Scott Cunningham (1) (1956–1993)
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Scott Cunningham authored more than fifty books, including the bestselling Wicca: A Guide to the Solitary Practitioner. He was a highly respected teacher and one of the most influential members of the modern Craft movement.
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Werke von Scott Cunningham
Encyclopaedia of Magical Herbs by Cunningham, Scott ( Author ) ON Oct-31-1985, Paperback (1987) 1,656 Exemplare
Divination for Beginners: Reading the Past, Present & Future (For Beginners (Llewellyn's)) (1993) 104 Exemplare
Cunningham's Magical Sampler: Collected Writings and Spells from the Renowned Wiccan Author (2012) 51 Exemplare
Handbuch der Natur- und Elementarmagie: Handbuch der Natur- und Elementarmagie 2: Tl II (2004) 7 Exemplare
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Wissenswertes
- Gebräuchlichste Namensform
- Cunningham, Scott
- Rechtmäßiger Name
- Cunningham, Scott Douglas
- Geburtstag
- 1956-06-27
- Todestag
- 1993-03-28
- Geschlecht
- male
- Nationalität
- USA
- Geburtsort
- Royal Oak, Michigan, USA
- Sterbeort
- San Diego, California, USA
- Wohnorte
- San Diego, California, USA
- Beziehungen
- Cunningham, Chet (father)
Ashworth, Christine (sister) - Organisationen
- Serpent Stone Family
- Kurzbiographie
- Scott Cunningham was born in Michigan but spent most of his life in San Diego, California. In high school, he discovered Wicca, and was initiated into an eclectic Wiccan coven. In the early 1980s, he spent some time in a group led by author Raven Grimassi. Scott was skilled in drawing on his knowledge of natural magic to write books that were comprehensible to people who had no prior understanding of Wicca or modern Paganism. He became one of modern Paganism's most popular writers. In 1983, Scott was diagnosed with lymphoma. He suffered from a variety of illnesses over the next decade, including meningitis, before passing away in 1993 at the age of thirty-six. Following his death much of his material was repackaged by publishers and released posthumously.
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A Great reference Book, however the downside is the author does not state where he got his information from in the plant profiles, not does he indicate the chemical constituents of the herbs, what herbs should be used internally or topically with caution, what herbs should never be used internally, etc...
Great Reference Book of tthe Magickal and Healing Uses of Crystals, Metals and Gems.
I do have some issues with this book is that Cunningham does not really reference where he got his information from, I would be happier if this book at better references of source material.
The book also does not go into Moh hardness of the various crystals. This is important as the Moh Harness Scale determines how hard a crystal/gem is and depending on where a crystal falls on the scale, would determine how you would store it as different hardness can damage other crystals when stored together.
He also does not go into depth which crystals are toxic in the individual profiles. He mentions making Gem Elixirs but does not state in the profiles which crystals should be used via the direct method (within water) or indirect method (empty vessel with crystal in it, sitting in another vessel of water), which is very important due to some crystals being toxic.
He mentions methods of cleansing crystals, but does not indicate which crystals should not be cleansed using water (some crystals dissolve/are damaged with water), some crystals get bleached or can cause fires if exposed to the sun, etc....… (mehr)
I do have some issues with this book is that Cunningham does not really reference where he got his information from, I would be happier if this book at better references of source material.
The book also does not go into Moh hardness of the various crystals. This is important as the Moh Harness Scale determines how hard a crystal/gem is and depending on where a crystal falls on the scale, would determine how you would store it as different hardness can damage other crystals when stored together.
He also does not go into depth which crystals are toxic in the individual profiles. He mentions making Gem Elixirs but does not state in the profiles which crystals should be used via the direct method (within water) or indirect method (empty vessel with crystal in it, sitting in another vessel of water), which is very important due to some crystals being toxic.
He mentions methods of cleansing crystals, but does not indicate which crystals should not be cleansed using water (some crystals dissolve/are damaged with water), some crystals get bleached or can cause fires if exposed to the sun, etc....… (mehr)
I read this book years ago and felt drawn back to it recently. The library had an audiobook ready so I took it as a sign. Still a great, easy to access book.
