Posts Tagged ‘Pagan’

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News & Submissions 3/12/2010

Friday, March 12th, 2010

Syracuse University’s newest chaplain is pagan priestess Mary Hudson
Hudson earlier this month became the 11th chaplain on the Hendricks staff, taking her place among representatives of more mainstream faiths like Episcopalianism, Roman Catholicism and Buddhism. Read full story from blog.syracuse.com

Pow wow marketing 101
If these events are well-attended, dancers feel a greater sense of appreciation, tribal members feel honored and vendors stand to make more profit. If these events have a low turnout the collective self-esteem of the tribe may suffer, vendors may have difficulty making ends meet and the outside public cannot benefit from the richness of learning about American Indian culture. Read full story from indiancountrytoday.com

Court rules “God” in pledge, on money, okay
A ruling by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals today rejected arguments that the word “God” or phrase “In God We Trust” violate the separation of church and state. Read full story from stl.com

Lesbian teen back at school after prom flap
JACKSON, Miss. – Constance McMillen didn’t believe her Mississippi school district would really call off her senior prom rather than allow her to show up with her girlfriend and wear a tuxedo. Read full story from msnbc.com

Man finds tombstones in basement of Triangle home
A man helping ready a Triangle home for the rental market found two tombstones in its basement Wednesday.

For the last week, Edward Grogg has been doing handy work at the a one-story home on Triangle Street, helping landlord Elliot Diamond get the 60-year-old house ready to be rented again, after two “unfavorable” tenants abruptly left with little notice two weeks ago. Read full story from starexponent.com

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News & Submissions 3/11/2010

Thursday, March 11th, 2010

Satan worshipers possible suspects in Simon slaying
UTICA —The last hours of Kimberly Simon’s life in 1985 were likely spent with a group of young men who worshiped the devil, tortured cats, used hallucinogenic drugs and sexually abused women, according to investigators who have been probing her homicide for the past 16 months. Read full story from uticaod.com

Court ruling says Amish farmers exempt from livestock registration rules
NEILLSVILLE, Wis (WSAU) A central Wisconsin judge says an Amish farmer does not have to register his livestock premise with the state, as required by a five-year-old law. Emanuel Miller Junior of Loyal said the law violates his religious beliefs. And in a ruling yesterday, Clark County Circuit Judge Jon Counsell said the state failed to prove that its need to protect food safety and animal health could not be achieved by adopting something less restrictive. Read full story from wsau.com

Air Force Academy chaplain convinces Catholic League to end call for probe
The Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights has called off its Feb. 3 demand for a congressional probe of the U.S. Air Force Academy in response to a perceived insult to Christians. Read full story from denverpost.com

ICWA: Individual and tribal survival at stake
RAPID CITY, S.D. – Children, grandchildren, and tribal nations – enrollment and inclusion can spell collective survival, because “Every tribe is one generation away from cultural and political extinction,” according to Maylinn Smith, a law professor. Read full story from indiancountrytoday.com

Ore. faith-healers sentenced to prison for son’s death
OREGON CITY, Ore. — The judge who sentenced a couple to prison yesterday for the death of their son says members of their church must quit relying on faith-healing when their children’s lives are at stake.Read full story from firstamendmentcenter.org

‘Archaeology’: Priestess tomb unearthed on Crete
An unearthed tomb on Crete reveals a dynasty of priestesses reigned on the isle during the “Dark Ages” of ancient Greece. Read full story from usatoday.com

Barking up the wrong sacred tree
Pagans on the whole are a fairly interesting if occasionally goofy set of folks – whereas I’m just sour-tempered and my car is ugly and smashed into the backyard fence at a comical angle on a bed of empty beer cans. By comparison, “occasionally goofy” isn’t a bad thing at all. Most of the “goofy” part comes via the names the pagans adopt to replace their given names. Read full story from theday.com

Reservist feels vindicated after state declines charges in beating
The Rev. Alexios Marakis of Greece said he was beaten bloody with a tire iron after asking the reservist for directions near downtown Tampa. Read full story from tbo.com

