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I’ve belonged to Dionysos for over a decade now. In that time I’ve been through a lot, felt his presence in countless ways, and even had my life destroyed and rebuilt by him a couple times. I’d like to think that I’ve got a few things figured out by now (fewer things, perhaps, than when I first started out, as it should be) and that I’ve worked hard to remake myself in his image and to live freer, fuller, and more authentically in his light. But Dionysos is a strange god, one who always finds a way to surprise us and reveal depths of himself that we never suspected existed, even when we’ve lived in close proximity to him for so long. There are always ways that he can challenge us, inspire us, transform us. If Dionysos ever stopped being able to surprise us, we would need him all the more because that would indicate that our spirits had grown stagnant and trapped by our conditioned responses. Dionysos is Lusios, the loosener, and Eleutherios, the one who frees – and I felt that aspect of him very strongly at this year’s Pantheacon. Pantheacon, for those who aren’t aware, is one of the largest pagan gatherings in the United States, held every year over President’s Day weekend in sunny San Jose, California. Pagans from every faith community imaginable descend on the convention center in all of their weird and wonderful variety. You’ll see people in Scottish Highland dress – complete with leather kilts and nothing underneath – rub elbows with transvestites in glittery purple fairy wings and men in beige mumus and Pharanoic headgear. There are Discordians performing saber dances in the lobby, Thelemics invoking Babalon in the hospitaly suite, and Dianics bemoaning the phallocracy while waiting to get their seat at the Hotel restaurant. It’s an amazingly affirmative experience: for one weekend, you aren’t the lone pagan in a crowd of indifferent faces; finally there are people who will understand and accept you, your tribe, now counted in the thousands, and you get to learn about all the different varieties of pagan religious experience. Pantheacon has been going on for almost twenty years now, but it wasn’t until 2006 that a large Hellenic polytheist presence was felt there. A number of us from the lists decided that we would gather at Pcon, since our community is so widespread and few of us had actually met in person, despite the fact that we had known each other online for years. We held a number of workshops, including a wildly successful Hellenismos 101, and several excellent rituals, including the now legendary Lenaia hosted by John Wells and his Cult of Dionysos. We also had a symposion at which members from our past – some of whom had been doing this since the early 1970s – met with figures who are prominent in the community today as well as people who had just found Hellenismos, but have shown that they are the standard bearers that will carry our faith into the future. It was such a huge success that we all vowed to be back next year. Not only did most of us return, but there were also some new faces in the crowd. Many of those new faces belonged to the Ecclesia Antinoi, a group that is reconstructing the worship of Antinous, the deified Beloved of Hadrian. I was looking forward to meeting several of these people since I had developed a strong friendship with Philippus, the Doctor of the Ecclesia, and had admired the contributions and eloquent correspondences that I had seen from the others since joining the Ecclesia earlier this year. In addition to that, I was going to be conducting a presentation on the goddess Hekate, helping to lead rituals for her and Apollon, and attending the presentation my partner and beloved Oinokhoe was giving on the Nymphs. Additionally, I was going to be helping John Wells conduct another Dionysian ritual, this one the Festival of the Worthy Bull, where I was slated to read a poem that I had written for the occasion and serve in the capacity of a Satyr during the rite. I had a pretty full schedule, and I was looking forward to it all when the Wednesday before we left for Pantheacon rolled around. Oinokhoe and I had just finished packing when we got a call from John Wells. He was heartbroken. A series of unfortunate incidents would be keeping him and his family from attending Pantheacon this year, and the Festival of the Worthy Bull would have to be canceled. All of us had been looking forward to this for most of the year. John is an amazing ritualist and Lenaia had been a truly ecstatic, life-changing experience. In particular, I was looking forward to the epiphany of my god in a crowd of reveling faces, since most of the time I only experience him personally, either by myself or in ritual with Oinokhoe. As John and I were talking, however, both he and Oinokhoe got the same idea at the same time: why don’t we take over the ritual, that way Dionysos’ presence could still be felt at Pantheacon? Taking that as an omen, Oinokhoe and I agreed, and set about planning our own ritual. There was no way we could do it on the same level that John had planned. For