How I fell Out of the Man Box

Throughout most of my life, and certainly my adult life, I have never had any doubts as to who I am, nor have I ever felt deficient, nor penitent about my race or sexual orientation. I just felt that I was an ordinary person with unusual interests and pursuits. I am an elderly white cis-gender heterosexual male living in the post modern United States. I don’t feel any guilt for the prejudice and racism that has been unleashed on blacks or people of color by people of my race, nor the bigotry displayed towards those of other religious persuasions. Despite the fact that I am a product of white privilege, I believe fervently there is enough abundance in the world for everyone to be treated equally, fairly and with dignity. I also believe in the possibility for reparations and affirmative action, along with other programs to fix racial inequality.  I am not politically conservative nor religiously exclusive, since to be this way goes against what I practice and what I myself promote. I don’t have doubts about my sexual preferences, and I don’t feel inadequate as a man nor troubled by my identity as one. I lean towards liberalism, but I am not part of the radical left, in fact I wonder if such a political perspective even exists anymore in our country.

I do take responsibility for racism and bigotry, and I try to address that whenever I encounter it, whether in momentary lapses in myself or in others that are close to me. I try to be mindful of the complexities of human expression and culture, and above all, to try and be open minded and compassionate to everyone. Of course I often fail at that attempt, but I am sensitive about the feelings of others and of my own behavior, and I seek to change when I am shown to be wrong or lacking in compassion for others. In fact, despite my many numerous flaws and inadequacies, I understand myself, my limitations, and seek to find peace with that knowledge. In short, I am who I am, but that’s all that I am. My friends and I call that the Popeye’s creed.

So, how did I manage to escape from all of the cultural pressures and discontinuity that seem to be challenging the definition of what it is to be a man in the world today? I don’t buy into the archetype of masculinity that has dominated the minds of most heterosexual white men, or even men of different races who are heterosexual. Like everyone else, I see the media personages of manly men, and I am amused and entertained by them, but not moved to emulate them in any fashion. Some men have become conservative both politically and religiously because within that mental perspective is a simple definition of manhood that they can easily emulate. Of course, taking that path will cause people to be at odds against the diverse culture that they live in, where plurality and tolerance are required in order to function and interact with others not like themselves. It would seem that accepting such a simple solution has very complex and negative consequences. 

Yet for me and my situation, I got booted out of the Man Box because I identified with being a Witch, a ritual magician and an occultist. I had broken too many taboos and crossed the line in what was acceptable male behavior to earn anything but scorn and derision from any alpha type male. That happened when I was a teenager, and because I could talk to spirits and gods in my head (and I wasn’t crazy), I had no other choice but to follow that path. My high-school peers rejected my choice in religious activity, and I became a pariah wherever I went. There was also something unmanly about being a Witch, since it was an epithet usually associated with nasty, over-bearing, threatening, and decrepit old women. It also had amoral and diabolic associations, marking me as someone who was obviously on the wrong side of just about everything.

Prior to coming out as a Witch to my high-school peers, I had some moderate success joining the high-school football team, but I was definitely B or C team material, and not good enough nor talented enough to be first string. However, I was an accepted part of that crowd of athletes, that is, until I let it be known that I was a Witch and began to dress and act the part. I became a goth before that was even a thing, and my peers, especially the athletic crowd, ridiculed and mocked me. My junior year high-school year-book was tagged with much of this kind of verbal abuse, since I unwittingly let it out of my hands when seeking others to sign it. I soaked up all of the negative attention because I relished letting my true self come out and I openly defied conventions and proper decorum. These were interesting times for me, as you can imagine, but it changed everything for me, and I was no longer considered “one of the guys.” Instead I was seen as that weirdo Witch person, and some women even called me queer, before that epithet became indicative of someone who was either gendered or sexually non-binary.

