You Can't Get Here From There, Francis

Pope Urban II at the Council of Clermont of 1095, given a late Gothic setting in this illumination from the Livre des Passages d'Outre-mer, of c 1490 (Bibliothèque nationale de France) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You will not find the Divine Feminine through Christianity.

 Christianity is a rigid patriarchy that at best tolerates its

'lunatic fringe', (currently Rev. Matthew Fox and his followers),

at worst defrocks, excommunicates and burns them at the

stake.

There has been a lot of wonder this week because Pope

Francis said he doesn't judge gay people.

 

Piffle.

 There have always been gay priests.

 

If Pope Francis had said, "I think women should be equal

partners in the church and I think the Godhead should reflect

the fact that we are all children of the Spirit," then there would

be cause for wonder.

 

But he didn't.

And he won't.

 

You just can't get here from there.

From Niagara-on-the-Lake to the End of Time

Pictures from Equal Pay Day actions in Leuven. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Canadian Premiers met this week in Niagara-on-the-Lake. 

A journalist asked why having an equal number of women at the table

made a difference. (Half of our Provincial and Territorial leaders are

now female).

 

Nobody was able to give an explanation.

They just knew it was better.

It appears that after 100 years of struggle for the vote, equal pay for equal

work etc. social justice came to Canadian politics without a lot of fuss.

 

A gender balance is a good thing. 

In any situation.

 

How different would be our history if women had been respected

and our opinions valued during the last 5,000 years.

And as our species gets ready to explore space, (something I am

so sorry I will miss as it will not happen in my life time), I think we

will be packing some hard learned lessons.

Maybe when time comes to an end and all of the species in all of the

universes are called to account, human beings will be known as

'The Just Ones'.

Wouldn't that be funny!

Swastika Rehabilitation Day?

Crematorium in operation at Dachau, the first concentration camp established in 1933 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 I was just over at Delightfully Ludicrous, (link), reading that

today is Swastika Rehabilitation Day. It's a funny/bizarre  

story and it's worth reading what she has to say about it.

Anyway.

I was on a bike tour of Bavaria in 1988 and was

overwhelmed by the beauty of the German countryside

and the intense spirituality of the people.  We often found

little grottos deep in the woods with a small statue of

The Virgin and a burning candle set in front of her. 

Religious paintings and statues were everywhere.

 

But Bavaria has a dark history.

Dachau is twenty minutes outside of Munich by city bus.

It is the place where the Nazis conducted their torture

experiments on prisoners. 

 

When we entered what was the SS headquarters for the camp,

there were huge banners hanging from the ceiling that showed

the faces of some of their victims.  

The Nazis documented everything so well.

 

I just don't have the words to describe what it was like.

How can you describe looking into eyes that show anguish

beyond all comprehension.

 

And there was not a sound. 

So many people were there that day and we were all numb. The

silent tears just ran down our faces and nobody bothered to try to

hide them or wipe them away.

The crematorium had a bad smell. 

Fifty years after it was first used it still stank.

But that being said, my dear fellow bloggers, it is my personal

opinion that the swastika can be rehabilitated -

 

when humankind learns to stop hating.

 

Until that time it must remain verboten.

Butterbrains Tries Blackmail

Clearing My Throat

Goddess (Photo credit: junibears)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For years now I've been reading the works of Matthew Fox,

a former Dominican priest who was silenced by the Vatican.

This is taken from an interview he gave a few years ago:

I think that the return of the Goddess is one of the most important

movements of today's hope.... the Goddess represents the Divine

creativity in everybody ... if we have just a male image of God, that

legitimizes the other patriarchal privileges and oppression - including

men towards men - that goes on in the culture. So obviously we need

gender justice in our divinities.

A few weeks ago I signed up for an online week-end seminar he was

leading.  Unfortunately the first speaker I listened to wasn't Matthew Fox. 

But Matthew Fox was there and I felt betrayed.

 In the space of one hour the speaker told the audience of mostly women

four times that he knew he was being sexist but he didn't care, (i.e. I

know this is sexist but I insist on a literal translation of this [ancient] text.)

 I don't give churchy men a second chance anymore.  I've heard this kind

of bullshit my whole life.  In my opinion if the ancient text is sexist then

it isn't ancient enough.

 Shortly after the week-end ended Matthew Fox tweeted this:

 

 ... The suppression of women in the Church is but one of the many signs

of this masculine domination….Reason has to be 'married' to intuition;

it has to learn to surrender itself for the deeper intuitions of the spirit...

from the presence of the Spirit in the depths of the soul. -Bede Griffiths

 

Normally I would be far too intimidated to reply to such a famous

intellectual but I couldn't stop myself.  I was far too angry.

