and I found myself uncertain about how to begin.

My mind was a repository for too many things. There was clutter everywhere.

Thoughts about music…

Thoughts about leadership…

Thoughts about love and relationship…

Thoughts about the responsibilities I’ve taken on…

These things clouded my mind, and made it very difficult to listen.

Listening, I’ve come to learn, has to happen first before any meaningful creation can occur. (This is why I prefer a silent space in which to write.)

I find that I don’t often know what to do when I’m in these moments of crowded-headedness. My first impulse is to try to organize the mess. (Not eliminate it, mind you, but organize it.) This rarely leads to resolution; instead, I feel little more than a mild sense of productiveness. I feel like:

Well, at least I’m doing something.

Other times I open up a browser window and find something to read. I scan Facebook, or I look at the comments on a post or a status update. I engage with others and allow the dozens of freeze-frame conversations to be my focus. I chat about someone else’s writing, someone else’s ideas, something mildly stimulating or (at times) completely engaging. Doing this feels like:

Well, at least I have something to say.

There are other ways I distract and occupy myself, but none of them seem to address what’s really going on.

And just what is really going on?

I think — and it’s a hunch more than anything — that in these foggy-brain moments I have forgotten, however briefly, what it is that brings me into alignment with my deepest, greatest sense of happiness and purpose.

(a.k.a. My True Will.)

I don’t know how to take that first step into the labyrinth because I have forgotten why taking that step is meaningful.

This morning I wrote the following update on Facebook; writing it was an attempt to kick-start my creativity after the first draft of this post petered into self-pity:

Each day we begin again. Each day we must make decisions about how to live, how to connect, how to release, how to create. Living is an art, even if at times it feels like little more than a struggle.

Being present with our own creative nature — the place where our humanity comes to look very much like something divine — helps us to be artful in our living.

How do you begin each day?

I wrote these words and realized that by reaching out to others, I care for myself. There is a connection between outreach and inreach (that should be a word), between service to others and service to myself, between the compassion I show for my community and the compassion I offer to myself.

These things are connected.

My mother used to tell me that when I felt sorry for myself I should do something for someone else. For the longest time I thought that her advice would have the negative side affect of fostering denial about what was really troubling me, but I think I was wrong. Turning my focus to the well being of others reminds me of what “well being” feels like. That act of turning outward has a profound and amazing affect on my own inner reality.

This isn’t to say that I shouldn’t sort some things out in my own head, away from the view of others. I certainly have my own work to do. But it’s a reminder that in moments of frustration or confusion, or when there is a lack of space in one’s mind, there is a great benefit in becoming a servant to others.

Turning outward in service is — I promise you — a service to yourself.

Each day we begin again. I begin with a mind and heart of service, and by showing love and compassion for others I receive the benefits of love and compassion in my own heart. I encourage creativity, and in the process I experience creativity. I remind others of the artful nature of living, and I am graced with a glimpse of the art in my own life.

This is how I began today.

How will you begin?

Privilege: The Other “P” Word

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Photo by Donna Higgins

Privilege, Photo by Donna Higgins

Yesterday I said, “Be nice.”  Perhaps encouraging nicety is not the right approach.

Perhaps to say “be nice” is too simplistic, and worse, reads very much like, “Hush now, your problems are not important,” or, “You are making me uncomfortable with your anger,” or “There really isn’t that much to be angry about, so can’t you just be a little more polite?”

“Nice” comes with baggage.

Kindness and compassion may be more appropriate, but there is still a problem. Encouraging anyone, especially people whose lives I don’t really understand, to be anything other than what they’re already being, even if what I’m encouraging is a little more kindness and compassion, places me in a strange position of authority. (To be clear, it isn’t that I feel I am in authority in any way, it’s just that making those statements reads very much like an authority figure trying to control the emotional reactions of a group.)

No, I don’t see myself as an authority figure at all.

I write this blog, and have for over two years. I post my thoughts and opinions, and I’ve fostered a vibrant readership. But, I’m not an authority on much of anything. I ask a lot of questions. I get stuff wrong. I’m completely fallible, and I’m not ashamed to say it.

