Personal Reflection
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In Which Straw Men Get Punched —More on Halstead/Green
This is getting silly, but more has to be said in this conversation. Here is a link to John’s latest response to my response to his response. Links to all the other pieces are listed in that one. I am frankly tired of John’s putting words in my mouth and then arguing with them. He’s an attorney, he knows about logical fallacies, and he should know better. Let’s just list them, shall we? I have never suggested that renewable energy will provide as much energy as industrial capitalism consumes now. I am not a “techno-optimist”, as he had it. I am a pragmatist who understands that energy consumption will conform…
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The Doomsaying Simply Isn’t Helping: More on My Exchange with John Halstead
I really think my friend John Halstead has missed the most salient points of my recent post, “Why the Doomsters are completely wrong”. His response glosses over my most important critiques of his position and mischaracterizes others. First and foremost, though claiming the space of “speaking truth”, he ignores the thorough debunking of Michael Moore’s recent film, Planet of the Humans, which does the dirty work of the fossil fuel industry by making false claims about the impact and effectiveness of renewable energy sources. John doesn’t seem to acknowledge the very game we are playing here, which is one of contesting ideas. While he says that “of course” we should…
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Why the Doomsters are Completely Wrong
My friend John Halstead has published Die Early and Often: Being Attis in the Anthropocene, recently reprinted in Medium. In it, he argues that the job of humanity now is to die gracefully: to accept that extinction is coming and work to leave a legacy that supports the Earth’s further evolution and biodiversity, and the memory of a remarkable and admirable species. He spices this up with much Neopagan mythological stuff, such as the myth of the Dying God. But that’s in essence what he says. It’s a thoughtful, well-documented piece, and it’s completely wrong. It’s wrong for essentially four reasons: 1) It mistakes the very nature of the human…
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What if..?
What if we lived in a world that respected knowledge and expertise? That embraced kindness and compassion as the most important human qualities? The culture of which ensured that every mouthful of food, every day of living was acknowledged as a gift of the Sacred Earth? That saw poetry, art, music, rituals, happiness as every bit as important as money? In which every person felt loved, supported, and at home? In which the passages of the seasons, of birth, adulthood, aging and death were celebrated as sacred milestones? That’s the world Atheopaganism is working to bring about. Our goals are simple, and revolutionary: Happiness. Kindness. Compassion. Equality. And right relation…
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UPDATE: The Atheopagan Society. Also, Please Stay Home.
Well, the new nonprofit has a name! The Working Group selected The Atheopagan Society (TAPS) as our monicker. We hope to move relatively quickly in developing the documents we need to file for incorporation in California and federal tax exemption, but there are a lot of policies and details to be worked out. The Working Group is meeting by Zoom on Saturdays, though we may move around so members who haven’t been able to participate can attend. Meanwhile, I have been working on stuff for the new Society. TAPS will need a website, so I am building one; I have bought the domain “TheAPSociety.org” to ensure we have a good…
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Earth Day, and Happy Silence
Since the beginning of the shelter-in-place order in response to the coronavirus pandemic, it has been utterly gorgeous here. The skies are clear and the green mountains stand out crisply. The mustard is golden in the vineyards, and the forests are growing bright new leaves. The silence broken only by birds’ calls, the scant traffic on the roadways and the clean, perfumed spring air remind me of how beautiful this world could be if we could just find ways to stop mucking it up. We’re all sheltering inside, of course, except for those of us on necessary errands or—like me—working in essential industries. We’re going stir crazy, having brain fog…
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Beyond the Walls: Reflections
So it’s been a month now since the shelter-in-place orders and the dawning realization of just how serious this pandemic really is. I feel grateful that this disease hasn’t touched my life yet. But I recognize that it is only a matter of time. I’m starting to see signs of real cabin fever in friends’ communications. Especially in California where the weather is mostly mild, people just aren’t prepared for what it is like to have to stay inside for weeks/months on end. But we must. We must continue to hunker down and protect one another from infection to as great a degree as possible, pursue our projects and hobbies…
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REBLOGGED: Paganism in the time of coronavirus – part 3: Virtual rituals
Some useful observations and tips for performing virtual rituals online. I will be starting to try this soon myself!
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On Authenticity
Many religious people and paths—including many Pagans and Pagan traditions—place a great premium on claims of authenticity: that their mythologies, traditions and practices are, for want of a better word, “real”. “Real” ancient lore or rites. “Real” narratives about god/desses. “Real” translations of “real” ancient texts. “Real” rituals, real traditions, real teachers, real magic. “Real Paganism”. There are those who will go on about this at great length, opining about what they believe is authentic…and, as often as not, why you’re not it. But here’s the thing about authenticity: it has nothing to do with any of those things. Authenticity in relationships has to do with what is in your…
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Love in the Time of the Coronavirus
Hello, Atheopagans. By now, everyone knows about the novel coronavirus, COVID-19. It’s spreading rapidly and it has killed more than 3,800 people worldwide as of this writing. It appears to have a mortality rate in excess of 2%. To put that in context, the 1918 “Spanish” (it wasn’t) flu pandemic had a mortality rate of 2%, and it killed 20 million people worldwide. That’s more than died in World War I. This is a serious thing, and we need to treat it seriously. You can follow the progress of the virus at the Johns Hopkins University dashboard here. So please: do as public health officials ask that you will do. If…
