Four Cornerstones May 27, 2009

In the time since I started this series of posts about ethics and values, I’ve shifted my focus, at least in terms of this blog, away from strictly Northern Tradition-based monasticism to a pan-Pagan viewpoint. This is in part because I suspect that when Hela requested that I write about my journey, She had a somewhat broader audience in mind than I did. Therefore I’ve narrowed my list of monastic values down to four: faith, contemplation, service and mindfulness. As for those mentioned in previous posts and which I have omitted (i.e. hospitality, sacrifice and contemplation) here are my reasons for that.

I have an obligation to show hospitality to guests who come into my household, both because of my personal feelings on the subject and on behalf of the other people who live here. It’s something I’d be doing even if I wasn’t a nun. However, if I were cloistered or an anchorite, hospitality would not necessarily be an issue. And some Pagans might not feel as strongly about it as I do. While I don’t expect anybody to follow my recommendations, I also feel obligated to leave this virtue out of the list for the sake of being inclusive of all expressions of Pagan monastic life.

On the other hand, sacrifice, I feel, is an intrinsic part of service. In the course of serving the gods, other people, our communities or all of the above, we are often asked to make sacrifices, or else we choose to make them in order to realize a goal or achieve harmony in our communities. Sacrifice in terms of the giving of a special and extraordinary gift as an offering to the Holy Ones is also a part of serving Them. Making the decision to enter into a contemplative religious life on a full-time basis entails a great deal of sacrifice. Because of all this, stating it as a separate value seems redundant to me.

Celebration can also be seen as service. When we partake in ritual and devotional activities, we serve the gods and spirits by giving Them love, friendship, honor and respect. When we partake in these activities alongside other people, we serve each other as well by strengthening our collective faith and creating unity. Service can be extended to cover a wide variety of subjects, possibly to the point f ridiculousness, but here I want to stress that service in a monastic context is all about being a part of something larger than yourself, even if you’re a solitary, and working to make that larger something better than what it already is.

I feel that for Pagan monastics, no matter what your tradition or religious leanings, the four remaining values are key to a more fruitful relationship with the Holy Ones and a deeper understanding of one’s place relative to Them, to other people, and to the rest of the world(s). Were I to set up a more or less eclectic Pagan monastic order, I would want these, at least, to be a foundational set of values for the establishment of a Rule and the day to day functioning of the community. If I were to set up a specifically Northern Tradition order I would still want to retain these, but I would augment them with other values, such as hospitality and honesty, which are particularly emphasized in Norse/Germanic literature as well as those cherished by modern-day practitioners.

Having said all this, here is a vow of profession based on the four “cornerstones” of monastic practice I have chosen to retain. Feel free to use this if you are so moved, and while credit is greatly appreciated, it is not necessary.

I, _______________, [beloved of (patron/matron deity)], come before the Holy Ones of earth, sea and sky, of spirit and flesh, of death and life [and before my peers, brothers and sisters, friends and allies, etc.] to make these vows.

I vow to strive for faith so that it may become a staff which supports weakness of flesh or spirit and a shield which protects from fear and loneliness.

I vow to strive for mindfulness and to use my powers of observation and attention as a lens by which to clearly see the world around me and a mirror by which to clearly see myself.

I vow to spend time in contemplation of the Holy Ones and Their ways, as numberless as leaves in a forest, and the Mysteries that go as deep as the roots of the oldest tree.

I vow to serve my gods [ancestors, allies, brothers and sisters, community, etc.] with my whole heart and to the best of my ability, that I might become staff and shield, lens and mirror, shade and root for those to whom I am obligated and those who look to me for protection, clarity or relief.

Therefore I, ____________, make my profession as a [monk/nun/whatever] from now until I am released from my oath by word, deed or death. So may it be heard and remembered by the spirits of this place, [by all who stand here and] by the gods in whose names this vow is spoken.

I had set out to write a very different sort of statement, but as these things have a way of happening, what came out was the above vow. I realize now that after several years, I’ve gotten past the novice stage and am ready to dedicate myself formally to being a Pagan nun — as in taking an oath before the gods and possibly some of my friends as witnesses. Before I do that, however, I need to establish a better daily routine and spend some time thinking about more practical aspects of monastic life, as opposed to intangible things such as I’ve been discussing here. And then the real work will begin, no doubt.

