#I'm actually a hellenistic pagan

[ashes-onthewind]

Idk if you know her but I DON'T CARE

Athena from EPIC specifically

AAAAAA YESSSS i love epic so much TwT (from this ask game!)

[flannel-pup]

What if I told you I finally started drafting my modern-ish retelling of Apollo and Hyacinth 👀

[thornsent]

killing all of you violently to death

[sophieinwonderland]

Shit when you bring up Tartarus & your only knowledge of it is fucking western media, ofc you’re gonna get called out. Some people actually grow up in the culture, and yes- joking about things from cultures you don’t belong to HAS ALWAYS BEEN BAD. You’re a cishet white man, check your fucking privilege.

Honey, I'm a bi-girl in an AMAB body. 🙄

But sure, double down on the misgendering and queer erasure. It's a great look for you and your hate group.

Also, do you realize how easy you are to bait? Ghost had a long-time interest in legends and mythology. Was obsessed with with Egyptian mythology as a child, and later Greek. That particular interest probably was spurred by reading Rick Riordan's Percy Jackson books, although Ghost did enough research into the gods on his own time to be annoyed with mistakes in the books, like confusing Kronos with Chronos.

And we've studied a lot more of the original Greek stories since then.

(Not to mention Ghost having a very brief stint in pagan communities around people who worshipped those deities.)

But I just knew making it sound like our only knowledge of Greek mythology and religion came from watching the Disney+ Percy Jackson series would cause you guys to have a meltdown. Or fake a meltdown, anyway. 🤷‍♀️

Like I said, Greek myths and religion is heavily ingrained in Western society and always has been. Hellenism is an open religion. And joking that your hate sub should be sent to Tartarus isn't going to be offensive to Hellenists. (Except maybe ones who are members of your hategroup.)

I don't care about your pretend outrage.

[citrineandrosmarin]

Looking for any people who are actually Greek and practice Hellenistic paganism or Hellenismos! I'm specifically looking to hear your voices and opinions about some things on this subject and how I and others can be more respectful as pagans, especially eclectic pagans.

Reblog/Share to boost? 🥺

[meadowtwins]

Small introduction sheet:

Welcome to my blog. When I first started this I really had no idea what to post, now I still don't, therefore expect much more than just my some research sheets about Paganism and Witchcraft. What exactly? I don't even know, just be surprised. However, I definitely will post a photo dump or two.

Here's to me ⬇️⬇️

-use Zoya when referring to me, it is my practice name

-18-24 years old (minor are obviously still allowed to interact but don't expect a full fleshed out conversation if it isn't about a question/advice/help)

-from middle Germany 🇩🇪

-a Pagan practicing as an Eclectic Witch(with a focus on green magick), honoring Dionysus as my deity 🍇 —> I am neither Wicca or Hellenistic, I simply work with Dionysus and agree on the existence of other gods

-Capricorn Sun, Cancer Moon and Libra Rising

-born on the 13th of January (a friday! hilarious)

-pronouns are she/they, although I often prefer she

-additionally I'm unlabeled in sexuality, since I've had relationships with many different people of all kind and don't really wanna put myself in some category when I really don't care

-dealing with mental health issues that are not focused on depression or anything in that area but I won't go into detail

-I'm an ISTJ (do people still care about that?)

-Oh, and I'm an Artist in my freetime ✏

These are the main aspects to get to know me and this account a little better. So if you actually cared enough to read this,

Happy witching!

[clownrecess]

As an autistic individual myself, I am interested in the intersection of neurodiversity and various identities.

You've mentioned that you identify as a Norse Pagan. I'm curious about how your spiritual beliefs intersect with your neurodivergent experience. Do you find that your autistic identity informs or impacts your spiritual practice in any way?

(Tw for discussions of trauma, religion, etc.)

Sorry for the late-ish response! I've been working on this post a little everyday to make sure I write it how I want it.

I dont think that my autism has impacted my religion or spirtual experiences/beliefs, but my brain as a whole does. (Update: It actually did influence it quite a bit. I'm realizing this after writing this post. So, uh, thank you for helping me realize something that I find quite interesting!)

When I was a kid, I was raised in christianity. I was very religious. I prayed everyday, I had a cross in my room, etc.

