Witch Craft

I was talking to a friend about witch craft recently when the thought had occurred to me the true craft of witchcraft has been almost lost. Most references to it are in context to religion. When in fact for the most part that is only a small portion of witch craft, that portion of the craft is what most role playing systems refers to as clerical magic. The bigger part there are only bits and pieces of that it seems most of the world is willing to let fall into forgotten myth, legend and history.
Worse yet most who claim to be interested are willing to let the major contents of the craft vanish and accept only that which is spewed by a religion that is less than a century old or passed by its want to be practitioners.
For those of us with an interest in the true craft it seems we are stuck with a few tid bits of truth and the task of recreating the craft to its true form.
This is a taunting task at best yet in the attempt to do so, those who practice their clerical magic seem to shun tease and make a living hell for us instead of opening their minds and admitting that there is more and attempting to help. This leads me to believe the fear what the true craft is capable of and want to convince everyone that their form is all there is and only a fool would contradict them.
As I see it they only harm themselves in doing so for it is the fool who accepts what is fed to him not the ones who question and open their minds to other possibilities.

Rogue

An Open Mind

An open mind is a good thing to have, however there are several pitfalls, and distractions that tend to close a mind quickly. One of these distractions is the impulse to quickly critisize others and what they think, feel, like or any other aspect of them.

This tendency will quickly change an open mind into a hipocrit. The open mind is fueled by the ability to accept others as they are and to aknowledge that the only person one can change is themselves. To accept is to open your mind to understand anothers point of veiw. This by no means dictates that an open mind has to like everyones ideas and ideals but to understand and let others be how they are not trying to change them to suit ones own belief.

Another downfall to an open mind is the nature of humans to make things black and white. There is more than one wrong way and in contrast there are also many ways that are right. To set a mind that there is only one right and one wrong way for any given circumstance is to close ones mind.

I travel my path and welcome company even for short periods of time but through my journey I fight and struggle to keep my mind open and I am willing to accept anyone els'e ways. I may disagree or maybe agree but welcome the company as I travel through life.

A theological conversation

Today I had a conversation with a old world Catholic. You know, birth control a big no, no and sex is only for procreation. Any way we had a long theological talk about if masturbating is a sin than by the same logic a woman sins once a month. In fact most of what men try to understand about women is also sins that women carry.
From that we discussed poly. He was a little confused as his Bible shows it to be both allowed and forbidden. Although through the discussion I made the comment of if you have to be married before conceiving a baby who married Adam and Eve to each other. He admitted that there was no one to do so but that was different because woman was a gift to man from God. I am sure you could guess the conclusions that came from that one.
Later he conjectured that maybe it wasn’t really god who gave the gift of woman after all women have been men’s fatal weakness throughout the Bible. So, partly in jest I said “So women are demons who cannot help but to commit sin and drag man down with her unless a man owns up and treats her like property and keeps her in line.”
To my surprise with a straight face the guy I was talking to said “yes, that is how it was meant to be.”
Thank the Gods I am not Christian.

