In Memory: Yana

25 Comments

I’m at a loss for how to write this obituary, this tribute to a life lost so horribly.  The usual forms a reporter uses won’t work in this situation.  I don’t know her birth date  or the exact day she died, and because I don’t want to put others in harm’s way in Syria, I can’t even use her real name.

What I do know is that this is the last email I received from Yana in June of 2012.

email-for-article

I know she lived in an area of Syria where the fighting was intense and foreign fighters, allied with local Sunni fundamentalists, had taken over the adjoining area.   When she, like other Pagans in the area,  no longer responded to attempts at communication, I hoped she had fled with her family or was staying quiet to avoid detection.  She told me the rebels were targeting women and she was especially afraid they would find out she was Pagan.

See January 2013 article:  In Syria and Egypt, Pagan voices fall silent

What happened to her is so ugly I’m struggling to … I can’t even finish that sentence.  I’ll just tell you what I have learned, and although i trust this source, there is no way for me to independently confirm this.  Some time in late June, Yana’s brother, who had become radicalized, informed the rebels that his sister was a Pagan.  They took her, tortured her, then her brother publicly denounced her as a whore and a witch.  After that, she was drug out onto the street, raped, and killed.

What I remember about Yana is she was always joking, always smiling.  She injected joy into everything she did, from talking about the Gods she honored to showing off her latest hair style.  She had more hair combs than anyone I’ve ever known.  She wanted to come to America and eat bacon.  She was fascinated and repelled by the thought of bacon so I would tell her about putting it in chocolate and on maple ice cream.  She was nervous about getting married.  Her father doted on her and she worried a husband might not be so kind or forgiving of her free spirit.  She told me younger men like to show how manly they are so she thought about telling her parents to find an older man for her to marry.  It was hard to see her become less exuberant as the fighting started, and then drew closer.  To see fear creep in and hear from her less often.   How sad she was that she never left her home anymore because it wasn’t safe.

Yana is just one of the estimated 70,000 people who have died in the fighting in Syria.  What may have started out as a fight for freedom quickly turned into something far less noble as foreign fighters, terrorists, and local Sunni fanatics purged the ranks of the pro-democracy movement and asserted control – with the help of foreign (including US) funding and weapons.  Yana wasn’t a warrior, that wasn’t her path in life, but she died as one.

Hail Yana!   May Nemesis seek justice for you so the Kore can welcome you to the Fortunate Isles.  Until then,  I will set out bacon and hair combs for you each month at the Deipnon.  Hail Yana!

 

PAGANS DONATING TO SYRIAN RELIEF – IN YANA’S NAME

A Tribute page, where you can donate to help other injured and sick Syrians, has been set up with Doctors Without Borders here.  We have set a goal of $1000 and the Tribute page stops accepting donation on March 28th -1 week.

Doctors Without Borders says, “The situation[in Syria] is dire; the needs are massive and the overall humanitarian response is extremely limited. … Surgical operations are an important part of our work because civilians are caught up in bombings virtually every day.  We treat around one seriously wounded person per day, but when a bomb falls in a place with lots of people we treat up to 30. When there’s a big battle, we treat 80.  But it’s not just surgery. As more and more people fled away from the frontlines of the fighting, we started running an outpatient clinic that enabled us to identify other needs, such as care for chronic diseases.

In the big city nearby, for example, people are desperate to escape, but it’s not easy. Many people slip out, pretending they are just off to visit some relatives, on foot or by taxi, taking nothing with them. At first these people settled in houses abandoned by their owners, but there are more and more tented camps in the mountains. Because it is so cold, we immediately started donating blankets as a first step to helping these people.”

Editor’s note:  I have heard from a Pagan in Lebanon and a Pagan from Syria recently commented on an article.  Both are fine and safe.  

Follow the Moon: Astrology of intention and mindfulness

by Teri Parsley Starnes

Teri’s interest with astrology lies with helping people see how following a practice of intention and self-awareness leads to a fuller relationship with Mystery. Astrology is a wonderful tool for this. Her weekly column orients readers to the seasonal energy of
each month’s Sun sign in order to set magical/mindful intention for the lunar month beginning at the New Moon.

Each week Teri will write about the unfolding energies that support and challenge our intentions. The ebb and flow of the lunar cycle resides deep in our souls. Through following the phases of the Moon, we remember the natural cycles that guide us.

Continue reading →

The Human Impact of Frac Sand Mining – Editorial

2 Comments

Microscopic Silica Particles Cause Lung Damage             photo: http://elcosh.org

There are several studies on the impacts of frac sand mining underway, from many different perspectives. There are no comprehensive studies that are available now.  Citizens feeling powerless to have any control over this intrusion into their environment are resorting to videos to get their stories out. I invite you to take a few minutes and listen to some of these, they say it best.

