Tolerance of the Intolerant: Practicing Pagan Preaching

I have just come from G+ where once again I have been defending LDS people's right to claim their own faith as valid. This is the second time I have had to do this in the past two weeks. The poster to whom I was responding wrote: 

...what the Mormons actually are in my opinion is the most offensively bad bunch of archaeologists on the planet. :) I hang out with a few people who believe they're elves and dragons, and their beliefs stillhave more support in reality than the Book of Mormon's history of pre-Columbian America. 
...
I figure most Mormons are decent people on a person-to-person level, but dammit, if you're gonna go messing around with the way that other people live, you had better have a MUCH sounder reason than "some 19th century con artist ASSURED us he found magic tablets in the desert, among a Native American civilization that we have plenty of good evidence was NOTHING like our holy book describes, so um, yeah, we can't let you visit your dying boyfriend in the hospital, sorry. Our magic seer stones told us you couldn't." It just... makes me want to say, "Oh, yeah? Well my MAGIC KANGAROO FRIEND said God wants me to take your wallet," because it feels just about as valid and fair. :)

In my response, I didn't address her factual errors, of which there are many, but I did talk about the issue of validity, one unprovable faith to another. I wrote:

Frankly, people from almost every religious tradition believe some odd, unprovable things and things that are flat out wrong--and are still very sure of themselves. Rick Perry, for example, believes the earth is only a few thousand years old, serpents and burning bushes can talk, humans have physically wrestled with angels (and won!), and that a virgin gave birth, among other things. And his ONLY proof? "My book says so." In my opinion, for someone to believe all that but say Mormons' beliefs are just too far out there is totally ridiculous. Either it's all ridiculous and invalid, or every faith is equally valid on its own terms. But no one, no matter how well founded their beliefs, should prescribe morality for anyone else, ever.  

Back in the founding days of the church, Mormons were very hardcore polytheists and vocal about this fact along with vehemently opposing any church's involvement in politics. In the past fifty years or so, however, there has been a decided shift toward stumping for "moral" causes, perhaps to curry favor with evangelicals or appear more right-wing mainstream. Personally, I prefer the out loud and proud polytheist pioneer, "leave us alone to pursue our weird beliefs and we'll leave you alone to pursue yours" types. But then, no one asked me in what direction the church should go, so there you have it. :)

The reason I bring this up is I am utterly galled by anyone, let alone one of my Pagan own, attacking someone else's right to believe whatever whacked out thing they want and, in the process, claiming that their odd beliefs are more valid. Don't get me wrong, LDSers are certainly guilty of this too--my mother, for example, assuming that as a Pagan I believe things like trees and rocks are God--but as a good deal of Pagans have supposedly liberated themselves from this sort of dogmatic thinking, I am nonplussed that such vitriol still exists. Isn't tolerance supposed to be one of the unifying principles within the Pagan community? 


Tolerance means tolerance and, if it hold any integrity at all, must be extended equitably, even to the intolerant. If we, as a community, only extend our tolerance to fellow Pagans and members of other minority religions, we are no better than the oppressors we claim to have spiritually and intellectually escaped. 


Blessed by the Mystery,
-M. Ashley


PS
Boy oh boy, it was down to the wire--I got distracted tonight making dinner for my stepson then watching Jackass 3D with him, 'cause that's just how spiritual I am ;)--but this makes day five of consecutive posting for National Blog Writing Month. Ahem--pardon me while I break my arm patting myself on the back. 

Spiritual Desires: What I Want, What I've Got, and What's Still Missing

Yesterday I wrote a post exploring some of my reservations about even lightly reconnecting with the LDS church--the church of my youth. Despite my reservations, however, I do feel strangely drawn to that reconnection, so today I decided to make a list--yes, another list, (it is the lazy bloggers go-to after all)--exploring some of the top things I want from a faith and how my current faith and the one of my childhood compare. In doing this I hope to uncover what I feel is missing from my current practice for which my spirit is searching elsewhere. Here is what I came up with:

1) I want a faith that honors both feminine and masculine divinity equally and offers equal amount of detail about both. 

I have not yet found a faith that meets this quality fully. Paganism tends to honor Goddess over God and offers far less information about the nature of the God in general than it does about the Goddess. Mormonism acknowledges a Heavenly Mother as equal to and in partnership with a Heavenly Father, but there is little information on her or actual working veneration of her. 

2) I want a faith that acknowledges a multitude of Gods.

Both Paganism and Mormonism fit this one, though lately, with their rigorous PR campaign, the LDS church has been much more reluctant to publicly acknowledge this belief. 

3) I want a faith that demands spiritual, ethical and intellectual rigor yet is free of shame.

Paganism is, frankly, not all that demanding of this kind of rigor whereas Mormonism demands it to a point of being shaming should you fall short. In my opinion, there really should be a balance. 

4) I want a faith that honors other faiths as equally valid in accessing the Divine. 

Paganism fits this to a tee as does Mormonism. Although Mormons do regard their church as the “truest” church, they believe all spiritual roads eventually lead to the same place. 

