Asatru Folk Assembly - April 2021 Live Discussion

00:00:00.000 hello hey guys hope everybody's doing good tonight um

00:00:11.520 our newest folk builder james all donated uh a ring light and a new camera so hopefully we're

00:00:20.160 looking sharp this evening um let me know how it turns out i do have to look over here a little

00:00:24.800 bit at our screen as you can see looking off to the side to uh read our chat um hopefully

00:00:32.160 this all works this all works very good and uh yeah looking forward to see what you guys think

00:00:43.120 march was a huge huge month for for me and for the afa um the month started off with

00:00:52.720 with the very first Ostara held at Thorshof.

00:00:58.220 And it was fantastic.

00:01:00.040 So many great people showed up.

00:01:02.540 Our leadership team out at Thorshof did an amazing job.

00:01:06.180 The event was really memorable, something very special.

00:01:10.500 And it was the first time

00:01:11.700 that Steve and Sheila McNallan were out at Thorshof.

00:01:15.400 I was very honored to be able to show off Thorshof.

00:01:20.440 It's such a special place.

00:01:22.720 in linden north carolina if you guys haven't uh haven't had a chance to go out there yet and you

00:01:28.880 can i would encourage you all to go but ostara this year was was absolutely phenomenal they did

00:01:34.800 such a great job and i think i was thinking to myself and it's such an amazing amazing privilege

00:01:44.000 um and i think i may be the only person who's done this i celebrated ostara in march

00:01:50.720 at three Hoffs on three consecutive weekends. And I was so very blessed to do that. We had a

00:02:00.100 great Ostara out at Odin's Hoff. And then I went out not only to celebrate Ostara,

00:02:06.160 but I was able to dedicate Baldur's Hoff in Murdoch, Minnesota. It's been a long,

00:02:12.080 long adventure getting that up and running. We have people up there that worked so very,

00:02:19.780 very hard to make that a reality and the reality is is greater than we could have ever hoped for

00:02:27.140 and uh with so much potential to become even greater in the future that dedication was really

00:02:33.620 special um the place felt so very special it's hard to describe it was such an emotional weekend

00:02:43.940 for all of us there and it was so very i don't know very powerful to be able to dedicate that

00:02:54.260 hoff as a as a gift to balder and to celebrate and worship and honor him in that way um i'm

00:03:02.660 honored to be able to share that with everybody who's able to attend i'm extremely thankful for

00:03:08.420 for Githya Brandy Callahan, Githya Anna Funk, Gothi Jason, or I'm sorry, Githya Anna Schapansky,

00:03:17.820 Gothi Jason Plurd, Apprentice Folk Builder Nathan Erlinson,

00:03:24.960 Folk Builder Jason Gallagher, everybody out there that made that work. They're truly,

00:03:31.860 truly amazing people. So it was very special that I was able to be a part of that.

00:03:36.040 It looks like a lot of folks have showed up before pregame here on the side to see what they've got going on.

00:03:47.280 Thank you guys so much, those that showed up early and were here for this.

00:03:54.720 Andrew, thank you so much.

00:03:56.260 I'm glad that you think everybody gets excited when I talk.

00:04:00.040 I hope that's the case.

00:04:06.040 Texas is absolutely doing amazing stuff.

00:04:10.440 Thank you so much for our great members and AFA family in Texas.

00:04:16.200 Lori Wadsworth, our folk builder out there, Goethe, Kevin Long, you guys are doing great stuff.

00:04:22.000 It's so nice to see Texas take off, and Texas has really taken off the past few months.

00:04:28.460 Guys, keep doing what you're doing.

00:04:29.800 You guys are doing amazing.

00:04:36.040 Wow, you guys are going over here in the chat.

00:04:41.980 Hello, Mary.

00:04:42.720 I'm glad you're with us tonight.

00:04:50.720 Lane, thank you.

00:04:51.580 I appreciate it.

00:04:52.440 I do what I can.

00:04:58.080 Awesome.

00:04:58.620 I'm glad, guys.

00:04:59.160 I'm glad it's looking decent.

00:05:01.840 It's a really nice setup that James got me.

00:05:04.860 So thank you. Thank you, James. Appreciate it a lot.

00:05:17.620 Vargerhoff, glad you could join us. I'm not sure who you really are or exactly where you're at, but I'm glad you're with us. I'm glad you decided to join.

00:05:34.860 where are our facilities? So we have three Hoffs now. The first Hoff is Odens Hoff in Brownsville, 0.76

00:05:42.080 California. That's in Yuba County, California. We have Thors Hoff in Linden, North Carolina.

00:05:48.440 I believe that's in Cumberland County. And we have Balders Hoff in Murdoch, Minnesota. I believe

00:05:55.140 That's in Swift County, Minnesota.

00:06:04.980 Jillian, I'm so glad to hear that the Lansdale True Folk

00:06:09.240 had a good Ostara.

00:06:10.400 I saw the pictures, it looked great.

00:06:12.580 Those guys are doing fantastic.

00:06:14.820 I love the Erickson's, some of my best friends,

00:06:17.320 and it looks like that Kindred's really got great things

00:06:21.320 going on every time I see their pictures,

00:06:22.960 they look fantastic.

00:06:25.140 Thanks, Mandy, for the assist, getting people connected on the side.

00:06:38.460 Glad to see that.

00:06:43.380 Well, thank you, Mary. I appreciate that.

00:06:49.380 Ah, Cameron, that's Vargerhoff. Glad to have you. I'm very glad you decided to join us.

00:07:03.380 It's great to have you here tonight.

00:07:06.380 I'm trying to figure out a name over here on the side. It's using a character that's

00:07:23.060 really hard for me to read over here. It looks kind of strange. Anyway,

00:07:26.360 someone's asking a question about what would it take to get a Hoff going in north central

00:07:31.840 Pennsylvania? Not a lot. I'd be very tempted. We've got some great people there. Central

00:07:41.400 Pennsylvania is where we host winter nights every year. In Pennsylvania, we've got some of our very

00:07:47.100 best people. We've got folk builder, Adam Hudak. We've got Githya, Katie Erickson, and we've got

00:07:53.100 Witten member and one of my best friends, Clifford Erickson out there. I think Pennsylvania looks

00:07:58.220 like a great place to have a Hoff. It would take finding the right property at the right

00:08:04.380 time for the right price. But yeah, I'd be very, very interested in us getting off there

00:08:08.820 sooner rather than later. We've got a really good support system and great people in that

00:08:16.220 All right. Well, fantastic. We got some questions coming in.