So, before I even became fully an adult man, I was judged to be not at all manly or even a pretended manliness. Even my short and pathetic stint in the Navy didn’t change that image, in fact it made it worse because I was discharged as unsuitable for military duty. This was before Wicca was an accepted religion in the military and acting as a Witch was wholly unacceptable, and I took that discharge as a release from the limitations, enforced conformity, and regimentation of a military life. By the time that I was 20 years old, I was completely out of any kind of cultural definition of masculinity, and that fact was not only a relief and a way of achieving personal freedom, it was something of a badge of honor for me. I wasn’t like other people, and in fact, I was, in many ways, contrary to what others believed was normal and acceptable behavior. Since I was so outside of the norm, I saw no reason to be prejudiced against others who were also considered outside of the norm, such as gays, lesbians, radical left-wing types, and the hosts of the disenfranchised “Other,” and I was seen as an honorary member of that wonderful but despised group of people.

Gone was the pecking order of men who in groups sought dominance over each other, since I was never considered part of their group, and I had little interest in sports, drinking beer in bars, or attending churches or other expected social gatherings. I was an outsider, but I had no regrets since I was free to associate with whomever I wished, and I didn’t have to deal with the pressures and harsh opinions of my peer group. I didn’t worry about what sports team I was fond of, because I was not part of any group where that mattered. It was the same for me regarding politics and religion.

While white heterosexual men sought to deal with our changing culture, dealing with civil rights, women’s liberation, and then later the “Me Too” movement, and finding that adjustment difficult if not almost contrary to what they perceived as the edifice of manhood, I was completely onboard with these changes. I cheered them on since progressive social changes would mean that I would become more acceptable and mainstream, and some of the cognitive dissonance that I had to deal with would be diminished. While some men struggled or even lost ground with these social changes, I had already actually arrived at that point years earlier. My masculinity was not defined by culture or popular consensus. It was defined by my own inner sense of personal value and an acceptance of who I was at a core level. I had developed my personality without racial prejudice, bigotry, or the need to dominate, and I felt it was acceptable to feel and express my pain or loss in whatever seemed appropriate to me, not caring what others thought. I was notorious for quietly crying when watching the sad or poignant moments in a movie, and that was also true when I lost a pet or a friend. I saw any role that a man or woman might take on to be appropriate, especially if they excelled at it, and this made the stereotyped role models that were pushed when I was growing up as completely irrelevant. 

Additionally, the myths and ideals in my religion supported gender role reversals and promoted equality and equity, even though early forms of Wicca were locked into the High Priestess and High Priest, Goddess and God kind of binary polarity, and allowed for a structure of initiatory hierarchy to be formulated. That proved to be ultimately untenable and it was the old tropes and patterns being forced onto a new religious system. In the present time, the traditional Witchcraft and coven social structure is being replaced by something that is much more egalitarian, and that is more in keeping with the true spirit of Witchcraft than what was earlier established by Gardner and his followers.

I followed this path of Witchcraft throughout its various winding and twisting and saw it become something of a fully realized mystery religion, and as this creed developed, so did I. I started this path back in the early 1970's, before it became a popular religious movement. It was a time when a few hundred of like-minded individuals would gather together in a park or a campground that included some of the various founders of the later expanding traditions. We were a distinct minority, and we were scattered across the country in communities where we were often few or even alone in our pursuits. Isolation often made us peculiar and insular, and without much of a social world in which to meet and greet others of like mind, we were sometimes loners.

My only regret is that taking such a path, and being judged as one of the Others, also meant that it was more difficult for me to find a mate or achieve a long term relationship. While I may have touched many individuals, and initiated many women into the Craft, I was unable to find anyone who wanted to join their life with mine. I found that women in general were mostly keen to remain part of the mainstream establishment, and that in many ways, they were the ones who enabled and maintained it. Whatever rejection and dismissal I got from mainstream white heterosexual men was amplified by white heterosexual women. I was neither socially attractive, handsome, materially successful, nor was I any kind of alpha male that they would identify as a suitable match. So when it came to pairing up, I was left outside and alone. However, I could talk to my Goddess and felt her love, and as it turned out, love was much more my path than fighting, resistance, or anger and hatred.

Unlike the much talked about Incels of today, I didn’t blame or hate women for my predicament. I saw myself as the source of the problem, and I also understood that I was an undefinable quality as a man because of my involvement in Witchcraft and magic. I took the good along with the bad, and knew that in time, I would find someone, or someone would find me. Meanwhile, I had a lot of magical rituals to develop, and continued to engage with my sparse Pagan and Wiccan community, walking a mostly solitary path in the beginning, but over time, seeing the popularity of my path continue to grow. 

