Are you ready for the cameras and notepads? It’s the time of year when journalists notice the Pagans!
ReligionLink is on the job with story ideas. At least they admit that they are recycling their resource list from 2004. (No, that’s not my telephone number anymore, sorry.)
“Oh, my” indeed.
Yesterday M. pointed out to me a small AP story in Sunday’s Denver Post that I had overlooked: the death of Elizabeth Clare Prophet, head of the Church Universal and Triumphant, one of the chief motivators of the “cults scare” of the 1970s-1980s.
(“Suffered from dementia for years” — there may be some cynical chuckles at that line from ex-CUT members and their families, even though it was Alzheimer’s dementia.)
Her hometown newspaper in New Jersey offers photos of her at various ages and more links.
But I owe her thanks for sending me to graduate school, for in the 1970s, when I came back to Colorado after my undergraduate years at Reed, CUT (then called “Summit Lighthouse“) was headquartered at One Broadmoor Avenue, Colorado Springs, a prestigious address, in a red-brick 1930s mansion built by some Oklahoman oilman.
I had never heard of Summit Lighthouse and as a Pagan was not too interested in quasi-gnostic metaphysical magical chanting–they called it “decreeing”–but a visiting friend wanted to see it, and so we went.
We picked up some pamphlets and got a tour of the public rooms from some of the followers, who despite the content of the teachings, had a definite Young Republican vibe too them. We did not meet Elizabeth Clare Prophet herself.
(If there was magic worked on behalf of President Reagan, CUT was working it.)
Later, as a reporter for the Colorado Springs Sun, I was approached by Mrs. Prophet’s disaffected ex-secretary, who offered herself as a source for a feature story on the group. Mrs. Prophet herself did not do interviews–as high as an outsider could go was the group’s spokesman, Murray Steinman.
And I was introduced to the whole network of “anti-cult” groups, parents’ groups, and so on, not to mention one stream of American metaphysical religion, going back to the “I Am” movement and even farther.
Writing that story (and a couple of others on other groups) gave me more satisfaction than my regular work on the business beat. I credit them with nudging me towards an eventual decision to go to graduate school in religious studies, because I realized that as a newspaperman I could not really examine new religious movements in any depth.
Later, too, my chief interest in CUT was whether they would sell some of the land they bought for their “end of the world” retreat north of Yellowstone National Park in a deal arranged by the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation to keep an elk-migration corridor open.
Metaphysical movements come and go, but the elk should endure.
Yet another of the sixty-plus people crammed into James Arthur Ray’s Sedona sweat lodge has died. She evidently was one of his true believers:
The Rev. Meredith Ann Murray of Bellingham, Wash., who has completed all of Ray’s retreats, said [Liz] Neuman was among Ray’s earliest followers and had attended dozens of his events.
According to Ray’s Web site, Neuman was the leader of the Minneapolis-area “Journey Expansion Team.” The teams, developed by Ray’s friends and followers around the country, meet to exchange ideas on his principles. The next Minneapolis-area meeting is scheduled for Oct. 23.
But here is the delicious part. Ray, facing homicide charges, is evidently bobbing and weaving:
In his first public appearance Tuesday in Los Angeles, Ray told a crowd of about 200 that he has hired his own investigative team to determine what went wrong.
Sheesh, Veronica Mars could tell him what went wrong. He was greedy and heedless of the safety of his followers.
Sweat lodges have been around for a long time in many places. I see them as part of the old Stone Age circumpolar religion, along with flat-headed drums and a special relationship with bears.
Whether used for physical health, for contacting the spirits, or both together, they are a small-scale magical technology. It sounds as though Ray tried the “megachurch” approach to sweat lodges–at $9,000-plus per person.
Aside from all the issues that this case raises, it speaks as well to the difficulty of turning small-scale mysteries into congregation-size events.