But yesterday, as I wrote about this idea that being nice would help us in our online communications, I also stepped into a conversation that I felt unprepared for. That conversation is one about privilege, particularly my privilege.

Privilege: The Other “P” Word

I say that I was unprepared, because I didn’t see encouraging kindness (or niceness, which I was conflating a bit with kindness) as an exercise of privilege. I wasn’t seeking to strengthen the Pagan side of the Pagan/polytheist divide by weakening or stifling the polytheist’s voice through the imposition of niceness. But, it was kind of read that way.

I learned that my privilege (or at least, my assumed privilege — some of the accusations made about my privilege were inaccurate) was sprinkled all over my post, and it seems it has been present throughout many posts on my blog. My first reaction to this information was a kind of shutting down. Being called on privilege, whether that call is warranted or not, feels a little like a silencing. In effect,

You’re speaking from a place of privilege. You don’t really know what you’re talking about. You’re off base, out of line, misinformed.

BOOM -> Silence.

No one said these things to me directly, but they could have. I’ve been silenced before, and being called on my privilege had a similar feeling.

And, to be honest, I’m not sure I can argue about having privilege. I can clarify about the assumptions that are made about me (that I’m not 100% white, that my marriage is gay, that I’m not currently “financially secure”), but I can’t dismiss the fact that, upon closer inspection, I do have privilege.

My own paganism, after all, is Eurocentric. It’s what I’ve gravitated towards, and what (at this time) feels natural to me. But how does that Eurocentrism place me in a position of privilege, especially within a community which, itself, is not privileged?

I could evaluate my life, look at it from a distance, and see where the privilege lies. I probably should. We all probably should. We all have unexamined privilege, I imagine.

But me looking at my own privilege seems different somehow than a person who doesn’t know all of my life pointing out my perceived privilege. Is the act of calling a person on their privilege itself an act of privilege, I wonder?

I’m writing this, as always, from a position of non-expert. I don’t know the answer these questions, nor do I understand clearly how privilege plays into every aspect of my religious life or my social and cultural interactions. With that said, I’m open to learning. It’s no one’s responsibility to teach me (even if they feel compelled to do so), but I think it’s my responsibility to learn.

My hope would be that in this process of coming to better understand of what privilege is and how privilege may be informing my thoughts, opinions, and perspectives, that there is also something to be learned about what to do when you recognize privilege in yourself or in others.

If we are all privileged in some way or other (and, if you’re reading this post on a computer screen — one that you own — you are probably more privileged than some), than what do we do with that information?

What do we do when we recognize a certain privilege in ourselves or others? How do we avoid silencing one another, or feeling silenced ourselves?

How Do We Respond to Conflict in Pagan Communities?

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Paganism, on the surface, seems like a retreat from the challenges posed by organized religion. Our great, mostly-pentacle-shaped umbrella, under which all shades, shapes and sizes of earth loving, god or goddess invoking creatures rest, looks to the untrained eye like a respite from bureaucracy, miscommunication, and any of the other ills of “The Church.”

It just isn’t so.

When people gather, organize and commit to being in relationship with one another, conflicts arise. This is an inevitability. The question is: how do we respond when those conflicts occur?

Conflict, by atomicity

When I was a child, I attended an Episcopal church in Englewood, Colorado called St. George’s. The church was small, but it was a home to me and my mother. She married my father in that little church, she had me baptized in that little church, and she struggled through a divorce in that little church, all with the aid of a kind, soft-spoken priest named Father Welsh.

I loved St. George’s. I was an acolyte, a regular at the Sunday hot-breakfast after service, and I felt completely at home inside that house of worship.

But then there was a conflict within the congregation; some political squabble I was later told. Father Welsh was making the church open to AA meetings in the basement, and that made many of the parishioners uncomfortable. Father Welsh was a recovering alcoholic, clean for years, but accusations were made against him to the bishop. They said he was drinking again.

