Do we raise our children to be independent and thinkers or do we expect them to allow us to do all of their thinking for them forever and ever, amen and how many advancements would our society have made if there were no curious people. Christopher Columbus believed that the world is round because he was a sailor and he made some astute observations about the way the sun  moves in its daily journey and sets on the horizon and thereby made the deduction that the world is not flat as was then greatly believed and until he made his journeys he was for the most part a laughing stock in his community.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                          Sometimes time can be and energy expended can be kept to a minimum in order to complete what would otherwise be an onerous task if you dare to entertain the idea that perhaps there is an easier way to perform this particular task than the one you were taught and I have proven and seen proof of this my self while spending a number of years farming and there were many times that I had to prove this theory to my then husband who thought that just because he grew up on a farm that he knew it all. Why spend a half a day completing a task that could be completed in only a couple of hours and leave you with  couple of extra hours that you may get to spend enjoying one of your hobbies and hobbies can be utilized as a way to relieve stress and are what any good doctor would also recommend  in addition  to any necessary medical treatment if you were suffering from (for example) ulcers.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              I, for example have a number of hobbies, such as; learning to play guitar and reading which were both chosen by me both because I enjoy them and because they can be done by a person who suffers flagging energy levels due to a heart condition. Unfortunately, I dont always have the stamina  to go for long walks and occasionally I am in too much pain. I also have hypoglycemia or low blood sugar and I can only guess as to how long this particular medical condition was afflicting me before it was diagnosed. At the present my diet is sort of at a minimum of what I need which means that I try not to make a glutton out of myself although I am trying to insure that I get the basic nutrients that I need to be as healthy as I can even though I still cannot financially afford to have open-heart surgery. I am taking some herbal remedies that help my body to work better than it otherwise would. Perhaps someday I will have the necessary funds to have my heart problem corrected and this is one of my longstanding goals. I am not lazy, it just sometimes takes me longer than it would you to perform the same task and sometimes I have to delay a task whether I like it or not simply because my body tells me that it will have to wait.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                 I did not ask to be born with a heart murmur but if I want a life then I have to live my life a little differently than a lot of people do. disabilities come in all shapes and sizes and not all are readily apparent  to the human eye and ear, I am a bit of a cripple too. People forget that there were blue babies but I have not because I was one and I know first hand what some of the physical effects of this condition are. Telling me to buck up because you think I am merely suffering from depression is not usually going to help me very much and my particular disability does impose such great physical limitations on me that I do sometimes have a reason to be depressed but a mere pep talk is not going to really cure me because there are too many days when I barely have the energy to do the basic necessities that I know most people take for granted and I do a lot of sitting on the sidelines instead of being physically able to participate, and sometimes the mind is willing but the body needs a nap. I am a lot more health conscious than I am given credit for but sometimes the money for proper medical treatment just isnt there and this is partly due to the fact that I am really not always physically able to work whether I like it or not and I do not at this time have any health insurance.                                 Just prior to my divorce a few years ago, I finally decided that I was no longer able to do some of the more manual labors that were required of me as a farmer and that I had better begin trying to provide myself with a sit down desk job before I either had a heart attack  or permanently injured some part of my body but it is difficult to make this big of a change if you are the only emotional ,  physical and financial support that you have. I am at this time more hopeful than I was in the too recent past that I will have some measure of success. Having hope helps people get out of bed in the morning.

               WHO ARE YOU CALLING A NEOPHYTE?

I have recently discussed affiliations both at home and as a member of a religious forum. What has become increasingly apparent is that there seems to be an elitist thought pervading  the discussions.  Most seem to think theirs is a closed sect.

In particular, the thinking is such that only a true believer is welcome at some or all of their functions. This seems to be true with Wiccae, Mormons, Islaam, Judaism, and particular Christians cults. Either you are not welcome at some of their ceremonial gatherings or you or not welcome in their afterlife.  Each cult has a novice period in which one has to achieve a gradient in order to have a say in what the organization does.  Smacks of a caste system!

Suppose one has been studying apart from the cult in order to understand its origins, teachings, and functions.  Over time, thisindividual has a strong repertoire of the cult and tries to gain entry.  Through self-study, the initiate finds he has more  knowledge about the cult than its clergy.  The clergy finds this person a threat to its authority and shunts him to initiate status, if in fact it will let him into the order at all.  Should he question the cults hierarchy he is pigeonholed into some deviant or other whimsical category outright.

In our modern context the methodology to gain admittance to a particular cult is to pay in the form of a tithe or through somecult-generated ritualistic teachings.  These teachings become animpetus for money-making, and over time the initiate has to payboth the tithe and for the lessons of the cult.  Why?  Has not person who is self-taught in the cult already made the grade? Who sets the measure for acceptance when the neophyte has already done the work or transcended to that level of cult-spirituality equal to the clergy before attempting entry?

It appears as though the convening authority of a given insti-tution cannot accept the novel way in which a self-taught person has learned.  Gender transcended, Wiccae gives credence to the Crone as the sophist, relegating the High Priest to a lesser status. Catholics have priests, bishops, cardinals, or the pope, and like the Latter Day Saints, Judaism, and Islaam, denigrate women as chattel.  However,  the self-taught individual, whether or not of like gender, is still a challenge to the rigidity in which the cult has gained acceptance in the community at large.

There is an interesting treatise by Hegel on Dialectical Materialism.It fosters the idea that in order for an entity to nurture and grow, itneeds to constantly change.  Otherwise, it stagnates and falls by the wayside.  So too, has it become with the established religious cults, Wiccae aside because it is a work in progress.  (Wiccae cannot get its head out of its ass long enough to accept the truth of its origins and refuses to make the necessary changes in order to accepts all its affiliates.)

Ritual holds the key!  Not the cult ritual, but the original Pagan rituals on which the aforementioned institutions base their own ceremonial patterns.  Stop and look at each worship service and how it is carried out.  Each has an association with some bygone ceremony that it has taken for its own, calling the original  here-tical or blasphemous to its order.  Further, the cults consider their ritual as having been authored by themselves.

As a Pagan, it is amusing to watch these cults in practice.  Consider their modelPagan ritual.  It is insult to my beliefs because while the cults have stolen my rituals, they shun me as infidel.  In point of fact, the infidels are they themselves who are little more than thieves!

© Green & Rhodes 2002