Deb & Peter’s Handfasting Ceremony

I have been of late questioned as to why I (or indeed anyone) chooses to tick the ‘Pagan’ box on a religion questionnaire.

Strangely enough, this scrutiny has come more from atheists and rationalists than it does from Christians or those of other faiths (although Catholics have been known to cross themselves and pray for my soul when in my presence! LOL)

Well, simply put paganism (note the lower case ‘p’) is merely the spiritual tradition of the People (a folk religion, if you will). There is no institution, no ‘church’, no formalised organisation, dogma, or theology. In my humble opinion it is a term that denotes something akin to agnosticism (the belief that there is something out there, but we don’t know what; as opposed to atheism who claim categorically that there is absolutely and irrefutably nothing out there…) except that paganism does tend towards being pantheistic (everything in the Universe is Divine) and inherently pluralistic (that all expressions of faith/meaning are valid and more often than not culturally defined; which is why pagans are inherently eclectic in their beliefs and tolerant of all other faiths).

Paganism (upper case ‘P’) on the other hand is a closed set of beliefs, and does generally refer back to the pre-Roman-Christian religions of Western Europe; this includes Druidism, Wicca, Nordic, Celtic, etc. The term “Pagan” was not really used until after the Christian dominance of the Roman State, when everyone else who followed “the old gods” was denounced and belittled for not coming over to the “new way”. So Paganism became a term to refer to those who worshipped deities like Apollo, Athene, Jupiter, Isis, Mars, Diana, etc etc. (the old gods of Rome, Greece, Egypt, Syria, Persia…)

Of course it doesn’t take a genius to understand that the exoteric rituals, symbols and myths of Roman (Pauline) Christianity were all borrowed from the religions of the day. What better time for the birth of a Sun-God than Winter Solstice (Christmas) and the death/rebirth of that same Sun-God than the Spring Equinox (Easter). I explain it like this: if Australia was to become a Republic, would the people approve of losing the Queen’s Birthday holiday? Of course not – so the holiday would remain, and we’d change the name of it! Always a good way to win over the punters!

For me, paganism (little p) is merely the exoteric (outward) expression of a fundamental Truth that is internal and subjective, whilst also being collective (this begins to fall into the realm of CG Jung’s theory of the collective unconscious…). I personally don’t follow the forms of Paganism (big P), as I have explored (and continue to) notions of the Divine on an internal manner, and choose to express it by way of the world around me, ie: nature. For me, it is more or less irrelevant to personify or anthropomorphise the Divine (ie God) by labelling it or defining it; hence wrote the Chinese sage Laozi “The Dao that can be named is not the Eternal Dao”….

This is starting to drift into the realms of metaphysical philosophy and theology, and that is not the purpose of this piece (its also distracting from studying for exams). But rather, I would like to say that if I can see the inherent divinity in all that lies around me (ie, the natural environment), then perhaps am I not more likely to treat it with respect, and be grateful for what I have been blessed with? This could be a circular argument, but even if one studies Biology, Physics, Chemistry, Chaos mathematics, etc one can get a sense of the inherent beauty and patterned organisation of the Natural Universe. Do I need to decide between Evolution and Creation? What is the point of this? Atheist tend to argue that one should remain in the present moment and appreciate what is immediate and tangible. But one doesn’t need to remain a materialist to perceive the beauty of the natural world: it is what it is, and I’d rather that tree was there rather than that ugly car park!

This is my personal myth. And ceremony is but the re-enactment of that myth.

So the handfasting for me is the re-enactment of the coming together of two fundamentally opposed yet inter-dependent forces (yin and yang; female and male; etc) to create a unity that is more than the sum of its individual parts. For this myth – the inter-relationship and dynamic interplay between two relative forces – is what I see when I look out upon the world.

This is what my faith is, to me. I am pagan by virtue of the fact that I respect this ‘diversity-within-unity’ concept, that this is how I perceive and comprehend the order of the Universe. I need no scripture, no tradition, no ‘great book’ to justify my beliefs, for all the justification I need is all around me.

I hope this ramble has shed some light on this subject….

See you on the day!