All of these experiences made me realize that I could do nothing more than just be myself. I could assume the persona of the Witch and Ritual Magician in social settings if I chose, or just be neutral and reside in the background, unmolested. This realization certainly was active when I began to be exposed to the Men’s Movement in my circle of Pagans and Witches. I found it to be problematical because it seemed to focus on the old themes of masculinity of the past ages, of the warrior, hunter, provider, father soldier, and the various exponents of paternity that I had originally rejected to be a Witch. These old themes seemed no longer relevant in our post modern world, so I felt that the Men’s Movement was not particularly useful in addressing these issues of role assumption. I think that the only thing a Men’s Movement would be able address, as comically as it would seem, would be the mystery of being gendered a male, but even that seemed overly simplified. Having a dick seemed too basic to make up any kind of religious practice, and considering the complexity of gender and that it was no longer perceived as binary, it also seemed to be irrelevant.

What could we, as men, ascribe to in this post modern world that would truly represent our ability to assume any role needed or desired? Roles that were typically associated with women would be just as appropriate as roles that defined the alpha male in the previous age. What role someone assumed was actually completely flexible and could not be confined by stereotypes or even archetypes. We have entered into a brave new world where any static definition for roles or for one’s identity are too limiting and too restrictive. If we reduce all of the social expectations for roles and eliminate the binary definitions to include any and all possibilities, what we are left with is to just to be whoever and whatever we feel is correct and appropriate, with the idea that we can be flexible and change our role whenever circumstances, situations or internal feelings dictate we should. Our world is constantly changing, and we should understand that nothing is either permanent nor fixed regarding our internal being and our cultural persona. Being inflexible and resistant to change is, in my opinion, a recipe for personal disaster.

In the end, roles are just superficial masks that we wear at the moment, and they cannot either define who we are or reveal our inner souls. We are just individuals, functioning both individually and collectively, and we embody our experiences of life, our relationships to others and ourselves over the long or short course of our life span, and that is all who we are, even at a deep spiritual level. We are a mystery of life and death, and learning to accept that fact is the beginning of wisdom. Our individuality and our fragile human existence is buffeted by change, and we, ourselves, are constantly changing. Nothing is permanent nor eternal in our sphere, and everything is ephemeral. If we seek to be truly free, knowing that nothing stays the same and therefore, too great of an attachment to anything brings with it the sorrow and despair of loss, we can live our lives liberated and even enlightened by this knowledge. We must therefore learn to lightly assume roles, follow our life’s path and be who we are without fear or regret, so that we might by guided by love and compassion for everyone and everything, especially ourselves. 

Frater Barrabas

Necessity of Compassion and Empathy in Magic

Typically, magic is about getting something by using oblique or probability bending methodologies. This is particularly true when the object or target of one’s magic is something that is material. Magic has most often concerned itself with achieving some objective or getting something that would be otherwise unobtainable. It could be something that is highly improbable or even impossible, or something that might be obtainable if one’s fortunes were to be weighted slightly in one’s favor. Doing magic for unobtainable or improbable achievements seeks to create what is known as a “black swan event,” where the objective that seems nearly impossible happens in an almost miraculous manner. Since this kind of magic will more often meet with failure than success, what is more commonly sought after is something that is likely to occur.

Magic seeks, therefore, to make something happen, usually for personal and material profit, so it is a particularly self absorbed activity even when it is practiced for someone else’s gain instead of one’s own. Practicing magic for someone else is either a bought and paid for transaction, or one that is done for various personal reasons. The outcome is the same whether that magic is worked for one’s self or another. The action of this kind of magic engages the self and especially the ego, just as it does when we ambitiously seek to advance our material conditions or the conditions of those who are close to us using mundane actions and tools.

