Buzz Coil: February '09

Driving Audhumla: Victoria Slind-Flor writes about teaching a crone preparation class in her Jan 18 post (that we missed last time), "Hanging out with Freya" The course is for women in their 50s and focuses on a different Goddess each session. The post has pics of priestesses’ crone staffs, an altar to Freya, and women in the crone class quilting. Her Feb. 21 post, "The quintessential techno-Pagan" has a pic from Pantheacon of a priest who used a well-known techie gadget to prompt him during a ritual.

Blog o’Gnosis: "Attention, Pantheacon Shoppers!" calls Anne Hill’s Feb. 19 post in which she writes about the popularity of the badge ribbon she created, which reads, "Ask Me About My Feminist Rage."

Branches Up, Roots Down: In her Feb. 17 post, "blessings,"Deborah Oak writes about the rain ending a California drought that coincided with this years’ Pantheacon. She also writes about a panel discussion and other goings-on at the ‘con.

The Wild Hunt: Thanks to Jason Pitzl-Waters for picking up the info from our post on Cakes for the Queen of Heaven and adding some opinions and info in his Feb. 24 post, "Baking Some New Cakes." Jason also reports on Pantheacon in his Feb. 21 post, "A Preponderance of Post-Pantheacon Ponderings" Check it out for even more of Pantheacon than you see here.

The Village Witch: Byron Ballard’s Feb. 2 post, "We All Come From The Goddess," mentions the "Cakes" class she is leading and her attempts at adapting hymns and prayers (especially of Inanna) "into a more useful form."

At the end of desire: Blogger Inanna, in her Feb. 10 post, "Earth my body, water my blood," compares this Goddess chant to words attributed to Jesus at the Last Supper and which have become part of the Christian Communion. Inanna wonders:

...why Christianity had to assign a central ability and task in the lives of women to their Main Guy and elevate it to the central and supreme sacrifice of the faith. Jesus gets mad props for making this sacrifice; his willingness and generosity are signs of his divinity.But women are the ones who literally give of our body and blood so others might live.
And that gift is one of life begetting life, not one of death begetting life.

House of Inanna: In his Feb. 16 post, "Back Again," Brian Charles writes of a presentation about InannaTantra that he gave at a Love Festival in Budapest. Beginning on Feb. 20 with "Barry Long - a personal reflection on a couple of his tapes", Brian writes several posts exploring sex that, to me, show how messed up our culture still is about sex. Brian’s posts attempt to shed some honest light on the subject and our nakedness.

Gorgon Resurfaces: In her Feb. 13 post, "The Goddess vs. The Dark Night of the Soul" blogger LaughingMedusa tells why she no longer feels that her soul has a dark night; why she is no longer "ashamed of being human nor do I feel repentant...." A provocative post on the Christian God’s "absence" contrasted with Goddess immanence and ending with Goddess words from Abby Willowroot.

Amused Grace: In her Feb. 22 post, "Creative Every Day Update" Thalia Took shows us "little Minoan things," including an altar, that she created for the Sims. In her Feb. 15 post, "As they have always done," she writes about an Archaeology Magazine article discussing the mummy of Egyptian priestess Meresamum. With pics including, as she points out, a stunning (and to me inspiring) visual of the encased mummy about to be moved into a CT scanner. Also don’t miss her beautiful art, posted in Feb. 13,"Labrys"

Necropolis Now:In her Feb. 24 post, "Faeries Wear Boots," Caroline Tully, in a longish and fascinating post, explains various theories of what/who faeries are and how to most easily connect with them.

Peeling a Pomegranate: Blogger Ketzirah Carly’s Feb. 10 post discussed "Shabbat Tzovot" a special Sabbath that her Kohenet (Hebrew priestess) group observes. This Sabbath is related to the Shekhinah and honors "the priestess at the doorway." Carly uses the High Priestess card from the Coleman-Waite Tarot deck to illustrate this post.