00:08:31.920 So Scottish Witch, I am really sorry that your husband has not received the lapel pin.

00:08:47.960 Hopefully, Mandy, you can get that to the right person who needs to know, and we can get that sorted out. 0.91

00:08:54.980 Yeah, I'm really sorry to hear that. We'll get you taken care of, though.

00:08:57.540 And we have James asking about the idea and the information going around that the folk mother, Elsie Christensen, was a Bolshevik, and he wanted me to set that straight.

00:09:15.260 So for you guys that may not know, Elsie Christensen was a extremely important figure in the establishment of modern house.

00:09:25.200 true she brought so many people to house a true and helped so many of our folk she

00:09:36.880 her involvement was extremely important she brought so many uh especially young men to

00:09:42.480 get involved in this early on and saw them through through regular correspondence um

00:09:48.240 very important person in modern house to true. And we want to honor her. One of my first things

00:09:55.160 that was important to me to do as, as I was Harry Goethe was to honor her with one of our

00:09:59.860 days of remembrance. The Midwest regional event in May is set up to honor her. And on the side,

00:10:08.120 we can get you information on how to sign up for that. We would love to see you guys out there.

00:10:12.140 I'm going to attend that event. I'd love to see you guys there. But anyways, back to the thing

00:10:16.540 about Bolshevism. So some of it's a little bit difficult to understand the political machinations

00:10:27.340 of 1920s, 30s, and 40s Europe. But there was two streams that there was a lot of overlap in

00:10:37.600 that developed after, in the mid 30s, they started to diverge pretty heavily. There was a lot of

00:10:48.880 socialist trends. And yes, among that was Bolshevism. And that coincided with national

00:10:55.140 socialism. It coincided with Italian fascism. And those elements overlapped quite a bit.

00:11:04.040 One of the things with with Elsie in Denmark at the time was she was very much involved in social concerns.

00:11:13.540 That was a time where you had a whole lot of poverty, a lot of crushing poverty and a whole lot of wealth in a very few hands.

00:11:20.920 And there was a real need to help out the rest of the folk. And that was very, very important to her.

00:11:28.420 um but she was part of the danish national socialist party of the time and she did have

00:11:34.700 affiliations with the more um labor-oriented wings of that party but no elsie was not a communist

00:11:41.560 um that's not the case whatever you think of her of her political decisions one way or another she

00:11:48.340 was she was at the time a member of the uh the danish national socialist party

00:11:53.320 all right looks like we're getting the pin thing squared away on the side

00:12:04.660 thank you James I do what I can um we had someone mail in a couple of questions email to me

00:12:10.880 so guys if you think of this first those of you who showed up early you guys can show up here as

00:12:15.360 soon as I schedule the next one if you have questions that you think of that you want to

00:12:18.840 throw out and make sure I get to. So I encourage you guys to sign in, you know, you guys can sign

00:12:24.060 in. I mean, as soon as I get it up tomorrow, the next day, and ask questions, then if you'd like,

00:12:30.500 you can also email me questions, mattflavell, F-L-A-V-E-L, at runestone.org. And I'd be really

00:12:38.120 happy to try to make sure I remember to get those into these conversations. So I'm trying to think

00:12:44.240 how they put it but they basically asked if philosophical schools of thought and have a place

00:12:52.240 in house are true um in other

00:13:00.240 and other religions and i guess in other spirituality there's a lot of competing

00:13:05.760 completing uh competing schools of thought and different philosophies

00:13:13.280 I think that

00:13:16.840 one day when Alistair True flourishes and all our folk come home and there's millions of

00:13:27.580 Alistair True are then maybe there's something to some of that I think that right now when I see

00:13:33.360 different major philosophical schools within I Also True. It seems to be a way for very few

00:13:39.920 individuals to feel special and superior to others by thinking they have some esoteric key

00:13:46.760 that the rest of us lack. I haven't seen that to be a reasonable thing in I Also True. I think that

00:13:53.180 our numbers are still not great enough that we should squabble over obscure points of esoterics.

00:14:00.280 I think that us being a unified body and a unified folk practicing Ausatru in a unified way without diverging into competing schools of thought is a much more legitimate thing for us to do.

00:14:12.380 um we saw in the early days of also true

00:14:16.160 a whole lot of

00:14:20.960 wasted potential and wasted energy of everybody wanting to be the king of their own little

00:14:29.600 backyard group and nobody wanting to work together and everybody thought they knew a

00:14:33.580 better way of doing it and what it always devolved into is rather than being a small

00:14:40.300 part of something big that was doing big things ever wanted to be you know it'd be four or five

00:14:47.660 fat guys in camp chairs in the backyard arguing over who gets the big piece of chicken

00:14:54.300 and thankfully we've moved beyond that and every time somebody comes up with this different school

00:14:58.860 of also true thought i think it brings us one step closer to being the guys in the

00:15:04.460 backyard arguing over the big piece of chicken oh also um

00:15:17.260 there was a question about what i think of survive the jive uh thomas is a really nice guy

00:15:25.500 i had the opportunity to meet him at a northwest forum a number of years ago

00:15:29.900 and uh seemed like a really class guy I really enjoyed our interaction um I think he does some

00:15:39.220 really good things I think the one the and I can't say I'm an expert and I don't listen to all of his

00:15:45.620 stuff regular so I don't I don't speak authoritatively on it the time I met him in the

00:15:50.340 time I've talked to him and I've heard some of his some of his things over the years one of the

00:15:54.620 things that I think he and a lot of folks do is they sit around and theorize what it would be

00:16:04.820 like if we had a revived Ausitru. What would it be like if this was revived in our modern day?

00:16:11.100 And they don't stop and realize it is revived. It has been revived. It's been revived now for

00:16:17.140 over 50 years it's being practiced in the house of true folk assembly for 26 years and counting now

00:16:26.980 we now have three hofs to our gods it's a thing it's ongoing we're past the stage of wondering

00:16:34.820 what if and we're in the stage of doing and acting and i wish that survive the jive and all

00:16:41.660 of those folks would come on board and join us and be part of what we're doing and and i'd love

00:16:46.860 to see that happen. And then I was also asked about Huger as part of the soul complex and whether

00:16:54.160 that related to the higher self, as you see in some other Indo-European schools of thought.

