PaganSquare


PaganSquare is a community blog space where Pagans can discuss topics relevant to the life and spiritual practice of all Pagans.

  • Home
    Home This is where you can find all the blog posts throughout the site.
  • Tags
    Tags Displays a list of tags that have been used in the blog.
  • Bloggers
    Bloggers Search for your favorite blogger from this site.
  • Login
    Login Login form
Subscribe to this list via RSS Blog posts tagged in community
Social Media and Pagan Culture

Full Title: Social Media's Centralization of Online Dialogue Hurts Pagan Culture

What if wildly witchy articles no longer existed? Imagine if only corporate media "Pagan" blogs were available, as milquetoast as the fake Christianity that dominates media to suppress robust, responsible Christians? Paganism tamed!

The more corporate social media centralizes online dialogue, the closer we move to deterioration of Pagan culture and extinction of meaningful online Pagan conversation.

I love social media, but it could devastate Pagan innovation and culture unless we do something. Here's why:

Last modified on
Recent Comments - Show all comments
  • J'Karrah
    J'Karrah says #
    Definitely food for thought! Thanks for posting
  • Francesca De Grandis
    Francesca De Grandis says #
    J'Karrah, thank you for your supportive words.

Posted by on in SageWoman Blogs
Celebrating Collaboration

It’s getting towards the end of the harvest season – quite a sensible time to be thinking about collaboration. For most of settled human history, harvesting was a big job that required the work of entire communities. Before that, survival for our ancestors certainly depended on working together. Modern technology has ‘liberated’ us from the apparent need to fit in and work alongside others, but the truth is that our ‘freedom’ also means loneliness and isolation for many people.

Any Pagan ritual or celebration is an opportunity to come together and make something. One of the reasons I especially like improvised ritual is that it creates the scope for everyone to be equal participants, crafting something in the moment.

...
Last modified on

Posted by on in Culture Blogs
What Are You Communicating?

 

I overhear a lot of conversations that become arguments, and I just want to smack my head because, as an outside observer, it's so clear to me why the two parties are having a difficult time communicating. Why, in fact, a pretty benign topic can become a full on argument. Often it really boils down to intention. What's your intention? What are you trying to communicate? What's your goal? What do you want to get out of this communication/interaction?

...
Last modified on

Posted by on in Culture Blogs
When Community Fails

My friend’s mother died this past spring.

The stroke happened suddenly and her passing came a few weeks later.  Despite a lot of preparation for a worst-case scenario, the death hit the family hard.  My friend had a difficult relationship with her mother (something many of us can relate to, I’m sure) and her ambivalent thoughts and emotions have been complicating an already difficult grieving process.

My friend announced her mother’s illness to our group, but she kept the news of her mother’s passing to herself.  She had been out of town a lot to be with family, and it was only recently that I saw my friend since her family tragedy. 

Last modified on
Recent Comments - Show all comments
  • Ann Edwards
    Ann Edwards says #
    I was interested in your comment "I as a priestess, did not show up at funerals..." Did you as a friend show up?
  • Anna Helvie
    Anna Helvie says #
    From 2002 to 2012, it was mixed. A coven member's father died and we did not go to the funeral. At that time it was because we we
  • Anna Helvie
    Anna Helvie says #
    My impression is that greater Pagandom has a substantial number of people who don't do well with these types of things, and that o
  • Anna Helvie
    Anna Helvie says #
    I meant "bring in a social worker who understands the nuances of bereavement and has specialty skills in this topic."
  • Ann Edwards
    Ann Edwards says #
    I'm sorry but this story struck me as almost a description of modern paganism. Events, celebrations, connections... but no true c
Why Christians Thrive and Pagans Fail

I have read many posts in forums, in blogs, and elsewhere regarding the social issues of the Pagan community.

 

...
Last modified on
Recent Comments - Show all comments
  • brianna
    brianna says #
    Interesting. but not fully accurate. I deconverted from Christianity because Christians cant get along with Christians from other
  • Emil
    Emil says #
    There are other things, which hold the pagan community back.Myself, being dedicated pagan for many years, I had moments, when I wa
  • Brian Radcliffe
    Brian Radcliffe says #
    Honestly, I don't know what Christian church the author went to because in my experience they are very fractured. The differing de
  • Anne Newkirk Niven
    Anne Newkirk Niven says #
    Dearest Leandra, Your criticism is spot-on, and your proposed solutions sound. I have only one caveat: you are comparing a squall
  • Steven Posch
    Steven Posch says #
    My dear friend and colleague Sparky T. Rabbit (of "Lunacy" fame)--a professional actor well-versed in methods of critique--always

Posted by on in Paths Blogs
Pop Culture Lessons on Pagan Community

When I started watching The Path on Hulu the other day I was not expecting to get smacked right in my Pagan Community feels.  Yes, I know The Path is about a cult rather than about Pagans, however it is filled with the dynamics of a small, insular, religious community and that is very, very relevant to our interests.  I’ve been a part of many healthy and less than healthy Pagan groups and I think we can all benefit from stepping back for a minute and looking at some of the the issues raised in The Path. 

