When I had the surgery I was a little concerned, to be honest, since fertility plays such an important role in my spiritual life, especially as a priest of Dionysos who is, well, a highly phallic deity in case you hadn’t noticed. How could I serve such a potent being when I planned to render myself infertile. (And yeah, vasectomies don’t actually make you infertile – they just ensure you can’t do anything with it, but that’s quibbling over split hairs. Or vasa deferentia, as the case may be.) Even if I never planned to have children – gods forbid! – shouldn’t I at least be capable of doing so?
But then I came to realize that there need be no conflict between my politics and my beliefs. While Dionysos’ abundant fertility certainly encompasses human reproduction it by no means exhaust it. In fact, there’s a great deal more to it than just hard cocks and good, old fashioned orgiastic baby-making. He is first and foremost the god of vegetative life. In fact most people know him only as the lord of the vine and the sacred drink made of its fruit. His potency extends over the whole of creation – including the realm of the human soul. Where does our creativity come from, our art and dreams and all the best and noblest aspects of human culture and civilization – if not from the dark and fertile recesses of our minds? Through him these things can be brought forth and made to live – and that’s a fertility I can get behind. Many of my festivals, in fact, work with fertility in this way, as a means of exploring the further reaches of human consciousness, cultivating ecstatic states, channeling inspiration, celebrating artistry, beauty and the awesome accomplishments of our race.
As is fitting for one who is so dedicated to Dionysos and Hermes, a great deal of the festivals on my calendar involve practices that could be regarded as magical. Of course it is a very different sort of magic than most people are used to and some might even question whether these practices fall under that rubric at all. I am thinking specifically of rites whose purpose is the alteration of consciousness, whether to induce ecstatic states, commune with gods and spirits, learn the future, receive visions and dreams or acquire power to accomplish certain goals. I have no interest in debating terminology – whether one considers such things magic or not, they’re the heart of my religious practice and have been from the beginning. Almost as soon as I discovered the gods I realized that such ways of interacting with them were possible, and that I wanted to devote my life to doing this sort of thing.
Almost every one of my festivals involves worship of this sort. Obviously it isn’t the reason why I celebrate these festivals. My religion has a solidly devotional focus. It’s about honoring the gods and spirits, thanking them for their manifold blessings, cultivating that sense of joyous wonder that comes from being in their presence, celebrating all that they are and do and how the world around me changes through the cycle of the seasons. Mine is a religion of love and service to the divine – but a big part of that service involves these sorts of practices.
Often I can’t even help it. I’ll be going through the normal worship routine and something will take hold of me. Images flood my mind, concepts coalesce, shapes appear before my eyes, sounds and voices come from everywhere and nowhere at once – the presence of the divine is made manifest to me. Since I appear to have some propensity for this sort of thing I have begun taking advantage of it and consciously cultivating practices that make it even more likely to happen. So, for instance, a lot of my rituals involve music, dance, singing and chanting, mask-wearing, processions, all-night vigils, fasting and feasting, the consumption of alcohol and other strange substances and paying a close attention to my surroundings. In fact the vast majority of my rituals are conducted outdoors, in the midst of nature or the heart of the city. Many of them take place at night or during dusk when the world becomes a different place, stranger, wilder, more beautiful and primitive. I don’t think I could do a lot of the things I do if I remained safely behind doors, in front of my shrines. For one thing I wouldn’t be able to honor many of the spirits that I do, since they only dwell in those wild places. To worship them I must go where they are – and make myself a little wild as well.
It is only when I began doing so that I really got to know them. Before, such beings were only on my periphery and I hardly had any dealings with them at all. Now they are the primary focus of my religion after Dionysos and Hermes and my whole way of worshiping has changed to accommodate their needs. It’s the biggest reason why I no longer consider myself Hellenic or Greco-Egyptian. How could I when the largest portion of my pantheon is comprised of local land-spirits and related beings?
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Tuesday, October 5, 2010
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