There is no doubt that jobs are created with any mining operation. The numbers used speculate on numbers of plants, rapid growth, and stability of the industry. Many of the jobs created are driving heavy equipment and trucks. These jobs require training often necessitating recruiting workers from outside the impacted areas,  and are seasonal. Numbers are computed based on “man-hours” of operation. The reality is often 10-16 hour shifts, and when allowed to mines operate 24 hours, seven days a week to maximize profits.

Proponents argue the increase in local taxes collected will help the local community’s tax base, lowering taxes for everyone.  Even in a heavily regulated local environment, the reality experienced in Wisconsin is that only with carefully crafted ordinances does the actual cost of mining on local services even get repaid. Often low traffic roads suddenly become truck freeways, and the affected towns and counties bear the cost of any improvements needed just to meet safety concerns.  In a well crafted ordinance the additional expenses of road maintenance, dust removal, sewer demand or waste water cleanup, and reclamation of the site are all protected with bonding in advance. For townships, there is no well-defined county or state testing of air and water quality that is required with these operations, so any specific testing to meet concerns of local residents must be funded by local government.

Continue reading →

Paganicon adds ‘Sacred Gallery Space’

The third anniversary of Paganicon, a three day convention for Pagans, Heathens, and polytheists held in the Twin Cities, also features The Third Offering, a sacred gallery space and temporary shrine.

Producers for the art show say this exhibit is quite different from an art exhibit at a science fiction convention or even other Pagan conventions.  “This is one of the things that makes our project different from, for instance, a typical science fiction con, where anything and everything that might possibly  relate to the SF scene is brought together in a fairly chaotic assemblage,” says Paul Rucker, co-producer for The Third Offering.  “We are combining the atmosphere of a gallery with a temple. And to my knowledge, there is no other indoor Pagan con, not even Pantheacon, that is doing anything quite like this.”

The idea for this year’s gallery began with an art exhibit that Rucker and fellow Helga HedgeWalker created for Paganicon 2012.  It was open for only two hours, but the positive response by attendees convinced the Paganicon board to expand the concept and have it open throughout the duration of the convention.  Rucker and HedgeWalker were asked to design and co-produce the prototype  for this exhibition this year.

The name for the exhibit, The Third Offering, comes from local ritualist and historian Steven Posch. Posch and HedgeWalker belong to the same coven, which made three  offerings to Minnehaha Falls at the autumn 2012 Pagan Pride festival.  The first sacred offering was water, the second was bread, while the third offering was rose petals, representing beauty. “Steve’s model of the “three offerings”  not only demonstrates the value of making beauty, of creativity, as valid and essential components of experiencing the sacred, but also, as I came to see, a useful way of picturing cultural maturity,” said Rucker.  He went on to say that when concerns for survival, legitimacy, and other cultural basics are addressed, space is made for beauty. “I suggested calling our exhibition space,  “The Third Offering Gallery” to highlight the importance of Beauty as food for the soul, and for an evolving culture.”

Yet the space is not just an art exhibit, it’s also a temporary shrine.  That idea came from HedgeWalker, who believes shrines are part of how a community can interact with the sacred and the beautiful. Both co-producers say, in future years, they may expand the sacred gallery space to include artists whose specific task is to design the shrine and ritual activity for this event.

1 g-night-DarkSister


1 Nuit_Queen-of-HeavenThe Third Offering features paintings, charcoal, photography, ceramics, and mixed media.  Seven artists, including Rucker and HedgeWalker, are part of this year’s show. Rucker and HedgeWalker also hand selected the artists due to a shortened time table for getting the exhibit launched.  The Paganicon Board also wanted to create a first example of what this could be, before it was opened up further the next year.  For 2014 there will be an official Call For Art to give area artists time to  create new works for submission and there will be a committee that reviews submissions for acceptance.  Rucker says they are open to more three dimensional and sculptural works in the future and ” If we can figure out how to incorporate video and perhaps “time-based” installations in future, we would like to open up the field further.”

1 She_the_Flowering_of_ishtar

Rucker, who has created other group Pagan art shows in the past, says, “Pagan themed art is diff

icult to place in traditional galleries, and opportunities to experience several artists whose works and worldviews overlap in this vein, is rare.”  He

 hopes attendees gain something through the concept they are creating for Paganicon, “Helga and I are both committed to the idea that art’s essence must be experienced directly, in the flesh as it were, by contact with original works. There is a mana in originals that cannot be described, only experienced. How much more so, when several like-spirited works are housed together.”

The Third Offering opens with a reception this Friday at 9:30pm in room 232.  Some of the artists’ works are available for purchase.  Rucker, HedgeWalker, and Posch are offering a panel presentation Sunday morning on The Third Offering: Sacred Beauty.