Time To Take Stock

We are living through a period of history that humanity has never encountered before. The world has opened up to us in incredible ways so that although we may never visit Lhasa we know what the temples at the top of the world look like, what sounds come from them, how the people who live in and around them dress and eat and work. We have some concept of the preciousness of the rainforests and the creatures who live with it, we know that we too live with the rainforests because we understand that climate is partly regulated by them. The horrors of war are revealed where in the past they could be denied or minimized. The realities of child labour, animal experimentation and other abuses, and all other miserable realities have been brought into our living rooms at the same time as miracles of health, travel, personal opportunity, semi-democratized knowledge, and choice have blossomed.

Everything is possible at the same time as we are being told that the world is on the brink of collapse. The places where Paganism has best flourished – the UK and US - have never experienced such freedom and comfort. We no longer depend on the opinions of popes and princes to tell us our place in the world, we’re not conscripted into industrial war machines, death doesn’t have such a consuming affect on our lives and we can chose whichever version of the afterlife best suits our desires.

Modern Pagans look to the past as a source of inspiration but we ignore the flea ridden, half-starved, freezing gloom of an average European family home pre-electricity. Most other religions look to an existence beyond earthly life for good reason, experiencing earthly life as something to endure, their Deity being somewhere other than where they are. Most Pagans who have a concept of Deity understand that Deity to be immanent, present in ourselves and in all things and I believe this is significant for Pagan practice.

All other religions make sense of the world through an understanding of Deity, and so has Paganism. When Crowley, Gardner and Valiente introduced the concept of a female Deity it was beyond radical and had serious material effects. Why do Pagans claim to care so much about the planet? Initially, because we understood the planet to be a manifestation of the Goddess. We’ve absorbed animist spirituality and as well as immanence it gives us the concept of genius loci. So we have some vague thoughts about what and who and how Deity might be.

Animism, a product of belief in immanence, has important effects on our practice. If everything is alive and in relationship then what responsibilities do we have for each other? Do rocks and birds have responsibilities towards us, and if not, what makes us believe we are so unique that only we have responsibilities towards other beings?

It seems to me that there are two things fundamental to justifying our ways of being in the world: the ways in which we understand power, and the narratives we tell ourselves. If we believe the narrative of original sin, or that suffering makes us more like Jesus, or of the gifts that Kali gives us then this will effect how we feel about each other, the world and ourselves. The manner in which we live these beliefs will be affected by our understanding of the use of power.

From the dawn of human consciousness people have been struggling with all of this and I see no need to reinvent the wheel, we can use the structures created by others to gain greater understanding of who we are. Where they don’t fit us then we surely have the intelligence and imagination to create our own. But create them we must. The Unitarians, who also avoid dogma, embrace and live within an ethical code. Are Pagans dressed up Unitarians? If we’re not we need to run to catch up with the rest of the world if we expect to be respected by it.

I have learned two lessons in my life: first, there are no sufficient literary, psychological or historical answers to human tragedy, only moral ones. Second, just as despair can come to one another only from human beings, hope, too, can be given to one only by other human beings.

Elie Wiesel

I’ve entered the stage of what’s been called ‘Post-Paganism’, a moment of awareness that Paganism as it is practiced no longer satisfies or means anything much. Apart from Samhain, I haven’t ritually marked any festival for myself for years though I make a mental nod to calendar dates and natural symbols – the snowdrop, the hawthorn flower – as they appear. My understanding of Deity has changed too, but the genesis and the final cause of my stepping out from Pagan practice is the way that too many Pagans behave.

It doesn’t matter what sacred books we do or don’t refer to, somehow we manage to interpret life to miraculously concur with our personal worldview. So it is that Christians, Muslims, Jews, Pagans, Hindus and everyone else generally conforms to their country’s legislation and social mores. Pagans may ask for time off for religious holidays but this is more a stamp of individuality than a heartfelt yearning for religious obligation, or a passion to be with the Land at a particular point in our joint journey around the sun.