00:17:00.100 Certainly, I think that it does. I think that it encompasses a lot of things, but a lot of it

00:17:05.840 having to do with your true will and your true self. So I do think it is very much connected

00:17:11.640 to that idea of the higher self.

00:17:15.980 Let me look out over on the side here.

00:17:17.960 I know we got a couple of other things coming in.

00:17:33.040 Oh, what's the best way to get in touch

00:17:34.660 with somebody about joining?

00:17:35.760 go to our website www.runestone.org read over stuff if you're in agreement with our declaration

00:17:46.660 of purpose and our statement of ethics feel free to apply on that website if you have questions

00:17:53.660 i always encourage you to reach out to your local folk builder those can be found on the contacts

00:17:58.640 page at our website or if you tell us over on the side mandy can get you squared away with

00:18:03.800 the Folk Builder closest to you to talk to.

00:18:10.960 Reminiscences. 0.99

00:18:12.360 If you're not getting emails back from folks that you're reaching out to,

00:18:16.360 please email me, mattflavell at runestone.org.

00:18:20.680 I promise if your email comes in, I will respond to you,

00:18:23.940 and I will get connected and figure out what's not working on the people

00:18:29.760 you're trying to get in touch with.

00:18:31.120 But I hate to hear that happening on the side.

00:18:33.800 please let me know and i'd be very very happy to help you get squared away with everything to talk to

00:18:44.920 any new platform to get make getting connected uh staying in

00:18:50.920 staying in contact a little easier a new platform i don't know about that we're trying to be very

00:18:56.760 active on vk uh folk builder lane ashby is working on expanding our social media a little bit more

00:19:06.280 we've got regional or district rather telegram groups going on hopefully those work well for

00:19:13.720 folks i know telegram can be a little bit difficult to operate we have cliff on the back end looking

00:19:21.720 at perhaps some forums perhaps something more like that to help our people connect a little

00:19:27.960 bit better we are looking at our options and doing the best we can on that right now the leaders are

00:19:34.200 our vk telegram and then i'm very happy to say our youtube presence is working really

00:19:38.280 well we reach a lot of people on youtube with videos like this but yeah we are working on that

00:19:44.120 personal choice for a okay brand the viking asks what would my personal choice be for a book to

00:19:57.140 learn runes um so michael followed you up directly suggesting that you look into the

00:20:10.480 works of edward thorson that's where i want you to go eventually if you're brand new to the runes

00:20:16.180 the best very basic primer on the runes i think is the runes workbook by leon wilde um i can't say

00:20:26.080 enough good about that book as a as a very beginner level book about the runes i think

00:20:30.960 it's really accessible i think it's accessible by older children and certainly by people who

00:20:35.200 new to alsatru um i think very highly of that book i like it a lot if you're if you're above that

00:20:43.360 then absolutely pretty much anything edrid writes on the runes i think edrid edrid thorson is

00:20:49.440 the foremost rune master that we have in the modern day perhaps ever i think his his knowledge

00:20:55.120 of of the runes is untouched by by any other competition um futhark is always a good first one

00:21:04.720 by him he has several rune might rune lore all of which are very good so i would i would uh

00:21:10.560 say go with that but any brand new people to the runes the runes workbook by leon wilde

00:21:18.720 Okay, we have somebody asked, what is the AFA's stance on people using the symbols of our faith to push dangerous political agendas and attacking our capital?

00:21:49.520 the images are of our faith are part of our folk soul and i think in a way are fair game for our

00:21:56.240 people to use towards causes that they sincerely believe in and sometimes i'm going to agree with

00:22:02.480 those causes and sometimes i'm not um i think attacking our capital is a little bit of a

00:22:14.400 misnomer of events that occurred not taking a position on it i don't think that there was a

00:22:19.680 lot of violence i want to be careful accusing people of attacking stuff the other thing i'd

00:22:24.240 like to say is when using our holy symbols for something we may not all agree on how they're used

00:22:31.840 but we should always be pious and respectful in our use of them we should never use them for

00:22:38.880 just never use them casually we need to use them

00:22:43.200 with a full knowledge of what they represent and who they represent

00:22:47.360 and make sure that's at the forefront of our mind when we do use those symbols

00:22:54.800 but you know referring to the same incident a lot of folks have a lot of different tattoos

00:22:59.040 that's just going to happen it is what it is

00:23:01.920 um if you tattoo holy symbols onto your body and then you find yourself doing and that's

00:23:08.400 something to be aware of if you find yourself in pictures with those tattoos on you doing things

00:23:14.080 make sure they're things that you uh you think our gods are going to support

00:23:18.960 and stand behind and i think that's a solid advice for all of us

00:23:25.520 okay

00:23:31.040 James the point of clarification did GoFundMe in fact shut Ron down. I'll look for your answer on the side. So some of you may know this leave two nights ago.

00:23:46.040 Also true elder, an artist and man that has done a whole lot for the resurgence of also true Ron McMahon. He awoke his garage and his car were on fire burned to, you know, almost nothingness.

00:24:04.040 the timing and some other factors

00:24:08.700 make it look very compellingly like it was an act of terrorism directed at him

00:24:15.540 as being a member of our faith and being so outspoken as he is.

00:24:20.860 And that's,

00:24:22.020 that's appalling that that happened to this elderly gentleman that's done so

00:24:26.320 much for us.

00:24:30.200 We've tried to immediately step in.

00:24:32.200 was a go fund me set up for him that i'm checking on the side but the james say might might have

00:24:37.160 gotten taken down go fund me has been abominable in the way they've treated charitable causes

00:24:45.080 if someone is in desperate need and they don't care for that person's politics go fund me would

00:24:50.040 just assume those people starve and their children suffer go fund me has been terrible in that

00:24:56.440 uh so with that in mind the astro folk assembly we wanted to step in we wanted to help run

00:25:02.520 in the best way we knew how we started a fundraiser so far that's going great um

00:25:10.760 james if you could post a link to that over in the side chat or mandy or any of our folk builders

00:25:15.720 if you could post a link to that in the side chat um we're running the the fundraiser through the

00:25:21.400 the Astro Folk Assembly so that it won't get shut down and so that we can make sure that money gets

00:25:25.780 to Ron. If you would like to help him out, every little bit counts. Everything you put in there

00:25:31.620 will go directly to helping Ron. And so far, you know, he's unhurt, but he lost the items in his