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News & Submissions 3/9/2010

Tuesday, March 9th, 2010

The New Paganism
As many commentators and “global warming skeptics” have observed, climate science has metamorphosed into a religion—or, more accurately, a cult in religious dress. It has its high priests (Al Gore, David Suzuki, James Hansen, Rajendra Pachauri), its sacred texts such as computer models whose inconsistencies and disparities are blithely ignored by the myriads of true believers, its prevailing orthodoxies that cannot safely be questioned or violated, and its Second Ecumenical Council of the Global Warming Vatican (after Kyoto), known as the Copenhagen Climate Conference. Carbon taxes resemble the traffic in Indulgences during the Medieval era as energy sinners buy absolution from a profiteering clergy. A divinity called Gaia now receives the prayers and invocations of a vast sodality of devout worshippers. The new religion is here, a resurgent faith, as George Will writes, “in man-made global warming [which] is now a tissue of assertions impervious to evidence.” Read full story from frontpagemag.com

Funeral Flap: Justices Weigh Religion, Speech Rights
The Supreme Court agreed Monday to delve into the sensitive question of whether the First Amendment protects anti-gay protesters carrying placards outside military funerals, bearing “America is Doomed,” “Thank God for 9/11″ and other volatile slogans, like “Thank God for dead soldiers.” Read full story from wired.com

3 Va. tribes gain state recognition
RICHMOND, Va. – The Virginia Indian Patawomeck Tribe has ended a 16-year battle for state recognition in the Commonwealth of Virginia. Approximately one week after an appearance by Patawomeck tribal member and entertainer Wayne Newton, the Virginia House and Senate approved HJ 150 granting the tribe state recognition and a seat on the Virginia Council on Indians. Read full story from indiancountrytoday.com

Teen to wed schoolgirl in pagan ceremony
A TEENAGER plans to marry a schoolgirl in a pagan ceremony next month with the bride’s mother officiating.

Using a simple length of rope, Alex Stewart-Pole and Jenni Birch will become partners for “a year and a day” through the ancient ritual. A handfasting can then be renewed for the same or a longer period. Read full story from southern-star.whereilive.com

Dowsers hold divining workshop
The Canadian Society of Questers, a group that promotes the ancient art of divining, will hold their spring conference at the agricultural college north of Calgary from May 14-17 and hope to open the minds of skeptics. Read full story from calgarysun.com

500 butchered in Nigeria killing fields
Dozens of bodies lined the dusty streets of three Christian villages in northern Nigeria yesterday. Other victims of Sunday morning’s Muslim rampage were jammed into a local morgue, the limbs of slaughtered children tangled in a grotesque mess. Read full story from timesonline.co.uk

Nail from Christ’s crucifixion found?
The four-inch long nail is thought to be one of thousands used in crucifixions across the Roman empire Read full story from telegraph.co.uk

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News & Submissions 3/8/2010

Monday, March 8th, 2010

Occult funeral for drug addict killed in ritual
A pagan rocker died at his drug-den farmhouse after a witchcraft ritual went nightmarishly wrong. Read full story from belfasttelegraph.co.uk

National Women’s History Project’s 30th anniversary brings new emphasis on women in history
Used to be, a woman had to wield a sharp instrument to get any respect in history class. Until the late 1970s, those who got the most ink in school textbooks were Betsy Ross, the widowed upholsterer who is said to have sewn the first American flag in 1776, and Carrie Nation, the hatchet-wielding, Bible-thumping temperance activist who broke up saloons in the early 1900s. Read full story from nj.com

Office Depot Foundation honors Navajo code talkers
BOCA RATON, Fla. – The Office Depot Foundation – the independent, nonprofit foundation that serves as the primary charitable giving arm of Office Depot – has recognized the legendary Navajo code talkers with the organization’s highest honor: the “Listen Learn Care Award.” Read full story from indiancountrytoday.com

He Who Casts the First Stone
Some protesters, mostly young men in their teens and early 20s, wore black hoodies and military fatigues. The men, Amarillo would soon learn, were foot soldiers of Repent Amarillo, a new, militant evangelical group that advertises itself as “the Special Forces of spiritual warfare.” Their leader, David Grisham, a security guard at nuclear-bomb facility Pantex who moonlights as a pastor, explained the action. “We’re here to shine the light on this darkness,” Grisham told the Amarillo Globe-News. “I don’t think Amarillo knew about this place. This is adultery. This is wrong. There’s no telling how many venereal diseases get spread, how many abortions.” The goal, Grisham says, was not just to save the swingers’ souls, but to shut the club down. Read full story from texasobserver.com

Did Saint Patrick banish snakes from Irleand?
Legend has it that St. Paddy stood on a hilltop, dressed in his formal green attire, and waved his staff to herd all the slithering creatures into the sea, expelling them from the Emerald Isle forever. And low and behold, there hasn’t been a snake seen in Ireland since 461 AD (expect for the odd household pet and zoo creature). Read full story from irishcentral.com