But heres the thing: I have OCD. A few different types, but out of those, one of them is religious OCD.

Most of my praying ages late 8-12 was done purely out of fear. At that point I wasnt even really a Christian, I was just really afraid, which really impacted how I viewed religion. I HATED conversation about it because it felt scary and icky to me.

I didn't understand why people would ever want to talk about it. It felt like a very private topic for me, so I figured people who go out of their way to talk about it must be trying to get extra "good points" with god (maybe that bit was caused by autism, actually.).

During that time, I would go through little phases of a month or so at a time in which I would try to "swing the opposite direction". This was around age 10-11. I was developing an intense anger toward the church, and I just wanted to be the opposite of they were, whatever that meant. Because I didn't want to think about religion (due to anxiety around it), I really didn't know what many religious labels actually meant because researching them made me very uncomfortable, so I briefly identified as a satanist (this would be on and off during ages 10-11.) despite really not knowing what that meant. I think I just wanted a way to separate myself from the church as much as possible.

A few months after I turned 12, I felt a really strong urge to research paganism out of nowhere (I didnt even know what "pagan" meant, I just suddenly felt the need to know things about it. It was very random.). It started sort of as a special interest (Maybe autism did influence me more than I thought! Interesting.), and so I would look into a lot of different branches of paganism, focusing most of my research around hellenistic paganism.

A few weeks after this, I had a very interesting experience which I now believe to have been a sign from Freyja (I dont want to go into specifics. It was personal and I want to keep that special to me. I might later, but for now it's just mine. Just know it was a very beautiful thing from her.). DIRECTLY following this event (Maybe an hour or two later), I felt another urge to research things, but this time to be looking into the Norse Gods/Goddesses (which I'd never even heard of at that point.).

At that point I ended up converting to paganism. It was an extremely sudden decision, but it made sense to me.

No matter what religion I had been apart of before, I always felt anxiety and guilt, causing me to try and fix things by becoming excessively religious again in a Christian way. But from the moment I became pagan, I just never had that ever again. It's been the only religion I've ever felt fully safe in.

It's obviously been quite a while since then, and I'm obviously still a Norse Pagan.

Whilst I now love all the gods and goddesses, Freyja will always be especially special to me.

At this point I have worked with: Freyja, Loki, Odin, Beyla, and Njord.

Now, I also think its important to mention another part of my brain that impacts my religious experience: I am in a system.

Nearly all of us identify as Norse Pagans, but we have a few Agnostics as well, a few Eclectic Pagans, an Atheistic Satanist, and a Theistic Satanist.

The primary religious identity within our system is Norse Paganism, with the majority of individuals identifying as followers of this belief system. Due to this, we say we are a Norse Pagan! We are also okay with just being called "Pagan" on it's own, though.

[blackcrowing]

currently having a very interesting conversation with someone who insists that halloween is offensive because it's derived from samhain... she also seems to think that no one follows irish polytheism anymore, or celebrates samhain in the modern era 😭 I've never seen any hate towards halloween in our community besides the yearly reminder that samhain ≠ halloween. I made sure to wish her a safe oíche shamhna just in case

wooooooooooow... Sorry you had to deal with whoever that was. I don't know a TON about the origins of Allhallowtide (the three day holiday cluster of Halloween, All Hallows', and All Souls' Day) but scholars are actually torn on if Christians grew this tradition out of Samhain or if it was already established in Christianity and just superceded Samhain. Having taken a quick look I'm actually inclined to think the latter. It seems Allhallowtide was celebrated in Ireland it mid April when it made its way there, which would suggest to me that both holidays were recognized as separate for a time and combined later? Plus given A. human nature and B. the fact that Hellenistic Paganism was also of the Indo-European branch and so has shared ideas it doesn't seem to far fetched that a religion would 'independently' create a holiday around the veneration of the dead 🤷🏼‍♀️

But honestly Christians get SUPER weird about Halloween (probably a hang over of the satanic panic) and even the best of them get pretty confused about polytheistic religions. I had to explain to a friend of mine (she's very understanding but has only had prolonged exposure to Jehovah' Witness, Southern Baptist and Catholic) that I believed in the Irish pantheon, like really thought they were real and not stories. She thought mythology (as many people do) = not real and I had to explain why the Bible is Christian mythology. It was more complicated than I expected and that was with someone totally open to me walking my path, it gets even wilder with "What do you mean other gods exist? There is literally just mine" Christians 🙄

but again SUPER sorry you're having to deal with this person... they seem like a gem...