00:25:40.880 garage. He lost his garage and lost his car. And I'd really like to do the best we can to not only

00:25:46.400 make him whole again but to let him know that we love him we care about him and we want to see him

00:25:52.560 taken care of so yeah anybody who wants to donate to that please do we're going to have somebody

00:25:57.200 pop up that link over in the side chat and james you've been taking point on this everybody big

00:26:03.960 thank you to folk builder james alt for being on top of this um if you would like a way to chat

00:26:18.280 every day with members and you are a member telegram groups are the way to go if you're

00:26:22.680 not already on there please get with your local folk builder and they will get you set up and

00:26:27.160 invited joel please do i would love to have some of your hungarian goulash i've heard you talk

00:26:39.880 about it a number of times and it sounds delicious are we setting up homeschooling that is faith

00:26:47.640 based i would really really like to we're having discussions about that on the side now we're

00:26:53.160 trying to get that squared away i think that's a long long way off from being completed and ready

00:26:58.440 but i really want to do that and if we have the right volunteers i would love to see that happen

00:27:03.320 it's important to me conceptually it's important to me for the folk it's also important to me as

00:27:08.280 as the father of almost one year old little girl that i plan on homeschooling so it's really

00:27:13.000 important that we get that squared away like i said we do have people on the back end working

00:27:17.560 on it. But I don't want to oversell it right now because we have not made the progress ready to

00:27:23.480 call that a thing yet. But we are trying. And like I say, we need that. We really like that.

00:27:30.280 and we're working on that.

00:27:45.340 Jason, when should someone new to Alistair True

00:27:47.520 begin to study the runes in depth?

00:27:51.260 If and when they want to.

00:27:55.320 A lot of people, that's their first step in Alistair True

00:27:58.500 is they want to they want to study the runes and be a you know be a mighty rune master

00:28:04.780 and i don't i say that in a weird tone because that's a it's kind of a silly first step it's

00:28:12.880 not a wrong ambition that's a great thing to do eventually but that kind of esoteric practice

00:28:20.400 is the frosting on a really great cake and that cake means living a noble life

00:28:26.600 true to our gods so worshiping the gods being part of our faith being part of the community

00:28:33.060 comes far before learning you know learning the mysteries of the runes that said if it's a point

00:28:39.640 of interest for you and something that you want to learn i'd never want to hold you back from doing

00:28:43.260 that it's just important that you don't

00:28:47.280 it is okay and it is valuable to worship our gods be part of our community

00:28:56.020 and not ever touch the runes.

00:28:59.860 I think it's inappropriate to touch the runes,

00:29:03.360 to study the runes, to devote yourself to the runes

00:29:06.320 and not to interact with our faith,

00:29:09.620 not to interact with our folk.

00:29:11.460 If that makes any sense, it helps.

00:29:26.020 Yeah, James.

00:29:45.760 So James confirmed that GoFundMe did shut that fundraiser down for Ron.

00:29:50.620 I knew that was coming at some point.

00:29:52.980 I hope Ron was able to get the money that that raised for him before that happened.

00:29:57.460 And he will get every bit of the money that came to the AFA that's still coming into the AFA forum.

00:30:03.140 So let's get that link up and the AFA can protect those funds and make sure they get where they need to go.

00:30:22.980 Okay, it looks like we do have that link up on the side. If you did want to donate to

00:30:30.280 Ron McVann, that would be the place to go.

00:30:45.920 Sorry, guys, I'm catching up. You guys got a lot of interest, a lot of questions on the

00:30:50.520 side today. I love seeing that. So I got a question. Does the AFA have a stance for

00:31:08.240 draw its values from the Oralinda book at all? No. No to all those. First, a good translation

00:31:16.660 and this stuff is relatively new.

00:31:19.160 We don't certainly take our stances from it.

00:31:23.820 I would really like to look into it quite a bit more

00:31:26.840 before I put a firm position on it.

00:31:29.200 As of now, the AFA has no great position on that one way or another.

00:31:33.160 I'd really like to have a better knowledge of that

00:31:35.420 before I comment on that more.

00:31:46.660 um dr yeah we practice the hammer sign a lot in the afa because as you noted steve mcnallan does

00:31:57.520 and um he's our founder and we took a whole lot of our whole lot of our cues for him and

00:32:02.600 for practices that he originated um i know that um edrid thorson also talks about the hammer right

00:32:10.560 and how it's performed i understand that it looks similar to the signs of the cross that catholics

00:32:17.120 do there's a little bit of argument about which came where but at the you know and whether it was

00:32:22.640 authentic and whether our ancestors used to do it i make no claims that our ancestors used to do it

00:32:27.520 it is mentioned once in the sagas but uh i don't do it because it's ancient i do it because it's

00:32:34.160 part of the history of modern alsatru and it's something that was holy and special to our

00:32:38.320 founders and it's something that we still do most often at afam meal blessings um in the holy names

00:32:45.040 of odin balder fray and thor we bless things so you may see that sometimes it may be kind

00:32:52.320 of old school but i know i always do that at meal blessings specifically

00:33:08.320 Okay, just asking something, Melissa, you said Moodle, and that's not a typo.

00:33:16.720 If that's the case, I will look that up, and hopefully Brandy sees that, and we can look that up as well.

00:33:33.380 It would certainly be awesome to create a village or farm we could all live together on.

00:33:38.320 A lot of people have wanted to do that over the years.

00:33:41.260 It's a beautiful dream.

00:33:42.380 I don't take anything away from it.

00:33:44.500 It's a very hard sell, and it's very hard to get people on.

00:33:47.300 If that's something you're interested, though, I mean, swing for the fences, and I wish you the very best.

00:33:52.920 But I think a good alternative or a good preliminary step to that would be just move closer together with some Alcetra or with some AFA members.

00:34:02.800 um i would love to see afa members move uh closer to one another obviously i think that moving

00:34:11.300 closer to our hofs is a really good idea i think that's a good foundation for a community to happen

00:34:17.220 in those places so i would really encourage that but yeah our our folk living closer together

00:34:23.600 is a huge step towards the idea of that village that so many people dream about

00:34:29.580 And I think that'll get you ahead in the right direction.

00:34:44.580 Oh, what do I think about the utilization of modern art and music to spread the word of our gods and inspire our folk?

00:34:52.020 And how do I think it should be done?

00:34:54.180 Well and classy is how I think it should be done.

