Post by theoccultchrist on May 12, 2007 13:12:19 GMT -5
Im Not sure where to put this article..so I 'll just put it here..if it needs to be moved to another part of the boards then so be it.
Witch Religion Would You Stand Up For?
Author: RaGWaD
Posted: May 6th. 2007
Times Viewed: 2,263
www.witchvox.com/va/dt_va.html?a=ustx&c=words&id=11563
Ah, Texas. When my family first moved here so I could take the pulpit of a small synagogue north of Dallas, we went on a tour of the region. Telling our story to a security guard at one site, he tipped his cap and said, “Welcome to the greatest country in the world.”
In many ways, he’s right. Texas is most definitely its own place, with a culture and style unlike any other part of the U.S. And much about Texas is great – the civic pride, the friendliness, the colorful history and the affordable lifestyle are all wonderful.
In other aspects, however, we Texans could still work on a few things; things like religious tolerance.
I’ve never really thought of Judaism as an “alternative” religion, minority religion, yes, but not really so exotic. Until I got here.
Maybe it’s my own upbringing. I grew up in New Mexico. There everyone, it seems, is a spiritual seeker. I always like to say that in New Mexico, if you throw a rock, you’ll hit a religion – evangelicals, Catholics, and Jews, for sure, but also Wiccans, shamans, Buddhists, alchemists, Brujeria, theosophists, and Gurdjieffians - the ‘Land of Enchantment’ really is the place where diverse enchantments reign.
So I was a little unprepared when, three weeks after arriving, I was invited to a “Clergy Day” meeting held by the superintendent of the public school district. I’d never heard of such a thing, but I thought it was good chance to meet the other religious leaders in the area. I admit I was not terribly surprised to discover I was the only non-Christian present.
But I was caught off guard by the presentation.
The superintendent, an affable old scion of Texas, began talking about church-state separation. Not so much about how it limits church participation in the public schools, really, but more about how were the best ways for ministers to work around it. And then he defined the local policy as “limited equal access.”
It wasn’t quite an oxymoron, but I have to say at that point alarms started going off loudly in my head.
“That means, ” he continued, “that we’re not going to allow hate groups like the Klan, neo-Nazis, or Wiccans get access to our children…”
As if seized by a dybbuk, my innate Jewish need to kibitz took me over. My hand shot in the air. Flustered by the interruption, he paused mid-presentation. “…Yes?”
“Excuse me, I’m Rabbi Dennis, I’m new to the area, but did I understand that you just lumped Wiccans in with hate groups?”
“Well, yes, we feel…”
“Pardon me, ” I went on, “But Wiccans are not a hate group, they are a religious movement – they have chaplains in the United States military, for God’s sake – and they are entitled to the same access as any other religious group. And as for this whole concept of ‘limited equal access’, ”I went on, “That sounds like code for ‘selective access’ – if you are going to allow any religious groups to operate inside the schools, then you have to allow all religions to do so, that’s the law…”
It was all boilerplate religious freedom rhetoric, but at the time I suddenly felt like I was a Jew arguing for freedom of conscious before the Holy Office of the Inquisition.
My speech effectively ended the presentation. He muttered a summary statement and invited us to enjoy the cold cuts buffet. As for my fellow clergy, half sat in aghast silence, the other half buzzed among themselves in amused whispers. At lunch one of the Methodist ministers simply chuckled and said to me, “Well, you certainly know how to kill a party.”
It wasn’t a total disaster. Yet. The next week I was invited to join the local ministerial alliance. The pastor sitting next to me cryptically whispered, “This should be interesting. With you here, inclusion won’t be a hypothetical anymore.”
No one else said anything about inclusion until the next month, when I took it upon myself to invite a local Bahai leader I had just met to also join the clergy group. The next day, the president of the alliance took me to Chinese food, handed me a wad of Internet printouts and said, “Do you know what these Bahais believe?”
Sure I do, I responded.
“Well, we really think of ourselves as a Christian fellowship.”
I looked at him for a moment and simply said, “So why did you invite me?”
It was obvious that at first he didn’t understand. His fork full of Sesame Chicken hovered in the air as he considered my question. “Well…I guess…well…I suppose you’re not, are you?...”
By the end of the lunch, he admitted the alliance would have to clarify its mission and membership requirements.
So the good news was that the ministerial alliance eventually did go “interfaith.” The bad news was, within a year it was dead, abandoned by the bulk of clergy who once affiliated. I meant well.
