Journey, Story

by Alison Mee

(photo by Sarah Eaton)

I have my story and I realize, indeed, we each come with our own stories. Sometimes, it is the time for the sharing of stories. But this is not that time. This is the time to look in each others' faces and acknowledge and nod and slip quietly together into the whispering hush of trees, the soft openness of water, the deep slow being of stone.

For thousands of years, our ancestors have used the drum to guide us in and out of shamanic journey. Feeling the drum entwine with the pulse of my blood and the sense of this air against this skin, wraps me in an agreement. I will journey, she will drum. Wherever I go, the drum will follow; wherever I go, I will bring the drum. I will not leave the drum and the drum will not leave me, and however far I journey I will return to the drum. I will allow it to call me home to my tribe when my wandering is done. It is an ancient and sacred trust.

With the drum to keep me safe, I drape my body over the rocks by the water. I am the person in the body on the rock in the water. I am the body on the rock in the water. I am the rock in the water. I am the water, lapping rhythmically against the rock, against the body. I am the bright warm star beaming against the skin. I am but the motion and the rhythm of the lapping. The pattern. The relationship of all these things.

I follow one molecule of water as it exits the lake with the lap, lap, lap, lap, rhythm, to lay on my skin for a moment and then rise up in the warmth of the sun. I fly swirling without destination, without focus or care. No concerns, no attachments, floating freely on the breeze. Time and thought recede. Colors wash away and I am without sight. There is only motion and a relaxed dance with the sky around me, as I rise and fall in response to a thousand different rhythms of connection.

(I am unaware of the passage of time and I am without worded thought.)

Awareness reawakens in the knowing that there is something in the distance calling to me. Don't go further, it says. Don't get lost. Return. Return. Return. Return. It is the drum.

My first conscious act is to resist this return. For several breaths, perhaps, I am in dual awareness. I am both this one molecule of water, on a breeze high above the lake, and I am the woman on the land dipped into the lake's edge. I am aware of the reality that from another perspective, all my story is mostly irrelevant. It's just a story. It's just the way humans are. Daughter? Parent? What does that matter, when I am floating free in an eternal rhythm of change, from liquid to gas, back and again...? What of one particular human existence being a bit shorter than had been hoped? What of hope? It's all as distant to me as the lake would be, diagrammed in a textbook, viewed from my human perspective.

Beckoned gently but firmly by the drum, I slip back into my skin, allowing my bones and blood and eyes to close in on me, the air moving through my throat as it does every moment of every day for years upon years. And as my body comes over me, so, shockingly, as plunging into an icy lake, comes grief, and love, and sorrow... comes knowledge, relationship, and sweet, sweet attachment. I am not a water molecule. I am a huge complex relationship of water molecules in living community with metal and stone and oils and bacteria and all the parts of me. Like a wave flowing gently across an ocean until it hits the shore, I crash into being human again, with tremendous emotion and care for not only all beings of the earth, but for some beings in particular, for no reason other than our blessed human connections.

My story matters. It matters to me. And it should. The shift in perspective serves to allow me to return and feel everything with raw edges, like a child again. I am in the love and the sorrow long before I search around in the recesses of my brain where I keep rational thought, where I use logic, reason and stoic resolve to tell myself everything is OK, to frame my story in some way that is easier to sit with, but diminishes it in the process.

By allowing myself the ecstasy of becoming other, I force myself to seek out my self and when I find me, I embody me, more fully than I had before my journey. I shake off denial and pity to find acceptance and compassion. I am grateful for my form of being, being human. Knowledge that my weeping, laughing, desiring, dreaming, dancing, loving, longing, raging emotions are simply my own perspective, makes them truly all the more precious. I am right where I am supposed to be.



[Editor's note: Thanks to Alison and Dick for sharing their experience as members of the Kodiak Clan this year at Twilight Covening and to Starwind for encouraging them. Do these experiences evoke feelings you would like to share, similar experiences or questions? If so, please contribute your comments.]

Bear Elements

by Dick Huntington

(Kodiak photo by USFWS)

I gaze at the sun

And it tells me,

"Feel my warmth;

Be healed in my FIRE."

I lift to the sky

And it tells me,

"Feel the AIR,

Softly Kiss your face."

I lean on the Tree

And it tells me,

"Come be touched

In places you cannot reach."

I walk in the WATER

And it tells me,

"Be no fountain

When the well you need."

I lay with the EARTH

And She tells me,

"Rest here in me

To be reborn --- again."

And so we came together at Twilight Covening, this time as Bears, or to be more exact, as KODIACS; each new clan-mate arriving from singular and divergent points on the cosmic compass. Under our Clan Leader's gaze, we accepted and acknowledged each other as family and quickly moved into Magical Space. Those of us who had known each other for years and those newly arrived, it made no difference for now we were one, litter-mates, cubs of the same Mother.

All of our Clan Time was spent outdoors in the open, connecting directly with the Elements in pursuit of our pre-stated goal of finding the source of all of our needs for renewal. We worked as individuals and together within the clan structure and even with some of the other clans to extend our connectivity.

The core-central theme of our leader's teaching was that we don't so much heal the Earth as we must learn to interact with it responsibly so that it may heal itself and thereby heal us. She told us, "Everything is about relationship. Learn to trust yourselves, each other and a loving universe." And so too we are connected each and all to each and all.

This is real human magic, true Earth magic; useful, sustainable and necessary; brought to us by competent and caring masters of the mind - body - spirit connection.

My deepest thanks and fondest regards too all at EarthSpirit, the hard working staff and leadership and to all my newest family members. WOW! A family wherein you get to pick your relatives. Will wonders never cease?