[my-name-is-apollo]

Hi! Sooo i wanna ask. Is there a difference between greek mythology and hellenistic pagan? Like do they worship the gods with/from the myths or is it kind of a seperate kind of thing?

I don't know a lot about this stuff, so when I read stuff similar to this, i get confused and I don't want to offend anybody.

I love your post btw 💜

Mythology is studying the myths and you don't have to worship the gods to do that. Hellenic polytheism involves worshipping these deities. I'm not a worshipper myself, but I have come across, and also interacted with some of them. Myths were an integral part of the worship of these deities back then, so I don't know if the worshippers completely separate the myths from their worship. But they don't seem to be taking these myths literally and treat them more like metaphors. That's what I've observed. But you can definitely try asking actual Hellenic polytheists. Most of them are welcoming and eager to help!

[avelera]

Looking at your rant on the Crowley-Lucifer theory as a Jewish person myself who actually majored in World Religions- I one hundred percent agree with everything you said. It was nonsensical from the start and I'm glad Neil ran it into the ground. Even without the S1 line stating that Lucifer was not Crowley, Gaiman knows his religion and mythology. Definitely knows it better than the majority of GO fans do. And you didn't come across as antisemitic or ignorant to me at all, idk what that other person was on about.

Thank you! Seriously, this is a huge relief. I know I shouldn’t get this angry about it but I have vast respect for Jewish people and the Jewish tradition and so being accused out of the blue of ignoring or diminishing Jewish people or Jewish thought is incredibly upsetting to me.

I personally am not a Christian (if anything, I’d consider myself a Hellenistic pagan, or an atheist if called upon by those I didn’t want to talk about that faith with) however I was raised in the Catholic tradition albeit unwillingly pretty much from the start. I’m informed on Catholic Christianity from that context, but I feel no connection to it or protectiveness of it (indeed, I welcome future iterations of GO absolutely tearing into Christian dogma, I think it’s hilarious and fertile ground for satire). I also took several courses on religion in college, both on the Christian and Jewish tradition. I don’t claim this makes me an expert by any standard but I am at least educated beyond a casual understanding of these faiths, I would like to think.

Anyway, it’s actually my gut feeling that a pivot from a context where Christ is the explicit son of god in GO to one where the Jewish tradition was actively called upon and needed to understand the text would be absolutely fraught with potential to give offense to the Jewish faith. It’s one reason I think GO stays far away from invoking the Jewish tradition, specifically out of respect.

GO takes place in a fantasy world where the Antichrist is real. To say the Jewish tradition is active would imply it’s only accurate to a point and then it becomes inaccurate because it would mean that Jewish people were wrong about Jesus being the Messiah, ie it means that in that universe Jewish beliefs are wrong and then superseded by the objective existence of Christ as the son of god and the events of the Second Coming, which is an incredibly offensive thing to say and ground that is incredibly fraught with echoes of arguments from the history (and present!) of Christian bigotry towards Judaism. It’s not disrespectful, in my opinion, to separate out the Jewish tradition from the discussions of GO lore, quite the contrary, to borrow from Jewish and Christian tradition while giving Christian dogma and its Messiah preeminence within the story as objective fact would be far far more offensive, and I personally think Neil understands that.

[areopagusimp]

Every time I see the "So I turn to Ares" comic, I am filled with glee as a blatant Ares simp, but I swear some people cannot hold two ideas in their head at once, it's one or the other. So many people are like "you're tearing down Athena in order to praise Ares :(((" as if she could be torn down.

Disclaimer, I'm not a Hellenistic pagan, but it's clear that worshiping Ares includes looking to Athena and having feelings about her and what she represents in relation to Ares. It's natural because they are two sides of the same coin. They are famously pit against each other in practically every piece of media involving Greek mythology.

I have ideas and feelings about Athena that a lot of people would call slander. But I think it's because people cannot imagine anything more complex than Athena = Good War and Ares = Bad War.

