Apr
Earth, Indeed!
Today is Earth Day. It is a holiday invented to promote concern for environmentalism. Every year, politicians make a big to-do about planting trees or some other show of “earth consciousness.” More recently, environmentalism has been attended by the adjective “green.” It all sounds so holistic and organic. Earth Day is becoming more a show of “being green” than a day to appreciate the world.
I do not think they get the point. They have been missing the point for over a thousand years. Heathens and Pagans get the point of it. We get it every day. We do not need an Earth Day.
This world is as spiritual as the next. The spiritual and material are not separate, except in monotheistic theology. You are as spiritual here as you will be when you pass to the next world, and the next.
Every one of our major Heathen holidays touches base with this world in which we live. Winter’s Beginning, Summer’s Beginning, Yule, Midsummer, Ostara, and May Eve all coincide with the seasonal; cycle of our home. Our Gods also help us touch base. Frey is a harvest God, among other things. Njord is a God of the sea. Aegir and Ran are deities of the deep sea, while Thor is of the skies and Skadi is of the mountains. Sif is a Goddess of reaping harvests. Earth Day? As far as we are concerned, the Earth Day people are a millennium late and a dollar short.
Healthy Heathenism and Paganism appreciate this world in which we live. For us, it is not on some contrived holiday. We experience it every day.