Francie McGlynn@Frazzee1       @FCSCreationSpir What am I missing? This was the message I was hoping to get from the Christ Path Seminar but it wasn't what I heard. - 03 Jul

 

Surprisingly he answered me right away:

 

@frazzee1 Bede is talking about the need to include right brain and intuition and spiritual practice to counterbalance left brain rationality. There was LOTS of that this weekend--surely the entire Sat aft practice with the Cosmic Christ icons; the Cosmic Christ itself; the chants. My talks on Jesus as a mystic/prophet living out the four paths of creation spirituality and the recesses of his soul. - Matthew Fox

 

Jeesh. 

I thought Bede was talking about the suppression of women and

male domination.

But Matthew Fox didn't ask me where I had gotten lost.

Anyway, somewhere in the middle of this struggle of mine I read

Magaly's blog that spoke about how angry she was when she learned

that there was a host of Anglicans who were adopting pagan practices

hoping to bring more people back to the church.

Her many Pagan blog readers were angry too. 

Actually angry isn't the right word but is there a word in the English

language to describe feelings that have built up over 5,000 years?

I decided to throw in my two cents. 

I said not to worry, Jesus would have accepted Pagans because that's

just the kind of guy he was but the Anglican Church would not.

 

The funny thing is that it wasn't until yesterday when I read that Dr. Fox,

former Dominican now ordained Anglican priest, is giving another talk

did I put the two together.

My own words came back and stuck in my craw.

 Because they were true.

The Church (be it Catholic, Anglican or any other denomination) will never

end gender discrimination.

 

I need to regroup.

 

 

 

 

Choking on My Own Words

Various different religious traditions have been labelled "pagan" over the centuries; including the Classical religion of ancient Greece (left; The Parthenon) and the new religious movement of contemporary Paganism (right; Romuvan priestess). (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 My New Year's Resolution one year was to follow

the blogs of women who hold different beliefs than

I do and to try and find places of understanding and

peace between us. 

 

I found a young Muslim woman to follow, a Christian

fundamentalist, a lesbian*, a Catholic mom of eight

and a pagan.

The Muslim woman eventually quit blogging and the

Christian fundamentalist seems to have either drifted

away or removed herself from my unwholesome influence. 

I had lunch with Debra, (the gay woman), and her partner

when they were in my area and now consider them friends.

The Catholic mom has also hung in there with me.  She

makes curt pro-life comments every once in a while when

she disagrees with something I've said but that's okay. 

I generally wear my big girl panties when I'm blogging.  

 

The first pagan I followed is Magaly, the young, beautiful, black,

writer of dark fiction, born in the Dominican Republic, ex-US marine, 

witchy dynamo from Pagan Culture.

She is probably the blogger most unlike me and the hardest

for me to put in a comfortable mind niche.

So it shouldn't be a surprise, (although it was), that I have

learned the most about myself from her.

I'm telling you all of this as an intro to my next blog.
 

I'm going to talk about the day Magaly found out that

a bunch of Anglicans were adopting pagan practises.

Because, my friends, I've been choking on my own words for a

few days now.
 

*Debra is also a pagan but it is not always the focus

of her blog, She Who Seeks.

 

A Happy Story

I have nasty neighbours.

And unfriendly.

They bought the condo next door awhile back

and the only good thing I can say about them

is that they have a sweet 12 year old golden.

Not that I ever got to know the dog.

Anyway they look to be in their early twenties.

They should be full of life, in love and happy.

But they are sour people.

The only conversation I had with the young man

went like this:

YM:  Your dog barks all the time.

Me: (puzzled because there are only two mornings

a week when Flynn isn't with me), She does?

YM: Yeah and my wife is pissed. She's gonna

write a letter.

And sure enough a note came from the condo board

addressed to everyone but complaining about barking

dogs (and kids on long boards).

 

So to try to mend fences I've been keeping my blinds

closed when I'm not here so that Flynn can't see any

passers-by but the neighbours remained cold.

 

Today Flynn barked and worried I hurried to the window

only to see that YM had parked his car in front of my house

and was lugging stuff from his place and putting it in the car.

I was outraged.

Why the heck wasn't he loading his car in front

of his own place?

"You're trying to make my dog bark!" I said.

"Yeah," he sneered and walked away.

I went and got my broom and leaned on it

like the crone that I am.

"I'm taking a picture of this for the next time

you complain about my dog barking," I said

and whipped out my cell phone.

That got his attention.

"Hey, there's a moving van coming in a few minutes,"

he huffed.

And, halleluiah, so there was.

 

 

Some stories have a happy ending.




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