Talk:Polytheistic reconstructionism

message: As IMBAS does still have an active listserve, useful articles on their website, and is in the process of creating a study program, I have removed the "defunct" note from their name.  I have also added a link to the CR Essay which, while not representative of one single group, is the only consensus tradition document co-authored by representatives of multiple, longstanding, CR sub-traditions.  The Essay also includes links to other websites in its resource section.  Do we want to include websites with CR content that do not represent specific groups?  Or shall we just let people find those sites through the CR Essay and other links?
Right now, these are the CR links:
* ACTG (Gaelic Tribal Confederation)
* Clann na Fhaoil-Choin
* The CR Essay
* IMBAS
* Tuath na Ciarraide
While I don't personally care whether they're included, I would note that, as far as I am aware, neither the ACTG, Fhaoil-Choinn nor Tuath na Ciarraide identify as CR anymore.  While they all initially called themselves CR, last I heard they had become very vocal about identifying as Gaelic Traditionalists, not Celtic Reconstructionists, and have distanced themselves even more from the NeoPagan community.  I believe there's now a GT Wiki entry, though I won't speak to its accuracy.  Kathryn NicDhàna 22:22, 18 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: External Links

message: What we seem to have here with the edit I reverted is a conflict between some Wikipedia conventions and the exceptions that need to be made when the words are part of an established name.  In contemporary usage, for example, "Pagan" is not the same thing as "pagan".  And the general idea of reconstructionism is not the same thing as in, for instance, "Celtic Reconstructionist Paganism", as the latter is part of an established tradition name.  I went into this a bit more on the CR page.  This is an example of a seemingly minor change actually making a major change in meaning. --Kathryn NicDhàna 17:26, 21 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: OK, cap "Reconstructionist" is fine, but I think "Pagan" really is the same thing as "pagan". I'm also alarmed that you reverted changes to the other links, many of which had used different capitalisation from their article names. I assume this was in error and have put them back, but left CRP alone. —Ashley Y 19:29, 21 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I disagree. In contemporary usage, "pagan" is often synonymous with having no religion at all. Capital P "Pagan" is more often used to denote a variety of specific religions. --Kathryn NicDhàna 18:33, 22 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I've never heard anyone say "pagan" to include atheists, though I have heard it to mean "some religion other than Abrahamic". If the most common phrase to describe CR(P) is "Celtic Reconstructionist Paganism", and also if it is a title (rather than as a description such as "Hellenic polytheism"), then you are right. Of course, if it is a title rather than a description, it logically leaves open the possibility of Celtic reconstructionist paganism that is not Celtic Reconstructionist Paganism. —Ashley Y 05:03, 24 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: See my responses at Talk:Celtic Reconstructionist Paganism --Kathryn NicDhàna 18:39, 24 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Caps Issues 

message: Right now this article uses three different styles of citation. We need to standardize to one.  Before I go through changing all the refs, I'd like input on which one we want to go with.  I added the Bonewits quote using the php.cite, as my understanding is that this is the most recent, preferred method in general on WP.  I also prefer it over the individually hand-numbered method that is currently in most of the article as php.cite allows for new cites to be put in without having to go through and re-number every other footnote. Thoughts? --Kathryn NicDhàna ♫♦♫ 22:36, 26 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think the newer php.cite method you used for Bonewits is best, if it dispenses with having to go back and reorder every time someone cites a source. WeniWidiWiki 00:07, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Citation formats 

message: I agree with dab, we've got too many links here.  There are also links to sites of low quality (geocities pages with very little info, even a YahooGroup), as well as overlaps in groups covered.  The hidden text posted at the top (not sure who posted it) - notability determined by having WP articles, official recognition by gov't, or established over ten years - would mean almost all of these links being cut.  I'm not sure that would be bad thing.  WP is an encyclopedia, not a networking site. I also know that there are some websites listed that *claim* their groups have been established for over ten years, but that that is not accurate.  So, if we're going to have any external links, I propose we agree on some compromise between the suggested standard and the free for all that exists here now.  I would be fine on the proposed tougher standard.  But I'd like to see some consensus before accepting that standard and proceeding with the slash and burn. - Kathryn NicDhàna ♫♦♫ 22:00, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: alright: my  point is that the "Specific traditions" section belongs in the article body, listing notable traditions (with their own articles). There can still be an "organizations" section under External links. --dab (𒁳) 11:09, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Link farm