Of Crows and Rain

by Tracy Wharton

photo by Moira Ashleigh

I was invited to write something for this blog back in May and I thought what could I possibly have to say that would have meaning enough for my community to spend the time to read? What of my life carries an important meaning that should be shared? What lesson would I pass on?

As I stood in the medical tent at the Occupy Detroit rally, putting together health kits, listening to a squawking murder of crows complain about the rain, I finally got it. What my friend Chris Lafond calls the “universal clue-by-four” (you know, that piece of wood that slaps you upside the head when you just aren’t seeing the obvious).

Crows.

Now, to be clear, I’ve never been part of Crow clan. I’ve been many things at Twilight Covening: Sphinx, Panda, Butterfly, Tiger, even aspired to the as-yet-mythical House cat clan, but I’ve never been a Crow. For those who haven’t had the experience of Twilight Covening yet, the long weekend is arranged around small group study and activity and each clan, animal themed, takes on a different intensive topic. The Crow clan is about service to community. The Crows hold space for us while we journey and make sure that there is space for us to return to from our travels, both in and out of the world. They enact spirituality through holding the community strong and safe.

To those of us who attend the activities of the Crow clan are mostly out-of-sight and we generally have no idea what they are doing most of the time. But they are there, doing what needs doing. This is what suddenly struck me.

There are many in our community who are great and wise voices in the world. There are a number of us who bring artistic beauty into the world, or stand and advocate and build bridges in a world too often fractured by artificial lines in the sand. There are those of us who teach and build the skills of others so that we may grow our communities, both in our home places and in our tribe. But there are just as many of us who simply live our lives, going about the place and doing what needs doing, usually without any attention or fanfare and generally out of sight and not thought of by almost everyone who isn’t directly involved.

I have said for over two decades that I live my life in service to others. This, for me, has manifested in both artistic ways, giving a break to people’s reality for a while and literal ways of service: as a social worker, a therapist, a human services manager, a researcher, a teacher, a priestess, a crisis worker and whatever else I might be doing at any given moment that gets some kind of nifty title. There have been hundreds of times when I’ve felt so small in a great sea of need, when I’ve wondered how my one small contribution could help change the world, or do anything at all. As I sat in the med tent, I thought about how I wasn’t carrying a sign, or laying down in the road for the police to carry away, or camping out long-term in the park like so many of the brave people who were genuinely taking a stand. I challenged myself about my convictions, how much I really believed in what was happening around me and thought long and hard about why I was there. Then I saw the crows and I realized that my belief in the nature of the world, my spirituality and the very fabric of what I am made of, is grounded in what I was doing and there was absolutely nothing wrong with it. It was exactly what I needed to be doing and exactly where I needed to be when I wanted to stand and be counted.

You see, when the protesters that we see on tv call for a medic, someone usually appears. There is always someone who steps forward with water, tissues, bandaids. In disasters, there are those who appear with food, with mops, with fresh garbage bags, with tarps and hammers and chainsaws. When the tornadoes hit my hometown of Tuscaloosa, people came from around the country with trucks and chainsaws to help clear trees and debris and haul away the mess so it could be rebuilt. They just did what needed to be done and that act gave space to those who needed it to do what they needed to do.

My point is that sometimes carrying our spirituality out in the world isn’t a grandiose thing. Sometimes it isn’t sign-posted and sometimes it isn’t even clear that it’s what’s going on, but when we stop and do what needs doing for the greater good or in support of something that we believe in, we are enacting what we aspire to. We have a chant we sing in EarthSpirit that goes like this:

Carry it home to your children, (NB: many of us sing “Carry it on to the city” for this line)
Carry it out on the street.
Carry it on to the ones you love,
On to the ones you meet.
Carry it light on your shoulder,
Carry it deep in your soul.
For we have been blessed with magic,
And the magic will make us whole.
(by Betsey Rose)

As I listened to the complaining crows and the sounds of rain on blowing tarps, I realized that “it” is what I was doing. I carry my spirituality deep in my soul and carry it everywhere as I go about doing what needs doing and right then, I was carrying it, literally, out to the city and the streets, as I put cough drops into little baggies so that people could soothe their throats after shouting and spending the night in the cold damp park. And that is the point, isn’t it?

Our lives are woven of small actions. It is the interaction of all of our lives that forms the tapestry of what we experience as “Life.” Just as the web that we weave each spring is made up of a thousand little knots and ties, our lives interact with one another to form the whole of what we experience. Some people hold the great spokes of the web and some people dance underneath and weave. Some people march on the front lines of the journey and some people stay in the tent and hold the space to keep them safe. One cannot survive without the other, both are needed to make something happen and there is space in our lives to take a spot in both places, sometimes in the front and sometimes not, but not all at once.

What is the lesson that I would pass on to others? That carrying it out into the world may mean that you do something huge, but sometimes it is a small act, something done without fanfare or credit. Sometimes we are called to hold space, to support others, to protect their journeying and that is every bit as important and valuable as any other role. The web doesn’t hold together if you start pulling out strands; our lives only become the tapestry that we want them to be when we hold all the strands as beautiful and valued. It is our interaction with others that gives life meaning and that is worth passing on.

