Any fellow Asatruars or Germanic leaning folk here?

[sunwyn]

[icymist]

1. I remember some folk here practice Asatru.

I remember one thread on the other site:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=262x1974
Being that the DU3 is still fairly new, you may want to post in the AWPS forum on the DU proper. I'm sure they are out there. Good luck, icymist

[patrice]

2. My mother's family is German. We have old German communities

in lots of our farming state west of here.

[tfrey1225]

3. Germanic Heathen

right here. I'm fairly new to heathenism but I love it. I've always been big into ancestor research and getting in touch with my roots and I find the Asatru/heathen religion and way of life really reflect my values and attitudes.

One thing does kind of trouble me in that many neo-nazi/white supremacist groups have taken on heathen symbols and myths used the religion as a cover for their racist political aims. The last thing I want to do is be associated with ignorant hate mongers. However the vast majority of heathens are like me: we just want to practice our religion and be left alone. We don't wish to hate anyone or support violence.

[Tyrs WolfDaemon]

5. I hate how those groups have taken our symbols and twisted them

I had several people in college ask me about those ties when they would find runes or other Norse designs in my notebooks and doodles. It normally took only a minute or two to explain it to them and all was well. I didn't think much of having to do that, it was Standard Operating Procedure (SOP), but I realized how important it is to tell my curious friends when I saw two classmates telling off (berating, verbally assualting...) a few dumb racist kids passing through our building that they did not appreciate their use of runes and symbols with their hateful message.


Hopefully one day there won't be a need to explain it to people.

[Tyrs WolfDaemon]

4. I consider myself a Norse Heathen

Mine has been a solitary path so I'm not all that familiar with the traditions of the various groups that can be found around the web/world/country.

I was raised Catholic but that lost interest fairly early leaving me to wander around looking at the various beliefs in the world. I had always been open to and could feel and see many of the things others couldn't. It was when my medical condition got a lot worse that I found comfort in my ancestral self. My path becamse more clear through a lot of 'soul' searching and some discussions with my father (he is a Catholic deacon but is actually very open to all sorts of things. He is always afraid of what the newer more conservative church leaders are doing. I sometimes think he is more of a Heathen in Sheep's clothing )

I could see and trace Tyr's influence in our family line going way back. We could even see it in some of our non-Norse lineage (that doesn't include Pio Quinto, a relative who got his name because he was Pious V' s illegitimate son ).

From there I have worked with Tyr and Freya ( ) a great deal while being very open to the others as they move through my life.

What about you? Do you belong to a group?




(if you haven't figured it out yet, I have a very strong tie to wolves, coyotes, and foxes. I let them pop in whenever they or I want... )

[tfrey1225]

6. I'm More of a Solitary Worshipper.

I'm a solitary practitioner. I am a member of the AFA but they don't have any groups or anything close enough to where I live. I don't partake in rituals really but I am thinking about becoming more active, even if I go it alone.

I was born into a nominal Baptist family. My parents never attended church or read from the Bible, but they strongly believed, and still do by the way, that one must "ask for forgiveness and accept Christ as your personal Lord and Savior." Though they don't attend services or anything they are intensely religious and it's important to my parents that I believe in Christianity. My religious beliefs are never discussed with them.

I converted to Catholicism in high school and was in and out of church for the past 4 or 5 years. In that time I dabbled in various denominations (hell I even flirted with Mormonism) and various religious traditions. I wanted deeply to find "the truth," to find the answer that I was looking for. Finally I dropped all religious affiliation and called myself an atheist. I found the atheist worldview lacking and I started researching my ancestry and my cultural lineage. I wanted a sense of myself and my bloodline's history, I wanted to see what made me who I am.

I first discovered Heathenism roughly a year ago but I really didn't want to get started with another religion and be dragged back into the craziness of organized religion. I was also initially scared off because I thought it was a religion for bigots. However the more I looked, the more my soul sang out for Asatru. One of the beautiful things about this way of life is that it's not organized religion. It's a fiercely independent religion. I've also come to realize that Asatru, true Asatru, has NOTHING to do with racism or any garbage like that. If anything heathenry teaches that you are to respect and treat all other peoples and cultures with respect and honor.

