Asatru Folk Assembly - 5⧸14⧸25 Victory Never Sleeps, Episode 149 - Gyðja Anderson

00:00:00.000 Transcribed by ESO, translated by —

00:00:30.000 Transcription by CastingWords

00:01:00.000 Transcription by CastingWords

00:01:30.000 Thank you.

00:02:00.000 We'll be right back.

00:02:30.000 We'll be right back.

00:03:00.000 Hello, and welcome to this week's edition of Victory Never Sleeps.

00:03:11.520 As you can see, we are joined by the lovely Githya Lauren Anderson.

00:03:16.500 Lauren, welcome to the program.

00:03:18.740 Thank you so much. Hi, everyone.

00:03:20.180 um before we get into the meat of the program uh gw farnsworth as always started us off with

00:03:31.540 a 30 donation thank you so much uh your consistent generosity is very much appreciated

00:03:40.100 um guys may have noticed that each week i am harassing you about uh our continuing efforts

00:03:49.460 to pay off yours off doing it because it's effective and we're making a lot of progress

00:03:54.420 so bear with me um we are at 84.2 percent of the way paid off which is substantial progress

00:04:09.380 we are getting close guys um there's 38 745 remaining

00:04:16.180 you guys have been extremely generous and continue to be so and we're very appreciative

00:04:22.500 of it we're trying to see how fast we can get this off paid off paying it off is going to be

00:04:29.940 our first step to getting phrase off um it seems like a lot and it is a lot this is our most

00:04:40.080 expensive Hoff so far due to its location and some other factors, but it's really impressive

00:04:49.840 and it's really amazing that we have been able to pay off, as I said, 84.2% of the cost of it

00:04:59.240 in less than three years. That is a tremendous amount of progress. It's due to y'all's continued

00:05:05.200 generosity so thank you guys very much for that if you are interested in helping with that the

00:05:12.160 link is runestone.org donate anything you can do is appreciated anybody who over the course of

00:05:21.920 things donates 500 or more gets their name on the plaque the donor plaque inside the hoff

00:05:30.320 many of you have stepped up and done that and it's much appreciated and we're making sure

00:05:34.480 your names are there for all to see for the ages um yeah and so i also give you guys kind of the

00:05:41.200 figure this breaks down to 53 dollars per afa member pays this thing off tonight were that to

00:05:49.440 happen so thank you guys very much also a couple other pieces of business we have uh midsummer

00:05:59.040 at odin's hof coming up this is our big uh 30th anniversary celebration this is going to be a big

00:06:05.920 one this is likely to be the most the largest event of the year it is at the afa's first hof

00:06:13.680 that we this is almost 10 years for this hof we found directly following our midsummer celebration

00:06:24.560 in 2015 and yeah so done some amazing things with property we have our folks out there taking such

00:06:34.880 good care of it that's in brownsville california if you can make it june 27th through the 29th we

00:06:42.480 would love to see you there we would love to show off uh odin's hof to all of you guys and

00:06:48.320 And anybody here, if you are a member, fantastic.

00:06:52.220 You should be there.

00:06:53.600 Get with your folk builder.

00:06:54.580 We'll get you all squared away.

00:06:56.420 And if you're not, we'd still like you to stop by.

00:06:59.040 I would love to meet you.

00:07:00.380 And any of our folk builders can get you all set up.

00:07:04.160 Also, the following month, in July, we have the third annual Sigur Bloat at Sigurheim.

00:07:11.240 That's in Jackson County, Tennessee.

00:07:14.740 It's going to be July 25th through the 27th.

00:07:18.320 I would love to meet any and all of you out there. It's a very special spot in a very special place.

00:07:25.120 We would really like to, you know, get you guys to see it and experience it firsthand.

00:07:33.780 This is going to be the location of the AFA's capital as we move forward.

00:07:42.540 Mandy and myself are going to move to the county as soon as we're able.

00:07:45.600 a number of other leaders and members would like to move there as well. We've got big things in

00:07:50.740 store. It will eventually be the grounds we build Tiershoff on. So I invite you all to come check

00:07:57.080 it out. It's a really special place. And yeah, same goes. If you're a member, you should be there.

00:08:03.340 We'd love to see you there. Get with your folk builder. If you're not a member, we'd still love

00:08:07.300 you to stop by and check it out. And I'd love to get to meet you. And yeah, so if you're in that

00:08:15.200 part of the country or you can be there. That's what I've got for the top of the program.

00:08:26.400 Oh, Brandy bought us five coffees. That is a $25 donation. Thank you, Brandy. We appreciate it.

00:08:36.680 So I invite everybody to ask questions to, if this catches you later and you have a question

00:08:44.220 you want asked on the show please send it our way at vns runestone.org and we'll answer it on the

00:08:52.860 following show um before we get into taking questions i know you were on the program um

00:09:04.460 week before last with uh brandy but for folks that might be just joining can you tell us a

00:09:13.420 little bit about who you are how you came to house a true and how you came to the astro folk assembly

00:09:18.540 in specific sure of course um so i i think my first uh afa gathering that i went to was maybe

00:09:29.340 in about 2006 um according to kind of the the records that i saved of the time it's about 2006

00:09:37.820 i have a um kind of a keepsake member appreciation letter where they uh the afa had just started to

00:09:45.340 keep um like a membership database at that time in 2006. so that's a really like a really nice

00:09:53.020 keepsake to have and around the same time i had the um maybe it was my first gathering i think

00:10:00.540 perhaps the midsummer of 2006 that was held at uh founder mcnellen and hofkithia mcnellen's

00:10:08.220 residence um i have the flyer for that um so i believe that was probably the first gathering

00:10:14.460 that i went to so it's about 2006. yeah fantastic yeah

00:10:21.500 So, 2006 at the McNallans' home, how large of a gathering was that back then?

00:10:40.920 No, I don't think it was that large.

00:10:43.180 um i think there at that time we did a lot of i as i remember there were some restaurant gatherings

00:10:51.580 like like the you know sizzler or you know various restaurants and it was really it was

00:10:58.380 really fun i i remember that people would just you know come if they were available

00:11:03.700 have a meal together and uh yeah at that time it was at the mcnallan's house and um i have really

00:11:13.080 you know, fond memories of that time, so. Yeah, from perspective, the AFA was

00:11:21.400 11 years old at that point. At that time, it was very, very much a

00:11:30.880 West Coast and a specifically Northern California-centered organization. We had international

00:11:38.880 members, we had members across the country, but very, very sparsely, and it was very much the

00:11:46.200 center of activity was not only just in Northern California, but centered around, largely around

00:11:52.380 everyone's home. Yeah. I feel really fortunate to have been in Northern California when that was

00:12:01.420 taking place. Yeah, absolutely. Definitely the right place at the right time for that.

00:12:12.300 So we've got a couple of questions coming in. One from Brandy. I'm a huge Githya Lauren fan.

00:12:20.800 Githya, can you tell us about some of your academic interests? What do you like to study

00:12:26.440 other than also true well I'm well I'm not sure how many people know this but I actually I studied

00:12:36.500 theater theater at UCLA University of California Los Angeles and I one of those years was over in

00:12:49.000 England I studied mostly Shakespearean acting and some art history as a minor

00:12:55.820 i'm kind of a big artsy person i suppose but yeah um that's what i mainly studied in uh in college

00:13:04.300 i got my bachelor's in theater from the school of theater film and television at ucla um i also had

00:13:10.380 some really great classes i think i told you about this brandy but um one of our textbooks for the

00:13:14.860 go there program was the jesse byock viking language book and i i was fortunate enough to

00:13:21.660 have his class at ucla his viking class so it was really fun i remember learning especially from

00:13:29.980 from him and that was really a lot of a lot of fun so yeah at ucla i was yeah

00:13:41.100 i i almost got a like a double major in indo-european studies and theater but they

00:13:46.220 didn't want anyone who was getting a theater major to get a double major so they didn't let us do that

00:13:51.660 But I took the classes and anyway, so.

00:13:57.400 That's fantastic.

00:13:59.480 What was your favorite Shakespeare work?

00:14:08.620 My husband will not like this because he doesn't like this one.

00:14:11.760 But for some reason, like Midsummer Night's Dream, I kind of like that one.

00:14:17.900 that may be my husband's least favorite one because everyone really likes it but um but

00:14:25.440 you know maybe it's just because i've been in a couple of shows i've been in a couple of live

00:14:30.920 shows of that one like during the during the summer and it's kind of this like magical time

00:14:36.420 you know during the summer you're gonna fun energy to do a live play and so i have like fond

00:14:43.120 memories of doing that play i also like and i know you're not supposed to say this on a stage

00:14:47.300 but I suppose it's okay here. The Macbeth show. I've been in that a couple of times and I really

00:14:53.220 like that one. A couple of them have some really strong kind of folk memory type things in them,

00:15:01.440 which is fun, which is one of the things I always enjoyed about Shakespeare.

00:15:05.800 When you say you've been in them, do you mean performing on stage?

00:15:10.460 Yes, sir.

00:15:11.360 Okay. So not behind the scenes stuff, but like upfront roles.

00:15:15.680 yeah yeah what'd you play in uh mcbeth i am mcbeth i i played uh lady mcduff two times

00:15:25.600 i believe and i played lady mcbeth once so yeah that's fantastic i didn't know that about you

00:15:32.900 either that's great yeah that was pretty good i bet that's that's outstanding i've never

00:15:42.940 had any experience like that that's really cool um tracy would like to know i've been wondering

00:15:50.540 if githya lauren would like to tell us her story luckily she's starting to do that now

00:15:56.940 how did she find alsatru and what are her future plans and goals that's a good question hi tracy

00:16:07.020 you know so i guess the um i won't bore everyone with a long story but well before

00:16:16.140 okay i guess we have a lot of time so um in college when i went to ucla um at that time

00:16:24.540 um i had been what i would consider um wiccan you know as a lot of probably a lot of women were

00:16:32.540 were at that time um i was wiccan until i went to college um and then i'm i uh there was a student

00:16:41.660 organization religious organization on campus that was headed by my soon-to-be friend and

00:16:47.740 we would co-head this after i got there was the uh the pagan circle um and she um recommended a

00:16:55.500 a book to me at one point, which was, I believe, the Freya Aswin's book, Northern Mysteries

00:17:02.580 and Magic. And she said, oh, I found this interesting religious tradition. I don't know

00:17:08.820 what you'll think about it. I kind of hear it's patriarchal or something, but check it

00:17:13.960 out. So I checked it out. And then we both kind of, we both at one point did this kind

00:17:19.800 of Uta Seta. I'm not sure if I'm pronouncing that perfectly, but we kind of went out to

00:17:26.320 this national forest in Los Angeles together and kind of both, you know, converted from

00:17:34.260 Wicca to Ausatru because we both found so much in it that we found to be, you know,

00:17:41.200 personally very, you know, rewarding. And I also had my first encounter with Odin.

00:17:49.800 whom I've also, I've always been very deeply devoted to, is Odin, and so at that time I thought,

00:17:57.800 well, I've definitely found my home, and I've never looked back from that point, so that was,

00:18:03.080 you know, maybe 20 years or so ago, 23, 24 years, so that's how I found it,

00:18:11.160 was my friend at UCLA when we were running the pagan circle.

00:18:14.920 what happened to your friend um i haven't spoken to her for a while um i think that

00:18:23.800 she perhaps went the more universalist type route um she i don't believe she joined the afa

00:18:33.320 um she was at my wedding i think at some point i think i will call her out of the blue and say

00:18:41.120 hello because i do still have so much fondness for her so i will call her and say hello but um

00:18:48.720 she doesn't belong to the afa but yeah she was my wedding you were too i was i remember that yeah

00:19:01.600 i hope that answered your question tracy if you have anything else just let me know

00:19:05.040 so cory would like to know githia lauren what's your favorite ausa true holiday and why

00:19:15.960 okay well i have a like a special fondness for mid sumar um because my husband and i were

00:19:27.220 married then in 2012 when AFA was still doing gatherings up in Camp Norgay in Northern California

00:19:38.840 in like the Alta area. So we had our our wedding ceremony there. So I kind of have a we'll always

00:19:45.660 have a fondness for that time. I guess I kind of have a fondness for like the liminal times of the

00:19:52.300 year kind of like you know winter nights you know kind of Halloween time when the veil is a little

00:19:58.220 bit thin I can kind of I really feel it in the air and I feel like it's a really like powerful time

00:20:04.400 for individual and group ritual and introspection but I really love Yule as well I've always really

00:20:12.360 loved you know before I was also true before I was anything you know there was like the Christmas

00:20:17.740 time and I always felt a really magical kind of feeling about that time of year

00:20:22.880 um just it was a wonderful time to be with family and friends and um you know i love

00:20:29.920 i love all father owen and you know all the legends about him being in the um you know the

00:20:37.120 wild hunt and everything during the time of yule that always really inspires me that's

00:20:41.760 kind of a powerful time of year so i do like that time as well so not a simple answer but it's true

00:20:52.160 so that's three if you had to choose between those three probably you'll

00:21:00.400 probably you'll yeah it's it's a special time of year isn't it no it absolutely is i think everybody

00:21:08.400 i don't know about everybody but i think lots and lots and lots of us have endless positive

00:21:16.880 associations with that time of year and you get 12 days for one holiday so that's true

00:21:23.120 there you go it's a good value for a holiday

00:21:31.680 so uh next dom barnes wants to know was edred with the afa then uh no as far as i'm aware

00:21:43.680 he was never a member of the Astru Folk Assembly.

00:21:47.120 He was a member of the Free Assembly back in the 1980s.

00:21:51.220 But on and off, you know, the McNallans have stayed close with him

00:21:57.500 and are in, you know, I don't know what counts as regular contact,

00:22:03.580 but are in, you know, semi-frequent contact with him

00:22:07.140 and kind of always have been.

00:22:08.980 Did he have any specific interactions with the AFA

00:22:11.980 during your early years in the AFA, Lauren?

00:22:15.720 None that I remember, and I don't believe that I met him.

00:22:20.600 I know I met a lot of people, probably, but I don't believe that I met him.

00:22:25.100 But, yeah, it would have been nice to meet him.

00:22:30.420 Yeah, I think he'd be a fascinating person to meet.

00:22:33.260 Definitely.

00:22:35.880 I was influenced by his books and everything, so.