Material Simplicity, Part Two May 23, 2009

As Pagans, we need to look at money differently than members of other faiths do, since there are factors to consider which come into play within a generally animistic worldview and which do not necessarily spring immediately to mind when one considers money and its uses and abuses. To nuns or monks, dealing with money at all might be a necessary but unwelcome chore — or it might instead be a blessing and honor. There is no one-size-fits-all solution to the question of how Pagan monastics should deal with money, and much of what I said in the previous post about material goods applies here as well. Looking carefully at one’s life and circumstances, taking responsibilities and genuine needs into account, and having a certain level of self-awareness are all helpful in determining how this resource ought to be used in your life.

However, while one’s possessions may or may not be of spiritual or magical value, money does have a spirit. Though it is manmade, it is alive in the same way certain other parts of the physical world are alive — roads and buildings, for example. It knows to whom it rightfully belongs, and it can become stubborn and stagnant when wrongfully hoarded or conversely, turn useless when recklessly misspent. A Pagan who wants to have a healthy relationship with money, whether s/he is a monastic or not, should be mindful of the spirit that inhabits this resource. It’s a lot harder to mistreat your finances when you know that the money you spend or save is aware of what you’re doing with it. I have seen money misused and consequently fleeing the person who misused it, and I have seen money used mindfully with gratifying results for more than just the person who used it thus.

I know someone who, although she does not consider herself a monastic, lives a contemplative life utterly dedicated to her gods. Happily, she is independently wealthy and a good deal of her wealth goes towards endeavors which she feels do honor to her deities, or towards helping other Pagans meet their spiritual needs. She has used her money to support environmental and animal rights causes she admires and to make her home a holy place where the gods she loves are always welcome. She has been a benefactress for numerous people and has paid for at least two persons of my acquaintance to finish their schooling. And she does not deny herself life’s pleasures — she enjoys good food and wine, has a beautiful garden, and lives very comfortably. She is no spendthift, but her generosity and wise use of money are inspiring and a fine example of how money, when used in a balanced way, can make a great deal of difference in the world in accordance with Pagan beliefs and values.

That’s the key here, I believe — balance. As Pagans we are not required to give up “worldly” things, but neither is it a good idea to get too wrapped up in them. However much money you have or don’t have, it is well to consider your own ethics and responsibilities, and then determine how those are best reflected by how you spend what cash you’ve got. The will of your gods might or might not come into play as well. In my experience, Loki does not seem very concerned with whether or not I’m thrifty or make wise financial choices. Hela, however, is all about prudent use of resources and not wasting anything — including money. (Sometimes it’s, er, interesting serving two deities whose attitude is so very different.) There are always going to be exceptions and extenuating circumstances, but the point here, for a monastic at least, is to avoid as best as possible either grim-faced miserliness or excessive and irresponsible spending. Neither are conducive to a contemplative life.

While it is true that too many of us are struggling to keep ourselves and our families fed and sheltered, and a lack of needed money is a hard burden to bear, people often need far less than they think they do in order to sustain themselves. There was a time when I would have gasped in horror at the idea of living as I do now. I subsist on very little money, but it is enough to cover my needs, which are few. I buy clothing mostly from secondhand shops. I have but one credit card with a very low limit and no other outstanding debts. I haven’t got any expensive habits or hobbies. I also have the good fortune to live on a farm which produces organic meat, milk, eggs and vegetables, so (particularly in the summer and fall) my food expenses are considerably lower than most people’s. And everything I own can fit into a modest-sized car — if I had one, that is.

A few people have taken all this as evidence of a lack of favor from the gods or an inability on my behalf to live a healthy, functional life. I strongly disagree. I don’t mind being “downwardly mobile” because while it is sometimes annoying to be house-bound and occasionally I miss having a certain amount of disposable income, my life has been enriched in other ways that make the lack of money negligible. And although it’s embarrassing to admit, I am one of those people who has used “retail therapy” when feeling out of sorts, so not having as much cash to throw around has forced me to deal with my issues in other, more useful ways. However, this is not to say I look down on those who have more money than I do, nor do I believe wealth is an evil thing in and of itself. Having a healthy approach to money includes not being envious or self-righteous when other people have more of it than you do.

Money is a sacred thing and should be approached with respect. It can take a long time for us to unlearn the unhealthy and petty attitudes about money with which our culture indoctrinates us, but it can be done. I recommend the book Root, Stone and Bone: Honoring Andvari and the Spirit of Money, which, although a Northern Tradition-oriented book, has a lot of useful things to say about this subject to interested Pagans.