Since that first year, I’ve learned that alternative spiritualities are alive and well in North Texas. The Uniterian-Universalist congregation serves as a clearing house for many groups, and I speak there regularly. The local Moslem community went public a few years ago. I’m a go-to faculty member for the pagan affinity group at the University of North Texas, where I teach. The Buddhists have built a spectacular temple in nearby Keller. And a New Age store even opened in Lewisville (only to close a few months later, but I think that was more a matter of economics then of persecution).
A lot of my Christian colleagues are still baffled by my impulse to ally myself with Wiccans, Hindus, and alternate spirituality groups. I try to explain to them that Judaism is not an exclusivist faith, that unlike the big “universal” faiths, we don’t claim to have a “one <myspace>size</myspace> fits all” answer to people’s spiritual needs. And while Jews share things in common with Christians (Scriptures) and Muslims (strict monotheism), we also share other things with Pagans (earth-based spirituality), Buddhists (reincarnation), and Shamanism (belief in spirits and spirit guides – we just call them angels). Moreover, we teach that what you do matters more to God than your fidelity to a given doctrine.
And then I say that Jews also form our attitudes toward others not just based on our Scriptures, but also on our experiences. And our experience has been that of a group that has been persecuted for refusing to believe as the majority says we should. So we oppose any stance that argues “error has no rights” and we stand in solidarity with any group that finds itself discriminated against because what they believe is unpopular.
Seven years since I arrived, I am pretty well accepted by most (if still amusingly eccentric to some), yet the struggle for religious freedom in Texas continues. Recently a Santeria priest in the nearby suburb of Euless was cited by the city for performing an animal sacrifice in his house.
In considering this case, a pagan I know has discovered his own doubts about the limits of his inclusiveness. As a vegetarian, he questions whether he should have to defend a right to do something he considers offensive. For me, this is pretty clear-cut (forgive the pun): I don’t see a big distinction between what Jews and Christians do (kill it – bless it – eat it) and what Santos do (bless it – kill it – eat it).
And as for consistency, it seems the town will let you slaughter a chicken in city limits, but not a goat. Yet so far as anyone can remember, no hunter has ever been prosecuted in Euless for dressing a deer in his garage.
As for defending a practice we find unappealing – well, that’s what believing in religious freedom is all about.
If we only support the rights of people who do what we like, how is that different from “limited equal access?”
Witch Religion Would You Stand Up For?
Author: RaGWaD
Posted: May 6th. 2007
Times Viewed: 2,263
www.witchvox.com/va/dt_va.html?a=ustx&c=words&id=11563
Ah, Texas. When my family first moved here so I could take the pulpit of a small synagogue north of Dallas, we went on a tour of the region. Telling our story to a security guard at one site, he tipped his cap and said, “Welcome to the greatest country in the world.”
In many ways, he’s right. Texas is most definitely its own place, with a culture and style unlike any other part of the U.S. And much about Texas is great – the civic pride, the friendliness, the colorful history and the affordable lifestyle are all wonderful.
In other aspects, however, we Texans could still work on a few things; things like religious tolerance.
I’ve never really thought of Judaism as an “alternative” religion, minority religion, yes, but not really so exotic. Until I got here.
Maybe it’s my own upbringing. I grew up in New Mexico. There everyone, it seems, is a spiritual seeker. I always like to say that in New Mexico, if you throw a rock, you’ll hit a religion – evangelicals, Catholics, and Jews, for sure, but also Wiccans, shamans, Buddhists, alchemists, Brujeria, theosophists, and Gurdjieffians - the ‘Land of Enchantment’ really is the place where diverse enchantments reign.
So I was a little unprepared when, three weeks after arriving, I was invited to a “Clergy Day” meeting held by the superintendent of the public school district. I’d never heard of such a thing, but I thought it was good chance to meet the other religious leaders in the area. I admit I was not terribly surprised to discover I was the only non-Christian present.
But I was caught off guard by the presentation.
The superintendent, an affable old scion of Texas, began talking about church-state separation. Not so much about how it limits church participation in the public schools, really, but more about how were the best ways for ministers to work around it. And then he defined the local policy as “limited equal access.”
It wasn’t quite an oxymoron, but I have to say at that point alarms started going off loudly in my head.
“That means, ” he continued, “that we’re not going to allow hate groups like the Klan, neo-Nazis, or Wiccans get access to our children…”
As if seized by a dybbuk, my innate Jewish need to kibitz took me over. My hand shot in the air. Flustered by the interruption, he paused mid-presentation. “…Yes?”