one, we were not as experienced in leading large communal rituals as he was, and secondly, we hadn’t had any preparation and most of the assistance and supplies needed wouldn’t be there. So, we spent the next several hours coming up with our own ritual from scratch and soliciting what help we could. I was very nervous when I arrived in San Jose. Although I have been a priest of the god for a number of years, I’ve always served him in the background, through my writing, through counciling people online, through performing oracles by him for the community, and by tending his shrine in my home. I was being thrust into the spotlight, into a position for which I had no experience, and as far as I knew, no aptitude. We also hadn’t had any preparation for this, and many of the details were still up in the air. It looked like it was heading for a disaster – but I couldn’t back out. He had put me in this position for a reason, and I refused to let him down. All that I could do was try my best, and if it failed, so be it. It was out of my hands at that point. Surrendering to the divine like that, trusting that the gods will bring things to fruitition, can produce amazing results sometimes. Everything that we needed for the ritual began to mysteriously appear. People such as Zoe, Ben, Nicole and Erynn (who isn’t even a Hellenic polytheist!) volunteered to help us out with supplies, such as the wine for the ritual, goodies for our after-ritual symposion, and vessels and decorations for the rite itself. We also were concerned that we would have to use canned music during the rite, but several people spontaneously volunteered, and Andrea and her husband tracked down others so that we had a full compliment of drummers by the time our procession started. There were so many other tiny miracles in the days leading up to the ritual that I can’t recall all of them, but it was truly amazing to see the community coming together like that, helping out and making something outstanding happen. It showed the strength of friendship and hospitality, and how the gods have a hand in all things, even when we can’t always see what their plan may be. So, I was pretty excited about our Dionysia when Oinokhoe and I met with the Ecclesia Antinoi crew to plan out their ritual, which was scheduled to take place right before ours. I was looking forward to this for a number of reasons. It would be the first time that I would have the chance to honor Antinous with others, since before that all of my devotions had been private and on the humble side. I was also looking forward to seeing my beloved Oinokhoe perform in the ritual, since she had volunteered her services as a Mainadic dancer to honor Antinous, who has strong affinities with Dionysos. And I was also looking forward to seeing Phil and Antonius Suba actually do their stuff, since I had admired these men for quite some time, and here they would be leading this lavish public ritual and everything would be on the line, as it would be for myself later in the evening. But beyond that, I was planning on simply being a supportive spectator, the only actions I intended to take being when I would go up and offer a private devotion to Antinous when the ritual called for it. But the gods have a way of surprising us, don’t they? I was sitting at the table in the hotel restaurant, listening to them go over various details when Phil turned to me and asked if I was under 30. Hesitantly I volunteered that I had just turned 29 when he asked if I would be willing to fill in as his lupercus primus since the gentleman who was going to take on that role had been unable to attend Pcon at the last minute. I was quiet for a moment. I knew full well what this would mean. For those who aren’t aware of the finer details of Roman religion, the lupercii were young men who would run about nude or close thereto during the Lupercalia and whip maidens with strips of hide to drive off harmful spirits and thereby promote fertility. The most famous lupercus as far as I was concerned was Marcus Antonius, a personal hero of mine who was declared Neos Dionysos at Ephesos, married Kleopatra VII and would have led a glorious Greco-Egyptian Empire encompassing all of Rome had he not met his defeat at the hands of that bastard Octavian in the ill-advised naval battle of Actium. It was during the Lupercalia that he attempted to place the crown upon Julius Caesar’s head, though the latter cannily noted the Roman populace’s displeasure with the act and declined. “How strictly are you intending to reconstruct this part of the rite?” I asked. “Well, we have a whip and you’ll have to flog people, but not seriously since we’re not trying to induce trance-states with this, just give them a taste of what it was like.” I chuckled. That’s not what I was having a problem with. I have a good hand when it comes to flogging, even if that’s mostly from kinky contexts as opposed to religious ones. “How nude are we talking here?” “That’s up to you. We’ve already advertised this as an adult-only ritual, but if you’re uncomfortable you could always wear boxers or something.” I swallowed