My mother assured me these accusations were not true. She said that this was just politics. She said these tight-wad people didn’t want the dirty alcoholics to be sullying up their clean church, and that this was some way to live like Christians.

In time, and while my mom and I were away for the summer, my priest was removed from the parish. Father Welsh left the state, and we never went back to St. George’s.

I don’t suppose the people who took their complaints to the bishop considered the impact that their choice would have on me. I also don’t know if their grievances were founded on the truth. He could have been drinking. I don’t know.

But I do know that the removal of a priest from his congregation is no small affair. The ramifications are great, and extend outward in ways that are unpredictable. The repercussions might not always be “bad,” but they will always be uncertain.

Empty Chair by Bob Jagendorf

But What About In Pagan Communities?

This situation at St. George’s could have just as easily happened within a Pagan organization. I imagine that something like this may have happened in the groves, covens or organized groups to which some of you belong.

When we’re faced with this kind of situation, especially one that has yet to be completely resolved, we have good cause to refrain from snap judgement, and to hold space. “Holding space” may be a useful way for Pagans to practice discernment, for by holding space I mean waiting, listening, keeping in kind thoughts all the parties involved.

Our partisanship does not always contribute to the resolution of political conflicts. It often exacerbates it. The quick creation of an “Us v.s. Them” mentality makes it very difficult to consider all of the information with a clear head and without bias.

I’m not sure my mother was unbiased. She didn’t want for our priest to leave. He was an important man in our lives. I’m also not sure that the accusers were lying. I’d like to think they were, because that allows me to side with the victim (and in some ways, make the victim the ethical hero). But I was never given the opportunity to consider all sides of the story, and I really only wanted to believe one side.

In religious community, regardless of your cosmology, (poly)theology, or creed (if you have one), conflicts create opportunities to respond to one another with compassion; to hold space for the accuser and the accused, until such a time that you are able to learn the fullness of the truth. Exercising compassion in moments of conflict is a natural and necessary component of a healthy religious life, I think.

So I invite your compassion. When there is conflict, may your heart soften. May you be willing to listen clearly, without prejudice, and with a willingness to hold space for all those involved.

Feel free to share instances where you’ve been faced with conflict within your religious community (and please withhold the names and specifics in order to respect the privacy of those involved). If your response was one of compassion, was that challenging? If compassion was not your response, why?

If you are involved in a conflict at this time, I ask that you not air your grievances here, but rather take this opportunity to hold space and practice compassion.

My Friend Got Stuck in the Winter

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We’re searching for new beginnings, my friend and I.

Yesterday, we took to driving along open roads, through fields turned yellow from the heat, with music playing loud enough to drown out all else, and we let the sound paint a picture of how much we’d changed.

A year ago, my friend and I let go of summer.

For me, the transition to autumn was swift and certain, and I gave myself no time to mourn the loss of light. For him, it was different. The slow draining of color from the maple leaves allowed for a deep, lasting sorrow to set in. And when the winter came, it stayed. There was little in the way of spring blossoms, and the summer heat has only felt oppressive.

The cold persists in defiance of the sun.

I’ve encouraged my friend, as I find I’m doing with many people these days, to try and root himself in a daily practice. When we get stuck in a season, and we feel unable to be fully present, I advocate that we make some new ritual to place us firmly in the season of the moment. It needn’t be complicated, only sincere.

For me, my personal practice is influenced by a variety of sources, some of which are quite complicated. I was born and bred an Episcopalian, and as such, my individual religiosity tends to be more structured and formal. I favor liturgy over improvisation (that is, unless I’m singing), and my daily rituals, when spoken aloud, are delivered in a tone that would be familiar to many an Anglican. But it doesn’t have to be that way for my friend, or for anyone who is searching for a method to feel present and connected again.

If I were to proselytize anything, it would be for everyone to develop their own personal religion; to make their heart into a hearth for lighting their own, distinct, sacred fire. How this is done is not of great importance to me, so long as it is done with intention, and done regularly enough to create a deep and lasting groove in your consciousness.

