Tuesday, October 30, 2007

Hallows' Eve


By Mexican artist José Luís Serrano,
permission to use pending.


"This is the Feast of Samhain, when the veil is thin that divides the worlds, the seen from the unseen, the day-to-day from the mysteries. ..."

I've been so wrapped up in celebrating this, my favorite sabbat, in ritual, I've had no time to tend to this blog.*

A week ago Sunday afternoon some Witchen friends and I sat at the big table in Victoria's loft making El Dia de Los Muertos candles. This was a year for deceased men in my life. I made one for John Patrick McClimans, my brother Jimmie O'Brien, my dad James T. O'Brien, and my late husband Rod Wolfer. Victoria has taken some fine photos of the altar in her shared yard, but she's been so wrapped up in her demanding new job that she's disappeared from the Pagan blogosphere for a time. I'm happy with the way they came out.


My brother Jimmie at about age 20,
shortly after the accident in which
he lost his left arm and his right leg.
You can see that his right ear has
not been entirely reconstructed with
plastic surgery yet.


My Dad Jim (Seamus)


My friend John Patrick. As you can
see, he had lost his legs when this photo
was taken. It's not very high resolution
because this is a color photocopy of a
photo which was then scanned and
saved as a jpg to put on the candle.


Friday night some Dianic friends graciously included me in their Samhain rites, also in Victoria's loft.

Saturday night I proclaimed the feast at Reclaiming's 28th annual Spiral Dance ritual** in San Francisco. I went with my friends Michael York and his partner Richard, who were virgins to this experience. I told them they would love the spiral dance (meaning the dance itself, not necessarily the whole ritual), and they did. Michael's knees were hurting so I insisted he sit in a chair in the center of the spiral with the wheelchair-bound, sleeping babies, and the likes of me, whose arthritic back cannot take that long dance. We were just as much a part of the spiral as the dancers. We looked into each pair of eyes as they danced by. A most intoxicating experience!

Sunday Corby and I were back at Victoria's big table carving jack o'lanterns with Prudence and Pasha and her. We were among the later arrivals; everyone else was gone when we arrived. That's because I was so wiped out from the night before I couldn't get going any earlier.

When we finished, we took the jack o'lanterns out in front of the El Dia de los Muertos altar and sat in a circle in the firelight and sang Samhain songs to our Beloved Dead. Accompanied by Pasha's guitar, we harmonized, in particular, a song that begins:

Dark is the night, still is the Earth
As the veil unfolds.
Turn the shining Wheel of rebirth.
May Earth received thy soul.
For me, that was the most moving and magical moment of this year's celebrations -- so far.

Tonight we are going to use those jack o'lanterns to mark our circle as we dance with the dead under the starlight.

You think that's enough? Nope. Next Saturday we, meaning ICT (Independent Craft Teachers, a guild), will be presenting a Dinner with the Dead at Martin de Porres Hospitality House in San Francisco. We will bring foods our ancestors loved, laid out on tables draped with black lace and topped with sugar skulls freshly-made by Oak. I've never done this particular ritual and I'm looking forward to it.

"What is remembered lives." May your departed loved ones live on on your hearts and minds. Blessed Samhain to all!

*Come back soon for two posts that aren't ready yet, one about death and dying practices and the other about critiquing rituals.

** Stills and videos of this ritual will be made public shortly.

Wednesday, October 24, 2007

Ancient Seasonal Songs Concert

Saturday evening on Corby's third day post-surgery, he felt strong enough for me to accompany him to an intime concert in Vicky and Shelby's downstairs "concert hall." About 40 people listened as Vicky's group, Women in Song, opened. Among the eight or so songs they sang, one was one of my favorites, "All Among the Barley,"

Broceliande, a Celtic and Early Music quartet comprised of two women and two men, all of whom both sing and play a variety of instruments, enchanted us with Autumn songs from their album called "Barley Rigs."


I've been enjoying the CD in my car ever since. It was a refined evening in a beautiful home, with elegant intermission comestibles, lovely people, and entertaining, accomplished musicians.

Monday, October 15, 2007

Macha twirl


My dear friends Sparky T. Rabbit and Steven Posch have stated that they think this photo of my most typifies who I am. It's not the most flattering photo in the world, but I agree it captures something. George Franklin took it during an antiwar March when our WOW (Witches Opposing War) Besom Brigade made our first public appearance. He put it on the cover of Reclaiming Quarterly. I got a kick out of being a cover girl. Anyway, I think it suits the Broomstick Chronicles so I've changed by profile photo to this one.