00:22:39.660 okay so what what is your favorite book by edry

00:22:50.620 um i think that i think that i i like runelore or futhark are the kind of the good standards

00:23:00.300 to read um i also i worked through a lot of the nine doors of ventgard of rune work um

00:23:08.620 but and i've been meaning to actually work through it again um that's one of my things

00:23:14.060 i've been working on so because i really enjoy working with the runes

00:23:21.180 the prescribed way or did you abbreviate for your own needs

00:23:28.460 well i'm not sure exactly say because it's

00:23:33.100 it's a lot isn't it

00:23:51.980 okay it looks like we're back there was some kind of something going on there maybe it was on my

00:23:55.980 yeah yeah i see you now okay so i was gonna say it was some absurd amount of time um on each of

00:24:04.860 those doors yes it was i tried a few times i made it through the first two doors the long way i

00:24:18.700 didn't have the patience for it when i first started it and it's one of those i think some

00:24:23.740 of doing it his prescribed very very long way in the patient like the exercising of the patients

00:24:31.340 i think is part of that as i've grown up i think that's part of the value to it

00:24:36.140 right but yeah i know anybody anybody listening

00:24:42.700 that's a really interesting book and i think that especially the early doors i can't personally

00:24:48.940 speak to the later doors as far as the value they bring going through them i've done some of the

00:24:53.740 exercises but i got a lot out of that one of the things that i that i tell people a lot and i try

00:25:02.060 to make sure our gothar students do came from that book and it's i think it's useful for anybody

00:25:10.540 listening but and i find i don't check back in on it as often as i should but i do still

00:25:18.540 periodically is he has you write a uh a journal of

00:25:29.340 like i think he phrases it like your leo staff qualities and your merc staff qualities your

00:25:37.020 your good things and your bad things your strengths and your weaknesses and not for

00:25:43.580 public consumption but just so you can be brutally honest with yourself and i think

00:25:48.540 that when we say brutally honest it means like you know don't lie to yourself and like admit

00:25:53.580 to all your faults but i think it's equally important and i think he may make this point

00:25:58.220 as well in there to write down your good qualities without worrying that you sound

00:26:04.060 like a braggart if they're things you genuinely think are exceptional about yourself put them down

00:26:10.140 and then check back in to see what progress or you know backsliding you've done on those lists

00:26:18.060 over time i found that very very valuable and i think everybody can do well to incorporate

00:26:25.260 that in a structured writing it down and then checking back in way and i think you might be

00:26:29.340 surprised in a good way on some of the things that you that you do improve with over time

00:26:37.580 i feel like it encourages like a healthy development of the ego

00:26:43.660 i think so um

00:26:47.900 githya lauren when do you plan on visiting york's hoff the bestest hoff in florida

00:26:53.260 it is the best office order i think that's undisputed i really i really would love to

00:27:00.260 visit new york's off i hopefully next year hopefully next year i really wanted to come

00:27:04.360 this year but i wasn't able to um but next year i hope to um i believe the mid perhaps the only

00:27:14.760 um travel i'll do this year to another half is to baldur's house in august i think that my

00:27:22.440 husband and I will both go to the uh the Freyfaxe gathering um but yeah I you know I have fond

00:27:29.960 memories of Florida my my grandmother lived in Florida and I have kind of fond memories of

00:27:35.140 visiting her in Florida so I really do look forward to that and I've seen all the wonderful

00:27:39.860 photos for all the gatherings and I just I just really want to see you guys yeah I look forward

00:27:46.220 demeaning you all? It's neat. I'd encourage everybody out there, you know, if you have the

00:27:55.860 ability, or when you have the ability, rather, visiting all of our Hoffs is a special thing to do.

00:28:08.940 People have been calling it a bloat fair, or like a pilgrimage, for lack of a better term,

00:28:15.780 a bloat journey to each of our Hoffs. And a number of members have done that so far. And

00:28:21.920 I don't know anybody who's done that and then regretted it or, man, that was a waste or man,

00:28:28.460 I shouldn't have done it. I know a lot of people who've done it and thought it was extremely

00:28:32.480 powerful. Each of the Hoffs, excuse me, each of the Hoffs has a really different feel to it

00:28:40.260 and a different energy when you're there and

00:28:45.020 it's hard to convey if you haven't been there but something really special happens when we

00:28:54.940 dedicate these haves and you know a piece of our gods resides there and inhabits that space

00:29:05.500 and i think it's very palpable to those of us who've been there and experienced it

00:29:12.620 and i would you know wish that for all our folk that they get the opportunity to

00:29:17.100 to experience that in you know at least one of but hopefully each of our hoffs

00:29:25.980 in our membership in our monthly district call in odin's house this month i believe um if you're

00:29:32.140 going to be part of that call we're going to be talking about bloat fair um the you know

00:29:36.780 pilgrimage to other hoffs um so if you'd like to join us for that we'd love to see you there

00:29:45.260 um

00:29:49.420 from mandy lauren's voice is so calming i want her to read me bedtime stories

00:29:54.860 brandy says i agree with mandy could there be audio of lauren reading old folk stories to us

00:30:03.340 well thank you ladies um well um some of you some of you perhaps in odin's office

00:30:12.420 i have been around for i've been um the first friday of the month we do a first friday for

00:30:18.840 frig um daughters of frig virtual tea and i've been doing these guided meditations and um some

00:30:25.480 some folks would like me to record those so we were thinking of doing that um for the you know

00:30:31.080 perhaps the youtube channel or making a separate youtube channel for that so maybe maybe maybe

00:30:37.640 we'll do that so no i think you i think you've got a really good voice for it too i think that

00:30:43.400 that Cadence and everything, I'm really curious.

00:30:46.800 I think that would be great.

00:30:49.960 Thank you.

00:30:52.640 I'm just glad that people get something out of it.

00:30:55.600 That's all I hope for.

00:31:01.160 Rachel would like to know, Githya Anderson,

00:31:03.900 what initiatives or goals do you hope to start

00:31:07.760 for the women of the AFA?

00:31:09.480 that's a good question um i would like i would like every every woman in the afa to know that

00:31:19.560 they belong first of all um that there is a place for you in in this religious community

00:31:27.880 you know that perhaps there's a reputation of as i was saying when i first discovered as a true

00:31:33.720 you know my friend was like my female friend was you know i've heard it's patriarchal kind of thing

00:31:39.720 but it's really you know there are a lot of women in asatru and they are just like waiting

00:31:46.520 to embrace their sisters um we did a um sarah alt probably talked about this but there was a

00:31:55.240 sisters um sisters coming home kind of egg ritual that we did this year where we um decorated

00:32:03.400 eggs um with symbols and everything and we they were it was a prayer for the for sisters to come

00:32:09.720 home to the afa um to find the afa and we did that and we kind of were burning the eggs in the sumer

00:32:17.800 mall fires and fires of mayday um praying for our sisters for the for our women to come home

00:32:26.120 and um there are just there are many women in alsatrew and we need them to know that they

00:32:31.880 belong and they're just as important as anyone else and they're very valued and you know if

00:32:39.960 anyone has any other questions just please let me know and i can answer any questions for you

00:32:45.160 yeah all right so traveling back to do days of your when you got involved in afa what would you say

00:32:55.640 the i don't know i mean we've said it a lot on here so i don't want to like feed you something

00:33:06.600 to confirm how would you describe the difference in the membership demographics of 2025's afa versus

00:33:17.880 20

00:33:20.120 just say 2006 when you joined or anything thereabouts

00:33:25.640 You know, actually, I want to say that there are actually perhaps more young people these days that I'm seeing, which is really encouraging. It's very, very encouraging.

00:33:39.640 um you know perhaps there are more people kind of moving from other traditions to asa true back then

00:33:49.100 you know but these but these days there are a lot more young people that are finding finding

00:33:56.040 something very life-affirming and powerful in asa true that they can't find anywhere else

00:34:00.960 and we can offer that for them um to men and women um to anybody and we really hope that

00:34:08.820 people come and find us because a lot of the things that people say about us aren't true

00:34:14.000 it's really true so i guess expanding on that what

00:34:23.760 what would you I mean how would you describe differences in the AFA of 2025 versus the AFA of

00:34:39.260 2006 I would say that it's a it is very much more organized these days

00:34:48.760 um very much more um well organized and um it's very it's a lot bigger too it's a lot bigger

00:35:02.260 because we didn't have thoughts back then you know we didn't have physical places where we

00:35:07.720 went to go worship every month like it's it is absolutely amazing that we have that i think

00:35:13.900 perhaps people um you know take that for granted maybe these days that we have hoffs to go to every

00:35:22.540 month or actually you know anytime if you're a member you can go to a hoff anytime you want like

00:35:27.080 that's absolutely amazing that is a you know a dream that we had for so long i remember um i

00:35:35.500 have memories of kind of looking around for land like in the car we were driving around looking

00:35:40.760 at places with i was with um godi thorgrin odin and his wife katie and odinsoff you know them

00:35:48.340 if you're in odinsoff and founder mcnellen and hofkithia sheila mcnellen we were looking around

00:35:56.100 at land and it just it hadn't happened yet but it has happened now and it's just so amazing

00:36:03.480 we're so like blessed we're so blessed to have what we have and um that's a big thing it's a big

00:36:14.360 thing yeah i i remark on here sometimes you know these these kids today it's it's such a double-edged

00:36:25.480 sword um many of the prospective members and um you know new members of the afa and even not so

00:36:38.040 new anymore um they just take hoffs as a given like of course there's hoffs how come there's not

00:36:49.240 a hoff in my town or in my neighborhood like how come there's not five hoffs in my town

00:36:57.800 the fact that we've come so far to where people assume or expect that is in a way gratifying and

00:37:11.720 a testament to how far we've come but it's also you know they they will they will never know

00:37:19.240 The struggle that it was when a lot of us got involved to where that getting that first half established was this elusive dream that we all planned and schemed and theorized.

00:37:32.540 And, you know, wouldn't it be wonderful if, and being able to live in a day and an age where that's happened, other Hoffs have happened, and where that's now a, I don't know if common is the right word, but a everyday part of our AFA experience is just such a different thing.

00:38:01.120 And it's a reality that many of us, you know, wouldn't have dreamed would be would be possible.

00:38:10.700 That idea of maybe having one off was like the biggest, you know, that's how high the bar was set.

00:38:16.560 And it was an insurmountable accomplishment.

00:38:20.420 it's amazing once that first half

00:38:24.980 became a reality how quickly we were able to get um additional offs and continue to do so

00:38:33.300 people didn't imagine back then that we would have i mean four of us that's this and land you

00:38:39.860 know to build another one it's amazing yeah um i mean when we got that first half

00:38:49.540 that was like oh the hoff okay cool we have the hoff now as if that's the only you know because

00:38:56.900 again it's hard to

00:39:00.740 when you set your sights on a goal for so long and as i mentioned before reading

00:39:05.540 you know some of the first rune stones i remember rune stones from the early 80s

00:39:11.060 you know any day now we're gonna have a hoff and we're gonna have land and we're gonna have this

00:39:14.500 off and do this thing yeah and you know it took almost 30 years you know over 30 years from that

00:39:23.300 point to get that first off so it's uh it's quite a thing and that's one of the reasons that we

00:39:31.940 try so hard to get every all of you to come join us at one of our hofs is we have worked so hard

00:39:37.940 for them and they're such a blessing and such a powerful thing when you're at them

00:39:43.940 that uh you know there's nothing we can do on here to express that with the same visceralness

00:39:51.300 of you actually experiencing it so if you haven't been i'd really encourage everybody please

00:39:57.060 you know make the effort go out of your way we would love to to show you and you know

00:40:04.260 experience that with you or you know i mentioned one of the things as gothar that's most gratifying

00:40:12.100 is when you're able to be there and in some way help facilitate someone having that religious

00:40:18.980 experience where their eyes go and this faith is made real to them in a more visceral way

00:40:28.580 and uh you know if we're able to achieve that ever it's a huge accomplishment and that's you

00:40:36.980 know that is that's what we live for so we would love to be able to help everybody experience that

00:40:42.980 yeah um so whitten young says glad to have githya lauren on the team uh tell us how did you come to

00:40:55.300 be with you well i believe that um i've been thinking about it all my life really i guess

00:41:09.780 that's kind of what it comes to since i was really like a small very small girl um i kind of i thought

00:41:18.500 of the world is um very um like holy and i grew up i grew up in the unitarian church which is

00:41:28.820 obviously very different than our faith um but i i grew up feeling like the world was very like

00:41:35.460 an enchanted magical place and something i wanted to be a big part of my mother tells me about i

00:41:43.700 would kind of make altars to things growing up when i was little and she didn't know what they

00:41:48.660 were too and you know i don't even i don't even know to this day but i think it was probably for

00:41:54.980 the same reason that i just i really wanted to like um be a part of the world that i felt was

00:42:02.020 like a magical place um i wanted to be a part of the world i wanted to help people um i've always

00:42:10.420 really in um sound personal fulfillment in helping people um making them feel better

00:42:21.380 connecting them to things that um would make them happier so i feel like this was kind of

00:42:28.180 a natural fit for me um spiritually and and otherwise so my parents both had uh like

00:42:36.260 masters in psychology so i kind of grew up around a lot of psychology kind of books and kind of that

00:42:42.740 kind of language and i always kind of helped my friends with issues they were going through and

00:42:48.100 everything so um i just i really enjoy talking to people helping them through things um

00:42:55.380 you know if anyone ever has anything anything they need help with just just let me know

00:43:00.340 write me an email or or call me i'm always here for you i hope that answers that okay

00:43:09.380 well it does tell um tell us a little bit about that i think when you say that you were raised

00:43:15.860 unitarian i hear a lot of people that you know get like a mail order ordination through that

00:43:26.660 kind of an outfit but i don't hear a lot of people that were raised in that as if that was their

00:43:32.420 faith growing up what was that like for those that you know don't know about it you know i'm

00:43:39.300 not actually sure if that's the same is that the same exact thing i'm not exactly sure and because

00:43:47.140 the yeah the the unitarian thing that you get that you know universal life church kind of thing the

00:43:52.740 certificate through the mail affiliated or not i'm not making the assumption that they are but

00:43:58.100 every time i've known anyone talk about being a unitarian it was kind of that they wanted to get

00:44:06.340 ordained and yeah somebody but they didn't really want to go through a yeah structured thing so they

00:44:12.900 they went yeah yeah i know that's definitely the universal life church i'm not sure how

00:44:18.020 much of a connection there is but yeah the unitarian universalists are i think you know

00:44:24.580 perhaps someone else could answer this better than me but um i think some of our like our founding

00:44:29.220 fathers were involved in the unitarian church um perhaps and jefferson i'm yeah i don't even know

00:44:36.900 but uh you know actually you'll find them in various towns um like i grew up in sacramento

00:44:43.380 california and so i would go to the unitarian universalist church in sacramento california

00:44:50.660 you know and it was just kind of a kind of a blending of various faith traditions you know

00:44:58.660 it's a little bit different than what we do but there was something good about it too but i

00:45:03.620 believe a lot of um you know secular humanists also were in it so they could go and find some

00:45:10.580 spiritual kind of fulfillment without being too tied down to something really you know tied down

00:45:16.820 in orthodoxy or something um i skipped a question somewhere now i'm trying to go back and find it

00:45:33.780 all right so brandy wants to know what are some of your favorite books also true related and

00:45:40.580 not us true related no um not usature related um i just have to bring up this amazing performance

