Talking Stick
Ime in:formed tHat Talking Stick ,lattre:ly Secret Chiefs, iz out of action the rest of the year. Like tHis sucks. Let us get it back in:tu action, preferably tu the pre-split standard. The Moot With No Name iz not an acceptable substytute - tHoze sods cauzed all the trouble.

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[Pimping] Peat Moors Visitor Centre to be axed

On the 4th of Feb 2009 the Executive Committee of Somerset County Council resolved to close the Peat Moors Centre at the end of October 2009. The decision is due to be ratified by the full council on 18th February.

The Peat Moors Centre is a renowned 'hands-on' archaeology centre. An area like Glastonbury which is renowned for its prehistoric spiritual connections needs to keep its only attraction that showcases who their ancient inhabitants really were.

While I've never been there, it doesn't look like the kinda place that should be getting closed down any time soon.

Link to the megalithic.co.uk page; scroll down to the bottom of the page to read the comments.

Xposted

Current Mood: blah

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Bibles
A strange subject for me, its true.

In going through stuff from my parents house I've found several bibles, some carefully stored away, some very old (100 years +). I can't work out what to do with them, to distroy them seems disrespectful to my parents in some way yet I don't want them and most are probably too tatty for anyone else to want. These are not fancy collectable ones either but just ordinary mass-produced bibles so I doubt they have any value.
They have no religious value to me either.

ideas anyone

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Sharing
Heritage at Risk is English Heritage's ground-breaking new programme. It seeks to identify the parts of the nation's historic environment that are endangered, and to get something done about them.

The West Midlands' .pdf is making for some interesting reading, so no doubt some of you might be interested in some of the others.

This'll probably get xposted lots btw, so apologies if you see it ten million times. :)

And thanks to Halla for sharing in the first place.

Feel free to share your thoughts on the issue. *smile*

Current Mood: confused

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Survey request

I'm told Mika is a PhD student from Finland, researching aspects of Paganism.

Cut & Paste:

About my current research. I have been handing out paper surveys in London, Avebury, Dublin, and in a number of locations in Finland. That didn't seem to work well (pen and paper survey, wasn't that popular in the 80's?), so I have now started a web survey. I have been sending the link to the pagans I know and they have forwarded it to their friends. A bit of snowballing... I'm trying to get as many participants as possible by the end of April.

According to a Darby Uni. study there are about 43.000 Pagans in the UK. If I get 1% of that I'd be thrilled.

So, if you, or anybody else on this list, would like to help me with this, here is the link:

 

Feel free to forward it. The only requirements for participants are that they live in either UK, Ireland, or Finland, consider themselves to be Pagans, and are at least 18 years old.

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=doxTyDZkvi2SCN6VIFLTbg_3d_3d

Current Mood: contemplative

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WitchyCon 2007!

WitchyCon 2007

Wantage Civic Hall - April 28th, 2007
Doors Open: 9:00am and stay open
until 11pm

So far we have the following lineup but more *will* be added:

Speakers:
Rae Beth
Anna Franklin
DC
Ralph Harvey
Rev Martin Hazel
Theresa Moorey

Workshop Leaders:
Paul Wood (Medieval Magickal Herbalism)
Steve Wilson (Occultism)
Merry Metcalfe (Make Your Own Cosmetics)
Peter Yockney (Dragon Magick)
Wyrd Walks
Pat Dunnicliffe (Drumming)
Theresa Moorey (Moon Magick)
Lesley Harris (Journeying)
Rev Martic Hazel (Visualisation)
Louise Green (Reiki)
Anna Franklin (Animal Powers)

http://www.WitchyCon.co.uk/

( More Info..Collapse )

They have a spare slot for a main speaker if anyone is interested ;o)

Current Mood: creative

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cold rose quartz

I have a piece of rose quartz under my pillow and i'll be holding it and it willl go very cold in my hand, is that normal?  Does it mean anything?

(x-posted)

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Light a virtual candle..........
........... here

http://virtual-candle.org/index.php

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dreams

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Eris named after Eris
On this day, Boomtime, the 38th day of Bureaucracy in the Year Of our Lady Discord 3172, a heavenly body was named after our most Illustrious Lady, the Goddess Eris Discordia.

May we celebrate this as a new feast day! May this be, for all time (until it seems fit to change):

Holy Pluto Butt-Kick Day

[If you like this idea - please pass on to other Discordians]

(x-posted)

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Thank you all very much!
This is the article as I have set it, in all it's simplicity, for my forum, to start the discussion going. Thank you all for your help and contributions. I haven't mentioned anyone by name, but if anyone wishes to be personally attributed, please let me know and I will amend my article.

Scrying is an ancient art of divination/meditation using (usually) a bowl of water or a mirror, in a similar way to which you would use a crystal ball. The earliest recorded uses of this are in China in 3000BC and in Egypt in 2500 BC.