Still Life

by Starwind

Wednesday night
Running late
I noticed the sky was an odd shade of yellow
And started looking

I arrived to get Robin (late)
And emerging from the car
I found it
An enormous double rainbow
From horizon to horizon
Surely an omen, and a really good one at that

The drive to Twilight, as usual
Was peppered with anticipation
Arriving (late) I was afforded the opportunity
To be still
To truly Arrive
To breathe in the Mountain
The trees
The chipmunks

The Work was deep
The Work was true
The Work was
Good Medicine
And it was over too soon
Far too soon

The glowing moon grew
With or without our Dance
The Pearl of Wisdom
Reflected in our spirits
Sparkling in our eyes
A treasure beyond worth

Packing the car (again)
Hitting the road (again)
The drive home was slightly melancholic
Until I started watching the sky

The sun was setting
The moon was up
The clouds were shredded
Like a milkweed pod
Swollen to fullness
The Work was released
Each tiny seed
Tossed to the wind
Trusting the spirits to carry them
To fertile ground
Safely home

The sky swirled
Colors swelled
A tiny patch caught my eye
Glancing eastward
Another tiny patch of color
The sun, glowing white
Much like the moon had
Smiling, watching us dance

I drove
And I watched
The rainbow form
Bracketing our work
Before
And after

Still life
Pearl with Rainbow Frame


(October 12, 2011, Moon in Aries)

Boston Gay Pride Interfaith Service

by Deirdre Pulgram Arthen

This weekend I was invited to participate in the Boston Gay Pride Interfaith Service. It took place at the Old South Church in Copley Square right before the parade on Saturday morning. It was wonderful to be a part of what turned out to be an inspiring service on many levels and I was heartily welcomed into the group of clergy which included Buddhist, Protestant, Jewish, Catholic, Muslim and Yoruba representation -- in addition to the Pagan. I look forward to having the opportunity soon to connect more closely with the organizing committee for this service and, perhaps, to finding some EarthSpirit members who would like to coordinate an EarthSpirit presence at Pride events around the state next year.

My part of the service was the "Call to Worship" which happens at the beginning of a Christian service as a transition into the focused spiritual part of the service after the welcoming remarks and announcements. The theme of the entire Pride week celebration was "no more and no less." Here is the text of my remarks:

Good morning,

We come together to begin this very festive day with a moment of reflection on, and celebration of, our personal connections with spirit, We do this here in a community of others for whom that spiritual connection is also an important part of life. Look around you and see the diversity of who we are here – We come from many backgrounds, from many spiritual traditions, we have different temperaments, different lifestyles and different perspectives. But at the root of it all, what we share in common is our humanity and, through that, our own special place in the web of creation.

In that web of life are the trees, the stars, the rocks, the rivers, the birds, the grasses on the plains, the thundering waves of the ocean, the insects in your garden, the deer and the coyotes in the forest, the mist rising at dawn. What wonder we can know when we open and experience the majesty of each of these! And what wonder can we know when we see that we are, each of us, no more and no less than any of these beautiful and powerful aspects of creation. That we are the earth itself.

Many people are inclined, I think, to choose to see themselves as separate from the world, to create an “us and them” divide that either values humans as the owners of a world where everything is created especially for our own use, or to denigrate our role to that of a cancer – eating away at our fragile eco-system and destroying our home.

While it is undoubtedly true that we humans have extraordinary capacities to create and to destroy, and that with that capacity comes an obligation to be conscious of our actions and take responsibility for them, as long as we keep viewing ourselves separate from the web we will not know how to keep it intact. We will not know the depth of the ways that our tugging on one strand affects the rest.

My experience has been that when I am able to let go of my assumptions, to allow myself to move away from my rational, judgmental brain and into my heart and spirit - to find that place in this sacred web where I belong, that place where I am one with the very soul of the Earth and the sky and all the beings in them, I can touch the mystery I am a part of, and find direction and peace.

I invite you to join me now in a call and response to open ourselves deeply to the sacred of which we are a part - no more, and no less than any other. My daughter, Isobel, will sing the response part with you – the words are simply “I am the Earth”

We then sang my chant "I am the Earth" together as a call and response.

(I was followed by a Muslim woman who read a scripture from the Koran and then by a Yoruba practitioner who led us all in a drum blessing.)

[Photos by Moira Ashleigh]

Practicing Paganism

by Morwen Two Feathers
Like a lot of other people, I got laid off during this last recession. When it came it was a blow, though I realized later I could have see it coming if I was looking. It was autumn, just past Equinox, time to slow down, turn inward, and that I did. Looking back, I saw that I had been seriously out of synch for a couple of years. My creativity had slowed to a crawl, and even in the warm growing season I’d felt curiously stagnant. Time for attunement.

When I first began to walk the pagan path more than 30 years ago, I was driven by a desire to connect with the sacredness I’d always felt in the woods. Although my studies in psychology, sociology and anthropology gave me a deep appreciation for the power of symbol, story, metaphor, and community ritual, I was not so interested in Deity or ceremonial magic. My investigations led me to a series of practices that were designed to align my life’s energy to the systemic cycles of the earth, moon, and sun. I found that careful attention and an intention to align myself with the cycles of the seasons and the moon, along with the life cycles of the animals and plants in my environment, helped me keep my life in perspective. And when I was attuned to the natural world in this way, the Universe delivered an endless stream of good fortune and synchronicity into my lap. I could not articulate any scientifically acceptable reason for this, but it worked out that way nonetheless.

It is easy to fall out of practice under stress, and the last couple of years have been filled with stresses including aging parents, a child hitting the teenage years, a changing primary relationship, and conflicts at work, not to mention my own dance with menopause. I just felt I didn’t have time or energy to stick with my daily meditations and attunements. As my practice slipped, though, my beliefs didn’t. I thought I was just as connected as always, until I was shocked awake by a layoff notice. And even then it took a winter of forced hibernation to make me realize just how disconnected I had become.

Nearly all the choices I make in my life are grounded in my pagan beliefs, including my volunteer work on sustainability in my town as well as my choice to seek work in the nonprofit sector, my consumption habits, my parenting, and more. Yet being forced to stop and take stock has made me realize that for me paganism is more a practice than a set of beliefs. And an interesting thing happened when I began practicing attunement again. Spring Equinox came, and I could feel the sap rising in the trees and in my own soul. And after months of sending out resumes with nary a peep in response, a week after Equinox I was contacted and asked to apply for three different jobs in one day. As I write this it’s still in process and I’m not sure where I’ll end up. But it’s good to feel the energy moving again, and to know that practice, not belief, is the key.

