The Cauldron: A Pagan Forum

I'm just, kind of, taking a poll about the pagans on the site who utilized their cultural heritage to find a path versus those who haven't.

So.

Did you base your pagan path off of the cultures in your family tree or not?

 
The path found me, it had been trying to get my attention for 50 years.
After that I researched my roots and that gave me some more information.

Did you base your pagan path off of the cultures in your family tree or not?

 
I am very into genealogy, and as far back as I can trace I am nearly all Roman Catholic Irish (with one grandfather being full blood Roman Catholic Italian). Since my entire family, past and present, is Christian, I'm not following my family tree in that way. However, at some point they can't have been Roman Catholic (it's only been around for so long, and for all I know they converted more recently). I started researching Irish deities and came across Celtic Reconstructionism (which I would love to learn, except I unforuntately don't have the time to devote to all that cultural study), and was also led to Neo-Druidry (which I had read a little about before, but only a very little). Neo-Druidry is the path I am most closely traveling right now.

I guess my ancestors' Irish deities led me to a part of Paganism that I think may really work for me. However, I don't worship specific gods, and the Irish ones can be very complicated and confusing. I will continue to research them and see where that takes me, and perhaps they will become a more integral part of my faith.

I'm just, kind of, taking a poll about the pagans on the site who utilized their cultural heritage to find a path versus those who haven't.

So.

Did you base your pagan path off of the cultures in your family tree or not?

 
Yes. And no.

I'm a mutt as well...and like many people in the States, my people were in like the third boat after Mayflower. I've got folk in both the Massachusetts and Virginia colonies. I've got ancestors that came over from countries that no longer exist as countries; Alsace and Prussia, for instance. Primarily European, but that's a pretty wide swath to speak of.

Thing is, my version of history and humanity...well, we're all related anyway. Just as one example, the Roman Empire included both England and Northern Africa at one point. They were in Egypt (which so few people even remember is in Africa that it's not even funny), and Israel, and...and...and...

And those Roman soldiers were from all those places. And traders...yep, lots and lots of boats and sailors and whatever else shipping goods back and forth and back and forth...

So despite my Ancestors being primarily European, who is to say there's no African in there? No Egyptian? No Jewish? There's really nothing that's outside the realm of possibility.

And that's just one Empire. That's not talking about Saxons...or Vikings...or Celts...

So...whoever calls me, I don't even really think about it anymore. So...no, I don't. But yes, I do.

I'm just, kind of, taking a poll about the pagans on the site who utilized their cultural heritage to find a path versus those who haven't.

So.

Did you base your pagan path off of the cultures in your family tree or not?

 
Yesnomaybe? It wasn't something I actively pursued when I was first becoming Pagan. I was always most drawn to the Kemetic Gods, and They were the ones who claimed me, so once that happened, it was hard to find a draw to go back and look into my ancestry for things. My soul is Kemetic, and I'm pretty sure it always has been, but my ancestry isn't, so my pagan path is mostly Kemetic because that's what calls to me and those are the Gods that claimed me.

But a couple of years ago, I did get a bit of a nudge from Aset to get to know my ancestry a bit more. I'm part Australian, English, Scottish, and Welsh, and apparently there's some Viking blood in there too if you go back far enough. The Welsh part of my ancestry is the side that draws me most strongly. But it's not a ... it's not a religious thing. It's not a call to start working with Welsh deities. It's much more of an ancestral thing, to know my people and my traditions, and where we come from, and how that shapes me as a person. So knowing my ancestry is part of my path, but it's not the most significant part, and doesn't really have much to do with my path. It's more about knowing who I am and where I come from.

But ancestry is complicated, because I've lived on the same bit of land for most of my life. I've got family connections here going back a few generations, and some of those are connections tied in with some indigenous families as my paternal grandparents were Christian missionaries working with indigenous kids. So I've got this weird connection in with indigenous culture, though it's not mine to claim, and I feel like I've lived here long enough that I feel I should give my respects to the native spirits who exist here. But I'm still working out the best way to do that that's both respectful but also not appropriative, as it's still a living culture. It's part of my ongoing work in figuring out the best way to do ancestral veneration that works for me.

I'm just, kind of, taking a poll about the pagans on the site who utilized their cultural heritage to find a path versus those who haven't.

So.

Did you base your pagan path off of the cultures in your family tree or not?

I'm a mutt whose family got off the Mayflower. Mostly French, English and Irish way back when. I've never particularly felt Irish or had a calling to Celtic mythology, except for Brigid and the Morrigan. If anything, I preferred the stories of King Arthur! I have no Norse/Asian/African heritage either nor any calling to any of those cultures.
 
The first I found was Greek. I started reading mythology at the age of six and my patron deities are both Greek as well. Greek, not Roman! I discovered Egypt when I was about twelve and am fond of it, but it's not the same. Also, Native culture, I've had my interests in. So, to answer, I'm a mutt of many cultures and worship?