My Darkness

People often ask me about my personal darkness, and it is difficult for me to come up with an answer on the spur of the moment. On one hand I have my beast that guides me but on the other it is rooted in what I believe and what life is to me. After that there is what darkness is to me and my belief of the misconception people have about the light. These are just major points in what my darkness is; another piece is the dark knight that resides in me and his true nature. He in himself embodies all that my darkness is and who I shape my life after.
The beast within is a popular subject amongst authors who write about people or creatures living with a duality in their life. In popular Vampire games it is what is used to describe the blood lust in each vampire character. The beast within is in each of us, it is what drives our basic emotions and instincts.
My beast is what I gave into and it has shown me the major flaws within humanity. Man is a creature of comfort; in fact mankind has almost destroyed the world in the pursuit of ease and comfort. I sit and see the nature of people around me and at times it makes me cringe at the length people will go to gain something they want and then discard it because it is no longer wanted. I have seen this happen within hours and the effort put out carried consequences that lasted a lifetime.
My beast shuns humanity to a point of men’s laws are irrelevant and a waste, after all the laws of nature govern and control all creatures even men. Men’s laws only apply is someone catches you where nature is always vigilant and exacts full retribution at her chosen time and there is no escaping it. Try to say that about the laws of men.
My beast is a dark creature to begin with however, unlike most would have you believe, that does not make it evil or bad. In the dark things exist and just are, the shadows about them make them indefinable therefore cannot be judged. This is the misconception most people have, all things good and evil, if you believe in such a thing, are within the realm of light. In darkness acceptance and choice reigns, in light judgment, definition and conformists exist.
Normal society is of the light and it dictates how to think, react and judge everything one comes across. Society looks for what is the same in everyone and tries, rather convincingly, to get everyone to conform to its ideals. In darkness one questions everything in the light society would have one question nothing.
In my beliefs, there may be many gods but I tend to look at them as forces of nature. The forces I follow are the force of the hunt, the moon and that of chaos. These are the forces that reign over my life and I pay the respect and due following. The laws of my faith is simple one is to be honorable, follow natures law and only give in to the laws of men when it conflicts with the natural instinct to be free. Humanity is a balance to the beast that I follow and I use it to make my life better without destroying nature.
This brings me to the dark knight. He is me and I am he. He is a traveler of life that walks his own path and heeds only the laws of nature and his own truths. He is a blessing to those he cares for and who he chooses to help, he is a nightmare to those who would oppose him and deadly to those who would be his enemy. He is selfless with those that he cherishes, charitable with those he would call friend, indifferent to those who are just there and a demon to those whom cross arms with him.
He stands alone to protect and watch over the world, he indulges in emotion when he chooses and never give in or up no matter the pain it may bring. He despises deception, welcomes loyalty and honesty and does what he thinks is right not that is expected of him by others. He cares not to have material things for they are only for a moment, he only seeks that which he needs and indulges in the luxuries of life as only a means to pass the time.
This is my darkness, in no way is this complete but it should shed a little insight into my world. After all truth is but a perspective and mine is a valid as anyone else’s. In the darkness I am able to accept all humanity the way it is, can you?

Pillar

Through out Greece and Rome pillars of marble and stone can be seen that each similar to the other are in themselves quite unique. Often when thinking of the Coliseum or the Greek Temples I get caught up in these Pillars that stand holding the weight of the buildings. Often many can be found that have crumbled or collapsed under the test of time.
We as people are very much like these pillars. Similar to others but never the same, we walk through life bearing the weight of our world and in the end we collapse under the test of time, yet in our busy lives how often do we really stop to consider the importance of ourselves in comparison to others? Do we stop to think about what it is we truly need?
When asked what a person really needs most people answer with food, shelter a means to get around and clothes. The more religious may toss in to follow their god and to go on a spiritual journey. Very few actually stop to think of what the soul really needs, to be known, loved and to have companion through life. They also overlook the need to be ones self to nurture that which they are, not follow a path already blazed by society and worn by the flocks of people who blindly followed it, but to go out a make their own path, to be that which no one else is yet what everyone should be, themselves.
There is so much useless bagged handed to us as we grow up, when a realization is made that we need to go our own way there is a heaping mountain of baggage sitting there for us to weed through. Society creates a lot of rubbish yet at times it is difficult to tell where our individual self ends and who society tried to make us begin.
A good example of this is the current acceptance of dress in America. It is acceptable for a man to go topless in public but if a woman does she will be cited for breaking the law. A woman has no more to hide than a man. Most are as nature created them and are not that much different than another. Yet society has made it so that the sight of a topless woman in public is appalling and the thing I always found amusing is it is generally most appalling to other women.
There is no answer for why it is this way, just the b.s. we are fed to avoid keeping us from finding that there is no reason for it. In truth from the time these customs came around it may have been to separate the two genders, to maintain a control over woman, after all it is a stepping stone for dictating what a woman can and cannot do.
From the times this stems from women were not granted any protection by their clothes, in fact history show that in the early days of men the women especially commoner never reached their wedding bed as virgins, thus societies excuse of protection for the women is a blatant lie.
Another example of this is fidelity and adultery. It is taboo to have sex before marriage, especially in years past although there is a movement to instill that thought into our children today as well. Why is adultery bad? Because some poor guy, that most likely couldn’t get any, manipulated others into believing this way.
The fact is there are several ideals that are considered bad or evil that harms no one and really isn’t society’s place to be sticking itself, but it does and because of this a confusion of what is ourselves and what is societies baggage is often hard to differentiate between.
In our house we only have four rules for our children, they are;
· Respect
· Honesty
· Truthfulness
· Responsibility
It may not work ideally all the time but it does allow them to be themselves and in general our children are content. The other reason these rules work is because it is easier to show them their mistake clearly by pointing out how they broke the particular rule. My wife and I try to allow them to discover themselves and their real self however even so society tries to give them the excess baggage although they will have less than most people.
The individual is the most powerful thing in the world, when applied correctly it can subtly change the world around them and only be noticed in those who interact with the individual. To deny the individual is to deny the world a catalyst of change.

