Yvonne Aburrow's Blog, page 75

Books for Kids

So, you want to share your Pagan world-view and values with your kids, without indoctrinating them into it? What better way than to give them the kind of books you loved as a kid, which may have influenced your own path to recognising that you are a Pagan?

The Sacred Fool

Humour skewers the powerful and the pompous, pricking their bubble of self-importance. That's why authoritarians don't like humour and seek to control it, to turn it as a weapon against the powerless. But the joyous wildness always breaks through the cracks, like ivy and creepers bringing down stone and concrete.

City of Refuge, by Starhawk (Book Review)

CITY OF REFUGE is refreshingly humble. Although it portrays earth-based spirituality, permaculture, sacred sexuality, nonhierarchical decision-making, collective ownership, and other politically-charged concepts, unlike other utopian/dystopian novels, it refuses to present its ideas rigidly or dogmatically.

What Does An Inclusive Coven Look Like?

Inclusive Wicca is about being inclusive towards everyone, regardless of sexuality, ethnicity, disability, or other differences. It is not a new or separate tradition; it is a tendency within existing Wiccan traditions.

Creative Endarkenment: the Need to Ground and Shield

Creativity is by its nature radical. Grounding and shielding helps us protect ourselves when the work gets messy, gets dangerous.

The Moon and the Sea

I have always had a bit of a thing about the Moon, and everything associated with the lunar side of life: poetry, intuition, silver, water, dreams, and stars.

Finding a Compromise: Keeping Places

Respect For the Dead In any discussion of what to do with human remains, I think we should start from the assumption that almost everyone respects the dead. But it is how that respect is expressed that is currently a source of conflict. Some have argued that respect can only be expressed by not disturbing [Read More...]

Metaphors for Religion

There are many different metaphors floating about for religions, and each one illuminates something different about the nature of religion - that's why I collect them.

Respect, Memory, and Human Remains

In 2008, I founded a group, Pagans for Archaeology. I did that because I believe that without archaeology, we would know considerably less about ancient pagans and polytheists than we do today. I even wonder if the Pagan revival would have happened the same way without input from archaeological research.The Pagans for Archaeology Facebook page now has around 15,000 likes - so even if many of those people haven't read the "manifesto" of the group, that shows a very big interest in archaeology among Pagans.

Cultural Appropriation and Racism

In my last post on cultural appropriation (Cultural Appropriation has nothing to do with "Race"), I made the point that the issue is about culture, not genetics and not "race". People are part of a culture if they have been brought up in and immersed in that culture - it has nothing to do with their genetic background. In this post, I show that cultural appropriation is an extension of colonialism and racism.