00:34:57.540 I think modern art means something different than art that happens to be made in the modern times.

00:35:03.840 But I would love to see more art done in modern times and music done in modern times.

00:35:10.540 I'm really excited to see starts of that.

00:35:13.620 We see a lot of art done in carving mediums and things that way.

00:35:18.060 We see a lot of beautiful horns and things done.

00:35:20.460 What's been really amazing is to see the murals that Witten's Vaughn Harrell has done.

00:35:25.960 at two of our three Hoffs so far.

00:35:29.860 His mural of Thor at Thor's Hoff in Baldur's Hoff

00:35:33.960 are beautiful, and it's hard to describe on here

00:35:39.940 how powerful they are when you're in the room with them.

00:35:43.940 Those murals, and I believe this fully,

00:35:47.220 invited the gods into their Hoffs,

00:35:51.140 and you feel that presence,

00:35:52.540 and I think that's because of that art.

00:35:54.160 so I'd love to see more art I think it's a huge tool to enliven you know to ignite that folk soul

00:36:03.140 in people and to express that folk soul from people so I would love to see more art musically

00:36:09.500 the fine arts um yeah I think I think more art the better and it's beautiful to see that start to

00:36:17.960 happen.

00:36:47.960 Melissa, it's funny that in telling me Moodle was not a typo, you made a typo. That's awesome.

00:37:11.280 So everybody keeps talking about School of the West. I know absolutely nothing about it. I'm

00:37:15.540 I'm not endorsing it, but after we're done with this, I would really like to take a look at it.

00:37:20.180 It sounds promising. So, yeah, I'd absolutely love to take a look at that.

00:37:29.100 You heard it here, folks. Andrew wants you to come on out if you're anywhere near Ocala, Florida.

00:37:34.600 And he says he's got something good going on there. If anybody wants to move there, he's looking to do big things.

00:37:39.820 so uh no that's great um i lived close to there for a little while in saint augustine

00:37:46.820 uh yeah that's interesting and i hope that goes good for you andrew

00:37:51.660 hmm

00:37:55.180 hmm

00:38:09.820 an AFA flag like this one in the background. So our store got taken down when Stripe chose to

00:38:18.420 persecute us a few weeks back. Cliff has got a prototype of the store up and running on the

00:38:24.100 back end of our website now. He's looking to make that go live here in the next couple of days.

00:38:29.400 As soon, the moment he gets that set up, we absolutely sell those flags at

00:38:34.900 www.runestone.org. And we would love for anybody who's interested to go there and purchase that

00:38:43.400 flag or anything else on the, on the shop once it's up and running. And I was, I was talking

00:38:48.820 with Cliff moments before this call, trying to get that set up. So there is product on there

00:38:54.600 and hopefully that'll go live, like I said, within the next couple of days.

00:39:04.900 Canon, forums are banning you and you want to know if there's safe forums for Fulkish

00:39:20.020 Ausitruor. Not that I know of, but I mentioned earlier, we're working on establishing some of

00:39:26.140 those now. We had forums on our website back, you know, way back when they were a big deal then.

00:39:32.620 and with the advent of social media and with facebook those forums became increasingly useless

00:39:39.660 now with cancel culture the forums now have a have a really important use again

00:39:44.700 so we're looking at getting that squared away and we'll let you guys know as soon as that becomes a

00:40:02.620 Lucas, are there any good informational Oustertruth channels on Facebook?

00:40:19.480 Yes, this channel right here.

00:40:21.160 Please subscribe if you're not already a subscriber.

00:40:25.260 I've been trying to load any kind of old footage I can find of anything Steve McNallan has done

00:40:30.220 or any other things the AFA has done in the past before we're really making a lot of use of this YouTube channel.

00:40:36.200 I'm always looking for those things, even if they're audio files.

00:40:39.100 I'd love to have them on here, but we are trying to flesh this out and get more information on it.

00:40:43.960 Well, David, I think you hit on it.

00:41:01.780 David asks what my thoughts are on VK.

00:41:06.280 I really like VK.

00:41:08.760 The downside is there's not a lot of people.

00:41:11.080 long. It's not a lot of English speakers on VK. VK has got a ton of Russians. I'd love to get our

00:41:17.320 Russian brothers and sisters involved in what we do. I'd love to have a lot of Russian AFA members.

00:41:22.420 As it is, though, it's hard to connect on there because so few of us are there.

00:41:26.720 The AFA is on there. We post there. I post there a lot from our different AFA

00:41:31.760 Hoff pages, the AFA page. And personally, I would encourage you all of you to come join me on VK.

00:41:37.780 is it as good as Facebook? No, but it also avoids the cancel culture problem. It also lets you have

00:41:50.360 free speech. It also is the place where we can do the things that we want to do now and it functions

00:41:55.700 in that way we're all familiar with. So I would really encourage everybody to come join us on VK,

00:42:00.560 check it out. The more you guys are there and participate, the more we can have something

00:42:04.420 thriving and worthwhile there vk has also got a lot of really cool and obscure history stuff

00:42:10.020 something that some of you guys may not know or maybe it's just me because i'm getting old but um

00:42:15.700 if you go to vk on your on your laptop or on your desktop uh google chrome at least does the um

00:42:23.460 automatic translating so all the cyrillic that's so very hard to read and understand

00:42:28.260 if you're looking at it on your on your your pc it's much much you know it does that

00:42:33.780 translating for you. And they've got some amazing history groups that is just the kind of stuff you

00:42:38.560 don't find on Facebook that was really neat. So I'm in a lot of those as well.

00:43:03.780 Okay, so James is asking me about my, my, there we go, my Rhydo ring.

00:43:29.960 This is the ring of the Gothar of the Astru Folk Assembly. 0.95

00:43:33.780 Chosen for a number of reasons. The rune Rhytho is the rune of right action at the right time. It's also a rune of nobility. And it's really important to me that that nobility and that right action at the right time guide our Gothars as we help lead our folk home. 1.00

00:43:55.460 Rhytho was also the symbol chosen by the Austro Free Assembly to represent that organization, to which the AFA is the successor of.

00:44:07.920 So the Rhytho rune inspires us to be noble in all the things we do and to act rightly, to act rightly at the right times.

00:44:17.820 So that's really important.