And that is just so insulting, isn't it? Do not fucking declaw Athena. Do not paint her as fair and graceful simply because she is a woman. And you knooow that's part of it. Athena keeps a clean reputation, but she fights dirty. The Trojan Horse was built and used in worship of her, but people like to claim that the violence that destroyed Troy was all Ares.

Give credit where credit is due. Put some respect to Athena's name if you're gonna try to white knight for her. Some actual worship. She's not a damsel at the mercy of big bad Ares. She smashed his head in with a rock once.

[mystical-sleepy-musings]

ICELUS/PHOBETOR/EPIALES

Onerioi of Nightmares

Somber Icelus

With your nocturnal tribulation

Shadowy beasts bring terror

With a feather

Clasped in your hands

You whisper

"Herefore lies within me"

"The shadow of myself"

Gifting the one who he cares for so

Visions of truth and understanding

He cradles them in his arms

Safe from all negative emotions

Loving them

Protecting them

Straddling the line between fear and ferver

He coaxes them with a gentle hand

They take his call into the wafting shadows

He is the primal instincts

Left to be buried

But now

They arise from the depths of being

Living amongst our subconscious

Icelus

The Shadowy One

The Giver of Trials

The Bearer of Omens

My dear Icelus

This is my poem for you

|Confusing names|

Epiales is his Greek name (considering I got a lot of flack for saying Icelus is a separate deity from Epiales I'm just going to see them as the same because the first mention of Icelus/Phobetor's name was in a Roman writing "Metamorphosis" by Ovid. So technically, he is Roman but was still around in Hellenistic Paganism as Epiales in spg(possibly upg* but not sure tbh). But he prefers the name Icelus in my own personal experience so I am going to call him that

|My Experience|(*UPG)

*The freakazoid crazy but lovable uncle going through a midlife crisis. He is known to show up in dreams as beasts and animals. So I took meltonin, which apparently gave me night terrors, but I needed to see Icelus/Phobetor, so I had a dream, and this pale skinned, dark eyed being appeared in my dream . It was not Morpheus taking on the form of Dream of The Endless cause he had a fancy headdress with a red jewel in the center and long black hair with black lipstick and a sinister smirk. He was in all black but didn't know what exactly he was wearing since it was just his head and shoulders. But I knew who it was... Icelus. So apparently, he was the giving me the night terrors, not the meltonin cause the dream was calm and not as chaotic as usual when I take meltonin. I think Morpheus kept his word and kept his rowdy brother in check, so he had no choice but to stay in the form that he usually takes . It wasn't a beast it was him in his (human like(?)) Form . I think his true form is something so terrifying that mere mortals die or go insane from upon seeing it. He is rough around the edges(he has a mouth like a sailor) but is actually sweet....in his own way. Usually, he teases Morpheus (or me sometimes) to make me laugh, especially when I'm feeling upset. But he guides by bringing tribulations to help you get stronger and to bring you closer to understanding.

He has a wild flamboyant personality, which is a complete contrast to me and Morpheus who are more quiet and introverted. He is a major troll to me sometimes cause when I asked him for a sign, he acted like he didn't want to, but then a couple of days later, he sent a brown recluse spider. Icelus, compared to Morpheus dresses, very elegantly. He is usually seen in suits or elaborate robes with 6 horned headdresses with a red jewel crowning his forehead, but sometimes he opts for a simpler but still bedazzled headdress. Icelus used to have long waist length black hair but lopped it off when he saw Papa Emeritus 3 of the band Ghost. Those three markings under each of his eyes....well....they are eyes as well. This makes sense to me since he likes spiders and spiders instill fear in many people . Icelus has fangs, of course, but his wingspan is significantly shorter than Morpheus's since yes, he is shorter than his brother but still a bit taller than me by a couple of inches He is the youngest out of the three named Oneiroi

|Associations|

*Note that this is UPG*

Animals

Ravens and Crows

Nocturnal rodents like raccoons and Possums

Spiders(To me, his main animal he associates with)

Just creepy crawlies in general. The more legs, the better!