Sunday, October 14, 2007

In Hot Water

Well, I did my best, but, as my friend Oak would say, "mistakes were made." No sooner did I release that press release than I received objections and corrections. My most egregious mistake was to list Lady Liberty League as a supporter. LLL does not take public stands on political matters, only those that directly concern Pagan legal rights. For that, I apologize to LLL and to Jerrie Hildebrand personally. My mistake was using a former press release that LLL did sign as a template for this one and neglecting to remove their names.

I also apologize to Caroline Kenner, the Chesapeake Pagan Community and the Sacred Space Foundation.

A few folks complained that their names were not included and they would have wanted to sign. I circulated the press release -- so many people seem to confuse 'press release' with 'petition' or 'letter'; it is neither -- with the words "TIME-SENSITIVE" in the subject line and said in the text that we intended to release is around midnight on October 12. Yes, it was rushed.

I had tried to list organizations separately, to strengthen the statement by inferring memberships. In order to accomplish that that, I lifted the names of people who'd signed and listed an organizational affiliation and put them into a list of organizations. This was a mistake. As things turned out, I got some of those folks in trouble with their organizations because they apparently weren't authorized to sign on behalf of the entire groups. To them I also apologize, and will do so to their memberships as a whole if requested.

I also tried to keep it to one page, also not possible. Anyway, after the fallout, here is the corrected press release:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Press Release

PAGANS OPPOSE MILITARY INTERVENTION IN IRAN

October 12, 2007

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: Ellen Evert Hopman saille333@mindspring.com 413 323 4494 East Coast
M. Macha NightMare herself@machanightmare.com 415 454-4411 West Coast

We are an ad hoc group of Americans who practice diverse Earth-based religions. We affirm the wisdom of peace, tolerance, and justice. These principles are consistent with the values and beliefs of our Pagan religions. We seek to exist in goodwill and fellowship with all peoples, cultures, and nations. In so doing, we express our love for the Earth and acknowledge our interconnectedness with all living things.

In the face of escalating international tensions regarding Iran, we urge the use of diplomatic actions for a peaceful resolution of differences. We reject any rush to military action, since we believe that diplomatic means will lead to a safer, more just, and more constructive solution. Therefore, we call on our political leaders to use diplomacy to create goodwill, peace, and harmony among nations, religions, and peoples.

Respectfully:

Maureen Duffy-Boose, Rainbow Chalice CUUPS, Salt Lake City, UT
Board of Trustees, Covenant of Unitarian Universalist Pagans (CUUPS)
Ellen Evert Hopman, Co-Chief, Order of the WhiteOak, Massachusetts
Nancy Machin, Pagan Educational Network, Indiana
M. Macha NightMare, P&W, San Rafael, CA
Cairril Adaire, Founder, Our Freedom: A Pagan Civil Rights Coalition, Bloomington, IN
Rev. H. Byron Ballard, Coalition of Earth Religions (CERES), Asheville, NC
Jo Carson, Fairfax, CA
Phyllis Curott, New York, NY
Max Dashu, Oakland, CA
Gus diZerega, Ph.D., Sebastopol, CA
Ivo Dominguez, Jr., Elder, Assembly of the Sacred Wheel, Delaware
Holli S. Emore, Columbia, SC
Cerridwen Fallingstar, Forest Knolls, CA
Rev. Sean W. Harbaugh, Sierra Madrone Grove, ADF, California
Caroline Kenner, Board Member, Chesapeake Pagan Community &
Sacred Space Foundation, Washington, DC
Rev. Robert Lee (Skip) Ellison, Archdruid, Ár nDraíocht Féin (ADF), East Syracuse, NY
Sabina Magliocco, Ph.D., Northridge, CA
Rev. Patrick M. McCollum, Director, Our Lady of the Wells Church, Moraga, CA
Michael McDermott, M.D., Black Earth, WI
Katrina Messenger, Founder, Connect DC, Washington, DC
Nava Mizrahhi, Oakland, CA
Ariel Montserrat, Editor, Green Egg Zine, Tennessee
Anne Newkirk Niven, Editor in Chief, PanGaia Magazine, California
Penny J. Novack, Elder, Step by Step Tradition, Buckland, MA
Rev. Rayna Ardren Owens, PhD., Miami, FL
Beth Owl’s Daughter, The Dragon’s Cauldron, Reclaiming, Durham, NC
Lynn Pacifico, New York, NY
Lauren Raine, Tucson, AZ
Angela Roberts Reeder, Baltimore, MD
Vibra Willow, P&W, Reclaiming, California
Rose Wise, Administrator/High Priestess, Ozark Avalon, Boonville, MO
Michael York, Ph.D., San Francisco, CA
Oberon Zell-Ravenheart, Church of All Worlds, Cotati, CA