5) I want a faith that supports the idea of eternal progression--that we continue to evolve spiritually, physically, intellectually and emotionally beyond this life on Earth.

Again, I think both faiths fit here, though I’ll admit I take my belief in eternal progression entirely from my LDS upbringing. 

6) I want a faith that sees the Gods as a higher evolution of our species, not a species unto themselves--a faith that sees Godhood as achievable by humankind.  

From the Pagan side, whether or not this one fits depends entirely on what brand of Paganism you adhere to. I favor Hellenism, which definitely embraces this idea. Once again though, I have taken the entire concept of achievable Godhood from my LDS training. 

7) I want a faith with a rich cultural heritage, compelling rituals and complex history.

My Hellenic leanings favor this one as does Mormonism. Wicca would have this too if more in the community would give up their dubious claims of unbroken lineages and embrace their own unique and compelling history beginning in the 20th century--but that’s an entirely different soap box. 

8) I want a faith that uses its tenets to actively achieve positive change in the community.

I have to avoid my soap box on this one too, but suffice it to say that Mormons have it all over Pagans on this front. It isn’t that most Pagans don’t have it in their hearts to make service to their communities a priority, they just aren’t out there in a large scale actually doing it. Pagan Pride Day is a good example. Instead of organizing a whole day around patting yourselves on the back, selling occult-y things and ranting about how you are not properly accepted in society, why not spend the day getting all the Pagans in the community to express their faith and pride by cleaning up a park, painting over graffiti, planting trees, etc. Put your values where your hands are and do something with them. Did I say I was going to stay off my soap box?

9) I want a faith that acknowledges Earth as a living organism and her cycles, along with the cycles of the heavens, as representative of the cycles of body and soul.

Now here’s one where Paganism has it all over Mormonism. Though LDS doctrine does acknowledge Earth as a living organism, it doesn’t take that to the next logical step of proper veneration or acknowledging the spiritual lessons apparent within her cycles.

10) I want a faith that demands of itself the same intelligent evolution to a higher spiritual state as it demands of its adherents. 

I think both faiths give a good amount of lip service to this without actually achieving it. 

To sum up, apparently the things I am missing in Paganism are truly equal veneration of Goddess and God; spiritual, ethical and intellectual rigor; a doctrine of eternal progression and attainable Godhood; putting beliefs into action; a true and accessible cultural heritage; and honest evolution toward better, more fluent expression of that faith. I cannot in good conscience say I could find all these missing pieces in Mormonism, nor am I willing to exchange the Pagan pieces for the LDS ones. 

So I am left with even more questions: 

What is the balance here? Am I stuck inventing my own faith or have I simply not found the right fit yet? Should I strive for a combination of my old faith with the new and my own ideals? What would the practice and doctrine of such a combination look like? If I cannot create a tenable combination, will I eventually have to compromise on my heartfelt spiritual desires in order to feel accepted within any one group? Is acceptance more important than finding a point for point fit?

As is usually the case in affairs of the spirit, questioning inevitably leads to more questions--and more blog posts. Stay tuned.

Blessed by the Mystery,

-M. Ashley

Reconnecting with Spiritual Cake--and Wanting to Eat It Too

Tonight I was supposed to go to a game night with some ladies from my local LDS church’s Relief Society. I chickened out at the last minute. There is a part of me that really wants to reconnect with this church--the church of my upbringing, the church that my mother still faithfully attends--but yet there is another part that is deeply frightened of the prospect. Perhaps the thing to do is make a short list of everything I’ve been fearing about the reconnection, thus bringing those fears into the light. Fears tend not to survive in the light but breed like rabbits in the dark, so here goes:

1. I am worried I will be reminded too much of an abusive situation I was in with an LDS man--not that his being LDS was the reason he did the things he did, or that the church sanctioned what he did in any way, but it was a big part of his identity nonetheless. 
2. I am worried that if I do reconnect with Jesus, somehow I will have to give away all the deep connections with the Divine Feminine I have made in the five years I have been away from the church. 
3. What I really want is to have a connection with the church that helps me fellowship with good people, have the power and provenance to do tangible good in the community and celebrate the masculine Divine Mysteries while maintaining my spiritual investment in those same Mysteries as they are associated with the Goddess. I fear I will not be able to achieve this balance. I fear that one side or the other will demand my total fealty to the exclusion of all else. I fear that remaining in the middle will cut me off from both sides completely.

That’s the crux of it I suppose--the fear that I can’t have both in my life and honor them equally--that I have to give up the good of the one for the good of the other even though they are not truly opposed. LDS doctrine makes no bones about the fact that there is a Heavenly Mother--so why is this worry so heavy on my heart? I truly don’t know.

I plan on attending church on Sunday, which is a little less scary as it is a little more anonymous than a purely social gathering like the one planned for tonight. I’ll keep you posted on how some of these worries play out. 

Blessed by the Mystery,

-M. Ashley

P.S.

I thought the picture was appropriate as "CTR" in LDS parlance stands for "Choose the Right," which is exactly what I am attempting to do.

P.P.S.

I just included this 'cause I like the "pp"