00:45:52.620 i went the other week um yeah i'd have to say probably at this point like my favorite

00:45:59.060 book is um like the lord of the rings um but all like three books kind of into one or movie

00:46:09.120 also into one and uh folk builder daniel odom and his wife and i and my husband went to the

00:46:17.140 san francisco symphony that were doing a showing they were doing a showing of the two towers which

00:46:22.160 is the second movie in the lord of the rings trilogy and um as that is like kind of my favorite

00:46:28.140 book my favorite movie it was really amazing they did like the symphony the score of the movie and

00:46:34.240 the coral background of the set of the movie at the same time that we were watching the whole movie

00:46:39.580 was really amazing but that that one that was kind of it's fresh in my mind because it was

00:46:47.040 just the other way so i have to bring that up the third one is next year so it's not too late if

00:46:52.460 anyone else wants to go with us you can get your tickets still in july but that is perhaps my

00:46:57.960 favorite um non-assature book um is christopher tolkien's lord of the rings like all three kind

00:47:05.800 of together i really love the hobbit too um non-assature and yeah assature wise um i would

00:47:16.120 you know recommend um deep to ancestors um culture of the teutons uh the imperial imperial press

00:47:23.000 um uh edition um i'm starting a really good book i've started into it the horse the wheel and

00:47:31.800 language that's really good um if anyone's read some of that you get about 10 chapters in and

00:47:42.260 it's just pottery after pottery after pottery for like 10 chapters but i love that sounds like

00:47:49.380 something my husband would say he was an anthropology major at ucla we both went to

00:47:54.040 ucla i was in theater he was in anthropology and says it's all pot shirts it's sherds they just

00:47:59.500 like they find all these hot like shirts and it's boring like 10 chapters of horse the wheel

00:48:04.960 language

00:48:05.440 yeah the best material makes you work for it some of the best material is a is a tedious read

00:48:17.540 and um yeah the um of course um founder mcnallan's book the pass the true um uh native european

00:48:33.860 spirituality is amazing it's an amazing book also it's a book the spear which is a little

00:48:38.740 bit more political but um but the uh but the uh the first one is it's really amazing they're both

00:48:46.420 amazing and um anything by avila um i'm reading the mysteries of the grail is another one i'm

00:48:52.100 reading right now so yeah

00:48:57.780 if that didn't answer it enough please ask me more

00:49:00.740 sorry i'm reading one of the upcoming questions here

00:49:16.500 okay so all right first before i do that ben in arizona donated 50 to vns thank you so much

00:49:35.940 been message we are cheering for you lauren hail the icer hail the afa

00:49:47.700 so you got fans no they're wonderful ben and desiree are wonderful people

00:49:56.660 nick would like to know if you could talk a little bit about

00:50:01.140 Oh, it was directed at you, not her.

00:50:06.140 It was directed at me?

00:50:08.140 It says speaking as a man.

00:50:11.140 Well, I'm trying to read through it and it's just like massive paragraph.

00:50:14.140 Yeah.

00:50:15.140 Some of it is not.

00:50:16.140 Yeah.

00:50:17.140 I typo.

00:50:18.140 All right.

00:50:19.140 I see it.

00:50:20.140 All right.

00:50:21.140 All right.

00:50:22.140 All right.

00:50:23.140 All right.

00:50:24.140 With me and you can chime in on this, perhaps.

00:50:25.140 Maybe that's part of the theme of the question.

00:50:27.140 Speaking as a man, who some of these online kids want to spout as being on and on about being in charge and leading,

00:50:36.340 what are your thoughts on women in the role specifically as leaders in the AFA and more specifically as spiritual leaders as Githjur?

00:50:48.520 All right.

00:50:49.320 So I was having a conversation with a guy on Twitter yesterday about this.

00:50:57.140 And our people come from where we come from, and that's different for everybody.

00:51:08.960 Everybody comes here a different route.

00:51:10.840 a lot of young men come to Alcitru from

00:51:18.360 a very isolated and a very

00:51:24.520 and I it is what it is but I don't mean this mean-spiritedly we have a lot of very smart

00:51:35.520 very intellectual young men who lack experience and real life wisdom and you know this guy had

00:51:45.840 a lot of concerns about women's roles in feminism and you know how he thinks women are better suited

00:51:54.960 in support roles and in in mothering and at the home roles as opposed to leadership and

00:52:00.880 organizations and various things and i i was sympathetic and expressed you know hey

00:52:07.760 if you give me a call i'd be happy to talk to you about any of this here's my phone number

00:52:12.320 and he was like shocked and affronted that i would suggest that he call me

00:52:17.760 because instead he's using his fake twitter name and that told me a lot about where the question

00:52:23.280 comes from. And again, I, yes, I do find that absurd. I'm going to be honest, but I think it's

00:52:35.240 also honest. I think there's a lot of people that, not just Ausitru, but their life in general is

00:52:42.580 played out in the realm of theory and online in endless masturbatory, you know, circular

00:52:52.240 conversations about their theories on things that don't really have a lot of practice involved in

00:53:01.420 them. And, you know, I would agree if I'm building a video game, everybody would be

00:53:10.260 this archetypical example of what my conception of the perfect, you know, role for each of these

00:53:17.760 people is and you know you can ask people that have known me coming up or whatever else my

00:53:25.360 my default setting is not let's stack the deck with women in leadership positions i

00:53:31.520 often think women in leadership positions in the world are absolutely terrible and abhorrent

00:53:37.840 and i do think that women absolutely do tend to do very well in domestic roles and in supportive

00:53:46.880 roles but reality matters and theory is just that it's a place to start but you have to make

00:53:56.640 decisions based on the realities that face you and quite honestly one thing that our women tend to

00:54:05.920 have often more than our men in the day and age that we live in is courage and conviction and loyalty

00:54:11.680 we have a lot of women within the AFA that have stepped up in a way that is exceptional

00:54:21.640 and have demonstrated consistent and sober judgment when a lot of our men haven't

00:54:29.620 and that's not a statement about masculinity or femininity it's just a statement of the

00:54:36.120 facts on the ground. And so we have to run things accordingly. What I think is also misunderstood

00:54:44.380 and often misunderstood by people who don't have the same seasoning of years doing things in the

00:54:52.140 world. There is a very different way that women utilize and wield power than men do. And I think

00:55:09.480 we've all seen that when a woman tries to express leadership in a masculine way, it's like nails on

00:55:19.100 chalkboard a lot of the time it's screechy like it's it's i use it as the most obvious example

00:55:29.420 not to be overly political but it's like hillary clinton stuff she's extremely unlikable

00:55:36.220 but i've seen that work very much the other way especially amongst our uh our gift here

00:55:42.140 and you can see some of it in expressed in the lady with the mead cup

00:55:49.140 there are ways of

00:55:55.440 controlling the flow of emotion controlling the flow of

00:56:03.720 how men interact with one another that I think only women can do in the way that they can do it

00:56:13.940 their ability to manipulate social structure is very unique when men are contentious and

00:56:22.580 scared of losing face so they're locked in stupid fights or fights that are just not productive

00:56:30.180 women are very often able to very simply and very eloquently diffuse the situation

00:56:37.660 in a way that men couldn't do without sacrificing one or both of their faith

00:56:45.980 or their honor and their, you know, perceived dignity.

00:56:51.440 that's expressed in a much quieter much

00:56:58.280 more graceful way than male leadership but it's always had its place amongst our folk and i think

00:57:07.040 that while that's not the social norm isn't that women need to run things all the time when we find

00:57:15.080 spots to where women do when we find queens when we find uh githyr of the past when we find you

00:57:22.360 know the motif the archetype of the the wise woman that people seek out for counsel that's based on

00:57:29.800 a very real thing amongst our folk tacitus writes about how women have a particular connection to

00:57:37.080 divinity in a way that's very different and distinct from a man's that leaders in

00:57:43.880 our ancestors day and in our day-to-day find special um guidance in and that's always been

00:57:53.160 kind of the case that's why in the day we have uh you know spow wives or uh seeth kona that would

00:58:03.800 that would that would go and be able to prophesy be able to advise uh kings and chiefs and leaders

00:58:14.120 we had um you know the the edda themselves it it means grandmother there it's the wisdom of

00:58:22.440 your grandmothers um the motherly education of that nurturing hand to lead and to groom and to

00:58:32.120 guide power and to help shape relationships between powerful men is very very useful

00:58:41.080 and so i don't think that's you know a natural role that i want to push women into when we find

00:58:48.680 women that excel in that way i think it's really important and i think that especially when we talk

00:58:53.960 about leadership in a religious sense within the afa one of the probably the function that are um

00:59:06.520 gothar as a whole perform more than anything else like on a depending upon the gothy or githya but

00:59:15.800 on you know sometimes a daily if not a weekly basis is counseling and i think that there are

00:59:22.120 strengths and weaknesses, what we find often is some, and a lot of people have misconceptions

00:59:28.820 about this too. I think from the outside looking in, one would assume that maybe men would do

00:59:36.260 better if they are counseled by a man and women would do better if they're counseled by a woman,

00:59:40.780 but that's not always the case. Different groups of people and depending upon what they need

00:59:45.320 counsel on very often a githya is able to provide counsel in a much more effective way or certainly

00:59:52.520 in a different way than a man is and depending on who is in need of counseling and what they

00:59:57.960 need counseling on that's oftentimes much more effective so it really really depends i think

01:00:06.840 that if people would and so we all start where we start as i was saying i was probably sympathetic

01:00:16.200 to that point of view before i got involved in the astro folk assembly and you know saw

01:00:21.000 the situation on the ground and the tools that we had to work with um and i do very much believe

01:00:30.680 in patriarchal authority i very much believe that the man needs to take charge in the household of

01:00:37.640 the spiritual development and well-being of his family and you know ideally i'd like to

01:00:43.400 see men step up and take leadership positions in the church but very often we have women that

01:00:50.520 are doing that much better and much more effectively and we're not going to forego that

01:00:54.920 due to a concept or an idea or an ideal situation that's not the one we're facing.

01:01:02.820 But I was going to say, we all start where we start, and I don't fault anybody for having

01:01:06.900 questions or concerns, but I would urge the people who have questions and concerns based

01:01:15.640 on theory or idea, trust that we're doing something right. What I think is lacking a lot

01:01:23.800 in Ausatru is, so this is more complex, I guess. A lot of people come to our faith not from an

01:01:34.040 overtly religious background. A lot of people come to our faith from an atheistic or at least

01:01:40.500 an agnostic background where they might be vaguely spiritual, but not really part of a

01:01:46.140 structure or an organized system of religion and so I think some of it

01:01:53.360 doesn't come as naturally to some as it does to others without so true I think

01:02:01.520 people approach it as a organization as a club as a when I say hobby I don't mean

01:02:11.920 trivialize it because i think some people who take it very seriously have yet to develop that

01:02:18.480 true religious mindset but i'd like folks who have those questions to first consider

01:02:28.880 what if the gods genuinely support the house of true folk assembly and give us their blessing

01:02:38.080 and if you allow for that

01:02:41.920 have a little bit of faith and trust that maybe maybe we're doing some stuff right

01:02:48.240 that's i don't want that as a uh you know carte blanche we can do whatever we want or any kind

01:02:54.560 of ulterior gothic infallibility far from it but maybe a kind of an assumption that maybe we got

01:03:01.920 some stuff right and see and check it out because some of us who've had to deal with the things that

01:03:08.000 maybe you're concerned about maybe we've been through some of this before maybe we've learned

01:03:13.760 lessons maybe we know a little bit about what we're doing and you should check it out and

01:03:19.440 give it a chance i think it's very it is much easier for people to see something that they

01:03:27.280 doesn't meet what they've decided in their head is perfect and therefore it's easy for them to

01:03:33.440 dismiss it. I think it's much harder to give something a shot and to take, you know, a leap

01:03:41.640 of faith, as it were, and come check it out and try to be part of it, try to pray on it and see

01:03:48.320 if it, you know, see if it works out, see if it rings true. And I think, you know, I wish more

01:03:55.300 people would give that a shot or adjust their mind in that way. And I think, I think we'd have

01:04:00.320 some better results in a lot of our lives um lauren what do you respond to any of either those

01:04:09.680 concerns or any of the things that i mentioned about what are your thoughts on that

01:04:13.440 yeah i mean it's a it's a complicated topic isn't it i mean i just have to say around the time that

01:04:20.580 i first um started going to gatherings with the afa i was also i was i mean i was like kind of

01:04:29.320 going to gatherings of whomever I could find.

01:04:32.320 I believe that I started going to some gatherings

01:04:35.720 of a group in Berkeley.

01:04:37.880 Probably a lot of people know about that one.

01:04:40.800 Perhaps a more universalist type of strain of our faith,

01:04:45.800 which is fine, but it's not what we practice.

01:04:51.140 And I didn't stay with that one, with that strain.

