Asatru Folk Assembly - February 2022 Live Discussion

00:00:00.000 Hello. Thank you all for joining me this evening.

00:00:16.000 Looks like we got a couple of folks over there in the chat room.

00:00:20.000 Mary, I'm sorry I forgot to respond to your email earlier.

00:00:23.000 I'm glad you joined us tonight.

00:00:26.000 All right, guys.

00:00:32.700 Well, it's been a busy start to the year so far.

00:00:39.700 A lot going on.

00:00:41.620 A lot of great things ahead of us.

00:00:44.520 Here this weekend, we've got Charming of the Plow in Washington State.

00:00:49.760 I know a number of AFA leaders are going there.

00:00:52.500 I'm going to go there again this year and share some fellowship and some time with our Pacific Northwest folks.

00:01:01.860 Very excited about that. It's always a really nice event.

00:01:04.500 And it's really a cool time of the year to be up there and in the mountains there in central Washington.

00:01:16.440 So we got that going on.

00:01:18.280 We also reached a new all-time membership high in January of this year.

00:01:27.020 So that's exciting.

00:01:29.560 Got more members now in the Ask True Folk Assembly than we've ever had before.

00:01:34.320 That's a really auspicious way to start our year.

00:01:42.200 Any of you guys have any questions starting off this evening?

00:01:45.760 I'm going to be ending it pretty promptly tonight because I have a Whitten meeting directly after our discussion.

00:01:56.740 All right. Well, I'll start off. We got a got a question.

00:02:00.180 I want you guys to know, feel very free to email me any questions you might have.

00:02:04.760 If you want me to address them throughout the month or whatever, when they come to you, go ahead and send them to me.

00:02:08.960 And I'll try to remember to get those on here. So there's a lot of different ways to ask your questions.

00:02:13.580 um we had one gentleman reach out and uh he had kind of an interesting question i think it's

00:02:21.500 something that a lot of us have have pondered or you know that friends and family have pondered

00:02:27.220 um it's something as a matter of fact uh king radbod pondered was you know what

00:02:35.560 where do we go when we die where do our our christian relatives go when they die

00:02:43.580 and and how does that work in the afterlife with those of different faiths

00:02:48.620 and i would like to tell you that i i know all the all the secrets of the afterlife and i can

00:02:53.740 tell you exactly what happens but i think that'd be foolish um so i want to start out by you know

00:03:02.060 we're not sure exactly how that looks or exactly what that looks like we have glimpses we have

00:03:07.900 insight uh we have you know over the course of centuries we have visions from the gods we have

00:03:15.500 people with near-death experiences um and we have uh have intuitions and things and ideas

00:03:25.500 one thing i'd like to say that i think is kind of fundamental to also true

00:03:29.740 are the gods in in our faith are are real they're not theoretical and it's your faith

00:03:43.640 in the metaphysics of life and death and immortality aren't aren't tethered to

00:03:50.880 what you believe or what you don't believe they're tethered to real things of where you go and how

00:03:57.700 mechanics of that works now i think that uh gods and powers beyond beyond our earthly you know

00:04:07.860 midgard existence have a say in that but i think that one truth in our culture and in our faith

00:04:16.420 and i think in most faiths is that you go to your ancestors there's that connection

00:04:22.180 on the other side of the veil between us and our loved ones um i have to believe that whatever

00:04:29.780 our ancestors did or didn't believe our folk reside in our folks after world and i think

00:04:39.860 that exists i think a lot of people are probably a lot of devoted people in other faiths are

00:04:45.300 going to be going to be surprised at how that works or where they end up and at the realities

00:04:53.240 of of our gods after after we pass. I think that certainly when we get on the other side of the

00:05:00.200 veil, we'll know and we'll we'll have that. I don't have that understanding of where we got

00:05:07.020 it right, where we got it wrong. One thing that we have seen with anybody who's had near death

00:05:14.220 experiences and those who've had, you know, shamanic experience where they've approached

00:05:20.580 the gates of that veil and come back to us is that family and loved ones are there to greet us

00:05:30.320 on the other side. And very often, those of our faith who have that experience, their families

00:05:36.580 and their loved ones that greet them, were Christian during their life. When we have our

00:05:42.220 desir bloats, and we think about our desir, almost all of us, our desir were Christians.

00:05:50.420 Our departed mothers and grandmothers and great-grandmothers, most of them,

00:05:56.740 we're now starting to get to where we have a second and third generation of Ausitruer, but 0.99

00:06:01.860 most of us, those desir were Christians during their life, and we believe they look on. We 0.99

00:06:08.540 believe that they are celebrated and honored ancestors beyond the veil looking onto us.

00:06:14.040 So I hope that comes close to maybe some insight into that question. And again,

00:06:19.520 when our day comes and we pass, then we're, then we'll have those answers for sure.

