Tag: Sacred Harvest Festival

PNC-MN Goes to SHF

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We’ve loaded up our cars, put the mead in the cooler, and are on the road headed for Sacred Harvest Festival. Southern Minnesota – here we come!

"Why No, Officer, that's not an obstructed view out my back window."

Over the past year, Nels, Heather, and I have attended various Pagan festivals and heard about ones we wish we could attend. This is the first festival of the year that the three of us are able to attend as a group. Who knows what will happen with all of us in physical proximity of one another? (Not much. Heather and I go to bed at 10pm each night and Judy keeps Nels in line.)

Ahem. Anyway. What you can expect are great stories and interviews from the festival. We hope to be able to post some stories while we are there. Much will depend on the quality of the WiFi available at the camp. If the WiFi sucks like it did at PSG this year (too many people on one pipe) it may be a bit quiet on here. But let’s hope for the best.

If you can’t go to SHF, don’t be sad! Grab a bottle of mead and celebrate National Mead Day today. You can bet I will!

Crystal Blanton – National Guest at Sacred Harvest Festival – Interview

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Author Crystal Blanton

I had the opportunity to interview Crystal Blanton about her appearance as featured guest at this years Sacred Harvest Festival presented by Harmony Tribe, inc.  Blanton’s first book, Bridging the Gap, was published in 2010 with Megalithic/ Immanion Press. Her new work, ” Shades of Faith; Minority Voices in Paganism”  is forthcoming. Included at bottom is the content of her main workshop offerings at Sacred Harvest Festival.

What do you hope to offer our community at SHF?

The scope of the work that I do is centered around group dynamics and learning how to navigate some of these dynamics in our community. To help with promoting healthier spiritual experiences for people. I take a lot of that material from being a counselor in my day life.  I take the skill I use in my everyday job and bring them over to our spiritual community. Many spiritual communities have already done this, it is just we haven’t gotten to that place yet in the Pagan community.  I will bring a lot of tools and skills around how to navigate certain group dynamics, how to create more communicative communities, how to navigate conflict and disruptions that can happen in any community dynamic. We’ll cover how to learn and pass on these concepts and tools after the workshops. To create a general sense of optimism in adding these tools that can help to enhance our community at large. That is what I hope to bring to the festival. Continue reading →

Pantheacon Thoughts: Walking Your Talk

This years Pantheacon, in San Jose, Ca. had a thought provoking theme, “Walking Your Talk”. Rhetorically asked was, “What are we doing individually and as groups to take our vision of Earth Centered Spiritually out into the world?”. As Pagan sub-culture develops in communities like Paganistan, we may find ourselves asking the same question.

I asked nine attendees,  mostly presenters and authors, but also a couple involved partic ipants the same three questions hoping to get at the essence of west coast thought on the matter.  You may find their answers not far from yours!

Victoria Slind-flor (right) dressed for Poma Gira Devotional, Nels and Judith Olson(left)

1) What does ‘Walking your Talk’ (WYT) look like to you?

2) What aspect of WYT is most important for Pagans bring to their relations in the mainstream community?

3) What area of accountability in WYT do Pagans most lack, or is your biggest complaint in Pagans WYT?


Victoria Slind-flor – Victoria is a Dianic crone Witch and Artist. She is a journalist and teaches at Cherry Hill Pagan Seminary, and is a member of The Pagan Alliance.  She is known to many in Paganistan from a 2005  SHF guest appearance. Continue reading →

Interview with Pagan Athropologist, Murph Pizza

I had the opportunity to interview Murph Pizza in August at the Sacred Harvest Festival. She is affectionately called Paganistan’s own “resident anthropologist”. Murph secured her Doctor of Anthropology degree about a year ago. Her published thesis is called, “Paganistan, the growth and emergence of a contemporary Pagan community in Minnesota’s Twin Cities”. It is an ethnography, or recent history and an analysis of what kind of patterns, practices, and customs exist in the Twin cities. It is available through the University of Minnesota library, inter-library loan.  She offers insights into Minnesota Pagans, that you may not know or have forgotten… Read on!

Murph Pizza, PHD Cultural Anthropology

What is Pagan culture?

When we talk about in anthropology about, ‘what is culture’, we kind of have working definitions but what we try to instill, when we are talking about culture, is that culture is patterns of learned behavior. They are passed on from one generation to the next, and usually they are passed on systematically somehow. They could be religious traditions, they could be foods or recipes, but anything that is cultural is learned. To be able to see the emergence of Paganistan as a culture you need a long enough span of time to see what is continuing to be repeated, and when are the innovations in the community necessary. That is really interesting to watch.

Is Pagan culture something outside of mainstream culture, or is it totally contained within it?

Continue reading →

New Council Brings New Theme to SHF

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Harmony Tribe announces new theme for the 2011 Sacred Harvest Festival,  Forest Family: Root and Branches Intertwined. New Council says theme changed due to attendee feedback.

PNC-Minnesota spoke with Jude K,  Marketing Director of Harmony Tribe, about why the theme was changed and what this means for the festival.  Jude says the old theme, Dreaming the Fae, was confusing to some festival goers.  He says people didn’t understand what it meant and questioned if enough rituals and workshops focused on the Fae could be created.  There was also concern about the precision needed to successfully and safely perform rituals honoring the Fae.   “I honor other religions and would not want to disrespect their ways. We thought making people adhere to extremely specific ritual protocol would take away from the joyous and easy going spirit that we try to establish at the Sacred Harvest Festival,” explained Jude.  He also said that the Council board wanted to make the festival more inclusive to all Pagan paths.

Continue reading →