Ritual Pagan Poem

Drogo’s Wiccan Rede ‘Ritual Pagan Poem’

Perfect Pagans must,

Seek perfect Love and perfect Trust.

Live and let live, Fairly take and fairly give.

Cast the Circle thrice about, to keep evil spirits out.

Bind a spell every time, by saying the words in rhyme.

Softly sight and lightly touch, Speak little and listen much.

Deosil waxing moon, chant out hopeful tune.

Widdershins waning moon, chant out wise rune.

When Moon Goddess is new, kiss the dark times two.

When Moon Goddess is peak, light heart desire seek.

North Wind has mighty gale, lock up door and sail.

South Wind fire heart, love kisses burn hot.

West Wind blows, to calm restless souls.

East Wind wakes, bread yeast bakes.

Nine woods go, burn them slow.

Birch & Beech shows, what the Horned God knows.

Oak & Maple towers’ might, build strong insight.

Elder and Ailanthus, burns with curses.

Fruit & Nut tree seeds, have fertility that feeds.

Willow wind and water bends, tranquil bark lends.

Lush bush & flower grow free, blessed be.

Wheel turns to Yule, until Beltane fires rule.

Four of 8 sabbats mark our solar light and dark.

Samhain new year start, merry meet & merry part.

Threefold magic brings things three times back to thee.

Chalice cup fill; An ye harm none, do what ye will.

So mote it be.

[ Based on ‘The Wiccan Rede’ Poem by Lady Gwynne Thompson 1974 ]

Muslim Islam, Arabic Abrahamic

Islam means “whole peace” and refers to the religion of Muslims. A Muslim is “one who submits to Allah”. Allāh (God) has no gender in Arabic. Most Muslims are of two denominations, Sunni (majority) or Shia (minority). Islam’s strict patriarchal monotheism is called tawhid. Like Christianity, Islam began as a small radical Abrahamic sect that worshiped another male prophet as the Messiah. Islam is like Judaism Part Three, because they accept Jesus, and added another main savior prophet of their own. Like the previous two Abrahamic religions, Islam is from the deserts of the Middle-East. The Quran (Muslim Bible) is the verbatim word of Allah, as revealed to prophet Muhammad through the arch-angel Gabriel. Muhammad is their final prophet.

The cult of Islam began with Muhammad (Ahmad) in Mecca, Saudi Arabia (600 AD). Ahmad was considered by Arabs to be another prophet in the Hebrew tradition that began with Adam of Eden. Although Abrahamic prophets preach to the times of their audience, they all agree on the Ten Commandments of Moses in respect to Sin, Armageddon, and the Resurrection Apocalypse. Ahmad unified Arabia under Abrahamic Islam.

Ahmad was a religious, political, and military leader who was adopted as an orphan by a wealthy merchant tribe. As an adult, Ahmad married, but would often spend time at a mountain cave in the country. By 40 Ahmad was was having severe mystical experiences, proclaiming that “Allah is One”, and that everyone should completely surrender to Him. Soon the arch-angel Gabriel appeared and commanded Muhammad to recite verses. Ahmad was also deeply distressed and resolved to commit suicide, partly because of claims he was possessed by demonic djinn. To him it was clear he was Divinely inspired because he was hearing bells, angelic voices, seeing visions, having seizures, fevers, and fits of madness reciting prophetic proclamations of reward and punishment according to Allah. Ahmad may have had some “Satanic Verses” advocating the worship of three Meccan Goddess Daughters of Allah (Crane Story), but ended up condemning Pagan polytheism. Most Meccan tribes ignored, mocked, and threatened Ahmad and his cult. Some of his martyr followers were killed. Ahmad and his cult fled to Medina, where he slowly grew the membership to 10,000, and in eight years unified the tribes and conquered Mecca.

The name Muhammad (Praiseworthy) occurs in the Quran, but usually by other vague prophet titles (announcer, light-bringer, witness, messenger). Muslims should not distinguish between prophets in the Quran, and are to believe in them all. The Dome of the Rock is the symbolic spot from which Muhammad ascended to heaven. However Ahmad died from his feverish fits at the age of 63, in the house of his wife Aisha. Ahmad was buried where he died, in Medina.

Jinn (djinn or genies) are elemental spirits from native Arabic theology who inhabit natural hiding places.

Jesus (Isa) is the messiah prophet sent specifically to the Children of Israel, but was not crucified on the cross (an illusion), and he will come back to aid Mahdi, and fight the Islamic Anti-Christ (Masih ad-Dajjal) during Armageddon. Finally Jesus will unify Islam and dispel the false religions (including Christianity and Judaism). After 40 days of war, Jesus will destroy the Anti-Christ. All humanity will be judged on their goodness (faith) and bad deeds (sins), but might be forgiven by Allah if they repent.