message: This could still be cleaned up further, but I have separated out WP:Notable groups by putting traditions and groups with their own articles in the "See also" section.  Per WP:MOS I've put the external links down under external links.  I've cut YahooGroups, pages with ads, and duplicate pages (such as a site that just lists sites that are already on the list; the alternative would be to cut that handful of sites and just leave the one that links to them all... actually, that would probably be better).  As this is English WP, and we have too many links, I also cut most of the pages that aren't in English.  My policy reason for this is WP:NOT#Info - we simply can't link to every site out there, and I'd hope that this article on other language-Wikis can cover those.  More of these can probably go, so I've left the linkfarm flag for now, but it's a start. - Kathryn NicDhàna ♫♦♫ 06:06, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: alright: my  point is that the "Specific traditions" section belongs in the article body, listing notable traditions (with their own articles). There can still be an "organizations" section under External links. --dab (𒁳) 11:09, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Initial cleanup

message: I think the WCER link is relevant.  "Ethnic" and "Reconstructionist" overlap significantly, and for many of us are exactly the same thing.  From WCER's Declarations: 
:Ethnic and/or 'Pagan' religions have suffered great injury and destruction in the past from religions claimmg they possess the only truth. ... We believe that the dawn of a new era of individual and intellectual freedom and global exchange of views and information gives us an apportunity to start again to return to our own native spiritual roots in order to re-claim our religious heritage. ... Let us be proud of our reborn ethnic religions.
There's nothing there that indicates only unbroken traditions are included, and judging by the member groups, they'd have to include reconstructed faiths. In terms of the racial side of it, they add this in the second declaration:
:We understand the term "Ethnic" as referring to religions and cultures that are related to a particular people's cosmology as it is expressed in cultural and social terms as well as ancestral. We recognize that many factors makes up people's identity. ... Historically those of other ethnic backgrounds have been adopted into new ones if they took on the beliefs and mores that are a larger part of the identity of that people.
Also their main contact appears to be a member of Romuva, which is "based on preserved Lithuanian pagan customs and archaic pre-Christian folklore. Compare with Celtic and Vedic beliefs."  I think this is a relevant link, so I'm inclined to put it back in. - Kathryn NicDhàna ♫♦♫ 03:48, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: We can keep it I suppose. But I've looked into WCER, and they happen to be an heterogenous bunch: besides reconstructionalists from Greece and hyper-traditionalists from the Baltic, they include megalith freaks from Spain, and Neodruids from France, neo-fascists from Belgium, among others. So, yes, some members qualify as "PR", while others clearly don't, so that I don't see how the umbrella organization is relevant to PR. They do not in fact have any members representing genuine "unbroken indigenous" religions, although they have taken pains to shake hands with Native American representants, and they (the Belgian neo-fascists, specifically) invited Vishva Hindu Parishad to their congress, so that unsuspecting fuzzy neopagan participants ended up face-to-face with the burning hatemongery of the sort of S. P. Attri :o) dab (𒁳) 11:07, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: WCER link