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I would never give this book to someone I knew to read, you know. Most people would just be like, U meen yer not uh normie like us? 😟—and my mom, who likes being weird, would probably just ignore whatever I said and launch into a speech about whatever she’d been listening to; I liked that line from “Persuasion” (2022) where Anne Elliot responds to her sister in Italian and she doesn’t notice; I’m not even sure that the sister understood Italian, you know, it was like, “our conversations are about me” (actually, even if I told my mom some Buddhist or new age prayer that she hadn’t heard of, she’d just get bored and interrupt me or ignore me and then start talking about her guru, you know. Although she’d never tell me I was wrong, about something, except maybe having my own ideas about food. But if I robbed a bank at gunpoint she’d be like, That’s ok. Everyone who works at a bank is a nutter and totes worthless—well, except for your brother. But mostly it’s like the government, you know?)—and my dad; to let my dad know I’m a witch would be to tempt him to sin, knowing he would be totally unable and unwilling to resist, you know. “I’m afraid this witchcraft stuff could almost lead to voting for Biden. It’s almost as bad as that, truly.” It’s like, I don’t need to know about you to condemn you, and I don’t want to know; and if you try to tell me, I’ll tune it out. If it’s not X, where X is whatever I imagine that I am or have to be or hold up as the ideal—if it’s not me and mine—it’s the Sauron/Voldemort pit of destruction, and it’s totally of zero interest to me, what the non-Alpha is if it’s not Alpha, or whatever it is kind of barbarian you are, if you’re not a Greek/Roman. (Ironic, I know.)
The only prudent thing is to keep it a secret.
But I read this because I was reading a Druidry & Zen book, so I thought it would be cool to supplement it with a Wicca & Christianity book—Druidry and Wicca are rather different, and I’m more of a Wiccan, you know. And just, as I’m slowly turning myself into a witch (I feel like the Damascus Road thing just leads to external and especially internal alienation as likely as not, and if it can be avoided—because you’re not headed down the road to destruction, lol—I feel like sudden belief death is better avoided), it’s curious as well as the—especially for witchcraft—important aspect of specific and applied teachings, to kinda understand the philosophy, and the deep, vague crap, you know. Of course, given the context, it’s hard to do this well. Since Scott isn’t a metal fan or whatever and since he’s trying to defuse the bomb of hate or whatever, there’s that tendency to portray it as total white light, like a kind of guru or angelic belief. This isn’t trivial, since it is good and important to be of the craft of the light, and indeed Wicca has been influenced by non-normative Christianity and angel etc. beliefs, especially but not only in more historical periods. But I wonder if in strained, humorless attempts to—it’s almost like trying to convince your parents you’re not snorting cocaine because you’re listening to the Ben Folds Five instead of the Backstreet~no, ~Beethoven~ Beethoven: the Funeral Masses—you know, it’s like; I’m not a social justice protester as much as some people are, but you are entitled to be a rebel in so far as you want to be free, you know? Even having a sense of humor marks you out as a rebel, perhaps.
I also feel like it’s a spiritual misstep possibly, in that all of us, whether we’re Christian, Wiccan, Jewish, Buddhist, whatever, have a shadow (as Jung called it); it’s just that the Christians who think that everyone is inevitably born mired in sin also inherit the Victorian belief that we’ve got to deny our own sinfulness or whatever and be good folk Christians and village people who never do ~anything~ bad or dishonor the ~village~ in ~any~ way…. Although we do listen to that country music about being a rascal, but really, we listen to that music because we love our mom, you know.
It’s a lot. There are many layers of lies, so it’s a lot. You can’t expect people to write a perfect book, you know.
But it is kinda interesting or whatever for the newcomer to ask her or himself, What is witchcraft, right?
…. Examples of tools: candles, crystals, herbs, words.
…. I don’t really feel that Wicca/contemporary religious witchcraft is the same as “folk magic”, and I don’t agree that it has nothing-to-do with ceremonial/fancy magic, you know; although I was reading in another book recently and saw just how fancy that ceremonial/ritual stuff can get, so I feel like I get Scott looking at it sideways and saying, “Yeah, whatever.” Also, in a debunking hate book I feel like there’s a tendency to oversimplify, you know. Like, if Christians were being persecuted/marginalized by the Worldwide Confucian Empire or whatever (just go with it), and you were a Protestant Christian, you might point out that the Pope doesn’t drink the blood of Chinese babies, or whatever, but you might also feel the need to say, “more importantly, the Pope isn’t so dope in Bible Christianity. Catholicism never influenced my religion”, right. You know—just to simplify.
