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Pagans are reviving the polytheistic religions of the ancient Greeks,and other civilizations.
Beliefnet ^ | August 15th, 2003 | Kimberly Winston

Posted on 08/15/2004 10:12:22 PM PDT by missyme

This year, Andrea Berman will watch the Olympics for the first time in her life. But she doesn't care who will jump the highest, run the farthest or swim the fastest. She'll be watching the games—being held this year in Greece, their ancestral home—for any mention of Zeus, Athena or Apollo.

"I will watch it to see if anything even remotely resembles anything I would know as an ancient ritual and tradition," Berman said. "But I kind of have mixed feelings. On one hand it will be great to see ancient traditions represented. But on the other hand, I know what the country of Greece thinks of our religion and people there who want to do this do not have the religious freedom to do it."

"This" is worship the Greek gods. Berman is a Hellenic reconstructionist–a practitioner of the religion of ancient Greece. A spare bedroom in her Boston area apartment is decorated as a temple room with statues of Apollo, Pan, Artemis, Dionysus and Eros. And like all Hellenic reconstructionists, she knows the original Olympics were not just a massive sportsfest, but a religious rite central to the worship of Zeus, chief among the Greek gods.

Reconstructionists are a group of neo-pagans–people who look to pre-Christian cultures for their faith–different branches of which worship the gods of ancient Norse, Roman, Egyptian, and Druid peoples. And while scholars say their numbers are only a fraction of the neo-pagan community, they also say they are a vibrant illustration of the rejection of traditional religion in the United States. And, in a curious boomerang effect, they are part of a movement away from the more eclectic forms of neo-paganism, like Wicca, taken up by pagan pioneers in the 1960s and 1970s.

"Reconstructionist groups seem to be kind of in the middle," said Sean McCloud a professor of religion and modern culture at the University of North Carolina in Charlotte. "On the one hand they want to embrace a coherent religion where they are not making things up. On the other hand, it is not the religion of their parents."

That is certainly true of Berman, a 26-year-old web developer who was raised in a non-religious home by a Jewish father and a Catholic mother. As a young teenager, she practiced Wicca. By college, she was into Celtic spirituality, but moved to the Greek gods literally overnight when, she recalled, a god appeared to her in a dream and said, "I am Apollo. You belong to me."

On a Saturday afternoon in July, Berman, known in her faith as Kyrene Ariadne, dressed in a long silky skirt of blue roses to join three likeminded worshippers and a guest to mark the Bouphonia, or Greek new year. The two men and three women assembled in the hall outside the temple room and chanted together from a prepared script:

"Hestia, tender of the hearth, first among gods, you sit at the center; steadily burns your flame."


TOPICS: Apologetics; Catholic; Charismatic Christian; Current Events; Eastern Religions; Ecumenism; Evangelical Christian; General Discusssion; History; Islam; Judaism; Mainline Protestant; Ministry/Outreach; Orthodox Christian; Other Christian; Other non-Christian; Prayer; Religion & Culture; Religion & Politics; Religion & Science; Skeptics/Seekers; Theology; Worship
KEYWORDS: apollo; arcadia; faithandphilosophy; godsgravesglyphs; greece; kylikes; mountlykaion; mountolympus; mtlykaion; mtlykaions; mycenaean; mycenaeans; olympics; pagans; polytheists; zeus
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1 posted on 08/15/2004 10:12:22 PM PDT by missyme
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Comment #2 Removed by Moderator

To: missyme

3 posted on 08/15/2004 10:17:15 PM PDT by GeronL (Viking Kitties have won the GOLD MEDAL in the 2,000 meter ZOTTING)
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To: missyme

They teach that stuff in English Class all over the US too.


4 posted on 08/15/2004 10:17:53 PM PDT by GeronL (Viking Kitties have won the GOLD MEDAL in the 2,000 meter ZOTTING)
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To: missyme

They are coming out of the woodwork these days.


5 posted on 08/15/2004 10:25:39 PM PDT by ladyinred (What if the hokey pokey IS what it's all about?)
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To: missyme

There's nothing wrong with nations keeping their indigenous cultures intact. Christianity was Europeanized and our own holidays reflect our indigenous cultures and holidays rather than Jesus and Yahweh. The Lord doesn't care about our trappings, if we remain Greek or German or Irish, or what our cultural rituals are, as long as we recognize Him as Lord and savior and follow His law for living. Amen and long live cultural diversity. It is the tapestry if life..


6 posted on 08/15/2004 10:40:30 PM PDT by followerofchrist
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To: GeronL
They teach that stuff in English Class all over the US too.

All sorts of hokey cr*p. We had to read feminist propaganda literature, Edith Hamilton's mythology book, and selections from the Bible. No Ayn Rand, though--that would balance things out, which would be unnacceptable.

