{"id":2427,"date":"2009-09-01T01:10:42","date_gmt":"2009-09-01T06:10:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/paganpages.org\/content\/?p=2448"},"modified":"2009-09-01T15:06:19","modified_gmt":"2009-09-01T20:06:19","slug":"serving-the-gods","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/2009\/09\/01\/serving-the-gods\/","title":{"rendered":"Serving the Gods"},"content":{"rendered":"
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They jump and twirl and skip, run around in intricately patterned steps, and shake all over in perfect rhythm.\u00a0 A two-hundred piece orchestra plays in minor augment keys and there are a dozen tympanis banging out a syncopated and complex code of a phony jungle beat.\u00a0 All the dancers have matching costumes and the females barely have any.\u00a0 It\u2019s a wild pagan<\/em> dance to the Great God Hiccup and the pith-helmeted explorers are tied to a handy clump of palm trees with a giant cooking pot bubbling away only a yard or two from them!\u00a0 Wow, it sure is exciting being a pagan in the 1960 Hollywood films, isn\u2019t it?<\/span><\/p>\n

Or there\u2019s the 1970\u2019s version:\u00a0 Heavily hooded devotees stand like statues in the torch-lit underground lair of the insanely cruel master or mistress of the super-secret cult.\u00a0 They mispronounce the badly written Latin phrases in perfect unison while the damsel in distress (the same one that was the object of the search by the pith helmeted guys in the previous movie) is stripped down to the few tatters of cloth necessary to appease the censors and stretched out on a cold stone slab that must have taken a hundred years to smooth down and carve into that shape.\u00a0 She screams helplessly but doesn\u2019t try to run as the High Poobah hovers over her with a ridiculously fashioned (but really wicked<\/em> looking) knife, about to plunge it into her heart for the glory of\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n

\u2026 wait for it\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n

The Great God Up-Chuck (they used to call him Up-Charles, but the British objected).<\/span><\/p>\n

Gee, don\u2019t you wish you lived back in those times?\u00a0 They just don\u2019t throw parties like those anymore, do they?\u00a0 Hmmm, maybe it\u2019s a budget problem.\u00a0 But here we are, trying our best to show some kind of worship for our gods and usually it\u2019s a quick chant and maybe a circle dance.\u00a0 Is that what it\u2019s all about?<\/span><\/p>\n

Not even a little bit.<\/span><\/p>\n

Our worship services may be a little less grandiose than Hollywood\u2019s, but they are surely a lot more authentic.\u00a0 Somehow I doubt that the outfits that are a cross between central Africa, ancient Egypt, and somewhere in Polynesia were ever used in real life. And as any who have had to lead a chant in a real Pagan circle knows, getting it in time, in tune, and pronounced right is nearly impossible.\u00a0 And forget<\/em> Latin!\u00a0 Maybe we don\u2019t put on the most grandly costumed or fantastically choreographed production, but our worship has nothing to do with any of that anyway. <\/span><\/p>\n

In its simplest form, worship is all about desire.\u00a0 We desire to get closer to our gods and to put ourselves in greater harmony with the universe.\u00a0 We desire to understand the way of things and the processes behind the amazing events we discover in a thousand different ways.\u00a0 We desire the blessings that are part of being alive.\u00a0 We desire the peace and the love that we know is part of how we are created.\u00a0 We desire to make ourselves better<\/em> and to know what that means.\u00a0 But, most of all, we desire our world to be inhabited by the goodness that our deities are<\/em>.<\/span><\/p>\n

After the circle is done, after the chants have faded away and we\u2019ve hugged everyone who\u2019s shared our small gathering, what\u2019s next?\u00a0 Are we to go our way and return in a month for more of the same, leading our lives as if the circle is the only place for our worship?\u00a0 Indeed, not.\u00a0 And any who do miss the most important aspect of our worship.\u00a0 It is not a slam-bam thing with us; it\u2019s all the time<\/em>.\u00a0 If worship is a way to express our desires, it drives our actions in every part of our lives.\u00a0 And because those desires have to do with Deity and our relationship to it, they will never be completely satiated while we are in this incarnated form.\u00a0 They will continue throughout our life and, who knows, maybe beyond.\u00a0 It\u2019s no exaggeration to say our lives are the real worship we give to our gods.\u00a0 Nothing defines what we worship better than how we conduct our lives\u2026 the everyday decisions we make and what they declare about what we desire.<\/span><\/p>\n

A worship service isn\u2019t\u00a0a bunch of mechanical events \u2013 stand up, say this, sing this, do that, sit down \u2013 it\u2019s just what is says it is: a service<\/em> conducted to help everyone discover their own relationship with the Divine and how they can shape their desire to enhance that relationship.\u00a0 The folks who are privileged with the task of presenting a ritual or a ceremony of some kind that serves<\/em> the people in this way must always keep in mind that the people are the target of their rituals and ceremonies.\u00a0 The gods don\u2019t need our worship; we need to worship our gods.\u00a0 Our rituals are nothing more than an efficient way for learning what we need to know to expand our day-to-day worship.\u00a0 Also, they often deepen our desire to conduct our lives in greater harmony with our gods.<\/span><\/p>\n

There exists a great variety of methods to increase our desire for a closer relationship with our gods and to facilitate that relationship in some manner.\u00a0 They are known as sacraments.\u00a0 All religions use them in various ways.\u00a0 Mostly, they fall into only a few categories:<\/span><\/p>\n