It’s not Gluttony, it’s….just my natural Earth Mother Goddess body.

It’s not Greed, it’s… my Goddess given right to do money spells.

It’s not Sloth, it’s….being too busy finding enlightenment online, to do the dishes and feed the kids.

It’s not Wrath, it’s…just Dark God/dess energy.

It’s not Envy, it’s…”The Secret” to Success.

It’s not Pride, it’s… “Being a Celt” (or Norse, or High Priestess, or…)

Yup; Seven Deadly Sins. And in case you might think I’m only picking on pagans here, I’m not. It was, after all, Christians who defined them. Actually, we’ve gotten really good at sinning; we just don’t use our religion as an excuse for sinning. All too often it seems pagans, do.

But ya know, when you’re surrounded by people all doing the same thing, you don’t really see it. After awhile it becomes the norm. When everyone around you eats too much, it’s easy for you to eat too much. When everyone you know is sleeping with everyone else, it’s easy to believe that’s a good and normal thing to do.

The problem arises when you start having to pay the price.

Forget the word “Sin” for a minute. Think about what is HEALTHY. What you KNOW is good and healthy for your body, for your mind, for your soul. Takes you right back to those ol’ Puritanical values, doesn’t it?

Let’s take lust for example.

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Every time that wee little planet appears to be moving away from us, it’s called a “retrograde,” and all sorts of things seem to happen. Since it’s the planet of “Communication” (think of Mercury, the messenger god)  - communications seem to go haywire. People misunderstand each other. Computers fry. You hit “reply to ALL” instead of “reply TO” and just basically, the cosmic doo-doo hits the fan.

When one turns away from the pagan path, and turns back home towards Christianity, one would kinda expect that the affects of Mercury would no longer apply.

But ya know what? It kinda sorta DOES. Or at least it seems that way.

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Whilst others are beating their chests, wailing on CNN, or blogging about the collapse of our economy/society/political system, I’ve just been bee-bopping along here. No worries.

It’s not that I’m not aware of what’s going on, or that I’m not concerned. I am; I just know that whatever happens, I’ll be ok. Chaos whirls around me, but my center is stable and I am at peace.

There’s a phrase our deacon has said a couple of times in RCIA class that I’ve found extremely reasurring. He’s said “Catholics are FOR this world, we aren’t OF this world.” It all seems to tie into the view of personhood; yes, our personhood does include our bodies, but it also includes our spiritual selves. They’re united. Since we aren’t OF this world, we’re pretty much immune from what goes on within it.

I really wasn’t that way when I was pagan.

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well the crying’s over, and I’ve been spending a lot of time hugging on Rufus. He doesn’t mind, he’s an affection whore anyway. I swear I’ve never had a dog who was ALWAYS in such a good mood.

I loved Jenz, everyone who met Jenz loved Jenz. She had such a goofy sense of humor it was hard not to. We met many years ago in the “Ask a Witch” room on AOL and fell into friendship. Of course she did with most she met!

I knew her for probably 10 years online before I even met her. But you know, it didn’t really matter; a friend is a friend, online or in real life. I remember after my divorce, when things got really dark for me, Jenzi sensed that things were really really wrong and set up a three way call with me and another friend, and really just cheered me up. Took about an hour and a half, but it did.

The only time our friendship was ever really threatened was over stupid forum crap, when she was letting herself get swayed by some negative people, well, one in particular. I had made a comment that sometimes the greatest life lessons, come from being ill. She thought that was the most stupidest thing she’d ever heard, and really attacked me for it. You know while we were going through that, I kept thinking to myself - God, I hope she never has to find this lesson out, personally. Cuz you know the Universe works that way sometimes.

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Story in USA today:

Touched by an angel? Most say they’ve been protected

“A new survey of the USA’s religious beliefs and practices finds 55% of all adults — including one in five of those who say they have no religion — believe they have been protected from harm by a guardian angel.”

What I found particularly interesting was this little tidbit right here:
“Members of almost every major religious group sensed angels running heavenly interference: evangelical Protestant, 66%; black Protestant, 81%; mainline Protestant, 55%; Catholic, 57%; Jewish, 10%; other religions, 49%; no religion, 20%.”

I think we must be running our Guardian Angels ragged these days

RCIA class went great tonight! It was on creation and original sin. Learned two important lessons: 1)It wasn’t Eve’s fault it was ALL ADAM’S FAULT for letting the serpent in to begin with and 2)Eve was intimidated into eating the fruit by a great big ol mean 7 headed dragon type critter, not some talking serpent from Dr. Doolittle. That always bugged me.

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You know, women who get all into this “menstration as female empowerment” crap, scare me.