But sometimes I do like fanciness and angels and medievalisms: when I’m in the mood. It does sound MUCH more difficult to practice, though….
…. By “religious magic” he meant “Christian magic”. This kinda overlaps with ceremonial stuff, although often it’s more popular. Witchcraft can be secular, but Wicca and things like it are religions. I feel like sometimes Scott muffs his words. (Granted, only theologians murder people when they speak ineptly.)
…. I think that by ‘folk magic’, he means ‘secular witchcraft’, something I find incredibly confusing/ambiguous. How is religious witchcraft NOT ‘folk magic’? 🤪
I’m still putting it under ‘Wicca and the major religions’; Scott was a Wiccan, and most of the book is in the second section, for Wicca.
…. I did once think that all-Goddess no-God Wicca (Dianic, they call it—often it’s also no-men, although that’s sometimes a stereotype or whatever) was kinda revenge-y, and uptight-woke and monastic, and just kinda…. Weird, you know. It is true that any sort of exclusion has the potential to be, and sometimes is, a little weird, and that’s sometimes people react too strongly and get a little weird. But I no longer feel as I once did. No god, no men—whatever. People get to decide for themselves. I started to read a Dianic book on Kindle Unlimited, (I was interested in the Ogham letters; “the tree mothers”, she called them), and noticed it was not a stereotypical uptight-woke person—not that I ever thought that All “woke” people were problematic, although the Uptight ones, OMG 😹; but again, sometimes something seems to code for uptightness without being so in reality—although I think the book reading was more effect than cause. The thing is, really, just that in our imperfect world, sometimes, actually rather frequently, women get abused by men, so part of it is a sort of trusted/safe space for women of that background. And yeah, part of it could be a sorta monastic vibe (assuming that they’re straight, of course—oh, the assumptions! Oh, the places you’ll go! 😹).
So yeah, I don’t feel as I once did about that….
Oh, and Scott was validating them, of course.
…. I don’t have all the tools, of course—when I start actually doing rituals in some secluded park corner when it gets nice out, I think I’ll use my wooden sword as sword-athame-wand, you know: how many pointy things do you need…. Or can you have before people look at you funny? I even had to answer questions about the wooden sword—no, it’s not metal….
But yeah: one tool I think I’ll order right now is my Hermes costume; because I’m Hermes. I hope people don’t decide that that makes me cracked, you know. It’s like: I think a lot of Hugh Auden’s poetry is cracked (think Downton Abbey getting so much of a prestige high, it’s like snorting crack), but I think that Real poetry/metaphor is NOT cracked, you know…. I know that right now, Hugh is prestigious/powerful/eccentric, (I mean, he’s dead, but you know what I mean), and I’m “poor”, and random basically, and on psycho watch, basically—(“cracked once, cracked for all time…. Yes, and I also believe in Hope: Hope, Spiritual Power, and Humbug Gossipry”) but you gotta play the long game, bro.
Play the long game. It’s what the BIG entrepreneurs do. 😎 (Even though I don’t like sunglasses lol. It’s an emoji.)
…. It’s not the best book. It’s hard. It’s a lot. I mean, people call you the Jews and Hitler all rolled into one: but then correcting people usually makes you sound like a scold, of course. 🤛 vs 🤫
…. And of course all my set prayers and ritual sayings I’m going to pre-record myself saying, with my phone, when I’m in my parked car in an empty parking lot, and then at the appropriate time I can listen to myself say it with my headphones or whatever.
Gotta make myself less persecutable, you know. That would have been far more practical, really, than a book of explanations and scolding for a world of abandoned normies and unrepentant accusers, you know. Like Calvin Coolidge, if offered the book they would not read it; if it were read aloud to them, they wouldn’t change. Change is a collaboration, and the person doing the changing has to do most of the work. Kinda inconvenient when that other person passively and actively marginalizes you, but hey. Them’s the way of things.
