Thomm Quackenbush, Pagan Standard Times: Essays On The Craft Quotes
The Hermit is an important tarot card with much to tell us, but he tends not to be so welcome around the bonfire.
A modern culture built on the back of dying gods immerses me.
I cannot let my blood pressure rise because someone wishes to spread his or her bad day around, as if to dilute instead of multiply it.
When I lay down on my deathbed, I want to know that I have done all I could to be a first rate human, not a third rate pawn of the gods.
My soul is not satisfied with an inert universe. The gods may not make a habit of speaking to me personally, but I can't help but whisper comments to them.
It is a challenge to love someone who does not see the divine as you do, and much harder still to date someone who considers your spirituality a design flaw in an otherwise worthwhile human being.
I am copacetic with leaning on the sacred, but I need to make sure all the mundane bases are covered before we break out the crystals and incense for a good chant.
If you do not need something that it is still useful, give it to someone who will appreciate it before you douse it in lighter fluid in hopes Santa Odin will put a new one under your Yule tree.
I miss more loving someone so deeply that I can't imagine a forever without her kisses.
If you think it is spiritual to burn food in front of starving people in hopes that your gods will bring this back to you in triplicate, you are missing the point and sowing animosity from all sides.
She is so free with herself and so certain of her path, something I now cynically believe only comes from not being aware of the infinite multitude of right paths.
Like language, I think any who have not acquired spirituality by a certain age are doomed to be never fluent and you are likely to mimic the one that surrounds you.
A goddess does not need to eat and does so only for her pleasure.
Every weekend, I fall in love again. By Sunday, the last thing I want to do is let her go, release her back into the cold water of life.
If you can't feel the touch of the gods on your own, it greatly behooves you to work on that before some lecher tells you his touch is just as good.
Everyone you meet is an aspect of the gods and has a lesson to teach you.
Hades does not have a runny nose. I know this. The entire Greek pantheon no doubt knows this. For some reason, my nose is unaware of this basic fact of mythology.
Mythology didn't cease to exist and be useful to Pagans when we gained digital watch technology.
People who believe their god loves them unconditionally are less able to be controlled through divine terrorism.
My faith is a tool I employ, a metaphorical context I find apt, but it is inert until placed in a hand that needs it.
I discuss my beliefs less because I bed my atheist, who cannot believe in much more sacred than our kisses.
Holding fantasy to our chests only means our hands are not free to work.
Our brains want God even as our minds debunk the divine.
Paganism is the default of most children, since they excel at magical thinking.
My main nurturing instinct toward children is mild sadism--picking them up and threatening to drop them--which is why I am a good uncle but would make a poor father.
Having ascended to some spiritual strength by focusing on the power of the feminine, it is no doubt tempting to wield this strength against that which triggers memories of having once been weaker.
Women are seen as imperfect or unclean, because of a myth of a tempting apple, because they bleed monthly, because they lack equivalent upper body strength.
Most magick I have experienced can be written off as a stew of psychology and coincidence, and I truly believe this is where magick is best worked.
Magick need not be a crutch, but it is hard to argue that anything you lean on in lieu of building your own strength weakens resolve.
I honor the divine on a daily basis, but I want to know that the greatest magick in my life is living authentically with what I have and can do.
We are left at the brink of our future each day and the only real choice we have is not to jump but instead make our path through the briar.
Loving her has become a part of my religion, a gentle mantra with every beating of my heart. I cannot imagine its Ragnarok without wilting.
If she had some level of theism, we might have a shared theological root from which I could shape holy words.
Reciting from rote seems a terrible way to honor the gods and a precise killing of the power of the words.
I do not want to credit my life to spells and rituals, cushioning me from the consequences of living.
I reserve magick for necessities, a bit like the good china. It has a time and a place, but eating peanut butter sandwiches off it each morning chips and devalues it.
I am not interested in wishing hard and having the Universe provide all I need without any work on my part.
As compassionate beings, we cannot harm others, not even through our inaction.
They act as if their religion were a celestial gumball machine, taking no blame for personal failures because they won't manifest their will in the real world by working for their goals.
I have heard that Paganism is for broken people, but life cracks everyone in some way. We are a religion of healing people.
Those who mouth your sacred words with an accent you deem wrong annoy you more than those speaking something you cannot understand.