The biggest reason I left Catholicism was that I ceased to believe in
an almighty, all-powerful, all-knowing God. Not only do I not believe
in one, I don't even want one to exist. That would be horrible. To
have such a Being with the personality of the Xtian God is even worse.
("I created you to love me and I love you unconditionally, but don't
question My will. If you survive the unexamined life I demand of you,
you get to spend eternity praising Me forever! Won't that be nice?")
I spent a few months as a hard atheist in 2008, but I couldn't keep it
up. I eventually took the nontheistic fallback of there being a
divine Sacred, but it's like water: we are made up of it, it surrounds
us, we need it to live, but worshiping it would be not only crazy, but
meaningless.
Against the backdrop of this eternal Sacred are the gods. The gods
are persons who embody the Sacred more than we do. They have
different bodies and live in a different reality than we do. They can
hear prayers and in some cases grant them, but they are far from
all-powerful and we know they are mortal. Odin knows a lot, but He'll
be the first to admit He doesn't know everything, hence His travels.
Like anyone else, the gods like having friends and enjoy spending time
with their friends. As the sagas make it clear, the medieval Norse
saw themselves as friends of the gods. So we can pray to them if we
like, but the gods certainly will be more present and happier with
people who are generous to Them in return, and welcome them into their
lives as more than just spiritual sugar-daddies.
Wednesday, June 27, 2012
Tuesday, March 27, 2012
Building a Heathen Home--the Nisse.
Wow, it's three months already. I've made the mistake of thinking I don't have anything to say, and I do. If nothing else, I should talk about what we've been up to to make our home a heathen one.
We're Danish tradition. My husband "Sven" grew up on lore at his grandfather's (morfar's) knee. Sven's mom, American-born as she was, had an absolute passion for nisseman images. When I first met his mom, I thought her "gnome figurines" were sort of quaint, even though I found the outdoor ones tacky. Eventually it dawned on me that "gnomes" weren't quite the same things as nisse, and that I'd been sneering at the household gods.
After her death in 2007, I picked up one of the outdoor figures from the backyard. While the others were round-cheeked little guys with beards and no moustaches, riding snails and whatnot, this one was an older man with a red hat, blue coat, full white beard and moustache, holding a staff in one hand. I brought it home and went about turning it into a memorial nisseman for Sven's mom.
I gave the figure a good bath and then took another look at him. The eyes were both closed, just little curved lines for the lids. I took a Sharpie and carefully drew in one pupil, effectively turning him into an Odin gnome. Mother-in-law would exclaim "By Odin's beard!" occasionally, so that worked.
I put the statue on a little shelf by the stove. I later found out that any warm place is one that nissemen appreciate. Eventually I named the nisse that was attached to it "Ted". I gave little offerings of pan dulce and milk to him outside, when we lived in a cottage where I could do that. I thought Sven would think I was being superstitious and didn't tell him at first.
One night, Sven and I were walking into our cottage complex when he said, "I just saw a nisseman run across the path."
At this point, I had to tell him what I'd been doing. Sven was glad I'd taken up what had been his grandfather's frequent practice, so offering things to Ted the Hjemnisse was no longer anything I had to do in secret.
Ted now resides on the mantel over our fireplace. He likes cigarettes, cookies with coloured sprinkles, and vodka. A nisseman (or a tomte, or a housewight if you prefer) is the heart of any Norse heathen home. Ted is an ancestral nisse who came from Denmark with the family at the beginning of World War 2. I suspect that many nisses/tomtes/wights moved from Europe with immigrant families, and in most cases they aren't honoured anymore. If you are from northern Europe, putting a little house with cookies by your stove or fireplace may bring your family nisse to you. I wish you the best with this; reuniting with your family's nisse is a large step towards a warm and happy home.
We're Danish tradition. My husband "Sven" grew up on lore at his grandfather's (morfar's) knee. Sven's mom, American-born as she was, had an absolute passion for nisseman images. When I first met his mom, I thought her "gnome figurines" were sort of quaint, even though I found the outdoor ones tacky. Eventually it dawned on me that "gnomes" weren't quite the same things as nisse, and that I'd been sneering at the household gods.
After her death in 2007, I picked up one of the outdoor figures from the backyard. While the others were round-cheeked little guys with beards and no moustaches, riding snails and whatnot, this one was an older man with a red hat, blue coat, full white beard and moustache, holding a staff in one hand. I brought it home and went about turning it into a memorial nisseman for Sven's mom.
I gave the figure a good bath and then took another look at him. The eyes were both closed, just little curved lines for the lids. I took a Sharpie and carefully drew in one pupil, effectively turning him into an Odin gnome. Mother-in-law would exclaim "By Odin's beard!" occasionally, so that worked.
I put the statue on a little shelf by the stove. I later found out that any warm place is one that nissemen appreciate. Eventually I named the nisse that was attached to it "Ted". I gave little offerings of pan dulce and milk to him outside, when we lived in a cottage where I could do that. I thought Sven would think I was being superstitious and didn't tell him at first.
One night, Sven and I were walking into our cottage complex when he said, "I just saw a nisseman run across the path."
