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Post by awenyddogamulos on Jan 27, 2015 11:04:20 GMT -6
There’s a point where theory and history and reconstruction have to be folded into our daily lives. So what does your life as a modern Brythonic polytheist look like?
What role does faith play in your daily life? Does it inform your choices? How has your life changed since your "conversion”?
Sacrifice – human, animals, and material goods – was a large part of our forebears’ religious and cultural life. How does this translate into your practice? If you don’t live in Wales, southern England, or Brittany (which I suspect most of us don’t), how does the landscape where you currently find yourself affect your religious practices?
On a more dogmatic level – what do you believe in? What is your personal view of the afterlife (if any)? Do you believe in magic? That was a serious question.
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Post by swamplord on Feb 19, 2015 11:01:01 GMT -6
I wanted to thank you for this... I am new to this path and am interested in going down a welsh path myself but i have found precious little resources... Thank you for creating these posts and adding a resources list... It means a lot to us beginners!  |
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Post by awenyddogamulos on Feb 20, 2015 8:21:30 GMT -6
I'm glad I could help! I am working on combing through the existing resources online and putting together some short links . . . I was trying to find one really good link to send to someone to explain who Camulos is, and I found absolutely nothing. "Uh . . . so read this website, and then this article, and then three chapters of this book, and this table from another book."
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veritywhitethorn
Junior Member
Posts: 60
Pronouns: She/her
Religion: Celtic polytheist
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Post by veritywhitethorn on Feb 28, 2015 4:42:26 GMT -6
These are all really good questions and ones to which I don't have solid answers at the moment. Although that said no matter what my practice consists of I pretty much always feel that it's inadequate, especially when I compare it with others' (I know, I know). Which frequently leads me to feeling that it's all too hard and throwing in the towel in despair (yes, I know)... I get overwhelmed easily, I guess, and I lack confidence, in the absence of really clear signs saying YES GOOD, that I'm doing the right things.
I believe in Magic, for sure, though mainly as worked by other people; i come from a Wiccan path, most recently, but even then I didn't work very much magic. I create stuff, almost compulsively—writing, crocheting, sewing,baking—and the writing in particular I often dedicate to my gods, particularly because Talieisn is my ?patron?—the deity I feel closest to, anyway. I have a small altar for 'ancestors and dead things', for want of a better term, and I light a candle on it and leave offerings there every few days at least. My husband is actively disinterested in spirituality—he's the most hardcore atheist I've ever met—so I find it difficult to incorporate a spiritual aspect at meals/holy days etc.
Tl;dr I have pretty much no idea what I'm doing a lot of the time. Would love to hear more from others <3
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Post by awenyddogamulos on Mar 9, 2015 14:50:50 GMT -6
Verity, I saw your reply and I totally skimmed the first paragraph and didn't reply because I thought I had written it. Because I think I said exactly that thing in a different thread.
COME LET US FLAIL TOGETHER LIKE THE MAJESTIC FUCKING PAGANS WE ARE.
Because that is exactly how I feel - I get so caught up in "Am I doing this right? But it's not shiny like other people's - ahhhh I am a Bad Pagan I guess I shouldn't even try" that my relationship with the Big Guys suffers. And it's something I still struggle with so I really don't have much advice for you other than 'keep on keepin' on'. I don't have much of a godphone or whatever the British equivalent is, but I have enough moments of calm and clarity that I cling to those moments when the rough parts come along.
More reply to come, I just have to switch computers and don't want to lose what I've typed.
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veritywhitethorn
Junior Member
Posts: 60
Pronouns: She/her
Religion: Celtic polytheist
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Post by veritywhitethorn on Mar 15, 2015 23:13:43 GMT -6
I have been looking up Welsh recipes over the last few days (thanks allrecipes.uk!) and today I made bara brith, it's similar to things I've made before and is what my mum would call 'cup of tea cake'—basically a fruit cake where the sultanas, raisins, etc are soaked in sweetened tea and then you mix in flour, eggs, spices, and bake. Very easy and hopefully tasty—I'll be offering the first slice of it up tonight for my Welsh gods to enjoy (hopefully)!