[nickinSTL]

7. Been a Heathen for about 10 years

Have some friends in the area that are also Heathen, and we've hung out with some others in the area a couple times, but we don't have an organized group.

For anyone looking for a place online to talk about Heathen topics and find resources, I recommend:

http://heathengods.com/temple/modules/frontpage/

The group that runs the site and Message Boards is in Kansas City, but there are people on the boards from all over the world.

Definitely recommend reading the thread The Tone of Our Board under Welcome & Miscellaneous to get started.

[eilen]

8. I identify with Asatru/Norse cosmology.

I belonged to AFA but let my membership lapse. I don't participate in any group or ritual. I wanted to look to a tradition that was part of my people's heritage, not a middle eastern desert religion nor a native American tradition. My people are Northern European, my mother from Germany, my father's family from Great Britain/Ireland/Germany. I grew up Catholic but cannot relate to their focus on abortion and gay marriage.

Here is an excerpt from Even Cowgirls Get the Blues

"No buts about it. Spiritually, I'm a rich man. Because of my Asian ancestry, I've inherited a certain amount of spiritual wealth. But-- you and Debbie and the pilgrims and the would-be pilgrims have got to understand this-- I cannot share this wealth! Why? Because Eastern spiritual currency is simply not negotiable in your Western culture. It would be like sending dollar bills to pygmies. You can't spend dollars in the African jungle. The best use pygmies could make of dollar bills would be to light fires with them.

Throughout the Western world, I see people huddled around little fires, warming themselves with Buddhism and Taoism and Hinduism and Zen. And that's the most they can ever do with those philosophies. Warm their hands and feet. They can't make full use of Hinduism because they aren't Hindu; they can't really take advantage of the Tao because they aren't Chinese; Zen will abandon them after a while--its fire will go out--because they aren't Japs like me. To turn to Oriental religious philosophies may temporarily illuminate experience for them, but ultimately, it's futile, because they're denying their own history, they're lying about their heritage. You can hook a rainbow to a crazy vision--Jellybean is doing that--but you can't hook a rainbow to a lie.

"You Westerners are spiritually poor. Your religious philosophies are impoverished. Well, so what? They're probably impoverished for a very good reason. Why not learn that reason? Certainly that's better than shaving your noggin and wrapping up in beads and robes of traditions you can never more that partially comprehend. Admit, first of all, to your spiritual poverty. Confess to it. That's the starting point. Unless you have the guts to begin there, stark in your poverty and unashamed, you're never going to find your way out of the barrows. And borrowed Oriental fineries will not conceal your pretense; they will only make you more lonely in your lie."

Sissy elevated herself or elbow... "But what can a Westerner do, then, in his or her poverty?"

"Endure it. Endure it with candor, humor and grace."

"You're saying it's hopeless then?"

"No, I've already suggested that the spiritual desolation of the West probably has meaning and that meaning might be advantageously explored. A Westerner who seeks a higher, fuller, consciousness could start digging around in his people's religious history. Not an easy task, however, because Christianity looms in the way, blocking every return route like a mountain on wheels."

"...I don't get it, I thought Christianity was our religious heritage. How has it blocked...?"

"Oh, Sissy, this really is tiresome. Christianity, you ninny, is an Eastern religion. There are some wonderful truths in its teachings, as there are in Buddhism and Hinduism, truths that are universal, that is, truths that can speak to the hearts and spirits of all peoples everywhere. But Christianity came out of the East, its origins highly suspect, its dogma already grossly perverted by the time it set foot in the West.

Do you think there was no supreme diety in the West prior to that Eastern alien Jehovah? There was. From the earliest Neolithic days, the peoples of Britain and Europe--the Anglos and Saxons and Latins--had venerated a deity."