If one of our strengths is our lack of a holy book then a corresponding weakness is that we have no idea what it is that we should be doing or not doing, or why, other than feeling good about ourselves. What began with the weighty “Know Thyself” passing through “ . . . if that which thou seekest thou findest not within thee, then thou wilt never find it without thee” has become pure solipsism. People outside of ourselves exist only as extras in the great, consuming drama of our life. We don’t actually want community at all, other than as some kind of heightened social life.

Protestations of openness, love and honouring as you walk away from a partner into the arms of his friend don’t mean much, neither do Twitters about how strong and beautiful and loved you are as your family flails about in agony. We’ve exchanged Bitchcraft (though this maintains a strong presence) for ethereal non-committal. This isn’t based in a concept of respect for personal choice and trust that we will make good decisions if we are cherished: it seems to me to be fundamental laziness. I’ll light a candle for you as you struggle with your child’s decent into drug addiction but don’t expect much more from me other than affirmation via Facebook. There is no action or event that requires meaningful group introspection or discussion.

I’ve just begun an MA in Philosophy of Religion and whilst I’m amazed at the contortions that scholars have put themselves through over the centuries to anthropomorphise Deity they also have basis' from which to make decisions. This is why Jews and Christians beleive and live as they do, because they have particular understandings of their religions. What might a Pagan theology around voluntary euthanasia be, and why? Non-Pagans might also say ‘Because I wouldn’t allow my dog to suffer like that” but is there a particularly Pagan response? Are we simply romantic, ritualised atheists? Paganism has no morality in the widest sense of the word, our ethics come down to plant trees and save the world by meditating and not watching TV. We would never dream of discussing how many children a Pagan might consider having, even though human population is the single most urgent issue facing the planet, way beyond carbon footprints and coal burning power stations. We have no answers or even suggestions on how to approach the most important issues in human life because it might impinge on someone’s personal choice.

My relationship with Deity, mainly in the form of the Goddess, continues, it’s not that I’ve given up believing that seasons change or that the Ancestors exist; rather, I’ve lost respect for the triviality that masquerades as Paganism and don’t want to associate with it. Like many Pagans, Jews, Muslims and people from other religions, I’m content to simply be in the presence of Mystery rather than wrangle over whether He/She/It is wholly simple or everlasting. But for me, the everyday application of a religious belief has to be greater than doing exactly as you like and justifying it by wearing a cloak.

Planning Ahead for a Samhain Project

We never get round to it because we’re too young to die, we’ve got nothing to give away, and the kids will be looked after.

I remember reading the horrific story of a mother who’d appointed the bank to be her executor. The children’s social worker had to physically intervene between the banks representatives and a fire to rescue a photo album from the conflagration of the children’s lives. Since the bank was only interested in what was saleable everything else could go to hell.

Despite what some websites will tell you, writing a Will is a complex matter, not something you can – or should – do on a form from a stationer. Samhain seems the very best time a Pagan can consider our own deaths, who we trust (and why we trust them) to see that our Wills are properly executed, and make sure our loved ones don’t have to struggle more than they must.

Will Aid have been going for years and make giving money to a lawyer far more agreeable, since the money you donate goes to charities. Will Aid comes but once a year, sometimes not even that often, so please make use of this great scheme.

Towards An Animistic View Of Mental Illness

Please visit this site:

As an animist, my relationship with my spirituality has frequently been positively provoked in discussions with people who function much of the time from within altered (as in altered from the norm) states of consciousness. For example, I spent an amazing night shift packing plastic bottles in a factory (before my nursing days) with a gentle young man, discussing the story of Lot in Genesis (Chapter 19) in which Lot is visited by angels (unknown to him) and insists on offering them hospitality. To this young man, these angels were messengers from God and in his realisation messengers from God came in many different forms, from the casual crossing of paths with a total stranger to the fall of a leaf as you passed a tree. And to him, all experiences were to be welcomed as being potentially such a messenger. In some respects, he was one of mine and I remember that one night, 25 years on,with much fondness. I didn’t see him again, but I did hear three months later that he had been forcibly detained for treatment in the local psychiatric ward.

