The Virus – A Pagan Sci-Fi

(A fictional short story inspired by the Australian lockdowns of 2021)

Statue of Mercury at Pavlovsk Park
Image by Aleksandrov (Wikimedia Commons)

The television turned itself on because it was time to get up. She lay in bed half-listening to journalists speaking in serious tones about various things, none of it was any more consequential than the faint sound of cars swooshing past on the road near her apartment until the voice of one man said sternly “what’s wrong with mandatory vaccinations?” Two men spoke to each other on the telly, one was a union leader complaining about activists hijacking a protest that had happened the day before – he explained that it wasn’t the case that workers were protesting against their own union for not pushing back against a government mandate that all tradies be vaccinated. What had actually happened was protestors had turned up and impersonated tradies … even so, the official union position was to support choice. The journalist on the State-run morning show chided the union boss for suggesting that adults should have the right to choose whether or not to be vaccinated.

Polytheism for Beginners

"For Karin's Name Day" by Larsson (1899)

After over a decade of being consciously polytheistic I think perhaps it is possible that I may have some useful advice for people new to polytheism. All of the advice below comes from years of studying mostly Roman and Germanic sources, as well as some others (such as Celtic polytheism, Buddhism and Hinduism), as well as my lived experience.

There is no one and true way

The first and most important piece of advice I can give is to completely ignore anything that follows if it does not resonate for you. I am not a guru, and I suggest you be wary of anyone else who holds that they have discovered the one and true way to be a polytheist. Polytheism does not just imply a plethora of Gods but also a plethora of approaches to the divine.

Beggar Spirituality

"A Beggar Girl" by Sargent (c. 1877)

When my husband died nearly two years ago it was as if in a thunderstruck moment I realised that the cosmos was not as I thought it to be – it was so much darker and more painful than I had imagined. I saw that the Gods had not kept me free from misfortune, and that my approach to worship had been absurd. I dismantled my beautiful shrine and even destroyed one of the statues in a state of bitterness and blank despair. But I did not stop believing in the Gods, nor did I hate them. Rather, I saw that on a very fundamental level *I* had got it wrong and that I needed a wiser and more realistic approach to the divine. Answers to difficult questions can never be finite – because the universe and the questions keep changing – but what I see now is that I was more of a spiritual beggar than a spiritual seeker. 

Faith in Polytheism

Roman coin depicting Fides, minted 2nd century CE
Source: romanmint.com

One of my first posts on this blog, nearly five years ago, was about the question of faith. It turns out this has been amongst the more popular of my posts. In it I essentially make the case for leaving faith out of my religious perspective. In one of the more articulate passages I wrote:

“Faith does not make anything true, it just makes something feel more true while at the same time abrogating one's ability to ask all possible questions and to be open to all possible answers.” 

When I wrote this my mother had been dead for less than a year. Her long illness (cancer) and death was profoundly traumatic for me and part of that experience was made up of her elder sisters, both devout Christians, coercing, persuading, and generally doing all that they could to convert her before she died. As she edged closer to death she began to fear the prospect of hell, without definitively converting, and it disturbed her peace of mind in her final months. For this reason I went through a phase of disliking Christianity and, to me, “faith” was a term irrevocably linked to it. I associated faith inextricably with the word that often precedes it – blind. The notion of faith seemed like (to me at the time) a dodgy trick by which people were lured into believing untrue things based on the flimsiest of evidence.* Fast-forward a few years and things have a changed somewhat. I can now look at faith without the caustic afterglow brought about by my previous antipathy to Christian beliefs.

How Many Polytheists / Pagans Are There?

Actor Jeremy Irons lights a huge effigy of the "Borgia Bull"
in a Pagan inspired celebration in season two of The Borgias

One thing seems certain – there are not too many people in Western nations who identify as polytheists … or are there? If social media, such as Facebook and reddit, is anything to go by there are perhaps only a few thousand people in the English speaking world who practice Roman polytheism. The number of Germanic polytheists in English language dominant countries seems to be higher, but even then it seems the numbers are only in the tens of thousands at most.* Statistical information only gets us so far, because meaningful data is limited, with the United Kingdom giving us perhaps the best hint of the true numbers. In the 2011 UK census the following written answers were given to “what is your religion”:**

Pagan Funeral Rites

Source: www.hbo.com/game-of-thrones

I’ve heard it said that there is a spiritual lesson to be learnt in contemplating death, thus I attempt to summarise traditional Germanic, Celtic and Roman funerary practices below. 