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atlene
Newbie
Posts: 6 
Pronouns: She/Her
Religion: Brythonic-leaning
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Post by atlene on Jul 3, 2015 5:15:35 GMT -6
Does anyone have any daily/regular prayers they say? I'd really like to do daily prayers and a small offering, but I really struggle to write them and can't find too many that I really like. And do you pray to (a) specific God(s), or do a general prayer to the whole 'pantheon'?. (Though, of course, there is no single unifying pantheon, I can't seem to think of a better word right now)
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Post by Banned User on Oct 1, 2015 10:37:59 GMT -6
quote:'Sacrifice – human, animals, and material goods – was a large part of our forebears’ religious and cultural life. How does this translate into your practice? ' lol i hope not. your post makes no reference to either the specific time frame or the ubiquity of such practice.....given that we have no Aztec like temples devoted to human sacrifice its a wild leap to assume there was 'large scale' human sacrifice in Britain. Caesar s 'Commentarii de Bello Gallico' has to be approached with some caution - we know there are always motives for colonisers to either extrapolate into convenient generalisations from isolated observations or stories which suit their narrative and political agenda - and Rome certainly had a political agenda in relation to Britain.
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Post by Allec on Oct 1, 2015 13:23:01 GMT -6
quote:'Sacrifice – human, animals, and material goods – was a large part of our forebears’ religious and cultural life. How does this translate into your practice? ' lol i hope not. your post makes no reference to either the specific time frame or the ubiquity of such practice.....given that we have no Aztec like temples devoted to human sacrifice its a wild leap to assume there was 'large scale' human sacrifice in Britain. Caesar s 'Commentarii de Bello Gallico' has to be approached with some caution - we know there are always motives for colonisers to either extrapolate into convenient generalisations from isolated observations or stories which suit their narrative and political agenda - and Rome certainly had a political agenda in relation to Britain. Use the quote function of the website. Moreover, there has been archeological evidence of human sacrifice, so it's not just Caesar's interpretations of the Gauls we're going off of here. |
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Post by Banned User on Oct 1, 2015 13:45:23 GMT -6
There has been no evidence of large scale human sacrifice in Britain of that era. Isolated examples of what 'might have been' do not constitute evidence of proof of 'large scale' human sacrifice.
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Post by Allec on Oct 1, 2015 13:54:04 GMT -6
"The best archaeological data supporting Celtic human sacrifice is the body of the man placed in Lindow bog in the first or second century C.E. We actually have the body (well, most of it) so well preserved that scientists were able to analyze his stomach contents to discover his last meal (a partially scorched grain cake). Lindow man was almost certainly a ritual sacrifice; he was strangled, hit on the head, and had his throat cut, in quick order, then surrendered to the bog. This pattern fits the “three-fold” death referred to in medieval Irish tales. What’s more, the man seems to have been of high social rank, and a willing victim. There are also other bog burials (the Tollund Man bog body in Denmark is very similar) in various places in Europe, as well as in grain storage pits and shafts in Britain, that, once they were no longer used for storage, had human bodies thrown in them, for instance at the Danebury hillfort. While Anne Ross in Pagan Celtic Britain is positive that the Danebury bodies were ritual sacrifices, most scholars are less certain." ( source) |
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lorna
Newbie
Posts: 9
Religion: Brythonic Polytheist
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Post by lorna on Nov 11, 2015 13:05:20 GMT -6
My polytheism plays a large role in my daily life. In the morning I make offerings to and / or spend time communing with the spirits of my house and with my patron, Gwyn ap Nudd and personal guides. Sometimes this involves prayers or readings of poetry, sometimes it's more meditation or journeywork. I like to walk each day and see this as a spiritual practice as I spend time communicating with the spirits of place and my local river goddess, Belisama. I also see my writing as a devotional activity, particularly if it focuses on a particular deity or mythic figure and their stories.
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