{"id":293,"date":"2004-10-28T19:52:00","date_gmt":"2004-10-28T19:52:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=293"},"modified":"2004-10-28T19:52:00","modified_gmt":"2004-10-28T19:52:00","slug":"293","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=293","title":{"rendered":""},"content":{"rendered":"

Pagan\/Christian clergy<\/strong><\/p>\n

Christianity Today’s<\/em> blog continues to be vexe<\/a>d by Pagan ritual in the Episcopal Church.<\/a><\/p>\n

With Matt Drudge<\/a>-like glee, the blog notes that the two married Episcopal clergy involved are also contemporary Pagan Druids. (Let’s capitalize Pagan, please, Mr. Olsen.) Their Druid group is here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

I have seen people hold clerical positions in Christian denominations and Wiccan groups as well. Back in 1996, the fourth of Llewellyn’s Witchcraft Today<\/span> anthologies<\/a>, which I edited, carried an article by a woman who is both Wiccan and a minister in the United Methodist Church<\/a>. So is her husband: they are co-pastors of a UMC church.<\/p>\n

From a polytheistic perspective, it all makes sense. From a cultural perspective, it is pretty risky, hence her pseudonym–although at least some of the UMC congregation knew of their dual roles.<\/p>\n

UPDATE: Conservative Episcopalians are in full cry, as demonstrated here<\/a> and here<\/a> (note the comments).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Pagan\/Christian clergy Christianity Today’s blog continues to be vexed by Pagan ritual in the Episcopal Church. With Matt Drudge-like glee, the blog notes that the two married Episcopal clergy involved are also contemporary Pagan Druids. (Let’s capitalize Pagan, please, Mr. Olsen.) Their Druid group is here. I have seen people hold clerical positions in Christian […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_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":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-293","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/s6xQTg-293","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":10778,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=10778","url_meta":{"origin":293,"position":0},"title":"Pagan Children & the Anglican Death Spiral","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"August 12, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"Photo: The Very Reverend Jane Hedges rides the 55-foot high \"helter-skelter\" inside Norwich Cathedral in England.((While her official biography says she was ordained a \"deaconess\" in 1980, she was elevated to \"priest\" in 1994. You can't say \"priestess\" in the Anglican church \u2014 evidently the word makes them think of\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"animism\"","block_context":{"text":"animism","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=animism"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/helter-skelter.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/helter-skelter.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/helter-skelter.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":2226,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=2226","url_meta":{"origin":293,"position":1},"title":"DADT Repeals Raises Issues for Wiccan Chaplains–Assuming that We Had Wiccan Chaplains, That Is","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"December 22, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"Terry Mattingly at Get Religion, a blog about religion and journalism, looks at some of the fallout from the \"don't ask, don't tell' repeal for military chaplains. His main question is whether a new military policy on homosexuals serving openly (they have always been there clandestinely) will affect the ability\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":743,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=743","url_meta":{"origin":293,"position":2},"title":"Who’s a Celt now? – 3","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"October 20, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"\"Celtic Spirituality\" as religious outbidding.During the recent Spanish Peaks Celtic Music Festival, St. Benedict Episcopal Church in La Veta, Colorado, took out a small ad in the program for their Celtic Spirituality weekend.Yes, before the contemporary Pagan movement was underway, various Anglicans were pushing \"Celtic spirituality\" as a way to\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":296,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=296","url_meta":{"origin":293,"position":3},"title":"Can you be a Druid\u2026","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"October 30, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"Can you be a Druid and an Episcopalian? The controversy over \"Pagan\" elements on an official Episcopal Church Web site and the husband-and-wife clergy connected with them continues to bubble. Christianity Today's blog has their bishop's statement: the situation is \"extremely serious,\" but there is no rush to the stake,\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6580,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=6580","url_meta":{"origin":293,"position":4},"title":"The Danger in Being “Ministerial”","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"July 15, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"When I saw a headline on The Wild Hunt, \"Wiccan Minister Kathryn Jones to Run for Office in Pennsylvania,\" it stopped me in my tracks. Not because Ms. Jones is running for office, but the use of the term \"minister.\" Immediately I thought of John Michael Greer's recent column in\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":291,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=291","url_meta":{"origin":293,"position":5},"title":"Idol-worshiping Episcopalians Christianity Today reacts\u2026","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"October 26, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"Idol-worshiping Episcopalians Christianity Today reacts to Pagan aspects of an Episcopal Church experiment with women's liturgy. Other conservative Christian bloggers chime in: check out the \"comments\" section of this blog. The ordination of women led to \"sexual narcissism,\" you see. It's been a long time--like 40 or 50 years--since the\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/293","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=293"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/293\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=293"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=293"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=293"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}