Submitted Story: Vancouver Island Poltergeist
The following submitted personal story is about what happened to Karen M. Her encounter with a poltergeist was far more noisier than a typical ghostly knock. Sounding like “10 people with long sticks pounding the walls“, Karen’s poltergeist encounter has haunted her all these years. Read full story from ghosttheory.com

The Rosary of the Unborn
If you’re a Catholic and want to fight abortion, there is a NEW and POWERFUL method for you to combat abortion — and it doesn’t require explosives! That’s right, for a limited time only, you too can purchase a special rosary to ask Mary to stop those evil abortionists: Read full story from unreasonablefaith.com

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News & Submissions 3/7/2010

Sunday, March 7th, 2010

Double, double fun and bubbles
Nobody’s getting burned at the stake. No one’s flying around the Benicia Clocktower on a broom. And there won’t likely be a curse cast on anyone questioning the admission charge. Read full story from timesheraldonline.com

Witches brew up a ball at Benicia Clocktower
“The Witches’ Ball is basically a celebration. They’re traditionally held around Halloween, but we decided it’d be much more fun to have a springtime Witches’ Ball,” said JoHanna White, president of sponsoring organization the Pagan Alliance. Read full story from timesheraldonline.com

Organization meeting set to explain pre-Christian pagan religion
Chant, of Rapid City, is hosting an organizational meeting for people interested in the teaching and practice of the ancient pre-Christian religion that dominated much of Europe thousands of years ago. Read full story from rapidcityjournal.com

‘Black metal’ movie to be filmed here
Part of Shackleford’s mission in the documentary is to let American imitators of black metal know that the music is inspired by Paganism, not Satan-worship. Read full story from news.cincinnati.com

Top home-school texts dismiss Darwin, evolution
Christian-based materials dominate a growing home-school education market that encompasses more than 1.5 million students in the U.S. And for most home-school parents, a Bible-based version of the Earth’s creation is exactly what they want. Federal statistics from 2007 show 83 percent of home-schooling parents want to give their children “religious or moral instruction.” Read full story from tbo.com

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News & Submissions 3/2/2010

Wednesday, March 3rd, 2010

Modern-day world lost spiritual orientation and sank in “high-tech paganism,” Kusturica believes
“High-tech pagans have invaded the world today. This paganism doesn’t do any good to a human-being. A person today lives under permanent technological control… However, the main difference of modern people is that they lost spiritual orientation. Uniqueness of a human being as God’s image in leveled down in the world today,” the film director said in his interview published by the NG-Religii paper in association with the Spas TV channel. Read full story from interfax-religion.com

Wiccan altar puts teacher, officials at odds
Dale Halferty, who has taught industrial arts at Guthrie Center High School for three years, was placed on paid leave Monday after he acknowledged to district officials that he told the student he could not build the altar in class. Read full story from desmoinesregister.com

Native status may be affected by diversity issues
DENVER – With the advent of an increasingly urban, multiracial country, it’s possible that Indian America will slowly be transformed as well, perhaps following a controversial trajectory toward inclusion in an ethnic American identity. Read full story from indiancountrytoday.com

Fairies take over Norfolk estate
And as the Fairyland Trust gets ready to host its showcase event at Holt Hall, the organisers say they still dream of finding a permanent Norfolk lair for magical creatures and nature lovers. Read full story from northnorfolknews.co.uk

Court refuses to stop D.C. gay marriage law
WASHINGTON – The Supreme Court today refused to block the District of Columbia’s gay marriage law, freeing the city to issue its first marriage licenses to same-sex couples the following day. Read full story from tbo.com

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News & Submissions 2/18/2010

Thursday, February 18th, 2010

Pagan Festivals and much merriment
Pantheacon 2010 was a hot spot for Pagan activities last weekend. We both were amazed at all Pagan wares for sale. It seemed like there was a lot more really beautiful occult supplies and jewels this year.  The costumes and fine clothing were stunning as usual. Always surprising how creative the Pagan culture is. Read full story from examiner.com

Christian Right’s attack on rights
Recently, WallBuilders, Inc., whose founder David Barton has been a guest on Fox’s “Huckabee,” among other venues, filed an amicus brief in a case in the Ninth Circuit. The brief argues that the religion protections of the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution should be limited to Christians or, at most, monotheists because, in the founding era, the word “religion” meant only Christianity or, at most, monotheism. Barton’s history is all wrong. Read full story from washingtonpost.com