A book about seeming “normal” while not ~actually~ being fucking normal would have been more helpful, you know. Just raging at the lies doesn’t make them go away, although I would have toned down the “Wiccans don’t say that Christians are XYZ” because sometimes they are XYZ, and realistically sometimes we say it, you know. But I do kinda believe in hiding my beliefs, and even, to some extent, in gradualism and compromise. Even with regard to myself—I have a long training in Christianity, probably more than one lifetime, and won’t become firmly rooted in the Craft overnight. Part of the folly of my young-young witchery that made me go back to the church was the error of imagining I was a witch firmly rooted just because I was pissed, you know. Which isn’t to say that to be a witch isn’t a sort of dissent even, in this world. I’m not a woman, but even to be an awake woman, or an honest romantic, is to be a sort of rebel—a rebel against patriarchy, to say nothing of the endless ‘blah’, the endless ‘meh’, you know.
So that’s what I think about that. Whatever he pitched to his publisher was probably good, you know, to some extent—some sort of conciliation is needed in the long term. But perhaps he dotted too many i’s, crossed too many t’s. The Episcopalians I used to belong to were terrible about dotting i’s and crossing t’s, you know. They’re not bad people, but to be honest, I think they’re part of the problem. As radical as you want, so long as nothing changes; and so long as nothing is felt.
…. His descriptions of sabbats are very normative, you know, very book-y. “Wiccans do magic and ritual at least 21 times a year, at set fixed times. They always do this even though there’s no social support for it, to the extent that iPhones think that the word “sabbat” isn’t a real word.”
(the Cookie Monster) Time for sabbat, little baby witch!
—Ah, I can’t. I couldn’t get off work, I didn’t buy supplies; I’m fucked, you know.
(the Cookie Monster) I arrange sabbat for you. The Cookie Monster fixes everything. (Jim Henson magic)
—Wow, that’s great! Although, I don’t know. I didn’t really sleep; I’m not up for ritual. Thanks for getting me off work though—what you tell them? Well, it doesn’t matter—I’ll just sleep.
(the Cookie Monster) If you refuse to honor the Goddess and God on their ancient sacred day, then the Cookie Monster will eat you! (The Cookie Monster proceeds to eat the Wiccan.)
And if I have to explain to you, you know, that that’s not really how it is, then I truly fear for the brain doctors of America. They’re gonna have to do some serious overtime, fixin’ some brains out there, you know. 🥸
…. I thought it was funny how he said that if you have a library card and ten dollars, you’ll be able to discover “the secrets of witchcraft”, you know. I thought that was funny.
(Hermes) I invested ten dollars, and got one book on witchcraft. (places book on bed). And then I looked in the library, and found they had a book on witchcraft. [ONE, lol. 😆]. (places book). With THIS book, I’ll gain the skills like Timothée Chalamet, the skills of an artist; and with THIS book, I’ll gain skills like Jeff Bezos, and people on Threads will call me StrongBad, and “rich boy”. (places books together so that their spines touch). I have the secrets of witchcraft. (beat) Oh, and I almost forgot: I read “David Copperfield”, and “Jane Eyre”: so basically I can go work for the BBC now. Happiness!
~ It was funny.
…. The chapter on sex seems pretty good. Witchcraft should not be about sexual negativity. I actually think a LOT of the sexual negativity today is basically a result of anti-sexuality teaching in the church. It doesn’t stop people from having sex, it just means that when they do things they do it while telling each other, “you’re no good”—which is negativity. Scott doesn’t really go there, but he mentions what Gerry mentioned in that novel: I mean, Gerry enjoyed nudity, of course, but part of it is learning to function in the presence of desire, and to remain chaste when that’s desirable. (As opposed to trying to enforce asceticism on an unwilling world, and then freaking out when Cupid’s arrow gets through your armor, and then proceeding to cut off your own head with your own axe because you can’t deal with desire.)