Ice on Fire, by Eugenijus Radlinskas

For me, I need to turn my little room into a sanctuary. I need to light my incense, prepare my offerings, speak with reverence and clarity to the gods in my heart, to all that is seen and unseen. I need the drama, because that’s a part of who I am.

For you, it could be as simple as standing in the morning sun, eyes open or eyes closed, and placing your awareness on your center, or your edges, or the feeling of the dirt, the tile, the carpet underneath your feet.

Whatever method feels right for you, the important thing is that the fire in your heart remain lit, and that you honor that fire regularly. As I wrote on Imbolc earlier this year, I keep vigil to the fire in my heart, for the fire is a birthright, an inheritance, and the fire will keep me warm as the summer turns to fall, and the fall to winter. The fire will sustain me through the cold, and prepare me once again for the return of the sun. I light this fire, and I experience a new beginning.

This is what I want for my friend, and this is what I want for you, as well.

So I ask you, my insightful readers:

If you were me, and you found yourself in dialogue with a friend or family member who felt disconnected from the fire in their heart — their feeling of passion, their sense of purpose, and their connection to divinity – how would you advise them to get reconnected? What words or rituals might you share in order to help someone discover that fire again? Is there is a part of your personal practice that would be helpful?

How would you help get someone unstuck from their perpetual winter?

How Does Paganism Handle Turnover?

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A friend messaged me this morning to tell me she’d been fired. The news was unexpected, as it often is, and she was understandably torn up over it. My heart sunk, and I hurt for her. I wanted to reach out and embrace her, but I couldn’t. There was only text between us, and the text was insufficient. Words are not the same as touch, the same as shoulders, the same as passing the tissue across the table. Words are sometimes not enough.

About a year ago I lost my job. It was non-traditional creative work, not the kind that pays regularly or has a set schedule. But it was still a job, and it was a central focus of my life. Losing it was devastating, and profoundly disorienting.

I didn’t allow myself much space to acclimate to my new state of joblessness. There was no time. There was a mortgage which had become, overnight, too much to manage, and I had a sense that the momentum I’d worked so hard to build in my career over the previous decade would be for nothing if I didn’t figure out, immediately, what I would do next. On top of all that, the people with whom I’d worked closest, who had become my support system — professionally and personally — were gone.

So, I scrambled. I called on friends to make introductions, and I began developing new business relationships. At the same time, my husband and I made the quick and difficult decision that if we were to stay afloat we would have to move out of our home. There was no way around that. So, in the course of a month we found a realtor, cleaned out most of our things, and put the house on the market. It sold in less than two months, and we moved across town into our smaller, more-manageable, for-rent abode. It was October, and a cold air had blown in. Hardly any time had passed, but nearly everything in our world looked different.

Turnover is a word misused in conversations about business. It’s vernacular for a cold, calculated process of comings and goings; new name-tags, new punch-cards; a new face to smile at, or laugh with, or avoid. But turnover would be better used to describe what happens in the heart, in the home, in the entire universe of the person who’s experienced a great loss. We undergo, perhaps even suffer, a turnover.

Many people “turn to faith” in moments of crisis, but it occurs to me that this phrase may not sit well with many contemporary Pagans, especially those who come from more literalist Christian backgrounds. Perhaps “turn to tradition” is less loaded, but I’m not sure it means the same thing. Turning to faith is often painted as an act of one rejecting logic, or practicality, or something sensible. Faith is the problem, it would seem. But I’m not sure I see it that way. People “turn to faith” because they hurt, and they’re reaching for something to sooth the pain.

We fall down, and we get up. Sometimes it seems that this is our only choice to make: to get up. As we sort through our faiths, our beliefs, our correct terminology, our religious traditions and our community disagreements, there are people on the edges of every conversation who are simply trying to get up from whatever knocked them down last. It seems to me that if our religions aren’t equipping us with the tools to help our neighbor get herself up, or to help us lift ourselves up from whatever tragedy has beset us, then they are lacking something essential.

