Just a few thoughts
Dec. 26th, 2021 01:17 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
brenainnAnother year is nearly over. As I’ve gotten older, time certainly does seem to have sped up. Yet, I don’t seem a lot wiser. It almost feels as though time flies by too quickly for me to really think over my experiences and learn something from them. Or perhaps I’m just not making the effort to do so. I hope to change that. So, I’m going to use this inaugural post to kind of reflect on the last two years or so of my life.
The last two years or so have certainly been different from many of the recent years of my life. I’ve experienced more growth and change over the last 18 to 24 months than I have in a long, long time. Perhaps the impetus for this growth began with the death of my father at the end of 2019 and the death of my brother-in-law in early 2020. These losses were devastating, and they left me feeling very lost and uncertain in life.
For most of my life, I’ve had a tendency toward spirituality and religion. But the religion that I had practiced up to this point in my life had been very superficial and shallow. It was the kind of mainstream Catholicism that is hard to distinguish from the mainline liberal Protestant denominations. I don’t wish to offend anyone but the spirituality and depth of these modernist churches is just a thin veneer over a core that is hardly distinguishable from atheism and secular humanism.
So a spiritual journey was begun, one that I’m still very much on. Maybe I’ve always been on it, and the events of the recent past have only made me recognize that I’m on a journey. Regardless, I’ve seen my religious beliefs and practices change significantly over the last year or so. The journey led me to realize a few things: there are many gods out there, there are many spiritual beings besides angels and demons in the world, and magic is a very real thing.
The writings of John Michael Greer were very influential in this realization. His book, “A World Full of Gods,” was especially helpful in convincing me of the existence of many gods. In addition to his work, a book by Steven Dillon, “The Case for Polytheism,” was an excellent supplemental work that further strengthened my confidence in polytheism. This was perhaps the case because a good deal of Dillon’s book utilizes philosophical arguments that have their basis in Aristotelian-Thomism. I’m fairly familiar with this form of philosophy, and Dillon’s adaptation of it in service of polytheism was masterful, and it was well received by me.
John Michael Greer’s work extends into areas beyond merely polytheism, of course. He’s got quite a diverse body of work out there. Some of it is on the occult and magic. And this was especially helpful to me. I encountered an understanding of magic and the occult that made sense, and that allowed me to begin some simple magical practices that have led to my own TSW moments. I was especially pleased to see that magic does not need to be taken on faith. All one has to do is practice it, and see the results for themselves.
And that’s really the gist of it. The realization that many gods and other lesser spiritual powers are out there, and how to use magic to improve my life have been the major changes that I’ve experienced over the last year. The effects have been profound, though. Unlike the modernist spirituality that I had previously been practicing, this has actually placed me in better contact with the Holy Trinity. It has led me to a more fruitful Catholic practice.
That might surprise some. I have not rejected Catholicism. On the contrary, I feel even more committed to my Catholic faith and practice than I did as the typical pew sitter who nominally endorses Jesus Christ, a watered down pluralism and ecumenism, and the joyless modernist rituals of present-day Christianity. It was certainly an unexpected outcome, but one that I’m very pleased with. I look forward to what I will learn and how I will grow in the coming year. Life has meaning, and purpose, and depth that I have only begun to explore.
The last two years or so have certainly been different from many of the recent years of my life. I’ve experienced more growth and change over the last 18 to 24 months than I have in a long, long time. Perhaps the impetus for this growth began with the death of my father at the end of 2019 and the death of my brother-in-law in early 2020. These losses were devastating, and they left me feeling very lost and uncertain in life.
For most of my life, I’ve had a tendency toward spirituality and religion. But the religion that I had practiced up to this point in my life had been very superficial and shallow. It was the kind of mainstream Catholicism that is hard to distinguish from the mainline liberal Protestant denominations. I don’t wish to offend anyone but the spirituality and depth of these modernist churches is just a thin veneer over a core that is hardly distinguishable from atheism and secular humanism.
So a spiritual journey was begun, one that I’m still very much on. Maybe I’ve always been on it, and the events of the recent past have only made me recognize that I’m on a journey. Regardless, I’ve seen my religious beliefs and practices change significantly over the last year or so. The journey led me to realize a few things: there are many gods out there, there are many spiritual beings besides angels and demons in the world, and magic is a very real thing.
The writings of John Michael Greer were very influential in this realization. His book, “A World Full of Gods,” was especially helpful in convincing me of the existence of many gods. In addition to his work, a book by Steven Dillon, “The Case for Polytheism,” was an excellent supplemental work that further strengthened my confidence in polytheism. This was perhaps the case because a good deal of Dillon’s book utilizes philosophical arguments that have their basis in Aristotelian-Thomism. I’m fairly familiar with this form of philosophy, and Dillon’s adaptation of it in service of polytheism was masterful, and it was well received by me.
John Michael Greer’s work extends into areas beyond merely polytheism, of course. He’s got quite a diverse body of work out there. Some of it is on the occult and magic. And this was especially helpful to me. I encountered an understanding of magic and the occult that made sense, and that allowed me to begin some simple magical practices that have led to my own TSW moments. I was especially pleased to see that magic does not need to be taken on faith. All one has to do is practice it, and see the results for themselves.
And that’s really the gist of it. The realization that many gods and other lesser spiritual powers are out there, and how to use magic to improve my life have been the major changes that I’ve experienced over the last year. The effects have been profound, though. Unlike the modernist spirituality that I had previously been practicing, this has actually placed me in better contact with the Holy Trinity. It has led me to a more fruitful Catholic practice.
That might surprise some. I have not rejected Catholicism. On the contrary, I feel even more committed to my Catholic faith and practice than I did as the typical pew sitter who nominally endorses Jesus Christ, a watered down pluralism and ecumenism, and the joyless modernist rituals of present-day Christianity. It was certainly an unexpected outcome, but one that I’m very pleased with. I look forward to what I will learn and how I will grow in the coming year. Life has meaning, and purpose, and depth that I have only begun to explore.
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