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Category: Challenges & Experiments

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Published on 1 Comment on Paganism in the time of coronavirus – part 4: Virtual rituals, continued
An altar glowing with candles as seen on a computer screen.

A socially distanced Beltane was necessary this year. Litha remains a question mark, particularly for my group full of people with health issues.

I was in charge of our Beltane, so I tried to take the lessons learned by Jamie Robyn when she ran our virtual Ostara (her post about what she learned is here). I had a mouse so I didn't have to reach across the altar. I took out our usual group vocal responses. I had everything plugged in.

The other thing I was interested in when writing a virtual Beltane is how virtual rituals could be better than in-person rituals. There are many ways in which they fall short and feel like a poor substitute for the "real thing". One thing I thought of is that with a virtual ritual, you can share your screen and present visual images to each individual in a way that would be hard with everyone sitting in a circle in person. Depending on what virtual meeting space you are using, you can also share audio in a really clear way. I came up with a few ideas:

  • Displaying a labyrinth people could trace with their eyes, fingers, or cursor.
  • Showing appropriate pictures for different parts of the ritual: an ocean for water, a Goddess image when invoking, etc.
  • Playing a pre-recorded meditation.
  • Showing a video.
  • Some sort of online game, puzzle, or challenge that either has to be solved individually or collectively.
  • A virtual altar or shrine, perhaps with candles that can be lit by clicking on them (for example, this "light a candle" website).
  • Virtual backgrounds everyone can use: either a shared one so we can all appear to be in the same location, or each one different depending on that person's role in the ritual.

Some of these ideas require more tech know-how than others. I can't easily build a beautiful virtual altar with candles that each person can light. If we have to continue having virtual rituals, that might be a skill worth acquiring or an expertise worth paying for.

Choose your virtual meeting software based on what you want it to be able to do. As of right now, Google Hangouts and Meet don't have virtual background options, and using your own image with Teams requires a bit of a hack, so if you want everyone to have a custom background, Zoom might be your best bet. Turns out that Google Meet is good for screen sharing, but it doesn't make it possible to spotlight or pin one person without losing the view of everyone else. So when you've chosen what you want to do, seek out the best tool for the job, and make sure you know how to use it.

If you can, with most of these ideas I suggest using two devices as the leader of the ritual: one for screen sharing and one to show yourself in the same way the other participants are being shown. Otherwise, when you turn on the photos or the video, you disappear, and I think in a virtual ritual that it is very important that we be able to see each other's faces. To keep it from echoing and feeding back, one of the two devices has to be both muted and have its volume completely off. In my virtual Beltane ritual, I pointed one device downward at my altar from slightly above and used that device to show the videos. My other device sat across the altar from me and was the one I looked at to see everyone and my script.

Until we can be together in person again, we need to make the best of what we can do. We might as well embrace the challenge and explore the advantages technology can provide.

Links:

Published on Leave a comment on Paganism in the time of coronavirus – part 3: Virtual rituals (guest post)

Lessons from a Ritual in Virtual Space

A guest post by Jamie Robyn

A candle-lit altar as seen on a Google Hangouts screen.

Living through a global pandemic means that we are having to become creative in how we connect with one another. For Pagans, this means we are having to adapt our rituals, rituals that usually depend quite heavily on physical presence. As I was writing and preparing for our small group Ostara ritual, the outside world was changing quickly and drastically. By the time we actually could hold ritual, we were all in quarantine or self-isolation and we needed to come together virtually. Now, with the ritual done and a bit of time to reflect, I am able to share what we learned in taking our ritual experience to virtual space. 

I. The process: writing and preparing

There were many things I had to take into consideration before and while I was writing the ritual itself. Here is a list that may be useful for others to consider:

  • Choosing a platform: 
    • What technology do folks have? 
    • What is everyone's wifi access like?
    • What is everyone’s comfort level with using new technology?
    • What platform will meet everyone’s needs?

We decided to use Google Hangouts as a video chat platform as everyone participating already had Gmail accounts, it was easy to use across devices, and it was pretty reliable overall. We did a test run of the link before the ritual date.

  • Platform education: Make sure you know how to do the following (as applicable to your chosen platform) and know how to help your participants find the options:
    • How to mute all your participants and how they can mute and un-mute themselves.
    • How participants can choose to see only you, or everyone, or whoever is speaking.
    • How participants can blur their background or choose a virtual background.
  • Adapting our typical ritual structure:
    • What tools do we usually use? Which can be omitted/modified/shared virtually and what does each participant need to have on hand? What additional tools will be needed (i.e., a laptop)?
    • What parts of ritual usually require physical touch and how can they be adapted?
    • Who will do what and how will that information be shared?