Five Pillars (Practices): Shahadah, Salat (daily prayers), Sawm (fasting) , Zakat (giving), and Hajj (pilgrimage to Mecca).

The Shahadah (declaration of faith) is a public promise :

“I testify that there is no god except for Allah, and I testify that Muhammad is the Messenger.”

Monotheist immortal spirits in Islam: God, Jesus, Muhammad, angels, jinn, prophets, kings, faithful, sinners

* my favorite Muslim is Nasir the Saracen

Celtic Paganism (Wiccan / Druid)

Neo-Pagan Wiccan and Druidic religions are derived from the ancient Celtic Pagan polytheist culture (1300 BC – 400 AD). The word Celt translates “chisel” or “ax” from the Latin word celte, and refers to an ethno-linguistic region comprised of several European tribal nations. Originally the Greeks and Romans got the name Celt from a specific tribe in Gaul (France). The main Celtic name for themselves seems to be Gal (“strong” or “fierce”) with derivations: Gall, Gaul, Gali, and Gael. The main Celtic nations were Gaul (France), England (Brittani & Cornwall), Wales, Ireland, Scotland, and Spain (Iberian Galicia). The basic Celtic periods can be divided into Bronze Age Urnfields (1300-700 BC), Iron Age Hallstatt (700-500 BC), Iron Age La Tene (500-0 BC), Gaelic Last Stand (0-400 AD).

Celts were commoners, slaves, nobles (equites), priests (druids), oracles (vates), and musicians (bards). Druids, bards, and vates were the three priestly classes. Secular Celtic society varied throughout their decentralized tribal civilization. Celtic priests emphasized an oral tradition, and forbid their doctrines and stories to be written down; perhaps to have exclusive control over the religious rights, much as we use copyright laws today. Druids were exclusive secretive authorities on cultural superstition, ritual knowledge, and political magic. Bards were story-tellers, singers, and musicians. Vates were prophetic seer shamans, or oracles. These priestly orders may have survived from a Neolithic or Bronze Age Indo-European religion of the Horned-God of Animals; which included wheels, spirals, torcs, deer, ram-horned snakes, and other animals as sacred symbols even into the Iron Age. Various Greco-Roman accounts refer to Druidic human sacrifice, magical practices with flora and fauna, belief in reincarnation, and that they were respected as authorities by Celtic secular society. Oaks seem to be their most sacred trees (followed by ash and yew), and perhaps wrens were their most sacred birds; because the word druid is related to roots which mean “magic-oak-wren-seer”.

The Greeks and Romans considered Celts to be simply barbarians, a term which lumped them together with germanic and other tribal cultures that were deemed uncivilized savage foreigners. It was also said that most barbarians were immoral mindless hordes, that will invade and destroy unless they are invaded and destroyed, or enslaved.

Thus Roman and Christian Empires invaded and destroyed most of ancient Celtic culture by war and assimilation. The only source scriptures we have are Greek, Roman, and later Christian literature for any linguistic detail concerning ancient Celtic religion. For obvious reasons these sources are biased towards the conqueror’s own beliefs. However in the New Age, Neo-Paganism resurrects the ancient religion, with the contemporary tradition of witch-craft (wicca), which is the rural underground vestiges of the ancient Celtic beliefs, evolved in family secret legacies and in assimilated spiritual superstitions for hundreds of years, despite numerous witch lynchings and burnings by Christian literalists.

Celts and Druids did not seem to have unified religious doctrines amongst the tribes, as to who the main gods were, or how the gods could be represented; as the Celts were not an empire in the centralized way that Greece and Rome were. Rather than temples, the priests seem to have preferred forest groves, so the emphasis was on regional environmental powers and wildlife (genius loci), more than detailed personifications. Yet the bards must have sung of heroes, and because they were not recorded (as the Homeric poems were) the closest we have are the later Christian Irish and Welsh selected writings. It was claimed that Druids forbid writing, but they did use some alphabets and codes like Ogham and Runes. It seems that if there were any other Pagan writings the Church did away with them. The dominant mythical stories of Celtic England, France, Scotland, and Spain may have been lost over the generations, although their oral and bardic styles remain a secular tradition.

