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Crafts and The Craft
By: Grizz Dragonzhawk
For the Imbolc 2006 issue of The Oracle, I wrote an article on how to make pentagrams out of popsicle sticks. This got me to thinking, how well do arts and crafts work within the Craft and within Paganism itself? Arts and crafts work wonders within the Pagan community as they are not only a creative outlet, but can work as a therapeutic modality and can be healing in many other ways.
I have found that the Pagan community is a rather creative force, whether individually or as a group. We have singers, painters, knitters and crocheters, musicians, wood workers, metal workers, folks who can make things out of any materials, and so on. The Pagan community is a very skilled one and these skills can be used in a myriad of ways. Enhancing our own spiritual paths and ourselves through our craft skills is a good thing. However, we need to think how these skills can better serve our own communities and the world at large.
But how can we use these skills not only as individuals, but as a community, to enhance and better the world? One example that I can give you is knitting blankets for the elderly in nursing homes. How about creating an arts and crafts class for children who are terminally ill? Or how about doing a woodworking class at a VA hospital? These are only a few things that we can do to help others through arts and crafts. We can create Pagan themed crafts for ourselves and our friends, but we can take these skills to the outside world and use them to help others.
There is one ethical question in creating crafts for others who are not of our path. This one question is: Do we add healing and other such spells to our crafts? This is a question that can only be answered by each individual. For myself, I would say that adding a healing spell is not a good idea. However, I can enhance the crafts that I create with love and white light. Or possibly, as I work on what I am creating, ask the Deities I work with to help the person my craft will go to in the way that person needs it the most.
If you have read this far, then you have figured out that this is not an article on a specific craft, but a call to the Pagan community to use their skills in arts and crafts to better their surroundings by using these skills to help others. It has probably done me more good and much healing to see the lit up faces of those whom I have helped with arts and crafts than it has helped them. Either way, my world (and the world of those I have helped) is a little bit better for having shared my artsy skills with those less fortunate than myself.
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