There are a lot of pagans in the trans community.When someone reveals they are pagan I treat it as something confidential and will not tell anyone else what I know and feel very complimented by their trust. The numbers do surprise me though. I am curious what drew people in. Are there any good online resources to read up on it?My personal belief is awe of this universe(multiverse?)and I am a serious science buff, I became a electronics tech because it struck me as the nearest thing to magic on earth when I was a child.As quantum physics advances it only gets more magical.I believe in the power of prayer and can use all the help I can get.
My roomate is quite open about her beliefs she told someone she would light a candle for her to which they responded "That's witchcraft in shock" Her reply was priceless "Only if it's done correctly!"Me, I'll take the candle and the goodwill.that comes with it.
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A question for pagans
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Why paganism?
Some are drawn in by the literary and screen portrayals. Very few of them stick around after they learn spellwork doesn't result in frogs. Some are drawn in because of historical and genealogical links. I think many come for the lack of judgement and the overwhelming acceptance of LGBTQ folk.
I am not a pagan.....
But rather a lost Christian.
I have seen too much to believe in a beneficent God, yet I have seen too much beauty in the world to not believe. How can a caring and loving God allow the evil that perpetuates this world? A good friend of mine who is a priest tells me that the same God created people like me to protect the innocent, and provided for the upbringing and training that made me who I am today, transgender and all. He would have me believe that it's all about choice; that each of us has the choice to be good or evil, and that most choose to be somewhere in the middle. I can only tell him that if his God exists that no matter how he as a priest feels about me, that I am damned for all eternity for I have too much to atone for. Of course, he tells me that is why he knows I am a good person - because I suffer for what I have done, and that God knows what lies in my heart.
The flip side of this is that I have seen beauty in the least likely places - a rose growing amongst the rubble of a bombed out town, the smile on a child at play amongst ruined military equipment and gravestones, the generosity of a group of locals towards my team for absolutely no reason, and the wonder on the eyes of a child being held in my arms while I helped her mother out of a home destroyed by naval gunfire I directed. Only God could have saved those people, and only God could have granted me the relief of seeing them safely out of the devastation I had wrought.
I would guess that there are those who only see the bad, and are incapable of seeing the good in the world. Or those who have given up on God for failing to answer their prayers. Perhaps that is the attraction in paganism - the support of a belief other than the God that you feel has failed you?
As for me, I will trust in the love of my spouse and sons.
D
D. Eden
Dum Vivimus, Vivamus
The Jolly Green Goddess
I'n not a pagan either (more of a Buddhist-Taoist-Jungian Heinz 57) but let me venture a guess here; That the appeal of paganism + Wicca for MtF transfolk might have something to do with the existence of a strong feminine principle in their spirituality, that seems to be lacking in the Abrahamic Big Three (unless you count Mary) and often a Goddess at the center of everything. I know that's what I like about it. A religion absent a feminine principle seems weirdly unbalanced + kinda scary. The Male Judeo-Christian-Islamic Godhead is from outside this world and almost seems to hold it in contempt, seeing it as a vale of temptation and corruption, even our souls aren't pure but they're capable of being purified by this God that's outside and above the world; While the Goddess is very comfortably a part of this world, and Nature in her blooming exuberance, and the flesh with all its desires too, and me + you + a dog named Boo...
~Wait, maybe I am a pagan!
Hugs, Ronni
What borders on pure insanity?
Canada and Mexico.
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Umbrella term
Pagan is an umbrella term that includes all the non monotheistic beliefs.
Looking for something to read you would need to search for each of the different belief systems individually.
What they all have in common is the attitude that what works for you in your life is your own business, unless you are causing harm to others.
This becomes acceptance for the LGBTQAI communities unless the individual is harming others.
Most can be boiled down to fitting the term spiritualism, there is a higher power ( or powers ) that only really wants us to live in balance with nature. [ the old 'Golden Rule' of Christianity that has fallen by the wayside ]
Stupidity is a capital offense. A summary not indictable.
Big problem is...
If you take your time to count saints and archangels in any "monotheistic" religion you will come with the number comparable to the combined number of gods in all known "pagan" religions.
And in many "monotheistic" religions there is a patron saint for agriculture, patron saint for the lightning, patron saint for fertility, patron saint for warriors, patron saint for sailors, patron saint for janitors, patrin saint for corrupt government officials...
No one was ever able do explain the difference from "pagan" other then "pagan is bad we are the good"...
I tend to describe myself
as a quasi-pseudo-neo-wicca-pagan, just because it's fun to say. Really, though, my deal is this:
--I believe that the universe is too large, too diverse, and too complicated to assume that there ISN'T something out there beyond our ken. Heck, we know there is, a LOT of somethings... so why should the things religion references be any different?
--As diverse as the world religions are, and as much as they like to argue, they share too many similarities, too many common elements, for all of it to be hokum.
I was raised, first and foremost, with one rule in mind: to treat others as I would want them to treat me. That doesn't extend to being a pushover, and I've always taken it with the corollary of "what others give unto you is what they are themselves due," but it really is what pulled me toward the modern wiccan movement. A belief system that's only real steadfast rules are to find what it means to you to be a part of it and to be yourself so long as no others are harmed? That was right up my alley, and even though my entire realm of study has been a handful of Cunningham books and the few other practitioners I've met... yeah.
It feels right.
*shrug*
Melanie E.
"to treat others as I would want them to treat me"
I very much hope that you are not a masochist ;-)
None of the above
I consider myself one of the ‘none of the above.’ Like many, my background is one of science. As such, I’m always asking for proof. This led me to the philosophical study of how do we determine the difference between those things that are ‘true’ vs those things that are ‘not true’; those things that are ‘rea’l vs those things that are ‘not real.’ I differentiate between true, not true and false; or real, not real and imaginary.
The rules are simple. To be ‘real’ we must have evidence of existence, ie living examples, bodies, remains, etc. To be ‘true’, there must be a substantiated proof. If there is no evidence then we must conclude that the object of discussion is either ‘not true’ or ‘false’; or ‘not real’ or ‘imaginary’.
We can then narrow it down by further investigation. For instance, we might find ‘rules’ that preclude existence/reality. If, for instance, the existence involves traveling at speeds greater than the speed of light, it violates the rules of physics.
Knowing the rules, we can test propositions. For instance, take the statement: ‘Cat exists.’ How would you prove that cats exist? First, you have to define ‘cat.’ We might describe Felis silvestri as a mammal that is a carnivore with five toes forward and four toes aft that meows and purrs, etc. Once defined, we can search for such a mammal. Finding one, we pat it, and it purrs. Note: Do not feed it or it will follow you home, sleep on your legs until they fall asleep, and purr. You will then become the personal property of said feline, along with everything you once thought was yours.
Now, try ‘Dragon exists.’ Let’s assume we’re talking about the classic Draco draconis. First, has anyone ever seen one? Then, has anyone ever captured one? Third, is there any physical evidence of the existence of such a beast? No, there isn’t. By the rules, we must conclude that Draco Draconis is either ‘not real’ or ‘imaginary’.
Then, we consider the number of limbs. Draco draconis has six limbs – four legs and two wings. How many six limbed amphibians, reptiles, mammals or birds can you name? None. That is, Draco doesn’t descend from any terrestrial animal group. We can safely conclude this creature is ‘imaginary’.
However, were we to consider a two legged, two winged dragon, we would have to say there is no evidence for its existence, but we can’t conclude they are ‘imaginary’ without further evidence.
So, let’s try ‘God exist.’ We start by looking for evidence. Has anyone ever seen ‘god’? Has anyone ever captured ‘god’? Has anyone taken a picture of ‘god’? We find there is no evidence for the existence of ‘god.’
So, we must conclude that either ‘god’ is ‘not real’ or is ‘imaginary’.
Do we have any rules that preclude ‘god.’ No.
Is there anecdotal evidence for the existence of ‘god.’ Yes, there is. There are holy books, various practitioners of ‘god’ anecdotal evidence, and various organizations devoted to ‘god.’
So, we study the anecdotal evidence. We ask questions. We pursue anecdotal evidence to determine if it is supportable. For instance, we can pursue an in-depth study of the creation myth in the Jewish/Christian holy book. Upon study, we find it to be wholly fallacious, perhaps ludicrous.
If every time we make such an investigation into such anecdotal evidence, we discover that it is fallacious, we lean further from the ‘not real’ and towards the ‘imaginary’ conclusion. After a large number of investigations lead to the same conclusion, we can begin to apply basic statistics to determine the likelihood of an event being different from the established norms.
Over time and after much study, I have used these methods to conclude that the likelihood of the existence of ‘god’ is extremely low, moving this nearer to the conclusive category of ‘imaginary’, but not precluding indefinite category of ‘not real.’ So, if the chances are one-in-a-million or one-in-a-billion or one-in-a-trillion, there is still a small but very real probability that ‘god’ exists. The reality is the probabilities are so stacked against the existence of ‘god’ that we may consider such a being is imaginary. However, I, like any true scientist, am always open to new evidence to the contrary. Until then, however, I will stand by the statistical evidence that ‘god’ is so ‘not real’ as to be ‘imaginary.’
Red MacDonald
Proofs
While I don't disagree with your conclusion, I don't think your analogy is terribly strong. Trying to disprove the existence of god by saying you don't have any evidence of such a being is like a primitive tribesman trying to disprove the existence of radio waves by the lack of a cell phone signal from a lost cell phone that has dead batteries. He doesn't know enough about how the universe works to understand how the cell phone works, so concludes that it is useless.
My take on the existence of god follows a different path. Any divine being that is so indifferent to the existence of his creations as to effectively ignore them, can be safely ignored in return.
I don't understand how this metaphorical cell phone works, and it doesn't really matter if I do. As the voicemail box on the other end is full.
Mostly in agreement but...
Proof of "nothing travelling at speeds greater than a speed of light" is based on the imaginary experiment, where replacement of light with sound will prove impossibility of travel at speeds above the speed of sound, and our inability to build detector for things at superlight speeds.
"How many six limbed amphibians, reptiles, mammals or birds can you name?" Only leads us to conclusion that dragons are insectoid. And, actually, dragons, as well a fairies are the evidence of our primitive ancestors contact with the people who had guns.
But it is a different story for the other time...
Relativity
There is actually a large body of evidence of the "proof" of the theory of relativity, which is where we get the light speed limit. Unless you are waving a writers magic wand of literary license, (which we have to do as taking 50 years to travel to the closest star really kills the dramatic possibilities) you are stuck with physics that have been demonstrated to work within the theories we have. Our entire civilization is built around them, and no one has yet came up with one that defines the rules of the universe in a better way.
We still lack a unified religion theory though.
That sweet word wicca...
... when magic is kind of almost official...
Light a candle
I thought 'lighting a candle for X' was a Catholic thing.
“When a clown moves into a palace, he doesn’t become a king. The palace becomes a circus.” - Turkish Proverb
Lol
My Real Fathers Family have been Pagans for Generations.That's why I fallow it
I am unabashedly a Christian
I am now attending a seminary studying to be ordained in the Lutheran (ELCA) church. I am the first out transgender woman to attend my seminary. We also have several gay men in my class. My church the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America (ELCA) allows GLBT people to be ordained as ministers. I will not take the time now to discuss what the bible actually says about gay people but if someone is interested just message me. But I am a strange Christian as I accept there are other ways to celebrate God's creation. As long as your way celebrates the main commandment that love is the reason for all good and as long as you love everybody as your self I can accept you. Wendy Jean I will be adding you to my daily prayers. At each service that I attend usually 5 times a week I say out loud a prayer that God protect all my transgender community and open the minds of the public about us.
I'm all over the scale.
Officially, I'm a 21st Century Abrahamic Religionist, and I am not being facetious. I see Abraham as the beginning of modern belief and Jews, Muslims and Christians are in that group. A non-trinitarian, that gets me in lots of trouble, because most Christians are trinitarian. Basically, I love the modesty and reverence of Muslims, but still cautiously believe that Jesus is special, and perhaps the literal "Son of God". Please don't start chewing me out about that until you have walked in my foot prints. I don't understand Judaism as well as I want to.
As far as I am concerned, if you think that your religion gives you the right to be mean to anyone, we are not on the same page.
I am post op transgender, and do not consider myself gay. I do not have sexual feelings. Most correctly, I see myself as a Eunuch as outlined in Matt 5, Matt 19:12, and Isaiah 56:4-5. Still working on if I should be living as a woman or not, but it suits me.
Merry Christmas
Gwen
Lighting a candle
Odd, to me a lighting a votive candle is a part of prayer that most Catholics and Anglicans would recognize. Personally, I am more of an animist but praying is praying whatever gives you support, spiritual or otherwise. I despise those who try to force their beliefs on one another.
Of course, I have been called a heathen and told I would end up in hell. Cant please everyone.
On a side note, not a fan of the term paganism myself, it's been considered derogatory since well before the middle ages.
Is fearr Gaeilge briste, ná Béarla clíste.
Broken Irish is better than clever English.