First Round of Answers

[qos]

These are actually answers to scinnlaeca's "Five Questions Meme" post.

1. In what spiritual tradition, if any, were you raised?
I was raised as a mainstream, non-denominational Protestant. My father was (is) a former minister who had left the church after a crisis of faith, and my mother was still a believer. They found a church where both were comfortable and raised my sister and me as Christians who had a better-than-average grasp of biblical scholarship and who were given common sense reasons for rules rather than just "God says so." I had nothing but positive experiences growing up Christian and am still influenced by my Christian roots.

2. How did you get from there to beginning on your current Path?
Ha! That's the big question these days. My dad asked me that question a couple of months ago and I still haven't been able to give him an answer.

Short form: I had an existential crisis during my sophomore year of college, leading first to atheism, then to agnosticism, then to Goddess worship. It's been a long and winding road since then, including ordination as a Grail Priestess in a Christo-Pagan Order of the Grail, a stint spent in the Swedenborgian church (where I thought I was going to become a pastor), and finally, after uncrowned_king's death, to the path of the underworld priestess.

3. What is your favorite Tarot deck?
The Robin Wood tarot. No question. See icon.

4. What, to you, is the most sacred thing about sex? (Obviously, it's all sacred, so one thing in particular.)
The most sacred sex I've experienced was initiatory and transformational. uncrowned_king and I advanced each other along our paths through our sacred intimacy.

5. What is your greatest challenge, spiritually?
So many things leap to mind. . .
Consistency of practice is the biggest challenge.
On my current path, not letting my rational mind derail me when I need to simply let go and trust my intuition and/or the seemingly non-rational practices.

Comments

[wlotus.livejournal.com]

I thought you were still involved in some way with the Swedenborgian church. When did you leave?

[qos.livejournal.com]

It's been at least three or four years since I attended the church regularly.

It's actually kind of ironic, given my own "wandering" nature, but I started to get frustrated by the fact that they had become so inclusive that -- in my mind -- they'd really started leaving behind the essentially Swedenborgian theology that had originally attracted me.

I also started getting irritated at the all the "kum-by-yah" sing-along songs in the services and "sweetness-and-light" New Age stuff.

The last straw was when I took _storyteller_ to a service and the pastor gave an utterly awful, ignorant sermon about a topic that ST had a lot more knowledge about -- and I was mortified. This pastor was perfectly capable of delivering fine, challenging, uplifting sermons -- but this one was deplorable. We left as fast as we could after the service (my choice, not ST's) and I've never been back.

I still have a lot of regard for much of Swedenborgian theology, but I'm no longer a member of the denomination or of that particular church.