The devil’s in the details
“I was appalled by the Satanic image of the devil in the canoe with the shadow over the reddened moon,” writes Dennis from Phoenix, Ariz. “What was that all about? … Is your newspaper getting any blowback on this? Are Canadians talking about it?” Read full story from vancouversun.com

Extreme nationalist brought to court for fiery swastika
The 45-year-old resident of the city Tashtagol did his landscape fire show on May 9 last year – the date of Russia’s national holyday marking the victory over Nazi Germany – which naturally led investigators to suspecting neo-Nazis responsible for the act. Read full story from rt.com

Walsh Library Acquires Collection of Afro-Latin Religious Books and Artifacts
Maureen A. Tilley, Ph.D., professor of theology, has donated various Afro-Latin religious books and artifacts to the Latin American and Latino Institute and William D. Walsh Family Library. Read full story from fordham.edu

Bob Barr’s new Atlanta Journal-Constitution article on Paganism causes a stir
I did not like Bob Barr while he was in office as a Republican. I thought of him as a smug elitist bunghole, a slightly smarter verion of VP Joe Biden. Then he cut ties with his party. Later he joined the ranks of the Libertarian party, the one to which I belong. I found this encouraging. “Pehaps a zebra can change his stripes”, I thought. There were signs in interviews that he had relaxed, become more embracing of individual liberty and the Constitution. After giving the man a chance and voting for him in the Presidential election, one he had no shot at winning, I purposely lost track of him. I had other things on which to focus. Read full story from independentpoliticalreport.com

Discrimination defies any logic
Even on this campus, people are being taken for granted and stereotyped because of their religious beliefs. How is it possible to exclude any set of people without taking away that principle of religious freedom which we ourselves so warmly contend over? If you walk around, dressed in all black from head to toe, people would consider you a Goth (or emo) kid. But do clothes really define you as a person? Do your beliefs really determine your friends? We, as human beings, are so quick to judge one another. We put our brothers and sisters down, we encourage violence, and we choose to not live by the rules. I see so many people who are turned down from jobs, are not able to join organizations, or don’t even get the chance to walk by a group of people because they are judged. Read full story from studentprintz.com

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News & Submissions 2/15/2010

Monday, February 15th, 2010

First Pagan Chaplain Appointed at Syracuse University
This is the first new chaplain since the appointments of the Buddhist and the historically black church chaplains and the 11th chaplain at Hendricks. As a chaplain, Hudson will work at Hendricks two days a week, sponsor community outreaches and be apart of the Chaplains Council. Read full story from virtueonline.org

Mary Daly changed my life
When I heard that Mary Daly had died in early January, I wrote on my Facebook page that she had changed my life. The ferocious theologian was among those writers responsible for the unraveling of my Presbyterian Christianity. I find myself hesitating to write about her, knowing that it means approaching the thick tangle of culture, gender, anger, and God. In that place, scorpions patrol and guard, tails lifted and ready to strike at a misstep in thought, feeling, or choice of words. As the witches say, “Where there’s fear there’s power,” so here I go. Read full story from uuworld.org

Newcomb: ‘Avatar:’ An eye-opener about indigenous peoples
Ever since its release this past December, James Cameron’s blockbuster 3D movie “Avatar” has generated a tremendous amount of discussion. Even the Vatican’s official newspaper, L’Osservatore Romano, stepped into the fray, criticizing “Avatar” because of concerns the movie promoted “nature worship” and “neo-paganism.” Read full story from indiancountrytoday.com

Screamy Window
A PALE young woman appears at the window of a ruined castle – in a photo said to show a GHOST. Read full story from thesun.co.uk

Woman in cross row loses £120,000 battle
A DEVOUT Christian lost her appeal yesterday after being banned from wearing a cross visibly at work. Read full story from dailyrecord.co.uk

ACLU accuses community college instructor of religious indoctrination
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — An instructor at a public community college in Fresno has been presenting his religious views on homosexuality, abortion and global warming as fact to students in an introductory health science class, the American Civil Liberties Union claims. Read full story from poconorecord.com

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News & Submissions 2/11/2010

Thursday, February 11th, 2010

Bewitching plans for 400th anniversary of Pendle witch trials
A YEAR-long programme of events is being proposed to mark the 400th anniversary of the trial and execution of the Pendle witches. Read full story from lancashiretelegraph.co.uk

Scientologists in Haiti: A Firsthand Account
We’ve spoken to someone who traveled to Haiti on a Scientology plane — and witnessed firsthand the ineptitude, quackery and irresponsibility of the church’s minions in a disaster zone. Here’s his account. Read full story from gawker.com