I went through past rituals to see what adaptations I would need to make to our materials and overall structure. I decided to set up a full altar in my space and make it visible to everyone, so that they could choose to set up a physical altar or not in their spaces. I decided which tools I could simply provide, and which tools each participant would need to have on hand. I decided in advance who would be responsible for each speaking part and wrote that into the script. I shared the final script prior to the ritual so that participants could have a read through if they wanted to, and so that they could either print it or have it open on their devices for reference during the ritual. Tasks that may have been done by one person previously, such as space cleansing or circle casting, seemed to make more sense as collective tasks online. Our territory acknowledgement was adapted to include all of the territories where participants were physically sitting.

  • Deciding on the ritual content:
    • What do people need to work through collectively right now and what may help them to access that work?

This was a big consideration for me, as I wanted to make sure our ritual spoke to the current climate and enabled folks to work through the myriad emotions they were (and are) experiencing. I decided to use the Ostara themes of balance, growth, and hope to guide us through our work.

II. The virtual ritual: lessons learned

  1. Collective speaking or chanting: This did not translate well to virtual space! In future, I would not try to recreate this virtually.
  2. Using singing bowls to mark transitions: This worked surprisingly well in virtual space, with each participant having a bowl on hand to ring as needed. The tones were each different and resonated at different frequencies, which made it a very sonic and melodic experience – quite possibly my favourite part of the whole ritual!
  3. Laptop placement: I had set up the laptop on one side of my large table, facing me. I adjusted the size of the ritual document so that I could read it from farther away. I then set up the altar in front of me so that most of it was visible to the webcam. This made for a lovely virtual ritual space, but eventually put a lot of hot fire between the laptop keyboard and I! In future, I would use a wireless mouse, kept on my side of the altar, to navigate the screen.
  4. Speaking order: Having a consistent speaking order worked really well virtually. Typically, our rituals are much more conversational and we often speak whenever we feel we have something to contribute. Multiple folks speaking at once during video chats makes everything difficult to understand, so deciding an order for responses helped things run smoothly and audibly for everyone. 
  5. Power source: Just as we were wrapping up and saying goodbye, my laptop died. I thought for sure I would have enough battery power to get me through, but video calls drain the battery pretty quick! Next time, I would definitely plug in.

Overall, the experience of coming together in ritual virtually was really good. Seeing faces and laughing together, doing some important spiritual work together, and being in sacred space together in these very uncertain and scary times was both satisfying and necessary. While some Pagans out there may hesitate to explore virtual options during the Covid-19 era, I hope that in sharing our experience and lessons you may feel that it is not only doable, but well worth the effort. Take care and stay safe folks.

A circle of logos: Green Hangouts in the north, purple Teams in the east, orange Go To Meetings in the south, and blue Zoom in the west.

Links: "Paganism in the time of coronavirus" part 1 and part 2.

Published on Leave a comment on Paganism in the time of coronavirus – part 2
A mural of eagles flying over a forest, flowers, and people dancing and doing martial arts. A banner reads "We take care of each other".
Strathcona Community Centre

My puppy, Poppy, loves social distancing because she's scared of most everyone and everything. When we're walking, I know where the closest person is at any given time by the direction she's pulling. She's particularly frightened of group sports involving balls, automatic doors, people walking behind her, scooters, skateboards, groups of people standing on the sidewalk, and people who appear to be talking to themselves (including those on cell phones). The emptier streets and the cancellation of team sports at the fields near us are nice for her, though she still gets pretty anxious. I do wish all the kids in the area would stop playing basketball, both because it is her worst fear and because it seems contrary to social distancing rules.

I'm Poppy's emotional support human, which is funny because I'm a fairly anxious person myself. Still, I take her out for long walks and we endure passing skateboards and steer at least a block around all basketball dribbling. And right now, we give other people a nice buffer, maintaining at least a metre of space.

Being so hyper aware of other people on the street is combining with the amount of coronavirus news that surrounds me every day and with my natural anxiety and is making me fearful. Other bodies are scary right now; even watching people standing close together on TV is making me anxious. My own body is scary too; though symptom-free, I could be a carrier, and when I see elderly neighbours or babies in strollers out, I am particularly aware of what I could have on me.

