"Whitewashing" Revisited

A while back, I wrote a rant about people who want to whitewash witchcraft. Today, I had to call myself out for doing that very same thing, myself.

On one of the message boards I frequent, someone asked about Asatru. Now, while I have qualms about calling myself Asatru, I do feel I know a decent amount about the religion, so I replied about it. Now as this post about Asatru was probably one of the few posts on this entire message board (which still leaves me wondering why I still go there at times, but that's another entry), I decided to see what I could do to keep the topic going for a little bit longer. To that end, I decided to see about posting a rite from the modern Heathen tradition. So I grabbed my copy of Gundarsson's "Teutonic Religion" and started flipping through it. I finally decided to post his Winternight's rite that included suggestions on how to modify it for solitary practice (I made those modifications when posting it), and set to typing it up.

Now, I haven't actually finished Gundarsson's book yet. (I'm in the process of reading it now.) As such, I was reading this rite for the first time as I was typing it. So imagine my surprise when I realized that it included a sacrifice done "in token." Nothing too major, really. The "horse" being sacrificed was called to be made of bread.

But that didn't stop me from having a moment of panic. Reading it, I could just hear the screams of outrage that the other board members would have. I could just hear some yelling how this is "proof" of how "terrible" those Pagan/Heathen types are. And for a brief moment, I very seriously considered scrapping the message I was working on and looking for a less "controversial" rite to describe.

Then I came to my senses. I remembered my tendency to call for an unapologetic stance. And I remembered that if people chose to have a problem with the right, it would just have to be their problem. After all, ancient Germanic religion did involve animal sacrifice (which isn't the horrible and evil thing people like to make it out to be today, anyway). And while I may not be interested in bringing back those practices, it does make sense to recognize and express some sort of connection to those practices today. After all, in the greater context of the rite, the lore behind Winternights, and Heathenry in general, it's appropriate. And if people want to take issue with that, I suppose I'll just have to learn to let them. "Don't like it, don't do it."

So I finished typing the rite. I posted it. And now I'm waiting to see if and when the screaming begins. But at least I know I lived up to my own standards. I stopped and remembered to "practice what I preach." And to me, that's important.