***This article will contain spoilers for The Path episodes 1-7***

The first thing that really got me while watching The Path (within minutes) was the issue of super special secret teachings that will lead to happiness/enlightenment/personal power/etc. that are only revealed once someone get’s to the highest levels of initiation - once they’re far too invested to walk away if they’re disappointed.  This is possibly my biggest issue with large chunks of the magickal community and the mystery traditions of Paganism.  In The Path the cult that is at the center of the story is the Meyerist Movement.  Their teachings are called The Ladder and as people are initiated into the group they move up the ten rungs of The Ladder (one being the lowest, ten being the highest).  As people move up The Ladder more of the group’s secrets are revealed, with the promise that the highest rungs will hold the secrets to true happiness - the only problem is that the highest rungs haven’t actually been created yet and the group’s founder is dying and in a coma.  No magickal group has ever promised higher levels of secret teachings that they haven’t actually written yet - right?  I was part of a well meaning group that basically did a less horrendous version of exactly this.  I do respect mystery traditions to a certain extent.  Yes, there are religious and magickal mysteries that require a seeker to have certain trainings under their belts in order to make sense of them safely and fully.  However, before I get involved in a group I want to know what I’m getting myself into.  If there are super special secrets that are essentially my reward for doing the lower levels, I want to know what they are (at least enough to decided if they’re worth it).  However, having questions answered with a dismissive, “well, you’re not a high enough level for those teachings to be revealed” feels a lot like an adult dismissing a child with, “You’ll understand when you’re older.”  That kind of condescension triggers all kinds of not-so-fun memories for me.  Further, I feel like a lot of groups use higher level teachings as a lure to get and keep members, rather than having them be the genuine tools for growth they’re meant to be.  I don’t want my Pagan groups promising me the secrets of enlightenment of the low low price of just four installments of $19.95 or the attendance of ten meetings and endless potlucks.  This behavior isn’t true of all groups certainly, but it’s common enough to be a problem.

An issue from The Path that grabbed me right from the get go is the cult of personality.  Many Pagan and magickal groups are founded by a charismatic leader that has the ability to bring people to their work through the sheer magnetism of their own personality and power.  Sometimes that leader is so charismatic that a well-meaning spiritual or magickal group becomes little more than a cult of personality - doing whatever the leader says just because the leader says so.  In The Path we have the character of Cal, the groundroots leader of the Meyerist movement.  Cal has the wonderful gift of being able to make anyone feel special, recognized, and valued - an invaluable skill for any leader.  However, it leads to people doing pretty much anything he says just because it’s him saying it, regardless of whether it’s really the right thing to do.  I’ve seen plenty of groups where the members blindly follow a leader’s direction long past the point of that leader’s actual ability to lead.  The point of religious/spiritual/magickal groups, in my opinion at least, is to further personal growth and create community, not just follow a leader like ducklings.  No leader is infallible and no human is perfect.  In fact, plenty of charismatic leaders get a little drunk off their own power over people and fall to the temptation to abuse it.  Cal is a wonderful example of a leader who gets caught in his own propaganda and starts to act like he can do anything just because of his position - and people let him get away with it to a shocking extent.  Even the most benevolent of leaders can fall to the temptation to just “shade” their words in a way that will get people to come around to their way of thinking, particularly if they can tell themselves it’s for the people’s “own good.”  I know I have a time or two (fortunately I had people call me on it so I could correct myself).  Sadly, there are plenty of less than virtuous folks out there just waiting for people to fall into their sphere of influence.  The Path reminds us just how very easy it is to manipulate people if you’re in a place of spiritual power over them.   Anyone who’s ever led a group will see shades of themselves in Cal (and if you don’t you are probably lying to yourself). 
   
Another issue that hit very close to home for me was the issue of prioritizing the structures of a community versus the personal growth of community members.  There comes a time for every well-established group where the leadership of that group becomes so invested in the structures/traditions they have created that they lose sight of why those structures were created in the first place.  In The Path there are very specific sets of procedures that people must go through in order to advance their spiritual development.  Those procedures were created by the movement’s founder and are virtually sacrosanct.  Very early on in the show the main character, Eddie, is falsely accused of infidelity and is forced to go through what amounts to mental reprogramming to “unburden” himself.  It is not a pleasant process.  However, because the Meyerist community is so invested in the methods they’ve established to “help” people they never stop to ask whether or not they’re really necessary or if there might be another way of doing things.  Further, while the process makes the community feel like it’s doing “good work” it completely emotionally eviscerates the individual undergoing it - stunting his own personal growth.  In a much more extreme example, in Episode 7 we see Cal confronted with an extreme threat to the Meyerist community as he knows it and he takes even more extreme measures to eliminate that threat - not because the threat was invalid or wrong but because it was dangerous to the structures and institutions that made his life comfortable, predictable and gave him power.  I’ve seen plenty of groups where traditions were held so dear that they were held onto long past the point of them being helpful or even healthy.  It’s perfectly natural and understandable for people to feel protective of and invested in the structures they’ve created and nurtured over time.  However, it is critical for any group/community member, especially those in leadership positions, to remember that structures and processes are created for a reason and once they cease to serve their purpose it’s time to come up with a new process.  Respectfully asking “why” is critical to the health of any group.  People change over time, communities change over time, the world changes over time and so must the process, structures, institutions, and traditions that we love or they will lose all meaning and fall to dust.

Turns out that spiritual/religious groups all seem to have the same issues of secret keeping, leadership, and ossified structures.  In The Path we see these issues writ large in a “worst case” scenario of a group straddling the line between a religious movement and a cult with a leader slowly losing control.  While the problems faced by most Pagan/magickal groups are less extreme (at least I hope so), we can still learn a lot from The Path.  What secrets does your group hold and why?  Are your leaders serving your group or are they lording over you?  Do your traditions still make sense?  Take some time and really think about how your group and the groups you’ve dealt with in the past take on these issues.  Ask yourself if your group is dealing with its issues in a healthy and productive manner or if personality issues and protectionism and fear are fighting for the status quo.  When our communities are healthy we all benefit and we all suffer when they’re rotting from within.

Last modified on

Something has happened on this site that delighted and empowered me. 

I've repeatedly come across blogs here stating ideas that make me post a comment along the lines of  "Me too, me too! I've been teaching my students that for years!" This is lovely for me.

Last modified on

Additional information