From: cortese@hepxvt.ps.uci.edu (Janis Maria Cortese)
Subject: Re: Sacrifice
Newsgroups: alt.pagan
Organization: University of California, Irvine
Date: 14 Apr 92 23:00:16 GMT

You raise some very valid points, ones that I should address.  (For
those who have not been following this thread, I'm talking to Erich.)

I think I should have stated that I don't consider eating animals to be
the same as sacrificing them; I was unaware that, as one person mailed
me and told me, you were speaking of food animals.  In that context,
marking the death of an animal you are about to eat by some ceremony is
not something I have a problem with (bet you just breathed a sigh of
relief! ;-)).

I have a problem with the notion of animal sacrifice for another reason,
the same reason I don't like modern hunting.  Nothing is "morally" wrong
with killing anything; death and killing, like so many other things,
cannot be judged outside of the matrix in which they occur.  The thing I
don't like about hunting is not that it kills Bambi and eats it.
Hunters ENJOY the killing.  They don't hunt venison because they have to,
or because they are hungry.  They hunt because they like the power rush
(it seems to me, and I know full well that I am not talking about all
hunters, so please don't flame me) of pulling a trigger and watching the
living animal on the other end drop dead.  They like killing things.

Again, please let me say that I am *not*attempting*to*make*a*blanket* 
statement*about*all*hunters, only about the majority of right-wing
"Let's go up to the cabin, get wasted, and blow away a few creatures"
types that I've met.

The act of sacrificing also seems to derive some kind of satisfaction
from the animal's death.  This gives me the willies.  I am not making a
moral judgement here; I'm just trying to describe how I regard animal
sacrificing.

However, the notion that's been running through this and other threads
of "sacrifice" itself is one that also gives me the willies.  I would
like to include here a letter that I wrote to another poster (I think
the person who informed me that you were talking about food animals).
Please keep in mind that, as this was a letter meant to be read by only
two people and sent over the informal e-mail system, it may be a bit
more informal than anything I post to the net might be.  I express
myself quite clearly in it, but I don't think I insult anyone.  I just
express my opinion, as is usual, in a very clear and strident way.

Read on, if you DARE!

_________________________________________________________________

In the last paragraph of your letter, you hit on something
that seems central: what good is a "sacrifice" if it isn't
a sacrifice?  That is one of the reasons I don't like the
word "sacrifice."  It presupposes that for something to be
any good, it must hurt.  That sentiment is a large part of
what makes this lifestyle so damaging -- the old-time work
ethic that pops up even in my department at school: "If it's
not killing you, you don't really love it."  You know the
sentiment -- if you're not kept up nights by it, sweating
over every little detail in some romantically tortured
fashion, then it's not worth anything.

Garbage!  If I love doing something and it benefits me and 
others, who gives a damn if it's considered a "sacrifice?"
"Sacrifice" is a subjective term anyway.  Something that I
would consider a worthy spending of my time, someone else
may call a "sacrifice," like I'm making myself suffer for 
the good of humanity, or some such crap like that.

The entire notion of sacrifice is trash, IMHO.  It's utterly
subjective, and gives us nothing but tension headaches and
high blood pressure.  We're too damned addicted to pain already,
to the notion that something must hurt for it to be worthwhile.
For the longest time, I remained where I was academically 
and emotionally because I thought that doing the easier, more
fun thing was somehow cheating, that it was too easy, and doing
something I actually liked made me a weakling somehow.  If I
wasn't suffering, I wasn't doing anything important; I was
copping out and being a spineless wimp.  I forced myself to
remain in a discipline that I didn't like and that didn't sit 
well with me for EIGHT YEARS.  Only recently have I decided to
follow my heart and thumb my nose at this perverse self-
flagellating notion that I don't deserve to enjoy myself, that
enjoyment was somehow weak and worthless, that people who killed
themselves to do something under the guise of "challenge" were
somehow superior, or more moral.  FUCK THAT!

Sacrifice is a meaningless term.  I am here to live a fun, 
meaningful, and important life, and to have a damned good time
doing it.  This "Life is a struggle" crap started with the 
Bible's notion of the whole of life being a punishment for
disobedience anyway.  I'd rather put myself back into the 
garden.  We were evicted from the place, but we CAN elect to
go back, as long as we convince ourselves that we are worthy.

Blessings,
Janis

________________________________________________________________

Well, that's basically it.  I *told* you it was written in *AHEM* my
typically "expressive" style -- i.e. strident and bitchy as all hell.
To summarize, the word "sacrifice" is as meaningless and open to
interpretation as the word "occult."  What one person calls "sacrifice"
another person may not.  We are arguing semantics here as to whether or
not the universe "sacrifices" for us.  The universe does what it does,
and remains ignorant of whether our language and perceptions classifies
it as a sacrifice or not.  It will continue to do what it will do,
regardless of how our semantics classify it.

Have fun with this one,
Janis