I wonder –

What have you turned to in moments of crisis? Faith? Tradition? Have you experienced a loss which led you to become more religious, or less so? Do you feel like Paganism, in any of its expressions, provides us with the tools to support one another in moments of pain, of suffering, of turnover? If so, how? If not, why?

Please share your story in the comment section, and feel free to engage one another in dialogue about your experiences. Then, pass this post along.

The Problem of the Pagan “Us and Them”

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When I questioned the place of compassion in Pagan and Polytheist philosophy a couple of weeks back, I got an interesting response from one of my readers, “LaurelhurstLiberal”. She wrote,

“Now, about compassion: as a Heathen Reconstructionist, this is one of the big questions I’m still trying to puzzle out. Right now, it seems to me that a Heathen should be a good neighbor and a good citizen, but isn’t necessarily supposed to have capital-C Compassion for everybody in the world. There are people inside the gates that you particularly need to take care of, and those outside the gates should be helped, or at least not harmed, but not at the cost of those inside the gates. I think that’s difficult enough without trying for a saintly level of universal compassion.”

Steven T. Abell, storyteller and Patheos columnist, followed up on this idea in his post, Compassion in Cold Climates, by explaining in detail the ideas of Inangard and Utgard, or “Inside and Outside”, “Us and Them”.

I appreciate both L.L and Steven’s attempt at unpacking these ideas, but I have to come clean here and admit that I’m having a very difficult time with this way of thinking.

I have been “outside of the gates” on many occasions, and perhaps this is a part of why I have reservations about religious or cultural systems which place a value on reinforcing the boundaries of the group. Build a wall, and there will always be someone on the other side of the wall, be it women, gays, trans-folk among the gays, or Pagans. The list of those being othered is long, and it includes many of us. This list is added to every time a new “Us and Them” philosophy is created; or, for that matter, an old “Us and Them” is re-constructed. So, for me, the question is less about how to treat those on the outside of the wall, and more a question of whether the wall is even appropriate anymore.

I appreciate that inspiration comes to many Reconstructionists from exploring ancient cultural practices. I used to think Reconstructionism was very rigid, but author and Celtic Reconstructionist, Erynn Laurie, changed my mind during the 2012 Pantheacon Conference. Now I understand that searching for information about the ancients is a source of great inspiration for many of us. It can be the launching point for our spiritual practice, and I respect that. Truth be told, I look to the past for meaning as well.

But there’s still something about the reclaiming of an ancient “Us and Them” philosophy that rubs me the wrong way.

I wonder if strengthening our sense of separateness requires us to ignore other ways in which we are connected. If there was ever a case to be made for questioning models of thinking that reinforce our culturally constructed boundaries, it is the current ecological crisis. The air we breath, the water that falls from the sky — these things care nothing about our walls. They do not acknowledge our rationale for keeping some people in, and leaving others out. The Earth does not discriminate based on how we’ve chosen to group ourselves. We share our resources, we share this planet, and we share — contrary to what some politicians would say — the responsibility of her upkeep.

There is a connection between the personal and the global that doesn’t seem to be acknowledged within a binary, “Us and Them” worldview. There are never only two of us; there is always at least a third. We have evidence that our individual actions have far-reaching effects (see the Great Pacific Garbage Patch), and we have tools — namely, the internet — which provide evidence of a diverse, culturally eclectic and totally interdependent world outside of the cultural boundaries we create. We are undeniably interconnected.

Steven writes in his column,

“You can try to solve the world’s problems. You will fail. Or you can try to solve your own problems. You might succeed. You can work at various scales, but focus on things close at hand. The world will be better for it, as will your place in it.”

I like where he ends, and I wonder if it is more accurate to say that our personal problems are the world’s problems, and likewise the problems of the world belong to each of us. Working from this, can we ask whether or not our personal systems, religious or secular, are supporting an awareness of our interconnectedness, or are they reinforcing a philosophy of division?

Where Does Compassion Belong Among Pagans and Polytheists?

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I’m having a hard time with compassion.

So far, I’ve developed a daily ritual at my altar, I’ve reconciled (for the time being) my differences with my Christianity, I’m working to hold the tension between my Druid Revival leanings and my ADF approach, and all of that feels good. I feel like I’m developing a balanced, sincere, honorable religious practice.