The Celts were animists, believing that all aspects of the natural world contained spirits. Celts communed with these spirits, and spirits were capable of reincarnation. Hundreds of Celtic deities and heroes were reduced to faerie spirits over time, and then futher diminished in size to tiny faeries, by the Renaissance. Although it is possible that small faeries always existed within Celtic Religion; even just as small animals. Also many animals continue to live in the ground, as our ancestors did, or dead people do, and birds fly like spirits in the air and mess about unseen. These are reasons that faeries exist.

The absence of a Celtic creation myth means either they never had one, or we have lost it. It is most likely the Celtic creation myth was lost on purpose by the Roman-Catholic Church, as it would have been seen as threatening to Catholic Genesis dogma. The Irish Christian story began with the settling of Ireland by several invasions. Celtic deities should be considered in a tribal clan context, due to their lack of specialization, as compared to Greek or Roman deities.

In Ireland, first were the Fomorians. Then came the Partholonians, who achieved architecture and landscaping, but were killed by plague. The next wave was the Nemedians, and they defeated the Fomorians. Then Fir Bolgs from Greece came, and civilized Ireland by dividing it into five provinces, and made laws. Next the Tuatha arrived and defeated Balor. Finally the Spanish Iberian Milesians came and defeated the Tuatha. The Milesians gave the Tuatha the land below ground and the Milesians the land above. Tuatha De Danann means “People of the Deity Danann” who came over water and went under hills.

Irish Scot Gaelic Deities

Danann / Danu – mother goddess

Dagda – father god, good with all

Morrigan – Nemhain, Macha, Badb (Triple Goddess)

Brigit – maiden fire

Lugh – light (Apollo or Mercury)

Goib – earth, craft

Oran Mór, “The Great Melody”

Crom Cruach Dubh – head bloody black crooked one of sacrificial stone mounds

Ogma – wise words, writing (ogham), and strength

Triple God of Skill = Dagda, Lugh, Ogma

Cú Chulainn – hero son of Lugh (Irish hero)

Fin MacCool – hero son of Cú Chulainn, (Irish hero)

Gallic Gaul, Briton, and Welsh Deities

Arawn Ankou – king of the dead otherworld realm of Annwn

Bran & Branwen – raven gods

Belenus – sun fire god of Beltane and cattle

Cocidius, a god of war

Condatis, a god of the confluences of rivers

Cernunnos – horned (Carnonos) nature virility (Hern) wild animals, green man

Ceridwen – (Carugwen) mother goddess of love, magic, change, transformation

Epona Rhiannon – horses

Nantosuelta Erecura – goddess of nature, earth, fire, and fertility in Gaul

Taranis – god of thunder and wheels (chariot or wagon)

Teutates = great tribal spirit, or leader of the people (Teuta), hundreds of deities

Sucellos – “kindly good striker” god of agriculture, forests, drinks, mallets

Damona Damara – a river fertility goddess

Coventina, goddess of wells and springs

*

Neo-Pagan Celtic Wiccan Deities

Kernunos – Triple God = Lugh, Dagda, Arawn / Ankou

Morrigan – Triple Goddess = Brigit, Ceridwen, Crone / Macha

Mathonwy – Merlin = druid god of magic, math, alchemy, science

Nantosuelta Damona Damara = Mother Earth, animals, plants

* Empedocles primary deity list (Harpers Faery way)

There is a connection between the old Celtic Horned-God Carnonos / (C or H)ernunnos, and with Dis-Pater. Wealth is represented by the torcs, which are both collars of control and value; stewardship over a livestock herd was wealth. Wealth, wildlife, and herds all connect Hermes-Pan with Carnonos. The horns and some underworld aspects link Dis-Pater and Pluto to Carn, but Pluto may have been Dagda as well… under-ground. Gaelic Hernunnos (Hern) and Gallic Carnonos. cairns or herms (Hermes-Pan), human – (Proto-Germanic) hurnan – horn-man (German)- hern-mon-os (latin hermanos “brother”) humanus (homo) (Persian Sanskrit) sur = horn, Berton kern = horn, herds

*

Sins of Scripture Summary

Notes on Sins of Scripture by Bishop John Shelby Spong

 

civil rights, equal rights, religious freedom, peace, evolution of thought

 

Preface

“Christian voices in our world continue to employ words that reveal nothing less than arrogance toward other religions, whose adherents they regard as fit subjects not for dialogue but for conversion. This attitude is regularly enforced with biblical claims that a particular religious tradition the certainty of the ultimate truth of God that is seen first as religious bigotry and later as religious persecution.”