00:44:18.900 and also around the edges and it's way too close and you guys there you go maybe you can see that

00:44:25.880 it's got um recurring all the way around in an endless circle it's got ansus lagus urus

00:44:33.400 lagus ansus it's got alu and then back up ula and uh it's because our gothar

00:44:42.340 are that link bringing the divine through the ritual symbolized by lagu's, the mead, the blood of sacrifice, through that ritual to the folk, to the primal, the divine to the primal, and then connecting the folk, the primal, back through ritual to ansuz, to the divine.

00:45:05.460 and very much in indo-european tradition the idea of the the gothar the priest being that bridge

00:45:13.840 between the divine and the folk and so that's very much what our gothar are as jane mentioned

00:45:21.080 there's a lot to go through with it there's at least a year-long course um where you're mentored

00:45:27.200 by an acting or by someone who's already an experienced gothi or githya

00:45:31.920 um and most of the lore stuff is stuff you should know already when you go through it

00:45:37.860 our course is much more about leadership about counseling so much about counseling

00:45:43.620 um and about how to actually be a religious leader for our folk and for our community

00:45:50.040 um it's been really touching in this day and age how much our folk you know there was a time where

00:45:59.880 gothar were looked at as you know masters of ceremony for ritual and certainly we conduct ritual

00:46:06.360 but it's been beautiful and i feel so honored to be a part of a time where

00:46:11.400 we're religious leaders of our folk and we're able we're come to by members

00:46:16.840 with all kind of very very serious counseling needs and we want to make sure that we're well

00:46:21.240 equipped and have the ability to counsel our people and to help make our people have better

00:46:28.440 lives to have more successful families and to make it through the hard times that life throws at us

00:46:36.520 it's what our ancestors gothar did that's what we're doing and that's we're striving every day

00:46:41.160 to make sure that the gothar that follow us down the road are better equipped and can learn from

00:46:45.720 us our experiences in order to do that more and better in the future with the challenges that 0.99

00:46:50.760 arise in days to come gab i don't like gab i don't find it very useful i i mean i like the

00:47:02.120 people at gab i like the idea of it i just that really quick sound the really quick couple of

00:47:09.000 words thing that gab gab is kind of a clone of twitter and um i don't find it to be super

00:47:15.480 effective for what we're trying to do but anybody wants to use gab please do i i appreciate what

00:47:20.280 what they're trying to do over there. I guess this follows that. Are we going to use Gab or

00:47:39.360 Telegram for social media? We use Telegram extensively as it is now. If you're not part

00:47:44.760 of that, please contact your local folk builder and they can get you sorted out.

00:47:48.720 It's not perfect, but it is a constant communication with other AFA members.

00:47:54.860 Gab hasn't been very fruitful to us, but I'm not opposed to people trying to make that work better.

00:47:59.220 Hopefully Lane will try to get on Gab and have some good ideas about how to make that work best for us.

00:48:18.000 Cameron, prison outreach is possible.

00:48:26.020 We have our apprentice folk builder, George Schindler, heading that up right now.

00:48:31.640 We're happy to interact with folks who are incarcerated that want to learn about Ausatru,

00:48:37.000 want to practice Ausatru.

00:48:40.480 We're very much of a mind to try to be helpful to those people and depending on what their

00:48:45.280 needs are get those in touch with our go thar and see what we can do to help them out um like i say

00:48:50.800 george schindler is the man you want to talk to about it if you're if you have more curiosity

00:48:55.920 uh we're just getting it off the ground kind of figuring out what we're doing and the best way

00:48:59.920 to serve that community and help them so um but yeah george is heading that up and

00:49:05.760 we're very much interested in doing that where we can

00:49:15.280 Patrick, how do I feel about the importance of the historical and archaeological past?

00:49:42.940 it's a complex question I think most of us who found our way here have a deep love of history

00:49:50.220 of archaeology and of those things I'm very interested in history I'm very interested in

00:49:55.880 what our ancestors did certainly I'm very interested in what you know also true ancestors

00:50:03.300 of the past did but I'm interested in what all my ancestors did I think it's important to look

00:50:10.420 to archaeology and history to inform some of our OstraTru practice, but I think that a lot of

00:50:17.000 people place way too much emphasis on it. We're a living faith. We exist now. OstraTru is just

00:50:24.320 as authentic in 2021 as it was in the year 800, as it was in the year, you know, one, as it was in

00:50:31.400 year 40 bc um ostrich lives and grows with our people as we grow uh and i don't what i

00:50:42.600 what i don't want to do is lock the afa or myself into the pat the practices and modes of the past

00:50:50.280 and to ape something that our ancestors did i have no interest in that i'd love to be informed

00:50:55.640 by their practice but i want to practice something that's real and that's relevant in the world that

00:51:00.280 we live in today and not pretend that i live in a world that we don't live in today if that makes

00:51:06.520 sense so it's important that the two the past and the present meet in order for us to go into the

00:51:12.600 future but um i wouldn't say that we're reconstructionists because that that leads

00:51:19.400 to reenactment and we're not redoing anything we're currently practicing ausiture

00:51:30.280 Folk builder Melissa Mills is hosting an AFA ladies event May 13th through 16th please make

00:51:51.380 sure you get with her if you're interested in that and if you're a lady of the Astro Folk

00:51:54.800 Assembly I'm sure you'll meet some some some great ladies there and you guys will have a good time

00:52:00.060 She can get you any information you need on that over on the side.

00:52:10.540 James makes a really good point.

00:52:12.900 And this goes out to anyone who can hear my voice, AFA member or not.

00:52:22.480 Now, if you're in trouble. If you're having a hard time. If things out there are just too much for you, please reach out to our go thar please reach out to me personally.

00:52:42.480 Please reach out to your folk builder who can direct you to our go thar please reach out.

00:52:49.480 um our go thar we are here to help we're here to counsel our folk we're here to listen

00:52:57.320 um so many people are going through a lot of hard times for a lot of different reasons

00:53:04.040 if you're struggling and you need someone to talk to please please reach out um

00:53:11.720 and this goes without saying and i'm not trying to make it awkward if anyone hearing my voice and

00:53:17.800 And because we've lost some people this way, if anyone here in my voice is so overwhelmed that they're thinking of ending it, I would really like for you to, I was going to say make me a promise.

00:53:32.440 I don't know how you're going to do that, but at least give it a try, giving one of us a call before you go through with anything.

00:53:42.120 Give it a shot.

00:53:43.020 Please, if you need help, we're here to help, okay?

00:54:06.480 Andrew, I have not watched that episode by Survive the Jive.

