HALLOWEEN BRINGS UP THE PERSECUTION OF "WITCHES"

Halloween and it's celebration of the witch - sometimes depicted as a beautiful, sexy, "Good Witch," but more often the elderly ugly "Bad Witch" or "Hag," reminds Sister here of the fact that through history many NMNK women have been the ones suspected of, accused of, and convicted of witchcraft or sorcery.  

Though witchcraft no doubt existed and exists, from what I've learned about the subject, it is often those who are or appear defenseless because they have no familial or husbandly protection that are easily singled out for abuse, harassment, and victimization.

Today people who do not marry and/or have no children are still thought of as odd, and while some of them perhaps have little choice in the matter, many others do.

Because so many people live together in what would be marriage and so many people have children without marriage or living together or become parents through remarriage, today we may have to think about someone who is NMNK as someone who believes living alone is the best way of life for them. People who live alone may perhaps be celibate by choice as well so we may actually live a more monastic by choice existence than ever before. For some of us living alone may be about pursuing a more spiritual way of life and for some that more spiritual way of life includes practicing ritual, mantra, meditation, or magic.

Happy Halloween to our "Witchy" sisters and brothers who are "SOLO."