Recent events with a younger family member of one of our regular hosts combined with listener feedback made us step back and do an episode on sharing one’s Pagan beliefs. We cover topics including corrupting minors by means of sharing your religious beliefs too harshly, ensuring newbies are given proper preparation before entering them into ritual and other tips to remind more experienced practitioners what precautions need to be taken with those who were not raised in a Pagan environment. We also pursue the age-old topic of teaching in the Pagan community.
Regular Hosts:
Amber of Red Tail Arts, Dave of PaganPodcasting.org, Ashlee, Joe
Guest Hosts:
Peter Dybing of Covenant of the Goddess, Star Foster of Patheos.com
01:30
How do you objectively determine if someone is a expert on paganism?
02:01
Scurvy reminds you to take 3 sentences you say into google every day and see what it says
02:19
The best teachers seem to be the ones willing to have a good conversation, not necessarily someone who is telling you they can teach you
02:39
Being open to teaching is one thing, one pursuing students, it might be a problem
02:46
A good teacher should be able to consider a student finding a different path that suits them well as a success
03:12
Seeing if someone is an expert is like any other field, check out who they associate with
04:22
Don’t trust a teacher that starts off telling you how horrible other people and other paths are. Run, fast, in the other direction
04:35
Before you see how they handle paganism, see how they handle every day life
05:18
You heard it here on PCP, Star Foster is not Taylor Ellwood, or Kellee Maize
05:37
College students shouldn’t be trusted if they claim to be a high member of a coven and are worthy to teach students
06:01
Is the person claiming to be a teacher or an expert really living what they teach?
06:46
There is a difference between teaching and teaching just what you’ve experienced
07:11
A good teacher is willing to be questioned and challenged!
07:27
Don’t trust the ones that act like cult leaders and are only willing to share what they know if you follow their “secret orders”
07:58
Trust your instincts!
08:07
Ask if you have to be careful what you say around your “teacher”
08:18
Does your teacher talk about their own struggles in their path or do they portray nothing but positive aspects
08:56
How do you decide if someone is worth talking to if you’re working for say…CNN?
10:10
Star shares her experience with trying to verify a Pagan group for their listings at Patheos.com
10:58
Dave relates how not being able to verify organizations to the Pagan Headstone Campaign
12:21
Peer recognition is how we tell who’s worth and who’s not
12:55
But how do we tell if pagan group is legit, and what exactly is legit?
14:15
An issue that’s plagued paganism for a long time…who belongs and who’s proper and who’s safe
15:30
Once you get more experience, more points will stick out to you on whether they are good people or not
15:52
Dave gives some guide lines for what is a legit pagan group
16:30
Make sure you have the “what is a cult checklist”
17:01
WarriorPrincessDanu: She was once terrified of a teacher that she was learning off of, and she learned that her instincts were right
18:13
If you’re new, and seeking to learn things, finding a specific path teacher might be jumping the gun. There’s a lot of organizations that teach a wide range of perspectives
18:57
If you’re in good company, they will lead you to the path that is best for you. Our old pagan group led many a person back to Christianity
19:14
They should be willing to teach you about their beliefs without making you commit to anything
19:39
Amber shares an example of not so good teaching
19:43
Name has been removed
20:00
The Silver Ravenwolf method of teaching and why you should not listen to teachers who say you should lie to your parents
20:54
Children are still under their parent’s protective custody.
21:18
When parents find out that you’ve been hiding your teaching their child ritual, it’s not a good thing for you, the parent, the child or your craft
21:41
If you have a pagan friendly parent, you squash any legitimacy you have by lying in the first place
21:41
If you have a pagan friendly parent, you squash any legitimacy you have by lying in the first place
21:51
From a legal standpoint, teaching without the parent’s notification is corruption of a minor
22:16
Rituals are supposed to be touching divine, how can you be pure when you’re telling someone to lie
22:33
It’s one thing to sympathize with someone who’s in a hard situation, but if you tell someone to lie straight off. You get them to believe that there’s something dirty and horrible that they should be hiding
23:10
If you’re underage, and any adult tells you they’ll teach you but don’t tell your parents..run in the other situation
23:42
Being pagan in a conservative Christian household does suck, but it gets better!
23:56
It gives an opportunity to read and reflect
24:58
Pagan Google-fu!
25:27
Write to Star at Patheos.com! Just don’t be surprised if it takes 3 month for a reply
25:44
Chrome now has an incognito mode that hides your history!
26:14
There are exceptions to the rule, but generally speaking parents are just worried about their children
26:47
Just because a parent tells you they don’t like something, does not mean your oppressed. Show them you’re willing to be responsible about it! It won’t be perfect, but it could help a lot!
27:49
If you’re pagan and you decide to invite a child to ritual, don’t lie to the child and tell them you’re taking them to the movies so they inadvertantly lie to their parents!
28:55
If you invite someone to your ritual, don’t assume that they know what they’re doing! Don’t even invite them to ritual first off, see if they understand even energywork!
30:42
There are some dangers in metaphysics work
31:04
You have to teach anyone safty before ritual. If something happens in ritual, someone will hold you responsible!
31:41
STAR FOSTER OF PATHEOS.COM shares her article on haphazzard ritual
32:19
Star was involved in a ritual that didn’t go well, and even she was sick afterwards.
32:42
Pagan Gods are not all loving and all forgiving entities. They will smack you upside the head!
32:54
Do Not Kellee Maize with our Gods!
33:32
If you e-mail PCP, you are invoking something. It’s the same as having ritual!
34:30
Hey Kellee Maize! You should respond to our e-mails with a Rick Roll!
35:13
Don’t do ritual just to piss somone off because they just don’t want you to do ritual!
36:21
Alex Mar has not officially adopted the term “recovering Catholic”
36:41
If you’re dragging someone into ritual, make sure to teach the basics first. If you don’t remember the basics, go read a beginners book!
37:08
If you don’t know how to give someone the basics, that might be a problem right there though….
37:42
Uh oh, Amber’s in the quiet angry mode!
38:06
There’s a problem with people being irresponsible, but when it comes to family, most of us will take it personally
41:11
The adult is supposed to know better, not the child.
41:23
Once you reach adult hood, your supposed to be an adult…that simple
42:52
Scurvy explains that even though it is one person doing damage, how that one person affects the WHOLE pagan community
43:35
Peter reminds us how many decades have we fought for us to be seen as something other than looking to steal children. Once person can take that back…
44:14
WarriorPrincessDanu: Psychologically, it takes 5 good examples to counteract 1 bad example
45:19
Why would you want a 14 year old student? At that age, it’s a lot more work than they’re ready to do.
46:25
Trivia: What started the precident for “expert testomony”? The witch trials!
46:43
Amber’s trying to see the brighter side of the situation…Ashlee and Dave shoots it into the ground
49:10
We’ve run out of time to do Danu’s topics again, we’ll have an episode all for you Danu!
Credits
Post-produced by: Amber
List of resources used or mentioned:
PCP is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 US License.
Season 19 Credits:
[DH] Lethal Destiny
http://www.newgrounds.com/audio/listen/354802
_-={Everlasting Times}=-_
http://www.newgrounds.com/audio/listen/170554
_-={Forces United!}=-_
http://www.newgrounds.com/audio/listen/290238
Originally Published: Sunday, March 20, 2011 at 6:00 pm
Pagan Centered Podcast
Licensed with CC BY-SA 3.0
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/us/