 

Word of God

 

“The Bible is a subject of interpretation: there is no doctrine, no prophet, no priest, no power, which has not claimed biblical sanctions for itself.” – Paul Tillich

 

“In the history of the Western world, however, this Bible has also left a trail of pain, horror, blood, and death that is undeniable. Yet this fact is not often allowed to rise to consciousness. Biblical words have been used not only to kill, but even to justify that killing. … It might be difficult for some Christians to understand, but it is not difficult to document the terror enacted by believers in the name of the Bible.”

 

“I had to document the evil that Christians have so frequently rendered to others in the name of our religion, including the way we have justified violence with biblical quotations. … There is plenty of guilt to go around. It appears to be in the nature of religion itself to be prejudiced against those who are different in looks, language, habit, and religion. Violence is almost always the result of such prejudice.”

 

“I believe the Bible must be preserved, but not the Bible that people have used to enhance the pain and evil present in human history.”

 

 

A Claim That Cannot Endure

 

“Perhaps the strangest claim ever made for any written document in history is that its words are or somehow contain the “Word of God”.”

 

“By Sins of Scripture I mean those terrible texts that have been quoted throughout Christian history to justify behavior that is today universally recognized as evil.”

 

Beyond the biblical lists of immoral mandates… “It is quite easy to demonstrate that the Bible is simply wrong in some of its assumptions. It is hard to maintain the claim of inerrancy in the face of biblical statements that are obviously incorrect. The “Word of God” is not infrequently simply wrong.”

 

Moses did not write the Old Testament (Torah). He was dead for at least 300 years.

David did not write Psalms, again several years after the death of King David.

Jesus’s followers did not write the Gospels

Paul was fucked up

“Paul was many things, but divine was not one of them.”

 

Bible and Environment

 

“…let them have dominion over … (animals), and all the earth…” – Genesis 1:26

“Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it.” – Genesis 1:28

 

over-breeding is a real problem

environmental ignorance is a real problem

 

Climate Change Summary

As global warming occurs at the poles, ice melts. The Ocean water temperature rises, and coastal flooding is happening around the World. This causes more frequent and larger hurricanes and tidal waves that kill and displace thousands. Combined with droughts on the mainland, these disasters create more violent civil conflicts. – Drogo

 

Biblical Anti-Environmental Attitude Summary

The quest to dominate the Earth comes from pre-biblical, Old Testament times. Hebrews coming from Egypt, had a sky god named “YHVH” (I am that I am). They wanted their ancestral homeland back from the Canaanites, who worshiped an earth goddess Astarte, and her lord Baal (Master). Hebrews were shepherds who believed in animal sacrifices to their sky god, and Canaanites were agrarian farmers who preferred grain sacrifices to their gods. The Hebrews invaded and made holy war against the Canaanites. – Drogo

 

“Mother Earth is fighting back. Mother Earth is rebelling against the way she has been treated by a single species which acts as if the whole world exists to provide comfort and wealth for that species.”

 

“Bad theology creates bad ecology.”

 

Chapter 31

 

“To our knowledge Jesus left no written records. … Whatever else the gospels are, they are certainly not the writings of Jesus. It is equally clear that the gospels are not the result of Jesus’ dictation found in the written notes from his disciples.”

 

Literacy was very rare in the days of Jesus, and they wrote in Greek

Jesus died around 35 AD

Paul’s 50-65 AD (was not an actual apostle)

Mark’s 70 AD (earliest) (not an apostle, but disciple of Peter)

Matthew 85 AD

Luke’s 90 AD (not an apostle, but a friend of Paul)

John’s 100 AD (last) claims to be son of Zebedee but he would have been about 100

Revelation

 

What was it about Jesus the human, that caused people to say his miracles were true and that he was the Messiah?

“No, I do not believe that Jesus stilled the storm, walked on water, … But I do want to understand what the experience was with Jesus, that caused people to apply Hebrew scripture God language to him.”

10 Eclectic Pagan Lessons

I am a pagan celtic wiccan shaman priest, and I thought I would share 10 lessons, or teachings that I have gotten from my wise elders and life experience.

As an eclectic pagan wiccan, there are a few core beliefs that I have. This means that these are things I believe every day of my life, and have since high school. Some of the ideas are more celtic, while others are more Buddhist, Native American, etc… I see them as very compatible spiritually. They are all a part of who I am. Here I will list a few of them.

1.  Nature = what others call “The One God”

2.  Elements = genderless aspects of Nature

3.  Goddess = female aspect of Nature, divides into dual, triple, etc.

4.  God = male aspect of Nature, divides into dual, triple, etc.

5.  Try to harm none, do what thy will.

6.  What we do comes back to us, in some form; sometimes multiplied.

7.  Shit happens.

8.  Seek positive aspects although often difficult, because negative are so easily destructive.

9.  Magic = power, energy, will, creativity, mysteries, etc.

10.  Try to make things better, and often it is the middle way; because nothing is as it should be, and yet everything is.

