Issues Facing Contemporary Druidry
by Emma Restall Orr
One of the most common phrases we hear
from folks who have newly come into Druidry is that what they
are experiencing is a return to the way
they were. They marvel at how they are once more discovering the
openness of childhood perception, with
its optimistic innocence, trust and lack of inhibition. They are finding
that, within Druidry, what they are being
guided towards is a natural safe space : a haven that feels like
home, to whatever extent 'home' has been
real or conceptual. It is the first glimpse of that elusive place
where they know they belong.
When, as Druids, we discuss these feelings
of that deep inner haven, many common threads and images are
revealed. In ceremony or by the warmth
of the hearth, as we share the joy and inspiration that it brings to us,
a sense of spiritual kinship rises up
around us. That energy is so rich and potent and with such a clear
directedness, when channelled into some
task the spirits of the Earth and Sky seem to open to their very
essence, and their laughter guides its
flow.
It is only when we begin to express or
explain how that spiritual haven manifests that the diversity of
humankind, of our differing needs and
experiences, comes to the fore. While as a species we can accept that
we are all very different, culturally
and through the individual experiences of many lives, within a faith it
can
be hard. As a species still rich with
animal instinct, our need to survive is still paramount, and is further
heightened by our gift of self-consciousness.
Walking along the pathway, between our
ancestors and our descendants, it is natural perhaps for us to crave
a bonding with our fellow travellers,
a pact of agreed reality more profound than that sharing of the
inspiration of the haven. We long for
trust on levels that go deeper and deeper into our soul, where we are
increasingly naked and vulnerable. To
realize that those who walk with us, apparently within the same
tradition, are revering or worshipping
Gods with whom we have no link or contact, listening to guides whose
advice we cannot understand, whose conditioning
and basic principles of life seem so utterly different, can
turn a dance among the flowers into a
painful hike.
As animists and pantheists, of all colours
and descriptions, most Druids have within their foundation teaching,
the concepts of equality that encourage
absolute tolerance and respect for all of Creation : be it oak or
couch grass, crystal or pebble, cat or
wolf or little red spider, philosopher or warrior. Yet, while there are
certainly many within the community for
whom the diversity within Druidry is a blaze of rich colours, there
are some for whom it is a crazy minefield.
One of these hazardous zones is, of course,
the jumble of issues that surround the old temple of Stonehenge.
Here we can see with some distinct clarity
the diversity within Druidry. For many years, after my first visit to
the stones in my early teens and later
finding myself, by chance, at the time of the horrific confrontations
between police and protesters in the late
1980s, working in a solicitors' office that coped with many of the
arrest cases, my attitude towards the
temple was that it was desecrated ground. I did not want to get
involved.
While my own tendency has always been
to find temple space deep in the forest or on the shifting ocean
shores, as my life brought my Druidry
more into the open, I found the energy of Avebury to be a profound
spiritual home. Living for some time close
by, I used to walk the Circle each day at dawn, and my
relationship with the Gods and guardians
of the place grew stronger as the cycles flowed. The energy was
warm to me, feminine strength, curvaceous
and nurturing.
Some time ago, however, my guides brought
the problems of Stonehenge onto my agenda. I was asked, as
Druid Priestess, to do ceremony there.
It isn't my way to fight, so I wrote and requested time in the temple.
The effect of my letter was a long telephone
conversation with the current site manager, and a resulting clear
and honest relationship. When I did first
go into the temple, I sensed the energy to be tight, flinched, bitter.
Translating my perception, it felt like
an reclusive and angry young man.
Since that first visit, I have been a
number of times, mostly out of opening hours with special access permits,
and both alone and with fellow Pagans
I have sung my reverence for the spirits of the temple there, the
ancestors in residence and the Old Gods,
with the intention of recreating a bond of trust between them and
us once more. With our talks to English
Heritage, there is an increasing understanding on their part of who
makes up the Druid community, and access
permits have been easier to acquire. More and more Druids are
taking the opportunities offered to visit
the great stones, to offer their respect and share the healing energy,
through the light body and their spirit
allies, through love and honour, through the bardic arts.
When I go now, the difference is astounding.
While still very male, the energy of the temple is usually now
open, open to the potential for healing
and joy.
Though still, admittedly, purely my own
perception, I like to equate the work done at Stonehenge with the
changing face of our society, the loosening
of patriarchal autocracy and pedantry, the softening of the edges
and the strengthening of the foundations
of equality. Yet as the male dominating society falls away, we are
also aware of the crisis of male identity.