And yet, I’m uncertain about compassion.

By saying that I’m uncertain about compassion I don’t mean to imply that I don’t feel compassion, or that I’m uncertain of how to show compassion. It’s more that I’m not sure how I incorporate compassion into my practice. This subject hasn’t come up much in my Pagan studies, and I’m not really sure why.

We Pagans and Polytheists concern ourselves a great deal with orthopraxy, or right action. We discussion belief from time to time, but mainly as it relates to what we do. In light of this, I think we are actually well suited to explore the subject of compassion.

Compassion, as I see it, is all about the doing. It is about right action in relationship to another person or living thing. Compassion speaks to a quality of interaction, and as I understand it, arises from a place of empathy. We act with compassion by seeking to understand, relate to, and care for another person, exactly where they are in that moment. In this way, compassion can be seen as a practice similar to a daily ritual at one’s altar, except that the opportunity to show compassion is present every time we connect with another person.

Compassion is not a solitary act; it is an act of communing.

Just before bed last night, I read a post by my colleague, Star Foster, in which she announced that she would be taking a brief hiatus from blogging. I also read a rather heated and uncomfortable debate between Star and her readership, followed by a flurry of posts about the exchange on Facebook. Everyone was worked up, and many were downright angry.

I’m not taking sides on the matter, because I don’t think that would be helpful. What I will say is that what is evident in the argument that unfolded around her original post, and the situation that Star describes in her Sabbatical post are indications that we are in dire need to have a discussion about compassion and what it means in our interactions with one another.

The internet, by and large, has not proven to be a haven for compassion. We all know this. We engage in social networks from a place of relative isolation, and in the process we practice a kind of inauthentic, calculated transparency. Our profile pics are not our genuine faces, and our text-voice is not our voice-voice. When we communicate online, we are interacting with something that only resembles a part of a complete person. I wonder if in recognizing this fact we give ourselves permission to be meaner than we would if a person was sitting across from us. Perhaps compassion feels multidimensional, whereas the internet presents us all as two-dimensional characters. I don’t know.

But I do know that I was upset by the intensity and insensitivity of the language that followed Star’s posts. I like Star, with all of her feistiness. I also know and like many of the people who responded to her, and I trust that they are equally as capable of compassion as she is.

In thinking about this, I had to acknowledge my own inability to convey and express compassion. My first draft of this post was quite righteous, and I’m afraid was devoid of any compassion whatsoever. Ironic, no? In my own quest to call out others for their lack of compassion, I experienced a lack of compassion. Why would that be so?

I have many questions. I would like to know if compassion could be a guiding principle in our interaction with one another, and if we might allow it to come more to the forefront of our minds. When we find ourselves being caddy with one another, or hateful, or when we use our language to shut one another down in conversation, I wonder if we might take a moment to ask ourselves if there is a more compassionate way of acting.

I could be the most pious, most devout, most respected person in the world (or at least, in my corner of the blogosphere), but if I don’t practice compassion with the people I come into contact with what is my piety worth? Perhaps it’s worth something to the Gods I worship, but I’m not living in a world populated exclusively by my Gods. Everybody else is here too, and you are all deserving of my compassion.

I would like to see compassion become a point of discussion in our community. I would like to see us discuss with a calm, self-reflective, gentle voice how we can be more compassionate with one another. I could imagine us searching through our histories, both mythological and ordinary, for examples of compassion-in-action, and holding up those mythological and historical figures who exemplify compassion as being worthy of special recognition.

And, I’d like us to think of compassion as an act of magick, as though our clear, concise choice to use our faculties and will to respond to our fellow human being with care and kindness is mystical in nature.

Could we conceive of compassion as a magickal practice?

If we are a people concerned with religious orthopraxy – right action in relation to the Gods – what would happen if we began to think of compassion for one another as a king of social orthopraxy – right action in relationship to one another? How might that change things?

What are your thoughts on compassion?