C is for Community

From birth to senior year, I attended my mother’s church. I fussed and squirmed out as often as possible, but I grew up there. I went to a private school that the church sometimes affiliated with (before arguing with the church that had the lion’s share of control) from ages two to fourteen. So, for the first fourteen years of my life, the years that I was Christian, I had a very stable and all encompassing religious community not only at church and home, but also at school. I had theological disagreements with my teachers and peers, but I kept them to myself, and I was fairly happy with my community.

When I started high school, everything changed. My mom finally got her own house, which meant we couldn’t afford tuition, which meant a new school at which I had exactly one friend out of seventeen hundred. I went from a graduating class of thirty to a graduating class of five hundred (of which at the end of senior year, three hundred remained). I lost my community, and in that shaky moment, I found out a friend of mine had been raped. My faith was shattered.

Eventually, I ended up discovering Wicca. While I like (and still really do like!) the structure of Wicca, I was a solitary Wiccan. Without community, I fell away from it.

This is why KO re-lit me. This is why the House has my devotion, and why it’s different from the other pagan/polytheist groups I’ve seen online. It has a community that meets every day on the forums, and every week on IRC for fellowship and ritual, and many months of the year to gather in person. The fact that we have Tawy House at our disposal for a meeting place, and an organized priesthood that spends their time to let us have the chance to meet makes me ecstatic.

This weekend, I had my second opportunity to head to New Jersey for a gathering. For a good thirty hours, I was in the company of Wasi, Shefyt, and Tepta; with them I laughed, ate, played, and prayed. There was hugging, there were onions, there was heka, there was a garden statue. We shopped, we squealed. We were solemn, we were joyous. We played board games in which Wasi and I became enormously competitive. I had, no, I have a family in them. I’m a Remetj, they are all Shemsu-Ankh (and two of them, priests). I wasn’t treated differently for being newer, for being of a lesser commitment to the faith. I was welcomed like a sister, just as I was to the previous gathering.

I have no doubt it my mind that Tawy House gatherings (especially Retreat, which I am desperately striving for) must be the same. I’m ecstatic that I will get to experience this community again and again over many years to come. And if you’re looking for a spiritual community, don’t hesitate to drop by. We’re more than willing to help.

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