Hearthside

So it is 10:30pm on a Sunday night. I am halfway through dishes in an attempt to make room in the kitchen to rack my mead… but instead I find myself at the kitchen table pounding out words at the keyboard. It doesn’t matter who it was this time out there is the broader sphere of online Heathenry. It doesn’t matter who got the gears turning. It wasn’t the first time. It won’t be the last. That is the point of this really… Sometimes we disagree with other Heathens. Sometimes we disagree with other Heathens who are in our own tribes, kindreds, or close-knit communities. Sometimes those disagreements are beyond reparations and lead to a rift, or splitting off into separate groups. Sometimes tempers just flare, and Heathens are too proud to do the work to reestablish common ground. Either way unless it is my group, it is none of my concern… at least it shouldn’t be. The problem is that in this fast-paced modern world, when tempers flare we often turn to posting online to rant. (Ranting on i...

I have been thinking a lot about Fair Speech in heathenry for a long time. I first became aware of the concept of Fair Speech when I was studying Beowulf in university. Fair Speech is very much tied to other heathen concepts such as Deeds, and Kinship. All three of these concepts relate to Frith and Grith in a way that is so interwoven that it is impossible to separate them. As such, I will focus on Fair Speech in this post, and bring in the other two as they relate to it when talking about Frith and Grith. My hope is that this ap proach will create a more complete picture of heathenry and these concepts.  Fair Speech in its essence boils down to civility and courtesy, the ability to express oneself without being disruptive to the social order or causing unnecessary offense. Within the tribe this takes the form of having a difference of opinion with one’s Kin, but expressing it in dialogue in such a way that all parties can engage in an open discussion that will neither alien...

So I have been on a bit of a hiatus, but for an important reason. I was getting married. I have had the blog entry below already written but in need of some editing for months, but I have a lot of ideas in the works most of the time. Now was the right time to put it out there, because our marriage speaks further to the topic at hand. We were supposed to be married last July, but of course pandemic times put plans on hold. We were blessed this year to have a small gathering of 26 people, and then through the wonders of modern technology livestream to friends and family all over the world.  Our ceremony was a meaningful and moving combination of our faiths as well bringing in elements of our combined story and emphasizing the importance of family in all its unique forms. At first I wanted to keep faith out of our ceremony, but my spouse wanted his father to say a prayer, and I knew that this would be a very meaningful moment between father and son and that it must happen. As such I a...