The part he should probably mention is that most Wiccans etc. are solitaries, so most of their nudity would happen during their daily shower, you know. I hate to be negative, but I can’t help but speculate whether or not in contemporary times being a witch makes it harder to have any sort of partner or nudity in your life at all. The two things (“witchcraft and nudity”) certainly aren’t guaranteed to go together. And then there’s the crone/old man phase of life, you know. Sometimes sexual activity does continue into later life, psychologists say, but obviously it becomes a little harder to get a good deal on the market, so to speak. It would be nice to have a “crone” friend, though—a nice “safe” feminine influence. Old people who aren’t in poor health, stuck in some past decade, or just stuck normies like people of any age can be, can really be quite a good influence, you know.
…. I’m not against activism; I mean that in a real way. Wiccans are persecuted, they want to get the word out about anti-civil liberties crap, etc. But I do think that too much focus on it can be a bad thing. Pointing out that people oppress you often has no impact on their desire to keep oppressing you, while simultaneously taking much of the pleasure out of life, you know. “That’s right, witches—I do oppress ya! I oppress ya in the Name o’ teh Loird! I oppress you like I oppress the old Jew boys coming out of Syria! I know you got that tarot shit from the Gypsies—and Gypsies got black-blood!”
Of course, holding down the mere mention of it can be difficult and unproductive, too. Groups and individuals who are attacked each need to navigate this issue in their own way. Certainly you have to keep in mind that many, perhaps most, Christians and normies are just…. Superstitious, you know. I don’t know another word for it, you know. “Is my mic working now? It is? Good. Now folks, we got problems—we got problems—we got witches! We didn’t get all of them in the Middle Ages; we didn’t get all of them at Salem—and they’re still out there, worshipping Satan! And! And! Eating babies! And I can prove it with the Word of God. This is my Bible. This is my Bible. It says in the Third Letter to the Church in Corinth, that the man who eats babies is an abomination before the Lord. But witches are like atheists—they don’t accept that the Bible is the inspired, infallible, Word of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, who is God, right. So they eat babies. That’s a fact. That’s a fact. I proved it with the Word of God—amen. So now the people of God have got to get into action—we’ve got to get into action people—(cheering)—we’ve got to write to Trump, the Shadow President, who won the election, (cheering), and get babies OFF the menu! (lots of cheering and clapping) And get witches, ON, the menu.” (clapping sputters and dies, people are like, wut? Wut just happen to us censoreds…. What just happen to us bitches…. Lol).
Also, realistically: not everyone is like that. A lot of normies would just think you’re a freak, you know—a harmless, gullible little freak to be lightly mocked. You’d get the equivalent of—although I’m a Millennial—“OK Boomer”, you know. “OK Wiccan—you go worship those ancient pagan deities. Go slay [or whatever the fuck it is Gen Z says, right].”
And it’s like: I will. I’ll buy robes.
“Consumerist zombie.”
Hey don’t shoot me when the revolution comes for being a capitalist.
“I’ll consider it.”
…. Although for the record, I think that GenZ people should seriously consider growing older faster than I’m growing older, so that they catch up. (Sometimes GenZ is full of shit, you know.) C’mon. Talk it over with a scientist. Work something out. Stop making excuses. 🏰
Although sometimes TikTok is funny.
…. But yeah Scott is very officious in this book. I feel like he should occupy the Office of Wiccan Persecution Amelioration in the World Judeo-Wiccan Secret Conspiracy Government, you know.
Don’t tell anybody I said that, now. 😉
…. Now I have this image in my head of somebody in an antique living room with a fire place in ridiculous stereotypical ritual do-dad robes shaking hands with a Jewish man while a male BBC announcer from the ‘50s gives a voice-over describing the sport of golf because somebody in headquarters fucked-up, you know. (Or maybe it would just be funnier that way, for the Cowans and normies, lol.)
I have a strange mind, of course.
…. And then it would be like:
—(Offended radical) It’s anti-Semitic! They’re saying that Jews are like Merlin weirdos—freaks!
—(the importance of being earnest) No! They were being sincere! There really are people, a minority in our society, who believe that they can work magic!
—(offended/dismissive radical) (makes humph noise) In mental wards.
lol.
…. There’s certainly no word relevant to Wicca that carries the sting of ‘anti-Semitism’, you know. (Not that Jews are always protected.) I guess you could say, ‘religious bigotry’, but even that sounds generic and weak, and anyway, many people, probably most of the people in our society have either decided that “religious bigotry” is a Good Thing—maybe it can even rehabilitate racism!—or else just totally forgotten, all forgetful professor, that there are religions and that people still believe them, you know.
