**First published in Volume I Issue I of Air n-Aithesc**
Title: Early Christian Ireland – Introduction to the Sources
Ethics of Divination
In most modern pagan paths divination plays an important role. This is true in modern witchcraft and in Druidism, where divination might be used in ritual to predict a group’s immediate future or to tell if offerings were accepted. Divination in witchcraft might be used before or after spellwork or more broadly to help a person find guidance or communicate with the Gods and spirits. In Heathenry we see divination used sometimes at baby blessings or namings, where a rune might be drawn to predict the child’s luck, or as part of some rituals by adult participants for a similar reason. Besides ritual applications divination is also used more broadly by people seeking answers and looking for insight.
Wellspring 2014
I returned home yesterday from my first national festival, Wellspring, an event put on by ADF. This is ADF’s 30th year, and although I’ve been a member since 2001 I’ve never attended an ADF gathering before. This year though I was asked if I’d be interested in doing a few workshops at Wellspring and after discussing the logistics with my Kindred sister, decided that it would be fun to go and bring the kids. I put in proposals for a selection of workshops and was set to do three: honoring the Other Crowd as a modern pagan, living Celtic Reconstructionism, and the Hidden Folk in Norse and Irish culture.
remembrance
This coming Monday is Memorial Day. These days it often is filled with sales galore on electronics, things for Summer and three day weekend and firing up the grill. The historical value of the day has shifted. Memorial Day was begun three years after the War Between the States ended (that’s a southern expression […]
Berchta – the White Lady
Berchta, also called Perchta, is a goddess of southern Germany and Austria who later became known in folklore as a kind of boogeyman who would frightens children. Modern Heathens look to a variety of sources to understand her as a goddess and so the understandings of her can vary widely.
Something Witchy for my UK friends
Something for my UK friends to check out – Rachel Patterson has written some interesting books and teaches workshops in southern England
Seidhr – a poem
(To respect the author’s copyright and visual theme, no excerpt of this post will be provided. Please click through to “Seidhr – a poem” to enjoy the author’s work fully.)
Daily Spirituality
One of the first things I often see people new to a spirituality asking about is how to celebrate the big things, like the holy days – and indeed one of the first things I did approaching German Heathenry was too look at the holidays. But a better question for people to ask is about daily spirituality; how do we live our spirituality every day? The answer to this question shouldn’t change no matter what religion a person is practicing.
Reflecting on the Nature of Things
Sickle
The symbol of green witchcraft, of the luminary mysteries into which the green witch must initiate, of one’s oath to honor the land and the dead-within-it- is the sickle. I chose the sickle crossed with the stang as the symbol of my tradition (the stang was to symbolize the commitment I’ve made to the practice) to be used among me and those I’ve worked with. Most other green witches I come across have some variation of the saturnalian blade included in the symbolism of their path, often intersecting with Hekate’s keys (their dedication to pharmakeia), or with the caduceus to honor their commitment to healing.
The Classical Arts of the Witch
She can heal, prophecy and predict, conjure up the spirits of the dead, can spell bind you, turn you into a hare or wolf, make you find treasure, and most fatal gift of all, cast a love charm over you there is no escaping. Jules Michelet, La Sorcière
Prophecy,