I can’t say that I’ve ever felt “more mystical” “more powerful” more “anything” other than “more cranky,” in the 35 years that I’ve had a period, period. It’s a period dammit, a sign that most of the time means you’re not pregnant, and no longer need all this fertile bedding stuff anymore. It’s not empowerment, it’s em-bed-iment, a perfect time to sit in bed and do nothing other than eat chocolate, watch George Clooney movies and give yourself pedicures.

It’s my down time, dagnabit, I get precious little of that as it is, why any woman would want to do anything else besides collapse and assume a fetal position, is beyond me.

My anamcara, who is blood-brother Lakota, told me once that in the Lakota tradition, the women have their own special “Moon Lodge” where the women who are on the rag go and do nothing. It’s a very special place of ritual, where they bleed in reparations for the sins of their husbands and brothers and warrior men from the previous month. Apparently, there’s lots of sinning to be had in warrior Lakota men.

And here’s what I have to say about that:

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“It’ll all work out.”

“How do you KNOW??”

“I DON’T know. It’s a mystery!”

…but, I figured it probably wouldn’t be a good idea to bring up a movie about a Catholic man having an adulterous affair, in my RCIA class, so I shut mah mouth.

I kept my mouth shut about a lot of things, actually. Like how some theologians (including Pope John Paul I) envision the third person of the trinity as feminine, but fortunately I didn’t have to say anything - he brought it up. He also admitted to having issues with that theory, which it is helpfull to know what one’s teacher’s issues, are. I suspect discussion of the Divine Feminine will be kept to a minimum in this class.

I really don’t have much difficulty with the concept of the trinity; I never did stop dealing with a triune god figure, even in paganism - after all. And even though it’s been proven that the whole shamrock-as-a-symbol-of-the-trinity thing can NOT be attributed to St. Patrick (the story is only traceable back 100 years or so; St. Patrick lived around 500 A.D.) - it’s still a good representation, I think.

A few more people showed up tonight, all with that wild-eyed deer-caught-in-the-car-headlights look. Catholics should take a cue from the Methodists and FEED new people.

It’s harder to bolt out the door when you’re busy digesting.

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So I said a quick prayer. Not so much demanding that I BE GIVEN A SIGN, as much as a “Hey God, can you kinda let me know that I’m doing the right thing??” - kinda thing.

None was forthcoming. But I got in the car to go, anyway.

Guess what was on the car radio. Go on, guess!

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Read the rest of Gimme a SIGN! (423 words)

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Earth Angel ¹

I guess my siblings and I were raised as somewhat unusal Protestants, in that we were raised with a belief in Guardian Angels.

To ward off the “boogie man” - and assorted other beasties that stalk children at night - our mother used to draw a picture of our “Guardian Angel” and tape it to the wall beside our bed at night. “See? there’s a picture of your guardian angel. Nothing is going to happen to you while she’s looking over you.” Many, many nights I’d fall asleep looking at that picture. When I became a mother, I used to do the same with my daughter.

When mom got lung cancer, and all her electrolytes went out of balance, she’d be talking out of her head, and she used to be afraid to fall asleep. So to help her, I drew a picture of her guardian angel too, and posted it by her bed at the hospital. It helped her, too.

In her last year she used to talk about her Guardian Angel, a lot. She said his name was “Sing” - well, it wasn’t really his name, that was just the name he gave her because humans couldn’t pronounce his name. She used to tell us all about the conversations she had with Sing, all the while, dad shaking his head behind his paper. We all just humored her, our mom had always been “weird” - this was just yet another way for our mother to express her weirdness. If it brought her peace - why not?

Recently I had an opportunity to go over her medical records. Our brother decided to file suit with the State of Florida with the Engle Trust Fund, against the tobacco companies, and I had to search through them to find references to her smoking before 1996. I found something very interesting in those records.

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I remember mom having this in the living room. I’ve always loved it; wondered who ended up with it, and Jeanne had it. But Meanie Jeanne wouldn’t give it to me! (I can say that cuz she reads my blog, heh)

BUT

Apparently, mom had TWO, and my younger sister Mary got the other one. She likes it too, but not as much as I do, so Sweet Mary gave me hers. Yay for Mary!

It’s just a little wooden book (best way to describe it, even though there are no pages), with a depiction of St. Francis on one side, and “A Simple Prayer” on the other.

Lord, make me an instrument of Your peace
Where there is hatred… let me sow love.
Where there is injury… pardon.
Where there is doubt… faith.
Where there is despair… hope.
Where there is sadness… joy.

O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek
To be consoled,… as to console;
To be understood… as to understand;
To be loved…… as to love

For
It is in giving…. that we receive
It is in pardoning, that we are pardoned
It is in dying… that we are born to eternal life.

St. Francis

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