I just started this book. It is the second book about paganism I've started. I have been lost in the realm of religion for awhile now, so I began looking for a home. Once I started reading about paganism it started calling to me. I'm hoping this book will also call to me and help with some unanswered questions I've had....

hmmm... I'd be interested to know what your questions are... if you don't mind revealing them here.

Bizbuff wrote:

I have been lost in the realm of religion for awhile now, so I began looking for a home. Once I started reading about paganism it started calling to me.

I love paganism too. The old religion before Christianity. It has had a bad press. There is something 'grounding' (in a good way) about it. It is a religion of celebration. Not too many 'thou shalt nots'. It is a joyous experience, so do enjoy it.

I would like to recommend, 'The Spiral Dance' by Starhawk.

arukiyomi- I am a very open minded person and I have a strange set of beliefs. I believe in evolution, but I believe that something/someone had to start it all....I also believe that there is more to this world than meets the eye (magic.) I am not athiest but I do not believe in the Christian "God". I do believe in things I cannot see so i would be a hippocrite to claim athiesm. Sometimes I think I should just start my own religion! So my questions are, "do my beliefs fit in here?" Either way it's been interesting reading up on it.

Thanks for the suggestion Penelope!

thanks for sharing. I know nothing about paganism so I'd be interested to hear whether what you are reading does fit your beliefs.

Bizbuff wrote:

So my questions are, "do my beliefs fit in here?"

It is not a question of fitting in. This is a place for 'freethinkers'. Chris, the owner, is an atheist and so are many of its moderators and supporters. We do not sit around nodding in agreement.

Because they are non-believers, they are willing to let us bounce our ideas around, and sometimes can be quite abrassive in their responses; therefore, it is a place where one feels compelled to be as honest and truthful as one can muster. They are very good 'bullshit' detectors. I find it very refreshing.

The honesty on here is a breath of fresh air. The need to put our ideas/beliefs into writing clarifies thought.

Hello, Bizbuff!

Welcome to booktalk!

I am a very open minded person and I have a strange set of beliefs. I believe in evolution, but I believe that something/someone had to start it all....I also believe that there is more to this world than meets the eye (magic.) I am not athiest but I do not believe in the Christian "God". I do believe in things I cannot see so i would be a hippocrite to claim athiesm. Sometimes I think I should just start my own religion! So my questions are, "do my beliefs fit in here?" Either way it's been interesting reading up on it.

Open minded is certainly the place to be! With anything, i try to come at it from the angle of what evidence is there that i should believe, rather than does this and that fit my belief. Because if it turns out that my beliefs have no footing, then i will be obliged to change them.

I think if you dig into physics a bit you'll find no shortage of "magical” and inspiring insights to reality, all with the added benefit that it can be demonstrated to be true! And that doesn’t bar things which can’t be seen.

For magic, take a moment to think about this:
If you got into a space ship and traveled at 99.99999999 percent the speed of light you could leave our galaxy and travel all the way to Andromeda, our nearest galactic neighbor and it would feel like 50 years to you. If your children wanted to see home, they could make the return trip in another 50 years (for them) and when they stepped out onto earth 6 million years would have passed on the planet.

Your children could see the far distant future of the planet through relativistic time travel!

I’ve been working on this and if you are interested I could explain how that works in pretty simple terms without ever putting up an equation, but I won’t dive into it here.

I have a pretty fun discussion of evolution here:

http://www.booktalk.org/yes-evolution-t8939.html

Which you might get a kick out of.

Welcome and glad to have ya!

Thanks for all the points of view! It sounds like I could learn a lot from all of you!