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So here I am publicly going on record that I'm sorry for those misunderstandings and my big mistake with LLL.

I'm embarrassed about those mistakes, but not sorry that we made the effort. It's high time for us to engage with the world. Make of this what you will, but I am pleased to get this response from Beth Owl's Daughter:

Thank you, Macha, for the powerful and focused intention behind this. Your timing turned out to be impeccable, paralleling Gen. Sanchez's bitter testimony yesterday about our "failure" in Iraq.

Through our actions and our magic, may peace and wisdom prevail.

The water's cooling off, so jump in and join me. Let's keep a-brewin' that magic.

Friday, October 12, 2007

Hoping & Praying & Casting Spells

This is what I've been up to this week, with three collaborators: Maureen Duffy-Boose, Ellen Evert Hopman, and Nancy Machin of Pagan Educational Network. We four live in different parts of the US (Utah, Massachusetts, Indiana and California). I think it's also fair to say that we represent the diversity of American Paganism (Ellen is Druid and the rest of us are Wiccans or Witches of one sort or another). I want to thank these colleagues publicly for helping to make this happen, especially Ellen, whose original idea it was, for nudging us to speak up as a demographic.

We (not exactly the same "we"; "we" meaning an ad hoc group of Pagans) did this once before when the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the lower court's ruling on Newdowe v. Elk Grove Unified School Dist., et al., a lawsuit to remove the words "under God" from the Pledge of Allegiance. That press release was issued on July 4, 2002, Independence Day.

This time it was my desire was to release this on October 12, Indigenous People's Day (fka Columbus Day). I chose that date arbitrarily for two reasons: (1) I think time is of the essence in terms of the administration's plans, and (2) I like issuing these things on "patriotic" days. I guess you could say I like the magic of the timing.

I know we rushed this. I felt a sense of urgency. I don't know how widely this will eventually circulate, and I am not so naïve as to think it will do much good in terms of influencing the administration, but I do believe it shows solidarity among Pagans, concern for the commonweal, and a willingness to stand up and be counted. The more we can act in solidarity, the more seriously we may be taken as a valid voting block.

You are free to circulate this widely. In fact, if you'd provide a copy to your local press (newspapers, radio and TV), that can only help. You may also wish to print this and send it to your elected representatives.

I'm viewing this as a big spell-working.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Press Release

PAGANS OPPOSE MILITARY INTERVENTION IN IRAN

October 12, 2007 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contacts: Ellen Evert Hopman saille333@mindspring.com 413 323 4494 East Coast
M. Macha NightMare herself@machanightmare.com 415 454-4411 West Coast

We are an ad hoc group of Americans who practice diverse Earth-based religions. We affirm the wisdom of peace, tolerance, and justice. These principles are consistent with the values and beliefs of our Pagan religions. We seek to exist in goodwill and fellowship with all peoples, cultures, and nations. In so doing, we express our love for the Earth and acknowledge our interconnectedness with all living things.

In the face of escalating international tensions regarding Iran, we urge the use of diplomatic actions for a peaceful resolution of differences. We reject any rush to military action, since we believe that diplomatic means will lead to a safer, more just, and more constructive solution. Therefore, we call on our political leaders to use diplomacy to create goodwill, peace, and harmony among nations, religions, and peoples.