UPDATE: Tim Giago, a veteran American Indian journalist in South Dakota, asks why, if traditional sweat-lodge ceremonies are so special and good, are they not doing more good for the Lakota:
Arvol [Looking Horse], why are the sacred rites you represent not being used to bring our own people back from the brink? Why aren’t they being used to bring back the good health our people once enjoyed? Why is there an unemployment rate of 80 percent on the lands you call home? Why is there such a high rate of STD’s and teen pregnancies in Lakota country?
What good does it do to speak out and criticize an event that happened in Sedona, Arizona, when it had no lasting impact upon the Sioux people? Aren’t there terrible things happening in our own homelands, right under our noses, to worry about and try to change?
Sarah Pike of California State University, Chico evaluates Dan Halloran’s run for a New York City Council seat as an “out” Pagan and concludes, “Since for many Americans, the Republican Party is inseparable from conservative Christianity, Neopagans were surprised that the party stood by Halloran, and took it as a sign that not only is the makeup of the religious left and the religious right shifting, but that the country as a whole is becoming more receptive toward their religion.”
I’ll be seeing Sarah next month at the American Academy of Religion annual meeting, and I shall have to ask her about this “Neopagan” usage. Following Graham Harvey, who argues that “Neo-” is outmoded now, the favored term (in academia, at least) is “contemporary Pagan.”
But she has written a good opinion piece—read the whole thing. The comments display the usual Pagan hair-splitting and in-fighting.
You can’t keep a good drama queen down.
Ted Haggard, the disgraced pastor of the New Life megachurch in Colorado Springs, whom you might of thought would never occupy a pulpit again, but rather skulk around Phoenix, Arizona, peddling life insurance, is ba-a-a-ack.
Ted Haggard, who proves that the Elmer Gantry archetype is alive and well in American Christianity.
Ted Haggard, who thinks downtown Colorado Springs is controlled by demons.
Ted Haggard, who, to his credit, thought that evangelical Christians should embrace environmentalism, but then got busy with meth and gay escorts.
Really, he belongs in a convertible with a sash (Drama Queen 2008) doing his best parade wave (“elbow elbow wrist wrist”).
Really, he is Colorado’s gift to religious journalism. What will he do next?
Arguments about “cultural appropriation” are usually dishonest.
Although they often take place in venues devoted to religion, spirituality, and magic, they are not about religion, spirituality, or magic.
Instead, they are political arguments about cultural survival, usually taking the form, “We/You took everything from them/us, and now we/you want to take their/our spirituality too!”
Let me propose a hypothetical bit of “cultural appropriation.”
I fetch the old Catholic missal off the shelf, blow the dust off (Colorado is dusty), and open it to the ritual for the Eucharist.
I find items to serve as chalice, platen, and all the other necessaries, make myself some cheat cards for the Latin, set up my altar, and proceed to celebrate the Tridentine Mass.
Cultural appropriation? I doubt that the Vatican will be too disturbed, and I will not need to watch out for albino assassin monks.
Is it not “cultural appropriation” when the so-called victim is large and powerful? If so, that makes me think that all talk about appropriation is merely politics.
So what are the consequences of my unsanctioned Mass? From the Catholic Church’s viewpoint, Aquila non capit muscas, I suspect. Any other consequences?
Now you can discuss the religious, spiritual, or magical issues.
Postscript: This post is somewhat based on a dream I had months ago, in which I was called up to baptize someone in some Protestant denomination, and of course I was thinking (a) what baptismal ritual do these people use and (b) since I am a Pagan, will it be “valid”?
Jason Pitzl-Waters offers more links on the Sedona sweat-lodge deaths, including to the Beyond Growth blog, which has been critiquing James Arthur Ray for some time.
(Related: I want to read Barbara Ehrenreich’s newest, Bright-sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America
I sometimes wonder at the whole concept of “growth.” Did Socrates talk about “growth”? I don’t think so. Wisdom, yes, attained by philosophical inquiry, life experience, and maybe the gift of the gods—chiefly the first. I expect he would have scorned a workshop that involved putting a couple dozen people (Correction: 64 people) in a sweat lodge and heating it until they collapsed. Not much logos there. Not much inquiry. Not much virtue.
