Blessed Hredmonath to all! Hredmonath was the pagan Anglo-Saxon name for the month of March according to the Venerable Bede in his *De Temporum Ratione*. According to Bede, the Anglo-Saxons sacrificed to their goddess Hreda during this time. Interestingly, the Christian holiday Easter ends up falling during the month of Hredmonath, when to the ancient Anglo-Saxons, it was the month of April (Eosturmonath) that was named for their goddess Eostre. The only recorded information we…

While the Matronae and Matres are a collective of indigenous Germanic and Gaulish deities, they were worshipped by a broad cross-section of people in the Roman Empire using Roman religious structures, rituals, and concepts. It is understandable for modern polytheists who are trying to reconstruct old Germanic or Gaulish ways to try and “scrape the Roman trappings off” in an effort to distill Matronae or Matres worship back to its original roots. However, even if…

I recently had the honor of presenting a devotional and oracular ritual dedicated to the Matronae at the Many Gods West conference held in Olympia, WA. The Matronae are a collective of indigenous Germanic and Celtic goddesses who were worshipped syncretically in the Roman Empire. It was a blessing and a gift for me to be able to present this ritual along with Rynn Fox and a fantastic team of warders and ritual helpers. I…

Participating in Community, Holding Our Leaders Accountable Polytheism as a religious identity is growing. And communities to support these old, new and emerging religions are growing too. As communities grow, leaders step up to help shape, guide, inspire, organize, and support these growing communities and the individuals within them. As leaders arise to guide new and expanding communities, it is important that we who are being led maintain active engagement with the shaping and maintenance…

I received a thoughtful and respectful comment in response to my article on animal sacrifice, disagreeing with my stance. I am grateful to the writer for being willing to engage with me on this topic, and I felt the response to this comment deserved its own article. The comment in question read: “I applaud the author for trying to write about this topic with a sense of compassion and an authentic intention of trying to…

I am a part of three separate traditions that practice some form of animal sacrifice, one of which is an ancestral tradition in which I was born and raised. I must admit, I have gone back and forth about whether or not to write this article, and I have reservations about having this published. But it occurred to me that most of the conversations about animal sacrifice that I’ve been privy to have been very…