Over-authority surely comes from insecurity, the wounded male or
animus. Not only does he need healing
but he needs to find the deep strength that was lost long ago, he
needs to find his true identity. So perhaps
it is with Stonehenge.
Many have said that they sense it is the
spirit of the place itself that has raised the wires and kept out the
hordes. Out of all the people I have taken
to the site, I am overwhelmed by the number who declare that it
should never be opened to the public -
amongst these are even some who fought in the beanfield riots. I am
aware of how many who declare that it
must be open to the public have never been inside the Circle, and
certainly not for a ceremony. It is a
powerful place.
But when overrun with those whose mission
is to take possession, climbing the stones, screaming their
victory, and not to revere, it seems to
me that the temple flinches. It isn't that long ago that the last stone
fell;
I wonder sometimes if the temple spirits
will cause another to fall.
English Heritage has a vision of the temple
being fully open to the public, the roads taken away and a visitor
centre at more than a respectful distance.
As they grow to understand that there are large bands within the
Druid community with whom they can speak,
they are increasingly willing to discuss the problems and
interested in our perspective and spiritual
concerns. When the work of changing the roads begins, Druid may
well be consulted on various issues, if
our negotiations with them continue in peace. In my work at
Stonehenge, I have seen an awesome reverence
for the spirit of place and the spirits of the stones in the
security guards who have lived and breathed
the site for over ten years. Neither they nor English Heritage
want a 'Disney'-fication of the site any
more than we do. They want the place honoured, respected, as do
we. They want to work with those in the
Druid community for whom it is a temple. They want to stop the
fighting, as do we.
But I have expressed my own opinion, and
having begun this article acknowledging the diverse needs and
priorities of all those within the Druid
tradition, I now stand back and accept that there are many for whom
my words will make little sense.
I add only that when last I was at Wayland's
Smithy I had a distinct vision of that mound also being closed
to the public. The National Trust are
already questioning how they can sustain guardianship for the West
Kennet long barrow considering the recent
problems. The graffiti and fire damage at both sites is consistent
and heartbreaking. In my vision it was
not the government or NT whose authority was brought into action,
but the power of the spirit of the place
that had closed itself off. I was told clearly in the vision that it was
a
possible outcome of continuing damage.
It is easy for us as Druids and Pagans
to blame some outer force. Yet it is people who are apparently of our
community who are lighting the fires in
the barrows that are cracking the stones. It is an issue which we must
address.
Are we so keen to have the ancient sites
open and in use that we are willing to see them fall and crumble? Is
our right to walk to the top of Silbury
Hill of more importance than stopping the erosion? Should we be
creating new sites, directing all the
energy spent on reclaiming the old and ancient temples into building new
mounds to honour the Gods and our ancestors,
new forests to honour our dead, new temples to honour the
cycles? There would be no fights with
tourists and archaeologists.
Essentially it was the issues around Stonehenge
that eventually broke up the old bond of the Council of
British Druid Orders (COBDO). As Druidry's
public image became more prominent and the Loyal
Arthurian Warband's battle for access
to the temple rose into the national news, some members of the
Council were finding that the public's
image of Druidry was changing in a way which was deeply affecting
their work. From the archetypal old sage
in white, to Druidry through the media came the figure of a modern
day bearded motorbike hero in the form
of King Arthur, getting arrested. The Warband has undeniably
done some wonderful work, Arthur recently
spending some time at the Newbury road protest, but for the
members of the Ancient Order of Druids
this image was simply too far from their own, and as a charitable
organization they were feeling the effects.
At the beginning of this year and after
some considerable thought, The British Druid Order resigned from
COBDO and were shortly followed by the
Order of Bards Ovates and Druids. The Council's founding aim,
to set up an organization in which Druid
chiefs and their representatives, could discuss the nature of Druidry,
had got lost. It was a political forum,
struggling to grasp together a unified voice of Druidry which would be
strong enough to make a dent in the armour
of whomsoever it was disagreeing with. While there is without
doubt a valid need for such an organization,
it was decided that it could only work effectively if created out
of an agreed standpoint; within Druidry
itself the difference of opinions was simply too great. It was time to
accept that there was no unified voice
spanning the whole community. Acknowledging this, honouring it and
committing to celebrating this diversity,
the new 'Druid Forum' is in its fledgling stages. News of its growth
and schedule will be published in the
Druid's Voice magazine (formerly the voice of COBDO and now of
the wider Druid community), OBOD's newsletter
Touchstone, the BDO newsletter, this Web site and no
doubt further afield as well.