Earthworms

Bats

Snakes

Dragons and Monsters

Black colored animals(how he appears to me in dreams)

He is known for appearing as beasts and animals in dreams, so yeah, he loves a lot of animals

Colors

Red

Black

White

Maroon

Silver

Green

Misc Objects

Feathers

Skulls and skeletons

Gothic decorations

Bug and creepy crawlies decorations or toys

Anything Halloween or spooky

Anything related to Beetlejuice or the band Ghost

Also, he loves memes and cursed images

Sweets like chocolate and cookies

Jewelry (with gothic designs )

Planet

Uranus(he picked it, not me)

😏

Music

Heavy metal

Dark vaudeville/Circus music

Anything that is annoying to his brother Morpheus

Rap

Meme songs

Dubstep

Musicals

Ballads(only a few so far)

He loves Shanklin Freak Show , Ghost , Skrillex , Marilyn Manson ,

Tarot card

The Tower

Crystals

Black tourmaline

Onyx

Obsidian

Red colored gems

Herbs and flowers

Mugwort

Roses

"Anything that bites back" is what he told me

Poppies

|Working and worship|

Icelus tends to like dark spaces, which I learned by Clairsentience he likes to lurk in an unused bathroom in my dorm or currently in my apartment bathroom, laundry room or closet, so I tend to keep the light off in those area's. And whenever I turn on the light, my clairaudience picks up on him hissing. So keep that in mind when it comes to altar placement. Also, he is very good for shadow work and inner child work. He teaches me how to laugh and have a sense of humor since I'm usually very serious. He can be vulgar and rude at times, so keep that in mind . Icelus can be brutal at times, but through tribulations, he brings you to understanding. When it comes to banishing bad spirits, he will tear them apart, lol. Ie he very good at that!

Also bonus:

Icelus, to me, sounds like Alex Brightman as Beetlejuice from the musical . Imagining Icelus doing and singing "The Whole Being Dead Thing" makes it even funnier cause it's not hard tbh

This gif reminds me of Icelus

[percabeth4life]

hi! currently reading atlop, and its lovely! i noticed you seemed really familiar with different varying hellenistic pagan traditions, and was wondering where you found them? wasnt sure if it was on the internet or like through physical books n stuff

I'm glad you're enjoying it!

I am myself a HelPol, so a lot has been absorbed through the last few years. Some of it is from talking with those more informed, a lot is from resources online (both historical, research based, and HelPol based), some is from hardcopy books (a lot of good ones of those are super expensive, but i have a few copies and can find more online if I dig enough)- I go all over to find the info, and I always try to find multiple sources to corroborate info.

A few things are from my own UPG, though I try not to add *too* much of that into my fic. Some of it is UPG I designed specifically for the story, because Camp would have grown over the thousands of years since HelPolism was popular.

You'll actually be getting some cool info on why the camp has such a lack of big worship stuff (like temples and statues) this book! I'm excited to explain that, and yes there's a reason connected to history that's already been partially told.

But yeah, a lot of digging for resources and talking with other HelPols.

[a-god-in-ruins-rises]

I recently converted to paganism from Christianity and I have some questions about offerings. What do I do with offerings after the fact? Do I dump them? Do I eat them? Would that be disrespectful? What are the best offerings?

welcome home! these are good questions. i can offer my perspective but of course opinions will differ from individual to individual and tradition to tradition. just keep that in mind. but here's my personal take.

it's flexible. i'm not a hardcore traditionalist. i think you do what you can with your circumstances.

i'll start with "what are the best offerings" and i'll say it depends. it depends on your circumstances and who you're offering to. different gods have different preferences and it would be a good idea to look that up before making offerings. however, in general some safe bets are water (especially holy water), alcoholic beverages, milk, oil, honey, meat, fruits, and grains/bread/cakes. also, votive offerings are always welcome.

when it comes to offering food people often fret over how much they should offer. the answer is whatever is reasonable. you don't need to buy an expensive cut of meat and offer it to the gods. you don't need to break the bank. i'd have to go through my notes but there are ancient references talking about how poor people offering their last loaf of bread is more pious than a rich man offering a whole pig, for example. offerings should not be an unreasonable burden but it should be /some/ kind of actual sacrifice. obviously, it /can/ be more of a burden if you want -- that would probably be pious (as long as it's not /too/ much of a burden) -- but it's not required. it's supererogatory. and obviously, there will probably be a difference in the quality of your daily offerings vs your offerings on especially holy days. so yeah, just offer whatever is reasonable.

