The Sunday Stew August 25-31

This week's stew is going to be really spicy, so grab an icy cold drink to go with it. The Cap'n and Adelina are taking vacation from Stew-making this week, but we've got everything from wakes to sacred music to integrity and lying about religion for you. It is highly recommended that you read Loren's full article.

La'Trice is giving us a super-easy, delicious recipe for the last days of summer; Rommy's got us strutting; Karen has our Pagan Lore, and we are SHAMELESSLY plugging one of our mainstays in Paganism. The news is a mixed-bag (quick shout-out to Magaly Guerrero who *always* reads the news!), but definitely worth reading.  Of course, your tarot, totem and astrology are all here too!
So, are you ready to dig in? Then, let's get to it!


Happy Birthday this week to Pagan Spitfire, TJ Spencer, Eric Sumwalt, Sharleen Skelly, Chris Boudreau, Monica Belenchia, Vanessa Bradley, Jason Broome, Angie Holz, Faith McCann, Amy Blackthorn, Barbara Brandt, Jackson Warren, Katie Reeves, and  Kimberly Everhart! May this be your best birthday ever, and may your next year of life be filled with all the very best of things in abundance!!

Kestril's Song of the Week

Strut

Sometimes all the moves come together in one perfect storm of awesome. When that happens don't keep it to yourself. Get on out there and strut. Celebrate your achievements in grand style worthy of a rock star. After all, if you don't celebrate your own achievements, who will?

Keep Dancing,
Kestril

In the News

Paganism Part 6: Is contemporary Paganism coming in from the cold?

Pagans Share Culture and Beliefs at Festival

What's Witchcraft? 6 Misconceptions About Wicca

Saudi Arabia's War on Witchcraft

Flying feather arrows, bows and witchcraft

Woman shares how she was tortured for 'witchcraft' for 14 yrs

Cahiers du Coco: Haxan: Witchcraft Through the Ages

3 Killed for Praticisng Witchraft

Woman 'thrashed' on witchcraft charge

Pagan Lore with Karen Szabo

Good Morning, Sunday Stew readers!  This week's Pagan lore takes us right up to the very end of August -- can you believe it's almost September?  I can almost smell autumn in the air, and I can't wait until it's here, how about you?  Personal opinion expressed, now on with the lore!

Sunday, August 25 
An annual harvest festival called the Opiconsiva was celebrated on this date in ancient Rome, in honor of the fertility and success Goddess Ops (Rhea). Later in the year, she was honored again at the Opalia festival on December 19 (the third day of the Saturnalia).

Monday, August 26
The periodic rebirth of the Hindu god Krishna (eighth and principal avatar of Vishnu) is celebrated by his faithful worshipers at midnight services on this date.
In the country of Finland, this is the annual Feast Day of Ilmatar (or Luonnotar), known as the Water Mother. According to mythology, she created the
Earth out of chaos.

Tuesday, August 27 
Consus, the god of the grain-store, was celebrated annually on this date by the ancient Romans. Sacrifices were made in his honor, and all beasts of burden were embellished with wreaths of flowers and given a day of rest.  The Festival of Krishna is celebrated annually on this day in the country of India. It is also a sacred day dedicated to Devaki, the Mother-Goddess.

Wednesday, August 28 
In the country of Norway, a Pagan festival celebrating the harvest is held on this date each year. Ancient Norse gods and Goddesses are invoked to protect the spirit of the harvest throughout the dark half of the year.

Thursday, August 29
This is the Ancient Egyptian New Year.  On this date in Nigeria, the Yoruba people celebrate the Gelede, an annual ritual of dancing and wearing of masks to drive away evil sorceresses.  In pre-Christian times, a festival called the Pardon of the Sea was celebrated annually in Britanny. It was originally dedicated to Athes, a Pagan Goddess of the sea, and was eventually Christianized into the Feast of Saint Anne.

Friday, August 30
In Bengal, India, gruesome human sacrifices to the Indian Earth-Goddess Tari Pennu were made annually on this date as recently as the mid-nineteenth century. After the sacrifice, a shaman would eat a bit of the victim's flesh, and then the rest of the remains would be dismembered, burned, and scattered over a plowed field to ensure the fertility of future crops.

Saturday, August 31 
To purify the family spirits, Eyos (masqueraders wearing demon costumes concealed by white robes) walk through the streets of Lagos every year on this date. The Ritual Walk of the Eyos is a religious custom that dates back to very ancient times.   On this date in the year 1934, Wiccan author Raymond Buckland was born in London, England. He founded the Seax-Wica tradition of Witchcraft, helped to introduce modern Wicca into the United States, and opened the first American Museum of Witchcraft and Magic.   In India, a women's festival of purificationcalled the Anant Chaturdai  is held each year on this day. It is dedicated to the ancient serpent-Goddess Ananta, who symbolizes the female life force.

I wish all of you a fantastic week -- see you next time with the first September edition of the Pagan Lore!
Karen
           

Sparkle and Shine with Sosanna

Integrity

As a blogger I spend a great deal of time researching my posts.  Some, actually most are straight editorial.  Meaning, I start out with some fact, define it and then explain what that fact means to me.  I participate in the Pagan Blog Project, where we take a letter of the alphabet and get a word to write about. We usually take a pagan spin on the word.  This is my second year participating and I’m rather enjoying it.

Earlier this year there was a situation where a member of the project was found to be plagiarizing material.  The person was promptly removed to ensure the integrity of project.  Recently I’ve discovered that there are some out there that don’t have the same standards.  I’ve located several, and by several I mean like 40, blogs of material that is directly copy and pasted without a reference or credit paid to the original author.
Some say that this is just a collection of all the general pagan resources out there in one location for easy access.  However I tend to agree with one of my witty friends who said that the poster suffers from Lazy Ass Pagan Syndrome.  I really really liked that.

