Religious Intollerance

I have given myself a few days to calm down after receiving an email from a family member. Fortunately, not blood family, but an add-on. If it were blood family, I don’t know what I would have done. As it is I hardly have any contact with “it” anyway and from now I definitely won’t want anything to do with them as they have just proved to me that narrow mindedness is catching.

The email in question started off innocently enough, telling me what they were up to for the Easter weekend. And then, unexpectedly, the following was inserted into the email:

to day until 2 morrow we fast for our heathen foreign families praying they dont die and burn in hell ........ then have communion and chomp a few hot - x - buns to break the fast after the easter service.

And I think to myself – in the words of Marcus – WTF? Where in all the world did that comment come from? What prompted it at all? Did add-on family member and its wife eventually lose their minds and join a cult of some sort? Never in my wildest dreams have I ever said anything about their religion, about my own beliefs, or anything of the sort...

I think they must have because I have NEVER in my life had anyone, even jocular, say anything to me like that. My outrage is genuinely beyond words. What makes me shake my head is that they are Rice Christians – do you know what Rice Christians are? – they “converted” to Christianity to have a white church wedding a few years ago.

At first it was jocular and then in the end, all the dogma sank in. We thought, fantastic, good for them. Fabulous thing to do, get religion, some direction. They have been after all, been living in “sin” and suddenly, once they got engaged and went to church, oops, no sex, sorry. Only for married people. They got married in a hair raising “halleluja” service. She looked lovely in her dress though. And the food was nice. She did swear like a trooper at the party and danced like a mynead. He just leered all the girls and regretted his choice of getting hitched.

Then, they started going to church, for real. Then of course they started on us. Come to church, blah blah. We never took them up on any of their offers. I grew up in a highly Christian household and after 24 years of going to church 3 times a week, teaching Sunday School and singing in the choir, and belonging and running the church youth group, I have had enough. I now believe what I believe, I am a searcher and have read tonnes of books on theology, mysticism, gnostic gospels and everything else I could lay my hands on as I was trying to find something that resonated better than an angry god that hated women, that encouraged bloodshed and did nothing to stop the wars raging across the world. I can form my own opinions now, thank you very much, I don’t need some pretend-priest of some scattered branch of some obscure fragment of a denomination to preach at me and tell me if I don’t repent, I will burn in hell, that as a woman I am worth less than a man and that all we are good for is to support our “men” and be good wives, tending to our many children as birth control is a sin.

And now this email! After a few other veiled comments like this: “maybe you should go to church sometimes, pray for your souls”, I think, said add-on family member can go and fly a kite in a thunderstorm. And the funniest thing is, sober they are religious and don’t swear and behave relatively normally (and listen to nice church approved music) but give them a drink and by the gods, they are back to their old ways, as easy as that, drinking, swearing and smoking and carousing. Rice Christians, they are a funny lot. I am so glad I haven't seen them in almost five years. I don't think I would be able to control myself if I ever had to see them again.

Triskelion Spell - To Protect a Traveller

This spell is to protect you on your travels.

Background:

The word "triskelion" comes from the Greek language and means "three legged". It is a very old symbol that has been ascribed many meanings through the ages and that is inevitably bound up with the mysterious nature of triplicities.

How to cast the spell:

One pale blue candle, 15 - 20 cm in length

Matches/lighter

One small single scallop shell, drilled

One fine paintbrush

One tube of vermillion paint

One length of 60cm cord

Timing - cast on a waxing moon and on a Sunday, sacred to the sun.

Casting the spell:

• Cast a circle
• Light the candle saying:

"Hermes of the skies

Hermes the traveller

Look well upon (insert name)

That they are hale going out

And hale coming in."

• Paint on the inside of the scallop shell the outline of a triskelion.
• Sit in the centre of the circle with the upturned shell in your upturned right palm, which should be placed over your upturned left palm. Close your eyes and visualise the triskelion you have painted spinning clockwise, faster and faster until it is a blur.
• When you are ready, blow onto the shell with your breath to bless it with power of air. When the paint dries, threat it with the chord and dip it into natural saltwater at the earliest opportunity.
• The triskelion pendant should be worn around the neck of those who would call on its protective powers.