message: Does the AFA qualify as "reconstructionist"? Their idea seems to center on occultist or mysticist notion of "ethnic essence" ("Metagenetics"), and in spite of the "Asatru" moniker, they do not reconsruct Norse polytheism, but some folkish notion of "Peoples of the North". Their "declaration of purpose" has 
*The preservation of the Peoples of the North (typified by the Scandinavian/Germanic and Celtic peoples), and the furtherance of their continued evolution
I don't know -- if they do reconstructionism they do reconstructionism, peace to them. They also state "Asatru today is a reconstructed version of what our ancestors practiced. We have adapted it to the context of modern life, but the essence remains the same."
There is a difference between serious reconstruction followed by conscious adaptation to a modern context, and simply flawed reconstruction. From the gist of the article, "Reconstructionist Paganism" seems to be mainly a polemic directed against flawed "reconstruction" or "tradition" along the lines of Wicca. There appears to be no point directed against those who do not reconstruct because they "know" the true essence of historical religion because it is in their blood / their genes. This lack of distinction between reconstruction and "nativism" makes the whole thing vulnerable to national mysticist subversion: PRs stand united against the muddleheaded Wiccans while the ethnic "blood+bone" ideologists sneak in through the back door. As evidenced by an article by Alain de Benoist cited as "reference" in the "Overview" section. The longer I look into this, the less clear it becomes that "PR" is in fact a movement, as opposed to an effort at debunking Wicca within neopagan discourse. dab (𒁳) 12:16, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: "PRs stand united against the muddleheaded Wiccans while the ethnic "blood+bone" ideologists sneak in through the back door." - Heh, yeah, we've had that problem with the Celtic/Gaelic milieu as well.  In 2001 I had someone plagiarise an early website of mine and then twist it to promote a weird, racist ideology.  It's definitely a problem, and the reason banner campaigns like Heathens against Hate and CAORANN were started.  Asatru is large enough now that there's a ton of variation across groups that identify as such, at least among the ones I've encountered in the US.  The Germanic and Celtic groups here have a lot in common, and have worked together on some projects.  As both Germanic and Celtic Reconstructionism (and their offshoots) have grown, we've seen people identify as such without sharing the principles of those who founded the movements.  I do believe that Polytheistic Reconstructionism is a movement.  There were enough "Pagan Reconstructionist" groups in 1979 for Margot Adler to devote a chapter to them in Drawing Down the Moon, and it's grown quite significantly since then.  There are general Reconstructionist communities online, where I've seen commonalities among people from different ethnic traditions, but those commonalities only go so far when we are maintaining our distinct traditions rather than being syncretic.  The unity comes from the shared principles of authenticity, scholarship and cultural cohesion.  - Kathryn NicDhàna ♫♦♫ 17:04, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: well, the fact remains that we have individual entries for specific organizations for all "traditions" except Finnish (Taivaannaula since 2007?) and Celtic. All "organisations" linked at the CRP article appear to be either internet "gateways" or personal homepages, with the exception of IMBAS, which appears to have constituted itself in 1999 in Seattle. If it is correct that IMBAS is the only known  CPR group that is institutionalised in any sense, this should perhaps be made clear in the main article. dab (𒁳) 11:18, 5 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: As seen in other Neopagan traditions, and in Wiccan groups, very few bother to incorporate.  In the late 1990s and early 2000s there was AACT - Aisling Association of Celtic tribes, but the organisers and members decided to return to focusing on their in-person organising activities and local groups rather than run such an ambitious project.  The burnout factor with national and international groups, which are almost always volunteer-run, is rather high.  The local groups that belonged to these larger organisations are still out there, but not so high-profile as they were when part of an incorporated group.  And as I noted elsewhere, we hear about a lot of these groups when a member of one of them posts on an e-mail list, writes us privately, or puts up a MySpace page or similar (such as when we heard directly from people in twelve countries and twenty US states who were all performing the CR/Págánacht Samhain ritual).  But the fact that some members of groups also communicate with the broader community via online technology doesn't somehow mean their groups don't exist IRL (which in some cases it seems like you've been implying).  While I do know for a fact that a few of the "groups" that have since been deleted from this article (and whose inclusion I objected to from the beginning) were not in fact "groups" but one person with webcrafting skills, the ones I've been including are ones where I have personal knowledge of there being an actual group behind the web presence, and have had personal communication with multiple members of said group. - Kathryn NicDhàna ♫♦♫ 00:00, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

text: First, while I stand by my views that I expressed, I apologize for making it personal earlier. It should have been phrased differently and the personal aspects left out of it. As a personal dispute, it should be hammered out away from here, and to the rest of the editors I apologize. Secondly, I think the sinnsreachd.org site as an umbrella for the Sinnsreachd movement would be fine, and while I am unaware of the current status of the Clannada na Gadelica, if they are still in operation they should be added back in as well due to the large number of people identifying as Gaelic Traditionalists. No need to list each and every website out there, since most of them are linked from umbrella sites.--Breandán 02:09, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