Material Simplicity, Part One May 13, 2009

Note: I’m not addressing money in the following post because I feel it deserves a more detailed examination on its own, which will be “Material Simplicity, Part Two.“

The question of whether or not it is necessary for a Pagan monastic to live a life of scarcity is an interesting one. Most monastic traditions, founded within faiths where spiritual transcendence is often emphasized over physical indulgence, stress an ascetic approach to the material world: simple clothing, a very basic diet, few if any luxuries and a marked lack of personal possessions beyond whatever one needs to perform day to day duties. (As for celibacy, I’ve discussed that elsewhere.) While clothing, food and luxuries are often as dependent on one’s environment and physical health as on one’s financial means, not owning a lot of stuff has seems to be a more unsettling idea to many Pagans than, say, wearing only simple, comfortable garments or abstaining from sugary foods or alcohol. At least, that’s my impression from talking to others and hearing their reactions to the news that I am attempting to live a monastic life.

After all, we live in a dominant culture which tells us every day and in a hundred insidious ways that we are our stuff — and it’s hard to undo that conditioning. And let’s be honest, at first glance being a Pagan seems to be all about the paraphernalia — statues, jewelry, altar items, books, magical tools, herbs, incense, oils, T-shirts with a wind-blown goddess posing under the full moon with a pair of wolves…you get the idea. (I still don’t understand the ginormous pentacles I’ve seen cropping up in occult stores within the last few years, though. Wearing a religious symbol larger than your foot seems a bit much.) Also, as there are gods of wealth in our various pantheons and a high emphasis on property and inheritance in some traditions, some might believe that it would be ungrateful to turn our backs on Their blessings and selfish to deny those things to our heirs, as well as silly to downplay all the hard work which earned that new car and five-bedroom house. And because it is so strongly linked with notions of extreme self-denial, accurately or otherwise, monasticism in general has even been called “un-Pagan” by those who feel that it has no place in a religious milieu where the physical world is viewed as every bit as sacred as the intangible one.

However, I would argue that for a Pagan monastic, simplicity of possessions is an idea which should be considered. Even the poorest of us often have many possessions which aren’t really necessary for a life of devotion and contemplation. Living with few material goods can be satisfying and spiritual without being painfully life-denying or self-abasing. (It also makes moving house a lot less hassle.) While it is always possible to take this too much to heart and become a scowling Greyface type who has forgotten how to honor the joys of living on this world, most of us aren’t going to go that far. But how does one know how much is too much, or conversely, how little is too little?

That, actually, is largely dependent on your circumstances. If you have the good fortune to live in a monastic community that has property in common (such as automobiles, appliances, tools and learning materials relevant to your tradition) then you probably don’t need a whole lot of personal belongings. But if you live in an isolated area and are the only monastic within several hundred miles, you may require more in the way of material goods simply to conduct your day to day affairs. Most of us fall somewhere in between these two examples; living a monastic life, or trying to, while juggling work, family, running a household and other “real world” responsibilities. Deciding how much you really need means, therefore, that you have to look objectively at your life in every aspect and determine whether or not the things you own are useful to the way you aspire to live, as well as whether they enhance or detract from your goals as a monk or nun. Perhaps it’s not really necessary to give up your comic book habit since it is something you enjoy without being very attached to it. Then again, maybe having your own computer is too much of a temptation for slacking and you’d be better off using the library computers for email and business instead of spending hours playing World of Warcraft at home.

There are a lot of resources available for those who feel they might benefit from reducing the amount of things they own. Many books and websites have useful information on de-cluttering your house, organizing what’s left, and determining things like whether or not you really need five winter coats or just one. The phone book has listings for charities which will accept all manner of goods, and eBay, Craigslist and your local classified ads are possible places to exchange unwanted items for cash. Even if you aren’t a monastic, doing this might well be a good idea — striving for material simplicity can show us what is really important, whether it be family, work, community service, activism, living more lightly on the earth or really enjoying one’s embodied existence instead of spending most of your time worrying about how you’re going to pay for it all.

The other side to paring down is not replacing all the stuff you got rid of with more stuff. (George Carlin had a funny routine about this.) Lots of us use acquisition as therapy or shopping as recreation — this is of course not immoral or unethical in and of itself, but does it really solve anything? And there’s a big, glaringly obvious issue about which many of us seem curiously blind despite all our talk of being in a nature-based religion: whether or not acquiring and owning an item justifies the environmental impact, use of resources and amount of human toil necessary to manufacture and transport it to wherever you are. Did those shiny crystals come from a strip mine in South America where they were clawed out of a mountainside and subjected to a chemical bath before being thrown in boxes and shipped all the way to the psychic fair? Maybe you’re better off using rocks you pick up from around where you live or special places you’ve visited. On the other hand, perhaps you do need that 4 wheel drive SUV because you live in the mountains and during the winter, it’s the only way to get to town to obtain supplies for your household. Careful consideration of all your material goods in this light might lead you to some startling conclusions, but at least you won’t be in denial anymore about what an earth-loving Pagan you are. (Or maybe you’ll be pleasantly surprised — not all of us follow the dominant culture’s emphasis on thoughtless materialism to begin with.)

