The divination question was about self-improvement with a community focus. This post contains the divination results and a bit of commentary.
Tag: community-building
Piety, Faith, Unmooring
Today, someone asked me a very hard question about what we do when people we respect say and do things that are awful — how to reconcile someone's piety with bad behavior that leaves our faith shaken without sinking into spiritual disquietude and extreme sorrow. I am going to tackle this question because these things … Continue reading Piety, Faith, Unmooring
Decompressing About Recent Events
When I quit Facebook in late 2016, it was because the site had shifted so much from learning about people I knew and keeping in touch with them to a collective political scream, with divides worsening as the people I knew, all of us processing what happened during the 2016 elections, fought with conservative relatives … Continue reading Decompressing About Recent Events
Yes, Let’s Do Post-Recon.
Recently, I read a post on Of Axe and Plough about what happens after reconstructionism (in the "post-recon" environment). The concepts of renovātiō (renewal), resitutiō (restitution), and reparātiō (restoration), which the author applied to considering modern revived polytheism, are a good start and an excellent seed for discussion. From the post: We must then collectively … Continue reading Yes, Let’s Do Post-Recon.
Acceptance and Resistance
Today was a blustery, sunny day. My girlfriend and I went out. I waited in the car rereading passages from Hermias and did a 15-minute Headspace meditation on acceptance while she navigated the line at a store to buy office supplies. People entered and exited every few minutes with balloons. She said that the interior … Continue reading Acceptance and Resistance
Brief Comments on Leadership
This week, I received Maxims #41, ὕβριν μίσει, and #132, θνῇσκε ὑπὲρ πατρίδος, in my weekly oracle. Hate hubris. Die for your fatherland. I've been reading Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics, and I started to take in what he said about tempers and self-moderation, specifically anger and leadership, while walking into work on Monday. Here's the result … Continue reading Brief Comments on Leadership
On Fandom and Gods
I read "What Polytheists Can Learn from Fandom" today. First off, the piece had some good takeaways: An emphasis on building coalitions through a lattice of local, semi-local, national, and international events and loose affiliations of people is important for the future of polytheism. We can do things that respect the diversity of religions and … Continue reading On Fandom and Gods
Maxim 62: ἐλπίδα αἴνει
I. To Elpis (Hope) Elpis, you remain in the jar, the potential of libations. Before words are spoken, on the tip of the tongue, among our racing desires, adventurous, grasping thoughts, you shine like a struck nebula, dispensing grace like flowers. You are the brightness we grasp, unseeing the Fates who know the topography of … Continue reading Maxim 62: ἐλπίδα αἴνει
Eris Disrupting the Feast
For months now, I've been thinking about Eris and the way she drives things apart when discord is not honored on the way to consensus or mutual respect.¹ It's part of why I wrote a devotional poem to her, wanting to push back against that — to find a space that honors her properly, that pivots … Continue reading Eris Disrupting the Feast