None of this is either new nor surprising since it has been a part of magic since the beginning of human culture. Where it becomes a problem is when it is paired with extreme selfishness and a callous disregard for basic human values. Because of the influences of the Christian church, and that western religious culture has always placed a high regard for charity and compassion, magic seemed to be balanced by the need to care for and help others and to do good to one’s fellow human beings, at least those of the same culture and religious persuasion. (The “other” has always been the subject of extreme prejudice and the target for negative magic, but we will cover that in another article.) Even so-called “black magic” was used to achieve justice and material equality in a world where social and financial power assured one of not only active participation in the decisions and rules effecting everyone, but of a kind of protection and insulation from the masses who lacked that power. Even so, black magic was considered an extreme action unsanctioned by the church and the culture at large, whereas white magic was either condoned or at least tolerated. Not too much has changed over the centuries, except for the influence of the Church and the requirement for some kind of charity and compassion. Perhaps the climax of these values are to be found in Christian democratic socialism that has built the social safety nets of the developed nations of the world, and that are now imperiled by the selfish actions of some groups.

The backlash against this institutionalized socialism is the creation of a class of individuals who have taken these institutions for granted and have promoted a kind of a selfish and self-absorbed lust to acquire all of the benefits that these societies have given to everyone but take on none of the responsibilities or civic duties (paying taxes, engaging in the political process and civic discourse) that make such a social contract workable. I am talking, of course, about ideas such as Libertarianism as espoused by Rand and her followers, and taken up by various fascist and proto-fascist movements disguised as a newly emerging popular ultranationalism in Europe and the U.S.

How these two movements have apparently merged is something of a modern mystery, but it would represent the need to tear down the existing socialistic democracies and replace them with one party authoritarian states. This has been made possible by a kind of potent lack of social compassion and empathy that has become manifest amongst the populations of the developed world, pushed as a newly minted perspective in our social media worlds. It has produced a social callousness and a selfish defense of the status quo, where that status quo is promoting an accelerating material and social inequality. It is a time where groups who have achieved much of what the modern world has produced have sought to keep that achievement to themselves and damn the consequences. I find this mind set oddly flourishing amongst people of my generation (the Boomers) and perhaps also amongst those Xer’s who have made it into the upper echelons of the middle class. The millennial generation seems to be more idealistic and inclusive, and I am grateful for that state and I hope it continues. Where my parents generation fought against the fascists of the west and east, my generation seems to be seeking to embrace this mind-set, even though it runs counter to everything that they have been given and benefitted from in a society and a government that has greatly assisted them in some fashion their entire lives.

I won’t delve into the selfish, arrogant stupidity that seems to motivate people into embracing fascism or proto-fascism out of a delusional fear that change in our world will somehow screw them any more than it already has. The pain of change in the last 30 years has been mostly forced on us through the passage of various conservative policies that have benefited the wealthy elite and damaged the middle class. What will change (hopefully) is that a certain group of people (white, protestant, male) will no longer be able to depend on maintaining their privilege. Instead, it will be society that treats everyone as equals, based, one would assume, on the principles of our cultural institutions and our constitution. That is a just and equitable solution to mitigate a drastically emerging social and material inequality, and help people deal with the profound changes that AI and automation will have on our world, not to mention the drastic changes needed to mitigate climate change.

We truly need in these times a powerful government to meet and resolve these challenges, and that government needs to represent and seek to aid equally all of its citizens, and in addition, the populations of the world. The world needs a strong western developed world to help it deal with its problems as well, since failing to do so will ensure our eventual extinction as a species. There is no place in our nation or the world for the kind of selfishness provided by ultra-nationalistic and totalitarian governments. What we really need is a world government working together with the various nations to deal with global issues.

Opposing any kind of collective or global cooperation is a resurgence of nationalism, which is merely a cover for extreme selfishness and self-preservation of the status quo. This kind of callous “me-first-ism and the hell with everyone else” mind-set has also, to some extent, infected the practice of magic in the west. We live in a culture where compassion for anyone outside of one’s political tribe or clique is practically non-existent. Therefore, magic is practiced as one more mechanism to gain that coveted place of isolated material and social comfort where the disenfranchised masses can be safely ignored. It is a way to fantasize about gaining unearned wealth and power when it is mostly probable that one will achieve what is more likely based on one’s already established station in life. Practical magic is the supposed great material equalizer, or so it is advertised, but it is getting harder to make miracles happen in the material world using magic, and probably a lot more profitable to just cheat and cut corners. While the window of opportunity is closing for most people, it also occurring in a stealthy manner while the masses fight each other for the leftover scraps after the rich and powerful have feasted.