text: yes: I believe the best place to link to individual Celtic Reconstructionist websites will be the Celtic Reconstructionist Paganism article. I have re-introduced the sinnsreachd.org link to that page. dab (𒁳) 08:33, 7 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: AFA

message: I agree that the two approaches in practice will have a lot of overlap. Nevertheless, there is room for antagonism. Of course the reconstructionists 'embrace' tradition, but the fact is that traditionalism (Folketro) originates as criticism of reconstructionism the same way reconstructionism originates as criticism of eclecticism. So the line is really drawn on the part of the traditionalists in this case, criticising the reconstructionist approach as misguided by the chances of literary transmission (all Germanic reconstructionists end up re-enacting 13th century Iceland simply because Snorri is the most extensive surviving source, and not because they have any special relation to 13th century Iceland in particular). The way I understand it, traditionalism entails the position that there is no "original" or "pure" tradition that can be reconstructed, because it is the nature of folk tradition to change and adapt with each generation, so that it is much more true to the spirit of "folk religion" to simply take up tradition as it stood prior to Industrialisation, say around 1900, than to piece together the tradition of AD 1200 or 800 from random fragments like a vase in a museum -- which is of course precisely what PR is about, and thus traditionalism in this sense should be taken as a direct counter-movement to reconstructionism. In fact, a traditionalist would  object to what Kathryn describes as 'a bit of dusting off and "back-engineering"' as a fundamentally flawed approach: to distinguish between layers of "dust" to be discarded, and an original "core" to be recovered is arbitrary, and you can in principle consider a tradition as consisting entirely of layers upon layers of "dust", so that you could keep removing dust until you have nothing left... dab (𒁳) 13:12, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: avoid linking to Traditionalism, which is a dab page for good reason: Integral Traditionalism ("Perennialism") is also known as "Traditionalism", and although it is ostensibly not intended here, it does have an impact on Neopaganism, viz. as the ideology of Neo-Fascist currents of Asatru. dab (𒁳) 15:51, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: reconstructionism "vs." traditionalism

message: I think this article would benefit with a "Criticisms" section. I'm not sure how many authentic sources could be found though. Most criticisms come from non-Religionist Neopagans, and in the form of personal opinion stated in online venues. The only thing I could find was some backhanded comments from Isaac Bonewits' The Pagan Man. --151.201.149.209 (talk) 19:06, 14 September 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Criticism section? 

message: How is the World Congress of Ethnic Religions unrelated to this article when it, and its member groups, are important aspects of this article and its notability? --151.201.149.209 (talk) 15:52, 28 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: you obviously haven't looked at the WCER member list. They have nothing whatsoever to do with reconstructionism. If they happen to have a reconstructionist member group, this would be purely by co-incidence. They are just an umbrella group of mainstream neopaganism. Also, dear anonymous, if you would like to pursue this argument, might I ask that you sign up for an account. --dab (𒁳) 16:50, 28 September 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  WCER unrelated? 

message: We need to cite the claim to be aiming for "reconstruction" for each group mentioned, and discuss whatever it is they mean by that in their own terms.
So far, I can see
*paganachd.com ("CR")
*templeofsumer.org
*Pravoslavya / H. Lozko: "The dissertation Ukrainian Heathenism as a Source of Everyday Religious Syncretism  proves the possibility of a reconstruction of the ancient Ukrainian religion." 
*Rodzima Wiara:  l'idée d'une reconstruction de la religions originelle de la Pologne. 
However, compiling such a list still falls under WP:SYN unless we can cite some third party source that discusses the phenomenon in similar terms. 
--dab (𒁳) 17:07, 28 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: So, your argument is that once we reduce this article to organizations who have verifiable 3rd party notability, and only after removing reference to organizations you state are Polytheistic Reconsctuctionism (which includes more than WCER), then this article has a notability issue and needs to be deleted? I think what you are saying if this article cannot support your opinion then it should not exist? --151.201.149.209 (talk) 17:17, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