Did you base your pagan path off of the cultures in your family tree or not?

No, no, no no no. No.

It's complicated.

I'm Filipina. Irish-Italian American maternal grandfather, very Americanized mother, Western cultural imperialism present by default -- but I grew up in the Philippines. I'm brown, okay? I'm tiny and Asian and short!

I thought the Bathalans referred to local tribal polytheism. Wikipedia says otherwise, and I would readily believe that because our Pagan history is. In. Tatters.

Where I was schooled, the Islamic empire (a major, major influence in the South) was a footnote, and the Igorots made out as a joke "the loincloth-wearing, more brown, backwards people" -- I don't even know, now, if Igorots were or are Bathalans, because when I finally met one, I thought it would be an insult to her for a city-slicking Manileño like me to even ask.

Social studies education is very, very Spanish-colonial based. All I know of the more formidable ones -- mountain deities or "spirits" for example -- is that they all changed their names to Maria at least all the female ones. I only recently learned of the existence of the Boxer Codex -- guess what, it was written by a Spanish dude.



Now, I do feel very close to Chinese mysticism, because that's also a major influence here. I like my astrological identity in that system, I've dabbled with those elements... but I have never, ever, even attempted to summon those dragons, or worship my ancestors. Maybe it's a kyriarchal racial-economic supremacy thing being projected into my spiritual viewpoint, but I just feel so certain that those entities are intensely insular. Besides, my ancestors... well... I doubt that they'd get it. So it's probably insulting and certainly baffling to everyone incorporeal, even though it's technically something that I've grown up with and been exposed to every day of my corporeal life.

It wouldn't be cultural appropriation, as I've understood it, because I'm not in a position of power here, religiously, politically, economically, or culturally -- those of Chinese blood and heritage, are. They're classy, here. Non-Chinese people here aping some Chinese tradition would be expected, because it's held up as glamorous (not shiny, as if I look down on it, but glamorous-- I look up to it.) But there's a line. I keep to my side of it, I hope. To contradict a little what I'm going to say next: I don't have Chinese blood.



I have a drop of Irish blood from my mother's father's mother's side, but it's not heritage. My family has carried on absolutely no traditions from her. It's completely unrelated that my main patron is an Irish deity, but, if pressed by people who are concerned or impressed by such things, then I have that to fall back on maybe to shut them up. But I won't like doing it, especially if it works, because it comes off to me that "family tree based Paganism" on an individual level is -- to quote cigfran in another excellent thread tangentially related to this -- prescriptive and proprietary. Incidentally, I have never had any interest in Stregheria.

Maybe if I succeeded in my astral projection to Ablach and they said, "Welcome incorporeal but still Asian girl who we would totally disallow here if it weren't for your mother's father's mother's mother's mother's mother's mother's blood that you didn't physically bring here anyway," then maybe I'd put some stock in it.

Actually, now I wonder if how insular a culture is, is determined by its otherworldly energies or by its corporeal people or both.

Did you base your pagan path off of the cultures in your family tree or not?

I don't know where the rest of you guys come from, but my cultural heritage going back over a thousand years is Christian!  I really don't understand the justification behind the attitude that we must abandon all things Christian and try to resurect religions and practices done by our ancestors who lived back before things were changed.  How is this attitude any different than the "big mistake" that happened when our ancestors decided to abandon their old religions and burn all their relics in a fervor to accept everything new, "cool," and Christian?


That said...  then yes, I have chosen a path based upon my cultural heritage.    I choose to keep as many things Christian that I find useful and relevant.  I protest the idea that I am "not a real Christian" if I believe and do some things that are unorthadox.  I don't care.  Religion is a personal thing and there is no Grand Inquisitor telling me what I have to do.  We should not cave to the pressure to either do it all or be expelled from the religion and forced to find alternatives.  Christianity is OUR religion, and we should be free to do what we want with it!  

I am somewhat baffled though by the "other" gods that have chosen me.  My last name is German, so Heathenry was at the top of my list when first exploring paganism.  But for some reason it seems I was tagged by the Greek/Roman pantheon; and had to make an abrupt u-turn away from Asatru to Hellenism.  Come to find out later that someone on my mom's side traced the family tree back to the Roman Emperor Tiberius; though I don't put too much stock in their research and I don't see how that could possibly pass on the rights to my personage over to the Roman deities.


Another thought though, is that Minerva is featured on the Great Seal of the State of California (where I live).  Does that make her the (a) Goddess of California?  She is the first "other" god that spoke to me, and by doing so validated the whole neo-pagan experience thing.

Did you base your pagan path off of the cultures in your family tree or not?

 
Not in the slightest. The Celtic and Scandinavian pantheons have never connected with me and I'm unsure of exactly what's in my bloodline. I usually just think of myself as mongrel English.

My leanings towards the Greek pantheon come from research and that 'click.'