Germanic funerary customs

The numerous Germanic burial mounds scattered across Europe appear to be connected to the worship of Vanir Deities (associated with fertility); they are the kinds of Gods that farmers and fishermen would have particularly revered, or indeed anyone to whom fertility was important. It seems that those inhumed in burial mounds were thought to live after death as spirits connected with the land. Davidson notes that there “seems to be some link between elves and the dead within the earth” (Scandinavian Mythology at 117). 

Pagan Swear Words, Expletives and Exclamations

The TV series Spartacus is full of inventive expletives

When I experience momentary frustration or surprise I tend to outburst variously with “Jesus Christ!”, “Christ almighty!”, “crikey Moses!, “oh my God!” and other biblical profanities.* These words flow out of my mouth impulsively, and in a sense they are just meaningless words, and yet sometimes after I unthinkingly exclaim them they bring home to me just how close Christian thinking still is. Should I then switch my expletives to a Pagan mode? On television and online I have come across the following alternatives:

• Gods be good!
• Juno’s c-nt!
• Juno’s peacock!
• Jupiter’s cock!
• Jupiter’s eyebrows!
• Neptune’s beard!
• Odin’s Raven!
• Pluto’s thorny cock!

Organised Religion – A Perspective

Expulsion of heretics (c. 1415 illustration), British Library

Organised religion is a double edged sword. On the one hand organising religion allows religious beliefs to be preserved and propagated – this gives that religion accessibility, strength and potentially longevity. It also enhances the social aspect of religion, acting as a means by which a religious community can come together. On the other hand, organised religion can and does give rise to some serious problems. The main problem, as I see it, is that it is prone to encouraging individuals to believe that they somehow have a monopoly on divine truth. Flowing on from this, members of religious organisations may be prone to developing less flexible attitudes to their own religion, and then impose these onto other would be members of this religion and even non-members (who might be thought of destined to an undesirable future state for not believing in the spiritual authority of the organisation). It can even go so far that some organisations believe they can represent their deity’s approval, and feel entitled to exclude and shun members over trivial theological differences. In this case the believer’s ability to communicate with the divine is superficially abrogated in favour of the believer’s relationship with the leaders of an organisation, some of whom may be corrupt, stupid, fanatical and/or unkind. 

In Praise of Venus

"Venus healing Aeneas" by Blondel (19th century)

In Greco-Roman mythology only Venus has the power to disarm Mars, whom we associate with violence, or to sooth Vulcan’s destructive and potentially life extinguishing fires. Even today, the white doves of Venus are the foremost symbol of peace. Venus also shared her love with the quick-witted Mercury and thereby bore he whom we think of as the masculine aspect of love – Cupid. Interestingly in Germanic mythology we see a related pairing – Woden, God of wisdom (equated in ancient times with Mercury), is paired with Frija, Goddess of love – surely Venus in another guise. It seems to me that when the two Gods merge we find the highest state of being arises – the Buddha himself said that wisdom (prajna) and love (maitri) are conjoined paths to enlightenment.

Paganism for Children

Goddess of wild animals, forests, the hunt and the moon -
Diana / Artemis, by xx12taylorxx.deviantart.com

This post is devoted to helping older children to understand what Paganism is. Pagans have a wide range of views and not all Pagans will agree with everything written on this page – which is fine. Paganism  embraces an open, not a closed, view of the world and can incorporate a wide range of different beliefs and practices – which makes it both very wonderful and very hard to describe. I have attempted to not use too many complex words, so that everyone can easily understand it – and disagree with it, if they want to.

What Paganism is

Paganism means different things to different people, but the one thing that almost all Pagans agree on is that the natural world includes sacred, or divine, forces and that it is good to show respect for the sacred forces, or spirits, that exist in nature – because as humans we are part of nature. When we show respect for the natural world we show respect for ourselves and the entire universe in which we live. Many Pagans understand that the most powerful divine forces of nature are Gods – which includes Goddesses. By tapping into the power of the Gods we can improve our own daily lives. As the Gods are powerful they can help us achieve the things we want.

