Yvonne Aburrow's Blog, page 18
May 18, 2023
Library books
If I hadn’t had access to books about mythology and King Arthur and Robin Hood, I might not have become a Pagan, and my life would’ve been very different. The book that I count as the one that made me realize I’m Pagan is Puck of Pook’s Hill by Rudyard Kipling, but I’m sure all the mythology and other stories helped too.
May 17, 2023
Deep magic
The deepest magic that I know is love. Not sacrificial love, not romantic love, but the everyday magic of connection, nourishing and soul-satisfying.
May 16, 2023
Stories
The power of stories to change and challenge a person’s worldview is immense. My worldview was definitely informed by reading A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula Le Guin, Tolkien’s The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings, The Writing on the Hearth by Cynthia Harnett (now sadly forgotten by most people), Mary Stewart’s Arthurian trilogy, and The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint Exupéry. And of course the Narnia series by CS Lewis, and many other books depicting...
May 14, 2023
Wibbly wobbly
Changing paths is a wibbly-wobbly thing. During the process, I was all over the place. It was like having the bends (you know, the thing where a diver rises too quickly to the surface and gets cramps) or being on a giant scary roller coaster ride.
May 13, 2023
Pagans and marriage
Marriage is an odd composite of disparate concepts. It’s a legal contract to share property. It’s usually contracted between two people who love each other. It’s a meeting of minds and hearts. When it’s really special, it’s a sacred union of two people in an alchemical and spiritual relationship.
All societies and cultures have had some form of marriage, including ancient pagan societies and traditions. Some cultures preferred monogamous marriage and some preferred polygamous marriage. Th...
Things I do miss
Unitarian hymns — specifically the earth-based ones like Peter Mayer’s “Blue Boat Home” (which doesn’t get sung often enough in the UK), “Mother Spirit” by Norbert Čapek, and nature-based ones like “Daisies are our silver” and “Spirit of Life” of course, but also some of the other ones like “Name Unnamed” which is beautiful. And I really appreciate how the Unitarians have defanged some of the classic Christian hymns by remo...
May 12, 2023
Things I don’t miss
Changing Paths challenge day 12 — things I don’t miss about the traditions I have left.
May 11, 2023
Why I left
I left Unitarianism in the end because of archetypes. The archetype that fits me the best is that of the witch, and it’s an archetype that sits uncomfortably in the Unitarian path. (The combination may work for others: didn’t work for me.)
I left Christianity because of its exclusivist views on salvation and the institutional homophobia.
And when I left Paganism for a while in 2007, it was because of it being excessively heterocentric / heter...
May 10, 2023
Still friends
I’m still friends with several Unitarians, either in person or on social media. Last September two of our longest-standing Unitarian friends from the UK came to visit us in Canada and we had a great time together. A quote from one of them found its way into the book too.