While it is possible to fall from the economic station of one’s birth, it is getting less likely to step far above that same station. Social and material mobility has slowed down, and the number of newly made high-tech millionaires has likely already peaked, particularly if the power-elite are successful in creating a servant class out of the middle class. You can’t exclusively benefit from your own inventions unless you have the economic freedom to be outside of the corporate sponsored sphere of patronage and ownership, or somehow gain a large share of the profits of such endeavors.  I suspect that the current interest in magic might in part be due to the lack of opportunities for social and material mobility. However, magic cannot be expected to make dramatic changes in one’s life station if the possibilities for such expansion are closed.

Yet in this world of cut-throat competition, where the wily find ways to cheat, scheme and manipulate events, and the ethical just get screwed by those who are rapaciously ambitious; it would seem that compassion and empathy are weaknesses that need to be either suppressed or eliminated. Caring for the poor, the disenfranchised, the victim, or the “other” is just not tenable. Having feelings or caring about those who you are not close to is to be defined (by the successful others) as a sucker - a fool who unwittingly desires to be played, used and discarded just like all the rest of the masses out there in the world. Some modern politicians like to make these easily identifiable “others” as the enemy, when they are really just the sad victims of calamity and evil circumstances. Yet that is a distraction to the real screwing that is going on right in front of us every day. Yes - we are being screwed whether we know it or not.

When idiots rant about the racial superiority of the white European world, or the need to preserve “White Christian” values in our culture, that people of color get too many unearned benefits, or refugees who come to our country fleeing horrifying social conditions and threats against their lives are somehow suspected terrorists or undesirables stealing jobs from privileged citizens, they are listened to and commented upon by the media as if they were somehow speaking wisely. They are not called by many of these same media pundits as racists, misogynists, fascists, or religious bigots; but they should be called out as such and rejected by one and all. (Even better, their words shouldn’t be quoted at all.) What this shows is that we no longer seem to feel badly about what is happening to other people who are not directly connected to us - that misplaced “other-ness” that makes them an existential evil. There is a lack of compassion operating in our culture, and an inability to empathize with others who are suffering, particularly if they are part of the population that occupy that inhumane definition of people as the “other.”

What drives this lack of compassion is aversion and the passions of focused hatred that seems to be bottomless and lacking any kind of moral compass or boundaries. Yet impassioned hatred cannot be represented as any kind of strength, superiority or power. It is, in fact, the grossest kind of weakness and pathetic human need for the preservation of one’s own tribe as the expense of everyone and everything else in the world. It is a delusional lust for power driven by fear and ignorance, and these forces in human nature are completely the opposite of anything having to do with real magic, or any kind of spirituality.

When a magician thinks of doing ill in the world by using magic to benefit himself or his tribe at the expense of other people then it weakens and profoundly diminishes whatever good he might believe he is doing. In fact, it weakens magic as a form of occult practice. This rule cuts into the idea of using magic against others for individual or tribal gain, whatever the justification. If you are going to curse your enemies, steal from them or cross them in some manner, even if it is for good reasons, it ends up pushing the overall tone of magic down and creates a spiraling downdraft counter force. A lifetime of negative magic not only weakens and diminishes the individual performing it, but it also has a negative impact on the social domain of magic as a whole. The cartoon-like character of the “black” magician who is completely corrupt, depraved and empty of any human-like qualities or virtues does have an element of truth within it, and it typically leads to a terrible but justifiable self-destruction.

It would seem then that if aversion represents a great weakness in our world, then love could be considered its opposite, thereby being the greatest strength. Instead of being based on aversion, delusion and ignorance it is based on compassion, understanding and clarity of vision. It takes courage to love others, particularly those who are not part of one’s family or tribe. It takes an open mind that is not stained by prejudice to feel empathy for others, and allow one’s self to expand to include everyone and everything in the embrace of knowing and understanding. To follow such a path is difficult and it would seem that the greatest challenge facing any individual or group of humans is to be able to pass the threshold of selfishness, even for a moment, to realize the suffering and pain of others who have no connection to one’s self.