At this point, I had to tell him what I'd been doing. Sven was glad I'd taken up what had been his grandfather's frequent practice, so offering things to Ted the Hjemnisse was no longer anything I had to do in secret.
Ted now resides on the mantel over our fireplace. He likes cigarettes, cookies with coloured sprinkles, and vodka. A nisseman (or a tomte, or a housewight if you prefer) is the heart of any Norse heathen home. Ted is an ancestral nisse who came from Denmark with the family at the beginning of World War 2. I suspect that many nisses/tomtes/wights moved from Europe with immigrant families, and in most cases they aren't honoured anymore. If you are from northern Europe, putting a little house with cookies by your stove or fireplace may bring your family nisse to you. I wish you the best with this; reuniting with your family's nisse is a large step towards a warm and happy home.
Building the Northern Home Part One--the Nisse
Wow, it's three months already. I've made the mistake of thinking I don't have anything to say, and I do. If nothing else, I should talk about what we've been up to to make our home a heathen one.
We're Danish tradition. My husband "Sven" grew up on lore at his grandfather's (morfar's) knee. Sven's mom, American-born as she was, had an absolute passion for nisseman images. When I first met his mom, I thought her "gnome figurines" were sort of quaint, even though I found the outdoor ones tacky. Eventually it dawned on me that "gnomes" weren't quite the same things as nisse, and that I'd been sneering at the household gods.
After her death in 2007, I picked up one of the outdoor figures from the backyard. While the others were round-cheeked little guys with beards and no moustaches, riding snails and whatnot, this one was an older man with a red hat, blue coat, full white beard and moustache, holding a staff in one hand. I brought it home and went about turning it into a memorial nisseman for Sven's mom.
I gave the figure a good bath and then took another look at him. The eyes were both closed, just little curved lines for the lids. I took a Sharpie and carefully drew in one pupil, effectively turning him into an Odin gnome. Mother-in-law would exclaim "By Odin's beard!" occasionally, so that worked.
I put the statue on a little shelf by the stove. I later found out that any warm place is one that nissemen appreciate. Eventually I named the nisse that was attached to it "Ted". I gave little offerings of pan dulce and milk to him outside, when we lived in a cottage where I could do that. I thought Sven would think I was being superstitious and didn't tell him at first.
One night, Sven and I were walking into our cottage complex when he said, "I just saw a nisseman run across the path."
At this point, I had to tell him what I'd been doing. Sven was glad I'd taken up what had been his grandfather's frequent practice, so offering things to Ted the Hjemnisse was no longer anything I had to do in secret.
Ted now resides on the mantel over our fireplace. He likes cigarettes, cookies with coloured sprinkles, and vodka. A nisseman (or a tomte, or a housewight if you prefer) is the heart of any Norse heathen home. Ted is an ancestral nisse who came from Denmark with the family at the beginning of World War 2. I suspect that many nisses/tomtes/wights moved from Europe with immigrant families, and in most cases they aren't honoured anymore. If you are from northern Europe, putting a little house with cookies by your stove or fireplace may bring your family nisse to you. I wish you the best with this; reuniting with your family's nisse is a large step towards a warm and happy home.
We're Danish tradition. My husband "Sven" grew up on lore at his grandfather's (morfar's) knee. Sven's mom, American-born as she was, had an absolute passion for nisseman images. When I first met his mom, I thought her "gnome figurines" were sort of quaint, even though I found the outdoor ones tacky. Eventually it dawned on me that "gnomes" weren't quite the same things as nisse, and that I'd been sneering at the household gods.
After her death in 2007, I picked up one of the outdoor figures from the backyard. While the others were round-cheeked little guys with beards and no moustaches, riding snails and whatnot, this one was an older man with a red hat, blue coat, full white beard and moustache, holding a staff in one hand. I brought it home and went about turning it into a memorial nisseman for Sven's mom.
I gave the figure a good bath and then took another look at him. The eyes were both closed, just little curved lines for the lids. I took a Sharpie and carefully drew in one pupil, effectively turning him into an Odin gnome. Mother-in-law would exclaim "By Odin's beard!" occasionally, so that worked.
I put the statue on a little shelf by the stove. I later found out that any warm place is one that nissemen appreciate. Eventually I named the nisse that was attached to it "Ted". I gave little offerings of pan dulce and milk to him outside, when we lived in a cottage where I could do that. I thought Sven would think I was being superstitious and didn't tell him at first.
One night, Sven and I were walking into our cottage complex when he said, "I just saw a nisseman run across the path."
At this point, I had to tell him what I'd been doing. Sven was glad I'd taken up what had been his grandfather's frequent practice, so offering things to Ted the Hjemnisse was no longer anything I had to do in secret.
Ted now resides on the mantel over our fireplace. He likes cigarettes, cookies with coloured sprinkles, and vodka. A nisseman (or a tomte, or a housewight if you prefer) is the heart of any Norse heathen home. Ted is an ancestral nisse who came from Denmark with the family at the beginning of World War 2. I suspect that many nisses/tomtes/wights moved from Europe with immigrant families, and in most cases they aren't honoured anymore. If you are from northern Europe, putting a little house with cookies by your stove or fireplace may bring your family nisse to you. I wish you the best with this; reuniting with your family's nisse is a large step towards a warm and happy home.
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