{"id":12059,"date":"2021-02-11T20:55:35","date_gmt":"2021-02-12T03:55:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=12059"},"modified":"2021-02-11T20:57:37","modified_gmt":"2021-02-12T03:57:37","slug":"christmas-when-the-veil-is-thin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=12059","title":{"rendered":"Christmas, When the Veil is Thin"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"

Christmas Eve 2020<\/p><\/div>\n

In December (yeah, this is late) I was tapped by a public library in Oregon to give an hour’s Zoom lecture on the “Pagan origins of Christmas.”<\/p>\n

I did it, but that format is still pretty weird. How many people are watching? Three? Thirty? Three hundred? And are they awake? No post-lecture Q&A or chat was scheduled by the organizers, so I will never know. On the other hand, they sent the check promptly.<\/p>\n

While I agree there is some swapping of symbols back and forth, I will just say that Yule and Christmas are still fundamentally different.((And Santa is not a flying shaman; he never flew before about 1823, and his red and white suit commemorates Coca-Cola, not Amanita muscaria<\/em>. Old-time Santa Claus\/Father Christmas figures wore various colors \u2014 often green \u2014 frequently with fur trim.)) The Christmas Story is just that, a linear narrative, while the Pagan Yule is cyclical and performative. We used a few minutes of video from the Denver winter solstice custom of Drumming Up the Sun at Red Rocks Amphitheatre <\/a>to introduce my talk.<\/p>\n

Another thing\u00a0 \u2014 it’s been drilled into me since my twenties that the “veil between the worlds” is thin at Samhain<\/strong>, so it was a jerk back into someone else’s story to be reminded, while doing my research, that there is a whole parallel tradition of the “veil being thin” and the dead walking on Christmas Eve. (Also domestic animals talking and other nonordinary stuff.)<\/p>\n

In fact, M. and I always do that, hang a candle lantern at Christmas Eve, Pagans that we are. For the Holy Family? For the dead? Is is just one of those customs that you follow, while the rationale changes from generation to generation? It has always seemed like the right thing to do.<\/p>\n

Over in the sidebar of the blog \u2014 if you are looking at the main page \u2014 is a list of magickal and paranormal podcasts. One of my favorites is Timothy Renner’s Strange Familiars. <\/em>For the last two Decembers, Renner, who sometimes calls himself a “Marian<\/a> animist,” has invited on Br. Richard Hendrick, an Irish Franciscan monk with a deep interest in paranormal matters, albeit seen through a Roman Catholic lens.<\/p>\n

For the 2020 show, “The Three Magi, Mary Magalene, and More,<\/a>” he wrote, “We discuss the pagan [sic<\/em>] origins of Christmas, the Three Magi, Mary Magdalene, the Holy Grail, the teachings of Saint Francis, Christmas legends and rituals, and much more. Brother Richard also relates some stories of his encounters with The Other.”<\/p>\n

In my talk, I did not have time to get into “thinning of the Veil” stuff, and I did not know if was appropriate for my invisible audience, but listen to this episode if you want to hear more.<\/p>\n

And the show with Brother Richard from 2019 was pretty spectacular too<\/a>!<\/p>\n

You could imagine the Pagan Dead (countless generations of them) showing up at Samhain and the Christian Dead at Christmas, but really, from their perspective, does it matter?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In December (yeah, this is late) I was tapped by a public library in Oregon to give an hour’s Zoom lecture on the “Pagan origins of Christmas.” I did it, but that format is still pretty weird. How many people are watching? Three? Thirty? Three hundred? And are they awake? No post-lecture Q&A or chat […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[204,24,66,298,69,43],"class_list":["post-12059","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-ancestors","tag-christianity","tag-halloween","tag-ritual","tag-samhain","tag-yule"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6xQTg-38v","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1263,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=1263","url_meta":{"origin":12059,"position":0},"title":"Father Christmas Works the Bar Crowd","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"December 6, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Father Christmas makes his way through the bar after a small-town Parade of Lights (of which more later). No, that was Santa on the fire engine. Different demigod.","rel":"","context":"In \"Yule\"","block_context":{"text":"Yule","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=yule"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1098,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=1098","url_meta":{"origin":12059,"position":1},"title":"Yes, Hypatia, There is a Santa Claus","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"December 17, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"This fellow -- Santa Claus, Father Christmas -- has joined the lineup of graven images on our polytheistic\/animistic mantel. That's Hermes' foot at the far left, followed by an ossuary jar of sharp-shinned hawk bones, and Hekate on the right.We all know that Santa's name derives from the Dutch form\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"American religion\"","block_context":{"text":"American religion","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=american-religion"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":576,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=576","url_meta":{"origin":12059,"position":2},"title":"I still call them \"Christmas\u2026","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"December 14, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"I still call them \"Christmas cards\"When I was new to the Pagan movement, I was militant about saying \"Yule\" instead of \"Christmas.\" I managed to train one of my sisters to employ the same usage when speaking to me; the other one never really noticed.This year, we are enjoying this\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":779,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=779","url_meta":{"origin":12059,"position":3},"title":"A sign of the season","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"December 11, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"How do you know that Yule is coming? Is it the Christmas music in stores? Is it the Sun setting at 4 p.m., which means I have to stop my project of staining the exterior walls of the new cabin addition?Or is realizing that you are standing beside a photocopier\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Yule\"","block_context":{"text":"Yule","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=yule"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3622,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=3622","url_meta":{"origin":12059,"position":4},"title":"Last Yuletide News Bits","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"December 24, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"\u2022 This is your brain. This is your brain on Christmas. \u2022 \"How the Lawyers Stole Winter\"\u00a0 \u2014 are we raising kids who can't cope? No, it's not Yule-related, directly. Indirectly, yes, I would argue. You have to embrace all of the wheel. \u2022 No matter how \"imagistic\" it may\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"childhood\"","block_context":{"text":"childhood","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=childhood"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/12\/SantaPickuptruck1.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":3578,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=3578","url_meta":{"origin":12059,"position":5},"title":"Father Christmas in the Wild","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"December 13, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Just to put you in the holiday mood. You don't think that he just appears out of nowhere, do you? Want more?","rel":"","context":"In \"Yule\"","block_context":{"text":"Yule","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=yule"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12059","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12059"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12059\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12071,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12059\/revisions\/12071"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12059"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12059"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12059"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}