00:54:11.260 He does great work.

00:54:12.280 I'm sure that the scholarship in it is extremely sound, and that's probably a really great thing and maybe something that I'll look into.

00:54:42.280 Nate, I'm glad you liked them. We'd love to get you up there one of these days. Let's make sure

00:54:57.420 we get a couple of those in the calendar. This is the same Nate from Colorado I'm thinking about.

00:55:04.020 If you see him over here on the side chat, he is the man you have to thank for the beautiful

00:55:07.560 AFA calendars we have every year. He does a really good job on those and we really appreciate them.

00:55:21.560 Um, Das Schaefer Sturm Trooper, Trooper. I'm sorry, he's not getting back to you.

00:55:41.360 Anders, if you see this, if anybody's got contact with Anders, let him know that you're reaching out.

00:55:46.760 If you email me, mattflavell at runestone.org, I'd be happy to get that squared away and figure

00:55:53.580 out what's going on there. I can speak personally. I know Anders. He's a really good guy. I think

00:55:58.820 very highly of him. I don't think he's ignoring you on purpose, but if there is a glitch and

00:56:03.580 something's going on, I'd like to get to the bottom of it and figure it out for you.

00:56:16.120 I'm sure there's a lot of people that consider themselves white separatists.

00:56:20.580 It certainly doesn't conflict with Ossetru.

00:56:23.080 It's also not a position point of the Ossetru Folk Assembly or something that we're in any way trying to push, but I don't see it as contradictory to Ossetru in any way.

00:56:33.520 There's a wide scope of politics within the AFA and, you know, within reason in a way that it doesn't contradict our core principles.

00:56:42.100 We, you know, we certainly encourage our people to, to have strongly held political beliefs and to believe in them and practice them in a, you know, legal and appropriate way.

00:56:52.720 But yeah, I'm sure you'll find people like that.

00:57:12.100 Okay, one of our, our Uruguayan member is well can't really see the names not sure if it's our member or not. But a gentleman from Uruguay is asking if I think it's a problem some countries have some religious institutions that are held as official level, like the Anglican Church

00:57:42.080 or churches that support the monarchies. This is a hard question, because of course, I don't like

00:57:50.000 the ones that aren't also true. But you know, in a perfect world, if I was making the rules and

00:57:55.460 establishing countries, also true would absolutely be an official religion. I think it depends on

00:58:01.320 what official religion means. And if it implies negative things towards people that aren't of

00:58:08.360 that faith. But I think context is key to all of these things. I will say this, I appreciate when

00:58:15.320 Austertru has official recognition and in the places that it's treated as an official faith.

00:58:20.560 So far, it's treated that way alongside other faiths. But I think the context to that is a

00:58:28.300 huge thing. And I think there are situations where, you know, if Austertru was the official

00:58:33.420 religion of a state or of a monarchy, that would be a beautiful thing. And I think that

00:58:38.160 certainly the case with many of our ancestors in many different times in history

00:58:57.600 okay got an interesting question do i think that saying white instead of native european has hurt

00:59:02.240 the afa helped or made no difference seem like it's triggered some people it has triggered a lot

00:59:07.760 of people um but no i don't think it's hurt the afa i absolutely think that it's helped the afa

00:59:14.960 um the trouble is when you say european and i don't say white all the time ethnically european

00:59:20.160 is a fine term but it has ambiguity a lot of people and some in our international audience

00:59:26.240 may it may not be the same where they're from and i know that's the case in some european countries

00:59:30.960 but here in the united states white means something when we fill out job applications

00:59:37.040 or applications for schooling and various other things there's boxes you check for your ethnicity

00:59:43.200 and white means white non-hispanic means something very specific you find numerous

00:59:50.640 mixtures of people that because a part of them is descended from europe would describe themselves

00:59:56.240 as european but those same people that would not be eligible for the astro folk assembly

01:00:02.720 I also do not ever check the white box on any of those applications. Barack Obama is half Irish, but he's not white and he would never tell you or claim to be white.

01:00:14.840 So that's why white has such a value. When I made the post about how in the AFA we love our masculine men, our feminine ladies and our beautiful white babies, it triggered so many people. 0.90

01:00:26.880 But there's nothing mean or, you know, abhorrent about any of it. And the fact that I used the word white to very clearly describe what we're talking about, because we're not ashamed of it, that brought a lot of people to the AFA.

01:00:41.680 Simply the change from being scared to use the word white and actively using it has caused a big surge in AFA membership.

01:00:53.340 And I attribute a lot of it to speaking plainly about what we mean and not being afraid or being ambiguous for the sake of political correctness. 0.83

01:01:03.540 And there's nothing wrong with being white. It's not a bad word. It's not a mean word. It's not derogatory towards anyone. 0.89

01:01:10.960 And it clarifies what we're talking about.

01:01:14.040 So, no, I think it's helped a great deal.

01:01:15.740 But it absolutely has triggered people.

01:01:19.220 Often when you do the right thing, a whole lot of people get triggered, unfortunately.

01:01:34.180 All right.

01:01:40.960 Melinda, I'm really sorry you haven't heard anything about your application.

01:01:45.960 It depends on when you sent it, it can take up to a week to get someone to respond to you.

01:01:53.960 If you're comfortable leaving your name on the side I can look, I can look it up in our database and get back to you after this program.

01:02:01.960 If you're not comfortable you can email me at mattflabel at runestone.org and I'll try to see what's going on with that and get you some answers.

01:02:09.960 Again, we do appreciate everybody that applies so I'm sorry to hear that and buck stops here get a hold of me and I'll take care of it and get you squared away. Okay.

01:02:18.960 um any fundraisers coming up um we're currently doing the fundraiser for ron

01:02:28.400 um outside of that we are always always doing an ongoing fundraiser to help out

01:02:34.960 the displaced uh displaced white farmers in south africa um we're always running that those people

01:02:43.040 can always use our support and we're constantly trying to keep that going and helping those folks

01:02:47.840 our hoffs are always in need of funds uh the donate links on the afa page can get you there

01:02:53.520 they certainly need your help and folk services we try to build up a war chest in folk services

01:02:58.640 so when our folks uh come on hard times we're able to uh to help them out and to jump right in

01:03:05.520 and you guys have been generous on that we've been able to help a lot of people

01:03:08.640 So, Folk Services is a constant fundraiser that's running.