***
Attunement Practice for Connecting with Food:

With your plate of food in front of you, come to inner stillness. Meditate on the source of each ingredient in your meal. Where was it grown? How did it get to your table? Be aware that all food comes from the Earth, and ultimately from the Sun, the source of all energy on our planet. Be thankful for all the human hands that brought the food from its origins to your plate.

Say:

“Mother Earth, bless this food.
Fruit of your body, fruit of your womb.”

Enjoy your meal mindfully. Over time you may find your choices of what to eat shift. Listen to your inner wisdom.

Deep Peace: Ten Years of Inspiration

by Susan Curewitz Arthen

"Peace in my heart
Peace between our hearts
Peace at the heart of the world"*

I am Susan, mother of Elizabeth, godmother of Isobel, daughter of Mary, grand-daughter of Sarah and Ann and I have spent the last ten Mother's Day holidays celebrating with a Deep Peace ritual at the EarthSpirit Peace Cairn in Western Massachusetts.

In 2001 I was inspired to reclaim the origin of Mother's Day after listening to a radio broadcast on NPR (National Public Radio). This holiday was the creation of Julia Ward Howe, abolitionist, feminist and author of the Battle Hymn of the Republic, who issued a Mother's Day Proclamation in 1870 (below). She was outraged at the Franco-Prussian war, and felt that women needed to be called to action. Julia believed that if all mothers had a day off from their labors, they would find a way to make peace happen in the world. Although the holiday was signed into law by President Woodrow Wilson, it has clearly turned into something quite different from her vision. Hallmark cards, breakfast in bed and a new toaster oven replaced a radical call to change the world.

My personal feelings about Mother's Day have been quite mixed. The holiday has always felt contrived to me; a day to honor those who Mother sounds wonderful, but there are the other 364 days where the reality of mothering is dismissed and undervalued and when, as a mother, I felt dismissed and undervalued as well. When I learned of the original intent of the holiday, I felt an immediate and urgent need to bring it to light within my own community, to share the passion and inspiration it fed in me. And all women, whether or not they have given birth, are welcome to Deep Peace. When Julia Ward Howe was alive, most women were mothers and that is not the case today.

My inspiration deepened after a workshop that Deirdre Pulgram-Arthen and I did at Rites of Spring, also in 2000, about the EarthSpirit Peace Cairn. She said, "Before we can make peace happen in the world, we need to find and commit to peace in our lives." And so, Deep Peace was born. Every Mother's Day, a group of women meet at the Peace Cairn; we share our female lineage, and open our hearts to peace with chant and movement. Then we each go off for some time for personal reflection. Some clear the ground around the Cairn, some sit by the stream or at the point where two streams join, and all of us seek what we want to honor in the coming year to bring peace into our lives. We often make a talisman to remind us of the commitment, and when we gather again by the Cairn we speak our commitments and also offer the story of any stones we may be adding to the mound. The richness of what is shared there often enriches me as much as any personal conclusions that I have come to, and I am amazed, honored and grateful at the willingness of the women to be so open.

Having the Peace Cairn as the location for the ritual was serendipitous. Or maybe not. The Cairn was offered as EarthSpirit's gift to the 1999 Council for the Parliament of the World's Religions in answer to the challenge offered there --- what were we going to do when the Parliament was over, what actions were we going to take in the world? Since then, the Cairn has grown from just a few stones to a mound; a Peace Pole was donated several years later with the words "May peace prevail on Earth" in four languages, one on each side. They are English, Gaelic, a Native American language and Pawprints, honoring those whose spirits dwell here. Visitors to the EarthSpirit Center are encouraged to bring stones for the Cairn: stones from their own land, stones from their travels. The stones that are brought to the Cairn create a web of connection to the places they have come from, and are blessed and nourished in many ways. The Deep Peace ritual is one way of sending our intentions back out through that web and into the world.

Some years the ritual is small --- a handful of women --- and some years it is bigger. The last few years, we have deepened the event by including Stand for Peace, sponsored by Julia's Voice, a group of "mothers and others" also working to "Take Back Mother's Day and honor Julia Ward Howe", and thus expanding the energy going out through that web as well.

One notable year, we had several pairs of mothers and daughters and I was moved to tears when I asked Lucia, Deirdre's mother and the oldest woman present, to start the lineage naming. It fed a need for multi-generational sharing that I did not know I contained. Every year brings a challenge, an answer, no small amount of camaraderie and joy, and, of course, delicious food sharing at the end.

My wish for this year is that others also begin to create Deep Peace moments wherever they are on Mother's Day in addition to any traditional celebrations; take some time for yourself, connect to the Deep Peace ritual, connect to the Stand for Peace event, open to what will bring you peace in the coming year, and feel the strength of our power and intent. "Arise, the women of this day! Arise all women who have hearts…"

Mother's Day Proclamation, by Julia Ward Howe, 1870

Arise, the women of this day!

Arise all women who have hearts, whether your baptism be that of water or of fears!

Say firmly: "We will not have great questions decided by irrelevant agencies.
Our husbands shall not come to us reeking with carnage, for caresses and applause. Our sons shall not be taken from us to unlearn all that we have been able to teach them of charity, mercy and patience. We women of one country will be too tender of those of another country to allow our sons to be trained to injure theirs."

From the bosom of the devastated earth a voice goes up with our own. It says, "Disarm, disarm! The sword of murder is not the balance of justice!" Blood does not wipe out dishonor nor violence indicate possession. As great men have often forsaken the plow and the anvil at the summons of war, let women now leave all that may be left of home for a great and earnest day of counsel.