Messenger Animals as Omens

An owl in England (source: neo polytheist)

For me, being open minded about the potentiality of omens is part of polytheistic practice – omens being signs from the Gods indicating their will, favour or disfavour, as well as being divine signals indicating present or near future auspiciousness or inauspiciousness. In ancient Rome divination of omens could take any number of forms but the most common methods included observing the manner of the flight of birds; observing the way that birds ate; studying the state of the internal organs of sacrificial animals (haruspicy); analysing one’s dreams, and being alert to the import of unusual natural phenomena (Shelton at 375; Turcan at 15; Kamm at 83-84). Tacitus records  that as well as the casting of lots, which appears to be an early form of reading the runes, the following means of divination were common amongst the ancient Germanic tribes:

Shamanism

Korean Shaman. Source: people.cohums.ohio-state.edu

A month or so ago I got talking to a fellow I know who had just come back from South Korea – he was a little drunk, which was fortunate as it opened up a bridge of uninhibited communication between us via which we landed on the fascinating topic of Shamanism. He told me he had been to Shamanic ceremonies in Korea and proceeded to describe them. I can’t recall his exact words but what really hooked me in was the fact that he was describing Shamanism as a living tradition. I had recently been reading about the Shamanistic religions of the former nomads of northern Europe, but it was all in the past tense. What he described was a continuing, unbroken tradition practiced by people of our own times who are not wildly different from ourselves – I can’t say I think of Koreans as exotic (there are a lot of Koreans in Sydney). Following our fascinating conversation, I got my hands on the most reputable book on Shamanism I could find. It is by Piers Vitebsky, who is described as “an anthropologist and head of Social Sciences at the Scott Polar Research Institute, University of Cambridge”. Most of the information, and all page citations with no other referencing, in this post are sourced from this book, published by the University of Oklahoma Press in 2001.

Devotional Practice – Meditation

Sometimes when we feel a strong pull towards a particular deity we may be unsure as to how to connect with that God or Goddess – making suitable offerings is obviously the first thing we can and should do. If we want to do more, and we are inspired by devotional practices common within the most well established polytheistic religions of our own time (Hinduism and Buddhism), we might consider meditating on the deity for whom we feel a particular pull. We can do this by resting the mind lightly and mindfully on an object, image or place associated with the God or Goddess with whom we wish to connect.

Roman Gods, Indian Gods

Fire ritual in honour of Agni, God of fire. Source: balu on Wikimedia 
(image is cropped). Agni is cognate with the Latin "ignis" (literally "fire")

I recently spent time trying to discover how the interpretatio Romana could be applied to the Indian pantheon. I discovered that it is not easily applied and that Indian polytheism is almost unbelievably complex. The first thing to know is that Hinduism is the sum total of numerous polytheistic belief systems emanating from the huge geographic region that is south Asia and linked by “various common elements such as Vedic tradition, the caste system, religious and moral law, epics and myths, and reverence for spiritual teachers” (Dallapiccola, Hindu: Visions of the Sacred). The second thing to know is that polytheism as experienced and understood by Hindus today is not the same as south Asian polytheism in ancient times. These days it appears that the majority of Hindus believe that most, if not all, Gods and Goddesses are manifestations of other more major Gods and many Hindus believe all deities are aspects of Brahman (or Shiva or Vishnu) – the ultimate reality and deity, which is a concept not dissimilar to Neoplatonic ideas about “the One”. The major Gods of Hinduism today are Brahma, the creator; Vishnu, the preserver and Shiva/Siva, the destroyer, as well as Devi/Shakti, the great Goddess – these Gods do not really have direct parallels in the Roman (or Greek) pantheon, which is not to say that the Indian equivalent to Roman Gods cannot be discovered but it makes the process difficult and uncertain. The Vedic pantheon of ancient India certainly seems more recognisable to one who is familiar with Roman Gods (and Vedic Brahmin priests appear to have been even more obsessed with the correct practice of ritual than the patrician priests of ancient Rome) but many Vedic Gods are no longer widely revered or they have been subsumed into other, more accessible, deities such as Vishnu or Shiva (Vedic Gods may be considered less accessible because traditionally only Brahmin priests can perform sacrifices to Vedic Gods).

3D Paganism – Philosophy Matters

"The Temptation of Saint Anthony" by van Craesbeeck (1650)

It all started when I had an argument with my partner. Something about it (perhaps being accused of living in an escapist's dream-world) dragged me into an intensely vicious depression. Like the Romans who overturned their altars and attacked the Lares when their beloved Germanicus died, I turned my back on the household Gods, who I felt had failed to protect me and my familia, despite years of almost daily offerings at my household shrine. I did not resort to violence, but I let my shrine fall into dusty disuse.