01:03:24.220 That's a good point. 0.75

01:03:26.160 Your beliefs, your religion should absolutely affect your politics.

01:03:31.880 But your politics shouldn't affect your religion.

01:03:35.040 It flows one direction and not the other.

01:03:38.640 our political stances ought to be based on deeply held beliefs that we have and of course that's

01:03:43.600 that's formed by your religion but we don't ever want to make the mistake of

01:03:48.240 of having that politics dictate our religious choices.

01:03:51.680 James, Uruguay is absolutely in the Baldur's Hoff District.

01:04:21.680 Thank you.

01:04:51.680 Um, Andrew, do I think that the association with white supremacy on VK has a negative

01:05:14.420 effect on the perception of the AFA?

01:05:17.180 Um, I think that every time the mainstream culture throws out white supremacy, it's going to make certain people view us negatively. It's one of those trigger words that still has some power.

01:05:32.260 Although I think the more that they misuse the term, the less power it has.

01:05:36.600 But no, it's still a scary word.

01:05:39.100 And when they put it on us, it scares certain people.

01:05:42.760 I think it also for the people who've picked up on the fact that they label everything white supremacy or everything, everything that's, you know, encompasses a certain worldview.

01:05:52.960 I think it probably also advertises us to people that are tired of tired of being thrown in that category themselves.

01:05:58.360 So, at some point, I don't think it has, I think it has a net neutral effect, because I think it has pluses and minuses getting that label, and I'm not owning that label in any way, but knowing that they throw it on everybody, I think it loses some of that power, and I think it does mark us as people that are going against the current of political correctness, which, in a way, and as long as that's done in a principled way, helps us.

01:06:28.360 Yes, that is on the website. If you want to contribute to helping our folk in South Africa, that links up there, and we make sure that goes to helping folks in the camp.

01:06:52.100 Often we try to make sure that gets targeted towards children for things like blanket and food needs.

01:06:59.260 One of the big things we were involved in was a project to give baby formula to a lot of babies that don't have that formula over there.

01:07:06.200 Or whose mothers are not capable of providing milk for them.

01:07:10.820 Situations are really bad in those camps.

01:07:12.900 And every little bit helps and your money goes a long way in South Africa.

01:07:22.100 it's a good point um that's being made over on the side don't own the labels that they want to

01:07:37.080 throw on you don't own just because they call you a white supremacist that you are

01:07:40.780 we're not we don't claim to be that's nothing that we do that's a label that they throw on us

01:07:45.780 um and you want to make sure that you never play into their hand by being the villain that they

01:07:50.960 paint you as. And I think that's something we should all keep in mind.

01:08:07.360 I think that's an interesting concept, the idea of the Norse gods won't save you.

01:08:12.480 I'm not sure what everybody wants to be saved from. I think we're obliged to save ourselves

01:08:17.760 from things. I think our gods help us. I think our gods inspire us. But I don't think we've ever

01:08:24.940 had any promises to be spared conflict or difficulty. In fact, our gods themselves embrace

01:08:31.280 conflict. So I don't think it's an issue of looking to be saved from anything, certainly not

01:08:36.300 saved from some sort of original sin. But I think our gods do help us. But if we have situations

01:08:43.040 that we need to be saved from we need to look to each other and to uh to the gods for inspiration

01:08:48.640 but for us to do the hard work of saving ourselves

01:08:58.720 ah there's a number of regional events for hexanocton mayday and i encourage you to reach

01:09:03.840 out to folks for those i believe all three of our hofs are hosting an event for each of those two

01:09:09.120 days so please reach out to your local hoff and your local folk building area

01:09:15.280 and see what's going on for those days

01:09:39.120 Daniel, can I touch on ancestor worship and why it's not as prominent as it should be?

01:09:49.740 Ancestor worship, good thing.

01:09:52.640 We should all do it.

01:09:54.680 It means different things to different people.

01:09:58.300 Connecting with our ancestors is extremely important.

01:10:02.920 One of the reasons I think it's neglected by people, I've seen two cases.

01:10:07.500 um first

01:10:09.180 the glittery shiny first stuff you come into when you learn about ostrich is about the gods

01:10:17.060 and that's great our holy gods are extremely important and uh deserve worship in our attention

01:10:25.180 and that's fantastic i think coming to the idea of worshiping our ancestors

01:10:30.180 is more of a wisdom thing that comes in time.

01:10:36.380 But it's extremely important.

01:10:38.940 The gods have a whole lot of us to worry about and think about.

01:10:41.660 And, you know, at the end of the day,

01:10:46.080 they may not all be that particularly interested

01:10:48.460 in the trivial goings-on of your particular life.

01:10:51.240 But your ancestors, your grandfather, your grandmother,

01:10:53.840 your great-grandmother, those folks look on

01:10:56.520 and they know you and they care about you.

01:10:59.380 and they that's extremely important and as daniel mentioned it's often neglected so uh i would

01:11:07.800 encourage everyone to have an altar for their ancestors and to talk to them regularly talk to

01:11:12.400 them with your family talk to them with your young kids we say good morning to the ancestors me and

01:11:17.380 aubrey every morning when i wake her up because i think it's important um yeah more ancestor worship

01:11:24.120 would be a really good thing and really a perfect thing for your home altar

01:11:36.680 okay guys all right well it's been very good tonight does anybody have any last questions

01:11:44.200 that they want to get in as i mentioned if you have questions you can come to the scheduled

01:11:49.720 live chats and put them in the little chat bar before they happen. And I'll see those and know

01:11:55.100 to get to them. You can email them to me. Thank you guys so much for joining me tonight. I look

01:12:01.440 forward to this every month. I'm very excited to get to talk to you guys. Thank you, James,

01:12:06.300 for this fancy light hookup. Hopefully this makes for a better product and we can refine it as time

01:12:12.220 goes on. Uh, yeah, you guys are amazing and I love my AFA family. Well, uh, DR, I don't really

01:12:23.500 roll MMA. I do a Japanese jujitsu. So a lot of throws, um, we do do some grapple work, but it's

01:12:30.960 a lot of, it's a lot of throws. Um, but yes, I absolutely still do that. And it does a lot for

01:12:37.420 me and I, and I love it. So, all right. Well, I hope you guys have a great night. If not before

01:12:44.000 then, I'll talk to you guys next month. Hail the gods, hail the folk, hail the AFA.

Asatru Folk Assembly - April 02, 2021

April 2021 Live Discussion

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