hard. I knew that if I was going to do this, I had to do it all the way. As a Dionysian, you don’t do things by half measures. It’s all or nothing. And I saw that I was facing a crucial decision. Let me give you some insight into who Sannion is. I come across as bold and playful, unapologetically sexual. And I am, mostly. But there was a long time when I wasn’t. I’ve always been heavy, since I was a little kid. Children are cruel, and I was teased mercilessly about it. Those hurts stay with you, long after the words fade from memory. I learned to keep people at a distance, to never let them in so they could hurt me again. All through high school I was a loner. I kept to myself, with my nose buried in a book. People liked me, and would talk to me at lunch (especially when I started doing Tarot readings) but I always had a wall up between myself and them, never let them get a glimpse at the me on the inside, never shared the things that were important to me except with a very, very few individuals, and even then it was mostly about religious or intellectual things. Whenever I was invited to hang out with people or come to their parties, I found a reason to beg off. Eventually those invitations dried up, and I was actually glad of the fact. I never had deeply intimate friends; I was a virgin until well into my twenties when I met my first serious girlfriend online and moved in with her after a single visit. And had Dionysos not come into my life, I would probably still be that same scared, lonely, emotionally distant, walled up individual. But Dionysos has a way of forcing us to work through our issues, of tearing down our walls, or breaking through all of our barriers and shields and dragging us (often kicking and screaming) into freedom and wholeness. It hasn’t been an easy process, let me tell you. Some of that stuff is deeply rooted, and even when you think you’ve dug most of it out, it finds a way to hide until it can take hold of you once more. I recognized in Phil’s casually asked question a challenge from my god. Are you mine? Prove it. My priest will not be held back by fear and insecurity. My priest is strong and bold and whole, and will tear down every wall, every mask, every chain, and everything that would hinder his spirit. If you would call yourself a priest of mine – then show it. And I didn’t hesitate a second longer. “I’ll do it. I’ll be there. Whatever you need, I’m your man.” Of course the second the words left my mouth I wanted to take them back, cringe down in my seat and never show my face again, but I recognized that those were just the death tremors of my old self, the Jeremiah I had helped slay so that I might give birth to Sannion, the man I am today, and a strong sense of peace and purpose swelled over me. Hell, I routinely make a fool of myself – how would this be any different? If everyone was aghast by my flabby buttocks, who cared? So long as the woman I found sexually attractive felt the same about me, that’s all that mattered. And she did – I could see the look of pride in her eyes when she glanced my way and I knew that I had made the right decision. The rest of the convention until we gathered for the Ecclesia Antinoi ritual passed by in a blur. I only vaguely remember standing in front of the mirror, examining my nude frame in the surface, wondering how the hell I was going to do this. Free as I thought myself, I still had those demons deep inside me. I could see every imperfection in my body, all the extra weight I was carrying around, and I felt fear and shame rise up in me. But I refused to let it control me. So I wrapped myself in the purple cloth of my make-shift khiton and descended down through the Hotel to the ritual space. Phil and Antonius led a marvelous rite. It was ornate and beautiful, a mixture of Greek, Egyptian and Roman religious practices. As the words of Phil’s inspired Latin washed over me, I could begin to feel the presence of Dionysos and Antinous in the room, different and yet similar. Up until then I had been uncomfortable, carrying myself stiffly, covering my body with my arms, rearranging the khiton so that it concealed everything. I was very much in my head, conscious of eyes upon me at all times, even when they weren’t. I could hear the whispers of childhood mockery in the back of my head. I didn’t feel a proud and confident priest of my god: I was the fat and ugly little boy I had been all those years ago, afraid to let anyone too close for fear that they might hurt me. But then, I felt myself enveloped in the warmth and loving care of those gods. I felt all of that hardness and pain washed away, melting like the clay of a cracked, dry mask submerged in the rejuvenating waters of the Nile. I began to see myself through the eyes of the divine: I was frail and imperfect, but so are all creatures. Inside of that imperfection arises perfection and beauty, the beauty of the lotus that sprang up from the droplets of Antinous’ blood. I was flesh and flesh is the form through which the divine manifests; I was blood and blood is the source of life; I was spirit and spirit is eternal