01:04:55.140 I stayed with the AFA because I felt like, I felt at home with the AFA, and I mean, even though it's hard to describe these kind of things, I know we're not a political organization, but perhaps, you know, the other group, the Truth in Berkeley,

01:05:20.660 um were a little bit more liberal and i had grown up in a little bit more liberal family

01:05:25.700 so perhaps someone would um expect me to go with the troth instead of the afa but i

01:05:33.460 am with afa and i always have been um and that's just something with me

01:05:41.620 even though people say things that aren't true about the afa i've always my heart has always

01:05:46.820 been with the afa and i can you know answer any questions anyone has about that um or uh

01:05:55.140 it's been hard because part part of being in something like the afa is realizing that

01:06:02.260 some things people say in the media aren't true you know and if you grow up in perhaps a liberal

01:06:08.740 family um you kind of think of yourself as well you're part of something that's on the right side

01:06:15.060 of things you know the media doesn't lie to me or whatever but they do um so i hope that makes

01:06:21.860 sense sense to people well tracy is asking a question for all of us or all of us are dying to

01:06:32.500 know girl what is your skincare routine you're glowing oh goodness you learn oh and maybe it's

01:06:42.340 directed you matt maybe our our glowing skin i'll share goby uh well i don't know i'm one of the

01:06:57.620 kind of fun fun fact about me i used to um work at uh the clinique uh clinique skin and makeup

01:07:04.180 counter uh the the makeup counter at the mall so those ladies in the lab coats that you'd see

01:07:10.900 i was one of those ladies for a little while the clinic but um i do enjoy i do enjoy skin care so

01:07:16.980 perhaps that is part of it uh part of it i i appreciate your your words thank you so much

01:07:23.860 do you have any product that you would recommend to ladies that would like to have a similar glow

01:07:29.220 oh um i would just say just find any kind of whatever is in your budget any kind of

01:07:35.700 like gentle skin cleanser even it's like you know vanicream or like a any kind of like a lot of

01:07:43.860 great things in the drugstore um just like a non-soap kind of gentle cleanser and gentle

01:07:51.540 moisturizer and that makes a lot of difference just just cleanser and moisturizer and it's a

01:07:57.380 great self-care thing too it's not just like the aesthetics of it it's just how it makes you feel

01:08:02.340 it makes you feel a lot better about your day if you can treat yourself to something like that it

01:08:08.020 doesn't have to be expensive at all i always enjoy that

01:08:14.580 being pretty is a revolt against the modern world oh goodness

01:08:20.580 that's the thing aesthetics matter you do look great tonight lauren thank you

01:08:25.460 um question from the stream that jake built give you lauren what cat is best and why is it the

01:08:34.980 calico hello jake we love our cats i wrote everything's off i i don't have a calico cat

01:08:43.060 but i do have we my husband and i have two cats that we love very very much we have

01:08:49.380 two kind of siamese mixed cats um we have one that's like um whose name is pumpkin and he's a

01:08:58.020 siamese mix with like a flame point kind of thing so he's kind of like a toasted marshmallow kind of

01:09:03.860 cat oh and my husband might bring over runa runa is a little like uh she's kind of got a little

01:09:12.260 little bit of a calico in her um but we adopted them from the bounty shelter but they are so

01:09:20.440 sweet we're big cat people this is runa i always have such joy watching jake's cats on the

01:09:29.460 membership meetings we love our what we love our cats in odin's off oh

01:09:34.300 all right cool i appreciate those are amazing though calicos are

01:09:41.660 so sweet we love your your little cats too jake

01:09:49.980 i would like i have never owned one but i would like to experience a smushed face cat

01:09:56.060 leaky eyes I don't like that yeah push face I like smush face things English Bulldog was my

01:10:06.500 favorite dog ever had or Sphinx cat they look really interesting they don't get dander

01:10:16.520 everywhere the two expensive I would like to donate a sphinx cat or multiple space

01:10:21.260 cats um you're welcome to and i they will they will go to a good home

01:10:28.700 just any pet that loves you is amazing they are such gifts of the gods they really are whether

01:10:34.220 it's a cat or a dog or a guinea pig whatever whatever it is it they are all just i'm i am

01:10:42.620 a real animal lover i have always been an animal lover and will always be a word about allergies

01:10:49.820 like uh oh we're doing show and tell um oh oh there's pumpkins all right this is one of our

01:11:05.020 her government name her government name is uh annabelle we've referred to her the past several

01:11:10.540 years as a babu which got shortened to babu because aubrey could not manage annabelle so

01:11:19.820 um she's a very nice cat she's probably the only of our cats that i could hold one-handed like this

01:11:24.780 and would not be struggling i appreciate that um speaking of or you know a reference to allergies

01:11:33.100 now that we're talking about cats i was pretty allergic to cats growing up and you know up in

01:11:39.900 into my 30s um when i moved to florida to be with mandy um i was extremely allergic to cats and she

01:11:49.340 lived in a in a small in a small home where she had four cats and i was i didn't know what i was

01:11:57.180 going to do but i'm that guy like you know what you said about pets is true i have my preferences

01:12:03.020 of you know kinds of dogs and cats and creatures that i like but it comes up to me and says hi

01:12:11.340 i'm gonna pet it and snuggle it and inevitably get it all over my face and then sneeze and whatever

01:12:18.300 so i mean my eyes would swell up my nose would run my whole face would just leak it would look

01:12:24.220 like i got a boxing match to where i just couldn't see out of my eyes that was up until the day i

01:12:32.620 moved like the day before i was at a yule gathering at my friend's house and he had one cat and again

01:12:37.980 they took care of their place it didn't you know reek of cat dander and cat litter this guy came

01:12:43.500 up i was petting him and man i was swole up terrible but within about a week of being at

01:12:50.380 mandy's i never had a cat allergy since then so it's strange how that happens oh i mentioned a

01:13:01.100 side note i take little random asides um i did that with these baby bears one time

01:13:09.020 i love bears well so i was out at uh camp morga it could have been in 2012 um but i walked out

01:13:21.820 into the woods and i was entrenched because these two baby bears came up and started sniffing my hand

01:13:29.740 and so oh this is Rolo very soft he's a kitten he was up we had him on VNS before we just got him

01:13:41.020 and he was on your hand he's he's big now but uh what I was gonna say is yeah I let these bears

01:13:48.820 sniff me and I like pet these bear cub and it was you know 20 seconds until the light bulb went off

01:13:57.160 like probably not by themselves mom's probably somewhere and I very slowly and

01:14:05.620 carefully retraced my I never saw a mom you're lucky I'm in a tree but very

01:14:15.340 close to losing my life that day but that was really cool I almost wanted to

01:14:23.740 a veterinarian but i'm actually like i'm so much of an animal lover that i thought that i might not

01:14:29.740 i mean frankly i thought i might not be able to like deal with it if i was taking care of a

01:14:35.660 like a sick animal that i might it might get in the way of my caretaking of the animal

01:14:42.620 animals as a veterinarian then yeah yeah so

01:14:47.180 Tracy suggests this is a serious question. We'll take her out her word.

01:14:57.140 Ranch versus blue cheese versus honey mustard, and you can only keep...

01:15:02.820 This is a big debate in our chat circles. Okay, so my favorite dressing is actually ranch. I'm

01:15:11.720 not sure if everyone knows this, but I am a ranch girl. I do love ranch. I love, you know, I love

01:15:18.500 blue trees and Caesar and everything else as well, but ranch will always be my favorite.

01:15:25.300 I know Sierra will be happy about that. It's not a fair question. There's,

01:15:29.320 there is many a different application for each of those three dressings.

01:15:34.360 Right. Right.

01:15:35.320 like what are you putting it on yeah well i was gonna say if it's if it's salad that we're using

01:15:47.320 this salad dressing for so it's not fair because ranch is so readily available

01:16:00.920 blue cheese is available i'm gonna go blue cheese just because i don't get it as often

01:16:05.320 i don't know if it's better i just don't get it as much on on wings blue cheese all the time

01:16:13.240 yeah that's actually really good blue cheese on on wings on a sandwich or other stuff honey

01:16:21.720 mustard sometimes but i like ranch on a sandwich honey mustard is pretty good yeah i don't think

01:16:27.640 there's bad choices there although i'll say this about blue cheese i need a funky blue cheese

01:16:32.840 i was talking to you earlier before the show about wine get like a subtle hint of something

01:16:39.560 right it's something special yeah it's got to be significantly

01:16:45.960 it's got to be well aged and extremely for me to appreciate the

01:16:53.880 yeah side note my daughter likes the funky cheese oh does she i'm not a feta guy she likes feta and

01:17:01.720 like really funky blue cheese she likes the sharpest of sharp cheddar cheese has she always

01:17:08.120 liked that or just like them recently always yeah i mean since since she's had the opportunity she's

01:17:14.760 like feta for forever she's liked you know the sharp cheddar over the mild cheddar um she was a

01:17:23.000 baby and you know as soon as she we let her try some blue cheese not thinking she'd care for it

01:17:28.760 she loved it so that's something we're born with it's definitely something we're born with and i

01:17:33.960 mean there's something to be said obviously for other things that are you know genetically inherited

01:17:39.160 like a lot of tastes whether it's uh you know culinary or religious are definitely inherited

01:17:50.840 so tyler in virginia donated ten dollars to the new york's off fund thank you tyler we appreciate

01:17:57.400 that. And Ronald Blake, haven't seen you in a while. It's great to have you back on the

01:18:05.780 show. Bought us five coffees and says, hail all. Well, hail to you, Ronald. It's great

01:18:11.840 to see you back and we appreciate the five coffees. It's a $25 donation. Thank you so

01:18:17.040 much. Tyler says, Matt, you talked about men taking leadership in their families. My wife

01:18:25.160 is very supportive of my beliefs but is very agnostic we both fell out of christianity at the

01:18:31.160 same time i found alsa true uh but she but she's very agnostic what advice can you give as far as

01:18:40.040 bringing her into my beliefs um so i'm gonna i'm gonna swing at this because my question but i'd

01:18:46.920 like your i'd like your your follow-up on it lauren um now uh with any of these questions

01:18:58.760 you know the specifics everybody is not a cookie cutter so i've got to move on generalities um

01:19:06.920 um what i would say there is a nuance and an art to taking leadership i think demanding that she

01:19:21.440 participate in alice and making it a negative and contentious experience is probably not your

01:19:27.400 pathway to success and even if it is functionally i don't think that's the best way for her to build

01:19:35.720 a meaningful and positive relationship with our gods.

01:19:42.860 I think I noticed that you said she's agnostic and not atheistic, which I think is a really

01:19:50.500 important distinction, especially mentioning that you guys come from a Christian background.

01:19:57.140 If she has the capacity to entertain belief in something higher than herself, I think

01:20:05.120 that's a huge step in the right direction and i also don't think that our gods demand

01:20:16.160 a blanket deep devotion to them coming out of the world that we live in i don't think that's

01:20:23.680 the scenario at all i think they would like that to develop but i have no reason to believe that

01:20:31.120 they demand some kind of sight unseen faith in the same way that perhaps you know the Abrahamic

01:20:37.120 religions would uh would demand that that's never that's never been a real belief of our folk is

01:20:45.040 is that you know especially some and if we're living in an interesting time in the days of

01:20:50.080 our ancestors there wasn't a conversion process you were you know of the Cherusi tribe of course

01:20:59.760 you were also true you were norwegian of course you were also true that was just who you were

01:21:05.440 and it was integrated it's we're coming from a different place now so i think the expectation

01:21:10.720 that for her to just blindly devote herself to the gods is that's a big ask and usually not a

01:21:18.400 very realistic one what i think is really important is that she's provided with opportunities and

01:21:25.280 encouragement to develop those relationships and if she's open to it that she is invited and

01:21:33.120 encouraged and kind of nudged to come along and attend different things with you

01:21:39.440 at whatever level of participation she wants to have um it's not uncommon for people if they bring

01:21:47.600 family members or somebody's you know attending something for the first time or you know the

01:21:52.160 first few times or ever long if there's somebody's family to observe and check it out to participate

01:21:58.640 in the socialization of you know meeting other alsatur and talking and you know playing with

01:22:05.680 people's kids and having a good time and then when there's religious um you know when there's

01:22:12.720 ritual done to participate as much or as little as she's comfortable with but the first thing i'd say

01:22:21.040 and this is not just to you tyler anybody listening that has a similar question

01:22:27.200 first establish that this isn't some spooky secret thing you do by yourself this is something that

01:22:33.840 she's welcome to be a part of secondly i would say get her to a place where this is not scary to her

01:22:43.440 and this may or may not be scary to other people but if one of the concerns is that it is

01:22:49.200 uncomfortable, or there's a fear of the unknown, or even a bad interaction with some know-it-all

01:22:56.440 online that's, you know, socially toxic, getting her to see that it's nice people in the daylight

01:23:07.360 doing something nice and positive and not scary is a big part of it, too.

01:23:12.640 and not being afraid to express your faith in a way that's not you know I guess weaponized to try

01:23:26.160 to force her into something but letting that be known associating good changes and good growth

01:23:33.780 in your life to your also true practice and expressing that in a way to where she associates

01:23:41.140 your also true practice with positive things i think that goes a long way i don't think there's

01:23:48.680 any perfect solution to make it happen for sure but it's one of the things as a gofi um that i

01:23:55.820 relates there are parts to be played by everybody involved when we do a ritual and i go out to

01:24:07.260 perform bloat, I tell people beforehand, usually, that I want

01:24:16.260 them to go into the the ritual space with an open mind and an

01:24:20.580 open heart. I think in order for something transcendent to

01:24:26.180 happen the assembled folk need to be at they need to be honest and they need to at the very least

01:24:40.760 be open to experiencing something spiritual and not give the impression of being worshipful if

01:24:51.360 they don't have a sincere belief but have a real like hey i'm here i'm listening i hope this is a

01:24:58.140 thing you know going in there with a good faith openness is very important having an effective

01:25:07.900 or a you know worthwhile go for your githia is also important but there's you know a third

01:25:18.360 element that's really important as well is the gods facilitating that so all those three

01:25:26.000 those three things have certainly the gods and the participant have to work and the gothi or githia

01:25:32.560 can help facilitate that they can help draw the attention and the goodwill of the god that you're

01:25:40.320 approaching they can help facilitate the person in the in the ritual to open themselves and to

01:25:48.600 fully engage in the process but that gift cycle has to happen between the folk and the gods

01:25:56.400 and it requires both parties and it doesn't happen every time with every ritual for everybody

01:26:02.240 but it does happen and it happens with increasing frequently as you as you grow in your in your faith

01:26:11.900 providing her opportunities for those things to happen because they don't typically just randomly

01:26:19.580 happen when you're sitting on the couch watching Netflix they happen when you're out engaging in

01:26:26.060 the process and and when you're open and you're in a space where that's possible to happen

01:26:31.520 So getting her to be open to the possibility and the more you can get her involved in processes where she's not, where it's honest, where there's no expectation that she's pretending to be something she's not because you can't fool the gods.

01:26:52.180 You can't trick them. And then doing what you can to facilitate.

01:27:00.280 At the very least, those things not being scary and at the most where she opens herself to the possibility of religious experience and then, you know, see what happens.

01:27:10.780 Some of it, you know, you have to trust and have some faith in the gods as well to help.

01:27:16.640 You know, to help. Provide that from their end as well.

01:27:22.180 But I think you doing the best you can on your end and then asking for a little bit of help from them, too, helps make that a reality.

01:27:30.520 The other kind of side note, as far as conceptually being open to it, oftentimes if people don't initially have a sincere faith in the gods, one of the things that is easier to get them to be open to is the ancestors.

01:27:47.940 one of the things even Christians or people who don't consider themselves religious or whatever

01:27:54.500 else in moments of quiet in their life they will talk to the dead they may not go through a big

01:28:03.200 deal of lighting a candle and going before their altar but they'll you know talk to their parents

01:28:09.820 or their grandparents they'll reach out they'll look at a picture on their wall of one of their

01:28:15.200 loved ones that's passed, and they'll talk to them. And they may not think much of it, but it's,

01:28:21.760 it's nothing can be more natural to the human condition than to reach out to your ancestors.