text: That is true. We have the definition of "reconstructionism" pushed by Adler and Bonewits, which may be "scholarly" but is generally still eclectic, wholly Neopagan, and does not report to actually revive cultural pre-Christian religions themselves, and the "reconstructionism" described in "Uncovering the Effects of Cultural Background on the Reconstruction of Ancient Worldviews" by Bil Linzie that was used in the "Overview" section of this article. --151.201.149.209 (talk) 17:34, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

text: The reason I said pushed is because while he did coin "a phrase" in the 70s it does not look like it actual came into use until the 90s, and there is no real evidence groups adopted the term from his coining rather then its use by other religious movements. (Christian Reconstructionism, Reconstructionist Judaism) The link is only assumed. Bonewits, as evidenced in his book Pagan Man, wants to take credit, but also likes to state which are taking the right approach (those who are more Eclectic and Neopagan), and those that are not (those who are more historical based and culturally specific). --151.201.149.209 (talk) 13:13, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

text: If we can agree to base this largely on the Linzie paper, I can see  this article getting somewhere. We'll still need to be cautious to include other views, but at least the basic outline of the topic won't be completely up in the air. Linzie explicitly fixes the beginning of PR in the late 1960s, with the first emergence of Asatru.  But he also specifically excludes any movements basing themselves on notions of "pan-European paganism", which will exclude large portions of USian Asatru (especially Stephen McNallen), who see Nordic paganism merely as an expression of the "European Folkways" (by which they mean an inherited religion of white people). "Asatru" in this sense would not qualify as PR according to Linzie, no matter how much Old Norse terminology they throw around. --dab (𒁳) 09:08, 29 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, groups focused on creating a pan-Indo-European religions (such as the ADF) fall under what Bonewits calls Eclectic Reconstructionist Neopaganism, but this is not the culturally specific reconstructions of many groups that identify as Reconstructionist, such as Hellenismos, Religio Romana, CR, Kemeticism, and others. --151.201.149.209 (talk) 13:26, 29 September 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: [[WP:V]]

message: This content in the opening section is disputable: "Reconstructionists tend to view the tendencies of proselytization (missionary activity) and orthodoxy (prescribed doctrines) found in the major world religions as destructive to the cultures and societies subjected to these practices.[2]"  I read through the reference and couldn't find any justification for a generalised statement such as this.  I've modified it but it should ultimately be restored to the original or a citation for the original text found. NZUlysses (talk) 03:48, 2 October 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I doubt this has a place in the intro at all. --dab (𒁳) 05:27, 2 October 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Page introduction 

message: I propose that "polytheistic reconstructionism" is merged into "modern Paganism". The reason is that the article is of a very low quality, lacking substance and poorly sourced, and the term "reconstructionism" seems to be a fringe descriptor or have largely fallen out of favour both within the communities of modern Pagans and within the academia. Religions that some have classified as "reconstructionist" largely employ the terms "traditional", "indigenous" and "native" to present themselves, as it is already described in the main article.--Eckhardt Etheling (talk) 16:04, 30 July 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: While I certainly agree that this is a low quality article in desperate need of work, the idea that reconstructionism has fallen out of favor or that this should be merged into paganism is misguided. I'm curious as to your sources on that. If anything, there is a noticeable trend of a complete separation between Neopaganism and reconstructionist religions, with most reconstructionists preferring to no longer use the term "pagan" or associate with the larger pagan community due to certain connotations of the term "pagan" and the pagan umbrella both from inside and outside of that community. Polythiestic reconstructionism, as a term, has become more of what it was intended: a catch-all term for unconnected religions from varied world cultures that share only some methodology and intent behind their resurrection. They, by and large, wish to not only separate from Neopaganism and its Wiccan roots and influences but also from one another, to be recognized as the independent and unique religions that they are, as can clearly be seen with Asatru. There is some comradery between reconstructionist groups from different source cultures, but most often it is only in as much as an exchange of methodology and a shared status against the background of Wiccan privilege within the general pagan community, for those who choose to continue those associations. Ruyn13 (talk) 20:14, 30 July 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: , Thanks for your comments. Could you weigh in over at Talk:Modern Paganism#Proposal for merging "polytheistic reconstructionism" with "modern Paganism"? I think that's the more central discussion. Thanks! - CorbieV ☊ ☼ 21:41, 13 August 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Merger proposal