and expansive. I understood the words that Phil had spoken so beautifully in Latin: Haec est unde vita venit, "This is where life comes from!" Feeling the epiphany of Antinous-Dionysos within me, a boldness and wildness arose in my spirit. When my time came I knelt before the priests and received their blessing; I took up the whip and administered the blows to drive off the same impurity that I had felt myself freed from. I danced in the circle with the others as we watched Oionokhoe become filled with Antinous-Dionysos Khoregos and dance before his lovely idol. And even when the ritual ended, their presence remained with me. We went from the Ecclesia ritual directly into preparations for our own Delphic Dionysia. Our purpose in gathering that night was to mark the transition at Delphi which was soon to take place. Several months before Apollon had gone off to Hyperborea, leaving the oracle in the hands of his brother. Over the cold, dead winter months Dionysos had presided there, and soon his brother was going to return. So we would give him one last hurrah as the Lord of Delphi. We set up the room with images of Dionysos and fruit from the area. We filled a table with cups of wine (24 bottles in all!) and we set up an area to the side where I could perform oracular work with the god. By that time we had a fairly large group gathered outside, waiting to come celebrate the god. So we joined them. I read a piece that I had composed to set the stage. At first I was afraid that I wouldn’t speak loud enough, but I found my voice, and it was bold and echoed through the halls. Then we began chanting the god’s names, and we led our procession through the hallways of the Double Tree Inn. We chanted so loud I thought we might shake the very roof itself. Everyone turned to look at us, and when we passed the bar, several people starting chanting along with us and cheering and got up from their seats to join the procession. When we got back to our room, our group had swelled to almost twice its number. We had infected those people with Dionysos’ spirit, and they had come to revel with the god. Oinokhoe and I went through the standard Hellenic offeratory rite, and the whole time I had this double sense: I couldn’t believe that I was doing this, that we were leading such a large group of people, that here I was, shy old me, in the spotlight, guiding people in worship, perfectly remembering my lines, reciting the poetry I had written to honor my god in front of such a huge audience, and then the other part of me that was doing this without thought, purely by reflex, for this is what I had been created to do, to serve my god as his priest. Then we came to the part in the ritual where the wine was shared, and the drummers began drumming and people started dancing, and I went off to my corner to speak the words of the god and share his wisdom with all who would have it. Before Pantheacon I had been nervous about this part of the ritual. While I will frequently do 20 or more readings at a time, they’re always done on my own, without the person there, with time to reflect and find the right words. But here I was, on the spot, with them sitting across from me, and if I fucked up, if I stalled and the words eluded me, they would see, and it would screw up the whole ritual. But when I sat down, there was none of that. I fell right into the trance. I didn’t even need to journey to Dionysos’ distant temple: he was here, surrounding all of us, and I became intoxicated with him and spoke the oracles as they were asked. I don’t know how many people I did readings for: it was at least an hour, and every time I looked up, there was a large crowd of people waiting. Eventually, I had to go outside so that I could finish up, because our time was up. (If we ever do this again, we will be better prepared, so that those poor people don’t have to stand around so long and miss out on the festivities.) Although it’s hard to say, I think the readings were spot on. At one point a woman wept for what was said; another man challenged me, saying he didn’t believe in any of this and to test it, he would keep his question silent. After the reading he stood up, shook his head, muttered “how the fuck did you do that?” and walked away. Several others expressed that Dionysos had spoken what they most needed to hear, and later on throughout the conference they came up and thanked me, or bowed to me. It was an exhilirating experience, and I was glad to be able to bring the god’s presence to them so clearly. But I don’t believe that I would have been able to had Dionysos and Antinous not tocuhed me in so powerful a way. Through them, I was able to triumph over my fears and inhibitions, I was able to find freedom and boldness within my heart, I was able to become the sort of priest I always wanted to be. I am thankful beyond words, but I just wanted to share some of that gratitude here and show that, no matter how free you think you are, no matter how well you think you know the god, he can always surprise you and strip away those hidden layers within yourself. Io Dionysos! Ave Antinous! |
