I want to be clear about the definition of the word Pagan. I am sure that this will get me into trouble with many of my Neo-Pagan friends, but here we go. According to Wikipedia ~

“The term pagan is from the Latin paganus, an adjective originally meaning “rural”, “rustic” or “of the country.” As a noun, paganus was used to mean “country dweller, villager.”

“From its earliest beginnings, Christianity spread much more quickly in major urban areas (like Antioch, Alexandria, Corinth, Rome) than in the countryside (in fact, the early church was almost entirely urban), and soon the word for “country dweller” became synonymous with someone who was “not a Christian,” giving rise to the modern meaning of “Pagan.” This may, in part, have had to do with the closeness to nature of rural people, who may have been more resistant to the new ideas of Christianity than those who lived in major urban centers and were cut off from the cycles of nature and the forms of spirituality associated with them.”

Pagan, country dweller, one who lives close to nature. As opposed to city dweller where one is cut off from the cycles of nature. It is that being cut off from nature that I believe our current social problems stem from. Cities by their very nature need to consume the surrounding natural environment in order to survive. Throughout our civilized history cities have sometimes by force and other times by forfeit consumed the country dwellers themselves.

No one can deny that we are now living in a world of mass civilization. By far more people dwell within the city walls then live rurally or out in the countryside. Most city dwellers have no idea of any other way to live. They have been raised in the city environment for generations. The growing of their own food is too far a reach from going to the grocery store.

However, it is my belief that tucked within the city walls is our world’s salvation.

This is where I get to vindicate myself with all my friends. There is a population of people who have been studying the “old ways”. The understandings of the cycles of nature are not lost to us. I am referring here to those we now call Neo-Pagans. I define Neo-Pagans as city dwellers who understand nature and have made a point in their lives to remain in contact with or re-connect themselves with the natural cycles of the Earth. Those who are not separated from Earth and yet live within the city walls.

I too lived in the city for quite some time and as I studied the cycles of nature my heart desired to break free of those city walls more and more. The way of life I was learning to live was in conflict with where and how I was living. The courage to leave the city and become a country dweller did not come easily. Thankfully I had been studying a Neo-Pagan tradition called Wicca. What Wicca did for me was to re-connect my soul with the cycles of nature. All the years of learning and practicing this Neo-Pagan tradition safely within the city taught me what I needed to know to be a country dweller, a true Pagan.

This brings us to the crux of my point. Our current social situation is in peril. Our ability to maintain civilized city environments is coming to a quick end. The city experiment is failing at a rampant rate. Understand that my rant here is not about doom and gloom because I do not believe in doom and gloom. I do see clearly that what we need is a balance between the old ways, and the new ways found within the new old ways.

Who, one might ask, is going to teach us these new old ways? It is you my friends, the Neo-Pagan population of city dwellers. As thousands of years ago, when the Pagan population left their country dwellings for the comforts of the city, the time has come for us to return to the country that we abandoned so long ago. They say that nobody knows how to live in or with nature anymore, they are wrong. The Neo-Pagans do! You do!

It is time for a great movement, a movement from Neo-Pagan to simply Pagan. It is actually a very short step all in all. Most Neo-Pagans celebrate different Holy Days than Christians. These Holy Days we celebrate are a reminder to us of the cycles of nature. Notice that I used the word celebrate here for the shift from Neo-Pagan to Pagan is simply from celebrating these Holy Days to practically applying them. A Pagan does not spend time observing the cycles of nature, but lives in direct relationship with them.

Beltane is a time when seeds are planted or when some rest from planting the seeds, real actual seeds in the real ground. Samhain is the time when we need to have completed the harvest or the freeze will come and kill the crops. What greater observances could we possibly do to honor nature than to live our lives according to the established cycles going on all around us?

I am afraid that if we do not get out the city and participate with nature, that soon nature will abandon us like we have abandoned her. The ancient egregors are still available to us, but for how much longer?

How much longer do we all have to wait until society has the courage to decide to live in a state of balance with nature? The time is ripe for you beautiful city dwelling Neo-Pagans to put your spirituality into actual practice. The world we live in needs examples of how to live at one with nature now more then ever. And, you are it, we are it. We Pagans are all the world has left to guide its population back into harmony with the source of our existence, the Earth Herself.