Granted, some monastics may not wish to instill this kind of constraint on their accumulation of possessions at all. Remember, I said that considering material simplicity is a good idea — but it isn’t necessarily useful for everyone. If you serve a deity of abundance, then having a certain amount of material luxury is probably the thing to shoot for. If you support yourself with craft work or some other activity that requires a lot of supplies, then getting rid of all your yarn and raw flax and wool is folly. If your tradition teaches that the gods favor the faithful with material prosperity, then it may be important for you to openly celebrate the blessings They bestow rather than shunning them. But there is a world of difference between enjoying your stuff in a spirit of honest delight and gratitude, and becoming avaricious and greedy — an attitude that is seldom tolerated for long by either other people or the gods, if myths and fairy tales are anything to go by. If a monk or nun chooses not to live a life of material simplicity, it is important that he or she pay close attention to how much time, money and energy are spent dealing with or acquiring possessions, and thus take care to check excesses whenever they seem in danger of coming up. (Moderation is a monastic value I hope to address in a future post.)

Generosity is a much-admired trait in almost every religious tradition, and if there is one thing to be said for having material abundance, it does afford one to be generous. Some cultures see the most important people as being the ones who regularly share all they have with their fellows, while in some religious traditions, gift-giving is seen as something that creates an obligation between people and forms bonds between people of various social ranks or family relationships. For a Pagan monastic, none of this might matter — or it may matter a great deal. This is another reason why one may wish to retain his or her material goods, in order to develop a stronger sense of community and stronger ties of friendship and alliance. These things can be done without handing out stuff, of course, but there is a special kind of bond created by the gifting of a precious or personally important item to someone who is aware of its significance, and these bonds might be more important to cultivate with one’s co-religionists and neighbors than giving everything you have away to strangers.

Whether one is restrained about material ownership or not, there is one thing to keep in mind: it’s only stuff. Its presence or absence does not have to interfere with your spiritual life unless you allow it to, nor does having more or less necessarily make you more enlightened or blessed than others (and the gods sometimes exhibit peculiar standards for showing favor anyway, in my experience.) Exerting self-discipline and remembering to take pleasure in whatever you do have, however much or little, is more important than worrying about whether you are sufficiently ascetic or are not exhibiting enough proof that the gods have blessed your family. And as always, being mindful of your relationship to your possessions is the best way to avoid letting them (or a lack thereof) own you.

Fire May 3, 2009

In the interest of full disclosure, I’ll say that like a number of my friends, Pagan and otherwise, I’m a kinkster. It doesn’t have a lot of bearing on my spiritual life since I don’t do ordeal work nor practice any shamanic or magical techniques that would make such things relevant to my vocation. This is not a place where I normally care to discuss my private life, either. However, I had a rather intense experience this past weekend which I’d like to share, as it is actually relevant to the themes of this blog.

At a large-ish Beltane gathering focused on sacred sexuality, I attended a workshop about fire play. This is practiced on another person, but not to harm them or cause pain or discomfort — it’s more like giving a massage with fire. It’s very sensual and relaxing, even therapuetic. Some of the other folks in the class even said that working with fire in this way helped alleviate arthritis pain in their hands, as it’s warming both to the giver and the receiver. I was unsure what to expect and was cynically prepared for it to be boring or lame. As it turned out, it was anything but.

Basically, playing with fire in this way entails moving a lit fire wand (which looks like an oversized cotton swab) dipped in rubbing alcohol across someone’s skin and following it closely with the other hand to make sure the person doesn’t actually ignite. There are other techniques one can use to cause various sensations, but that’s mainly what it is. The man who taught the workshop was a jovial fellow who sort of looked like Mario from the video game. He had come highly recommended as someone who was both enthusiastic about sharing his expertise and very safety-oriented, which was part of the reason I decided to take the workshop.

“Fire is a living thing,” he told us at the start of the class as we were going over the basic information. “It will act the same way in the same circumstances over and over…until one day it doesn’t. You have to be ready for that.”

I know this all too well. As a child, I thought of fire as being something my mom made in a fireplace occasionally, something my dad used to barbeque ribs in the grill in our backyard. I was taught not to play with matches or lighters and to stay away from fires. But when I was 7, my family home burned down on the Winter Solstice due to bad electrical wiring. It was very sudden and we lost the house and everything in it, but my family (including the dog) were all unharmed, and after the initial shock was over life went on, in large part thanks to the generosity and help of family and neighbors.