The issue of the public image of Druidry
is an important one. While Wicca and the Craft have suffered
considerable defamation in the press and
public consciousness through an infuriating lack of understanding,
modern Witches more often than not have
come to celebrate their faith behind closed doors. Druids, on the
other hand, are more likely to struggle
through pouring rain, thigh high snow drifts and tearing gales, and, in
the summertides, sway sweating in the
noon sunshine, just to feel the breath of nature in every pore. The
COBDO Parliament Hill ritual at the Summer
Solstice in London is an event that is becoming well known.
The Avebury Gorsedd is growing, with rituals
at every festival, the last one before writing (Beltane 96)
having some 280 people in the Circle,
and included four handfastings, the blessing of perhaps two dozen
children, initiations into the Gorsedd
of Caer Abiri and a wonderful eisteddfod.
Public ritual isn't for everyone, but
when one celebrates out of doors, after some years of walking the Path,
unless one lives close enough to an utterly
isolated spot, passers by, tourists, dog-walkers and even UFO
crews (?) start to become acceptable parts
of the watching countryside. Our image in the public
consciousness is growing. Everyday folk
are beginning to know we exist. It is interesting, a topical concern,
as to exactly how we are being portrayed.
OBOD has brought together an advisory
pack for anyone approached by the media but still recommends
that newcomers to the wiles of the media
reroute any enquiries to their central office.
In an local newspaper article after our
Newbury healing ceremony, I was pronounced to be 'Oxfordshire's
very own Pocahontas'. I may well have
some Native American physical qualities, such as long black hair
and a strong 'injun' nose, and my faith
is particularly animistic and nature-based in a similar way to many
Native American traditions, but my family
didn't stop laughing for a week. I was happy in some way that as
a Druid priestess I was compared to this
'modern' heroine; it was a sure way to gain a wider public empathy
or understanding. I was sad too, though,
that the archetype of the Druid who was my inner hero was so lost
from the British psyche that a model from
across the great waters had to be used in order to explain who I
was and what I did to the people of society
in which I lived.
On the whole, much of the sensible press
has lost the idea that anything Pagan will be a source for scandal.
Indeed, when they had to admit that there
was nothing innately dreadful and amoral about Druidry, they tried
to hurl us down with the declaration that
we were 'boring' and without substance.
It's an easier label to live with than
the other extreme. As I have said many times before, it is all too easy
for
people who are not finding that safe space
within their own community, especially youngsters, to come into
Paganism and Druidry, tempted primarily
not for the spirituality but to be accepted into a community which
itself is ostracised or outside of mainstream
society.
I believe this is changing. As Druidry,
presenting itself as a celebratory faith, in tune with the natural world,
uninhibited by the light of day, becomes
more widely known, its spiritual wealth overwhelms and heals any
underlying need for alienation.
Being a strong and joyful part of society,
as individuals and as a recognized faith, is the impetus behind much
of the interfaith work which so many Druids
are currently involved with. Details of workshops and
conferences, including the Meeting in
the Presence III at Calne in June, and the Long Man Inter-traditional
seminar in October 96, can be found on
this Web site, through OBOD or the BDO.
A number of things have occurred to me
through my experience of attending and organizing interfaith
gatherings, most of which have been Pagan
/ Christian. One of the most formative was a vision of how our
land has been populated, conquered, overrun
and the way in which at each stage the incoming peoples have
acknowledged and absorbed the resident
Gods (however willingly or subconsciously, repressively). Through
the experiences and scattered memories
of so many lives, so many cultures and eras, we are each one of us
such a fantastic constellation of being
and knowing. It is easy to try to hold ourselves together in one box,
one faith, denying all else, denying the
teachings which have brought us to our current knowledge. In March
97, a purely Pagan interfaith conference
is being held in Oxford, to acknowledge the diversity and the
connecting threads between the different
native and polytheistic spiritualities practised in Britain today. One
of the key focus points is the honouring
of how we have come to where we now stand. Indeed, what does
make up modern Druidry and Paganism? The
nature of OBOD is without doubt rich with the textures of
Philip Carr Gomm's previous spiritual
journeys.
