Pagan Godspell

Oh I know – it’s more like #8 or something, but I’ve kind of lost count, and why not 25651?  I’ve never been much of a numerologist (and thank goodness, having just today learned that it’s terribly “unhealthy,” and leads to all kinds of nasty things, like “occult murder“), so if there’s a special significance to the number 25651, I am unaware of it.  But if you want to connect today’s Good News Communique to some deeper meaning, like maybe coded passages in the Bible, or the origins of Atlantis, or the geometric significance of crop circles, then I’m all for it.

Today’s Good News Communique doesn’t have a theme.  In fact, it’s the antitheme.  It’s the Whatever I Noticed Here It Is Tra La! Anti-Theme Good News Communique.  Because the World is Bizarre, and that is Good News.  Because the terrible is met with the lyrical and creates the bittersweet sublime, and that is Good News.  Because at the vegan restaurant I frequent (for their out-freakin’-standing Coconut Corn Soup and fresh whole wheat bread) yesterday, we overheard the waitress list off the day’s desserts, and one of them was homemade Grape and Vanilla Soy Ice Cream with Fresh Mangoes and Lime Sauce, and that’s crazy Good News.  Eat hardy.

1.  Crop Circles.  Maybe you think crop circles are all a hoax perpetrated by drunk mathematicians with boards strapped to their feet.  Maybe you think they’re signs of alien adolescent graffiti artists.  Maybe you think they contain really really important messages from other planets.  Maybe you think they’re grain spirits having a good howl at our expense.  Maybe you read Daniel Pinchbeck’s 2012: The Return of Quetzalcoatl and now you don’t know what to think.  This is all good - because any way you slice it, crop formations are beautiful, interesting, and mysterious.  And that’s good enough for me.

2.  The Washington Post’s new religion blog series “On Faith.”  Like Hecate, I too think this series falls flat, particularly in its choice of questions.  For instance, today’s question is – “Have women fared well or badly in the world’s religions down through the ages? Why?”  Uh – what?  Seriously?  That’s a question?  I mean, there’s more than one answer to this?  (Oh I know there are folks out there who think [incorrectly] that religion over the course of time has treated women just rosy-osy, though I didn’t expect Dr. Wendy Doniger’s rather terse reply that crapped on Goddess-worship in a surprisingly uninformed and simplistic way).  However, like Hecate and a few others, I also really enjoyed Starhawk’s answer to last week’s question about “just wars.”

3.  And speaking of Hecate, I also wanted to point to this great post of hers regarding speaking up and educating folks about Paganism and other religions, particularly in “interfaith” contexts. 

4.  Exhaust balloon activism.  From the WorldChanging blog: the German environmental group, BUND printed earth balloons that can be wrapped onto tailpipes, such that when the driver starts the car, the exhaust inflates the balloon. As it blows up, the message “The world can’t take any more CO2″ becomes legible. And then comes the big bang: the balloon bursts, and hopefully the driver of the car gets a little wake-up call.  *cackle*  Awesome.

5. And finally: The Time Travel Fund.  Because why not? 

Here’s wishing you a muppet-dancin’, antitheme romancin’ day.