now how do you dispose of offerings? well, it also depends on some things; what you're offering, why you're offering, who you're offering to, and where you are making this offering. there are a variety of possibilities; you might pour libations either onto the earth or a body of water or a sacred stone or into a special bowl reserved for libations (which you will then pour onto earth when possible), you might bury votive offerings or certain foods (if you're a hellenist this is especially preferable for cthonic deities and spirits), you might burn the offering in a fire (especially for ouranic deities), or place them at an outdoor altar, or you might consume them yourself (some consider this impious, but i don't -- there is plenty of evidence attesting to this), or you might give them to other people or animals to consume, etc.

to elaborate on eating the offering: lots of people find this controversial. they consider it cheap and impious to eat something you're supposed to be sacrificing. i think this is valid and i definitely sympathize with this sentiment. on the other hand, other people say it is impious and disrespectful to waste an offering of food and that the gods would want us to share in the bounty. again, i think this valid and i am sympathetic. so i personally practice a middle ground. if it's something simple/cheap like bread or milk or something i will just offering the gods a portion and leave it to nature. but if it's like a lavish feast, especially one including meat, then i will typically reserve a portion, especially the inedible (or less desirable) parts and any excess fat, for the gods in a burnt offering. the rest of meal in general can be symbolically offered to and blessed by the gods and then consumed.

again, it's important to remember you just have to be reasonable and be putting a sincere effort. don't overthink it. if you're buy a prime rib roast for a feast you don't need to buy an extra one to offer the gods. you can just trim off the fat and offer that. it's all the same to the gods. they don't /need/ the food like we do. they're not literally physically eating the food. they're spiritually sharing in the meal with us. that's the important part. the communion. it's like a father eating with his child and the child offers pieces of his own food from his plate to his father and the father gleefully accepts even though he doesn't really need it (he has all he needs) and both father and child are enriched by the act. it's the act of sharing and the intention and the thoughtfulness and the bond that matters.

[marsdeathdefiances]

Hello!! I have a question(s?) for you but you can totally just ignore it if it comes off as rude (I'm so sorry if it does). So I recently found out about Hellenistic paganism through your blog and I know next to nothing about it. I found it super interesting and just wanted to ask some (probably really silly) questions.

First of all:

Is there a specific way or specific ceremony/ritual involved that I need to do in order to convert? How do I get started?

And also a bit more specific of a question:

Can you still worship Aphrodite if you're aroace? Are you /allowed/ to worship Aphrodite if you're aroace? It's a silly question, but it feels kind of important to me. I had pretty bad experiences with a couple of other religions because they weren't very tolerant (or maybe it was just the people that I was around?), and it drove me away from them completely. I just want to make sure I'm not getting into something like that again. Nothing wrong with having set-in-stone beliefs and stuff, but excluding certain groups just doesn't sit right with me.

Thanks for taking the time to read my questions. I hope they didn't come off as rude.. Hope you have a great day!

(Sorry it took me so long to get to this it must’ve gotten buried in my notifs lol)

Hi! You don’t come off as rude at all and your questions also aren’t silly ones, they’re actually fairly common questions!

First of all, there’s no set ritual or ceremony you have to partake in in order to convert. Basically, if there’s a god you’re very interested in worshiping, just reach out to them! The first god I worshiped was Apollo and I just gave a simple offering, introduced myself, and prayed to him. Of course you don’t have to do it *exactly* like that but that’s what worked for me. It just gets you out there and familiar with the act of praying and giving offerings (also the first offering I give to deities when I’m ‘introducing myself’ is just water. It’s simple, sure, but they accept it. Again it’s just a nice way of putting yourself out there). Of course you don’t have to be completely perfect the first time (hell I’ve been doing this for years and I’m still making mistakes now and then, so don’t put too much pressure on yourself to do it perfectly the first time), so don’t stress it there.

