Wednesday, November 04, 2009

Christian intolerance in South Africa

Sorry to see that South Africa is about 20 years behind the times in the matter of Christian nutters releasing ridiculous twisted slander about Pagan festivals. And it's a reminder for the rest of us not to remain complacent - extremist Christian slanders are always rumbling along in the background. But it's also important to remember that many many Christians want to live in peace with Pagans and actively promote genuine interfaith dialogue.

Minority Review - The Dance
In the southern hemisphere the feast of Beltain is celebrated on the last day of October and the first day of November around a celebratory 'May'-pole. The dance of the Maypole is a symbolic act of fertility magic in which male and female partners, each holding ribbons attached to a central pillar, dance in opposite directions whilst weaving toward and away from the pole, around an erect pillar of wood decorated with flowers. Maypole dancing is an ancient (pre-Christian) and wide-spread form of western European folk dance.

This year, as every year in living memory in this country under the fascist white Christian Nationalist government, amidst the Beltain celebrations, venerations, joy and laughter in covens and Pagan gatherings across the country, the feint reek of Christian agitation against Pagans once again focussed on Halloween. The agitators? Fanatical followers of Peter Hammond's Africa Christian Action network.

2 comments:

Makarios said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Makarios said...

The problem with these people is that they seem to engage in what I might call an almost pornographic enjoyment of outrage for its own sake. As someone on Digby's blog once remarked, the hamster wheel of their anger isn't designed to go anywhere, but, rather, simply to keep spinning and spinning and spinning. If every Pagan in S.A. were to emigrate to North America, these folks would find some other group to be the target of their venom.