{"id":4509,"date":"2009-12-30T05:15:23","date_gmt":"2009-12-30T11:15:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mrsellars.com\/mrblog\/?p=4509"},"modified":"2010-02-28T06:58:18","modified_gmt":"2010-02-28T12:58:18","slug":"yulemas-i-aint-pagan-enough","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.brainpanleakage.com\/?p=4509","title":{"rendered":"Yulemas: I Ain’t Pagan Enough…"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>The other day a friend of mine (yes, I have friends) told me that a mutual friend had asked him “what had happened to me?”<\/em> By this she apparently meant, “What life altering experience had slapped me in the back of the head with a 2 by 4 and made me eschew my spiritual path.”<\/em><\/p>\n

I’ll be honest. This came as a shock to me because I was entirely unaware that I had done so. My spiritual path has grown immensely over the years, but it has never been abandoned. It has been right there with me all along.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Now, granted, I have not “self-identified” as Pagan<\/strong> for quite a long time now. There are numerous reasons for this, none of which we will go into here because my blog is generally a fun place – although, I will admit to soapboxing every now and again. And, as it happens, I will be doing so here today… But, I really don’t want to create too many suds, if you know what I mean, therefore we will stick to one brand of detergent for this missive.<\/p>\n

So, anyway, back to “what happened to me”<\/em>… To be perfectly honest, at the outset I didn’t really think too much about the “question.” After all, it had been years since I’d seen the particular individual who was making the actual query, so I had to assume she was mistaking growth for a “negative change” (in her eyes, at least). But, as it turns out I wasn’t able to keep it on the back burner for long, because soon afterward I started receiving the annual “what’s wrong with you?”<\/em> emails from other folks…<\/p>\n

Yes, I said annual<\/em>…<\/h2>\n

\"\"<\/a>You see, not a year goes by that I don’t receive at least a dozen or so queries from folks out there who cannot seem to understand why a guy who writes books about Witches, and who portrays Paganism in general – as well as various specific alternative religious practices – in a positive, and moreover accurate <\/em>light, would stoop so low as to celebrate *GaSp!<\/strong><\/em>* Christmas… After all, anyone with any sense whatsoever can tell you that the historical probability that Jesus – if he even existed – couldn’t possibly have been born on December 25th. But, even more importantly, how dare me, a “Pagan Author,” celebrate a *GaSp!<\/strong><\/em>* Christian Holiday. Everyone knows they co-opted our celebration, so why am I choosing to observe it and lend credence to them? Have I *GaSp!<\/strong><\/em>* turned into a Christian<\/em>?<\/p>\n

Oh noes… Say it ain’t so!<\/p>\n

I’ll be truthful here – At all of this nonsense I would expel a hearty laugh were it not so utterly sad and ridiculous. Instead, I find that I must expel a hearty and saddened sigh, complete with a shake of my head.<\/p>\n

You see, what always seems to prompt these emails is the fact that E K, the O-Spring, and I exchange gifts on Christmas morning instead of Yule proper – that being the Winter Solstice. The complaint is, if we were “proper Pagans” we would exchange our gifts on the 21st of the month – or for the truly fundamental, 0 degrees Capricorn<\/em> – instead of observing a *GaSp!<\/strong><\/em>* Christian Holiday.<\/p>\n

Yes… Believe it or not, that is the basis of the “what’s wrong with you?”<\/em> emails I receive each year… Some of them are actually flat out scathing, accusing me of undermining Paganism. Apparently I am a spy sent to infiltrate the ranks of Pagandom and infect it with Christmas Cheer… Who knew? Hell, I’ve even had people tell me they are never<\/strong> going to read my novels again, because obviously I am “not Pagan enough” <\/em>to warrant their attention.<\/p>\n

True story. Really. Even I<\/em><\/strong> couldn’t make this sh*t up.<\/p>\n

So, allow me to point out a couple of things that might have some bearing on what is wrong with me<\/em>…<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. My family and I celebrate Christmas as a secular holiday<\/strong>. This means the Coca-Cola Santa Claus and all that jazz, even though the O-Spring hasn’t believed in the jolly elf for many a year now.<\/li>\n
  2. We also celebrate Yule as a spiritual holiday. For us, this means a fire, a feast, and good friends present at both to help us usher in the light.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    \"\"<\/a>So, what does all this mean?\u00a0 Well, depending on who you ask it apparently means that “I ain’t Pagan enough,”<\/em><\/strong> all because we wait an extra 4 days to open our presents.<\/p>\n

    Oh well… Guess I’d better turn in my broom…<\/p>\n

    More to come…<\/p>\n

    Murv<\/p>\n

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    \n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Since when did a holiday make or break a person’s individual spirituality? Observations from author M. R. Sellars<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,61,233],"tags":[1379,8119,3175,297,50,3794,3793,8162,16,1119,2158,164,119,479,2105,1022,8102,719,150,133,3791,190,67,914,1997,452,3792,844],"class_list":["post-4509","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-life","category-rant","category-religion","tag-blog","tag-books","tag-celebrate","tag-change","tag-christmas","tag-christmas-cheer","tag-coca-cola-santa-claus","tag-e-k","tag-family","tag-feast","tag-fire","tag-friends","tag-fun","tag-gifts","tag-holiday","tag-honest","tag-m-r-sellars","tag-m-r-sellers","tag-novels","tag-pagan","tag-pagan-author","tag-presents","tag-santa-claus","tag-shock","tag-story","tag-time","tag-winter-solstice","tag-yule"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brainpanleakage.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4509","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brainpanleakage.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brainpanleakage.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brainpanleakage.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brainpanleakage.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4509"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.brainpanleakage.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4509\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brainpanleakage.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4509"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brainpanleakage.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4509"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brainpanleakage.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4509"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}