Goodbye, Lola
Over the weekend, I “buried” my grandmother, my lola. She died on February 28 this year, in her home in the Philippines. My family cremated her shortly afterward and put her ashes in our family’s grave. They held her funeral…
THE BARROW HOME
LIFE OF A MODERN POLYTHEIST
THE BARROW HOME
LIFE OF A MODERN POLYTHEIST
Category Religion
How to Be a Polytheist: A Reflection After 10 Years
Prayers On most days, I wake up and scroll through my phone for 30 minutes. This is because I’m a Millennial and addicted to social media. But I get up eventually and wash my face. As I do this, I…
He Who Announces the Way
I had a revelation at ten o’clock yesterday morning that did not leave me alone for twelve hours. A religious one, as they tend to be these days, and goes something like this: I have been completely wrong about my…
Today, I Resigned
Three years ago, I helped a group of people — a couple of which I still keep in touch with — create a server on Discord that we named Skíðblaðnir, after the magical longship owned by the Norse god Freyr.…
BYRGENHĀM II: The Mothers Revealed
Mōdraniht (Mothers’ Night) approaches. An Anglo-Saxon Heathen holiday, it focuses on venerating “the Mothers,” a grouping of deities who were worshiped throughout Celto-Romano-Germanic Europe as Matres or Matronae. (The Old English word for Them is Mōdru.) They were very localized…
BYRGENHĀM I: An Introduction
Nearly four years ago, I began exploring Heathenry. I had ended my practice of Kemetism two years prior and was, at the time, focusing on the death positive movement in the West. But I also felt adrift, unanchored by any…
A Heathen Midsummer Picnic
This past Saturday, I invited a couple of local Heathens and our guests to celebrate the Midsummer holiday and enjoy a picnic. We picked Font Hill Wetlands Park as our location, a small park with a gazebo in the middle…
‘Assassin’s Creed: Origins’ and the Normalization of Polytheism
Back in April, I suffered mental burnout that almost resulted in a breakdown at work. To recover, I purchased a copy of Assassin’s Creed: Origins and played it all evening. Three months and 47 hours later, I’m glad I did. Not…
Death Midwifery and My Initiation into Sacred Duty
My great-grandmother Lourdes died two weeks ago, on the morning of November 1st. As I was falling asleep that night, my mother texted me to break the news. We briefly texted back and forth, and I agreed to send some…
A Feast to Welcome Autumn
My Midsummer celebration earlier this year was fantastic: Friends gathered, the kitchen filled with dishes for our feast, and libations of blood-wine seeped into fertile soil. I left the party feeling joyful, pleased with our rituals, and looking forward to…