Yet the overall rewards for such a crossing over are great, since it not only ennobles the individual and takes them to a higher plane of being, but it makes the world, at least in a small way, a better place. When love becomes the backbone of magical workings then the magician who practices it becomes evolved in a manner that is empowering and expanding. It leads to a kind of personal and collective ascension, and this would seem to be the goal of all world religions. It reduces the suffering of the world and helps to foster the characteristics that ultimately lead to a form of individual and collective enlightenment, which should be the ultimate goal of magic and the mystical elements of every religion. The key words to love being the core of magic is empathy, acceptance, mindfulness (openness and acceptance), clarity of vision and above all, compassion.    

My message is to say that compassion is a truly great power, and that if we have lost or misplaced that quality then it shows how lacking our culture (or magical practice) has become. I don’t think it is completely lost so much as it is omitted or suppressed as a so-called practical approach to living in our post-modern world. However lost or misplaced in our society at present, when it is omitted in magic, it makes the operations of said magic weak, ego-bound, diminished in scope and lacking in vision. 

Performing magic to project ill into the world, however justified, darkens the world; but projecting good into the world through magic diminishes suffering and lightens the world. How do we determine such a supposedly subjective and relative value such as good or ill in our magic? We determine this by measuring what we do and how we work for ourselves and our clan against the needs of the many and the “other.” Is our magic selfish or selfless; does it promote the greater good or does it promote the individual or the tribe at the expense of everyone else. 

A compassionate magic believes that there is enough material and spiritual wealth in the world to benefit everyone; that we can have our fulfillment and find our place in the world without having to rob others of their fulfillment. An averse magic believes that there are extreme limitations to the world - both materially and spiritually. That one must cheat, steal, plunder and dominate in order to acquire one’s fulfillment in the world and to maintain that dominance at all costs.

Finally, the question that all magicians must ask themselves is whether they believe in a compassionate or an averse kind of magic. Over time, you will know the magician from what he or she becomes as they live in the world day by day, and what kind of magic they believe in and practice.

Frater Barrabbas      

Terrible Death of a Thelemite

Last month I had heard that one of my acquaintances from long ago was murdered in his home in Columbia, MO. That individual was Brian Daniels, who I had met during my interlude in Kansas City, back in around 1985 to 1986. His half-sister introduced us and told me that we had a lot in common with each other. When I spent some time with Mr. Daniels, I found him to be quite harmlessly demented, perhaps even a borderline psychotic. Brian implored me to invoke Satan so that he could meet him, because he believed that the Devil was his real father. I also heard that Brian had performed his own kind of Satanic Mass, blessing the wine and hosts in the name of the Devil and inviting demons to enter into them, and then at the climax of the rite, greedily consuming them. His reasons for doing this is that he wanted to become completely possessed by the Devil.

I found Brian to be something of a nut-case and refused to have anything further to do with him. Even though he was quite delusional, I thought that he was also quite harmless. Brian never hurt anyone, nor was he was ever violent or even vocal about his apparent off-putting mental problems. However, I didn’t invite him to be a part of the then forming Order of the Gnostic Star, and I also declined to either initiate or even ordain him, as he had apparently hoped. In fact, I tried to convince him to get out of the occult altogether and get some help for his obvious mental instability. He found that to be quite funny and still had hopes that I would relent.

Brian passed out of my life once he determined that I wasn’t going to enable his delusions, and from what I understood, he moved on to other pursuits. Once in while, one of my acquaintances would tell me something that they had heard about Mr. Daniels. I had heard, for instance, that he had moved to Columbia to study at the university there, but never pursued a degree. For those who might not know this little fact, Columbia is the capitol of the state of Missouri. Another time, I had heard that he had been involved in a terrible apartment fire and that he had barely escaped with his life. There had been some issue with the smoke alarm detectors not having been properly installed and failing to go off, and that Brian had received a considerable sum of money as a form of compensation. Apparently, the fire had left him disfigured and crippled one of his arms and one of his legs, making him rather incapable of either getting or keeping a job. As a disabled person, he earned disability coverage for life as well as being the recipient of quite a windfall from the ensuing lawsuit.

From what I understood, Brian pursued his passion for magical artifacts. He ordered artistically produced magical tools from various local artisans, and he also collected and sold valuable artifacts on Ebay. From what I had heard, he had grown out of being a diabolical seeker to one that was firmly in the Thelemic camp. I don’t know if he ever joined the OTO or received any initiations in that or any other organization, but he did delight in projecting a kind of creepy, occult image of himself in a town that was probably quite conservative, despite the presence of the State Capitol and the University. If anyone had ever asked me what I thought about Brian Daniels, I would have said that he was a harmless crank. So, that’s the most of what I remember about him back in the days when I lived in Kansas City; and that is all that I remember hearing about him since those days from folks with whom I have met whenever traveling up that way. 

