NIC VOICE News Update 06-27-2005 New voices emerge in pulpit swap Sunday - Wiccans included in interfaith exchange marking Sept. 11 anniversary

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Trinity United Methodist Church, Austin, TX September 2004 Newsletter Item

The Spirituality of the Tarot - This four week class will be led by (name omitted). The tarot is a set of 78 illustrated cards that originated in Italy in the 15th century. Originally the cards were used for a game like bridge. Later they became known for fortune telling. Beyond those uses, the cards have a deeper meaning as a roadmap to our individual journeys of personal and spiritual development. The class will cover the history of the cards, a description of various tarot decks and a discussion of how the pictures depicted help us to understand our lives. A common format for tarot reading will be introduced, to help participants look at situations in their lives from different perspectives. There is one recommended book: "The Complete Illustrated Guide to the Tarot" by Rachel Pollack. If you have your own tarot deck, bring it to the first class. If not wait and purchase one after you have had a chance to see a variety of decks in the first class.

This church defines itself as supporting "Creation Spirituality" - -

Trinity's Statement Regarding Creation Spirituality

Trinity's clergy support Creation Spirituality, a movement that draws on ancient spiritual traditions and contemporary science to awaken authentic mysticism, revitalize Christianity and Western culture, and promote social and ecological justice. Creation Spirituality teaches that God permeates all things and that humanity is created blessed, not tainted by original sin. In this paradigm, Christ is God's liberating and reconciling energy, transforming individuals and society's structures into conduits of compassion. As we embody God's love, we become the Creation that God intends.

Creation Spirituality draws on the earliest traditions of the Hebrew Bible and has been celebrated under various names over the centuries, most notably by the Rhineland Christian mystics of medieval Europe. It is an eclectic tradition that honors women's wisdom and the cosmologies of indigenous cultures around the planet. Creation Spirituality seeks to revitalize contemporary worship by asking what would happen if, instead of requiring artists to conform to established worship practices, Christian worship adapted to the creativity of artists.

New voices emerge in pulpit swap Sunday

Wiccans included in interfaith exchange marking Sept. 11 anniversary

By Eileen E. Flynn

AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF

Monday, September 13, 2004

It's almost 9 a.m. at Trinity United Methodist Church on Sunday, and Tom Davis, a Wiccan, is looking for the sun. In a few moments, he will cast the circle, pointing to each direction and invoking the four elements: earth, air, fire and water. He starts by facing east.

"By the earth that is her body," Davis declares as light pours through a stained-glass window behind him. "By the air that is her breath. By the fire of her bright spirit. By the waters of her living womb."

For the congregation of the church, at 600 E. 50th St., a witch leading worship isn't scandalous. It isn't even that unusual.

Trinity members have hosted American Indian shamans, Buddhist priests and other faith leaders, including Wiccans, before. They even practice their own pagan-inspired rituals at services.

"It's not my way or hell," said Trinity member Linda Eldredge. "All are welcome here. Everybody's got something to offer."

But for Davis and the Live Oak Local Council of the Covenant of the Goddess he represents, Sunday marked an important, albeit small, step toward inclusion as new members of Austin Area Interreligious Ministries, an interfaith group that voted this year to accept Wiccans.

Davis wasn't the only person of faith building bridges Sunday. At churches, synagogues, mosques and other local houses of worship, clergy relinquished their pulpits to leaders of other faiths for a "pulpit swap," a project organized by Interreligious Ministries to commemorate the third anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks and to build on relationships that emerged in 2001 when people from different religions made an effort to befriend Muslims and learn about Islam.

"I don't think as a nation we've figured out what to do with September 11," said the Rev. Tim Tutt, United Christian Church pastor and president of the Interreligious Ministries' board of directors. "This is AAIM's best attempt to create a living memorial."

Christians and Jews shared their sacred space with Muslims, Hindus and Bahais, and more exchanges are planned in the coming weeks.

The Rev. Gerald Mann, pastor of Riverbend Church, a large Baptist congregation in West Austin, hosted Imam Safdar Razi, spiritual leader of Islamic Ahlul Bayt Association, on Sunday. Although Mann thinks his flock is open-minded, he said he also knows that prejudice and ignorance can plague any community.

"Here I am with a Ph.D. and studied in philosophy of religion," he said, "and I'm 66 years old, and this is the first time I read the Quran."

Mann added that he was surprised to find many familiar stories from the Bible in the Muslim holy book, examples of the two faiths' commonality that he and Razi shared Sunday.

At Trinity, Davis, a former Methodist, started with the most basic similarity: "We are a people of faith," he said, "and that's hard for some folks to get their minds around."

Wiccans, who are part of a pagan tradition that predates Christianity, celebrate nature and the divine, which they see as both male and female. They tend to believe in reincarnation, Davis said, and have their own version of the golden rule: "If it harm none, do as you will."

After the service, Davis noted the dread of sharing one's identity in public. Just as some of Trinity's gay members fear the consequences of coming out of the closet with their sexuality, he said, Wiccans have a metaphor for their own situation: coming out of the broom closet.

The expression is an example, Wiccan Gordon Fossum said, of the mix of mirth and reverence his faith embodies. Earlier that morning, Fossum had jokingly invoked the "Goddess Caffeina" to get the church's coffee maker brewing.

Wearing a silver pentacle necklace and sipping from a Garfield mug, Fossum shrugged.

"If a religion can't laugh at itself, it's got some work to do," he said.

Demythologizing Wicca at Trinity isn't Davis' greatest challenge. But Trinity's pastor, the Rev. Sid Hall, said Wiccans' participation in the interfaith community may "open up the dialogue to see how Christianity has walked a very tight line with both diminishing pagan roots and Celtic roots and yet incorporating (them) when it was convenient."

Over the centuries, Hall said, Christians have condemned paganism as evil while infusing Easter and Christmas with pagan symbols.

The real challenge, Tutt said, is engaging people outside of Interreligious Ministries, whose members are made up primarily of like-minded liberal congregations. Members must agree not to proselytize to each other, a rule that has sent some clergy packing. And the inclusion of Wiccans also sparked dissent.

The Rev. David Bernard, pastor of New Life United Pentecostal Church in North Austin, plans to end his membership because of the proselytizing ban and the inclusion of Wiccans.

"The beliefs and values of the Wiccans are antithetical to biblical Christianity," Bernard said. "We respect them as fellow humans and fellow citizens, and we teach respect for their civil rights and religious freedoms. However, since we have nothing in common religiously, it does not appear that either of us could profit from a religious association together."

Tutt still holds out hope for the possibility of other interfaith connections that the pulpit swap might inspire.

"Maybe someone will see that Imam Razi is speaking at Riverbend," he said, "and some other large Baptist church in town will think, 'If Riverbend can do that, we should do that, too.' "

Additional Links of Interest at Trinity UMC:

Links Relating to Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgendered  Related to the Methodist Church

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RECOMMENDED ADDITIONAL READING: 

Christian response to WITCHCRAFT, WICCA AND NEOPAGANISM from CANA, Christian Answers to the New Age
by Marcia Montenegro
First written in 1995