Sex laws

Sex Laws
My opinion on sex and marital laws.
I feel for a large part that Sex laws and marital laws for the most part are an example of how the government oversteps its authority. Who and how people are married and divorced should be left to the religious leaders. The only need for court intervention should be for property and paternity disputes, other laws that are included but in no way exclusive are the monogamy law, the ban on homosexual marriages and the dictation of who cannot marry. These are for the most part religious issues not issues of governing. The government should outlaw any laws that govern morality as this is not it place. Laws for coexistence safety and government support are the limits the government should impose on itself. Frankly along with this the government should also clean up its law books. Laws that are no longer imposed should be removed for practicality. For example in 2006 a man shot and killed 6 American Natives in South Dakota and got off free because the government never bother to remove a law that stated that anytime more than 4 Native Americans were seen together that they could be shot, because this constituted a war party. Needless to say that law outlived its necessity by over a century. Needless to say the law has been removed and the person in question did get 20 years for his breaking several other laws in the process of the murders.
There are many states that have old laws on the book that are often overlooked because the outlived their purpose, most marital and sex laws are just as pointless. Who cares how Mrs. Brown does it with her husband, although there are still states and towns that dictate the proper way to have sex. Some places enforce them other places just ignore them but they are still there and can be invoked at the whim of an idiot.
The only sex and marital laws that should exist are those that protect children, one to prescribe the age of consent and those that describe what constitutes the various types of rape and the punishment of the conviction for such an offense. As for marital laws the requirement of registration of a marriage/ divorce and the process of settling disputes of property and paternity.
Even child support should be dropped for a more direct version. A parent that doesn’t have custody of the children has a choice, be part of the child’s/children’s life and pay support or walk away to never have anything to do with them. Motherhood is a choice as is father hood, if a child makes its way into the world the woman chose to be a mother, only by commitment a providing support of a child makes a man a father. When a woman chooses to have the child she made her commitment a man should not be forced to give the same commitment because of what the woman chose, however this also leaves the choice of whether or not to have the child completely up to the woman.

Consent

Consent
A concise revision of my opinion on consent.
Laws vary state to state on who can consent to various things. In my opinion there should be one age of consent. One of the major issues with consent is sex with minors. My question is how many sexual teenagers are charged with this. For the government to say minors can only consent to sex with minors is discrimination. What the government needs to do is make a law that only people of a certain age and above can consent to sex.
This would free the courts case load of cases that shouldn’t really be there. It has been said that after the age of thirteen a child has learned everything they are going to from their parents and from that point on is putting into practice what they have learned and experimenting for themselves. If parents took responsibility for what their children know of the world and sex there would be fewer teens having sex and the age of the partner would be of no consequence.
The second point would be the nature of human beings. A majority of the males in human society align better with females that are younger than themselves. Generally it is only of two to five years difference although it is still there. By current laws 19 and 20 year old adults cannot pursue females because by average of 3 years what comes natural has been deemed illegal.
There are rare incidences that the difference is closer to 10 to 15 years, when it comes to love age has no definite ages, but what of those who would use an innocent young woman? Simple, there is already a law that covers that ground for all, it is statutory rape. Statutory rape does cover manipulating someone into sexual acts that they would not consider otherwise. This may take a guardian to note and bring up to authorities when this case happens but it sole basis is on behavior and action not just age.
The reason for the natural inclination of the age difference is maturity. Woman mature quicker than men, to be with someone of the same maturity level or a needed maturity level causes the desire for a person of a different age.
Personally I would say the law should give the freedom of consent to people who are somewhere between 14 to 16 and older, the exact of where in that three year range it should be I would leave up to the government to argue out and preferably do a study to determine at which age a teen knows themselves well enough to give consent.

What if? (My Answer)

What If?


I posted the following question on Pagan Space.net, What if you were told that you were not part of the human race becuase of your beliefs or becuase of the way you were born?Society does this to people. Think about the last time you ran across a bum on the street you probably avoided him.Society has trained us to avoid things that are different from what it wants.The thought might be well that is in the largely christian people yes but that is not as bad in the pagan society becuase in pagan society we have an open mind and are able to accept things that most others would just close off.So my question is what is an open mind? And how open minded should a person be?

My answer to this is rather simple. An open mind is the ability of a person to be able to understand and have empathy for other people' opinions, beliefs and ideas. How open minded should a person be? Well in my opinion I believe they should be able to be completely open minded. However I do understand as humans it sometimes is hard to take an empathetic look at things that directly go against us. Therefore complete open mindedness is a goal that those who embrace the value off open mindedness but rarely becomes reality. All things being equal the attempt to be open minded is a virtue that is appreciated by everyone even if you do not even succeed. As the old saying says "if at first you don't succeed try, try again" in the end if you take the challenge of having an open mind in the end you and your life will be better for it.

Consent

Society has a standard of consent that is rediculous. The law makers should come up with an age of consent and stick with it without exception. If they choose 18years old anyone having sex with a minor should be charged(whether they themselves are a minor or not) more realistic they should set the age of consent at about 15 and not worry about it. It is the parents responsibility to insure their child is properly educated about sex, not the governments job to insure that they cover for parental denial.

As many of the laws that govorn children and teenagers the laws on consent are taking the freedom away from the people. There are laws and standards in society that make it the responsibility of someone, not the parent to raise children. Me and my wife found that teachers were telleing our children that they don't need to listen to their parents that we can not make them do chores, their homework etc. The school board wouldn't do anything about it and the courts decided it was needed for children that might be being abused. Needless to say we now home school our children. This is an example of how the government wants to put children in the system and try to raise them itself, but when it doesn't work they point the finger at the parents.

The laws for consent and any of the other ones should be for child safety, but should be excluded to just that, not trying to force parents to raise their children to be how the standards of society dictate.

Sex Anyone?

This is a touchy topic for most of society, however that is a major downfall of society. There are several ways of sexual expression and the idea of denying your true nature never sounded right to me. Several religions and philosophy instruct it followers to ignore or deny that which has been built into our nature. Sex by natures design is pleasurable. Human's by nature are social creature and the closer they get the more the desire grows to be intimate.
Lust is just as valid of a reason to have sex as any other. The save yourself till you get married attitude, I believe, is one of the biggest factors in today's divorce rate. If people could admit that certain people would be a good fuck buddy and not able to be a long term relationship fewer people would marry so they can have sex.

If people could admit they are sexual creatures and it is just a part of their nature there would be less problems. For one thing if it was thought to be a natural act, parents wouldn't squirm at the thought of telling their children about it. Having young teens more educated about sex would lead to teens at least having fewer children of their own as well as less of a delima with having sex before they are truely ready to.

Over all society has turned something natural into an evil act that is to be avoided while the whole time we react sexually everyday and supressing it only causes more anxiety and stress in living life.