#erin lale

No, Ash Wednesday is not a heathen or pagan holiday. Yes, Wednesday is named after Odin (Woden.) Yes, other cultures besides Christianity used ritual fire and some even used ritual ash. Some Hindus in India receive a blessing from ash from a sacred fire. Fire as a source of cleansing, heat, and light is pretty basic and obvious, and the fact that x culture used it does not mean y culture stole the idea from x culture.

There are 3 basic ways to welcome a new spiritual object into your life.

My answer:

If you're celebrating by yourself or just with your family, start simple, with a sumbel (toast) with wassail (hot spiced cider), mead, or another beverage. Encourage Sunna to outrun the wolf trying to eat her and return to the sky for another year. While she's out of the sky, hold her fire for her in a Yule Log through the solstice night. If you're celebrating with family, the presents-under-the-tree custom is perfectly heathen, you can use it.

When I took a class by Melissa Paige Eggstaff on Romani spiritual words and ideas, it amazed me how many similarities there are between Asatru and Romani concepts. This was the first time I had encountered any other culture besides the heathen cultures that had the idea of the multipartite soul. I kept thinking, hey, that’s just like us! And so is that! So I wrote up this comparison. For the heathen words, I use the word most commonly used in Asatru, my sect of heathenry; some of these words are in Modern English and some are in Old Icelandic. The Romani words are from Melissa's class.

Long-time readers of this blog have watched me go through a strange journey. After 25 years as Priestess of Freya, comfortable with my spiritual routines, it was weird to suddenly have Loki crack open my head and funnel all the other gods in, all because I walked out of a movie saying, "I bet I could write something more authentic than that."