While I am waiting for the book, I think I shall be reading the blog.
Some of the reaction in the Pagan blogosphere to the “shamanic” casualties in Sedona have trotted out that old horse named Cultural Appropriation.
A couple of months ago, one of the Pagan lists in which I participate had a whole discussion of “cultural appropriation.” Cultural Appropriation was led by the halter and trotted around the ring, and all the usual arguments were made:
.Eventually that discussion thread wore itself out. Not two weeks later, someone posted an announcement for a Sun Dance:
The Sun Dance is a ritual of community and praise for the sun and the great spirit that the natives of this continent felt drew them together. Regardless of our faith, everyone can appreciate the sun’s power and importance to all life on Earth. So this will be an upbeat celebration of the sun, the summer we have just had and community. It is also a ritual praising the sun and saying farewell for another year.
Since there is no one ritual for the Sun Dance, and so many tribes viewed and practiced this event differently, we will have a blending of many traditions in our Sun Dance. Please bring drums, bells, noise makers, whistles, rain sticks, musical instruments, or anything else you’d like to celebrate and make a joyful sound with. This event will be outdoors so please wear appropriate clothing as the weather dictates. Also, as part of the ritual involves body and face painting, if possible please wear something that gives you access to your collarbones.
And ol’ Cultural Appropriation stayed in his stall. No one said a word online.
Why?
In the long run, religious creativity will always trump the kind of finger-pointing accusations that you hear about “cultural appropriation” — even before you come to the theological argument that “the gods choose whom they will.”
We have freedom of religion. You cannot stop someone from holding a Sun Dance and calling it such unless you show up and threaten bodily harm. You can threaten other sorts of consequences—that it will offend the spirits or the Grandfathers and someone will suffer—but you cannot guarantee such threats. What if the spirits like the other person better?
As Shawn Spencer, the fake psychic detective, says in the TV series Psych, séances—or in this case, Sun Dances—are like garage sales and plastic surgery: Anyone can have them.
Pagans are well-placed to realize that religion is a creative activity. Writers incorporate the influence of other writers, musicians “steal” from other musicians, actors learn from other actors—why should religious practitioners be any different.
I have complained about some “plastic shamans” in my time too, but to what effect? Just do it. See what happens.
Two dead, others sickened after lengthy sweat lodge ceremony at the Angel Valley Retreat Center in (where else?) Sedona, Arizona, which advertises, “Angel Valley offers the opportunity to ‘retreat’ from the ‘bus-i-ness’ of life while providing the optimal condition and the services to assist in connecting with and expressing who you are, being your True Authentic Self.”
From the AP story:
Authorities said self-help expert and author James Arthur Ray rented the facility and was hosting the group inside the dome, a low-lying structure covered with tarps and blankets. In a testimonial on the retreat’s Web site, Ray said it “offers an ideal environment for my teachings and our participants.”
On Ray’s Web site, a guide for participants of the five-day “Spiritual Warrior Event” includes a lengthy release of liability that acknowledges participants may suffer “physical, emotional, financial or other injuries.”
• I have been traveling–and writing about it at the other blog. So for now, some links.
• Raw food and Linux: Interview with two Pagans. Raw food is fine, but it’s easy to look good if you are in your twenties and have the bone structure … As for Linux, that’s fine too, but I have no real reason to switch from Mac OS X. Just not geeky enough—or you could say that I prefer to be geeky about other things.
• Jordan Stratford claims the steampunk aesthetic for Gnosticism. Next, raw food and Linux.
• Boing Boing is hosting guest-blogger Mitch Horowitz, author of Occult America: The Secret History of How Mysticism Shaped Our Nation
Is it the pop version of Catherine Albanese’s A Republic of Mind and Spirit: A Cultural History of American Metaphysical Religion