Organizations:

Ár nDraíocht Féin (ADF)
Assembly of the Sacred Wheel
Cherry Hill Seminary
Chesapeake Pagan Community
Church of All Worlds
Coalition of Earth Religions (CERES)
Connect DC
CUUPS-Continental
The Dragon’s Cauldron
Green Egg Zine
Lady Liberty League
Order of the WhiteOak
Our Lady of the Wells Church
Pagan Educational Network
Reclaiming
Sacred Space Foundation
Sierra Madrone Grove, ADF
The Suppressed Histories Archives

Individuals:

Maureen Duffy-Boose, President, CUUPS-Continental, Salt Lake City, UT
Ellen Evert Hopman, Co-Chief, Order of the WhiteOak, Massachusetts
Nancy Machin, Pagan Educational Network, Indiana
M. Macha NightMare, P&W, San Rafael, CA
Rev. H. Byron Ballard, Coalition of Earth Religions, Asheville, NC
Jo Carson, Fairfax, CA
Max Dashu, Oakland, CA
Gus diZerega, Ph.D., Sebastopol, CA
Ivo Dominguez, Jr., Elder, Assembly of the Sacred Wheel, Delaware
Holli S. Emore, Columbia, SC
Cerridwen Fallingstar, Forest Knolls, CA
Rev. Sean W. Harbaugh, Sierra Madrone Grove, ADF, California
Caroline Kenner, Chesapeake Pagan Community & Sacred Space Foundation. Washington, DC
Rev. Robert Lee (Skip) Ellison, Archdruid, ADF, East Syracuse, NY
Sabina Magliocco, Ph.D., Northridge, CA
Rev. Patrick M. McCollum, Director, Our Lady of the Wells Church Moraga, CA
Michael McDermott, M.D., Wisconsin
Katrina Messenger, Founder, Connect DC, Washington, DC
Nava Mizrahhi, Oakland, CA
Ariel Montserrat, Editor, Green Egg Zine, Tennessee
Anne Newkirk Niven, Editor in Chief, PanGaia Magazine, California
Penny J. Novack, Elder, Step by Step Tradition, Buckland, MA
Rev. Rayna Ardren Owens, Ph.D., Miami, FL
Beth Owl’s Daughter, The Dragon’s Cauldron, Durham, NC
Lynn Pacifico, New York, NY
Lauren Raine, Tucson, AZ
Angela Roberts Reeder, Baltimore, MD
Vibra Willow, P&W, Reclaiming, California
Michael York, Ph.D., San Francisco, CA
Oberon Zell-Ravenheart, Church of All Worlds, Cotati, CA

Tuesday, October 09, 2007

Collective Joy


Just finished reading Barbara Ehrenreich's fascinating study of the history of collective joy, Dancing in the Streets. The occurrences she describes are so like our biggest and best Pagan rites. Here's one of many quotes I could excerpt. This one has relevance to interfaith dialogue.

...[C]ompared to the danced religions of the past, today's "faiths" are often pallid affairs--if only by virtue of the very fact that they are "faiths," dependent on, and requiring, belief as opposed to direct knowledge. The prehistoric ritual dancer, the maenad or practitioner of Vodou, did not believe in her god or gods; she knew them, because, at the height of group ecstasy, they filled her with their presence. Modern Christians may have similar experiences, but the primary requirement of their religion is belief, meaning an effort of the imagination. Dionysus, in contrast, did not ask his followers for their belief or faith; he called on them to apprehend him directly, to let him enter, in all his madness and glory, their bodies and their minds.

Photograph of "Dancing Maenad"
by Dimitrios Constantin, Greek,
1865, from the Getty Museum,
Los Angeles

I might add that Dionysus is the original Christos, or the god who is apprehended by the worshipper's consumption of his essence. In the case of Dionysus, wine. In the case of the Christian eucharist, the body/bread and blood/wine of Jesus the Christ. The Christos is an entheogen ("becoming divine within").

Monday, October 08, 2007

Stanislaus Pagan Pride Alive & Well!


Dorothea in front of CHS banner in our pavilion

This is a late report, but a good one nonetheless. Dorothea, a seminarian at Pacific School of Religion who's doing field work with CHS, and I drove to Modesto for the Stanislaus Pagan Pride Day. The last time I was there was for PPD in 2004 and I think that may have been the most recent PPD in Modesto. This community, like most, has had some struggles, but I'm happy to report that they've coalesced into a wonderful group. All very helpful, very friendly, and very enthusiastic.

Several members drove to Lafayette when Victoria and the Pagan Alliance performed a ceremony to honor Wiccan military casualties. They come to PantheaCon in San Jose in February. I saw their crew two weeks earlier at the Sacramento Sacred Harvest Festival Honoring Pagan Pride Day.