We live off the grid and our home is solar powered. Some who use solar power put their solar array on an automated tracking system so that the panels turn toward the sun on their own. I chose to manually turn our panels every day throughout the day. This daily act over the past eight years has brought me into a direct relationship with the Sun. Throughout the year I have the opportunity to see where on the horizon the Sun rises and sets and how high up above the horizon it moves.

Using and tending to our renewable energy system is part of my spiritual and religious practice. The practice of daily sun salutations, either yoga or resh, has been replaced by the daily ritual of turning the solar array. Equinoxes and Solstices become more important as we experience the changing affects that the different seasons bring with more power in the summer and less in the winter. By the time the Winter Solstice arrives we find ourselves longing for longer days and are filled with excitement as we watch our power increase with each day as the Sun rises earlier and sets later.

It is my belief that our society has simply stopped paying much, if any, attention to the Sun. We have forgotten all the beauty that surrounds us thanks to the Sun. All the sustenance we receive, the food we eat, the water we drink, the transmutation of solar energy that takes place within our own bodies, and let us not forget the warmth of the day. Most important the sun is critical to the photosynthesizing plants where in the plants transmute the carbon dioxide in the air into the oxygen we need to breath.

It seems as though that our days are so filled with the struggles of the mundane that we simply take for granted that the Sun will rise tomorrow. And it will! For now, thankfully, the one thing we can count on is that the Sun rise is a constant.

However, one of the lessons contained in the Arthurian myths is ‘that that which we stop paying attention to goes away’, like the Pagan Gods. Imagine for just a moment where we would all be if the Sun decided to go away. Its endless light and radiance simply stopped shining upon our beautiful Earth. Imagine, if you will, some catastrophic event that we humans have created that hides the Sun from us yet we know it is still there. Where would we all be without the Sun? Dead! No longer in existence!

In ancient times the people actually gave their attention to the Sun. Worshiped it even. They built temples that honored the changing of the seasons. Some very sensibly built their homes and communities in ways that the Sun would shine on them all day long keeping them warm even during the coldest of seasons. Some of humankind’s earliest technologies were solar powered clocks and calendars. Over time religions of the Sun became religions of the One God and his Son or prophets. We lost reverence for the God the Sun in our sky. Yet while spiritual and religious practice has lost its association with the sun, we still know and understand its power.

Scientists say that enough solar energy reaches the surface of the Earth in one day to provide all of us with enough power for a year. One year for one day for all the electricity we humans consume. This even includes the energy needed to produce the technology necessary to convert solar energy into electricity.

With the energy of the Sun, we can power our lights, our homes and even our cars. In the renewable energy industry there is a saying; “priority should always be given to the Sun“. This is more important today then ever before. With the ever increasing population and the endless consumption of natural resources the time has come for us as a species to turn full circle and look up once again towards the Sun.

Today’s Sun worshipers build and use the temples of technology that honor and worship the Sun. Such temples include solar photovoltaic panels, water heaters, thermal collectors and solar ovens. There is nothing tastier then a sweet potato cooked in a solar oven. A solar oven actually infuses the food with solar particals, otherwise known as photons or energy of light, that when eaten are transmuted into the Sun worshipers body.

It seems to me that we are all currently paying attention to the “wrong” things. We spend our days under artificial light. We cook our food using artificial heat and wave forms. We heat our homes and travel about by consuming non-renewable resources. We have even begun to grow our food using these artificial means. We talk environmentalism as a society but we put profitability and economics ahead of everything else.

Maybe I am being too harsh. Maybe it is not the “wrong” things we are paying attention to at all. But I definitely know what we are not paying attention to, and that is the things of the Sun.

Natural light, the warmth of the day, the taste of natural grown and solar cooked food, the feeling of Sun’s light on our skin as we walk through the grasses, trees and wild flowers. Nature and the stuff of nature are in a constant state of co-creation with the Sun for us to enjoy and participate in its endless beauty. And what we have forgotten most of all is that we are a part of this delicate balance, not apart from it.

As we participate in our daily lives let us all remember the new mantra given to us by today’s Neo-Sun Worshipers; “Priority should always be given to the Sun“. Let us remember that without this great and wonderful power we do not exist. Let us live our lives, daily, accepting and practicing this as truth.

It is time that we all bring our attention back to the Sun.