I wonder how long this feeling will linger after the crisis is over. The longer we're all in lock-down, the longer I anticipate fighting with the feeling that other people's physical presence is a threat and that I am potentially contaminated. Even once we're free to gather again, I fear that the idea that bodies - mine and other people's - are inherently dangerous will be deeply ingrained.

I think one of the things Pagan ritual is good for is bringing our subconscious up to our conscious and using it as fuel. When this is over - be it Beltane, Litha, or later - and we can celebrate in person together again, it will also be time to examine the fears of this time and let go of these beliefs that will no longer serve us. We will be able to hold hands again one day, and hopefully sacred space will make it feel safe again when that time comes.

Links: Paganism in the time of coronavirus - part 1 and Paganism in the time of coronavirus - part 3: Virtual rituals.

Published on Leave a comment on Watching for holy days


In some desert areas, there are spectacular wildflower blooms after particularly wet winters. In the mountains, temporary waterfalls are created by spring snowmelt. Lunar and (especially) solar eclipses; meteor showers; comets, auroras, bird migrations, autumn foliage... there are marvels that come around us, and not too infrequently. We must not be "too busy" with quotidian affairs to experience them.

Seize the (Unusual) Day from the Atheopaganism blog

On a sunny day, a paraglider and a bunch of kites are flown at a shoreline park. We can have as many natural holy days as we can notice. Where I live, in Vancouver, watch the flags and trees: when the wind starts blowing from the south, rain will arrive within a day. If we notice it coming - if we go outside to an open area away from wind tunnels and wind shadows every day - then we can celebrate both the last hours of sunshine and the return of the rains that nourish our temperate rainforest.

Maybe ideally we would celebrate every sunrise, every sunset, every sign of the changing seasons. The animist part of me knows that every piece of the world is sacred, so every day is a holy day. We're surrounded by miracles and beauty every day, all the time, but we also need to pay the bills and visit the dentist and take out the recycling. And despite reading many cute articles about how to clean your house in a ritual or sacred way, I don't feel like I'm connecting with a higher power while I'm crawling to vacuum under the couch. Though I'm lucky enough to have a day job that is aligned with my values, it is still work and my love of spreadsheets doesn't make them sacred. I am not a monk.

I can't live every moment in a state of awe or connectedness; that's why we have rituals. If I try to make every day into a sacred day, I know that none of them will feel special. The full moon is beautiful to see, but seems remote and I've never quite got the habit of Esbats. But I am challenging myself to watch for the south wind coming in, and to honour those weather changes. And if they should bring with them one of Vancouver's rare lightening storms, I'll be thrilled to honour that too.

Published on Leave a comment on Trust me: you can trust them


Three white pillar candles sitting on a mirrorI was listening to a tech podcast this week that included an interview. The host kept asking these long questions that were basically stating the guest's entire findings or opinions ending with "does that sum it up correctly?" Luckily the guest was skilled at mining a topic to elaborate on out of those paragraphs; if they'd just taken the question as asked, it would have been all yes and no answers.

When I first started teaching a choreographed group fitness class, I thought I had to cue every movement. I was pausing the music between songs to demonstrate techniques and then filling the room with my instructions on mic over the music: "Double pulse; double tap; down and up; three more; and speed it up!" After a couple of years, I took an advanced class in this group fitness style, and it was a revelation how little had to be said to have people follow along just fine. Body language, big gestures, and a few key words here and there were enough.

For my day job, I attend an annual "unconference". An unconference is where the participants collectively create the schedule and both teach the sessions and learn from them. It takes some skilled coordinating done on the fly as participants propose topics, experienced unconferencers group topics to create sessions, sessions are voted on and scheduled, and then moderated. Multiple sessions are run concurrently and participants are encouraged to move between sessions as their interest is piqued. It works because people attend sessions they know a lot about and where they are ready to answer questions. It also works because people attend sessions they know nothing about and where they only have questions.

If you are wondering what all of this has to do with writing rituals, I trust you will figure it out.

Published on Leave a comment on Down to the core


"Finding balance" by woodleywonderworks; Creative Commons CC BY 2.0

Sometimes we talk about balancing the elements in ourselves: balancing the wild passion of Fire with the practicality of Earth; balancing the emotions of Water with the intellect of Air. It strikes me that that's a bit like balancing by focusing on your limbs. Balance isn't in your arms and legs - it is in your core.

To balance your body, brace your core, focus your eyes, and breathe. If your core is strong, your limbs can be flung in any direction, you can be still or moving, you can be on a small base of support, and still you will be in control.