I took the trouble to ask around and ask people what they thought of it and received mostly positive feedback. Some use a candle to reflect on the bowl or mirror, which makes me wonder if that is connected to candle spells, which seem so popular lately. Many mention that state of mind is important to use this tool properly, and indeed some use it as an aid to meditation or focussing the mind. One lady actually mentioned that she used coffee witb creamer as a contrast and achieved good results with that! Oil is sometimes used as the shape of the oil in the water helps form and interpret the shapes. It is also universally agreed that the objectivity you need with other forms of divination is necessary. There are also suggestions that black mirrors and bowls are better. The times of year that one lady remembers scrying being done in ritual, were at Samhain (with a ball), and Midsummer (through a wreath of greens into a cauldron of candle). At the former, the God can be said to be at His lowest point, since He is is now the Horned One leading the Wild Hunt. At the latter, He is considered to be at his peak, the height of Summer.

People achieve different results with scrying. Some see clear images and some see symbols.

All you need, therefore is a bowl of water, or a mirror, and a dimly lit and quiet ambience, and time to concentrate your thoughts. You may want to direct the ritual with ideas you bring to it, or let it unfold in it's own way. Either way relaxation and objectivity are necessary.

Firescrying has been mentioned too: this is concentrating on flames instead of water. This is a varition on the theme, and people use what suits them.

Current Mood: cheerful

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Scrying
This IS being crossposted: so I can get a good set of answers.

What does everyone think of scrying and does anyone have any experience of it?

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Hello from Hampshire
Merry meet!

Thanks to raven_muse for accepting me into this community.

I'm a solitary witch from just outside Andover in Hampshire.

I moved here from London about 2 months ago and although moving out of the city means I've gotten back to nature, I seem to have become a little lost socially!

Being in London meant that I could attend a glut of pagan talks, moots, rituals but I've gotta say things seem a little dry out here!

So I'm hoping keeping in touch online (and maybe irl if anyone's close!) will fill a wee gap in my life.

Hello and thanks

Secxx

Current Mood: happy

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An idea I have
It's often discussed in the chatroom, and I usually keep out of it, because it is (at least among pagans) somewhat controversial.

Eclecticism is the word I mean. Well, what is it first? It's borrowing from many cultures to make up your own cultural philosophy. In terms of religion it means usually borrowing gods and pantheons and blurring the edges a little. Hubby and I disagree on this drastically, and I am sure he will comment here, but that's ok too, people have their opinions.

I personally believe that in the past, before the better communication and information that we have, it wasn't difficult to make cultural distinctions and keep to them. It would be difficult for the Mayans, for example, to adopt and adapt Ceres as a goddess because they had never heard of her, nor were they ever likely to hear of her. However, since I like to read, can explore the net and love documentaries, I HAVE heard of her. I could therefore, in theory, incorporate her and her characteristics into my idea of a goddess/Goddess/mother/female lead of pantheon/whatever I want. I don't really want to, but there we are, I COULD.

There is some natural blurring of the edges takes place. I am thinking of my area in Northumberland, and how it happened that along Hadrian's Wall, for instance, you find shrines to the Green Man and Cernunnos (in Vindolanda), a Mithraic temple, and the expected assortment of Minervas and the like. The soldiers who were not locals married and settled there, and adapted, giving and taking a little. A little further north, the Norsemen crashed through Lindisfarne and Bamburgh and Tynemouth (I have seen all of this, for this is my home.) They too settled and as merchants adpated and left behind some of their ideas. Of course, the Romans ran around Europe a lot and their army was principally composed of mercenaries, many of them local, so they had to adapt and allow this. The Romans themselves were, um, open minded, and even lifted the WHOLE of the Greek pantheon and made it their own (romanising things in their own inimitable way, i.e. Zeus/Jupiter, Neptune/Poseidon and the like.)

Conquest plays a role here too. How many countries were converted to Christianity through conquest, where they would not otherwise have heard of it?? In some cases, conversion was the excuse (to cover, I believe, the territorial/colonial instinct and the wish to acquire riches).

We can go back a little further than Rome. The early Egyptians revered Ptah, and Khnum, and that gave way to Geb and Nut and Amun. Let's not forget the Isis/Osiris/Horus trilogy (which has been suggested is a model for the Trinity in Christianity) and let us too remember the 4000 years or so of the Egyptian faith. Amun and Ra blurred together, as did Isis and Hathor. Hathor's temple at Dendera (which I have seen) is the one which originally had the Zodiac symbols, stolen by the French and still in the Louvre. Where DID astrology start???
And later, the Greeks then the Romans came along and the Egyptian culure was Hellenised, and later Romanised. We can continue on the lines of the Coptic Christians and then the Muslims, to see how the land of Egypt has had many cultures imposed upon it, many gods, and yet remains Egypt.

The point I am trying to make (and sorry for being so exhaustive) is that the modern Westerner, with his greater area of communicative choice, looking around, has many things to choose from for his/her philosophy, whereaas the person from, say, Romanic Gaul, only ever knew of his Gallic gods. Who are we to say it is wrong?? the barriers are down. The borders of countries do not exist in the mind and human spirit, and are indeed abolished by modern communications.