Let them meet first, as women, to bewail and commemorate the dead.

Let them solemnly take counsel with each other as the means whereby the great human family can live in peace, and each bearing after her own time the sacred impress, not of Caesar, but of God.

In the name of womanhood and humanity, I earnestly ask
That a general congress of women without limit of nationality
May be appointed and held at someplace deemed most convenient
And at the earliest period consistent with its objects,
To promote the alliance of the different nationalities,
The amicable settlement of international questions,
The great and general interests of peace.

*(Deep Peace chant, at top, © Copper Fox)

Review of Witches & Pagans winter issue

by Kate Greenough Richardson

I was excited to see the EarthSpirit community prominently featured in the winter issue of Witches & Pagans magazine (issue #22). Selena Fox is on the cover, and it’s billed as “The Community Issue”. There is an article written by Deirdre Arthen, with photos by D.J. Anderson, called Weaving the Web. Deirdre describes vignettes that will resonate and stir memories with anyone who has been to EarthSpirit events.
To see color versions of the beautiful photos, check out the magazine preview at http://www.witchesandpagans.com/. Click on the ‘sample flash view of the magazine’. You won’t be able to read the articles unless you buy it, but the photos look great. And it’s well worth the price of a latte to read the stories, poetry and wealth of interesting articles.

Heartbeat and Beyond

by Starwind

Twilight Covening has always presented opportunities to learn, to share, to experience, to develop lasting bonds --- but this year I experienced something else. This year, I broke through a wall, and what might otherwise have been considered a personal “ecstatic” spiritual experience was infused with a profound sense of the Sacred.

Twilight can be warm (not my favorite years), can be wet (less favorite), can be very cold (fitting for the work), but for sure while my spirits are always revived, invariably I get tired --- bone-deep tired. This year, confronted with the challenge of “holding the space” for the closing of the visioning ritual, I inwardly sighed and wondered how to contain/direct/keep focused the energy of so many people having such potentially profound experiences for a significant period of time…..

My tool of choice is the drum. So I drummed a heartbeat. And I drummed, and I drummed and I drummed --- and sang. It made perfect sense to me at the time --- few words, simple tune.

We are One

With the Soul

Of the Earth

Mother Earth.*

At first, I felt all my trained magical and physical muscles kick in, and then they began to quiver with strain (the drum is not small), and mentally I was continuously checking in with the groups of people coming in to the closing space, watching the energy, listening for “issues”. Moving with the energy into and out of the various rooms --- I was doing what I considered to be my Job that evening. The folk were there, imminently present in the space and the moments as the chain of that ritual formed link by link…..and I drummed, and we sang. And time became a blur --- until my muscles reminded me that I was human, standing, drumming for what seemed like hours and my back and neck and shoulders were singing a protest song. What to do? Common sense said take a break (I did relinquish the drum for a time) but I was uneasy about taking a breather and losing the tenuous harmony that had formed in the closing space --- both inside where it was warm, and outside where the stars danced and more of the Folk were singing. So instead, I took a breath.

The Camel Clan had a wee space in the corner of the room where they were practicing some breath work and some poses, people were doing physical and energy work on each other, profound support was pouring from those overflowing to those in need --- and in a clear moment of increasingly blurred vision, I Saw that the tapestry was not of human weaving; that the perception of my Job that night was nothing but my ego speaking --- the entire concept of containing, directing, and focusing that night’s work was ego --- and nothing more. The pain in my back and shoulders continued to increase, and I fought to ignore it. And I drummed, and we sang. And finally the pain said to me “sit and breathe”, so, slumping down the support pillar, my back resting against it, I continued to drum and to sing and to breathe --- and with a tear of exhaustion, I released the need to succeed, to control the environment, to “manage” the energy of the closing space…I could no longer contain what wasn’t mine to begin with.

(photos by Tchipakkan)

I breathed --- and felt the plants and the trees and the mountain and the stars and all the Folk breathing along. The drummed heartbeat, maintained for, oh, 5+ hours or so, beat whether I struck the drum with a feather touch or an earnest stroke or at all as my fingers had cramped around the antler beater. The song was now a whisper on my dry lips, and yet the Music flowed without effort. The tiny spiral of twinkle lights arranged on the floor whispered of continuity, of intent, of progression and creation --- a spiral dance that we’d danced year after year as a Community.

We had Gathered. We had remembered. And the Pattern Endures.


*We are One With the Soul of the Earth, © 1981, Andras Corban-Arthen

the most ordinary magic

by Sarah Twichell

I spent last week at my family’s cabin on the St. Lawrence Seaway. It has a tiny kitchen with an electric stove whose best quality is that it functions, and the running water isn’t potable, but it’s beautiful – for me, almost archetypically so. I woke up every morning to the boughs of a pine tree outside my bedroom windows, and they’re the same ones I’ve seen every morning up here since I was old enough to get a separate bedroom from my sister. When it is cloudy, as it is today, the water looks flat and grey in a particular way that is completely familiar to me. When it is sunny, I know exactly how it sparkles. Although I have no sense of direction normally, in this place, the knowledge of which way is north is as sure as a compass. In short, this place is one of my homes, a landscape so familiar that it feels burned into my heart.

From my office, I often take a walk at lunch, up behind an office building and past a river, then around to see a pond on the other side of the road. I count swans and kayaks. This, too, is familiar: the house with the gate like a tree branch, the spot where the men play chess on the hood of a car, the place where there’s a lilac whose blossoms hang over the road in May.

