Pagan

News:

As long as the grass grows and the poverty shows During the election cycle we tend to ask: What does America mean; where are we going? And then someone decides to check on the Indians to find out the answer, as though Indians represent America’s soul hidden in the attic. And of course politicians have long stood next to their “souls” and posed for pictures on the campaign trail. Within the last year, Diane Sawyer and “20/20” did a special on the sorry conditions at the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota, and the New Yorker featured a grim photo essay on Pine Ridge too. The New York Times published a piece on brutal crime at the Wind River Reservation in Wyoming and another on the deep financial problems at Foxwoods, the Pequot-owned “world’s largest” casino in Connecticut. Indians make the news, but the news isn’t really news, it’s just a way for the country take its temperature. Read full story from latimes.com

Arts & Entertainment:

‘With this broom, I thee wed’: offbeat family inspires play ‘I now pronounce you wife and wife."

Canadian singer-songwriter David Hein, 36, heard those words about 18 years ago when his divorced mom married her lesbian partner. At the time, same-sex marriage wasn’t legal, but the pair have since made it official.

Hein’s mom came out as a lesbian when he was a teenager. Around the same time, she recommitted to her Jewish faith. Her bride, though, was a Wiccan – a modern-day pagan.

News:

US should return stolen land to Indian tribes, says United Nations A United Nations investigator probing discrimination against Native Americans has called on the US government to return some of the land stolen from Indian tribes as a step toward combatting continuing and systemic racial discrimination.

James Anaya, the UN special rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples, said no member of the US Congress would meet him as he investigated the part played by the government in the considerable difficulties faced by Indian tribes.

Headlines:

UNITING PEOPLE TO PROTECT THE PLANET Earth Hour 2012: Saturday 31st March, 8:30PM

Earth Hour is a unique opportunity for you to become more sustainable and do something positive for the environment. It’s been the source of inspiration for millions of people taking steps towards a cleaner, safer future. It’s not just about saving energy for one hour, it’s about going Beyond the Hour with lasting, behaviour-changing actions for a sustainable planet.

Click photo to enlarge

A Prayer for Spring

I pray to you, Demeter, to remind you of the spring,

for Persephone has come home to you,

your little girl, now a great queen.

Show us your joy, mother of grain, at her homecoming.

Warm the Earth, make the ground soft,

so we may walk barefoot again in the grass

and plant the seeds that will grow all summer

until the harvest, when your full power will be known

News:

Call for PNG to repeal sorcery act after West Sepik deaths Papua New Guinea’s Constitutional and Law Reform Commission says it wants the Sorcery Act repealed by the end of this year.

Last year, the Commission released a review of the Act, after an increase in the number of false accusations of sorcery were slammed by human rights groups.

But it’s making headlines again as six people accused of sorcery or witchcraft were killed in West Sepik Province by people who had taken the law into their own hands. Read full story from radioaustralia.net.au

Religion:

Pagan mom challenges Bible giveaway at North Carolina school WEAVERVILLE, N.C. –  A pagan mother’s challenge to the distribution of donated Bibles at a local school has prompted the Buncombe County Board of Education to reevaluate its policies regarding religious texts.

Ginger Strivelli, who practices Witchcraft, a form of Paganism, said she was upset when her 12-year-old son [who did not wish to be photographed for this article] came home from North Windy Ridge intermediate school with a Bible.

News:

Witchcraft trial hears how tortured boy drowned A teenage boy allegedly tortured and killed because his attackers believed he was practising witchcraft struggled to get out of the bath where he was drowned but had no strength left, a court has heard.

The Old Bailey watched video footage of police interviews with the brother of 15-year-old Kristy Bamu – who cannot be named for legal reasons – carried out the day after Kristy was allegedly killed by Eric Bikubi and Magalie Bamu, both 28, because they believed he was a sorcerer.

Arts & Entertainment:

Warner Bros. to adapt ‘Discovery of Witches’ David Auburn is looking for witches and vampires and has come on to adapt Deborah Harkness’ “A Discovery of Witches” for Warner Bros. and producers Denise Di Novi and Allison Greenspan.

Studio acquired the property last summer. Story centers on a reluctant witch and a 1,500-year-old vampire. The witch – a direct descendant of the first woman executed in the Salem Witch trials – accidentally unlocks an enchanted manuscript and finds herself in a race to prevent an interspecies war.

Environment:

This is What the U.S. Would Look Like Without Environmental Protections (PHOTOS) In the early 1970s, an amazing photojournalism project called Documerica captured a polluted nation in the midst of establishing its first major environmental protections. Documerica was sponsored by the fledgling E.P.A., which hoped to document and examine the extent of the country’s environmental troubles. A team of talented photographers was assembled to shoot, in breathtaking, uncompromising detail, the unchecked air pollution, contaminated waterways, hazardous coal mines, and some truly disturbing waste issues across the U.S. Read full story from treehugger.com