01:28:28.080 I think fundamentally, it's very built into us to understand that as real. And I think that's a good

01:28:34.640 place to start intellectually with getting people to accept, you know, things beyond the veil,

01:28:43.540 and you can build from there that's kind of my thoughts on it lauren do you have any

01:28:47.020 follow-up to that definitely i mean i think one of the big things for everyone is the

01:28:56.680 the ancestors i think everyone i really believe that everyone at their core like

01:29:02.820 hungers for their ancestor worship to talk to their ancestors to to just give praise

01:29:10.780 their ancestors to be grateful their ancestors for everything that they've done for them

01:29:15.100 um i think i i remember i was very influenced by the books that i read growing up when i was

01:29:23.180 really really young i'm not sure if anyone else has read these but there were these books by

01:29:29.740 some this author named lynn v andrews um called like medicine woman and jaguar woman

01:29:37.340 it's like all these this is a european descended woman but he she talked about being um mentored

01:29:47.180 by these uh native american shamans this was like in the 80s that she wrote these books and i wrote

01:29:53.900 i i read these books in the 80s when i was growing up i i was reading it like this is kind of the

01:29:59.740 woes of a gifted kid kind of situation but when i was like in fifth fifth grade i was reading

01:30:05.100 when I was kindergarten, I was reading the fifth grade level. So I was reading these books

01:30:09.180 about this, this white woman who was practicing this indigenous American religion. And I found

01:30:18.540 something in it. You know, I think that women hunger for this, we have for this, from this

01:30:23.820 young age, it's in our metagenetics that I strongly believe in. We're born with this,

01:30:29.500 with this desire to have this ancestor worship but in modern society it's not provided for us

01:30:37.500 um so we have to find it so this is what we provide for people and you can provide that

01:30:42.380 for your wife um and i believe that she'll um that she with um you know time and patience if she sees

01:30:52.300 you know results if you um do some some bloat and you know perhaps symbol little rituals for her

01:31:00.060 that where she sees little results happening you know when she she can share her um her feelings

01:31:08.140 about them with you and um i'm sure that she'll find something out of them because i mean seriously

01:31:15.980 we we all really hunger for these things it's just that modern society doesn't give it to us

01:31:22.300 whether, I mean, no matter what political spectrum,

01:31:28.300 part of the spectrum we're on.

01:31:30.220 So I believe that our faith gives that to us

01:31:35.280 and it's just really powerful.

01:31:37.500 And I'm just, I'm so grateful for the AFA,

01:31:42.280 for what it does for people and for women.

01:31:45.860 I hope that answers some of those questions.

01:31:52.300 What's next on here?

01:32:02.320 So, Owl of Omens, what do you feel gives the AFA a theological precedency over other groups?

01:32:13.420 Lauren, do you want to take the first swing at that?

01:32:19.020 No.

01:32:22.300 i suppose i can answer from someone who's um looked into other groups um that probably

01:32:30.780 is valuable um i did look into other groups after i um after i you know moved over from

01:32:38.540 when i was about 12 perhaps and i decided that i was more you know wiccan or whatever but

01:32:45.980 it was you know looking back it was really more kind of vanic worship but that's kind

01:32:50.540 of another story um but you know college level when i kind of uh looked into things and then

01:32:59.340 after that i was kind of like what's around well there's you know there was like the afa

01:33:04.620 and there was like the troth in northern california so there's there both those things

01:33:09.500 are there for me so i went to go to meetings for both of those things um and i was welcomed to see

01:33:18.140 you know kind of what you know um what was in most in sync for me and um i remember

01:33:26.780 feeling much more at home with with with afa gatherings um because i suppose i um i had always

01:33:36.460 been a little folkish um i suppose you could call it even when i was um wiccan i was very

01:33:43.740 connected with with our gods and goddesses with our European gods and goddesses so you know and

01:33:57.720 I didn't feel like there was anything wrong with it too that's another thing these days some of

01:34:03.180 these groups that you might come across might tell you that there's something wrong with with your

01:34:10.380 heritage or with with something you know something like that but there's nothing wrong with you and

01:34:16.900 there's nothing wrong with your heritage with your gods with your goddesses there's nothing wrong with

01:34:22.840 what your ancestors did yet we're told that time and time again and um the afa it's it's really a

01:34:33.840 place where you can be yourself you can be with other people of your folk you could be proud of

01:34:40.620 who your ancestors are you can be proud of who your gods and goddesses are and um you can worship

01:34:48.560 them and you can be very very happy there's nothing wrong with that i hope that makes sense

01:34:54.960 It does. So there's a couple of different questions here.

01:35:06.280 And I think that when we ask questions in those terms and when we evaluate theological precedency,

01:35:26.160 i think it gets us on a

01:35:33.120 debate about concepts and about

01:35:39.640 about a level of intellectual detail that i think misses the point

01:35:56.160 So, first, and I'm going to answer the meat of the question, but first, like, what makes the AFA better? Lots of stuff.

01:36:07.560 I think the scope of the AFA, the sheer quantity of in-person, real-life, doing Ausatru events that you can see on our calendar at runestone.org.

01:36:24.520 Nick can throw up the thing where you can go directly to our calendar and just take a look.

01:36:29.500 But, you know, every week we have lots of people gathering in the real world to worship our gods and to have fellowship with one another.

01:36:42.800 I think if you see that, you know, we've got four Hoffs, we are working on the fifth and the sixth simultaneously.

01:36:51.340 We have a lot of plans for the future.

01:36:53.720 We plan for and accomplish the future. I think that if you look at our consistency, I think if you look at our family embracing-ness, I think that if you look at a lot of things that way,

01:37:17.320 I think that seeing that we are, you know, we have 30 years in the books now as the House of True Folk Assembly, we're built on the theological journey and foundations of Othin's relationship with our founder, Steve McNallan, back in 1968.

01:37:42.160 and all of the efforts and things that he put forward i think that is a testament to our

01:37:52.120 well i think all of those things are testaments to why we're better

01:37:58.380 but i think that beyond that that's not really the you can be better organized or more numerous

01:38:06.400 and still be wrong what i think speaks more to the theological precedence and correctness

01:38:14.800 is that all the other things that i mentioned besides just speaking to practical efficacy

01:38:23.840 they also speak to active consistent faithful participation in the gift cycle

01:38:29.840 our relationship with the iser is built around the gift cycle it's built around our actual

01:38:39.780 real life frequent exchange of worship with our gods and you know us giving them our worship

01:38:49.000 them giving us their blessings and that being renewed all of the time year after year for as

01:38:58.840 long as it has. I think when we talk about the successes of the AFA, that also speaks

01:39:06.380 not just to, yeah, we're well organized or we're efficient, but it also speaks to know

01:39:12.940 we're blessed. As people of faith, we believe that our success is due to the approval and

01:39:20.060 the blessings of the Aesir. And that doesn't mean that everything, you know, I would never

01:39:26.120 put it on our gods that they you know think everything we do is the greatest thing or

01:39:31.140 everything i say is the greatest thing but i do believe that they believe that in generally we

01:39:37.720 are moving the right way we're doing the right things and that they're pleased with the things

01:39:42.660 we're doing um that's confirmed time and again through ritual and through things and i realize

01:39:50.060 everyone may make those claims, but I do think that 30 years

01:39:56.660 and four halves and a continued and a steady progression of things does say a lot. I think

01:40:06.400 when you look at other groups, as you say, you don't have that time of being successful. Sometimes

01:40:19.160 you have some of the older groups that have a storied past and don't have any further interaction

01:40:26.100 other than online conversations or Zoom meetings. I see a lot of groups within

01:40:34.280 modern Ausitru, and I don't just mean recently, but since the beginning, since probably the 80s

01:40:40.920 is when you start seeing rival groups going on, but you don't see others with the longevity of

01:40:48.220 astro folk assembly you don't see others that are able to stand the test of time and really build

01:40:55.820 their their church their clergy their theology in a consistent and time-honored way you have

01:41:06.620 people that go in and out you have personalities and groups that you know wax and wane often in

01:41:15.260 very very short bursts i think the longevity of the afa really speaks to that i think that the

01:41:21.820 seriousness and the piety that our uh our gothar and many of our leaders put into this is a

01:41:32.140 testament to that and i think all of those things get there i think that our theology is superior i

01:41:40.140 think that the asa true true log mal that i spend a lot of time putting together

01:41:47.180 presents our faith in the best way that i've seen presented um and i stand by that and i'd be happy

01:41:56.780 to you know address any specific points of that but i think more than that and i've had people

01:42:05.660 from different groups and different organizations that attest to this, when we stand in ritual to

01:42:12.480 our gods, our gods are there and they bless us. And it's something that I've heard time and again

01:42:23.040 that means a lot to me. First, our members, when they are part of the AFA, very, very often describe

01:42:31.400 that it's like coming home, that this is the best thing they've done with their lives and that this

01:42:37.180 is very meaningful. We get those testimonials daily. But when people participate with us

01:42:44.200 at our Hoffs or where we do ritual, consistently the feedback is that's the first time they've

01:42:53.860 done rituals and the gods were there and the gods responded um i've had people from different

01:43:01.940 organizations that really like what they do or really like what other groups do but attest that

01:43:10.400 in an afa ritual like specifically you know one of the ones that i often hear is that

01:43:16.800 oh then like no he appreciated that ritual he was there he participated

01:43:23.680 and when asked if that's you know not what happens at their rituals the answers to we

01:43:29.600 know that's not the experience and you know again i assume that other people if you ask

01:43:35.440 that question they'll probably tell you something different i can't say that that doesn't happen

01:43:42.240 there i i don't know that knowing some of those groups i think quite a bit of them

01:43:49.200 that doesn't happen but i'm you know i i'm not going to

01:43:57.600 i'm not going to suggest that can't happen other places but i know that it does happen here

01:44:02.800 i know that it is here and i know that the blessings of our gods are manifest in

01:44:09.040 our lives and the lives of the in the life of the outstreet focus in me consistently and significantly

01:44:16.320 as long as i have been a part of it i know that firsthand and i think that our success

01:44:23.280 our longevity and who we are speaks for itself the more you look into it and i think that something

01:44:29.520 melts that is real look at what we do you can see regularly on and again it may sound cheap but it's

01:44:41.760 real it's the world we live in you can see on our website and social media all the time the things

01:44:48.320 that we're doing and that we're not just about idea or concept or thought but we're about practice

01:44:55.100 and that we practice regularly frequently and widespread and that's real i don't see that from

01:45:05.380 other groups i don't see that frequency or that real life practice about it and there's lots of

01:45:15.600 scholarship out there but scholarship on a subject doesn't equal participation in that subject

01:45:24.180 there's you know millions of fat dudes in their armchair talking about football they might be

01:45:31.860 super fans of football but they're not football players there's any number of people out there

01:45:37.860 that are you know experts on the intricacies of star trek but they're not you know manning

01:45:47.380 24th century starships that's not what they're doing they know just because you know a lot about

01:45:53.220 doesn't mean that you're participating in that subject.

01:45:58.180 Our real-life participation, I think, is what speaks the most to the theological precedency

01:46:04.700 that we have over other organizations and other groups.

01:46:08.580 Oh, and another thing that I just want to mention on that that's really important.

01:46:14.800 In the AFA, more than any other group that I'm aware of,

01:46:18.800 we focus on the reality that we live in today and our future.

01:46:25.160 We don't conceive of Al-Satru as being locked in the past.

01:46:30.080 And the be-all and end-all, the focus of our theology is not on how our ancestors practiced Al-Satru.

01:46:37.820 It's certainly informed by that.

01:46:40.380 But our focus is on how we are currently practicing Al-Satru

01:46:44.300 and how we want to set up our children and our grandchildren to practice Ausatru in the future forever and ever.

01:46:54.400 And I think that timelessness of the AFA also speaks to our theological relevance and precedency.

01:47:14.300 Sorry, trying to keep up with a couple of things over in the over in the chat.

01:47:23.880 Our next question is, did anyone catch the interview between Mark Puryear and Red Ice today?

01:47:32.800 Have they reached out to the AFA for an interview before?

01:47:36.280 So, yes, I did an interview with them years ago.

01:47:41.240 Steve McNallan has done I think two or more interviews with them. We've actually had

01:47:49.400 Henrik and Lana out to a few AFA events over the years. But yeah, I'm unaware that

01:47:58.560 Mark Puryear had an interview there today. I didn't catch that. Lauren, were you aware of that

01:48:04.080 or did you catch that? I wasn't aware of that. I look forward to hearing that though.

01:48:11.240 so if anybody has any more questions feel free to ask them about literally anything you want

01:48:22.180 in the meantime um

01:48:25.020 lauren is there anything you would like our audience to know is there anything that you

01:48:36.480 want an opportunity to speak on or to tell folks about or any message that you think our audience

01:48:43.960 needs to get from you. Something I saw in our spiritual excellence chat the other day was

01:48:57.820 Just concerns about the EFA and about, you know, as a woman, she was concerned about, you know, things with, you know, things people say about us, basically.

01:49:13.920 and um i would just you know if if anyone if anyone who's considering joining the efa or

01:49:22.640 anyone who's already a part of the efa who's had who has any concerns about anything that you've

01:49:29.700 heard or anything just like reach out to me and i'll talk to you about that because i've worked

01:49:36.160 that myself you know um the afa is not what people say that we are um and we i'm just so grateful

01:49:49.760 that um that the afa exists and we are so blessed by the gods for what we have

01:49:58.160 and um if you ever want to talk to me please reach out to me uh ell anderson at runestone.org

01:50:04.560 and I'm always there to talk to you about anything you ever want to talk to

01:50:08.460 about and you know thank you so much I love you all thank you yeah I want you

01:50:22.140 know everybody to know that certainly on the program you can always ask questions

01:50:26.920 and send them to VNS at runestone.org and we'll answer them live on here but

01:50:30.880 also if any of you personally have uh questions any of our go thar would be very very happy to

01:50:39.040 answer anything you have you know including myself um whether you know whether you're a member or

01:50:49.200 not if you have questions and there's stuff that you would like our our advice our thoughts our

01:50:54.800 counsel on or just to clarify something please always feel free to reach out there's contact

01:51:02.320 information on our website any of those things can get to us messages to any of our folk builders

01:51:10.160 can get to us and we'd be really happy to answer anything i know that this is a good place to get

01:51:16.240 things answered publicly but if you have something that's more private or you're you're less

01:51:20.080 comfortable asking here that's fine but we would encourage you to reach out questions or

01:51:26.800 questions are always always welcome and not only are they welcome but they're appreciated

01:51:38.960 so i've seen um another question on uh well i see it's something kind of going on in the chat

01:51:50.080 Um, Dom Barnes says that, uh, that when I, when I told folks, you know, if you're practicing

01:52:02.200 Alcitru and you're not with us, you know, why, why not? So that was what caused, um,

01:52:09.120 him to join. And I think it's a valid question now, as much as ever, if you're listening to this,

01:52:15.140 and well, a couple of things, if you're listening to this, thank you. We're glad you're here.

01:52:19.920 Anybody is welcome to listen to this and participate in the chat room and ask questions.

01:52:26.220 Whoever you are, if you find this entertaining, if you find it educational, if you find it spiritually enlightening.

01:52:34.700 Awesome. We're glad that you're here.

01:52:37.180 I'd also like everybody if you enjoy it.

01:52:39.640 Like, share, subscribe anywhere you find this as a podcast or as a video.

01:52:46.320 Like, share, subscribe.

