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Pagan Parenting: Spiritual, Magical and Emotional Development of
the Child Author: Kristin Madden Trade Paperback, 312 pages
Publisher: Llewellyn Publication date: November 2000 ISBN:
1567184928
More Information:
http://www.ecauldron.com/cncbook.php?asin=1567184928
Neo-Paganism has come of age. When I first became a Pagan in the
1970s, very few Pagans I knew had children. This quickly
changed, of course, as people started forming families, both
traditional and non-traditional. Unfortunately, only recently
have books aimed at helping Pagan parents raise their Pagan
children been published.
In her deceptively short book, Pagan Parenting, Kristen Madden
covers the basics of raising a child in a Pagan home. She
provides games, exercises, and rituals for children of all ages
and their parents to help a child develop his or her psychic and
magickal abilities. Most are simple and easy for a young child
to understand (shielding as being inside an egg, for example)
and are designed around a child's attention span.
While these activities are what the back cover blurb stresses,
there is a lot more to this book: material that may actually be
more useful and important to many parents. The chapter on the
family covers things you will not find in standard books on
families, such as communal and polyamorous families and families
where parents are involved in alternate sexual lifestyles. The
chapter on communities discusses Pagan communities, including
things to consider when going to Pagan festivals with your
children. This book helps parents answer a number of tough
questions that generally aren't answered -- or even considered
-- in mainstream books on parenting. Unfortunately, some topics
like deciding whether or not to homeschool, are given less
attention than they probably deserve.
One thing I really like about this book is that the author
doesn't try to tell parents what they should be doing. Unlike so
many books I've seen on raising children, the author of Pagan
Parenting doesn't have the one perfect child-raising system to
sell the reader. The author doesn't come across as "The Expert"
lecturing parents on the "proper way" to raise their children.
Instead she comes across as a friend presenting ideas and
discussing methods other Pagans have used in particular
situations.
I'd recommend this book to any Pagan with children or thinking
of having children. It provides a thoughtful general overview of
being a Pagan parent and raising a Pagan child in a Pagan
family. It will not give you the answers, but it will give you
ideas and activities. Most importantly, this book will make you
think about your responsibilities and the decisions you are
making from a Pagan perspective. Thinking about such things is
something I think all parents should do.
This review is one of hundreds of reviews of Pagan, Wiccan,
occult, and metaphysical books in The Cauldron: A Pagan Forum's
Books and Reviews section at
http://www.ecauldron.com/bookstore.php.
About the author:
Randall Sapphire is the founder and co-host of The Cauldron: A Pagan Forum
( http://www.ecauldron.com/ ), a popular Pagan Interfaith web
site and message board. He is also an editor at The Cheap Web
Hosting Report ( http://www.cheapwebhostingreport.com/ ) and
webmaster for a number of other sites.
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