This is the most ordinary magic in the world: our feet cross a place over and over – whether it’s most days for a year or most years for decades – and slowly, we come to belong to that place. We don’t need any special techniques or well-honed skills, or any traditions other than those we make ourselves. In a world where things move quickly and it’s easy to feel adrift, this is how we make places where we feel rooted, connected, grounded. And as we return to these places, we return to our own inner quiet, to a measured motion as reliable as the turning of a clock or a monk praying liturgical hours. To ourselves.

On Twilight Covening

by Irene Jericho

[Ed.note: Irene Jericho attended our Twilight Covening gathering in October this year for the first time. With her kind permission, we are posting an account she wrote about it, since she captures so clearly and beautifully the deeply transformative environment which our community has so carefully crafted from our collective spiritual experiences over the past two-and-a-half decades. Irene is the frontwoman of the Pagan operatic metal band Cassandra Syndrome, and co-chair of the Shenandoah Midsummer Festival in Winchester, VA.]


This is for the Pagans, or those of you who have been curious about some of the Pagan stuff I do. Everyone else, these are not the droids you're looking for.

This past weekend (Friday-Monday), I attended Twilight Covening in Massachusetts for the first time. It's a four day spiritual retreat for those on the Pagan path and this past Covening was its 25th year.

There are a lot of things from this past weekend that I'm still processing and am not ready to talk about yet. Maybe I never will be. Some things there are no words for. So what I'm going to try to do is tell you about the space, the environment that Twilight creates and envelops you in. Perhaps that will be enough to give you an idea of what's happening up North.

Imagine four days of ritual space. The ritual begins in the evening on Friday, when everyone arrives. The initial circle is formed, the energy spreads out. And the energy... There are around 200 people there. Every single one is there because they have chosen to devote four days to intense spiritual, emotional and psychological work. Imagine ritual space infused by the focus of our most committed practitioners. And that those committed practitioners stand to the right and left of you, holding your hands.

Now we add to that. That ritual space is constantly actively held. At all times, a Clan (usually 6-18 people) is actively concentrating on maintaining the spiritual connection of the space. They lend their energy to help your connection, to help you focus, to help you on your path. At. All. Times. Night or day, you are energetically guarded, enhanced and protected by a team of dedicated energy workers. Even while you sleep, they help you stay attuned.

Now we add to that. Everyone is there because they want to work as hard as you do. Everyone is there because they are actively trying to improve themselves, to heal, to connect, to grow. So everyone you talk to is sharing a lot of the same things you are going through. Everyone there wants you to succeed. The people you interact with honor your trust. They listen when you share your insecurities, your fears, your weaknesses, and do not trivialize or brush off. Instead, they try to find ways to help you. They pray and laugh and weep with you. They help you find ways to lower your shields and to reach out in ways you didn't know you could.

Now we add to that. Your specific Clan is even closer to your own path. Clans are small--the largest I saw was maybe 18 people. They are led by one or two facilitators--some of the most accomplished Priests and Priestesses our tribe has to offer. The Clan you are in is specific in its focus. The people closest to you not only share your goal of working on your spirituality, but they share some of the specifics of that goal. You eat, sleep and work with your Clan. You share and learn from each other. You hold each other while you cry, you raise energy together, you joyously witness the steps each Clan member takes forward because you know just how hard they were to take. You've been taking those steps yourself.

Now we add to that. The space that you are in is breathtaking in natural beauty. You're on top of a mountain in the Berkshires. There is no light pollution, so the sky at night is a sea of stars. The trees are in a full autumnal riot of color and their vibrant tones are reflected in the lake. There are boulders and tall pines, towering oaks and birds singing. There are spaces for quiet reflection, there are spaces for intimate conversation, there are spaces for group work. There are even spaces for silliness. Mirth, after all, is the counterpoint to Reverence.

These words can only capture a fragment of what that space feels like. I wish I could give you the memory of that feeling. I wish I could cover the world with it.

So, I guess what I'm trying to say is that you should go. If you're on the Pagan path, if you're working on your spirituality, Go. Set aside those days for next year now. Start setting aside the money now. Go. Please Go. You probably need this as much or more than I did. And I needed it. I needed it the way a rose needs the sunlight.

Go to Twilight with me next year. Our tribe has built something beautiful in Massachusetts. You should feel it, too.

A Call for Solidarity on 9/11

from the Board of Trustees
Council for a Parliament of the World’s Religions

As the anniversary of 9/11 approaches, there are competing views about the meaning of these tragic events.

Across the interreligious movement, there is deep distress about the intentions of some to identify the Muslim tradition, and the Muslim community, as the villains, rather than a few radical individuals. Unfortunately, too many in the United States know little about the true aims of Islam, nor do they know that Islam is fundamentally a religion of peace and human solidarity and that the majority of Muslims around the world are peace-loving citizens who unequivocally condemn terrorism in the name of religion.

Regrettably, recent opposition to the building of mosques and community centers in several cities has led to violence against Muslims and the desecration of their sacred texts. Burning that which others hold sacred is an act calculated to spark anger and fuel violence. We believe that such actions are unworthy of our nation and stand outside the shared values of our traditions which call for mutual respect and harmony.

Trustees of the Council for a Parliament of the World’s Religions call upon people of faith, spirit and goodwill from all traditions to use the solemn occasion of this 9/11 anniversary to reaffirm our commitment to building a better world for our children and grandchildren, and to affirm our solidarity with the Muslim community in this country and around the world.