A Doctor For Disease, A Shaman for the Soul

The New York Times reports on traditional Hmong shamans working as part of the hospital team.

Bread, Salt, Mead and Honey

I’ve just returned from the funeral of Jane, who lived and died in poverty. No one in her circle of friends has any money to spare either and so a local authority funeral was arranged.

Because Jane lived and died in poverty her body spent a month in a hospital morgue while one of the richest countries in the world scrabbled around to find the £753 that it costs to dispose of a human body with studied bareness. Jane was blessed to live in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea which provided a hearse and dignified undertakers. Had she not lived here, her coffin would have been deposited at the crematorium by van.

The priest allotted for pauper’s funerals could barely speak English and couldn’t find his way – and thus couldn’t lead us - around the funeral service. What he could do, however, was take the opportunity to proselytize and tell us that we would end up in paradise only if we would come unto Jesus. He wasn’t intentionally wicked, just hopeless and the kindest thought I can muster for him is that he will lie in bed tonight and wail with humiliation. He would not be chosen to run an affluent parish but he is good enough, apparently, for the very poor.

I was shocked afterwards to discover that a funeral funded by the State demands a Church of England service, but can see the good intent behind this imposition. A publicly funded funeral is the absolute last resort for people who die alone and without friends or for those of us who have absolutely no income or savings to fall back on: the dignity and solemnity due to royal dead is also afforded to people at the other end of the social scale.

The service can be very beautiful.

http://www.cofe.anglican.org/worship/liturgy/commonworship/texts/funeral/beforethefuneral.html#receiving

Personally I wouldn’t be restless in my grave if it was said over my body, but that’s because I’ve spent a great deal of time thinking about and dealing with death and have my own philosophy on the matter. But it wouldn’t suit my family and friends to sit and listen to Christian liturgy with my very Pagan body on the catafalque, and since I know no one with £1,000+ to spare and haven’t got £1,000 lying about it’s likely that I too will have a state funded funeral. If, as most non-monotheists believe, funerals are for the living rather than the dead then having something that satisfies the bereaved rather than a Church they had nothing much to do with, seems important. Can this be achieved by having a friend read something less formal at some point? It feels token, a deviation allowed by a benevolent dictator.

I could take out a funeral plan and very good many of them are too. Bodies cost money to dispose of and the more we want someone else to do for us, the more we have to pay. The Natural Death Center is absolutely brilliant at helping to empower people who want to do as much as possible for their dead and a DIY funeral is guaranteed to be as meaningful as you like. But you have to plan, and plan now, because bereavement renders you pretty helpless and convention takes over.

What this has brought home to me is that income determines the religious form of a funeral. Whether or not this was the intent of the Church of England, in a multi-cultural society it’s no longer appropriate. So I can take up arms against a sea of Church and State bureaucracy, and by opposing it, go bonkers. More usefully, I can put some serious thought to how my funeral will be funded – with Samhain approaching this seems appropriate. I can beg you to think about, discuss and compose your own funeral as a Samhain project, and thus remove a great deal of weight from the people you love.

And tomorrow, Pete and I will carefully take the hair from Jane’s hair brush that, curiously, she specifically left us for some reason, and burn it with incense, rose petals, honey, salt, mead and bread, to mark her life and death in our own way with our own words.

Professionalism.

Every job these days now seems to require some kind of qualificational (is that a word? It is now!) route into and through it, and the more organized these groups get the more some individuals will want to be recognized as ‘professional’. The professional counseling and psychotherapy association I belong to, the BACP, was created when individual counselors and psychotherapists decided that the public was suffering because counselors and psychotherapists had no accrediting body. They set up the BACP and approached the government to demand that only qualified counselors and psychotherapists be recognized as such. Today, people who are not qualified as anything can still offer their services as counselors. The government, who once took no notice of us, have now decided that they will only recognize psychotherapists and not counselors, which leaves a great many highly qualified counselors potentially out in the cold, and the BACP running about trying to catch up.