…. It is amazing somehow that the Catholic Church and its descendants have conditioned people to accept without question that rituals never change even though people change, times change, life changes. Like, the Episcopal Church, which I used to be part of, hasn’t dotted an i of their liturgy differently since ten years before I was born (1979–no Millennials yet), and really it hasn’t changed substantively since it was Catholic ritual in Latin; they just reluctantly change it to 200 years out of date language every so often, you know. You’re not supposed even to want to cross a t differently. “We can’t do anything like that, we always need the bishop to let us do things. Let’s ask the bishop? Well, I don’t want to ask him, and I’m the priest. Besides, the bishop doesn’t have the authority—you’d need all the bishops to agree, after carefully considering the Ancient Greek used in England in 1662, that it was logical and correct to un-cross the t or re-dot the i. And anyway nobody’s gonna ask anybody to do anything, because nobody wants it. Submit or find a different church.” The Episcopal Church is usually considered “liberal Christianity”. It is hierarchical, and even in the less formally hierarchical churches (although in almost all churches there’s someone in charge), there’s that vortex where custom meets superstition, you know: Granny says No. Don’t make Grandpa get his rifle. This is religion. ~The “Indian fighter” blood boils in their veins, you know. So everyone has their own way of considering themselves the last to change, or the ones who’ll never change, in Consensus Christianity, you know.
I mean, things are happening all the time, and in response you can’t even write a prayer or something, and if you do you can’t put any feeling in it, and if you do, it’s hostility. It’s deadness, you know. And that’s like, “religion”—“not on the table to be negotiated”. If it wasn’t social control, it wouldn’t be [sing-song] Jesus.
…. I mean, I think they (my TEC church) wrote a prayer—the important people there wrote a prayer—for the Ukraine war, you know; white people in another country were in danger; that’s how you catch, almost an ethnic American’s attention, you know: and certainly a very, very normal one’s. (And what a dubious blessing to win the love of such people: “I don’t think there should be a war in your country, because you’re white, you know.”) But I can’t remember it, any of it. I went to that church when I could for years and read the TEC BCP 1979 all the way through, (I even looked up a few dozen pages’ worth of the lectionary before giving up—it just never ended; which is how I felt during services), and it’s like…. I never ~felt~ anything you know, and I never remembered anything. Once they had this special Lent/Holy Week service and I went and I had this magical-miserable experience of divine pain, you know, “dolor”, I guess the Mexicans would call it: sadness/pain.
But I never really felt anything good, really, and 99.5% of the time, pretty much nothing at all. If you don’t count restlessness. Sometimes physical discomfort—it was cold in that building. I’m not even making a joke.
…. I also tried multiple other churches, and most of them were similar. My dad’s church is worse. They voted for the stinker.
…. But magical religion (as I sometimes call it) isn’t about nagging the Christians, you know. If you go into Avalon, sooner or later some god or another will piss you off or rub you the wrong way, or some person. Or it could be some ordinary problem or person is hard to solve/reconcile despite your magical life. You might even irritate yourself.
(shrugs) Elizabeth Gilbert says that her Guru, (it was Gurumayi, although she didn’t name her—she was Muktananda’s girl, although she didn’t name either of them—Wikipedia does, though, and actually it’s pretty obvious), liked to say, “Fear—who cares?”, I think it was, you know. So you let yourself down. It’s still your life. Or just—life. And there are still more gods and spirits out there than you could ever meet in a single life—and more God in yourself, too, than you could ever need. So, Bob’s your uncle, as they say in Britain.