Daily Kos: Tara the Antisocial Social Worker continues her Wednesday series, "How a Woman Becomes a Goddess," about Goddess spirituality and political activism on this well-known progressive political blog. Her Feb. 4 diary was on "Santoshi Ma", the Hindu Goddess of contentment who apparently appeared first in the mid-20th century, with comments on a similar situation with Aradia. Her Feb. 18 diary is about "Mayahuel," ,the Aztec food Goddess with 400 breasts associated with the maguey plant. Tara the Antisocial connects Mayahuel’s story with U.S. political right wing’s "love of control, particularly when it comes to women’s bodies and sexuality." She also connects Mayahuel’s story with the role of "the token [female] torturer" in the mutilation of women and then connects this attitude to the "fraternity hazing syndrome" which she sees as related to repeatedly sending troops to die in a war so that previous deaths won’t be "in vain." Quite a diary! You can see previous posts (and follow future posts) in this excellent series by going here.

On Feb. 22, Julia Rain posted a diary in the Kos series "History for Kossacks" (Kossacks are what bloggers on Kos call themselves): "Introduction to Wicca/Paganism". This is a brave attempt to present a subject that may not be welcomed by all Kossacks and can be controversial even among Pagans and Wiccans. Though it is clear that Julia was trying to write in an even-handed, objective way, well, stuff happens... For example:

We believe in both the male and female aspects of divinity. To me, this just makes sense. The moon represents the Goddess and the sun represents the God (in Asian cultures it is the opposite).

This of course leaves out Dianics and others who are primarily Goddess centered. Julia corrects this misperception in a comment at 7:24:14 PST. There is at least one misstatement of fact: Julia writes that the holiday Ostara is held on Easter. A more correct statement would be that Ostara occurs on the Vernal Equinox (or is a name given by some Pagans to the holiday at the Vernal Equinox), and Easter is also related to the Vernal Equinox in that it occurs the first Sunday after the first full moon after the Vernal Equinox. This error was corrected in the comments by a Kossack at 8:12 p.m PST.
By my bedtime on Feb. 22 there were 184 comments to this diary. By midday Feb. 24, there were 463 comments. Some of them were questions about accuracy, some disagreements among Pagans, some questioned why such a post was appearing on this political blog (answer: because there are Pagans in the Kos community and it might be good for non-Pagans to understand what they were about), and many comments expressed appreciation for the post. I recognized only one commenter, mainly because he blogs under a recognizable name (bloggername: ibonewits aka Isaac Bonewits ). He contributed a number of comments that added much clarity to the discussion.
Julia deserves praise for even attempting this, for presenting the material in a thoughtful manner and for searching out such colorful illustrations.

Around the Mother House This is the blog of the Re-formed Congregation of the Goddess, International. Kip Parker’s Feb 1 post, "A chance for real change" is a spiritual call to collaborate with the Obama administration in bringing real change. Kip writes:

Because at this moment in the UNiverse, we have a chance to do even more than a stimulus package, end the war in Iraq, renew protections of civil liberties and renew our commitment to the idea that we do not torture. We have a chance to make a real and lasting change in the way our society functions, the way it sees its leaders, and the things it expects from its government. I for one will do everything I can to assist this new era in its birth, physically, mentally and magically.

Alive Mind & Spirit: In her Feb. 5 post, "Imbolc: The Goddess Brighid" Juliette Lauber, writes how Imbolc came to her during a visit to the Louvre in Paris.
In her Jan. 21 post, "A Prayer for the President and a New Era," Carol P. Christ expresses her hopes for the Obama Presidency yet is also critical. She writes:

I found too much militarism, patriotism, and American exceptionalism (well-known acolytes of the Father God) in the events and speeches, including the President’s own. I was disappointed that Obama used non-inclusive or sexist language in addressing us all as “my fellow citizens.” (I guess he didn’t he read my blog on the subject.) When President Obama spoke of us being a nation of “Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus, and non-believers” I wondered why he didn’t add the simple phrase “and spiritual seekers” to include the rest of us. And I was screaming out “What about the Native Americans?” when he praised those who settled the West.

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