This reminded me of something straight out of Harry Potter.
I was really interested in this because I had a negative view of wiccans. Kinda till now. Also my friends and I have been discussing the importance of reclaiming spirit in the decolonization and anti-oppression process.
link:
http://activism.ca/wiki/G8_Calls_to_Action/A_Call_for_Gaia_ResistanceA Call for GAIA RESISTANCE
at the G-8 Summit in Kananaskis
The new Empire is having a meeting of its leaders in 2002 in Alberta, Canada at Kananaskis Provincial Wilderness Park*.
Pagans are the spiritual if not literal successors to the peoples first colonized in Europe - the Pagans colonized by the Roman Empire and its heirs the Christians. Our resistance to this latest and largest empire is the continuation of the resistance of our ancestors to the earlier empires. When we fight against the globalized McCulture so they fight through us, and by honoring our Pagan ancestors we find ourselves as indigenous Peoples reclaiming our heritage of resistance.
When the Amazon forests are cut and the indigenous peoples forced off their land, it is like our ancestorsí sacred groves being cut again. These are our sisters and brothers. When the indigenous cultures are overwhelmed and the languages and music submerged in pop pap and junk food, this echoes the destruction of our people hundreds of years ago. These are our languages, these are our people.
The Pagan religions are not the religions of the rulers and their giant cities but of the ordinary people, the peasants, the indigenous peoples uprooted to work in those cities, in those factories. Those women stitching together Nike shoes for pennies an hour - those are our people.
And we must stand with them, with them all. Our Ancestors require it, our Mother Earth requires it, our own spirit and honour require it.
Like the Roman Empire before it the new American Empire wants to make the world into its own image, where the state is the handmaiden to corporate interests. This form of globalization evolved from institutions of the cold war like the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. With the WTO, APEC, MAI, NAFTA, FTAA, etc., and every new series of trade agreements we now see the outline of this transnational corporatist Empire.
In a natural dialectic there has emerged an anti-globalist radical opposition movement. This emerging movement is our ancestors reawakened in our people - it is the same part of the broad left that we have always identified with - the fertile, earthy, anti-hierarchic and complex social and political radicalism that is red, green and anarchist - socialism from below.
The most successful resistance to the Empire that has mobilized inspired and radicalized the anti-globalization movement is the Zapatista movement in Chiapas, Mexico. The lessons of the Zapatista movement are that we mobilize globally, using the Internet, while mobilizing local indigenous mass movements of opposition - cultural, spiritual and political. We are building a new mass movement in opposition to the global hegemony of the American Empire.
A New Ghost Dance Around the Globe
We will use our magicks to resist the neo-liberal globalization of the American Empire.
The mission of GAIA RESISTANCE is to bring together the Pagan oppositional currents, to develop a liberation theology and an activist magickal practice that is not purely one of resistance but also of hope and new growth - the roots finding cracks in the concrete through which to rebirth the forest.
While many in the Pagan movement have taken up this battle on their own, there has not been a global movement that has made common cause through local Pagan communities to express a common goal and practice of combative magick. We will build a political spiritual resistance movement from the bottom up. GAIA RESISTANCE has evolved out of our belief that a global resistance movement of Pagans, Wiccans, magickians, shamans and all our community must be articulated and put into practice to build resistance to globalization at the community level.
It is not good enough to have a handful of witches appear at demonstrations against globalization. We must, as communities, with one purpose, pledge to use our magicks to resist the Empire. It is not enough to practice our magicks just for our-selves, or our circles, covens, lodges, etc. It is time for us to use our magicks in service of the people against the Empire. This is our ancient right, our ancient tradition, it is the reason the state used the burning times against us. It is our most cherished birthright, to use magick against oppression, to fight to free not just our-selves but also our communities.
To make a common Pagan alliance against globalization we need to use our magicks in a concerted effort to reinforce, energize and spread the global resistance movement.
We are calling for a Grand Coven gathering at the G8 meeting in Kananaskis.
As Pagans in Western Canada we invite you to join us in creating a worldwide movement of GAIA RESISTANCE. Whether you can be here in person or not, let us use our magicks in the summer of 2002 against the empire, and in defense of the resistance.
Let us call forth the grand coven, let us make a ghost dance of resistance around the globe.
To join in this effort we ask that you endorse this call for a GAIA RESISTANCE.
On local level we call on all Pagans, Wiccans, magickians, etc. to become active in their local
Anti-Globalization Movement as part of the GAIA RESISTANCE.
Join with us in planning for magickal-political-resistance activities around the globe for the G8 meeting in Alberta in 2002.
* [This environmentally sensitive eco-region and its indigenous wildlife face the prospect of mass intrusion by the corporatist global state and its police. Not satisfied with having intruded in this wildlife area with golf courses and tourist hotels, for the 1988 Winter Olympics, now we have the prospect of global leaders meeting in private surrounded by thousands of security forces. Kananaskis is symbolic of the privatization and rape of our natural environment that results when the G8 carve up the world for the good of Transnational American Corporations.]
Ya Basta! Non Passaran! Ompheda Balasti! So Mote It Be!
Lammas 2001 (CE)
Ashtorethean Wiccan Temple of Alberta (Edmonton)
Pagans for Peace (Canada)
GAIA RESISTANCE, Box 1075, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada T5J 2M1 email: gaiaresist@yahoo.ca
GAIA RESISTANCE MANIFESTO
As Above, So Below
Magick is the spiritual and activist expression of the oldest liberation theology in the world.
Magick is opposed to hierarchy, domination, intolerance, exploitation, and oppression.
Magick is the peoplesí spiritual path unmediated by priests, shamans, politicians, the church or state.
Magick is the will of the oppressed made manifest in the world.
It is a weapon, a salve, nourishment, for the spiritual will of the common people.
To be a "heathen Pagan" is to be of the common people, and their struggles.
As Pagans we use magick to aid in changing and liberating not only the self but also all of our-selves.
Our religion celebrates honours, protects, and proclaims for, our Mother Earth and all her children.
We use our magick to maintain our mother, our-selves, our communities.
It is our duty. It is required of us.
We declare that corporate globalization is a material, political, economic, social and spiritual anathema to our mother and all her children.
We declare a Grant Covenant against Corporate Globalization and evoke our magicks to resist the Empire.
Ya Basta! Non Passaran! Ompheda Balasti! So Mote It Be!
Lammas 2001 (CE)
Ashtorethean Wiccan Temple of Alberta (Edmonton)
Pagans for Peace (Canada)
GAIA RESISTANCE, Box 1075, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada T5J 2M1 email: gaiaresist@yahoo.ca