00:06:24.060 just looking at questions on the other side

00:06:37.880 so one thing unfortunately that happened in january so january 28th we were supposed to

00:06:45.840 close on yordshoff i know i've been telling you guys about yordshoff for months and months and

00:06:50.900 how close we were getting. And it's very unfortunate. Some positives, the bank that we

00:06:57.080 were interacting with, we actually were, it was a faith-based lending group, and they had farmed

00:07:04.480 our loan out to a particular bank. Both the lending group and the bank said that we had some

00:07:09.460 of the best financials they'd ever seen. They were excited to do business with us. They wanted to do

00:07:14.520 business with us in the future. All the numbers and everything looked amazing, and they were very

00:07:20.120 eager and excited about it for mysterious reasons at the very last minute uh one day before our

00:07:28.440 our closing was scheduled they decided to back out and cease doing business with us very abruptly

00:07:34.220 and they refused to tell us why so we're left to assume various reasons why i believe that uh that

00:07:41.800 our faith and our beliefs were that reason i think that makes sense can't say that for 100 sure and

00:07:48.480 And they made sure of that by not not honestly giving us an answer to that question, unfortunately.

00:07:54.200 But all of the real reasons we asked and they said those were all good.

00:07:58.520 So we have to left to assume anyways, that was on Thursday that we found that out.

00:08:06.020 I came to you guys on Friday, I believe, in one of these live discussions, very brief, to ask for help and support with that,

00:08:14.860 to try to get lenders from our folk, from our extended family, from people that we know

00:08:20.000 to be willing to lend out of their pocket and out of their resources to make this off happen.

00:08:26.220 Now, I can't guarantee, but we're currently in the process of arranging a closing.

00:08:31.180 We have, you all have stepped up in a beautiful, amazing, overwhelming show of support.

00:08:42.100 Thank you to everybody who shared that video around.

00:08:45.200 Thank you to the, I don't know, 20 or so of you that have gone on and donated hundreds of dollars out of your own pocket to your Tsoff fund to make sure that happens.

00:09:00.440 And quite a few of you have reached out willing to lend large amounts of your own monies so far.

00:09:08.020 and we haven't received all of this yet, but we have promises of over $450,000 in lending

00:09:14.480 from you guys to make this happen and make this a reality. So we'll praise the ice when it's

00:09:23.640 crossed, but if we don't get this, it won't be because of lack of money and it won't be because

00:09:29.360 of lack of generosity on your end. You guys have been fantastic and I'm very eager that

00:09:34.660 Hopefully by the next time we have one of these lives, we'll be able to celebrate getting

00:09:38.620 your top and making that a reality.

00:09:41.600 Like I say, thank you all so much.

00:09:44.360 From the bottom of my heart, I'm blown away.

00:09:46.500 I'm impressed.

00:09:47.260 And it's such a good sign for the future.

00:09:49.820 If you guys are willing, and the other lenders that you know that you've engaged on this

00:09:55.320 are willing to lend to us in future projects, it's going to make it a lot easier and going

00:09:59.200 to make it to where we don't have to go through the banks and go through the system of folks

00:10:03.480 that may be opposed to our values and our faith in the future when we want to make things happen.

00:10:08.300 That's a really exciting place to be. And like I said, thank you guys so much for stepping up.

00:10:23.140 Sorry, guys, looking over here on the side, make sure I don't miss anybody.

00:10:33.480 appreciate you guys posting links as my wife did post that's a link to our website to our

00:10:41.480 contact page it's got all of our our gothar and our folk builders on there and ways to reach out

00:10:46.440 and contact them you're always if you have questions or if you want to connect to somebody

00:10:50.960 and you're having trouble you're always welcome to email me personally matt flavel m-a-t-t-f-l-a-v-e-l

00:10:57.920 at runestone.org. And I'll get back to you and do what I can to answer anything and see that you

00:11:04.180 get taken care of. Okay, we have a question on the side. What is the best response if a Catholic

00:11:26.160 makes the argument that our gods are merely demons and that our practice of spirituality

00:11:31.180 is intrinsically evil.

00:11:36.740 No, honestly, I there's a lot of different ways you can go on that.

00:11:43.060 But the arrogance of that statement is shocking and absurd.

00:11:47.060 The only way that makes sense is under the rules that they've arbitrarily decide to lay

00:11:52.800 out.

00:11:53.220 our gods and our faith predates theirs certainly predates christianity and uh it's it's very

00:12:02.480 ancient it's something that our people had for millennia before the catholics came around for

00:12:08.200 them to one day decide that all of our gods are demons and uh what we're doing is evil is highly

00:12:14.100 subjective to the catholic worldview the other thing to say is by them making that statement

00:12:19.860 they acknowledge that our gods are real and that our gods exist and that our gods have power

00:12:25.460 that being said if they want to put them in a context and label them something else it doesn't

00:12:29.860 alter the reality that they have acknowledged by making that statement that our gods exist in our

00:12:36.900 potent spiritual forces and i think that that starts us on the right foot of having legitimacy

00:12:42.500 discussing it with them um but it's such a ridiculous claim for them to make that it's

00:12:50.180 it's kind of absurd on the face of it but that's what i would do is i would start by acknowledging

00:12:54.820 by i guess restating to them that their position acknowledges the existence and the power of our

00:13:02.660 odds. Pam, how often are these live chats held? Typically, we do them for sure at least once at

00:13:18.540 the beginning of every month. Depending on what I've got going on, I try to schedule that as close

00:13:23.380 to the first as I can. Usually we do it at whatever day of the week that falls on. I shift

00:13:30.420 that around quite often so hopefully more people can make it depending on their schedules we

00:13:34.980 usually do it about six o'clock pacific time so that most people can get to it it's hard i know

00:13:44.020 it makes it a little bit easier for our east coast folks if we do it earlier but if we do it earlier

00:13:48.900 a lot of our west coast folks are are still at work and then it's always kind of difficult for

00:13:55.140 our international members to attend so it's always very exciting when they're able to

00:14:01.780 the afa's spread is so wide that there's no perfect time that we can get everybody in this

00:14:07.460 unfortunate as that is that we that we do miss some of our some of our folks that way

00:14:12.260 it's really a powerful statement about how widespread our faith is and that's that's something

00:14:16.980 pretty cool jared it is not too late to donate to the hof um we absolutely need funds even if

00:14:30.500 everybody comes through with their promised loans to us we still need to pay off those loans

00:14:37.220 if uh one of our folk builders or if my wife mandy could post the link to the

00:14:42.740 jords hoff fundraiser on our site that's the best way to donate to that effort any donation towards

00:14:49.540 that is greatly greatly appreciated um folks that have donated 500 or more will get their name on a

00:14:57.140 donor plaque at jords hoff and uh it's a really really special gift to the afa to our folk most

00:15:04.180 importantly it's a really special gift to the the great sea captain you're there um and those that

00:15:11.940 are very appreciated so thank you for asking and thank you for anybody who has or intends to donate

00:15:17.380 Sinister Warrior, are there any crypto donation options for Njortsov? Yes, there may be people

00:15:44.720 on the chat watching this that know a little bit better about that i know very little about

00:15:48.880 cryptocurrency i know we do have some crypto donate options it may not be on that fundraiser

00:15:54.480 itself but as far as donating on our website there are links to donate with cryptocurrency

00:15:59.760 and we'll make sure any and all of that goes to this hoff effort um so yeah i appreciate that

00:16:05.280 you're that you want to do that and we can absolutely make that happen if you need more

00:16:09.920 information on that. If you reach out to me after this live, I'll try to get you a better answer

00:16:17.180 than I have right now. Dr. Lawson Axford, absolutely. I notice a lot of people and I

00:16:34.380 appreciate the sentiment of, you know, why care what other people of other faiths think about us?

00:16:38.740 It's very important what other people think about us. It's important that they take us seriously. We want our enemies to be intimidated of us, and we want our friends to be strengthened and to think highly of us. We want everyone to respect us.

00:16:55.640 And very importantly, when you mention your family, and I think this is the key point, we all have a lot of friends and family of other faiths.

00:17:05.100 We would love to bring those folks into our faith, but we want them to at the very least understand and respect what we do and think highly of us as people.

00:17:17.900 And I think that's extremely important. So I absolutely respect your question and where you're going with it.

00:17:23.320 I think you're right on with that. I've always said, I think the best thing we can do in that

00:17:27.920 regard, rather than having a theological argument with Catholics over it, is you need to be the

00:17:34.340 living example of Alcetru and the value it brings. Your life is the most powerful testament to Alcetru

00:17:41.480 that you can offer them. If they know you to be a person of substance, they know you to be somebody

00:17:47.780 who is successful, who is a good person. And by good, I don't just mean he's a swell guy, he's

00:17:54.540 kind of nice. We often let that pass for good these days. I mean a virtuous person, a person

00:18:00.640 who has value, a person who brings something good to the table and who accomplishes great things.

00:18:06.280 If they know you as that and a person of great character, and if you can connect that to your

00:18:10.840 House of True Faith and your membership in the House of True Folk Assembly, that is the best way 0.99

00:18:15.680 to communicate our values and our faith to, um, to non-Hausitruer. 0.98

00:18:36.140 Rubizal. What, what do I normally say to someone who is interested in faith, 1.00

00:18:41.500 but does not know where to start. Generally, people say read X book, but do I have a better

00:18:47.500 way? Absolutely. There's a lot of options on where to start. Certainly, there's tons of good

00:18:56.300 stuff you can read. There's cool, you know, basic stuff you can read on our website. And reading is

00:19:02.620 good and great. But what I think is the most, that's where you start to learn academically

00:19:09.360 about Ausatru a little bit, but if you want to start practicing Ausatru, the most important

00:19:15.700 thing, I think, is making an offering to the gods. And it can be really simple. I remember when I

00:19:24.300 started out, one of the first things I did was I went through our gods and goddesses, and I tried

00:19:30.700 to pick one every, I forget how often it was, I think it was every three days or something,

00:19:35.440 and learn what I could about them. And each evening I'd make an offering.

00:19:42.940 And sometimes something really silly, like one, I mean, I did this with quite a few of our gods,

00:19:50.020 but I remember one of my first offerings was to Freya. And all I knew was Freya liked gold

00:19:56.520 and that she had some cats that pulled her chariot at the time. So I said, okay, I poured a shot of

00:20:04.160 Goldschlager and opened up a can of Fancy Feast. And as silly as that may sound, as a really young 0.89

00:20:12.440 man who's just making the effort, I lit a candle and I said, hey, I'm here, I'm listening. And I 0.81

00:20:19.420 sat there in some meditation and I did that right before bed that night. I had a really important

00:20:24.720 dream, I think, and I felt like I helped build that connection. Our faith is all about the gift

00:20:29.800 cycle and learning and knowing about the gods academically is great. And I do think it's

00:20:35.300 important, but what's much more important is building that relationship. I don't think the

00:20:40.760 gods are, you know, your personal buddies, they're gods, but you reaching out in a sincere way and

00:20:48.680 opening yourself up to them. That's the first step in being also true. And I think that if people do

00:20:56.820 that and they proceed with a with an openness and make those little offerings amazing amazing

00:21:04.180 things can happen and opening their heart opening their mind to our gods

00:21:09.620 it will change their life and that's what i would recommend people's first step be

00:21:18.900 uh kingdom of vinland how can someone who is new find folk in your area the contact

00:21:25.860 page that they shared with you is the first and best suggestion i'd make it's our folk builders

00:21:30.660 contacts it's also the contacts for our go thar those people are dedicated to helping you make

00:21:37.140 those connections into building our afa community if you can't find somebody on there that you think

00:21:42.740 is close enough you can always reach out to me and i can direct you to the right person

00:21:47.220 but that is your first step and we've got people that that's their job is to try to help connect

00:21:52.100 you with other people close to you i'm not sure where you're at so it makes a difference on who

00:21:56.980 i'd recommend but if you tell us over in the side i can can give you some suggestions

00:22:10.100 hmm whereabouts will njordshoff be located in florida um again till we're safely on the other

00:22:24.500 side of it i don't want to get super specific but uh you know northern half of florida is where

00:22:31.600 we're where we're looking to make njordshoff happen

00:22:33.780 florida is kind of special with that there's a long history in florida of making offerings and

00:22:43.560 building that relationship with new order uh our people there even from a time some of them you

00:22:49.460 know before they even joined the austral folk assembly there's a long tradition of that being

00:22:54.720 a spot of your worship and uh of building that relationship so we're very excited to make sure

00:23:01.840 as Hoff goes there.

00:23:02.840 So one of our folk builders, Cody, reminds us that Ostara in the south,

00:23:32.780 held at Thorshof in Linden, North Carolina is coming up in March. Make sure you're there. I'm

00:23:39.400 going to be there. I would love to see you guys there. Anybody and everybody who's, you know,

00:23:44.640 if part of the Astro Folk Assembly or a trusted guest is welcome. And we would love to have

00:23:50.340 everybody there to celebrate and to visit the Hof of Asa Thor and to be able to get together with

00:23:59.640 your AFA family there in North Carolina. It's a beautiful place. We'd love to see you guys there.

00:24:15.480 Henry, without giving away too much sensitive information, are there other hops to come

00:24:20.360 soon? And if so, where would they be? Yes. Soon is relative. It all depends. We've got a number

00:24:27.920 of numbers, we look out on the back end and make sure that not only can we get the Hoff, but we can

00:24:32.380 afford it, maintain it, have people that are going to care for it. We don't want to get a bunch of

00:24:38.060 Hoffs and then have, you know, have them in a spot where we can't make them the temples to our gods 1.00

00:24:44.760 that they should be. So we want to make sure we can take care of them. There's a number.

00:24:50.820 We always like to dream. We got a lot of dreamers in the AFA, myself included. So we certainly have

00:24:56.040 plans about our next Hoffs coming up. If you go to our website, we have a list of the order that

00:25:02.560 the Hoffs will come in. Next one, after we get Nyorder His Hoff, it's going to be Freyer's Hoff. 0.95

00:25:10.440 We'll get His Hoff. And then after that, we'll get Tier His Hoff. Don't know exactly where those

00:25:18.200 are going to be. We'll see. Situation on the ground changes. Love to give you some more

00:25:24.440 information on that for sure, but I just can't quite do it yet. We will keep you in the loop

00:25:29.400 on where those Hoffs are, are going to be. I would look for one in the fairly soon future to be in the 0.99

00:25:36.940 Western Pennsylvania, Ohio area. That's where I would put,

00:25:45.420 that's where I would put the most money right now on, on betting where the next one's going to be

00:25:51.040 after New York's Hoff, but we'll see. James, depending on where I move, I think right now

00:26:09.780 the reason I have the Odenshoff one behind me is I'm currently in the Odenshoff district,

00:26:15.340 But we'll see. I'm sorry, James was asking if I'm going to change out the hot flags behind me.

00:26:21.340 behind me. Reinhard Frederick, we have members in Europe. We've had a European member. Sorry,

00:26:41.820 I'm not sure if everybody can read this on the side. I don't see it on the replay version. I've

00:26:45.300 tried to adjust the settings, so hopefully it's on there. A gentleman asks if we are going to

00:26:50.640 expand to places like Europe when we get big enough. We are and we have. We've got a kindred

00:26:57.260 in Ireland. We've got, we've actually got members in 14 different countries right now.

00:27:04.060 Scandinavia has always been our biggest and most active European membership. We have a folk builder

00:27:09.660 in Sweden, Erik Lugnet, and he's doing a great job for us over there. We've got Norwegian,

00:27:17.260 Dane and Swedish members all in that area. We've got a very active Swedish membership as a matter

00:27:23.080 of fact. A number of us went and visited our Swedish members a few years back and that was

00:27:28.080 great. A few years before that some of us went and visited our Danish members. So we do have

00:27:34.180 European members and we would love to have more members in our homelands of Europe.

00:27:47.260 It's an interesting point over on the side that Dr. Lawrence is making about, first heard

00:28:10.600 about us due to one of the media hit pieces.

00:28:13.160 One thing of the left I don't think they understand is when they do unfair propaganda against us, instead of hurting us, every time they've done a news story about us, we've had members join us because of it.

00:28:28.260 It's made us stronger.

00:28:30.200 Now, I don't like those.

00:28:31.840 I would much rather they did fair reporting on us.

00:28:36.120 Even better, I'd love for them to do something about all the great things that we're doing.

00:28:39.760 I think it's a fantastic story that we're restoring the worship of of our gods that haven't had Hoffs in a thousand years.

00:28:48.540 I think that our food distributions and all the good things that we're doing deserve and are newsworthy.

00:28:54.800 Instead, they want to focus on racism or whatever the hot button controversial issue is that they can pretty much make up to create a controversy.

00:29:04.200 But every single time without fail, we get members out of it.

00:29:08.020 We get some really great members out of it.

00:29:17.160 Is there a damnation concept in Ausitru?

00:29:23.460 Yes.

00:29:24.440 So we're a lot less damnation focused than other faiths.

00:29:32.480 There's absolutely a judgment time after we pass where our deeds and our value is weighed.

00:29:42.340 And there's good options and less good options beyond the veil.

00:29:49.440 And I don't think our journey stops there.

00:29:51.300 I think there's room for movement on the other side of this life.

00:29:54.300 but uh yeah there's there's hell which isn't such a miserable place but it's a it's kind of a place

00:30:02.160 of stasis and beyond that there's the strand where it's talked about venom perpetually dripping on

00:30:08.180 oath breakers and cowards and and uh those who suffer that kind of damnation and i think that

00:30:15.320 the concept there isn't so much eternal torture as it's disillusioned and dissolving um that

00:30:21.680 symbolism of the venom is something that dissolves and destroys so that so that parts and base

00:30:31.900 materials can be recycled into something else but there is a judgment that that you get based on

00:30:38.020 your value and I think that it's not a one and done situation so one of the special things about

00:30:45.960 also true is that your or log and that which you pass on to your family is the sum of the things

00:30:54.140 that you do so even if there's a lot of bad in there you can water that down with great things

00:31:00.100 you can counterbalance poor decisions and poor choices by heroic action heroic deeds and doing

00:31:07.840 great things so uh i think there is it's important and it's special and it's it's encouraging that

00:31:17.920 you can start right now trying to make that better and trying to overshadow any past

00:31:24.160 misdeeds with great and heroic deeds in your future and in your present so i'd encourage us all to do

00:31:29.680 that that's true kingdom of vinland you may not have somebody that's right directly next to you

00:31:42.400 um said you're in the toronto area i do know we have some membership in that area we don't have

00:31:47.440 a folk builder in toronto but i would encourage encourage you to reach out to

00:31:54.320 I think Cliff or Katie Erickson would be a very good choice. I think that Jessica Lambert would

00:32:03.100 be a good choice. I also think that James Ault would be a really nice choice for you. And there's

00:32:07.720 contact information for all of those people on our website, on our contacts page.

00:32:12.780 henry we do not give out membership information on who's members and who's not

00:32:24.820 we try to try to respect people's privacy that way but lana and henrik have been great to us

00:32:30.580 and uh we've invited them and i believe they're going to attend our charming of the plow event

00:32:35.640 it'd be great if we see them there but they've always been fantastic to us and they're they're

00:32:41.200 great folks.

00:33:11.200 Oh, me and for the dead air, like I said, guys, I'm just reading over on the side and

00:33:17.560 making sure I don't miss any questions.

00:33:25.620 Henry, let's have one of our folk builders, Cody, who brought it up.

00:33:29.640 Cody, could you give Henry the information on when Thorshoff is going to host OSTARA

00:33:35.640 this year on the exact dates?

00:33:41.200 Henry, no, it wasn't too revealing at all. You ask me anything you like. I'm just going to be

00:33:49.260 selective about, you know, I'll share my business as much as I want. I just try to be careful about

00:33:54.540 other people's businesses. I don't think the Henrik and Lana would be concerned about that

00:33:58.560 one way or another, though.

00:34:11.200 All right, Cody just put up the dates, so go ahead and look at those if you're interested

00:34:22.800 in attending Ostara at Thorshoff in Linden, North Carolina.

00:34:29.620 So what else do we have tonight?

00:34:31.500 Is there anything else folks would like to hear me give my opinion about or talk about

00:34:36.580 or answer any questions?

00:34:41.200 I appreciate all of our folk builders over on the side helping out and posting information.

00:34:54.540 I think that's really helpful to the people who are joining in on this.

00:35:03.340 Let's talk about something, I guess, that I've been thinking about, and that's perseverance.

00:35:08.280 we have been extremely extremely successful the past few years of the astro folk assembly

00:35:15.560 and there's a lot of factors to it but for those of you just joining us we've had so much growth 0.66

00:35:22.580 so much development we've had these three hoffs come about in a very short amount of time

00:35:29.560 about to have a fourth half happen we just reached a new membership high

00:35:34.040 great, great things are happening. And first and foremost, we are very, very fortunate and blessed

00:35:43.860 by our gods. I believe very strongly that the Iser look on what we do and smile. I don't think

00:35:53.900 everything we do is perfect, but I do think in broad strokes, the gods approve and appreciate

00:36:00.140 the things that we've been doing. And we're so thankful for that. Their blessings have really

00:36:05.420 been manifest in the world around us and in the AFA success. The other thing has been in perseverance.

00:36:13.520 These things don't come in massive waves. There's not one big victory that makes everything happen.

00:36:19.500 This is the steady hard work and loyalty and generosity of our AFA family day in and day out

00:36:26.900 over the course of years bearing fruit and paying off and sometimes it's easy to get

00:36:34.900 discouraged or distracted by things going on in your life and things going on in your life things

00:36:42.740 going on in your family things going on in the world but what has allowed us to be so successful

00:36:49.060 is people stay on the course continuing that gift cycle with our gods continuing that fellowship

00:36:56.820 in good times and bad with the Austria Folk Assembly and making these things happen and

00:37:02.500 that continual push by all of our people all of our AFA family has made some truly amazing things

00:37:08.340 happen and I'm so so honored to be able to be here and share that with you guys at this time

00:37:14.500 and to be part of all these things we have going on and it's really a special time to be in the AFA

00:37:19.300 and a special time to be also true and what makes that happen is perseverance day in and day out

00:37:26.820 And I thank you guys for that.

00:37:36.440 James is asking how our community outreach is going.

00:37:40.140 Going fantastic.

00:37:42.440 The food distributions.

00:37:43.880 So some of you may not know who are just chiming in

00:37:46.100 or just joining us on this.

00:37:48.440 Each of our Hoffs participates as a local food pantry.

00:37:52.600 So once a month, they collect food, local charitable donations of food from local businesses,

00:38:01.540 and they distribute those to folks in need in their community.

00:38:06.040 That has been an amazing thing.

00:38:08.060 It has given us the opportunity to help out the communities that we have our Hoffs in.

00:38:12.400 It's given us the opportunity to meet our neighbors and to be a part of that local community

00:38:20.120 and to help out some folks that are in need and some folks that are hungry.

00:38:26.260 It's really nice, especially when so often we get frustrated about things going on in the world

00:38:33.320 that we don't like and that we wish were different. It's really nice to be able to

00:38:38.840 spend that time every month doing something that's positive for people, doing something that

00:38:44.660 You know, there were families that didn't get enough to eat that do now because of what our AFA members around those Hoffs have done.

00:38:55.240 And that's a really special thing. And it's a real honor to take part in that.

00:38:59.460 But, yeah, it's been amazing. And it's really built us a lot of friendships in those communities.

00:39:04.020 We have Odens Hoff in Brownsville, California.

00:39:08.380 Thors Hoff, like I said, in Linden, North Carolina, Balders Hoff in Murdoch, Minnesota.

00:39:12.800 And it's been great to build relationships in those communities.

00:39:27.660 Okay, we've got a question.

00:39:29.080 Does national socialism conflict with Ausatru?

00:39:33.960 Those things all depend on really specific meanings.

00:39:37.160 I find when people use those terms, they associate them with specific points in time and specific geography.

00:39:45.700 And the devil's always in the details as the expression goes.

00:39:49.940 No, I don't think that explicitly it's it conflicts with also true.

00:39:54.400 I think there's a lot of political governing systems that are compatible with also true.

00:39:59.540 And there's a lot that aren't. I think how they're administered has everything to do with their level of compatibility with our faith or not.

00:40:07.160 I get asked this a lot. I really have never listened to the Wisdom of Odin's

00:40:16.940 YouTube channel. I've never listened, so I can't comment on the good, bad, or otherwise of that

00:40:24.860 broadcast. Rachel, what leadership is planning on attending Ostara? Can't say for sure. I think

00:40:36.880 most of our East Coast guys are going to be there. I hope Brandy is going to be there also.

00:40:47.180 Brandy Callahan from Minnesota. I am going to be there. I believe our fork builder, Mason Johnson,

00:40:55.760 is going to be there from Washington State. Other than that, I'm not sure who yet is going to be all

00:41:01.300 at Ostara, but we should let you know as things are coming up.

00:41:06.880 Thank you.

00:41:36.880 All right, guys. Is there any other questions you guys have or anything else you guys would

00:41:45.320 like to hear me talk about tonight? So I'd like to say on this and take a take just a second.

00:41:56.200 Jason Cohn from No White Guilt. Thank you very much. He got with some of his guys.

00:42:04.360 He rounded up a lender that has been very generous in offering to lend to us.

00:42:10.200 We appreciate that so much.

00:42:12.460 We're working out the fine details on that.

00:42:14.880 But that is a huge, huge step forward and a huge help.

00:42:18.580 And just wanted to say that while I have a moment here, we really appreciate it.

00:42:24.100 Thank you very much, Jason.

00:42:33.640 Not sure the question. So we have a question on the side. Is there a possibility of more

00:42:47.040 weekday activities? As far as AFA stuff, please reach out to your local folk builder. We can see

00:42:52.560 with people's work schedules, it's really difficult to figure out a time where everybody

00:42:56.920 can get together. But if you talk to your local folk builder, hopefully they'll be able to figure

00:43:01.940 out something for you to help make schedules work out as best as we can okay we got a question on

00:43:16.980 how uh how steve mcnallan is doing it's doing great i just celebrated um thorough bloat with

00:43:26.180 the mcnallans up at odenshoff a couple of days ago and steve was doing great it was

00:43:31.940 it was really nice um says his health is doing good says things are going good that way

00:43:38.740 he and i sat next to each other at uh at the feast and it was really cool watching everybody

00:43:43.580 in the hof eating and feasting and sharing and spending time together and it's kind of a special

00:43:50.960 moment steve looked at me and and just kind of said hey this is this is what makes it all

00:43:56.400 worthwhile this is what it's all about it really was a very very nice weekend so yes steve's doing

00:44:01.780 fantastic. A question about giving family member info on Ausitru if they're interested and they're

00:44:16.100 a Christian. I would direct, so a couple of things. The information on our website is really

00:44:21.880 good, so I'd obviously recommend that. One of the things that I would recommend most, excuse me, on

00:44:29.160 that is uh our runestone articles and if you look we've got um each of our runestones in the library

00:44:35.960 section but it gives a really good it gives a really good perspective on what we're up to

00:44:43.880 uh it's our monthly newsletter and it's got got all the stuff we've been up to and it really puts

00:44:48.360 our best foot forward um the other thing i would suggest that also does that is getting them to

00:44:54.680 look at our youtube channel ah my daughter aubrey wants to join us and say hi but she's kind of

00:45:00.680 squirmy right now so it's going to be a brief visit this evening but look how pretty she is

00:45:05.480 she's beautiful i'm luckiest daddy in the whole world um ah she's squirming here she goes but i

00:45:13.080 would i would highly recommend that you get folks to look at our youtube channel and especially just

00:45:18.200 the little i don't know how i mean anywhere from two to five to ten minute videos i have of uh

00:45:27.320 our events because gathered around at our events that's really what it's about and that's

00:45:34.920 i think that's a very appealing thing to show anyone as far as what the afa is

00:45:39.880 who we are what we're up to so i would recommend that you show them those videos because they're

00:45:48.200 hope i'm still with you guys i just got a disconnect thing so i hope i'm still there

00:45:55.400 um cool so anyways i hope you guys heard that i recommend anybody that you can share youtube

00:46:01.000 videos with not just sitting here listening to me talk they're welcome to if they'd like but

00:46:05.960 especially the ones of our events with the little clip shows of all the different pictures

00:46:09.800 of our events i think those are the best thing to show people about who we are and what we're about

00:46:18.200 Sorry about that. My internet's been kind of iffy all day. They're putting in some new

00:46:25.520 infrastructure in our neighborhood, and hopefully that works good to get my service a little bit

00:46:31.320 better. Round two of the oms. Sorry, guys, just looking on the side to see if I missed any

00:46:46.320 questions or anything going on um all right she's wiggly i hope she doesn't keep us up tonight we'll 0.99

00:46:58.240 see she is growing up right in front of us she's grown up so fast uh mandy shows me pictures every 1.00

00:47:05.040 day of aubrey from you know a year ago on this date or whatever shocking how fast she grows up

00:47:10.800 we're very very fortunate to have that beautiful little girl in our life

00:47:16.320 I have no thoughts on the upcoming movie.

00:47:21.620 I really don't know anything about it.

00:47:27.540 Corey, no, this is our only child.

00:47:29.760 We both were very fortunate that we could make this happen.

00:47:32.600 We weren't sure about it.

00:47:34.780 We both kind of waited longer than we should have to start having babies.

00:47:40.700 But Aubrey is really a blessing.

00:47:42.300 Mandy and I were both 39 years old when when Aubrey was born, but she's amazing and we're very, very lucky to have her.

00:47:51.300 Got any questions, any additional questions tonight or things you want to want to hear me say something about?

00:48:07.300 about. Okay, so I got a question about the new membership number. So our new record membership

00:48:18.460 number sounds tiny, but it's tiny because it's honest. Our new membership number is our high

00:48:26.100 this week. We reached 808 members. Now, unlike other churches, other organizations count their

00:48:36.260 membership very differently. This is paying adult members. That doesn't include spouses that are not

00:48:43.900 individual members themselves. It doesn't include all of the children that we have or all of the

00:48:50.200 friends that come around that may have expired or, you know, maybe meaning to sign up who haven't

00:48:55.200 signed up yet. But that's the biggest number we've ever had. And that number's up about 10%

00:49:01.700 in the last year, which is, I say the last year, it's up about 10% in the last seven months,

00:49:07.120 which is huge. So numbers not as big as we'd like to see. But if I was sitting here telling

00:49:13.720 you about 100,000 members, it still would not be as big as we'd like to see. But it's really cool

00:49:20.700 for those of us who've been watching it grow because it's very significant for us.

00:49:31.700 so a couple of a couple of different things if i could describe charming of the plow so

00:49:48.580 the idea of charming of the plow is

00:49:53.380 so much of our yearly celebrations are about cycles of productivity

00:49:57.220 winter has been a time of stasis a time of um turning inward celebrating with friends and

00:50:06.060 family through the winter taking stock of what we've accomplished celebrating at yule

00:50:11.420 um coming in out of the cold and celebrating at thorobloat and in february we kind of start

00:50:18.620 our accomplishments in that yearly cycle we start doing we start working so charming of the plow

00:50:26.480 So traditionally, you're celebrating that implement of breaking the hard soil for planting season.

00:50:35.940 In modern house of truth, so much of Charming the Plow is starting the year off right with our tools of our industry, with our plans, with our vitality for the things that we're trying to build and accomplish in this year.

00:50:53.300 And so much of the symbolism of the plow breaking the hard soil has everything to do with us purposefully inflicting our will into the world.

00:51:05.420 So much of all of the magic associated with Alcetru, especially associated with men in Alcetru, is us being forces of will and having our will literally penetrate the earth, penetrate the ether, penetrate the world around us and implant and impregnate that with our will, with our intentions, with the things we want to accomplish and the deeds that we want to do and the seeds that we want to sow.

00:51:33.960 And so that's kind of the idea behind Charming the Plow. Very often we celebrate Frayer at Charming the Plow. He is the god of that manly penetration of will and fecundity. So we tend to celebrate him at Charming the Plow.

00:51:50.960 out. So James brings up a situation I don't know if you guys are aware of. A while back,

00:52:05.900 Ron McVann was, I don't know if they ever finished their investigation of it, but we have every

00:52:12.980 reason to believe he was the subject of a left-wing terrorist attack that burned down his

00:52:18.880 garage and his vehicle again i don't know i don't know if they've come back with anything conclusive

00:52:25.200 on it but all things pointed to that kind of arson anyways we stepped up uh as the astro folk

00:52:32.400 assembly especially with the help of of our folk builder james alt and arranged some fundraising

00:52:38.880 to raise money to help ron to rebuild and to compensate some degree of what he lost in that

00:52:44.480 attack and i was very proud of all of you that donated for that and we've had work weekends set

00:52:50.640 up to help him rebuild we just had a number of afa members along with other friends and

00:52:55.840 also true who are associated with ron go out and put in a very solid weekend rebuilding a carport

00:53:03.280 for him building something nice spending that fellowship with him and i was very proud that

00:53:08.800 we had our afa members involved in that ron's a great guy he's a person who's a beautiful artist

00:53:16.000 he's spent so much of his adult life contributing to the growth and development of also true

00:53:21.760 it's nice to be able to do do something in a small way to to help show our appreciation for that

00:53:33.520 what is my opinion of the show vikings um

00:53:38.800 Viking is fun to watch. I'm not going to say I didn't watch every episode of it. I did.

00:53:43.820 There's a lot of things that are silly. There's a ooga booga fetishism in it to where it tries to 0.74

00:53:51.700 portray our ancestors as just being barbaric savages dressed in all black and skins all the

00:53:59.160 time. It's not true. Our ancestors loved bright colors and beautiful things. They were about

00:54:07.240 civilization and not savagery there's also a lot of strange degenerate behavior in the show

00:54:14.360 it's a fun show one of the things that's very cool on it is to hear

00:54:19.800 to see people portrayed religiously observing our faith um

00:54:27.960 i don't think a lot of people who aren't exposed to alsatru

00:54:32.600 conceive of our ancestors believing in and worshiping our our ancestral gods and seeing

00:54:38.680 that on the tv screen was a special thing the first time i saw that but the show was not you

00:54:44.840 know i don't think it's accurate to our faith i don't think it's accurate to history well i know

00:54:49.480 it's not accurate to history um it was a fun show to watch and i think it brought it brought also

00:54:56.840 true to a lot of people's attention that maybe hadn't thought of it before brought it to a lot

00:55:01.960 of silly larpers and buffoons but i think it also brought a lot of really great people around and

00:55:07.640 maybe that was their first exposure to it or it sparked something in their ancestral memory and 0.98

00:55:12.760 And I think that was positive.

00:55:27.660 I have no thoughts on the National Justice Party.

00:55:30.520 I heard something about them last time I did one of these interviews.

00:55:33.820 I really have no familiarity with who they are or what they're about, so I can't really comment on that.

00:55:42.760 um also the nordic resistance movement i don't know anything about that i don't you know as

00:55:52.540 officially representing the afa we don't really have a big political stance on any of these

00:55:58.080 political parties or exactly what they're doing we certainly have have i guess meta political

00:56:02.720 stances um but you know again i like some of the things i've seen but i i don't i'm not familiar

00:56:09.360 enough with them to give you a solid opinion on them and any opinion i might have on them

00:56:14.000 isn't representing the afa sorry guys reading over here on the side or the side we had big burst of

00:56:27.280 activity in the chat which is nice it's nice to see this chat so active on the side

00:56:39.360 all right guys well I mentioned I got to cut it a little bit shorter than usual tonight I do have

00:56:58.960 my uh Witten meeting with those folks here right after this uh this chat thank you for joining me

00:57:06.040 this evening thank you so much for everybody who's helped out and donated to njordshoff

00:57:12.520 it's very appreciated and i believe with all my heart that you're there appreciates your

00:57:17.400 generosity as well um look forward to seeing you guys again this time next month i hope i see a

00:57:25.720 lot of you at charming of the plow this weekend i hope i see even more of you at ostara in north

00:57:31.480 Carolina next month. And anybody who has questions or needs anything, mattflavell at runestone.org.

00:57:40.280 Thank you guys so much. Hail the gods, hail the folk, hail the AFA.

Asatru Folk Assembly - February 03, 2022

February 2022 Live Discussion

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