There is only one sea, one sky, one sun, one moon and one land. So I see myself how easy it is to find that archetypes may well be a template.

I am happy for any comments, and also am happy to learn from all of you.

current mood: thoughtful

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Conference coming soon..
WitchyCon! 2006

Saturday April 1st, 2006

Wantage Civic Hall , Oxfordshire

Sally Morningstar, author of 9 books on magic and spirituality including "The Art of Wiccan Healing" on which subject she will be talking.

Anna Franklin, author of over 20 books on the Craft including the popular Sacred Circle Tarot, Midsummer, Lammas Fairy Lore, Herb Craft, Magical Incenses and Oils, Hearth Witch, A Romantic Guide to Handfasting and Familiars. She is speaking on "Wicce" at the conference.

SAHSA FENTON who has a wealth of knowledge is leading the talk on Palmistry which you simply will not want to miss.
JOHN DEE who is a great personality and is a wealth of information is doing a talk on Egyptology and what he doesn't know probablt isn't known to grab yourself a chair and take notes!
RALPH HARVEY has a new book due out and was such a huge success at the last convention, we just had to have him back.
STEVE WILSON is doing a facinating workshop on Archaic Witchcraft which I know will be stuffed to the gills.
MERRY METCALF is doing a popular workshop on how to make your own cosmetics and to compliment her we have a workshop by
PAUL WOOD on Medieval Magickal Herbalism.
PETER YOCKNEY who is this country's leading dragonm magick expert will be leading a workshop on Dragon Magick and
ANIA MARCZYK is leading a workshop on Tarot and she invites you to bring your deck along.

Membership of WitchyCon 2006 will get you: tea and coffee; in to all talks; in to all free workships (jewellery-making workshops or similar may have a cost associated with them); a con pack; entry in to the free draw; lots of fun (we hope!) and stalls to stock up on Pagan wares.

£12 pounds on the door now.
http://www.witchycon.co.uk/

Current Mood: curious

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Radio 4
Book of the Week
Suburban Shaman
9 March 2006

Thursday 9 March 2006 9:45-10:00 (Radio 4 FM)

Repeated: Friday 10 March 2006 0:30-0:48 (Radio 4 FM)

By Cecil Helman, read by Miles Anderson and abridged by Doreen Estall.

London GP and anthropologist, Cecil Helman, considers how contemporary medicine could be made more humane and less mechanistic. He visits a sangoma, a traditional South African healer, and wonders whether modern doctors might learn from the more holistic approach of the shaman.

Producer Emma Harding.

Current Mood: sad

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Colours
Hiya,

I've just done a Colour Therapy course and I was trying to find a source in the uk for clothes shops that specialise in a Rainbow range of colours?
That is the main Primary and secondary colours

I remember in the Aura soma shop in glastonbury they had some but they don't have a website and its a trek to get down there.

I'm looking for one particular colour - ie Turquoise and varying shades of blue and green - plain fabric
larger sizes would be good.

I know there a couple of shops out there on the high street but I can't find them with Google. One that does differnet outfits in Jersey material in matching contrasting colours come to mind but whats its name lol

Most shops only do what colours are in fashion and I'm not a fashion person really.

EDIT I'm really looking for websites not shops thankyou

Any websites and suggestions would be helpful ;o) I'm in Oxford by the way.

thank you xxx

Current Mood: bouncy

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Newbie
Hi there,

thanks Raven_muse for letting me join.

Single witch from Oxfordshire ;o)

I used to go on Alt.Wicca along time ago when I first got into email

good to meet you all

Current Mood: tired

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Definition or hallucination?
I know that from somewhere I've encountered the original definition of 'pagan' as being a "peg in the ground" or a "stick in the mud", but I'm having trouble tracking down where I actually got some vague form of corroborative evidence for this definition. I've tried wiki and dictionary.com off the top of my head, but after that there's so many other places I could be heading that I've confuzzled myself and now don't know where to start.

Anyone got any suggestions/links to somewhere that'll prove I'm not losing my marbles and imagining this definition, please?

Xposted all over the shop

UPDATE: Solved, with thanks to badseed1980 for being able to see the line on the wiki page I'd already looked at. *rolls eyes*

Current Mood: curious

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The importance of tradition ;)
Penda the Pagan
Royal sacrifice and a Mercian king
Alby Stone

Penda, a seventh-century king of Mercia, was a noted regicide. Indeed, his other achievements - his military campaigns and a crafty and unlikely alliance with the British king Cadwallon were instrumental in carving out Mercia as an independent kingdom and establishing it as a power to be reckoned with - were almost completely overshadowed by his reputation as a slayer of kings. As Penda was a pagan, and his alleged victims all Christian, it comes as no surprise to find that medieval chroniclers, mostly monks or Christian nobles, viewed his reign and deeds with horror and denigrated him at every opportunity.

Read the rest, and find loads more like it.

crossposted from my LJ to: livejournal_uk, mercians, midlanders & uk_pagans.

Current Mood: interested

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