“Excuse me, I’m Rabbi Dennis, I’m new to the area, but did I understand that you just lumped Wiccans in with hate groups?”
“Well, yes, we feel…”
“Pardon me, ” I went on, “But Wiccans are not a hate group, they are a religious movement – they have chaplains in the United States military, for God’s sake – and they are entitled to the same access as any other religious group. And as for this whole concept of ‘limited equal access’, ”I went on, “That sounds like code for ‘selective access’ – if you are going to allow any religious groups to operate inside the schools, then you have to allow all religions to do so, that’s the law…”
It was all boilerplate religious freedom rhetoric, but at the time I suddenly felt like I was a Jew arguing for freedom of conscious before the Holy Office of the Inquisition.
My speech effectively ended the presentation. He muttered a summary statement and invited us to enjoy the cold cuts buffet. As for my fellow clergy, half sat in aghast silence, the other half buzzed among themselves in amused whispers. At lunch one of the Methodist ministers simply chuckled and said to me, “Well, you certainly know how to kill a party.”
It wasn’t a total disaster. Yet. The next week I was invited to join the local ministerial alliance. The pastor sitting next to me cryptically whispered, “This should be interesting. With you here, inclusion won’t be a hypothetical anymore.”
No one else said anything about inclusion until the next month, when I took it upon myself to invite a local Bahai leader I had just met to also join the clergy group. The next day, the president of the alliance took me to Chinese food, handed me a wad of Internet printouts and said, “Do you know what these Bahais believe?”
Sure I do, I responded.
“Well, we really think of ourselves as a Christian fellowship.”
I looked at him for a moment and simply said, “So why did you invite me?”
It was obvious that at first he didn’t understand. His fork full of Sesame Chicken hovered in the air as he considered my question. “Well…I guess…well…I suppose you’re not, are you?...”
By the end of the lunch, he admitted the alliance would have to clarify its mission and membership requirements.
So the good news was that the ministerial alliance eventually did go “interfaith.” The bad news was, within a year it was dead, abandoned by the bulk of clergy who once affiliated. I meant well.
Since that first year, I’ve learned that alternative spiritualities are alive and well in North Texas. The Uniterian-Universalist congregation serves as a clearing house for many groups, and I speak there regularly. The local Moslem community went public a few years ago. I’m a go-to faculty member for the pagan affinity group at the University of North Texas, where I teach. The Buddhists have built a spectacular temple in nearby Keller. And a New Age store even opened in Lewisville (only to close a few months later, but I think that was more a matter of economics then of persecution).
A lot of my Christian colleagues are still baffled by my impulse to ally myself with Wiccans, Hindus, and alternate spirituality groups. I try to explain to them that Judaism is not an exclusivist faith, that unlike the big “universal” faiths, we don’t claim to have a “one <myspace>size</myspace> fits all” answer to people’s spiritual needs. And while Jews share things in common with Christians (Scriptures) and Muslims (strict monotheism), we also share other things with Pagans (earth-based spirituality), Buddhists (reincarnation), and Shamanism (belief in spirits and spirit guides – we just call them angels). Moreover, we teach that what you do matters more to God than your fidelity to a given doctrine.
And then I say that Jews also form our attitudes toward others not just based on our Scriptures, but also on our experiences. And our experience has been that of a group that has been persecuted for refusing to believe as the majority says we should. So we oppose any stance that argues “error has no rights” and we stand in solidarity with any group that finds itself discriminated against because what they believe is unpopular.
Seven years since I arrived, I am pretty well accepted by most (if still amusingly eccentric to some), yet the struggle for religious freedom in Texas continues. Recently a Santeria priest in the nearby suburb of Euless was cited by the city for performing an animal sacrifice in his house.
In considering this case, a pagan I know has discovered his own doubts about the limits of his inclusiveness. As a vegetarian, he questions whether he should have to defend a right to do something he considers offensive. For me, this is pretty clear-cut (forgive the pun): I don’t see a big distinction between what Jews and Christians do (kill it – bless it – eat it) and what Santos do (bless it – kill it – eat it).
And as for consistency, it seems the town will let you slaughter a chicken in city limits, but not a goat. Yet so far as anyone can remember, no hunter has ever been prosecuted in Euless for dressing a deer in his garage.
As for defending a practice we find unappealing – well, that’s what believing in religious freedom is all about.
If we only support the rights of people who do what we like, how is that different from “limited equal access?”