Then I read in an April edition of the “Wild Hunt - Unleash the Hounds (Link Roundup)” a news item that Brian Daniels was found shot to death in his home in Columbia on April 10th. I was a bit shocked to read this news item, so I followed the links and verified that indeed, this was the Brian Daniels that I had known. You can find a newspaper article about the murder and its early investigation here. However, a few days later, Brian’s alleged lover, house-keeper and intimate friend (who even had the power of attorney) was accused of the murder. Two other suspects were also arrested for lying to investigators. You can read about the whole sordid affair here. Even despite the controversy associated with Brian Daniel’s life and his rather lurid public persona of being a Thelemite and a closet Satanist, the local newspaper wrote an op-ed on his life that was quite fair and open minded. That impressed me and it also gave me hope that maybe there is some degree of compassion in the world for those who are not normal, particularly in a part of the U.S., which is not known for its compassion to pagans, witches and occultists. Yes, they painted him as some kind of crackpot occultist, but at least the human behind the facade was also noted. I am sure that Brian Daniels would have relished the attention that he is posthumously getting, since it shows him to have finally achieved his desire of being one of those infamous forbidden left-hand path magicians and occultists. Yet part of me feels sad about the whole ugly affair.

However we judge Brian Daniels, he deserved to live out his full life without being murdered. It is an object lesson to all occultists that we need to ensure our own safety and well-being, despite the capriciousness of fate and that bad things do happen every day. It is also sad because even though Brian was one of those individuals who delighted in the “ooky-spooky” aspects of the occult, he was essentially harmless. Whether or not he was ever able to deal with his lifetime of mental problems and serious psychological defects will never be known. His story will remain basically untold, but one can assume that such troubles are never fully eliminated, and they may have contributed to the obvious poor choices that he made in regards to the affairs of the heart. Those poor choices prematurely ended his life; but I suspect that he was likely also lonely and without family support and care, and this can lead nearly anyone to make bad choices as far as friends and lovers are concerned. May whatever Deities were in alignment to Brian Daniels at the end assoil his troubled spirit and keep him in a place of peace forever. 

All of this is, of course, quite sobering to me, and it shows that human nature is fragile, relationships and trust must be given to those who are truly worthy, and that life is precious. We must guard ourselves from the iniquities of those who would do us egregious harm, and seek the blessings of the Gods to ensure that this state is maintained.

Frater Barrabbas

Update: Jefferson City is the Capitol of Missouri, not Columbia. My mistake.

Wrath of God or Natural Causes?

An earthquake with a magnitude of 7.0 on the Richter scale rocked the island of Haiti on Tuesday, near the capital of Port-au-Prince, causing enormous devastation to an island nation already afflicted with endemic poverty. While we can feel empathy for those who are suffering, and perhaps dip into our pockets to send money to various aid agencies, some seem to think that the cause of this disaster is the wrath of God. One of the most notable U.S. televangelists, Pat Robertson, went so far as to say that the destruction was due to the fact that Haiti is cursed because it's aligned with Satan. In other words, God sent the earthquake to Haiti to punish the Haitians. I quote an article from Huffington Post:

‘Televangelist Pat Robertson said Wednesday that earthquake-ravaged Haiti has been "cursed" by a "pact to the devil."’

Such a statement made by a well known public pundit seems totally absurd if it weren’t also an indication of tragic callousness and sectarianism. Haitians tend to be Catholic and their alternative religion, Voudoun, is unfortunately notorious, particularly for those who know little about it. The fact that an important spokesman for the religious right has shown himself to be incapable of feeling any compassion or concern for the suffering of fellow human beings is astonishing, but not really surprising. There is an implied notion that when something happens to people who are not the same color or religion as oneself, that care and compassion is thwarted by xenophobia and disassociation. It’s almost as if compassion occurs only if the people afflicted are one’s own race, religion or nation. This kind of sentiment is outrageous and deserves to be harshly criticized. But the underlying spiritual perspective is even more disturbing.