They were kind enough to provide us with a pavilion and people to set it up for us. The site near the riverside was shaded by Valley Oaks native to California with lots of their unusual looking acorns covering the ground. We used them to prevent our flyers from being blown off the table by the wind.


Our booth

A producer, cameraman and interviewer Martin Sargent from Revision3 came to interview me for a Web Drifter podcast. Martin interviewed me a few years ago for a now-defunct late night show called Unscrewed with Martin Sargent for TechTV. Martin and I participated in the main ritual as more and more people browsed the booths and gathered to watch the circle from outside. Thankfully, Dorothea covered the CHS booth while I gave a talk, attended the ritual, and conversed with Martin for the interview. Martin's a wise guy, so I hope I held up under his jesting.

They extended warm hospitality, fed us, and treated us like visiting royalty. I even won two prizes in the raffle drawing!

Dorothea and I joined fellow presenters Oberon Zell and Michael Gorman, and others for dinner to fortify ourselves before the long drive home. I enjoyed our lively conversation tremendously.

I'm glad to have been invited and I wish this community continued healthy growth.

Monday, October 01, 2007

Holy Convergence


Yesterday Patrick and I attended an event at Peace Lutheran Church in Danville, CA called "Holy Convergence: An Interfaith Festival for Families." Billed as "a celebration of Ramadhan (Islam), the Feast of St. Francis (Christian [at least those brands of Christianity that have saints]), High Holy Days (Jewish), Divali and Gandhi's Birthday (Hindu) [is Gandhi's birthday a religious holiday or a national holiday?], Indigenous People's Day [fka "Columbus Day" and now known in PC San Francisco as Italian Heritage Day], Sikh Guru Gadhee, In Love with Life Season (Buddhist, Sufi and Bahai), and World Communion Sunday (Protestant Christian). Note there is no mention of Autumn Equinox, which is called by different names but celebrated by nearly all Pagans.

At the opening ceremony in the sanctuary, I met Bob Stranathan, a Christian Science practitioner, who seemed bewildered by my presence, and said he thought that Pagans were godless. I told him we had lots of gods and goddesses. Bob asked me if I were 'black or white'? We conversed in a spirit of openness and friendship. He did ask me if my poppy-tattooed arms were part of my religion. I said, no, they weren't a required accoutrement of Paganism, but, yes, they express, for me, my connection with and dependence upon the land where I live, a land covered with these flowers from early Spring until late Summer.

Right after we concluded the opening with self-introduction of religious representatives in attendance, a lovely young woman approached me and said how glad she was to see a Pagan presence there. She introduced me to her female partner and their daughter of about 9. We only had a few minutes to chat because Patrick and I were off to the first of two panels.

The first panel addressed the questions: "What are the 'end goals' of your faith? And how are they achieved in practice?" Each panelist had five minutes to speak, with the rest of the time taken up with Q&A. I didn't get all their names. A Sikh man said that Sikhs live in the world, and must leave themselves as Allah made them -- meaning no shorn head or facial hair, no embelleshments of the body (while seeming to be looking directly at my colorful arms).

The Rev. Carole Anderson from the Church of Religious Science in Concord said that there is only one god but that god can be complimented and integrated into other religions.

Rabbi Dan Goldblatt of Beth Chaim Congregation in San Ramon, said the world is borken and needs repair. He seeks to find a balance between justice and compassion, to seek peace. He said there is little in Judaism by way of theology, but that we should listen with our whole hearts.

The abbess of Buddha Gate Monastery in Lafayette, Master Jian-Sheng, claims that all sentient beings have the potential to attain Buddhahood, or enlightenment, by (1) observing the precepts -- she spoke of five precepts and eight precepts, but only itemized the six I'm mentioning here -- (2) practicing tolerance; (3) practicing charity, with no attachment and without greed; (4) practicing meditation; (5) being diligent; (6) attaining wisdom, beyond knowledge. She cautions to avoid extreme views and keep to the middle way.

The final panelist, a Sufi woman from the Rahima Foundation, said that the goal of Sufis is to attain divine pleasure and divine love, to serve 'the lord' (I don't know what lord, exactly; Allah, I assume) by serving his creation.

During the Q&A, I wanted to bring up the topic of the feminine divine. I said I felt at a disadvantage because there had been no expression of anything other than monotheism and that in NeoPaganism -- yes, I used that term in this rather conservative context -- and my question was about acknowledgment of the feminine divine. I said that many women left the religions in which they were brought up because they saw no image of the feminine divine in those religions, and instead they found a more personally meaningful spiritual path in Paganism.