Pagan Resources

Whilst not comprehensive, here are some Pagan friendly resources that I can personally recommend.

Movies/TV

• Gladiator (2000) There are only a few Pagan references in this film but where they occur they are brilliant, in particular the references to the afterlife.
• Rome (2005-2007). One of the best television series I have ever seen - set in ancient Rome during Caesar's time. Some of the historical detail is blatantly wrong, but the atmosphere and story line of the series is brilliantly engaging. 
• Pan's Labyrinth (orig. El Laberinto del Fauno, 2006). The Pagan themes are subtle, but the magic is not. This is a really beautiful, haunting film with much depth. 
• Agora (2009). Already a Pagan classic - based on the life of Neoplatonist philosopher and mathematician Hypatia, who was murdered by Christian fanatics in the 5th century CE. This is a really fantastic, inspiring film.

Accepting Paganism

"A Priestess of Apollo" by Alma-Tadema (1888)

pagan (say 'payguhn)
 noun 1. a follower of an ancient polytheistic or pantheistic religion or set of beliefs.
 2. 
a. one of a people or community professing some other than the Christian religion (applied to the ancient Romans, Greeks, etc., and sometimes the Jewish people).
b.  (derogatory) someone who is not an adherent of one of the world's major religions.
 3. an irreligious or heathenish person.
 4. a person who follows a contemporary set of beliefs modelled on the ancient pagan religions.
–adjective 5. relating to the worship or worshippers of any religion which is neither Christian, Jewish, nor Muslim.
 6. of, relating to, or characteristic of pagans.
 7. heathen; irreligious. [Middle English, from Late Latin pāgānus pagan, from Latin pāgānus villager, peasant, civilian; used to refer to noncombatants by the Roman military, and later by Christians to refer to those not enlisted in the Church military] 
–paganish, adjective [Macquarie Dictionary]

Pagan Idolatry

"Semele waiting for Zeus" by F Bol (b. 1616)

When I consider the Gods I do, unavoidably, consider the many representations (written, painted, sculpted) that mankind has made of them. If I think of Venus in corporeal terms I imagine her as an immensely beautiful woman with full hips and breasts, and no hint of prudishness about her. I confess that I imagine her as ethnically European – whether her hair be blonde or dark. The more I think of Venus in this way the more absurd my imaginings seem for being so hopelessly centred in Western perspectives on this mighty Goddess. If I see her as merely a European Goddess of sex and fertility then perhaps my imaginings can be forgiven, but I do not live in Europe so why should I revere a specifically European Goddess? Or do I imagine that, regardless of place, she hears the prayers of those who call her Venus or Freyja or Aphrodite (or some other European title given to her) but not those who may call her Rati (Hindu), Ishtar (middle eastern), Qetesh (Egyptian) or some other name? If the Goddess of sex and fertility is universal why should I not also imagine her in the image of these Goddesses? But the images I have seen of these non-European Goddesses are for the most part alien to me – they do not resonate. Like Cicero, I imagine the Gods from a perspective of cultural bias. Under the guise of an Epicurean philosopher he wrote:

Pagan Offerings

The Vestal by Corcos (1900)

If in doubt the following may be acceptable offerings to divine beings:

• Food – can be symbolically offered on a plate before an image or symbol of a deity, or burnt in a ritual fire, or left in a sacred location, or hidden in a sacred tree, or thrown into sacred water.

• Fire – for a simple or preliminary show of reverence light a candle in a sacred location.

• Incense (note that frankincense was the most popular incense used in ritual offerings in ancient Rome). For an in depth look at incense as an offering, including issues relating to health, see my post on Incense – Offerings to the Gods.

• Aromatic herbs (juniper, laurel, rosemary, thyme, etc). 

Raw Paganism

Ouroboros from a Byzantine manuscript (1478)

To me, part of the appeal of Pagan practice is the potential link it gives one to ancient or even pre-historical spirituality – to something raw, to something fundamental and continuing in the human spiritual process. The Religio Romana interests me partly because I see it as an ancient European religion about which we are reliably informed – much of the source material on Roman Paganism existing today was written by Pagans writing in a Pagan world, but, of course, there are other ways we can inform ourselves about authentically ancient spiritual practices and that is by looking to that which is common to a multitude of cultures and timelines – as a child of Europe I am naturally interested in the beliefs of the Indo-Europeans, from whom I am (at least partly) descended. Common themes in their belief systems include/d: