Asatru Folk Assembly - December 2020 Live Chat

00:00:00.000 Hello. Appreciate you guys joining me this evening.

00:00:15.220 Looks like we've already got a couple of questions up in the chat.

00:00:21.000 I'd like to start with a couple of things.

00:00:25.360 uh first i'd like to start off tonight's live chat with a moment of silence for an afa member who

00:00:33.180 was very tragically taken from us uh this last week it's been really hard on those who knew him

00:00:40.640 um he was a member that uh went to odinsoff and was friends with quite a few people out west and

00:00:48.080 made a big impact on the lives that he touched so if you guys would join me in a moment of silence

00:00:53.620 for Adam Weinhart. I know he will certainly be missed. But on to happier things, a couple of

00:01:13.260 things I wanted to announce since the last time I spoke with you guys. We have two new AFA

00:01:22.900 kindreds that i wanted to mention we've got stonewall kindred in west virginia western

00:01:31.460 regular virginia and uh maryland area and those guys are an offshoot of the iron guard kindred

00:01:38.900 made up of solid afa members there they're going to do really good things and we're

00:01:43.620 we're excited excited to see that also very exciting uh we have our first irish afa kindred

00:01:52.900 Paca Mictira, and that's headed up by Fiona Edgar, our folk builder over in Northern Ireland,

00:02:03.940 and I'm very excited to see that. This is the, like I said, the first kindred we've had there,

00:02:08.240 and I think it's a really exciting addition. To get to a couple of things on the side,

00:02:15.420 I can't see when you ask, but Joel asked nice and early for news about Baldershoff and if there's

00:02:23.740 been more understanding of the AFA there. Still we wait on Baldershoff. I believe things are going

00:02:34.160 well. Hopefully we know a little bit more and the zoning situation works out in our favor. I think

00:02:41.120 that it think that it should. Don't have any new news on that, but hopefully here relatively

00:02:51.900 soon we will. As for, you know, whether there's more understanding for the AFA in the area,

00:02:57.520 absolutely. We've heard great things from our folks that have been up there

00:03:01.760 as far as the community having nothing but positive things to say, stopping by, waving,

00:03:07.920 um extending courtesy and and some of them even apologizing for some of the rougher treatment

00:03:14.400 that that we've received uh it seems to be a lot of people that are outside of that community

00:03:19.040 stirring things up but the locals there in murdoch have been very nice to us and we really appreciate

00:03:25.360 that we have a question about the status of afa kilts uh just okay so it came to my attention one

00:03:35.520 One of our folk builders, our folk builder for the Midwest, specifically the Wisconsin area, James Alt, found some distributors that can do a whole variety of things in our custom AFA Tartan.

00:03:48.320 Being that it's a registered Tartan, there's some custom shops that can do things that way.

00:03:54.200 Because there's not a wide demand for our Tartan, the price is very steep at this point.

00:04:01.740 But we're looking into the best deals on that.

00:04:04.120 In order to get something made in-house to get kilts for a reasonable price, we need to pre-order 70 or so to make that work.

00:04:15.380 And I think that's been a difficult thing so far.

00:04:19.700 I'm waiting to hear if that interests there, but it's a pretty substantial investment.

00:04:24.960 And so far, we don't have 70 people that have committed to pre-ordering for it.

00:04:29.860 But we would love to see things in our official AFA Tartan.

00:04:33.340 And it's beautiful. It's a beautiful pattern, and it would be very exciting to see that in use.

00:04:47.580 Oh, great. I'm glad we've got some Danes joining us. 0.99

00:04:51.100 It's been too long.

00:04:53.280 I was in Denmark back in 2014 on an AFA trip, and I absolutely loved it there.

00:05:00.100 Some very special, very special experiences in Denmark.

00:05:03.340 David, I'm glad we're on YouTube instead of Facebook too. Hopefully we get the traffic

00:05:16.240 here. Hopefully we can spread the word. I know it's kind of a new platform for people

00:05:21.120 to be expecting us on, but this worked a lot better last time I thought. It's certainly

00:05:27.780 easier on my end, and just seems to be kind of an all-around better experience.

00:05:42.800 I've got a question on how the folk building is going in Idaho. Folk building is going great in

00:05:48.540 Idaho. Our folk builder, Ben Cooper, in Idaho is there and ready, and they're building a good

00:05:56.720 community we have the uh north idaho all thing kindred in the area and there's some solid folks

00:06:05.040 doing great things building families um so yeah we we've seen seen quite a bit of growth in idaho

00:06:11.680 over the last year i'd say see some excitement about texas texas is also a region that's really

00:06:21.360 taken off for the AFA in the last, I'd say about four months, three, four months. And that's been

00:06:27.500 in large part to go see Kevin Long moving to the Texas area. I say the Texas area, he moved to Texas,

00:06:36.500 but I believe he's in the Austin area. And he's been doing great things there. One of our new

00:06:40.960 folk building apprentices, Lori Wadsworth's been doing really good things there. So yeah,

00:06:47.300 got a lot of excitement in Texas that we haven't seen for a while and getting a lot of membership

00:06:52.180 joining and I'm pretty excited about what I see there. I'm glad so far the feedback on doing it

00:07:02.180 on YouTube is looking pretty positive. That's always nice. Is there an AFA presence in Michigan?

00:07:11.780 absolutely there's an afa presence in michigan um i mentioned the gentleman that pointed out uh

00:07:18.660 the places where you could get custom afa tartan things uh james alt he's our folk builder there

00:07:24.260 and he uh he's uh michigan's part of the afa is midwest region james is working out of wisconsin

00:07:32.500 but he does a lot to build our folk in michigan and we got quite a few members there

00:07:41.780 What exactly is the zoning problem with Baldrishoff?

00:07:46.480 So, we purchased a former, I want to say Lutheran church, and that had been on the spot for

00:08:03.140 a very long time as a religious-use building.

00:08:07.280 A few years back, though, someone purchased it and they were going to turn it into a residence.

00:08:13.740 And they started up a couple of projects and quickly lost interest and put it back on the market.

00:08:19.160 But they had went ahead and changed that zoning to a residence.

00:08:22.980 So we're wanting to go go back to its traditional zoning to be a religious use.

00:08:29.980 And we're we're working our way through that process right now.

00:08:36.400 I do not have any recommendations on Yule literature for children. I'm hoping somebody

00:08:43.180 who is looking at this chat can help me out and throw you a couple of good suggestions on here.

00:08:49.720 As a new father, I'm going to need to figure out some good Yule literature for children.

00:08:55.200 So I think we could all use that. If anybody reads this and has suggestions,

00:08:58.700 please throw them up in the chat on the side. Speaking of stuff for children, though,

00:09:04.420 I wanted to mention, go ahead, no time like the present to register your children or if you're

00:09:14.020 a child watching this to get your parents to register you for the AFA Youth Program for 2021.

00:09:20.260 2020 was the first year we started the AFA Youth Program. Folk builder Brandi Callahan is running

00:09:27.220 that and she has done a truly phenomenal job with it this year. We've seen a lot of activity,

00:09:33.780 a lot of interest. It's been a great program. It's evolving, so it's always going to be better

00:09:39.540 than the previous year, but we're pretty excited to get started in 2021. And if you're interested,

00:09:46.820 if you got children, if you know folks that have Alistair True Children that'd be interested,

00:09:52.100 get the word out and send an email to bcallahan at runestone.org and she'll get you all set up.

00:10:00.660 I also believe you can send an email to youth at runestone.org.

00:10:08.340 Is there an AFA presence in Arizona? There is. I would always like to see there be a better one,

00:10:13.540 but there's an AFA presence there. And as a matter of fact, we've got one of our great

00:10:16.820 members down there hosting a good-sized Yule celebration. So if you're interested,

00:10:22.260 you want to contact our folk builder for the region jason plurde j-p-l-o-u-r-d-e

00:10:30.020 at runestone.org and uh and he can get you information if that's something you're interested in

00:10:41.860 looks like rob already had that taken care of answering that question

00:10:53.140 oh the suggestion for survive the jives uh yule book i'm not sure about the american distribution

00:11:02.020 of that um if that's available for a reasonable price here in the united states that's a great

00:11:07.860 book uh i was at an event with with him when he was uh marketing that when he when he first came

00:11:14.500 out with it and it's beautifully illustrated it's a really neat book so yeah i highly recommend that

00:11:21.140 Good call. Yeah, good call on putting that out there. Thank you very much.

00:11:33.140 The AFA really is everywhere you want to be. One of the neat things watching the AFA grow

00:11:37.860 over the last several years. We've got AFA across the country and truly around the world.

00:11:44.620 You've got AFA members in 15 different countries and all throughout the United States.

00:11:51.800 And chances are, wherever you're at, if you're willing to drive maybe a couple of hours, you've got AFA members near you.

00:12:01.720 Chances are better than not, you have a thriving AFA community near you.

00:12:05.520 So it's really kind of an exciting time.

00:12:08.740 Hmm.

00:12:12.220 Oh, hey, Lane.

00:12:13.120 I didn't recognize your YouTube name.

00:12:27.860 Azathoth.

00:12:28.980 Yes, Jason is awesome.

00:12:30.900 Jason's a good friend of mine.

00:12:32.300 He's doing good things out there.

00:12:34.200 And yeah, he'd be a great guy for you to contact anybody in the whole Four Corners region.

00:12:40.440 Jason can get you set up.

00:12:43.120 So something else that we're doing, and we haven't really announced to everybody yet,

00:13:00.840 but I think this is a good a place as any. I mentioned that Brandy Callahan is running the

00:13:05.600 AFA youth program. What we're also going to have starting in January is we're going to have a

00:13:14.160 little program for adults that are interested in, you know, new to Ausitru, new to the AFA to get

00:13:22.860 kind of a grounding in the fundamentals of the AFA, who we are, what we do, and how we practice

00:13:30.480 House of Truth. And so folks who are interested in that, certainly new people or people who just

00:13:36.800 want to brush up on some of the basics, please send your emails to bcallahan at runestone.org

00:13:43.600 and Brandy would love to get you set up with that. We're launching that for the first time

00:13:48.880 in January and we're excited to see where that goes.

00:14:01.120 Yes, absolutely, you need to come check out the Hoff we have in Brownsville.

00:14:04.400 Odens Hoff in Brownsville, California, Thors Hoff in Linden, North Carolina,

00:14:10.560 and Balders Hoff in Murdoch, Minnesota.

00:14:18.880 Do we have any other questions off the bat here tonight?

00:14:32.640 So in the meantime, while we wait on some questions, it has shocked me how fast 2020

00:14:47.380 has come and gone and uh it goes without saying it's been a rough year in a lot of ways

00:14:52.900 but for us in the afa it's been a really really good year we've hosted our our largest national

00:14:59.940 gathering that we've ever had uh at odin's hof at midsummer we had over 140 people um

00:15:08.980 we got two new hofs this year which has been an amazing thing it's really been a very special year

00:15:14.420 to celebrate we've been celebrating our 25th anniversary all year um you know now coming up

00:15:21.380 on the end of the year we have 26 years in the books now as the astro folk assembly and it's

00:15:28.020 it's a really special thing to be a part of and it really says something that we've

00:15:32.420 built a 26 year relationship with the acr um that relationship has paid off immensely for us

00:15:43.140 uh we have been blessed tremendously by our gods and and i hope very much that the

00:15:50.100 relationship has paid off well for them um everything we do we hope makes the gods proud

00:15:56.180 of us and and helps to to glorify them and to glorify our folk and to uh to work their will

00:16:03.620 here in midgard but yeah we've had some really good things this year it's it's shocking to me

00:16:11.860 that it's already already yules upon us and it's a very special time of year if uh if you're able

00:16:19.460 if you're healthy i would encourage all of you guys everyone please spend time with your family

00:16:26.100 this uh this yule season celebrate with your family celebrate with your folk celebrate with

00:16:31.700 the afa do it right make it special we never know how many of these we have um this may be the last

00:16:40.340 Yule we have. Now I'm not doom and gloom. I expect many more amazing Yules, but you never know. Don't

00:16:47.220 take them for granted and celebrate time with your folk and your family. Please don't let,

00:16:52.020 please don't let fear prevent you from doing that.

00:17:03.060 Excellent. Brandy over there put her email address on the side. Again, she's the one you want to

00:17:07.140 contact for the youth program and for the introduction to AstroTru in the AFA program.

00:17:18.500 Very, very seldom do people dress up in tunics and medieval linen attire for events and

00:17:24.740 celebrations. In the AstroTru Folk Assembly, that's not something we do. That's certainly

00:17:29.540 something AFA members have done in the past, but that's something that is not typically done

00:17:36.500 at AFA events and AFA celebrations. We are people who exist in the modern age. We dress

00:17:47.700 in a modern, respectful way to be dignified before our gods and before our folk.

00:17:54.500 So yeah, we've adopted a...

00:17:56.660 say in the AFA we try to dress classy for our gods and dress serious for our gods and I know

00:18:08.980 some folks that dress in in medieval clothes that helps them feel like they're having a closer

00:18:13.960 connection and if that's what you want to do fine but in the AFA we we try really hard to

00:18:19.680 make sure we're focused on the life we're living now instead of instead of reenacting or

00:18:25.660 playing at something that people did in the past. So very seldom do you see any kind of medieval

00:18:32.060 costumes at AFA events. Joel, that's a good question. Sean, who used to do our store,

00:18:44.840 is no longer handling it. I'm mailing things out from the store. We got a little bit of a hold up

00:18:49.500 right now on shirts and some things. It's something we're looking for some volunteers

00:18:56.140 to help on and to make that happen. We've also, we're looking into embroidering some of our own

00:19:02.800 products in-house to sell like shirts and hats and things. So I can't tell you a good time on

00:19:09.160 that, but it is something we're working on. AFA flags are always available. AFA flags are available

00:19:17.260 on the website right now. If you go there and that's not the case, please let me know and I'll

00:19:22.460 check and see if there's something weird on the back end. But AFA flags are always available.

00:19:26.740 We have lots of them and we love to see them out there flying.

00:19:29.840 David, how do we answer Christians who accuse us of worshiping the creation instead of the

00:19:50.140 creator? I think that Christians who accuse us of that heard it from someone who heard it from

00:19:58.360 someone and they repeat it. I think they're very ignorant of what we believe, if that's the case. 0.88

00:20:04.320 Certainly, we worship the gods of creation. We talk about Odin being the Allfather and Odin and

00:20:12.140 his brother sculpting the world that we live in, our existence, and imbuing us with what makes us

00:20:22.540 people um so i don't think in any way we're worshiping the creation and not the creator

00:20:28.320 one of the things the hallmarks of our folk and our gods is creation is creating things

00:20:35.520 um and i think that taking you know creating order from chaos is fundamental to our myth cycle

00:20:42.400 i think that's just one of those taglines that christians like to use because they

00:20:47.380 believe their God has some all-powerful claim to creating anything and everything. And I think that

00:20:57.260 they don't, if that's what they're accusing us of, they're not showing any respect to our belief

00:21:05.580 for where we're coming from. They're trying to force our beliefs and our religiosity into their

00:21:13.460 paradigm and it just doesn't fit there. But yeah, I would answer them with talking about Odin and

00:21:23.700 our story of creation and Odin fashioning, you know, our existence.

00:21:36.960 Does the AFA allow persons of color to worship with us? No, we do not. The AFA is a folkish

00:21:42.660 organization. Iostru is an ethnic faith of European peoples, and we respect that and we

00:21:50.040 worship the gods of our ethnicity. And we would encourage others to do the same in regards to

00:21:54.340 their ethnic deities. That's what being folkish is about.

00:22:03.060 Hmm.

00:22:08.520 What else do we have tonight, guys?

00:22:12.660 uh the concept of reincarnation is talked about in in house to true communities

00:22:23.220 certainly talked about within the afa i think that

00:22:27.780 i think that that concept is much more mysterious than

00:22:34.300 the common understanding of it um i think that it's it's pretty much agreed

00:22:42.560 upon that a part of our soul complex manifests throughout family lines and does reincarnate.

00:22:50.020 I think a lot of that has to do with hymenia and with luck throughout your family. And I think that

00:22:57.400 carries certain traits and certain things of your ancestors. But we also have a very clear belief

00:23:02.860 of our ancestors living on beyond the grave, beyond generations. If we believe that all of

00:23:10.640 our grandmother incarnates into our daughter, when we offer blow to raise a horn or we worship

00:23:19.800 our grandmother at the altar, we don't look at our daughter, we look at our grandmother.

00:23:24.840 So I think clearly there's a belief that that person lives on in an afterlife and all of

00:23:31.000 them doesn't just get completely and wholly recycled.

00:23:34.740 think the nuances of that are are certainly a mystery that that we're still we're still

00:23:39.780 probing and searching for answers on but that's a it's a very complex thing and i think that

00:23:46.980 the very simplistic oh i used to be joan of arc in another life version of reincarnation

00:23:52.900 is much much too simplistic and isn't really isn't really what our ancestors thought that was

00:24:00.980 i know that's kind of a murky answer but i hope that's that's useful in some way

00:24:14.820 um yes frayer frayer was of the tribe of gods of the vanir and he was accepted and became a seer

00:24:25.940 uh was the afa think of frayer uh we we worship and celebrate frayer uh he is he is one of the

00:24:35.920 the isere and uh yeah the afa strongly practice a lot of our um ritual is devoted to frayer

00:24:43.740 certainly a lot of our harvest ritual um charming of the plow we focus very heavily on on frayer

00:24:49.580 and the abundance of the earth and penetrating the soil.

00:24:55.060 No, we spend a lot of time worshiping, worshiping for air.

00:25:09.920 Hmm.

00:25:19.580 Yeah, Frayer has always been a God that got a lot of worship and celebration from our folk.

00:25:40.500 Specifically in the country of Sweden, Frayer was their royal God that they derived royal lineage from.

00:25:49.080 He is a God of kings in Sweden and a God of abundance, of celebration of the of the green earth.

00:25:57.640 So, yeah, the celebration of Freyre is something tremendous, tremendously important to us.

00:26:02.740 I'm very excited for the day that we'll have a Hoff to Freyre.

00:26:09.360 While we're talking about, well, I was talking about Hoffs, I guess.

00:26:13.160 I'd like to just say out here publicly a huge thank you to our volunteers that have put in so much labor at at Baldershoff, getting that prepped and ready and and taking care of that place to really make it a sacred temple for our gods, a sacred temple for Balder.

00:26:31.540 um brandy and jason and anna and other members have been out there just just pouring love into

00:26:42.360 that place making it something truly special we got an amazing deal on it so we knew that would

00:26:47.960 mean doing some work on the interior fixing some things taking care of it shining it back up and

00:26:54.100 our members in the northern plains region and specifically led by our amazing leadership there

00:27:01.060 They've done a great job. If you guys have seen the pictures on Facebook, Baldur's Hoff has its

00:27:06.340 own page, but you can see them almost every weekend out there swinging a hammer, putting up drywall,

00:27:12.260 doing doing work to make sure that place is special for for Balder and also make

00:27:17.540 sure that place is special for our AFA family when they gather there.

00:27:30.180 Absolutely, you should visit Thorshoff as soon as you can. They're doing great things there.

00:27:39.980 They've got good things going on at Thorshoff. For you, that's not that terrible of a drive for

00:27:47.080 you. So you should absolutely make it out there and get together with those guys. It's a very

00:27:51.800 special place. I can't wait till the next time I get out there. It's really something to behold

00:28:00.600 and something to experience. You know what? A lot, as a thought, a lot of people have talked about

00:28:17.080 making pilgrimages, if you will, to the different Hoffs. And that's a neat thing. And I think that

00:28:24.800 there's something really special about each of them. I think there's something to be gained

00:28:28.980 from making that journey and being there, worshiping our gods in their own Hoffs for the

00:28:35.820 first time in a thousand years. I think that's a really special thing to do. And I would encourage

00:28:41.760 everybody to do that. I know local AFA members at these Hoffs, they love to have people visit

00:28:48.240 and be part of kind of their home Hoff. It's easy to think of the Hoff in your region as like

00:28:55.660 your Hoff, but these are all AFA Hoffs. If you find yourself in a spot that doesn't have a Hoff, 0.99

00:29:02.400 you have three Hoffs. It may be a little trek for you to get to them, but they're all home for you. 0.95

00:29:07.440 And I would encourage you all to to go and make it to those hoffs at any opportunity you can. 0.94

00:29:13.660 It's really an amazing thing to worship our gods in a place of our own in temples to them.

00:29:20.800 It's special beyond words.

00:29:37.440 how can you support the baby blanket project if you can't knit or crochet so this is something

00:29:45.320 you guys may not know um our afa ladies provide for every new baby we have uh within the afa

00:29:54.880 we provide them with a baby blanket just to show that their afa family loves them and cares about

00:30:00.160 them and is thinking about them um so that's something our ladies put a lot of love in making 0.61

00:30:05.560 blankets these these homemade blankets to get out to them um uh anna you can you can sew a blanket

00:30:17.800 you can do any other word that means make kind of blankety stuff um but also if you know someone

00:30:26.120 else that is doing the blankets you could help them with supplies uh there's always something

00:30:31.960 you can do to help with the blanket situation. And I don't know all my blanket crafting terms,

00:30:36.680 but it sounds like people on the side are giving you some tips on that.

00:30:45.640 Well, Bran, I would love to see Texas have a Hoff. I don't think we're quite there yet,

00:30:51.640 but I would absolutely love to see that. We need a solid group of folks there that are consistent.

00:30:57.960 we need that membership to be strong and consistent and then we need to to find a

00:31:02.440 time that's right and uh in a situation that's right for it but i would absolutely

00:31:06.360 love to see one of our next offs in texas

00:31:27.960 um i had somebody asking about yule traditions and what what some of my favorite were

00:31:36.040 you know every family's got a lot of their own yule traditions um

00:31:42.360 something we do at odin's hof that's a yule tradition that i'm i'm excited about and

00:31:48.200 it's something that's been really special because we have a hof to do it at

00:31:52.280 but we like to go up there and host a event for the community to where kids can come out

00:31:58.040 and we give toys out to kids toys hot chocolate cookies and read them read them yule stories

00:32:06.440 that's a really nice thing in a really poor community and it just feels good to be able

00:32:12.120 to help those people out and do something nice like that so that's one yule tradition we do

00:32:15.720 that i really like um there's a lot of fun yule traditions that are less you know jazzy and

00:32:22.520 aussitruy um i've looked forward as a yule tradition since i was a kid every year to going out

00:32:29.240 going and seeing all the all the lights on the houses and uh you know people have really perfected

00:32:34.360 that into an art form and there's some amazing neighborhoods with some really cool art uh

00:32:39.000 really cool uh light setups they've done one thing kind of religiously that we used to always do up

00:32:44.520 in alaska that was really profound because alaska's winters are so long and so dark

00:32:50.200 we'd all get together my kindred up there and on the night of of of the solstice on the longest

00:32:56.920 night of the year we'd get together and we would light a candle we'd light a flame um during that

00:33:03.560 right as the sun was going down and during the longest night we'd preserve the light we'd

00:33:09.160 preserve the fire we'd preserve that through that long period of darkness and welcome then

00:33:14.680 welcome the new year welcome the return of the sun and uh we do that throughout the night and

00:33:20.680 sometimes i'd be lighting a candle at three four in the afternoon and then holding vigil over that

00:33:30.520 candle until 11 the next morning but it was a special thing we'd get together and and we'd

00:33:38.120 celebrate and play games and watch stuff and spend time together as a kindred.

00:33:42.620 And that was a really special thing we used to do.

00:33:44.880 I remember it was really important.

00:33:46.580 And a couple of times I couldn't make it to where we were at at sundown.

00:33:51.240 So I lit my own candle.

00:33:52.740 And I can remember I can remember driving in the middle of the winter trying to battle

00:33:56.560 the defrost and keep my little candle lit as I'm driving to get up with my kindred

00:34:01.360 brothers and sisters to celebrate.

00:34:03.460 So that's a that's a Yule tradition that was always very special to me.

00:34:08.120 Crystal, will our other Hoffs have burial grounds like the one we have broke ground on

00:34:19.860 in California? So for guys that may not know, this summer at Midsummer, we officially interred

00:34:28.020 the ashes of our first person at Odin's Hoff. We have a large area set aside to bury the ashes

00:34:36.540 of our dead and and give them that respect and that place in the holy ground um we're all set

00:34:45.180 for that we have have one of our loved ones as i said already interred there we also have space

00:34:51.340 and are going to be doing that at thor's hof um thor's hof came with the remains of a gentleman

00:34:56.940 that uh that died there over 100 years ago um his tombstone and his remains were

00:35:04.940 largely forgotten by that community. There's a really nice, well-maintained graveyard across

00:35:11.500 the road from Thorshof. But on our property, there's one man's grave, Philip Bethea.

00:35:18.640 And we're working right now to get pertinent information about Mr. Bethea so we can erect

00:35:25.860 a proper, well-taken-care-of tombstone to honor him. And then alongside him, we're going to

00:35:31.860 inter the bodies or the ashes of our loved ones and AFA members there as well. So we have two

00:35:38.420 locations for interment of ashes right now. Baldershof and the grounds there just aren't set

00:35:46.260 up for that. So we're going to have to talk about what we're going to do there. We may need to get

00:35:51.060 additional land for that. We could also come up with some kind of a Calabrium or something like

00:35:58.180 that so we're giving that thought but yes everywhere where it's available it's very

00:36:03.300 important that we have a place to to lay the remains of our loved ones to rest and

00:36:07.860 and a place that we can go and celebrate them and honor them so we are looking out for that with

00:36:13.620 with all of our future hoffs and those that don't have the the geographic or

00:36:19.460 you know the landscape layout to make that feasible we're looking for alternatives as well

00:36:28.180 John, are you talking about our Northwest Charming of the Plow?

00:36:35.140 For the first time in a long time,

00:36:36.820 the AFA is going to be having a national event up in Washington State.

00:36:40.700 It's going to be in February for Charming of the Plow.

00:36:43.720 If that's something you're interested in or something you can make,

00:36:46.660 please get in touch with our folk builder there, Joe Rosenak, 0.99

00:36:51.700 j-r-o-z-e-n-a-k at runestone.org. And he can get you set up. He's putting on a really,

00:37:04.840 a really nice event. We're pretty excited. It's been kind of a, just a regional event for a long,

00:37:11.040 or for two years now. It's been very successful. I was at the last one and it was great. And we

00:37:16.680 wanted to turn that into a national event, really give it some attention and get more people at it.

00:37:25.500 So I think it's going to be fantastic if you can make it charming of the plow. And I butchered

00:37:29.720 spelling his last name. So once again, J-R-O-Z-A-N-E-K at runestone.org. And Joe will get you all set up.

00:37:46.680 Oh, okay. Jason asks, why is it spiritually relevant for our folk to reject modern victim

00:38:04.180 culture and for us to pursue success and greatness instead, especially for our men?

00:38:09.460 I mean, reading that out loud, it's self-evident and it's common sense, but in the world that we live in, we've we've seen that it's not people celebrate victimhood all around us.

00:38:24.880 And it's really unfortunate. In contrast to. In contrast to that mentality, our our faith, our religion is a religion of winners and celebrating heroes and champions.

00:38:42.400 It. One of the one of the great virtues of Ausatru is being victorious, is going out and making things happen and doing things.

00:38:58.140 That's kind of the Faustian instinct of our folk is to always push further frontiers to be more, to achieve more, to climb higher, to do great things.

00:39:08.240 It's been a hallmark of our people since the dawn of time. It's been a hallmark of Aryan man. And we lose that every time we celebrate victimhood, every time we voluntarily put ourselves, you know, in the role of being victimized. 0.99

00:39:26.860 one thing that's an important way of looking at life. And I think this is specifically

00:39:34.380 important for men, but I think it's important for all else that you are.

00:39:38.200 If you view everything as, I think your fault is a strong word, but go with me on it. If

00:39:48.660 everything is your fault and everything is something you're responsible for, then it's

00:39:54.340 within your power to fix everything. If you look at the challenges in your life as something that

00:40:01.300 you have responsibility for, then it's on you and it's within your power to change your circumstance,

00:40:07.920 to fix those things. And that's a very simple thought, but it's an extremely empowering one.

00:40:15.840 Every moment that we waste wallowing in victimhood and gnashing our teeth and raising our fist at who

00:40:23.600 we think did us wrong or why we think something's unfair, that's a moment that we could be righting

00:40:30.180 that wrong. That's a moment that we could be building, that we could be doing, that we could

00:40:35.520 be helping each other build and do. And all of our foes would like nothing better than to keep us

00:40:44.840 down and keep us convinced that we can't achieve because some outside force is preventing us.

00:40:51.480 if we know that we can succeed, we refuse to accept being victimized and we go out and build

00:40:58.340 and do. Don't always worry about the big thing you want to accomplish that's outside of your

00:41:03.880 grasp. What small thing can you accomplish today that gets you closer? I think that can-do attitude

00:41:09.740 is a hallmark of Alistair True. It always has been. And that's the key to any success in our

00:41:15.260 lives, in our family, in our faith, in the world around us. So a can-do attitude is extremely

00:41:22.600 important. Thank you for helping me out with that link, Mandy, in case I butchered Joe's name too

00:41:47.100 bed. Appreciate that. We have a couple of people talking about some death things over inside. We

00:41:55.320 had a couple of deaths close to us recently. And someone announced this here, but I'm going to post

00:42:01.760 a link to it and share more about it on the AFA's Facebook page after this. A matter of fact,

00:42:08.540 Let me see if I can throw up a link in here while we're talking, because I think this is really important, and I think it's a good time for it.

00:42:23.920 I'm going to share a link with you guys here.

00:42:26.740 all right so the link that i just posted it's something that i found and i've been thinking

00:42:37.500 on this for a long time um we find a lot of

00:42:43.640 a lot of us uh have not adequately prepared

00:42:51.540 for death. And I think that's a big weighty thing. I think that our entire life is about,

00:42:59.080 in some ways, preparing for the next life and preparing for death. But in a real concrete way,

00:43:04.380 so many of us don't like to think about it and don't get their affairs in order.

00:43:10.660 The idea of having a will and having those directives down and official

00:43:15.040 is always something we'll do tomorrow, we'll do down the road, we'll do when we get older,

00:43:19.960 you know, we're young, whatever, but time sneaks up and unforeseen circumstances can happen to

00:43:26.660 anybody. And we've seen too many lives cut tragically short. This may not prevent that,

00:43:34.820 but I think it's really important to get squared away the things that we can so that

00:43:40.200 our affairs are in order, our children, our assets are set up with what they're going to do.

00:43:49.760 and the way that we're honored in death, where our body is laid to rest at, how our remains are

00:43:55.260 handled, who makes those calls. In Ausatru, we're getting to where we have second and third

00:44:03.600 generation Ausatruer, and that's a beautiful thing. But so many of us, that's not the case.

00:44:09.380 And if something were to happen and our family doesn't agree with or doesn't take our faith

00:44:13.760 seriously you may end up finding something with uh with with your funeral or with your remains that

00:44:21.280 wouldn't really be in keeping with what you want so it's really important to get those things done

00:44:26.080 the site that i linked is entirely free and it makes legally appropriate to the best of

00:44:32.480 my knowledge and i've asked our law speaker and he's pretty impressed with this site um

00:44:37.360 it sets you up with a really simple but a good and comprehensive will with contacts with your

00:44:45.680 executor with all of the things you need in there with what you want done with your remains

00:44:52.480 if you want to bequeath any of you know outside of just passing it to your next of kin if there's

00:44:57.840 any bequeathment you want to do to a charity to the afa perhaps to whatever you'd like to do

00:45:03.680 that's set up in there and it's really handy. My wife and I went through last night and got

00:45:09.040 ours set up. It's also got things with medical directives that you may want in there. I know

00:45:15.160 power of attorney things for our loved ones, for ourselves are, we just had to go through that

00:45:20.320 with my mother. My mother suffers from dementia and we had to deal with taking care of some of

00:45:25.140 her power of attorney situations medically. These forms are also on that site. So I encourage you

00:45:31.120 guys all to please go on there. If you don't have a will and you don't have stuff taken care of,

00:45:36.280 it's very simple. It's very fast. It's easy and it's free. A lot of us are intimidated going to

00:45:43.460 see a lawyer about these things or it's too expensive.

00:45:48.980 I want each and every one of you, each and every one of us to have what we want happen when we

00:45:55.660 pass, what we want for our dependents, what we want for our assets, what we want for our remains

00:46:03.980 and where we lie in rest is so important. And we can ensure that to the best we can

00:46:13.760 by getting our affairs in order, getting that will in place, getting that stuff done.

00:46:18.560 And that's a really cool place to do it. Also, the AFA wants to start storing that for our members that would like that stored with us.

00:46:28.780 You certainly don't have to. It's your business. You take care of whatever you want.

00:46:32.380 But if it would be helpful for us to have that on file in case so that, you know, should something happen, we have record and we can help your survivors out with having a copy of your will.

00:46:44.420 we would like to do that for our members also. So, but those are just some thoughts that we

00:46:50.020 had on that. And again, I'll share more about that probably on Facebook here after this tonight.

00:46:55.940 AFA members in general, to answer OX, AFA in general, AFA members generally have plans in

00:47:14.640 place for emergency preparation and national disaster relief stuff. I think that right after

00:47:23.060 your comment. It's mentioned that the Mormons stockpile a year of surplus food. I think

00:47:27.900 stockpiling the things that you need is a really important thing to do. The AFA has talked about

00:47:37.820 some things to encourage that way, and we're still working on it, but I know a lot of individual

00:47:42.500 kindreds have really done a lot in the way of preparation for stuff. I think it's very wise to

00:47:50.460 have supplies that you need in case, you know, in case of natural disasters, in cases of a lot

00:47:57.420 of things. A lot of us saw with the lockdowns that went on in March and April, how things that

00:48:03.400 we took for granted that we liked or that we needed or that were important to us went, you

00:48:08.560 know, they weren't always there at the store where we could usually count on. I mean, toilet paper

00:48:14.040 is something we all laugh about, but that's a thing. So any of the things that you found yourself,

00:48:19.480 man, I hadn't thought about that and I wish I had, now's a good time to make sure you get a

00:48:24.060 couple extra when you go to the store. I know that's kind of a small answer to the question,

00:48:28.880 but yes, a lot of AFA members individually have done things to prep for those things.

00:48:34.780 Around our HOFs, there's been a lot of talk about natural disaster contingency plans and ways to

00:48:40.960 help. There's so many different variations there, but I think it's wise to do the best you can to

00:48:48.140 to meet those things and to, to be as prepared as you can be.

00:48:51.740 sorry guys I'm catching up over on the side I rambled about that will thing

00:49:19.560 for a little bit. And we got some comments over here to catch up on.

00:49:29.260 So how does the AFA handle disputes amongst members that can't seem to get the solution

00:49:34.680 themselves? To be completely honest, that's something I wish people took us up on more

00:49:43.620 often. Something that we've always talked about amongst our Gothar is a Gothi being able to

00:49:51.580 mediate disputes amongst members and to get those things settled. And sometimes that happens,

00:49:57.880 and that's certainly our plan. All too often, people are too in the moment, too angry or too

00:50:06.400 full of themselves to want to get somebody objective to help them through, come into a

00:50:12.160 come into a resolution. But the AFA has a system in place, our GOTHAR stand ready to help members

00:50:18.420 work through problems and come out with a solution that's going to be fair and going to

00:50:24.220 help everyone move forward. We would love to do more of that. And I encourage any AFA member out

00:50:29.980 there, if you guys are having a problem with another member, you guys should both bring it

00:50:35.700 before one of our GOTHIs or our Githias, and we can work to find a resolution and move forward.

00:50:42.160 We're a family and that's how we want things to operate. So I really encourage everybody to do that.

00:51:12.160 so crystal makes a really good point you should let your local hospital let uh let your primary

00:51:29.960 care provider know your religious preference and have contact information for the outstreet folk

00:51:36.860 assembly in general or for your nearest gothy or githya in specific so often we don't think to do

00:51:43.500 that we're such a um ironically it's you know the rebirth of alsatru is so new we're in ancient

00:51:52.560 faith but as far as that being a practical option for you it's only been recent that we have the

00:51:57.600 spread of folks to be able to make that happen but don't forget that that exists and it's there

00:52:03.800 Everyone, when they ask your religious preference, don't slough it off and say other.

00:52:08.620 Say Ausatru and say the AFA is my church.

00:52:12.000 Here's the contact information.

00:52:13.980 That's what our Gothar are here for.

00:52:15.700 And speaking for our Gothar, we'd be tremendously honored to help in any kind of a medical situation and be there to advocate for you, be there to support you and your family emotionally through that, and be there to provide ritual and connection with the God.

00:52:33.080 odds while you're going through your medical scenario. Joel, absolutely go there and see how

00:52:44.900 easy it is. If you don't like it, you can make a new one. It's free and it just takes minutes.

00:52:50.360 But if you get that and you get it signed, then you have something. I'm really glad that my wife

00:52:54.740 and I did that last night. I'm talking about getting the will made on the free will link

00:53:02.040 that I posted. If you guys see that, please find that and please go there. I think it's a really

00:53:06.200 important thing. And there's a number of people that we've lost that would have been much better

00:53:10.960 served if they had known about this and done that.

00:53:32.040 Sorry, guys, just reading up on the comments on the side.

00:53:52.220 well i'm glad george i'm glad the letter the letter was meaningful

00:54:02.640 i meant everything in it i think very highly of you and i'm glad that letter helped you um

00:54:08.660 does uh anybody else have anything they want to make sure we cover tonight

00:54:19.180 um thank you guys for joining uh joining me here i look forward to these every single month this

00:54:28.580 is one of my favorite things to do in the month i really like getting to talk to you guys in this

00:54:33.920 way and youtube has been a really good platform for that not an expert on it but i'm gonna learn

00:54:39.380 on these youtube things every time that that we move forward so we can do them a little bit better

00:54:43.380 and hopefully more folks will join us.

00:54:46.860 But I love getting all your questions.

00:54:48.800 I like connecting with you.

00:54:50.700 We can't end without a cameo appearance

00:54:53.720 from the most beautiful baby in the entire world,

00:54:57.220 my daughter, Aubrey.

00:54:58.960 She is absolutely amazing and I love her.

00:55:01.400 And this is one of the best things

00:55:02.520 that happened in 2020 to me.

00:55:05.480 Maybe thank you for bringing her up here

00:55:07.260 to say hi to folks.

00:55:08.200 and uh yeah if that's all we've got for tonight um thank you guys so much for joining me and uh

00:55:16.920 look forward to talking to you guys next month if i don't talk to you between now and then i wish

00:55:21.840 you guys all a very very happy yule please celebrate that spend time with your families

00:55:27.040 time with your kindred time with your folk happy yule to everyone uh hail the gods hail the folk

00:55:33.760 He'll be AFA.

Asatru Folk Assembly - December 04, 2020

December 2020 Live Chat

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