01:52:47.560 tell folks about it send folks our way um because yeah that word of mouth is really important but

01:52:54.440 also if you're out there and you agree with us and you're a heterosexual white person

01:53:02.360 you should be in the afa and if you're not you should ask yourself why

01:53:07.320 perhaps you have a reason i'm not sure what that is but without a good reason

01:53:12.680 we'd love for you to come and be part of what we're doing.

01:53:18.020 We're doing amazing things. We can do them better and faster.

01:53:23.000 And with added energy,

01:53:25.400 the more of you who would like to join and be a part of it.

01:53:28.700 And I genuinely think it would be wonderful for you and your families to be

01:53:33.540 part of the Ask True Folk Assembly. Believe that with all my heart.

01:53:37.500 I'm sure Lauren does as well. That's why we're here.

01:53:40.120 it's why our families are here. That's why we do what we do. So I would encourage everyone,

01:53:46.620 you know, there's always some perfect time, you know, man, when I have a better job, man,

01:53:52.840 when I'm in a more stable spot, man, when I'm not working so much, there's a million different

01:53:58.160 reasons. And we all do that. That's not throwing shade at anybody. We all do that.

01:54:02.540 Yeah. There is no perfect time. The perfect time to join the AFA is 30 years ago. The next most

01:54:09.480 perfect time as today we all are where we are and this is the perfect time to join and if you have

01:54:16.800 any you know hang ups or anything you have questions just like let us know because we've

01:54:21.760 we've come into those questions just like let us know we could let you know we are on the side of

01:54:26.860 the winners i can let you know we are i've looked at other groups we are the winners compared to

01:54:32.840 other groups you're not lying so i would uh also i see somebody talking in the chat room about

01:54:49.160 if anybody's had any experience with the quote unquote odin brotherhood

01:54:54.120 um no I've heard about that um I've only heard about that from that one book I haven't heard

01:55:08.340 about a lot of deeds and existence in the real world I know there are claims made in the book

01:55:17.460 that there's some kind of an unbroken line of spiritual descent

01:55:27.640 from the, you know, art heathen period to today.

01:55:34.080 I don't, I am suspicious of that,

01:55:44.140 But without giving it a deeper examination, I'm not going to speak negatively about it.

01:55:51.420 But no, I'm not familiar with them as far as their existence in the world and stuff that they've done recently, other than that book.

01:56:03.000 There's a number of other groups with very similar names.

01:56:06.040 There's a bunch of different Odinist fellowship variations over the years.

01:56:13.440 so i'm not sure if we're talking about the same group but um the odin brotherhood i'm familiar

01:56:18.560 with is based around uh i want to say a book from the early 90s talking about that

01:56:27.440 um else i'm checking just checking some things over in the chat here

01:56:35.920 You know, we can we can test the, you know, I mean, if you look at just look at the results,

01:56:42.400 you know, that's the thing, the results from what everyone is doing and the results from

01:56:50.720 from the AFA is is like objectively superior. It's superior. It's absolutely superior. I,

01:56:59.680 you know, it doesn't matter what your political view is or anything you can be

01:57:03.840 whatever liberal or progressive or anything but the afa is doing so much for our folk and

01:57:11.560 we are absolutely like communicating with the gods and we are giving gifts with the gods and

01:57:16.780 they are giving gifts back to us and we are having such an amazing time you know and we we'd really

01:57:22.640 wish that you would join us you know even if you're on the left just join us it's okay it's

01:57:29.220 not true what they say about us it's not it it is okay and i think that that's kind of

01:57:36.740 that's an interesting political point yeah there are it's funny how things have developed over the

01:57:43.060 last 10 years and some of our our younger audience may not internalize this in quite the same way

01:57:49.860 way people who were quote unquote on the left in the 1990s would be considered right-wing

01:58:01.140 extremists uh by the world these days the left has moved so incomprehensively far to the left

01:58:11.940 yeah that it's really caused a you know we've seen that a lot people the words that they use

01:58:22.160 as pejoratives towards the right lose a lot of their efficacy because really middle of the road

01:58:30.140 folks or people that are classically liberal are now you know nazis and they're racist and they're

01:58:36.440 evil hate mongers and they're anything else for believing you know boys have a penis and girls

01:58:43.000 have a vagina that makes you a horrible bigot now um in certain circles uh believing that race

01:58:51.880 exists if you say that and you're a white person that's horrible hate speech there's it's gotten

01:58:59.880 silly so you know you don't have to there's not a political litmus test to your joining the astro

01:59:06.920 folk assembly there's a question of values and and core values and if your values align with ours

01:59:13.640 you should be here um yeah and a couple of a couple of things on this i think it follows

01:59:19.240 up to the next question here in a second. One of the things that has drastically reduced

01:59:34.080 the momentum and the potential within Ausitru over our modern existence is this toxic trait

01:59:48.000 amongst our folk to always want to start something fresh and think they can do it better

01:59:58.720 every we've seen this you know those of us who've done this for a while have seen it

02:00:05.040 tens of times um since steve mcnallen came home to alistair in 1968 it's been you know

02:00:15.200 probably hundreds of times certainly dozens of times that are noteworthy enough to you know

02:00:20.160 anybody know the name of it but everyone thinks that no no no i can do it better let's start

02:00:26.080 tomorrow this new thing as a result every time that happens everyone is starting from year one

02:00:33.360 and when every new year is year one we never make any progress you never get anywhere

02:00:39.280 we spend all our time you know i i've mentioned this before but it's funny my my cousin and i

02:00:47.120 we would play bass that's we used to call it pejoratively because as kids we'd get all our

02:00:53.520 action figures and we'd set up this elaborate base because we're going to have this big war

02:00:57.920 between all our action figures but we spent so much time setting it up that we never actually

02:01:04.560 played and this would happen over and over again and some of these people you spend so much time

02:01:11.200 trying to launch some new fledgling thing instead of taking an active participation in what exists

02:01:18.800 what is evident that the gods have blessed get on the team and if there's ways to make it better

02:01:25.200 let's make it better together if there's ways you know you think you've got this great idea

02:01:31.920 well get on the team and let's talk about it let's work together and let's you know none of us and

02:01:40.080 i think there's there's a lot of misconceptions in the afa we're not married to a lot of really

02:01:45.600 you know whatever ideas on how we want to do things what we are devoted to is pleasing the

02:01:52.160 gods and building the austral folk assembly in the way that is healthy effective and that pleases the

02:01:59.360 icer if you have an idea of a way to do that better cool we want to hear it if you want to

02:02:05.680 participate in building and shaping aussitrew get on the team this is where you can do that

02:02:12.160 what we do see is when everybody's doing their own thing all these different little offshoot

02:02:18.400 attempts don't go anywhere they don't accomplish but they do siphon off energy

02:02:25.760 of people that could be here helping us all to move forward but instead they're dispersed over

02:02:35.220 all of these pathways that are very that are ineffective but when they're here we're seeing

02:02:43.540 growth and development and accomplishment and blessings and beautiful things and again i know

02:02:49.940 that sitting where i sit you know of course he's going to say that but i say it because it's true

02:02:55.160 and i'm here because it's true you know i didn't come into the world as the alzharia gofi i i was

02:03:01.480 just a just a 20 you know a 20 year old

02:03:09.880 i want to say kid but i guess i was a young man at that point a 20 year old i remember you

02:03:15.240 i remember you at that point well i remember you you knew you knew me then um yeah you were

02:03:21.960 an extremely like you were extremely like intelligent i i just remember you i remember

02:03:28.120 seeing i just i remember seeing you at gatherings like at a you and you had an extremely like just

02:03:36.280 just amazing like um inner you know inner um composure you were very composed and i could

02:03:46.920 tell that you had a lot to say but you weren't necessarily seeing it but but you were very

02:03:54.280 intelligent and i knew that you had like a wonderful future in front of you and i just

02:04:00.680 it's just just joy to see what you have done since then this is like you know since 2010 or something

02:04:09.160 when i saw you like uh i remember i just remember seeing you with things and i was like i know that

02:04:15.240 he has like an amazing future in front of him and it's such a joy to see you from then to now

02:04:23.000 well that's one of the things i don't think people realize nobody wants to hold you down if you want

02:04:28.280 to be part of making alsatru move forward of building our faith of building alsatru get on

02:04:38.120 the team i was just like i said i was just a young man who wanted to

02:04:48.840 restore our folk to our trough to the icer and make this work and i knew at the time like that's

02:04:55.720 the thing i didn't know everything then i you know conceptually there's a lot of stuff the afa was

02:05:01.800 you know i think could have been different or could have been better shoot there's tons of stuff now

02:05:05.720 there's a lot of things that could have been more perfect but the afa was what was doing something

02:05:13.800 they were what was accomplishing that's what was working so i wanted to get on the team that was

02:05:19.480 working and help them be better and help them you know in the capacity whatever capacity i was

02:05:25.640 allowed to do i wanted to help move the ball forward and be part of things and we saw that

02:05:33.640 went what i found then and what i am very committed to being true now is nobody's holding anybody

02:05:41.560 back if you want to help carry the load by all means you know let's let's do that let's move

02:05:48.760 forward let's move forward together and over time i became a folk builder and a gothi and eventually

02:05:56.120 i wound up where i am now and i'm very blessed to be here but anybody who you know it's it's

02:06:02.360 a very natural thing to feel like a big fish in a small pond and that's really appealing

02:06:11.160 but nobody's stopping you from being a big fish in the big pond you won't start there necessarily

02:06:18.920 but you can get there and nobody wants to hold anybody back we want to lift each other up

02:06:24.200 so you know i i would encourage seriously every heterosexual white person i want to join the afa

02:06:31.240 and i want us all to move forward together um so what i what i see is the next uh question here

02:06:38.280 that's you know come up uh i call myself an ancestral cultist and i would join an afa

02:06:46.360 community if there was one where i live still waiting for one in michigan to begin

02:06:52.280 do you folks read any literature from carolyn emmerich uh

02:06:58.440 marie uh cachet uh or vard vikurnas um they're my complete foundation in my spiritual pathway so

02:07:14.520 a couple of things because i want to go through this kind of in order a little bit

02:07:21.400 Michigan is a is a funny state because your state is like two different pieces that are two completely different states in a lot of ways.

02:07:30.880 It depends where you are in Michigan, but we absolutely have people that get together every month in Michigan.

02:07:37.480 Yeah. And we are building things in Michigan.

02:07:42.720 So we would encourage you to do that first. Chris Savage is our folk builder in Michigan.

02:07:48.500 He's a fantastic guy and a friend of mine, somebody I have a lot of respect for.

02:07:53.200 And he's doing a great job in Michigan.

02:07:56.400 So C Savage, S-A-V-I-C-H, at runestone.org.

02:08:04.420 He would really like to talk to you and help you get situated if that's something you want to do and be a part of.

02:08:10.880 And this isn't, you know, your – I want to address this.

02:08:17.620 but again, please keep in mind the things that I say aren't always directed at the person asking

02:08:23.360 the question. So you may have your reasons, whatever. I just want to say it's a very natural

02:08:28.860 thing to, we all want to step into something that's already established and waiting to welcome

02:08:35.380 us in. I think we all want that. But the process of how an AFA community develops is a very simple

02:08:43.920 one. Simple doesn't mean easy, but it does mean simple. The roadmap is clear. It takes

02:08:51.300 one person to join, to stick around somewhere, to actively participate. And then when somebody

02:09:00.060 comes along and says, hey, you know, I wish there was somebody else in Michigan. Well, hey, I know

02:09:05.420 a guy. Here we go. Now we'll get the two of you guys together. And then we get three of you guys

02:09:12.060 together, and then four, and then five, and it snowballs over time into a community, and when

02:09:18.140 the community is large enough, we get Hoffs closer and closer to you, and that's the path, and

02:09:25.960 sometimes it's a long one, sometimes it's a short one, sometimes something catches fire, and you get

02:09:31.580 a bunch of people really quick, sometimes it's a long path, but the only way that happens is by

02:09:37.200 folks joining somebody's got to be that first guy somebody's got to be the second somebody's got to

02:09:42.480 be the third until you reach a critical task to where people want to be a part of it and but we

02:09:48.960 do have things going on in michigan i don't know how close they are to you but you should absolutely

02:09:53.920 reach out um if you're close to the border of your state depending on where you're at

02:09:59.840 we've got things happening in wisconsin we've got things happening in indiana we've got things you

02:10:06.800 know kind of on all sides of you as well but we do have things in uh in michigan also and i'd say

02:10:13.200 this you know i worked in the bar industry for a long time and what we would see sometimes on a

02:10:17.520 slow night everybody look in like oh it's dead and they keep walking and then somebody else

02:10:23.680 would look in like man it's slow and they keep walking somebody else looks in a few minutes

02:10:28.720 later man it's slow and they keep going if every one of those people just came inside and had a

02:10:34.640 beer all of a sudden people go oh wow there's two or three people and they're having a wow there's

02:10:39.280 four or five people wow there's six or seven next thing you know it's night that's how it happens

02:10:45.200 though is people want to signing up and getting there and you need that you need that pioneering

02:10:51.680 local to where you're at um i'm not so successful now that there's the afa is that that's the people

02:10:57.760 in the group is the afa like that's the people it doesn't matter like what what you know left or

02:11:06.240 right or anything even if you're on the left like those people in the bar that you go in you're

02:11:11.440 wondering if they're you know loyal to acer those are afa just go talk to them it's okay

02:11:18.800 yeah it's okay the biggest okay I've said this before the biggest step in Ausitru is the the

02:11:28.800 step from your couch to the front door right and that's for all of us it's not just for you that

02:11:34.080 was the biggest step for me I was when I first came home to Ausitru we had a a motley assortment

02:11:43.440 of people in uh anchorage didn't know what i was getting into they were having a um

02:11:55.040 i believe they were celebrating uh norna not i believe that's what the celebration was they're

02:12:05.760 they're in a park and they invited me and i came out and i um

02:12:13.440 I snuck around in the woods, peeking out from behind the trees to see who are these people,

02:12:22.240 what's going on, what kind of strange stuff am I getting into here. I think we all have that

02:12:29.160 hesitation. The fear of the unknown is the thing because literally you can't adjust to it.