Farewell to the Bodhi Tree Bookstore
The founding owners of the Bodhi Tree Bookstore are dealing with the closure of their L.A. institution as only spiritualists can. “In our best Buddhist sense, we try to incorporate the idea that things always change,” says Phil Thompson, who, along with Stan Madson, opened the Bodhi Tree 40 years ago. Through the years, their cozy Melrose Avenue shop became a nationally known, much beloved center for Buddhists, astrologers, psychics, yogis, swamis, acupuncturists, naturists and others seeking enlightenment. Read full story from laweekly.com

Inside the AFA worship circle
The new Wiccan, Druid and Earth-centered religious worship circle on a mountaintop at the Air Force Academy is equipped with a propane gas hookup for the ritualistic soul-healing fires — just like the worship circles a thousand years ago, when the High Priestess of Babalashadan would stand by the fire and cry out in an enchanted voice, “Lagaz atha cabyolas,” which means, literally, “OK, who brought the marshmallows?” Read full story from csindy.com

Pagans and Politics…Who and What
Having been asked many times what the heck a Pagan is, I’ve sort of distilled it down to some easy sound bites which actually may define most of us. Think of the three-legged stool analogy; here are the legs of the stool, in no particular order. First, Pagans believe that the Sacred Divine (note: no gender implied) is too enormous to fit into any single definition comprehensible to we humans. No “old man in the sky”, just something just beyond our grasp, something toward which we each find our own path. Read full story from pagannewswirecollective.com

Valentine’s Day Facts: Gifts, History, and Love Science
Where did Valentine’s Day come from? (Think naked Romans, paganism, and whips.) What does it cost? And why do we fall for it, year after year? Read on. Read full story from nationalgeographic.com

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News & Submissions 2/10/2010

Wednesday, February 10th, 2010

Pagan Spirit Gathering 2010:”Spirals of Spirit and Light”
The Pagan Spirit Gathering (PSG) is one of America’s oldest and largest Nature Spirituality festivals. Since its inception in 1980, PSG has been bringing together hundreds of people from throughout the United States, plus other countries, to create community, celebrate Summer Solstice, and commune with Nature in a sacred environment. Sponsored by Circle Sanctuary, PSG is open to long-time practitioners as well as newcomers of a wide range of Nature religion traditions, including Wiccan, Contemporary Pagan, Druidic, Heathen, Celtic, Baltic, Greco-Roman, Isian, Shamanic, Hermetic, Animistic, Egyptian, Native American, Afro-Carribean, Taoist, Pantheistic, Ecofeminist, and Nature Mystic. PSG is an opportunity for personal renewal, networking, education, and cultural enrichment. Get more details at circlesanctuary.org

Valentine’s Day: Ancient Festival of Sexual Frenzy
Valentine’s Day has its roots in ancient orgiastic festivals. On February 14, The Romans celebrated Febris (meaning fever), a sacred sexual frenzy in honor of Juno Februa, an aspect of the goddess of amorous love. This sex fest coincided with the time when the birds in Italy were thought to mate. Read full story from huffingtonpost.com

Haiti calls on voodoo priests to help battered nation heal
MARIANI, Haiti – To the outside world, their faith has long been shrouded in mystery, ministering as much to the dead as the living, and associated with images of animal sacrifices and human skulls. Read full story from boston.com

Television: Producer seeks stories from around the province to be featured on paranormal documentary series
Among his many projects, including the critically acclaimed The Border, Dennis is also producer of Ghostly Encounters, a paranormal documentary series shown on Viva, the W Network and A&E Biography. Last Wednesday found him in the city scouting for studio space to present some East Coast stories for the show’s fourth season, which will begin airing in September. Read full story from telegraphjournal.canadaeast.com

Stunningly Preserved 165-Million-Year-Old Spider Fossil Found
Scientists have unearthed an almost perfectly preserved spider fossil in China dating back to the middle Jurassic era, 165 million years ago. The fossilized spiders, Eoplectreurys gertschi, are older than the only two other specimens known by around 120 million years. Read full story from wired.com

Hindu healer wins funeral pyre battle
It took four years of complex legal wrangling, nearly bankrupted an ailing Hindu guru and has cost the tax-payer tens of thousands of pounds. But in the end open air cremations were legal all along. Read full story from independent.co.uk

Midnight In Savannah – Ghosts,Ghost Hunters, Psychics and Paranormal

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