In this spirit, we offer this Call for Solidarity:

On this 9/11 weekend, we invite all persons and communities of faith, spirit and goodwill everywhere to lift up their prayers, voices and thoughts to spark a new attitude and sense of urgency, and to enkindle a different flame:

• a spark that will ignite in us again the impetus to bring comfort to those who lost loved ones on that terror-filled day, and in the violent conflicts and wars that followed from it;

• a spark that will ignite in us again to stand calmly and firmly against the forces of violence, distrust, hostility and cruelty;

• a spark that will ignite in us again to stand with those who find themselves on the margins of our society – the homeless and those losing their homes, the documented and undocumented immigrant, the unemployed and financially insecure;

• a spark that will ignite in us again the commitment to seek healing and reconciliation at home and abroad, in the cause of justice and peace.

In whatever ways that are in keeping with our individual and unique sacred traditions, we issue a call to stand together this weekend of September 10 – 12 in order to quench the fires of hatred and violence in our nation and our world, and to become aflame for the cause of a truly “beloved community.”


The Board of Trustees
Council for a Parliament of the World's Religions

Report on Current Travels in Europe

by Andras Corban Arthen

During last December’s Parliament of the World’s Religions in Melbourne, Jonas Trinkunas ­­--- the head of the Romuva pagan religion of Lithuania, whom I had invited to attend the Parliament as one of the Indigenous speakers --- reciprocated by inviting me to speak at a Congress of European Ethnic Religions which he had founded a dozen years previously, and which was to be held in August in Bologna, Italy. Jonas also very kindly invited me to participate in a Romuva camp which would take place in the Lithuanian countryside about two weeks before the Congress.

I consulted with the EarthSpirit Board, and everyone thought it would be important for me to attend these events; after checking the books, we found that there were enough funds in the interfaith budget to finance the trip.

Then, this past spring, Kusumita Pedersen --- a friend and colleague on the Parliament’s Board of Trustees --- told me of some people she had met while participating in the annual United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues in New York. Kusumita said they ran an NGO based in Torino (Turin) which consults with the U.N. on Indigenous concerns, and that as part of one of their presentations which she attended, they talked a great deal about the Indigenous European traditions (“they sounded just like you,” she told me). This raised some interesting possibilities, given that I was already planning to attend the Congress in Bologna. Later on, while talking with my old friend Phyllis Curott, who has taught in Italy several times, she suggested that I should meet some of her friends and students there, and kindly put me in touch with them.

So, little by little, my trip has taken shape: Boston to Dublin, to do research for a couple of days at Trinity College. Then on to Vilnius and several days at the Romuva camp out in the country, followed by a return to Vilnius to testify on Romuva’s behalf with the Deputy Mayor for cultural affairs in their effort to secure government support for office/meeting space in the city. Then off to Copenhagen for a one-day stop to do some research at the Nationalmuseet. From there a brief stop in Milan, followed by a train ride to Torino to meet with the heads of the Ecospirituality Foundation. Then a train to Rome and a meeting with local pagans, and, finally, the conference in Bologna before returning home.

I am in Europe now (in Bologna, to be precise), though it’s very difficult to write more extensively on EarthSpirit Voices from here, given that I’m not staying in any one place very long and that it’s sometimes difficult to find good and accessible Internet connections. I will be publishing a full report of my activities here as soon as I am able, though it may have to wait until I’m back in the States.

The Revival of the European Pagan Religions

by Andras Corban Arthen

As it has been previously noted in these pages, within the global interreligious movement that has evolved since the first Parliament of the World’s Religions was held in Chicago, pagans have typically been placed in the category of New Religious Movements, which roughly applies to religions that have emerged since the middle of the 19th century. This would seem to be, surely, the most appropriate category for the neopagan and reconstructionist groups that make up the greater part of modern paganism, since their existence does not appear to go further back than the early 1950s.

For thirty-some years, however, I have been trying to make the case throughout the interfaith movement that some forms of paganism --- namely, the very few remaining survivals of ethnic European spiritual traditions --- more properly belong in the category of Indigenous Religions. My arguments, and others’ similar arguments, have mostly fallen on deaf ears --- both pagan and non-pagan alike --- for various reasons which make it a lot more convenient for many people to believe that no such survivals exist at all.

For Christians, for example, an acknowledgment that the original pagan traditions were not completely wiped out opens the door to the unpleasant possibility that they may, finally, have to deal with the genocidal horrors which Christianity inflicted on Indigenous peoples throughout the world. Outside of Europe, the blame for such heinous acts --- when they are even acknowledged --- has conveniently been attributed to chiefly secular motives, such as excessive nationalistic ambitions and economic greed, which obscure their actual, fundamental aim and rationale. When the Christian colonization of Europe is factored in, however, it becomes a lot harder to camouflage the theologically-justified goal of creating a vast religious empire, which continued to be the foundation for most subsequent Christian European colonization elsewhere. But if no trace of the original European pagan traditions were to survive, the motivation to open that painful door becomes less compelling, and the comforting obliviousness of the status quo can remain untouched.

For many North American Indians, the prospect of the continued existence of Indigenous European traditions is often met with decidedly mixed feelings. On the one hand, the survival of some of those traditions after more than fifteen-hundred years of Christian colonization could be taken as a hopeful sign for their own survival, not to mention the new allies they are likely to gain among the keepers of such practices. On the other hand, American Indians have had so much taken from them by “white people” that a lot of them can understandably react with suspicion and even resentment in the face of such a prospect, especially if it can in any way take some of the focus away from their own struggles to preserve what is left of their cultures.

And, ironically, many neopagans themselves are extremely resistant to the notion that ethnic forms of European paganism have survived into the present. For them, this raises fears of delegitimization, of marginalization, of power trips: given the contentious history of the modern pagan movement, this reaction is not very surprising.

Be that as it may, after all the years of trying to convince people in the interfaith movement, last December in Melbourne, for the first time ever, the Parliament of the World’s Religions finally included the surviving European ethnic spiritual traditions in the same category as other Indigenous religions from around the world, a very significant step which could pave the way to many interesting possibilities.