At the same time, the BACP created an accrediting scheme that can only be a box ticking exercise since it’s unworkable to have someone present during actual sessions to observe and assess. The BACP’s own research discovered that the greatest number of complaints are made against accredited practitioners.

http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~db=all~content=a792952432

(please cut and paste, my keyboard has no wriggly line!)

Nevertheless, the larger, more prestigious and higher paying employers of counselors and psychotherapists demand that we be BACP Accredited, not because they understand counseling and psychotherapy or because they want the best people for the job but because they believe that qualifications mean they will be getting a better practitioner and because they want people who are content with jumping through hoops in preference to thinking for themselves.

It’s no bad thing to know that a person has completed and qualified from a particular line of study. Pagans want this too, we don’t want someone calling herself Lady BlueBottle, Hereditary Witch Queen of Atlantis to be involved with, well anything really, but particularly not vulnerable people or representing Paganism. We’re all tired of the fantasy-driven pronouncements of too many Pagans and their incredible claims, and we know that this behaviour is not limited to teenagers. In the non-Pagan world we also know highly qualified and experienced professional people who are untrustworthy. Indeed, the more prestigious their status them easier it is for them to be untrustworthy.

What links these things together, from a growing number of US chaplains demanding access to patient notes and counselors and psychotherapists becoming mesmerized and deskilled by professionalism, to the growing number of very honourable and simple jobs becoming dependent on qualifications is status. Pagans are still struggling to have our status as a bona fide religion recognized, and the starting point for many individual Pagan chaplains in hospitals and prisons was the demand that this corporate status was acknowledged. Those Chaplains who overstep meaningful boundaries by demanding access to patients who haven’t requested it and patient notes, are motivated by the desire to have their personal status recognized.

All of which has nothing to do with accountability. We know that human nature is likely to try and get away with what it can, there’s little can be done about that other than the blunt instrument of punishment, and rather than waiting for behaviour to become criminal it’s probably wise to have an agreed standard of behaviour for different professions. Standardised teaching can achieve something like that and yet . . . when teaching establishments have to fulfill quotas in recruitment and pass rates, which all come down to keeping the institution financially above water it all becomes a bit meaningless. But it does keep the money rolling in.

In the US the Association for Clinical Pastoral Education Inc seems to be the largest representative body for hospital chaplains. They talk about people as ‘Living Human Documents’ and have detailed manuals and standards and an accreditation process and bylaws . . . all the stuff that makes an organization look very proper, professional and acceptable – and gives the organization and its officers high status. This is the group that has encouraged chaplains to demand access to patient notes believing chaplains to have the same status as medical professionals. Presumably, therefore, they believe that doctors have the same status as chaplains.

I’d like chaplains to be accountable to their patients and themselves primarily, then the hospital they work in, then their own Pagan community and then the wider world. But I don’t have a Pagan community, I work entirely on my own and so I’m only officially accountable to the chaplaincy office and the hospital which is perhaps good enough. I would really like a chaplaincy supervision group, Pagan or otherwise - almost entirely the same as my psychotherapy supervision group where I could discus in confidence how things are going. But there isn’t one, there aren’t enough Pagan hospital chaplains to create one and UK chaplaincy groups aren’t organized in this manner.

Long manuals and documents and acronyms do little to protect anyone. Libraries filled with complex and weighty tomes of case law and precedent don’t stop people from breaking the law. What does go some way towards curbing the desire to abuse power is mutual respect and support, keeping organizations small and intimate without becoming incestuous. It can be done. And it’s inevitable that such groups will have lower status and less income.

It’s important to know what the law of the land is and what hospital policy is but this doesn’t stop individuals from working – entirely within the letter of their professional standards – in a callous and burned out manner. (Thank you, Mogg) It is infinitely harder to create, maintain and belong to a small group that actually sees you and hears you, is responsible for and to you than it is to hand over your cash to an organization and perform the tricks they require for advancement which gives you a passport to prestige and greater income.

And of course doing things the hard way requires the patience to explain to the people in suits and the people who have been conditioned to trust anyone with a string of letters after their name, that membership of a professional body is no guarantee of a better service.