Florida Pagan Gathering, Beltane 2012; or Trial by Fire

The dragons are breathing. The scales of balance and justice are righting. The Beltane vibe this year at Florida Pagan Gathering was so unexpected: still fiery as always, natch, but without so much urge to party.

I talked to the sweet Orion Foxwood after his workshop on Southern Conjure and got a more solid idea of what has to happen in my life. It was nice to be able to confirm to him the right way to say Appalachian, at least in Southern Appalachia.

The sweetest time of all was with my friends. We had the types of conversations that usually only happen in college dorms at 2 a.m. I asked questions easily about supernatural experiences I've puzzled over for years, and the answers are coming. My path is strengthened and renewed. My soul and spirit have been nourished and loved on. Goddess has taken me home and fed me mashed potatoes.

There was just one thing. I had a beautiful time despite that one thing. It was as if someone asked 'Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play?' and she said 'Oh, it was one of the best plays I've ever seen. I still enjoyed it.'

That one thing, not a small thing, concerns the safety of the Pagan community. We talk a lot about love and trust, about compassion. Sometimes we need to be reminded that compassion should first be directed to the oppressed, not to the oppressor. There is a time to be a sweet soft marshmallow, but there is also a time to roast that sucker into oblivion.

Love and compassion--and I can't believe I even have to say this--are not about always making nice. That's how you harm nice people. Instead, find your voice, as I am. Breathe your fire! There is no excuse to accept inappropriate and downright predatory behavior in our community.

If someone has pressured you into sex or done it when you were unable to consent, please speak up! We need your fire.  Even one predator can be a cold, cold buzzkill, to put it mildly.

Again, I say, it's about the safety of the community. Can we all agree to let the safety and wellbeing of our community become more important than who you are or who you know?

I say we can. So mote it be!

Waking the Dragon

No, I'm not referring to the legendary temper of a character in A Game of Thrones. I'm referring to one half of an ongoing battle between...two forces. Not good and evil per se. Mercy and justice.

I associate so many names and faces with the Divine, frequently having many facets, as we all do. Folks in India dearly love Kali as Mother, yet we in the West are more familiar with her destructive aspect. Other Divine faces concern themselves with the not-too-different matters of both love and war: Inanna, Freya, Brigid. Even Kuan Yin, possibly the ultimate face of compassion, is often pictured riding a dragon.

It makes one want to say, 'What would Sybil do?'

It does seem odd sometimes that I experience the Divine this way. And yet, given how complicated even we humans can be, doesn't it make sense that we came from something or someone even more sophisticated? There is too much to fit into just one thought in just one brain, one feeling in one heart.

She is a mosaic to me. That doesn't bother me anymore. However, it does leave me wondering: if love is the law (and it is), why are there so many different and opposing ways to love?

Even if you remove sex and romantic love from the equation, it's still so easy to be cruel and kind at the same time. I don't know anyone who hasn't hurt someone else, and deeply, myself included. I remember this when one friend is accused of hurting another. How do I show love to both of them?

When does an unacceptable word or act become excusable? Does your position change if someone was drunk, off their medication, or simply had low blood sugar? What if there was a death in the family or some equally epic event? What tips the scales that far? What doesn't?

I just don't know. And I feel that I have to be all right with that. Yet life goes on, and so do the lives of those I care about. In a perfect world--no, a tame world--we would all be in a Hug o' War and no one would feel like a victim, a villain, an outcast. But we are wild and we are willed. We dance the dance of life, and in our passion, we stomp on one another's toes.

To continue the metaphor to its limits, some of us started the dance wearing cleats.

I don't like confrontation, but sometimes it's appropriate. The question is, when? When do you wake the dragon?

I still don't know.

Compassion Has a Thousand Arms

One of my favorite names for the Divine is Kuan Yin, 'She who hears the cries of the world.' A number of Asian nations just had festivals in her honor.  They all have their own take on her name, their own stories, their own religion through which they know her. So many view her as their own special protector. They may all be right.

She is known for her compassion. Often depicted as gentle and mild, her face is an approachable one, reaching beyond Buddhism to various faiths. Women ask her for her aid in conception, in guiding a baby's soul to its mother, then guarding them in birth. She is also said to aid the dead, freeing newly departed souls from the judgment of the underworld.

Yet compassion has not only a gentle face but a thousand arms.

One story of Kuan Yin's origins tells of her willingness to give her eyes and arms to heal a king. When at last the royal family thanked her for her unthinkable sacrifice, the earth trembled, flowers rained down, and her eyes and arms reappeared to them a thousandfold in the clouds.

I like to think we all are those arms. We work our work. We do what is needed simply because it is needed. We reach out and hug, type, hammer, lobby, support, plant, paint, chop, carry, caress, heal, manifest, applaud, and wipe tears away.

And when we can't be there, we ask Kuan Yin to be there and hear those cries.

(I'll talk about her dragon some other time.)