Maybe to balance your magic, brace your spirit, focus your intention, and breathe.

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Published on 3 Comments on What is remembered?


A black cat curled up on a cream coloured cushion.
Our beloved Puck passed away last summer at the age of 17.

There will always be loss. It is fundamental to Paganism that the wheel turns for each of us, and eventually life becomes death, which feeds new life.

As the weather has turned cold and grey and wet, I've been cuddling up in sweaters and listening to a lot of the Sickboy podcast. I've listened to about 20 episodes in the last couple of weeks, and I've been particularly interested in the episodes about those facing death. Jeremie, who has Cystic Fibrosis and is therefore facing a shortened life span, is a strong believer in doctor assisted suicide and death with dignity. He also seems to be an atheist. In one episode1, he talked about death as a final peaceful sleep - a welcome end when his body is failing. His intention is to live until the point when a double lung transplant is recommended, and then, as he says, to gather his loved ones and "drink the juice or whatever".

I've been thinking a lot about a phrase I see a lot on social media when Pagans lose a loved one: "What is remembered lives."2 As our lives become more digital and we each leave ever more long-lasting footprints - more photos, writings, recordings3 - it is possible than our distant descendants will easily know more about us than we could ever uncover about our great-greats.4 We will live on in memories and imaginations for as long as anyone cares to follow our digital life trail, but eventually there will be so many lives memorialized that we will be archived and allowed to rest unremembered.

I don't participate in ancestor worship myself. I remember those I've loved who have passed on and hold those memories dear, but I believe that those who have passed through the veil have earned their rest. When I light candles in their names at Samhain, it is for me, not for them.

Rather than ancestor worship, I propose descendant worship. In circle, let's honour and venerate those who are coming after us. We can draw strength from who they will be to power magic and action for a better future - the future they will inherit from us.

What is remembered lives... even if they haven't walked this earth yet.

Published on Leave a comment on Get witchy


We're only going to get browner and queerer and witchier and louder and stronger and prouder and watch the dinosaurs die out.
By Johnny / jblackchurch: https://www.instagram.com/jblackchurch/

I want to be witchier, but I'm not sure what that means. I do own a black pointy hat, but maybe it doesn't count because it has a fuzzy pink brim.

Witches are outsiders. Witches are radical, transgressive, dangerous. And in this world, right now, that can't be just dancing naked under the moonlight, putting bones and deconsecrated relics on an altar, and reading Aradia: Gospel of the Witches - even though that book does call for poisoning economic oppressors.

In this world, right now, to stand up for the environment, for science, for rights for everyone is to be an outsider. It is radical to support Syrian refugees. It is transgressive to fight trans-phobia. It is dangerous to be brown or queer - some of us have the privilege of forgetting that it has always been dangerous to be brown or queer - so the least those of us who aren't can do is be dangerous enough to stand up if you witness harassment.

If you want to be witchier, then make plans to save yourself if you need to, practice and prepare to stand up to bigotry, set up a solidarity network, and fight like hell. Maybe consider some trickster work to make sure politics in your area can't include racism, xenophobia, intolerance. And if you want to do it in the forest, naked except for a pointy hat with a fuzzy pink brim... I'll be there right with you.

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Published on 1 Comment on So let’s quote some Pagans


As in many things, Steven Posch is right about Pagans not quoting Pagans. I've just spent a couple of rainy weekend hours Googling variations of "Pagan quotes", looking at "Pagan quotes" on Pinterest, and checking out the Facebook feeds of a variety of Pagan groups. I found quotes from Eastern philosophies, from First Nations people1, from Christian poets, from scientists and agnostics and atheists. Many of the quotes are good and many are applicable to Pagans, but few of them are by Pagans. The quotes that were by Pagans were often of the problematic "we're not satanists" types2.

So, a challenge to my creative friends: let's create and share memes using quotes from actual Pagan authors, philosophers, poets, musicians, thinkers, and artists. Photos you've taken yourself or Creative Commons pictures only, please, and please attribute all the quotes right on the picture - we don't want the source lost as it gets shared. Here's my first attempt:

"When we let go of believing we are superior, we open ourselves to the experience of living in the community of Nature." - Philip and Stephanie Carr-Gomm
Quote by Philip and Stephanie Carr-Gomm from The Order of Bards, Ovates and Druids. Photo by Mud and Magic.

I know starting Internet memes isn't exactly the same as quoting Pagan during theology and philosophy discussions, but we have to start somewhere! Besides, I don't want Steven to think his work is done any time soon.



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