02:12:34.800 Anything that you put a name to and a parameter to, you can work yourself up,

02:12:40.280 work up the courage you can conceptualize prepare yourself for the unknown is always the scariest

02:12:48.120 um definitely but it's worth it it's absolutely worth it and we we are the ones who are doing

02:12:56.520 something we are like our group is and is doing things and other groups aren't doing things and

02:13:04.680 that's just the subjective truth i'm sorry it's just the way that it is so um you asked another

02:13:13.320 question there too and i only answer it honestly but i'm not answering it spicily please don't take

02:13:19.240 it that way so yes i'm familiar with uh carolyn i don't think i've read anything she's written

02:13:25.960 i've certainly talked to her she used to be a member for a time um

02:13:35.720 she's really big on theory and not on practice unfortunately uh getting her to

02:13:42.760 attend and to practice was always a step too far um it doesn't devalue stuff she writes about i

02:13:51.400 i can't speak to that i haven't read a lot of things that she's written i'm not familiar of

02:13:57.320 the second author you mentioned i am familiar with varg and

02:14:04.440 i don't think particularly highly of varg i think his ideas are

02:14:12.600 i think a lot of his stuff is

02:14:15.640 ego stroking i think he's got to have some new take on everything and i think there's a very

02:14:27.160 very unhealthy obsession with simplifying everything to placentas and the birth process

02:14:38.600 that's certainly extremely important i think it's

02:14:43.480 unnecessarily primitive and ooga booga to make everything just an analogy for that i think he

02:14:51.160 closes off a lot of paths to actual spiritual connection with the gods and i think in a lot of

02:15:00.040 ways there's an atheism there that i don't think is relevant to what we do and i don't even think

02:15:06.040 is remotely similar um i i but everybody comes from a different spot there's a lot of people

02:15:13.320 here that their introduction was varg either through his youtube through his writings or just

02:15:19.160 through his you know music and his band back in the day there's a lot of people that that was

02:15:24.280 their entryway so i'm not i'm not criticizing that at all i'm just trying to respond to your

02:15:28.680 question please don't take anything negative from that i know it's like man here's my favorite

02:15:34.040 authors and then people trash them that's not what i'm talking about um what about you are

02:15:39.800 you familiar with those three authors and their works you know i i follow farg on um on x and

02:15:51.320 i have a lot of respect for him um i mean honestly like i know that um he has a lot of views that

02:16:00.120 But these days are a little bit more polarized than other days.

02:16:11.640 But I feel like I enjoy seeing what he has to say about the holidays, about the days of remembrance and everything.

02:16:21.120 And yeah, yeah, I know that he's probably not a part of our group, but I do have a lot of respect for him.

02:16:29.600 and i do follow him on x that makes one of us

02:16:35.920 no and i say that varg um one so and that challenges me to it's very easy to just think

02:16:44.080 of the negatives and not think of positives um he lives life by his terms and i think he's authentic

02:16:54.160 to that you know he's decided to make his own little separate space world i wish he wasn't

02:17:01.040 so on the fence with things but you know that's just me that's the thing i think there's since

02:17:07.760 the beginning he's really with us but there's this is what it is like yeah there is an edgelord thing

02:17:16.160 and i think he very much is in the edgelord category right you think that we see a lot and

02:17:21.600 we run into these days especially in political spheres but also religiously

02:17:26.720 is people that just want to find something edgy and it's it's funny because

02:17:33.120 we live in a time where the axis of edgy has flipped right so you know up until

02:17:42.000 i don't know up until the 2000s certainly if not up until later the left was where edginess was

02:17:50.960 yeah a lot of people that have a pattern in their life that they're you know

02:17:59.600 at different times they would have been beatniks and then they would have been hippies and then

02:18:04.400 they would have been you know goth or punk and then they want to be the hot topic goth

02:18:11.120 and then they want to be whatever the the edgy thing is but we saw this shift where

02:18:17.520 being quote unquote trad is edgy and being you know conservative is edgy and i think that's why

02:18:26.160 you find some of these same folks that would have been diametrically opposed when it was going on

02:18:32.720 finding you know different fascist movements of the early 20th century to be you know an edgy

02:18:40.400 thing they can associate with and then it's you know it's edgy to join you know trad catholics

02:18:46.400 or the orthodox church there's always this like there's a thing now to where being

02:18:53.920 traditional is edgy so we have a strange lap of people yeah but a lot of the same people that

02:19:01.360 are edgy religiously in a super conservative way today were edgy in satanism 30 years ago

02:19:09.200 yeah and as soon as we win if also true was the religion of all white people then they would

02:19:16.560 be edgy by being something else by doing voodoo or doing some kind of other thing yeah because

02:19:23.280 it's not about the substance it's about being counterculture and i just have seen too much of

02:19:29.520 that with varg to not think that that's a very significant role in what he does and sometimes

02:19:36.880 if you get the right point in how the spectrum moves you'll hit to where somebody will be

02:19:42.320 be not your kind of folks but happen to agree with you on core issues yeah like I ran into

02:19:49.040 that you know when I used to watch Fox News yeah Hannity is not my guy he's not my guy

02:19:57.320 in so many ways yeah yeah because the left moves so far left me and Sean Hannity ended

02:20:03.620 up being too smart for Hannity you're too smart for Hannity well that's the thing it's

02:20:08.780 It's like, I don't want to be sticking with the guy, but we're standing on the, you know,

02:20:13.120 we're, if we're picking sides and standing on like, hey, hey, Sean, you know, it's the,

02:20:18.560 it's a strange, so sometimes there are strange, is that you're, you're forced, you know,

02:20:27.420 to be in the same category just because the other option is so absurd or because the

02:20:32.940 currents that you're in are similar. And I think that's one of the things with

02:20:36.860 Varg and Ausatru that just kind of happened to us at the same time yeah but that's a lot of talk

02:20:45.540 if you are interested please reach out to Chris and just see and check it out and if it's something

02:20:51.860 that you want to do also yeah you find out it's not for you maybe it will be down the road but I

02:20:57.280 think we've got really good things if you're in the upper peninsula I think it would be worth your

02:21:04.680 time even though it's a bit of a drive to find yourself over at baldershoff if you're in whatever

02:21:12.760 you guys call the rest of your state um down in uh southern end of indiana which is again a little

02:21:19.080 bit of a haul for you we have a really solid group of guys that have a building there that it would

02:21:26.920 be good to get you guys interacting with also out of curiosity or you know you might find this

02:21:33.480 curious or interesting um phrase hoff which is the next half we're going to get as soon as we

02:21:39.400 pay off new york's off is going to be in either um western pennsylvania or eastern ohio that might

02:21:49.640 be relatively close to you depending on where you are in your state so that's something to think

02:21:54.040 about also um subjectively like we are the only group that's doing anything i just want to say

02:22:12.040 like i know all the groups that are doing things and i just want to say like we are the only group

02:22:18.920 that's doing anything and if you have anything any questions about that just like let me know

02:22:24.760 and i will let you know yeah yeah yeah and i hope that makes sense well it's hard because

02:22:32.520 it is hard well well of course we're gonna say that but the difference is it's true like check

02:22:38.600 out any of our social media and you know it can be scoffed at but if a 15 year old girl has a

02:22:47.240 particularly good hamburger it's all over social media in the day and age where everyone you know

02:22:54.840 and i mean older people people in their 60s and 70s everybody's taking selfies and they're posting

02:23:01.160 stuff of them doing things i don't see that in these other places i don't see that in other

02:23:10.760 groups i've looked i know and that's why it's so important for me that we post those things

02:23:19.080 so others can see that there's people together doing stuff our gentleman who asked about you

02:23:23.800 know well man i wish there's somebody in michigan i can show you pictures of members gathered in

02:23:32.840 michigan this month and last month and the month before in many previous months and i think there's

02:23:39.560 a value in that because it's real you can reach out and touch it that's a thing if something

02:23:46.520 doesn't ever leave the world of ideas it doesn't count it doesn't count unless it's real um unless

02:23:53.560 you act on it the best there is a and i think we fundamentally know this i'm sure that authors and

02:24:07.400 and and thinkers have put this much more eloquently but there is a tragedy to dreams

02:24:14.280 and ideas that are never acted upon and never achieved there's a guilty you've never thought

02:24:21.000 of it then it's not your fault you just didn't have the idea but if you had the idea and you

02:24:26.360 knew you should do something and you wanted to do something and then you didn't there's a guilt there

02:24:32.040 there's a remorse there's a thought at the end of your days that you shoulda coulda woulda and you

02:24:37.160 didn't and there's a lot of people that find themselves in that spot yeah in the afa we're

02:24:44.120 you know we it's a common hail to you know hail the doers and it may sound campy or whatever but

02:24:51.160 we really mean that hail those that that actually do things that live the life that they talk about

02:24:58.200 or that they think about in their head or they plan for those of you that are out there those

02:25:04.440 of us that are out there putting our faith into practice that's where this is real and the gods

02:25:12.120 see that the gods know that yeah our next thing is uh from sierra lauren have you read or if you

02:25:19.640 have what are your opinions on the lady with the mead cup i don't know you know what that's

02:25:27.160 one of those books where i have on my my list of things that i wouldn't wait read um because

02:25:35.240 what no because um one of those that that's one of the the books that we wanted to read in our

02:25:43.320 in the books in uh in afa and i hope that that comes up again to be one degree ones that we read

02:25:54.440 because i would really like that to be one that we talk about together and um discuss together

02:26:03.160 but i do have that um in my collection um that is really important i'm super excited about that book

02:26:15.000 i i hope you're excited too i i feel like we're gonna we're gonna read it next couple months

02:26:19.560 so everybody listening to this yeah if you are ever if you are a woman excited if you

02:26:32.760 few if you if you enjoy the company of women if you have a daughter if you

02:26:40.120 have a spouse that you want to get more involved if you shoot if you have a mother that you want

02:26:47.560 get more involved whatever the case might be that's excuse me that's the definitive work on

02:26:55.240 women's practice in the ancestral expression of our faith and it's very well done there's

02:27:03.400 a lot of really good things in there it is it can be a challenging read and it tends to be repetitive

02:27:11.640 but it it's very important and it is the authority on the subject and I think it's

02:27:18.840 definitely worth reading for for folks um man it's been doesn't seem like it's been that long

02:27:27.400 ago it's been I don't know probably eight or nine years since I read it um if one is undecided and a

02:27:37.240 seeker, can you still visit and hang out at a hoff? Absolutely, you can. I mentioned earlier

02:27:43.380 in the program, we've got two events coming up. Midsummer at Odenshoff is coming up,

02:27:50.000 which is a really good opportunity. I don't have the dates in front of me, and Nick didn't show me

02:27:58.380 the graphic right now, so I'm blaming it on him. But it's coming up in June, and then we have

02:28:03.780 uh sigger bloated sigger sigger hame in jackson county tennessee coming up in july both those

02:28:11.060 really good opportunities but each of our hoffs has events monthly so if you can get yourself

02:28:18.180 and those are on the calendar i mentioned the calendar at runestone.org that is comprehensive

02:28:22.820 for all of the hoffs each hoff has its own district calendar you can look at as well

02:28:27.700 but the roomstone.org calendar is comprehensive the third weekend of every month except for the

02:28:34.500 the big event weekends are when the hoffs are celebrating things if you can make it out that is

02:28:42.180 absolutely something you can do reach out to any of your folk builders they can get you set up with

02:28:49.780 you know a time and welcome you in and show you around you can also stop by and say hi

02:28:54.580 each of our Hoffs is findable on Google Maps and you can type it in and a little blue line will

02:29:04.660 take you there that's another thing and it's funny and it's kind of a cheesy way to talk

02:29:11.380 about like our legitimacy but there's something really cool to type in our physical locations

02:29:17.260 and like that's the thing you can just put it into Google Maps and it takes you there that's

02:29:22.540 kind of a it is what it is it's a neat step to have that but yeah any of you guys that are

02:29:30.680 listening can absolutely check out our hoffs and if you if the only way for you to make it there

02:29:36.100 is at an off time where we're not doing something but you still want to check it out reach out to a

02:29:40.480 folk builder and chances are we can arrange something for you yeah uh random question

02:29:47.200 what steps to get my wife joined to the AFA? Does she have to pay a membership fee? Does the AFA

02:29:54.640 accept star stickers? Because that's all she has available currently. I am not sure what a star

02:30:03.940 sticker is. Literally just stickers of stars. It's a joke, Matt. Oh, okay. I get it now. No,

02:30:16.340 didn't know if that was some kind of state food stamp program or something um so real talk on the

02:30:22.820 question um family membership things people ask about this is kind of how it works

02:30:35.220 the afa would like every adult member to be a member in their own right to have their own

02:30:42.900 you know to express that they want to be a member and yeah if they want to join as individuals and

02:30:49.540 that's the way that the donation works is the you know the monthly membership fee then yes

02:30:58.180 but what we'd like for people to do and what we've been moving towards significantly over the past

02:31:03.860 10 years is the hoftaler and the hoftaler is based on you know if it's personal it's based

02:31:10.740 on personal income if it's family it's based on household income and that accommodates um you know

02:31:17.940 families where maybe the you know the wife doesn't work or whatever the situation is uh it's just a

02:31:24.260 percentage-based giving it's you know an honest one percent or more of uh of monthly income

02:31:32.340 and that's how that works and anybody can kind of set you up for it um often that's something

02:31:39.140 that's supported and doable by your payroll department but you can do that however you'd

02:31:44.500 like there's any number of ways to work that out and we take your word for it it's not anything

02:31:50.260 nutty like that um but yeah that's how that would get set up uh if that's serious question you can

02:31:57.300 talk to your folk builder and they can get her all set up and signed up um if it's not there's

02:32:02.660 plenty of people out there that do have that question and they can certainly get their spouse

02:32:08.100 signed up that way too we would like all spouses and adult children to participate and be members

02:32:15.380 on their own um and there's something to be said for that value um when something

02:32:27.060 when you have to actually have a commitment to something it it counts in a way that

02:32:33.460 you know free doesn't count as and we've seen that a lot in different ways there's a

02:32:39.780 a worth element to that that's really important and one of the interesting things about um

02:32:44.580 hoftoller is it's not a new concept it's uh something that our ancestors used to do that's

02:32:51.300 actually an old norse word for you know the the the tax or the percentage-based giving that was

02:32:59.220 utilized in our ancestors day to support hoffs and the gothar that ran the hoffs um

02:33:05.860 and i was reading something in the elder gods by stephen pollington that's about um

02:33:12.100 also true practiced in in anglo-saxon england and it was a uh i forget which priest was you know

02:33:20.500 You know, he was on this, this rant.

02:33:23.820 He was upset because the Ousitrur were showing up the Christians.

02:33:29.200 They were very loyal and very generous with their donations and with their

02:33:33.380 Hofftoller, whereas the Christians weren't their tithe.

02:33:37.000 And he was remarking, you know,

02:33:39.360 how the Ousitrur of the time were so noteworthy for their devotion,

02:33:45.280 whereas the Christians, you know,

02:33:46.980 weren't willing to give a penny to support the church.

02:33:50.500 That was an interesting thing expressed because you often don't hear that in

02:33:56.780 for people who have difficulty keeping their promises or oaths and have made them half-heartedly,

02:34:09.180 how can they rectify that failure and reconcile with those who they've let down?

02:34:14.560 Lauren, what are your thoughts on that?

02:34:20.500 Yeah, it's important for us to come to terms with everyone that we've, you know, made an oath to or anything like that. And it's fallen short. And to, you know, brought to account

02:34:50.500 An account of, you know, what do we feel is our, is our, you know, what do we owe to that, to that oath. And I feel that it's really important that we, that we come forth with that oath that we feel to and come forth.

02:35:17.260 And I feel that, you know, I'll show you a go at the ass more if you can say about that.