Secondly, yes, you can absolutely worship Aphrodite and be aroace at the same time. While a lot of people see her as the goddess of romantic (and subsequently sexual) love, she’s a lot more than that, because there’s a lot of different types of love. There’s the love you have for your family, the love you have for your friends (both online and in person), the love you have for your pets, and of course the love you have for yourself! There’s no rule saying you can’t worship her if you’re aroace, and if anyone tries to tell you as such they’re lying. Because, again, there’s more love than just romantic and sexual love.

And to answer that last little bit of having been in religions and dealing with people that weren’t that tolerant-in my experience a lot of people in the helpol community are very accepting and welcoming. People are generally very happy to help answer questions and help you get set in the right direction. Of course, sadly, there are still people that aren’t very accepting but from what I’ve noticed they’re pretty few and far between and I don’t interact with them. I just block and move on. That’s kind of the nice thing about helpol not being a ‘mainstream’ thing, you can very easily curate your experience and just block rude and bigoted people. That’s how I’ve been waltzing through this since I started and it’s made this very pleasant.

Also, I hate doing a self-promo but my side blog @worshipper-of-zeus I post pretty much strictly about this stuff over there and you can also find other wonderful blogs as well!

Anyways, I hope I answered your questions and helped give a piece of mind here, cause yeah because it can be somewhat intimidating at first. And it’s also important for me to say that not everyone’s practice is going to look the exact same, so don’t freak out if you’re practice doesn’t look exactly like mine or anyone else’s. Just do what’s best for you and your lifestyle. That’s my best advice tbh. But if you have anymore questions, I’ll happily answer them!

[moa-broke-me]

My relationship with religion is... Weird.

Because like, I'm an atheist, generally speaking, but... It's more complicated than that.

I practice witchcraft on occasion, mostly kitchen witchery and sigil-making. I turned to hellenistic paganism for a short while, even considered satanism. I was raised in the baptist south by two liberal christian parents, and for the longest time, I was one myself. I didn't deconvert because of any strictly logic or science-based reason like most atheists, because my parents had already found ways to work around that and still be christians despite the highly specific idea both of them were raised with of what christianity could be. I deconverted, in part, because I strove to treat other religions with the same gravity and respect as my own, but it was becoming hard for me to justify doing so if I believed they were factually, materially wrong, and I had tall the right answers. Mostly, though, it was thanks to the parable of the rat poison. My pastor only used this rhetorical device once, but I still remember how it goes. 'Rat poison is 99% regular, healthy food. That's how they get the rats to eat it. It's only the 1% of it that's poison, and it's enough to kill them. Christianity is the same way; You can be 99% of a Christian, and god will turn you away because of the 1% you rejected or supplemented with something else. Rejection of god's design for man and woman, rejection of the sanctity of unborn life, rejection of the truth of creation, these are all rat poison.' The narrowmindedness and paranoia this device tried to force me into intruded on my life, on my sense of identity. It gave me major imposter syndrome. I felt guilty every time my beliefs and values differed from that of my youth group. How could I be a christian if I didn't believe the exact same things as my peers? If I didn't take every single thing in the bible as literal, physical fact? If I ever dared to doubt anything I was told? My parents and I, according to the rabid persecuting voice in my mind that I used to call accountability, were all going to hell, along with everyone who ate the rat poison.

Now that I'm no longer a Christian, I can look at things from an outsider perspective. I can see that this is just one interpretation of a very old book. I view Jesus, not as the son of god, or even as a real person, but like the myth that most atheists do. He's about as real as Santa to me.

But... I do appreciate the myth of Santa, and what he represents; the spirit of generosity, towards people you've never met before and will never meet again, without expecting anything in return. That is something I want to emulate. In that same vein, I can appreciate the myth of Jesus, a representation of something we should all strive for; An all-encompassing love of the world, of humanity. An acceptance for people as they are. I can also appreciate the myth of Satan, the spirit of rebellion, of standing up for yourself when you're not treated as an equal, and being able to leave when they punish you for it. Living, unapologetically, as yourself, exercising the full extent of your free will and encouraging others to do the same.

And when you think about it, that's a little bit daoist of me, but I'm not gonna go into that too much, because the deepest research I've actually done about daoism was watching a youtube video about the philosophical implications of Kung Fu fucking Panda. So I could be totally wrong here.