I consider this a formative experience since it taught me not to be too attached to my possessions, a useful lesson for a future monastic. It also taught me at an impressionable age that there are things even adults cannot always control or conquer. Fortunately, having seen my home  turn to ash within a few hours did not make me terrified of fire so much as warily respectful of it.

Whether this was believed in earlier times or not, lots of people today apparently associate Loki with fire. I too associate it with Him because that element is an apt image for Loki’s essential nature as I understand it — beautiful, dangerous, wild, hot, hungry, sometimes a helpful and comforting friend, but at other times a raging, destructive force that listens to no reason. Yet I love Him anyway, as I love the fire which burns in our wood stove in the winter, and which once warmed my ancestors in their simple huts and tents. This is also the fire that may have burned some of those same dwellings to the ground and left prairie, forest or rice paddy scorched and desolate…but only for the time being. Fire allows new growth to emerge, uncluttered by the past yet fertilized by what’s left of it.

The first day of the workshop was spent going over basic information and watching the facilitator demonstrate the techniques on two prearranged volunteers. The building where this occured was an old wooden barn — not exactly the safest place for waving lit objects around, but it was large enough and anyway, it was raining outside. As night fell, the fire stood out more and more as it played over the models’ skin, and I thought it was one of the most beautiful things I had ever seen. Still, because I was tired and cranky from a long drive, I griped to my friends later on about maybe not going back the next day and just spending the time lying around in my tent until the rest of the workshops and events started.

However, I did return and the facilitator cheerfully told us that we’d be practicing on each other. This is not as dangerous as it sounds.  70% isopropyl alcohol does not burn terribly hot, we were all grown adults, and we had no mishaps during the entire workshop. There was a lot of joking and good-natured teasing while we got the hang of it. The class had moved into a side chamber of a large tin warehouse which was far less of a fire hazard than the barn, and the small room echoed with laughter. When it was my turn to lie down and be toasted, I wasn’t afraid so much as weirdly anticipatory, and only some of that had an erotic tinge to it.

Three people started passing lit wands over my skin, followed by their hands to extinguish any errant flames, as the alcohol sometimes ignites briefly in the wake of the wand. I am physically standoffish with people I don’t know, so I was actually more uncomfortable with strangers touching me than I was with a fiery piece of tightly wrapped gauze being passed over my bare skin. The sensation was warm and pleasant, however, not at all painful unless the wands were left too long in one place or if alcohol dripped from a lit wand.

I rested my head on my arms and closed my eyes, and suddenly I heard Loki’s voice in my mind. Then as someone passed a wand down the length of my spine, His presence seemed to envelop me, and it was as if my whole body was surrounded by intense flames. And I understood. I got it. I experienced some of the mystery that is Loki, in a way that I find it impossible to write down in words — which makes it a real Mystery, I guess. I had to swallow hard several times to keep from bursting into tears, as I didn’t want to either freak out my classmates or have my reaction interpreted as some kink-related catharsis experience, which it wasn’t. It was pure, uncontaminated knowledge of my Beloved’s essence, burned into my soul as the fire wands warmed my flesh, and the suddenness of this revelation made it that much more powerful.

Suddenly I felt my leg stinging when someone failed to follow up with their hand fast enough and some burning alcohol was left behind. They hurriedly put out the flame and apologized. It was a sharp reminder of the dangerous side of fire as well as the dark side of Loki. I have seen that face of His very clearly at times. It is not a side of Him that I commonly interact with, but I do acknowledge and accept that it’s there. He is, as others have often said, not always a nice guy — maybe not even most of the time. But at that moment I couldn’t have cared less.

This is going to sound bizarre, but the simplest way I can describe how I felt is the realization that, purely out of my love for Him, I would let Loki devour me utterly. I would gladly lose myself in the Fire that is Himself — even if that Fire is awful and destructive at times. I had secretly wondered if this was really true about me, having read the writings of mystics and poets like Mirabai or Kabir where similar sentiments are often expressed. But lying on that table right then, I knew it to be so with every cell of my fire-kissed body.

That being said, I was glad that the rest of my workshop experience was pain-free. I rose from the table feeling light-headed and dizzy, but quietly ecstatic. The workshop facilitator had me sit down for a while until I felt ready to pick up a wand again and practice on someone else. “…after you stop flying,” he added, grinning. I did eventually stop feeling light-headed, but I don’t think I’ll stop flying for a long time. The memory of that absolute understanding will stay with me always.