Shamanism

‘I’m Not A Witch’ Picked As Top Quote Of Year
Christine O’Donnell’s TV ad declaration “I’m not a witch” during her U.S. Senate campaign topped this year’s best quotes, according to a Yale University librarian.

O’Donnell’s quote is cited by Fred Shapiro, associate librarian at Yale Law School, who released his fifth annual list of the most notable quotations of the year. In the ad, O’Donnell was responding to reports of her revelations that she had dabbled in witchcraft years ago. Read full story from npr.org

A season for everyone
ST. GEORGE - Christmas may dominate the holiday schedule, but December is a special and spiritual month for many local residents, regardless of their religious beliefs.

Cedar City resident Melanie Cottam is clear evidence of that.

Though her Cedar City home is adorned with wreaths, candles and even a decorated tree, Cottam said she doesn’t focus her celebrations on Christmas each winter. As a pagan, she and her family observe a different December celebration. Read full story from thespectrum.com

Masters of Math, From Old Babylon
If the cost of digging a trench is 9 gin, and the trench has a length of 5 ninda and is one-half ninda deep, and if a worker’s daily load of earth costs 10 gin to move, and his daily wages are 6 se of silver, then how wide is the canal?

Or, a better question: if you were a tutor of Babylonian scribes some 4,000 years ago, holding a clay tablet on which this problem was incised with cuneiform indentations — the very tablet that can now be seen with 12 others from that Middle Eastern civilization at the Institute for the Study of the Ancient World — what could you take for granted, and what would you need to explain to your students? In what way did you think about measures of time and space? How did you calculate? Did you believe numbers had an abstract existence, each with its own properties? Read full story from nytimes.com

Ross: Being thankful on Thanksgiving
Sometimes it’s simply about saying “thank you;” nothing more, nothing less.

The prayers went on forever. Actually, they lasted – usually – about 45 minutes, maybe an hour. It really did seem like they would never end, though.

And the worst part was that he knew what he was doing to us! He knew that it was torture – the smells, the sights, the waiting. He and grandma put all of the boiling meats and the red hot dogs and the sweets all on the little table with the yellow, vinyl table cloth on it – right there for all of us to see. We all knew that the potato salad was going to be good and mustardy, and we knew that we were gonna get some pop that was not warm Cragmont Cream Soda. And it was simply mean, what he was doing, gosh darn it – the smells were incredible! Read full story from indiancountrytoday.com

On trial: Faith, delusion or excuse for crime?
He’s a self-proclaimed prophet who called his bed an altar.

He wore robes, grew his beard long and penned a rambling manifesto.

He said he received revelations and was destined to take 49 wives.

And he is on federal trial for kidnapping Elizabeth Smart, now 23, and moving her across state lines for sex. Read full story from cnn.com

Saudi Arabian court rejects ‘sorcery’ death sentence
Amnesty International has welcomed a decision by the Saudi Arabian Supreme Court this week not to ratify the death sentence on a Lebanese man convicted of “sorcery”.

Lost Abbey Ale may Change Label on Witch’s Wit after Wiccan ‘Brewhaha’
The bottle label shows a picture of a “witch” burning at the stake. Vicki Noble, who is “famous” in the pagan and Wiccan communities saw the bottle. What ignited was not just a witch on the bottle, but a fire storm about beer, being politically correct or offensive, and what is considered satire on a bottle label. Read full story from gather.com

Shamanism: Spirits in the valley
The cultural heritage of pre-Islamic philosophy and mythology is so interwoven into the mountainous Gilgit-Baltistan that strands of it survive to this day. Religions born of their environments, the influence of centuries of Shamanism, Buddhism, Baoism and Zartosht are seen most clearly in their interaction with nature, where the word worship can be interchanged with respect for and love of. Read full story from tribune.com.pk

Media needs to stop enabling stigmas
The Senate is on the verge of change as 37 of the 100 Senate seats are up for election in November. However, one candidate for the senate in Delaware is causing quite a stir. Tea party favored Christine O’Donnell caused an upset when she became the GOP Senate candidate after the primaries. Though I disagree with everything the tea party stands for, my issue with O’Donnell does not revolve around her party affiliations, but rather her idiotic comments. Read full story from understatesman.com

Shamans and sorcerors booted off Russian TV
Having a sixth sense will no longer be enough to advertise legally – from now on only a license will allow fortune tellers, faith healers, magicians and shamans to practice.

Anyone who wants to use their traditional or occult gifts to promote a business will be forced to get a licence – and it’s up to the media to check out the credentials of their clients. Read full story from mn.ru

Darwen man wins Druid campaign
Phil Ryder, of Richmond Terrace, led the campaign as chairman of the trustees of the Druid Network, a nationwide fraternity of followers of the Pagan practice. Read full story from Read full story from lancashiretelegraph.co.uk

Druids recognized as religion for first time in UK
LONDON – Druids have been worshipping the sun and earth for thousands of years in Europe, but now they can say they’re practicing an officially recognized religion. Read full story from news.yahoo.com

Native woman recognized as a pioneer in the aviation field
SAN MANUEL, Ariz. – On a sunny spring day in April a small crowd of people gathered at the San Manuel Airport outside of Tucson. They traveled from as far as Colorado and California to attend the two-day Gyrocopter “Fly-in” event.

In attendance was a woman known as the “Gyrocopter Queen,” 81-year-old Marion Springer, a Choctaw pioneer in the rotorcraft – or rotary wing aircraft – industry. The first female certified flight instructor, she has been flying gyrocopters since the late 1960s. REad full story from indiancountrytoday.com