A similar occurrence happened a few years ago when a tsunami struck parts of Indonesia and Thailand. Some folks talked about the wrath of God or that people were punished for being hedonistic and not pious enough in their spiritual practices. It would seem that whenever a natural disaster strikes, human beings apply all sorts of causes and reasons for it, many of them invoking the “hand of God”, fate, karma or some kind of spiritual retribution.

This implies that the concept of God in many places in the world is such that every infraction, impiety, blaspheme, or sinful behavior is somehow recorded, aggregated and when a certain threshold is achieved, a natural disaster is triggered to collectively punish everyone, sinner and pious adherent alike. The fact that natural disasters are caused by nature and not by a supernatural agency doesn’t seem to affect people’s thoughts and opinions one bit. Such a concept is almost medieval in its apparent superstitious perspective, representing as it does, a terrible, vengeful, omniscient and omnipotent creator Deity. However, my personal experiences with Spirit in association with ritual magick causes me to reject this troubling dogmatic belief.

My recent successful invocation of my Higher Self via the Bornless One rite has led me to realize that all spiritual phenomena are sensed through it, and that without it, I would have no sense of Spirit or Godhead whatsoever. The fashioning of the universe and the evolution of life may very well be autonomous processes that have nothing to do with any Deity or universal intelligence. However, the nature of the human soul and the development of higher consciousness over the millennia is certainly the domain of Spirit and provenance of the Godhead.

Pagans tend to think of nature itself as a Deity, but we can only approach this aspect of Spirit through our higher selves, since any other direct contact might be impossible. We could certainly admit that there is likely a godhead aspect associated with the bio-sphere, and some have even given it a name, calling it Gaia. Collectives of various types seem to produce egregores of some kind and cultural thought forms appear to function as autonomous entities. However, we comprehend the world through our own spiritual essence. We also appear to project our spiritual beliefs and perspectives on the world. What this means is that while there undoubtedly is some kind of universal aspect of Spirit, how it manifests itself is not really known. It typically appears in the form that we expect it, as if our spiritual beliefs and perspectives produce an over-powering bias. This is the reason why sectarian arguments are so hotly contested, with each side believing that they are correct, and also why they are usually impossible to resolve one way or the other. All opinions about the Godhead are true, but they are also incomplete and can be misleading if taken as an absolute truth.

To imbue all natural disasters with a supernatural element, making them the direct actions of the Deity, produces a being that is cold, cruel, capricious and murderous to all forms of life. Is that the kind of Deity that we would want to worship? The emotions of jealousy, spite, vengeance, hatred, anger, and violence represents all that is considered negative and bad in human nature. Why would we imbue our impressions of the Deity with those kinds of negative sentiments? Nature is profoundly neutral and unbiased. Living creatures are born, live and die every day of the year. Some die of natural causes, some are killed and eaten as prey, some die accidental deaths or by disease and others die as a result of natural catastrophe. There is nothing either supernatural or mysterious about these occurrences. In the natural world, dying is as much a part of life as living.

When thousands of people tragically perish due to an earthquake, tsunami, volcanic eruption, floods, hurricanes, tornadoes, pandemic outbreaks or any other natural occurrence, we should feel sad and compassionate about the fate of the survivors and the loss of so much life. Such an event is a time of sadness, but it’s also a time when human beings can show their love for each other despite differences, rendering necessary aid and comfort. Emotions like love, care, compassion, self-sacrifice and forgiveness represent all the sentiments that we value as the very height of human goodness. If we believe in a supreme being, would that entity not at the very least embody all that is good and the very best of human nature? I believe that this is an important question. The mystics talk about spiritual union, love and devotion, which seems to describe the very core of the Deity. There is nothing of hatred, anger or violence in their discussions, poetry and songs of God. So we could construe from this that all such negative sentiments are not part of the Union of All Being. Only love, which is the highest human sentiment, would seem to fit that representation.

When nature produces disasters, people are injured or die just because they happen to be in the way of earth’s titanic forces. They are unwitting victims, and as such, they deserve our compassion, love and aid, regardless of their color, nationality or creed.

(I have given $50 to the International Red Cross. I would recommend others to be as generous as well.)

Frater Barrabbas