7 posted on 08/15/2004 10:48:44 PM PDT by xm177e2 (Stalinists, Maoists, Ba'athists, Pacifists: Why are they always on the same side?)
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To: xm177e2

I am going to start a religion that begs aliens to swoop down and take liberals to another planet.


8 posted on 08/15/2004 10:50:47 PM PDT by GeronL (Viking Kitties have won the GOLD MEDAL in the 2,000 meter ZOTTING)
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To: missyme
Pagans are reviving the polytheistic religions of the ancient Greeks,and other civilizations.

*whew* Thank Tree.

< |:)~

9 posted on 08/15/2004 11:05:13 PM PDT by martin_fierro (Humor me.)
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To: missyme

Are they going to celebrate winter solstise by hanging prisoners from the trees in the sacred groves of Oden?


10 posted on 08/15/2004 11:12:07 PM PDT by claudiustg (Go Sharon! Go Bush!)
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To: claudiustg
Are they going to celebrate winter solstise by hanging prisoners from the trees in the sacred groves of Oden?

My Wiccian friends, who follow the Norse pantheon, hang freshly slaughtered beef or lamb to symbolize hanging the dead flesh of their enemies.
11 posted on 08/15/2004 11:27:58 PM PDT by Talking_Mouse (Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just... Thomas Jefferson)
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To: missyme
You really have to wonder what the modern Greeks think about this. People forget that the Orthodox branch of Christianity started there, and they are EXTREMELY devout to Christian teachings.

By the way, the reason why there were a lack of people in the stands at the Olympics today was the fact today is a major Orthodox religious holiday in Greece.

12 posted on 08/15/2004 11:38:43 PM PDT by RayChuang88
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To: Talking_Mouse

It's supposed to symbolize Oden hanging from the Tree of Life in order to gain special knowledge. It very curiously parallels the Crucifixion and probably is the antecedent of hanging decorations on the Christmas tree.


13 posted on 08/16/2004 12:27:09 AM PDT by claudiustg (Go Sharon! Go Bush!)
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To: missyme

"Berman is a Hellenic reconstructionist"

No, Berman is a nutbar.


14 posted on 08/16/2004 12:56:56 AM PDT by dsc
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To: claudiustg
Forgive my ignorance but I thought that Thor hung on the tree for 9 days.

I take NO responsibility that my Wiccan friends have no understanding of the religion they claim to base their faith on.
15 posted on 08/16/2004 1:52:30 AM PDT by Talking_Mouse (Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just... Thomas Jefferson)
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To: missyme
>As a young teenager, she practiced Wicca. By college, she was into Celtic spirituality, but moved to the Greek gods literally overnight when, she recalled, a god appeared to her in a dream and said, "I am Apollo. You belong to me."

Anything, absolutely anything, to avoid Christianity.

16 posted on 08/16/2004 5:48:12 AM PDT by Lee N. Field
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To: missyme
Act 19:24-27
For a certain [man] named Demetrius, a silversmith, which made silver shrines for Diana, brought no small gain unto the craftsmen;
Whom he called together with the workmen of like occupation, and said, Sirs, ye know that by this craft we have our wealth.
Moreover ye see and hear, that not alone at Ephesus, but almost throughout all Asia, this Paul hath persuaded and turned away much people, saying that they be no gods, which are made with hands:
So that not only this our craft is in danger to be set at nought;


My father taught me, nobody champions something like this for free, and this passage emphasizes this. In that day people were loose about the gods, participating in decadence in temples. When presented with a God that was tangible, they flocked to Christianity in droves.

I knew a woman who did this, it was more a game to her. She thought any religion was equal and so she worshiped the Roman gods. I personally think this paganism is the fruit of indifferentism. She figured that any faith was better than atheism. The only faith she would not abide was mine, Catholicism.

If you can swap Churches like crazy, why not gods?
17 posted on 08/16/2004 7:12:50 AM PDT by Dominick ("Freedom consists not in doing what we like, but in having the right to do what we ought." - JP II)
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To: missyme
for any mention of Zeus, Athena or Apollo.

Who cares about Zeus, Athena or Apollo, when do we get naked and dance around a tree?

18 posted on 08/16/2004 7:14:20 AM PDT by biblewonk (And you shall be hated of all men for my name's sake.)
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To: TruthInExile
Sweet. I'm considering Mithraism. It's like a cooler version of Christianity.

I'm in favor of the spread of new religions (or the revival of old ones). The world's major religions are getting musty. Time to try something new.

19 posted on 08/16/2004 7:51:09 AM PDT by Modernman (Hippies.They're everywhere. They wanna save the earth, but all they do is smoke pot and smell bad.)
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To: Modernman

Are you drinking Tequilla in your coffee this morning?


20 posted on 08/16/2004 8:39:10 AM PDT by missyme
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