Having been specifically invited to this event, you can imagine my surprise when several people, both panelists and particularly two men in the audience (one a Muslim, one Euro-American, presumably Abrahamic) spoke rudely and condescendingly. The Muslim man told me how Allah revered women. That, my friend, is not the feminine divine. The Euro-American man gave me a lecture about all the deities of both sexes in Hinduism (he neglected Ardhanarishvara and other androgynous or two-sexed deities); how highly esteemed women are in Christianity and Judaism. Again, so narrow and limited were their world views that they couldn't seem to grasp the meaning of my question. They were nasty and I was upset.

I told myself that encountering Pagans was a new experience to this community and that I should cool it and speak to individuals afterwards. I leaned over to Patrick, all nice and proper in a suit, with a CHS pin in the lapel, and tie, and whispered, "Am I being too contentious?" He said definitely not, but wait till later to address my discomfort. I said, "These guys are gettin' my Irish up. Am I being too thin-skinned?" I experienced these men (and even the abbess) as patronizing us. And if you wanna piss me off, just talk down to me.

I could have told this fellow that I attend Kali pujas on the New Moons. I could have told him lots, but alas, there was no time.

I felt that the moderator, who was at the rear of the room rather than on the dais with speakers, should have interrupted and made it clear that this was an interfaith gathering, and at interfaith gatherings we come together in respect. At that point in the day, I was ready to just leave and go home; instead, I walked around and cooled off between sessions.

While the interfaith discourses were taking place, there were other activities going on at the gathering. The various local churches and other religious organizations had tables in the courtyard where they handed out literature and had some refreshments. The Buddhists, bless them, had free bottles of water on this hot dry day. Meanwhile, some people took their pets the Children's Garden for a blessing of the animals; the Sikhs led people in chanting and dancing in the sanctuary, others walked the church labyrinth (a medieval circuit labyrinth), while children got henna tattoos or made balloon animals, worked on a large mosaic. The design of the mosaic, by Richard Caemmerer, is pictured above. Whether Pagans paths were intended to have been interwoven into this design, when I see the multicolored spiral uniting all the images, I know we're there.

After a short break, we reconvened for an "interfaith discourse" on the questions: "What are the views within your faith about other faiths? What are the relevant scriptures? What is the status of interfaith relations within your faith?" I'm happy to say that Patrick was the first to speak, and he stopped immediately when the moderator, still from the back of the room, signaled time. He was followed by a Baha'i gentleman, then Father Tom Bonacci, a Roman Catholic priest from St. Ignatius of Antioch.

Bob, the Christian Scientist I met earlier, said Jesus' job was to express the divine, not to tell about it. The goal of Christian Science is to heal "sin," and its teachings are Bible-based. He said we are to "be merciful, just and pure." From the First Church of Christ, Scientist, in Danville, Bob also maintains a healing practice from his office in Walnut Creek. He prays and performs healings by telephone or e-mail, but prefers working face-to-face.

The last to speak was the Sufi woman from the Rahima Foundation.

A woman went up to Patrick right after the discussion, so I left the room to look around at what I had missed in my hurry to get to the opening ceremony in time. People, but for a few stragglers like me, were packing their instruments and literature, folding tables and chairs, and cleaning up. I went back into the room after a bit, but I could see Patrick and the woman were deep in conversation. After another little while, I returned to the room and sat quietly waiting for them to finish. Evidently the conversation had gotten very heated on both sides; I don't think it would be constructive for me to detail it here. Suffice to say that the woman, who happened to be a Protestant convert to LDS, was apologizing profusely to Patrick, saying how ignorant she had been. What a guy he is! One of the smoothest talkers -- he surely kissed the Blarney Stone, he has such Irish charm -- one of the most diplomatic people I know, Pagan or not.

I'm glad we made this connection with the Interfaith Council of Contra Costa County. Patrick was wanting to connect with a local interfaith group close near his home.

I'm a little confused: our invitation came from ICCCC, the sponsor, yet the program indicates the event was sponsored by Interfaith - San Ramon Valley. For a completely different perspective on this event from mine, see this article from The Argus, a local paper. It also seems to have caught the attention of the Huffington Post.