…. I mean, after printing a Mabon ritual, Scott says, I don’t know why anyone would find fault with us over stuff like this.~ I get that; but perhaps it’s unimaginative. On the one hand, sometimes witches like Cowans act out, and also many folks, not limited to but perhaps especially Christians, have a deep-seated and rather irrational fear of sex and everything even tangentially associated with sex, you know; so things like that explain it, somewhat. I want to be fair to the Christians, you know; it is fear, but I don’t want to just shrug and say, I guess your brain is broken, you know. But to be fair to us, that’s not the only or necessarily the main issue. Maybe with a Christian who likes Buddhists but not Wiccans, there’s the tangentially related to sex issue, also the “you can trust established, powerful things but not ~other~ things” issue, but that’s not leads into something else which for many many Christians is the dominant issue. Most Christians don’t “need” witches to become better behaved; they “need” them to become more Christian, you know. (Come to our country music festival!) And that’s because, to use the kinda corporate language that I like even if it sets them off, you know: Christians are trying to build up their brand. They think they’re doing their god Jesus a favor, right. “I am doing Jesus a favor by scaring people into church.” They think they’re making their god stronger. They’re making the world a better place, strengthening goodness, by forcing people to make religious choices that they approve of. Or at least, constraining others as much as possible or practicable; and restraining them, hopefully, from making choices that they “truly cannot live with” without having a village gossip meltdown.
(shrugs) But consider getting over yourself. It may be hard to watch some people choose not to honor Jesus as their god; yeah, that could be a real trial for you. But life sometimes contains things we don’t like at first. Sometimes you just have to deal with the world as it is, not the way that you’ve decided it “has to be”. Sometimes it comes down to that, or unjustifiably attacking people, at a certain point, right. So choose wisely, cf getting the harvest you planted, right. (shrugs)
…. Very officious. Very, very officious. ~Why bother trying to sound like the presider at your local municipal event, when you know that you wouldn’t be welcome there? You could at least sound like a salesperson or something, instead of the bloody mayor, for fuck’s sake, right. “As consciousness rises, Edwardian Springs finds itself evolving: towards the light.” And yes, Wiccans do market goods and services: I joined this religion to join the real world, believe it or not. The normie world just doesn’t strike me as especially “real”, you know.
(shrugs) And you can of course always tell a salesperson to go to hell. Some people choose to threaten him with violence. (smiles) And people don’t sell cars door to door; you have to go to a car lot, right.
But it’s just so weird. He half finds fault with the philosophic new agers, while trying to sound like the fucking mayor, right. (sniff sniff) I want them to accept me. I want to win the popularity contest. ~You’re not going to win no fucking popularity contest, boy. Just focus on what works for you.
…. “Though many of these books are out of print” (in 1988, lol)—it’s like, what is wrong with people, right? Why are you promoting books that are ~~out of print~~? 🥸🫠
…. And again, witches IMO shouldn’t hex and be negative—leave that to the normies, right; most people certainly don’t know/do any Powerful hexes, but the average person is leaking negative energy continually—but at the same time, a witch is almost certainly, almost by definition, a dissent with non-normative ideas about politeness. A witch might read Jane Austen or watch a “Northanger Abbey” adaption—it’s possible, anyway—but they’re not going to sit there, realistically, and say, watch the sniveling little bitch say, “Yeah, I can tell you that General Tilney is at fault, and not you: but I have to be loyal to my family and my race, the race of England, and so I can’t really let you know what’s going on, sorry”—and be like, Yeah son! I want to be like that sniveling, immoral bitch without a sense of agency! Cowardly conformity, here I come!
Right? That just wouldn’t be witchcraft.
…. In a sense this book was a good idea, but it would have been good, while doing it, to remember that some people will always be rebels in this lifetime, no matter what they do, you know.
(going through crystal collection) I’ve been sensing a lot of bad vibes, lately. We should do a cleansing ritual. Go look in that book for a nice virgin goddess, maybe—
(Episcopalian Granny) You two are doing your witchcraft again—witchcraft is sex! Witchcraft is sex! Cover your ankles, woman of the world! (hurles copy of, “Without Buddha, I Could Not Be a Christian”).
(enter Country Jimmy, who thinks he’s your cousin; lyrics follow him in: “so bitch, plant your ass in the back seat of my truck…. Let’s make this easy….”) Are you harassing your grandmother again, you wicked little witch?
LOL.
…. So yeah: sometimes you take a break, you meditate, you purify your energies; you meditate with the fairies. And so too, sometimes the god comes into the clearing, wearing expensive jeans, an expensive watch, and no shirt—like a model out of “Esquire”. (shrugs) That’s witchy too; they both are.
And one’s not better than the other.… (mehr)