The BDO is spiced with its chiefs' past
experiences in the Craft, shamanism, Taoism, Christianity, atheism
and more. Order members also add their
energy, their wisdom gained, their spices bartered and won, into
the cauldron that is constantly creating
the faith as we practise it.
There is something in the nature of Druidry
which seems to many of us to be a wonderful gift, and one which
is so full with energy it is hard not
to be ever searching for a medium through which it can be used : I call
it
the 'bridge building'. Between Wicca and
Christianity lie many Druid paths, and there are many people who
walk with one foot in Druidry and one
foot in either the Craft or the Church. As such we are in a very
auspicious position.
As Druids, most of us agree that our key
purpose is the interaction with the natural world, with our Earth.
For many Druids, the Earth is their principle
deity, the Mother Goddess, nourisher, nurturer, the hands that
offer us abundance, the arms that hold
us in our fear and uncertainty. Yet as humans, we know that our
species has taken too much. We have not
only stolen the cookies, but we have emptied the tin, knocked it
off its high shelf, broken plates and
cups in the fray, and the whole kitchen is starting to flood. We also know
that Mum is coming through the door. It
is up to us, individually, responsible, to address and redress the
balance of energy.
Yet, as is acknowledged in many modern
Earth Healing ceremonies, we know it is ridiculously blinkered and
self-righteous to offer healing energy
to our Mother. She is angry. We've all been kids and many of us
parents : we all know how an angry, tired
mother responds! While we can and must give of ourselves, our
love and honour, our respect and reverence,
our energy, back to the Earth, it is within our own species that
the problems lie. The focus of our healing
energy, then, is more poignantly within ourselves, within our
families and relationships, our wider
communities, our political systems, our consumer attitudes, our
expectations and demands. It is about
our decisions, on how many children to have, what to buy and
recycle, how to communicate with the Jehovah's
Witnesses at the door.
As Druids we have already acknowledged
the problem. The Order of Bards Ovates and Druids is at
present re-evaluating and updating their
***********Campaign for Personal Ecological Responsibility
******************. Published in Touchstone,
is the telephone number for Waste Watch, an agency
dedicated to informing the public about
recycling and waste reduction, which is 0171 248 0242.
Not only then are we, as Druids, faced
with the environmental challenge, but also the challenge of correcting
the miscommunications between people,
within our own society and the mixtures of cultures, faiths and races
of our world.
It seems to me that it is our sense of
threat, our constant state of competition for resources, money, food,
space, attention, that has through the
process of our evolution brought us to this desperate state of
over-consumption. Yet because it began
to build slowly and has only perceptibly run out of control over the
century or so of the industrial revolution,
it is hard for us to see the fullest extent of our grasping from the
Earth.
Perhaps then, were we to release that
sense of being permanently threatened by our fellow creatures, our
fellow humans, we would be able to begin
the process of releasing our desperate grip on consumption.
Understanding each other, the ways we
think, our beliefs and goals, though we may celebrate different Gods
in different languages, is an inspiring
step along this path. Acknowledging that we are all growing, increasing
our awareness of the Earth and our need
to stop and think. The now cliched Age of Aquarius is not only
affecting Druids, Pagans and new agers,
but the whole world.
Of course, the other aspect of interfaith
work which is valid in any of the workshops and seminars that are
currently being organized all over the
world, is the fact that we do learn so much from each other. The
mainstream Christian concept may be that
as humans we were given dominion over nature, but there are
many Christians whose compassion, caring
and practical action for the Earth outstrips some Pagans'.
Amongst Pagans, there are many ways in
which we work for the Earth : stuck in the mud, clearing
riverways; writing letters and working
through the law; screaming and drumming eco-magic rituals; teaching
and healing, sharing the love.
In my practice of Druidry, it is the interaction
with nature - with all creation, both that of agreed reality and
beyond into personal perception - that
brings to me the power of inspiration. It is not only how I sense my
state of being, how I sense the Earth
and its resident spirits, but it is also about how I feed back that energy
I
am given and which is invoked, how I express
myself as my relationship with Creation builds. It is about
feeling the Awen, that total inspiration,
and knowing the strength that it offers - the possibility of living
beyond survival, of sharing that with
others.
As Druids we learn to access the Awen
and to dance its joy in the sanctity of our own blessed haven. We
also have the opportunity to open the
doors of our sanctuary and led the spirit flow out, out into the whole
world.
Emma Restall Orr
June 1996