As I mentioned in an earlier article, when given the task of organizing the European components for the Parliament’s Indigenous Task Force programs, I invited krivis Jonas Trinkunas, the head of the traditional Romuva pagan religion of Lithuania, to be one of the featured speakers. Lithuania was one of the last European countries to be Christianized, and its history and cultural makeup have combined in a way that has allowed paganism to survive there to a degree that may be unsurpassed anywhere else in Europe. In Melbourne, Jonas and I offered a presentation together, entitled “The Revival of the European Pagan Religions,” which was meant to address some of the various key elements in the survival of Indigenous European spirituality.


Jonas, along with his son-in-law Artūras Sinkeviĉius, opened the program by singing a Lithuanian daina, one of several thousand traditional folksongs from their homeland that are imbued with mystical and religious meanings. Jonas discussed the role of the dainas in ethnic Lithuanian paganism, as the most important vehicle for spiritual transmission across the generations. He then went on to talk about the history of Romuva, and about the various factors that enabled Lithuanian paganism to survive into the modern era --- preserved clandestinely or disguised as “folklore” --- despite intense opposition and suppression by both the Catholic Church and the Soviet Union.

I spoke then about the traditional practices from the Gàidhealtachd (the Gaelic-speaking culture of Scotland) which I received from my teachers back in the late 1960s; of my eventual realization that such practices represented the rare survival of a very old, non-Christian form of spirituality; and of my subsequent search, both in Europe and throughout the European diaspora, for similar surviving traditions.

Then Jonas and I took turns describing some of the commonalities that are found among most of the European traditions, as well as some of the important differences, particularly between Eastern and Western Europe (rural focus, preservation of old tongues, animistic vs. polytheistic approaches, etc.) Our presentation was very well received, and was cited in a very good article on the Parliament which appeared in the Summer 2010 issue of Parabola magazine.

There’s obviously a whole lot more that could be said about all this, though EarthSpirit Voices is probably not the best format through which to convey it. I have now presented a two-hour talk/slide show/film entitled “The ‘Indians’ of Old Europe” several times in the last couple of years, and it looks like I will be turning it into a book. I am also planning a series of trips to various parts of Europe to meet with keepers of surviving Indigenous traditions, though when and where that happens will depend on what kind of funding we are able to raise for the purpose.

I hope that the door which we managed to crack open at the Melbourne Parliament will gradually widen and that the surviving Indigenous pagan religions of Europe will finally be able to shed their mantle of invisibility, not only as a way to insure their continued existence, but also because of the particular wisdom, values and perspectives which they are able to impart.

[ Ed.note: Andras will be offering his talk on The “Indians” of Old Europe on Sunday, September 12 as part of The EarthSpirit Community’s “Sacred Lands” Open Houses at Glenwood Farm in Western Mass. For more information, go to http://www.earthspirit.com/openhouse/index.html ]

Voicing my Gratitude

Sunrise at Rites of Spring, May 2010

Voicing my Gratitude
by Anya

I have fallen hard for you guys. Although words will never be enough to express the gratitude I feel to you for the experience which you shared with me, this is to give you a slight idea. I love you.

If I’m to begin at the beginning, then I am to speak of the city, the running around, breaking into houses, chasing fuel for the flame and constantly going on fast forward. The beginning is the journey to the place which is a beginning of its own.

I entered The Place walking through a gate, surrounded by a cloud of sage. I tied an intention, took a deep breath, and stepped through.

Three fires were lit, bright as the sun, shooting fireflies into the air. We sang, and as the rhythm of the drums moved our bodies, we danced. The sky lit up, and with silent lightning it illuminated the joy on our faces. We carried the flame together, singing it alive, first to the ritual fire and then to the fire circle. The drums beat, and again losing all inhibitions, we danced. We let the world go, we became the world, we danced. Your songs pierced my soul, while your motion captivated me, and I fell into the world of which I have always dreamed.

We danced, until the moon no longer outshone the stars. We danced, until our feet became tattooed with the rhythm of the drums. And then I slept, a peaceful sleep to the chirping of birds and the rustling of trees. I slept deep, hugging close the magic which you have helped me feel.

I listened close to the place you have created, to the connections that you amplified between earth and sky, fire and water. After breakfast I went exploring. I walked around the ground, which you have decorated with intention, taking in the space I was lucky enough to occupy. I climbed a rock, I faced the water, and I breathed; watching, listening, being, I breathed and I was thankful to be alive, to be here, to be.

Time was no longer linear. Six sunrises followed three nights, sleep felt like a waste of life, and shoes began to feel like an unnecessary barrier. I tuned in, I let my roots sink deep into the soil, and with every sunrise I experienced a different state of ecstasy. When I thought I couldn’t dance any longer, you drummed harder, you danced stronger, you sang louder. You charged me with your energy and all I wanted to do was to give back, to be able to give you the enjoyment and fulfillment you have given me.

We raised a May Pole, we wove a web, we connected to each other, often without words. I have never met so many people brave enough to look me in the eyes. You taught me how to breathe anew. How to breathe the world into my soul, how to breathe so that all which has been pent up can come out, how to breathe myself into euphoria.

When I expressed my wish to fly you let me through another gate, across a bridge, and to a place of magic. Here spirits roamed, beasts explored and the air crackled. Here I was transformed, and here I learned to fly. I learned not to be afraid of the woods.

You shared with me your soul through your artwork, through your music, though your dance, through your laughter, through your love, through your beautiful voice. You reached out to me and let me reach back to you. Beneath the stars you helped me dance with fire, hearing its silent roar engulf me as I spun and you sang, or played, or watched. You reminded me how important it is to smile. You thanked me for being myself, and I want to thank you for being.