Witchy Con in retrospect...

Ralph on the far left with Audrey on the far right

Hello fellow crafters

This Saturday past - 1st April - saw the second Witchy Con take place at Wantage in Oxfordshire.

We arrived early enough, got parking and made our way to the Civic Hall where we were met by smiling faces and a very calm Judith of New Moon. We registered, got our name badges and our familiars badges and after pausing at the raffles table to admire all the very pretty prizes, we went upstairs for the opening ceremony. Judith is fantastic as a spokes person. She is funny and warm and had everyone smiling as she invited everyone to shop till they dropped and to attend as many of the talks and workshops as they could.

The whole day went well - she cleverly scheduled a lunch break for everyone and no workshops or talks were held during this time. All of the workshops and talks were free, included in the price of £10, which was a bargain.

Marcus and I attended the first talk of the morning by Sally Morningstar on Wiccan Healing. It was a very solemn talk and I genuinely took some new notions away with me. We wandered away to the dealers room, did a quick scout around and I bought two lovely bracelets - one depicting the 22 major arcana tarot cards and the other a sort of a charm bracelet. There weren't many traders in the hall, but they had good quality goodies and of a varied hue, so that really made a good impression. I shot off to listen to the Ralph Harvey talk whilst Marcus scooted off to take some photos of the Tarot workshop.

Wow - Ralph Harvey is such a genuinely knowledgeable gentleman with a keen sense of humour. And the amount of knowledge he has to draw from 52 years in the craft and with his wife and partner, Audrey they have seen so much and have been the catalysts in the world of the Craft for such a long time, that it was a genuine treat to listen to him. He talked lovingly about his history and told interesting antecdotes of his research. He is the author of a book called The Last Bastion - it explores the history of Witchcraft in England and especially in Sussex - the last county in England to embrace Christianity and the first to re-embrace Witchcraft once the Witchcraft Act was repealed in 1951.

We broke for lunch, came back and I sat in on John Dee's talk on Egyptology. A huge, vast and very interesting subject to cover in an hour. He did his best though and had us lapping it up - his style was humourous and jocular but informative. Yet another person to corner in a pub to sit down and talk to for hours.

John Dee

Afterwards I had the good fortune to sit down and chat with Ralph Harvey and his wife and I must say that they were wonderful. Marcus joined me and we sat, like days of old, before our elders, listening to tales told and of their adventures. I asked Ralph if he would ever consider writing his autobiography and he said no, quite vehemently. He went on to explain that so many things have happened in his life, personal and career wise that most people will expect it to be untrue. He launched into a story that had us gasping with laughter, it was so preposterous, yet true, by all accounts as Audrey backed him up on it. We could see that they were a dynamic couple, having got that intrinsic link that true soul partners have, finishing each other's sentences etc. We must have chatted in excess of forty minutes or so and both Marcus and I came away feeling like we have spent time with two very genuine and lovely people. They invited us to stay in touch - something which I think we will do.

Marcus flitted about, in a manly way, posing people for photographs and general making everyone touch up their make-up. I sat in on part of the Anna Franklin talk and too soon the day was over, with Judith closing the day down. Then the real fun started - the raffle! We all crowded around, around 200 of us, waiting to see if we had won anything. Sadly, my strip I bought came nowhere. However, they did a further draw based on our pre-registered badge numbers and I won! I darted forward and chose a Ly de Angelis book called The Quickening. Exciting stuff! We did a last zoom around the traders hall, waved goodbye to Judith and her team and drove home.

It was a good day. It was well attended, but there is scope for more people to attend. The talks I attended were brilliant and I enjoyed them thoroughly. I will definitely be going again next year.

List of traders attending: http://www.witchycon.co.uk/dealers.htm