Solstice is the Reason

Posted on November 8, 2007 by Isaac Bonewits

It’s time to order your holiday gift cards from my CafePress.com store! These “Happy Hanakwayulmas” greetings are available as regular folding cards or as postcards, along with buttons, t-shirts, gift boxes and more.

The text on both card types reads: “All hail the Return of the Light!! Happy Hannukah, Glad Yule, Merry Christmas, Festive Saturnalia, Good Kwanzaa, and a Happy Secular New Year to you and your family!”

If I get firm commitments from a dozen people in the next two weeks, I will have three-foot square outdoor banners made of the main graphic, so you can put them up in your town squares next to the nativity scenes and menorahs. These may cost you $50 or more, but think of how annoyed the Religious Right in your town will be!

Posted in Calendar, Pagan Stuff, Products | Comments Off on Solstice is the Reason

Initiation Experiences

Posted on November 2, 2007 by Isaac Bonewits

I have an essay on our website called Varieties of Initiatory Experience, which we are thinking of expanding into a full-length book. Every now and then we meet people with truly mind-blowing stories of initiations they have experienced. It occurred to us that stories of initiations that were wonderful (or really horrible) would be very interesting and useful to future initiators and initiatees. Combine those stories with my typology of initiations and we would have a Paganism 301 book of permanent value.

So send them in! If you have a story of an initiation that you received, perpetrated, or witnessed, send it to us! No oath-bound materials, please, and include a note of permission to reproduce your story and what name we should credit you under, if any. Put “Initiation story” in the subject line and we’ll be sure to notice it amid the 2000 spams we receive every day.

Posted in Writing Notes | Comments Off on Initiation Experiences

A Spell for Democracy: Encourage the Debaters

Posted on October 29, 2007 by Isaac Bonewits

Tomorrow night will be another Democratic debate and I’m sure there will be another Republican one soon as well. Let’s try watching the debates and using our magical skills to literally en-courage all the candidates to be open and honest about their opinions instead of calculating and timid. What’s more, let’s en-courage the media masters to ask tough questions before, during, and after the debates.

Simple, ethical, of benefit to the nation as a whole.

BTW, I’ve noticed that “live” television pictures don’t make very good magical links (possibly because of the time delays), so I recommend using photographs and other physical objects associated with the people being targeted. It’s easy to download digital photos from candidate and media websites, though an old-fashioned part of me whispers that low-tech chemical photos work better.

Posted in Current Events, Magic, Political/Cultural | 1 Comment

It’s that time of year again! (Halloween 2007)

Posted on October 27, 2007 by Isaac Bonewits

Yes, I know all this info is on the front page of our site, but it appears from my web statistics that many people are getting to our essays about Halloween via this blog and (I presume) the Table of Contents / Site Map. To save you new folks some time (Welcome!), here are some direct links:

The Real Origins of Halloween, a.k.a. Los Verdaderos Orígenes de Halloween.

Halloween Errors and Lies.

Halloween and Me.

’Twas the Evening of Samhain.

There are many more links for your Halloween research and fun within the the essays themselves. Have fun! Oh, and as we mention on the front page, if you are a reporter, you might find it well worth your time to go to Witchvox.com’s special press page.

Posted in Neopagan.Net | 2 Comments