02:35:24.920 Well, a couple of things.

02:35:33.500 Start today.

02:35:35.700 It's very easy to feel bad about the past and wait until you have the perfect solution to all your past failures.

02:35:47.260 but the biggest thing that you can do um you know when when you find yourself in a hole the first

02:35:54.680 thing you got to do is stop digging and i think this is this is debt in a certain way

02:36:01.120 stop incurring more debt start being morally solvent in your oaths and your agreements

02:36:11.620 the other thing that i would say is don't let perfect be the enemy of good

02:36:16.480 start trying to it's funny because the more I think of this the more this is very much

02:36:23.860 like a debt resolution thing but in a high trust society like you don't want to declare bankruptcy

02:36:31.000 and be like no I don't owe anybody anything I'm just going to move forward no what I think is

02:36:36.240 important is going back and trying to reconcile your debts in a fair way which sometimes is you

02:36:44.220 a compromise on some things what is really

02:36:52.460 i think fundamental to our moral sense of justice isn't so much the letter of the law as far as your

02:37:01.740 oath but certainly the intent there's it's perfectly valid for you to talk to the person

02:37:10.620 you made an oath to and come to an agreement on what would make them feel whole what would make

02:37:16.700 them agree that you fulfilled your oath or you know what would what would fix what you broke

02:37:25.260 because that's kind of a fundamental we talk about you know in the criminal justice system

02:37:29.900 we still give lip service to the idea of paying your debt to society

02:37:33.340 we don't really do a lot of that anymore you know you going to prison doesn't pay a debt

02:37:40.780 to society society doesn't benefit from that anyway but one of the fundamental concepts of

02:37:47.220 our sense of justice is that you fix what you broke and you can't always do that but often you

02:37:53.860 can try to compensate someone of equivalent value to whatever you failed on or you didn't do right

02:38:02.800 Maybe there's things that you swore to do in the past you didn't do.

02:38:06.040 Maybe there's ways you can make that up to the person.

02:38:09.520 Maybe there's ways you can actually make it up to the same quantity you agreed to.

02:38:15.080 Maybe you can't, but maybe there's ways that you can move closer towards it.

02:38:20.460 Like I said, don't let perfect be the enemy of good.

02:38:24.180 Fulfilling some of your obligations from the past is better than fulfilling none of them.

02:38:30.320 And making a good faith attempt at making things right with the oaths that you haven't lived up to, there's honor and there's a value in that.

02:38:41.740 um there's no guarantee of forgiveness or no guarantee of like wiping the slate clean

02:38:50.480 but if you start today being very careful about your oaths and very diligent and fulfilling them

02:38:56.620 that goes to counteract the damage done to your hymenia um for oaths that you haven't fulfilled

02:39:05.860 than the past you can't go back you can't undo but you can go back and try to compensate those

02:39:13.540 that you've wronged you can try to compensate them in the present and that can look like different

02:39:18.740 things in different ways um like i said and there's there's kind of a principle here and you know

02:39:25.700 there's a lot of um feud culture in ancient ausitru where there'd be these blood feuds

02:39:36.020 but pretty early on they figured out there are other ways you can compensate besides

02:39:42.320 you know oh you killed one of my guys i'm going to kill one of your guys

02:39:47.000 there was um wereguild you could pay the man price you could compensate them in some other form for

02:39:58.200 the value that you took for them and they could maintain not only their honor but also you know

02:40:04.360 whatever the the physical impact was of what you've taken from them and i think that relates

02:40:12.180 to promises we make today there's if you find that there's not a way to repay stuff that you broke

02:40:18.340 you can certainly find something that gets you closer than not doing anything don't let perfect

02:40:24.100 be the enemy of good and try to see what you can do to come closer to squaring

02:40:32.180 the deals that you've made in the past if you're able

02:40:34.500 um again better is better than worse it's it's a strange thing to put into words because i think

02:40:45.740 it's common sense but a lot of us just like waiting for the perfect time to join or the

02:40:51.900 perfect altar set up for you to approach the gods or the perfect understanding before you can do

02:40:57.640 ritual don't wait for perfect do the best you can and if you can do better than do down the road

02:41:07.240 but right now figure out the best you can and make the effort because the effort does count

02:41:12.680 the effort's not all it is but the effort is a lot of it and it counts and it also your oath

02:41:19.240 so yes the gods judge you and your ancestors judge you because they're watching and they

02:41:28.560 see what you do and they know your reputation but your oath is between the person that you

02:41:34.460 oath you compensate them very often because okay so when people in abrahamic faiths

02:41:42.560 conceive of sin or wrongdoing it's not typically sinning against or doing wrong by

02:41:52.000 another person everything you do is you doing wrong by their god that's different in in

02:41:59.840 house true you're not trying to square with the gods because you defrauded a person yeah maybe

02:42:07.520 there's something you need to say before your god's about that but it's doing right by the

02:42:12.640 person you're wronged it's very specific to that contract and the thing is if you and i have an

02:42:20.960 oath and you try to make it right with me i have the ability to release you from your part of the

02:42:28.400 oath and call it good it's a contract and a agreement that we have amongst ourselves and

02:42:34.800 people are able to let you out of something or to make a compromise or to you know forgive a debt

02:42:45.600 you're in debt to the person that you wronged so keep that in mind too there's a lot to be said

02:42:51.360 sometimes to people the thought absolutely matters especially if it's a debt they never

02:42:56.400 thought they'd be able to collect on so keep that in mind as well um

02:43:02.400 Matt and Lauren, those on the political left strike me as anti-white in all subjects.

02:43:10.040 I can't reconcile left-wing politics with a love for our folk.

02:43:14.320 How does it match up for you?

02:43:15.900 Can you give me examples of left-wing policies that would align with our folk soul?

02:43:20.640 Lauren, what are your thoughts on that?

02:43:23.640 That's an interesting question.

02:43:30.640 You know, and again, I want to say that we're not a political group, but, you know, I personally

02:43:51.920 grew up more on the left side of things.

02:43:57.340 would be you know providing for more you know left um you know left things for people um

02:44:13.500 yeah i i think that a major i i think that the frankly i feel like the uh

02:44:19.660 the left party you know has to deal with the with the anti-white thing I grew up with a lot of

02:44:32.500 rather liberal kind of things and you know people didn't hate anyone everyone wanted to

02:44:44.440 you know make sure everyone had everything that people needed but but

02:44:50.120 these days there is a pernicious kind of thing that is anti-white and we have to

02:44:58.260 deal with that we have to deal with it I know we don't like to talk about

02:45:03.340 political things but we have to deal with this we have to deal with them

02:45:10.140 neutralizing this kind of anti-white kind of sentiment that is in especially the the the left

02:45:18.620 part of of politics so i think that this is an interesting question that looks really different

02:45:27.820 depending when you ask it right we are in a place that is polarized in such an extreme in such a

02:45:36.060 specific way that yes the modern left in the united states is extremely anti-white absolutely

02:45:44.300 it is yeah but if you're dealing with people in their 70s

02:45:49.740 that's not the left they grew up with um exactly so just as an example of united states left not

02:45:59.820 being anti-white if you listen to the clinton's speeches in the 1990s yeah illicitly pro-white

02:46:13.900 we're acknowledging race things yeah exactly i mean you can see what a crazy lefty hillary

02:46:20.620 clinton is now exactly these she described young black males as super predators predators

02:46:28.380 to protect our society and our children from um my father was involved with the with the

02:46:35.260 democratic party i i saw the things that he did i i saw everything if you look and again i'm i'm

02:46:42.780 just pointing out true things i'm not trying to make this you know whatever but if you look at

02:46:48.540 joe biden and we've all seen recent examples of stuff that he does but in the 1970s

02:46:56.860 his platinum platform was anti-integration and that he didn't want his children to grow up in

02:47:03.020 racial jungles um historically in the south they would not elect a republican candidate

02:47:13.660 for 100 years after the civil war because the democratic party on the political left was the

02:47:21.740 ones opposing forcible integration and anti-white policies in the south um the political left i

02:47:30.780 think we define in a very specific way now and i think um you know we're probably under agreement

02:47:36.460 a lot of the ways but it wasn't always that way i think that when you look at traditional

02:47:43.340 policies that would have been considered to the left um you know freedom of association

02:47:49.660 freedom of speech yeah you know a lot of intellectual freedoms um which ironically

02:47:57.180 the current left is is very opposed to were very often considered classically liberal ideas

02:48:04.620 and left id ideologies by and large you know for a large part of human history since we started

02:48:11.740 using those terms but a lot of the things that i'm talking about are within you know

02:48:16.940 our lifetimes a lot of um social programs a lot of um you know providing providing

02:48:26.460 different forms of social welfare programs towards students with free lunches towards children

02:48:32.380 getting um yeah you know various free services towards poor people generally getting charitable

02:48:39.100 services those things were all traditionally things that were championed by the left that

02:48:46.140 i don't think are inherently anti-our folk i do think that the more these other policies are in

02:48:53.900 place it does make a lot of those more implicitly detrimental to our folk and beneficial to other

02:49:00.140 groups of people but um yeah and i say this i'm having to think outside the box because that

02:49:06.540 hasn't been the case in my lifetime you know i've been conservative you know i've been i guess

02:49:13.660 politically you would consider me to the right all of all of my life but the overlap of ideas

02:49:21.100 and and things was a lot more reasonable in the 1990s i think as this century's taken shape the

02:49:29.900 the left has and people always want to say oh well there's people on both sides yeah there's

02:49:37.420 jerks on both sides there's people with extreme positions on both sides but what i think we've seen

02:49:44.140 overwhelmingly is the left move drastically farther to the left in a way that's beyond the

02:49:51.660 pale and what it does leave is people who grew up especially people who find themselves like

02:49:56.700 my parents generation in their 70s and approach in their 80s people that grew up considering

02:50:04.300 themselves to the left now are in a very strange spot because the modern left has moved to things

02:50:12.780 that they would all vehemently disagree with or certainly were raised vehemently disagreeing with

02:50:19.340 but they don't consider themselves to the right either and i think that's some of the people that

02:50:23.340 we're talking to i guess our bigger you know you can be on the left and join the afa as much as

02:50:29.580 it's you don't have to identify yourself as being to the right to be part of the afa you just have

02:50:35.660 to share devotion to our gods and our folk and the rest will come whatever you politically define

02:50:42.220 yourselves as yeah that's definitely true i would encourage anyone who's you know who is uh you know

02:51:01.340 not sure about their political leanings perhaps to you know reach out to me if if you would like

02:51:08.700 to reach out to me if you don't know if you are part of the afa or not just reach out to me and

02:51:15.260 i will talk to you and i will let you know you are part of the fa you know well and that's that makes

02:51:24.540 sense yeah so i one thing also that i think is is wrong in directionality like your

02:51:38.540 religion should affect your politics and should determine your politics because your politics is

02:51:45.340 an expression of the things that you value and the things that you believe in practical ways

02:51:51.660 and practical applications and it's possible to have differences of opinion on how those are

02:51:58.860 excuse me on how those are implemented but what i do see a lot now that i do think's

02:52:06.780 wrongheaded conceptually your politics shouldn't determine your religion

02:52:13.420 um religion and your values and beliefs are eternal politics are always situational

02:52:22.700 now there's political themes that you can apply more broadly but in general they have everything

02:52:29.580 to do with the context of your circumstance whereas your relationship to the gods the

02:52:35.100 relationship to your fault those things exist beyond circumstance um and that should guide

02:52:44.220 you know how you act politically just because we're not a political you know a political

02:52:50.060 action committee doesn't mean that we would discourage anybody from interacting and engaging

02:52:55.900 in politics please by all means do that be politically active in the world that you live in

02:53:00.380 in um take part in the the decisions and the the things that shape the world around us but don't

02:53:10.460 confuse don't confuse being obnoxious in the streets with

02:53:18.380 you know lobbying for bills or running for office or doing actual political things i think we

02:53:28.460 categorize a lot of things as political that aren't necessarily politics in a meaningful way.

02:53:40.700 They're often, you know, social expression is not the same as politics. And I think sometimes

02:53:48.300 we confuse those two. And that's not to, that's not to, it's not to speak disparagingly of any

02:53:55.540 one of those things is just to say we tend to lump those two as if they're the same things

02:54:04.020 quote unquote street activism or pamphleting or whatever else

02:54:08.580 i think is is one category and i don't often think folks think about you know participating in

02:54:16.980 actual political institutions actual campaigning and actual political processes as being you know

02:54:25.060 how they engage with politics and there's a lot of you know there's a lot of room there

02:54:29.460 but the point is when you join the astro folk assembly agreeing with the uh true look model

02:54:36.420 and agreeing with our loyalty to the icr that's what this is about you don't need to fear that

02:54:44.980 maybe you're not you know you don't because there's there's a that is our point of commonality and

02:54:53.780 that's what we bond around and you don't need to feel left out or not part of the group if you

02:55:00.020 don't participate in the same you know in the same political events that maybe other people

02:55:09.140 do that's not relevant to your afa existence um do we have any more questions for either

02:55:18.420 lauren or myself this evening it's just important to realize that we have a lot of

02:55:34.100 you know ideological uh views and if you have an ideological view that you feel is you know

02:55:45.460 know for some reason uh you know outside of the afa just let me know and i will i will i would

02:55:57.240 love to talk to you about this i would love to talk to you about this and i would love to talk

02:56:02.800 to you about how you fit in to the afa because you do so if you have any and all questions for

02:56:12.120 any of us reach out to any of the gothar reach out to myself be happy to talk to anybody about

02:56:17.540 anything if you want us to answer questions on vns vns runestone.org and if you want to just ask

02:56:26.240 lauren questions l anderson at runestone.org so reach out participate come to midsummer

02:56:37.640 come to Sigur Bloat

02:56:40.040 go to a Hoff

02:56:41.840 touch the grass as the kids say

02:56:44.360 get out there and do

02:56:46.340 Ausitru in real life

02:56:48.000 and if you are hearing this

02:56:50.140 and you are a heterosexual white person

02:56:52.120 come home to Troth to the Gods

02:56:54.320 come home to Ausitru

02:56:55.920 come home to the Ausitru Folk Assembly

02:56:58.020 thank you so much for joining

02:57:00.320 us this evening Lauren

02:57:01.420 it's been great having you on the show

02:57:04.080 i will see you guys next week when swan and i continue with i believe part five

02:57:13.260 of our study of the voice saga until then hail the ice here hail the folk hail the afa

02:57:21.060 and remember victory never sleeps

02:57:34.080 We'll be right back.

02:58:04.080 Thank you.

02:58:34.080 Thank you.

02:59:04.080 We'll be right back.

02:59:34.080 Thank you.

03:00:04.080 Thank you.

Asatru Folk Assembly - May 15, 2025

5⧸14⧸25 Victory Never Sleeps, Episode 149 - Gyðja Anderson

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