With so many shady resources out there you may wonder how to locate a valid pagan source.  It can be daunting.  One thing that I like to do before blindly following someone is to do a quick search on their blog URL at copyscape.com.  Basically this will give you a list of any other locations their content can be found on.

A quick search will give you most of the info you need to determine if this is a reliable source.  Another thing to look for is giving credit.  A reliable blogger will link to a source article or will show any referenced material in italics or quotes.  Remember, it’s not just about citing the source, that’s mandatory.  Most of the time you need permission from the original author before adding the content to your page.  Words like “Used with permission” and sometimes linking to the email granting permission is something that is done.

Don’t blindly follow the masses.  There’s an old adage about safety in numbers, unless you’re on fly paper.  Just because someone has a number of followers doesn’t mean they are following the rules or doing it right.  We can look back in history to see how many leaders, politicians or movie stars had hundreds of followers but ended up being a pretty awful person.  Always, always vet your sources.

Finally trust your gut.  There’s a reason for that feeling that you get.  A few weeks ago during shark week, they were interviewing a number of shark attack survivors.  Each one of them said, I had this feeling that something was wrong.  That feeling is our natural instinct.  It doesn’t happen to everyone all the time, but if you get the feeling that something isn’t quite right.  You’re usually right.

Anyone who is honest and trustworthy will not mind your questions.  Anyone who is a positive person, will happily welcome your dialog.  I always list my email address on my webpage and my shop page because I welcome chat with my clients.  I want them to be happy and confident in my work.  I want them to consider me a reliable source and always give permission to quote me.  I’m not a superwitch and never claimed to be.

But I am honest, trustworthy, I credit my sources and do my best to treat others the way I want to be treated.  I look at my business much as I do my magical work.  I have a relationship with people.  I talk to them and not at them.  I don’t ridicule and slam another artist’s work.  When you’re looking for any relationship, be it magical or mundane all your work should be started with and end with integrity.  Something that I feel this has fallen out of style in some of the new and flashy pagan ways.

Namaste & Blessed Be
Sosanna
)O(

Oh The Humanity! with Loren Morris

Sunshine's Meanderings with Kathleen Lane

My Wake

The other night I was laying in bed searching for some kind of white noise on the TV to put me to sleep and ended up watching some old reruns of "Golden Girls". It ended up keeping me awake rather than putting me to sleep because one of the episodes concerned Sophia putting on her own wake. She wanted to see what her friends and relatives would say about her when she was gone.

That whole concept, of course, waked my brain right up and I ended up sitting up in bed with my bed table notebook jotting down notes. It started me thinking about the people in my life that have passed and how they would have wanted to be remembered and from there to what I would like to have remembered about myself.

If you could leave notes about things in your life that you have not shared with your children, what would you say? Would you share things that happened to you as a child or would you want to give them helpful advice? Do you want to be remembered for what you have accumulated in your life or for what you accomplished?  Do you want them to remember  those golden moments that left a vivid picture in your mind or things you shared as they were growing up?

My grandfather had a wicked and infectious sense of humor and even though he has been gone since 1976, I regularly see things happen or read things that I would love to share with him. He could see humor in so many things and shared his joy in life with those around him. Is that what you would like your family and friends to remember about you?

I hope that when the time comes my family and friends remember me with joy and laughter and share funny stories and golden moments.

Notes from the Circle with Alan Heartsong

Sacred Music

I was listening to National Public Radio on the way home from work the other day, when I heard this beautiful, haunting singing. After the bus passed me, I realized it was in Latin and I paid more attention to the story about the nuns of Ann Arbor, Mich. recording choral music.

I enjoy sacred music, especially some of the work done by nuns and monks I’ve heard over the years. It got me thinking though, about how I define “holy” when it comes to music.

For me, the holy and sacred music my spirit yearns for instills a sense of peace, and communion with the Divine. Probably in part because I’m an introvert and quiet time is what I need to recharge my batteries.

I’ve listened to my share of ecstatic music, and thoroughly enjoy that too but while it pumps up my adrenaline levels it doesn’t fill me with peace. It does make great music to listen to right before doing any heavy lifting, though, because it strengthens my spirit and makes the work easier on my body.

I began running through all of the pagan music I could think of on the drive home, looking in my mental catalog for something that was overtly pagan and still filled me with that sense of peace and harmony. I found lots of songs that make me happy in my mental pagan collection, but nothing that touched me with the same peaceful vibe I was getting from the Catholic singers. Lots of chants from various Reclaiming CDs are associated with happy memories of our community Chant Jam sessions, and some are useful for focusing energy and intent during ritual, but nothing left me with serenity.

Is it something we’re missing in our community collective repertoire? Are we missing out on peace within our own community music? Many of us are free-wheeling independent thinkers, captains of our own destiny, etc. etc. but does that exclude us from peace and serenity? Can’t that also be part of our path, and our music?

I'm quoting one of the sisters from the article here in closing, and I've shared the link to the story for your reading/listening pleasure as well.

"We bring people back where the culture, sad to say, is selling them short," Sister Joseph Andrew says. "The culture is not saying you need silence; you need to calm down; you need to meet God in however you might choose to worship him. And I think when you turn this music on, something interiorly starts to calm down. And there starts to be a freedom to be able to really listen to God within." ~From http://www.npr.org/2013/08/13/211639502/life-as-prayer-the-singing-nuns-of-ann-arbor

Peace and Harmony to you all,
Alan

The Spice with La'Trice Lott

What a great way to top off your next summer cookout?  Give this super easy desserts recipe a try.  I found it several years ago in Real Simplemagazine and have been making it for cookout and potlucks with great success.

Photo used under Creative Commons

 

 

Lux