– Drogo F. Empedocles

*

 

Conservative Christian Environmentalists

Christians For Latter-Day Justitude

Westboro Church Funeral Protests In Vain

How to Fight an Anti-Gay Church Group that Protests at Military Funerals

From what I have seen and heard of the Westboro Church Protests, they are idiots. Rather than just show more of their non-sense propaganda that they crave, I show here how to fight against idiot groups like them, whether they are Nazis, KKK, or just some stupid church. Fight them with their own ignorance!!!

this is an example of when their idiot messages are unchallenged,

but here are more images where they have been challenged!

 

Christian Evangelical Challenge

I hereby challenge anyone,

to a battle in Christian Right Wing Hate Speech,

or Evangelical Propaganda.

I have studied your craft,

and by the end,

you will be on the ground praying as a sinner,

to me your savior, in the name of Jesus Christ.

– God

Essay On Art

Although our lives are limited on Earth with the beating of our hearts, at the same time “we have all the time in the World” at this very moment, ironically. All the time in the World, at any given moment, may do us no good in finishing all the projects we set out to do to the best of our ability; yet we must use what we have, and write what we know. Also some satisfaction may be gained from the fact that some of our works will live on after our deaths, for whatever immortal or limited legacies they may be.

I understand the dichotomy of the “good or bad” opinion, and I do personally judge things as such on occasion in order to expedite my personal daily tastes. However, realizing that my tastes change; have changed and will change (to various degrees); i conclude that although art may be subjectively good at any given moment, it may also be bad simultaneously; and neither good nor bad at another moment to someone using another language or logic to analyze the subject material. Also when measuring a thing, the measurement result depends on what measuring system is used, and geometries may give a misleading reading. Even when using Trigonometry to calculate the value of an object, few material objects have the simplicity of a true square or circle (in fact none according to people like Plato, see – archetypes).

In fact the purposes for which we use our compositions, determines more “good or bad” than the experience of their existence alone. A hammer may be deemed “bad” when used for “bad” or unwanted destructive purposes; just as music or art is used for “bad” purposes, bringing harm to others and the listener. The same hammer may also be deemed “good” when used at another time, it builds and helps to improve “good” projects; just as the same music or art that has negative value for some, is used to motivate “good” change or moods in others.
You may say you cannot judge a neutral instrument or functional tool “good or bad”, and it is this argument that I apply Universally to all Arts. Some Art may be more or less useful to a person, than others, but they are neither “good nor bad” in the eyes of Nature. To me this is the true answer to the question why “God” (good) allows “Satan” (bad) to exist. To individual judgment-calls, the bipolar existence allows us to label and segregate choices, but many deeds in the name of “good” are “bad” to others; therefore to a third objective party a holy relic of one nation, that is a cursed object to another, is simply a work of art deemed powerful for destruction or creation by both sides.

I will allow that certain pieces of Art are more or less “bad or good”, for certain people or purposes. Whether those purposes are “good or bad” is even another matter. So while I say your work is good, I use the judgment for a purpose to support the purposes for which the work is made. Some songs may be sad, and therefore attends negative emotions that some do not want to experience, a sad song can be uplifting to others due to underlying uplifting instrumental harmonies or vocals, despite word semantics.

So to recap, Fantasy Art is my favorite art-subject, and as such I consider all Fantasy to be more personally important to me than Still-Life (non-fiction), which to me is either more objectively removed or invasively personal. This is why I am more tolerant with Fantasy, as I would be with friends. I may be alone in my love for certain fictional works, yet in order to not be lonely, I chose to be accepting of other works in order to share a zest for life and mutual interests.

To me, what is considered ‘pure honesty’ is not always more valuable than ‘sugar coated honesty’. Just as a ripe fruit may be sweet, it is no more PURE than an unripe or rotten fruit. ‘Pure honesty’ may also be unripe or rotten, as it may be influenced by negative feelings from something else entirely and unrelated. Truth may be told as honestly with sweetness, as it may be told with sadistic harshness.

Such is the depth of my belief in Yen/Yang relativity (Zen). Friends may take some pleasure in knowing I tend to side on the “good” side of Art as Inspiration, with less emphasis on any critique that is ‘worthless’ to my productive sensibilities. In my Wiccan faith this is the balance between God and Goddess, and how it affects us in Nature (Existence).

– Drogo