Asatru Folk Assembly - March 07, 2020


March 2020 Facebook Live Discussion


Episode Stats


Length

52 minutes

Words per minute

152.27

Word count

7,920

Sentence count

192

Harmful content

Hate speech

4

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

On this episode of the AFA History Podcast, we are celebrating the 25th anniversary of the American Folk Building Association! We are looking back at the events that took place over the past 25 years and reminiscing about the history of the organization.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 hey folks um sorry it's running a few minutes late today i logged in and wanted to get started
00:00:28.880 here and all of a sudden facebook had changed their whole interface for how you do live streams
00:00:35.120 so i had to play with that a little bit and get mandy to help me figure out a couple things and
00:00:41.360 yep so i'm sorry i'm starving about five minutes later than usual
00:00:45.600 but hey see people starting to roll in appreciate you guys showing up tonight
00:00:55.120 excellent excellent
00:00:58.880 I'm trying to give it just a couple minutes here to see people start coming in.
00:01:07.320 Since the last time I talked with you folks, I just want to give a big nod of appreciation to Joe Rosenich and all of the great AFA family that we have in the Pacific Northwest.
00:01:20.800 it was a very special thing i got to go to their charming of the plow event and it was a smashing
00:01:29.500 success those guys did an amazing job their event was fantastic this is the second year that they
00:01:36.420 did their event there locally and it was just such a great time had by everybody and the turnout was
00:01:42.800 amazing joe had it all figured out and planned out and ran like clockwork we're all very very
00:01:50.360 excited about it and we're uh planning to do that again next year but this time the difference next
00:01:56.040 year is charming the plow in the northwest is going to be an afa national event in 2021 so
00:02:04.440 we're really going to try to try to run with that momentum and make something special you know so
00:02:09.800 everybody else can experience the special time that we had again thank you joe for the wonderful
00:02:14.360 event you put on and all of our members who made that happen up in the up in the northwest thank
00:02:19.880 you guys. Rob, I get that it's humorous, but LaCroix is disgusting. I think you know that deep down
00:02:30.120 inside. Anyways, other news to just kind of start off the top of things, I guess, is if you guys can
00:02:43.360 make it we've got ostara coming up ostara in the south is going to be fantastic um a lot of work's
00:02:52.000 gone into that this year of making that really something special uh we are we are looking forward
00:02:59.600 to seeing all of you guys at ostara in the south if y'all can make it just got it's got like two
00:03:05.280 weeks now until that event so if you can if you're interested please reach out to your folk builder
00:03:11.040 let them know we'll get you all set up i'm looking forward to seeing our afa family in
00:03:16.880 that part of the country that i haven't seen in a year looking forward to to spending time there
00:03:22.400 to celebrating and it's just going to be an amazing event we're really looking forward to it
00:03:27.680 um so i've got a number of you guys joining us so far i i guess to jump right in um
00:03:37.680 um you guys got any questions um since last time we talked is there anything on your mind anything
00:03:43.080 you want to discuss anything you want to hear me hear me jabber on about
00:03:48.320 okay cool enough um be thinking if there is anything you guys do want to talk about hey
00:04:07.580 Eric. Good to see you. Yeah, or any questions. One thing, and I don't know if you guys are
00:04:15.620 noticing, but every week I'm trying to post an article so far they've been from the old
00:04:21.660 editions of the Runestone. As the AFA is celebrating our 25th year this year, we're trying to take
00:04:28.960 a look back and learn a little bit more about our history and where we come from, along with
00:04:34.360 posting those every week i've been going through and loading more documents into our library
00:04:39.880 section on the website so uh hey jack it's good to see you jack's a good friend of mine worked
00:04:46.600 with me when i was down in florida i miss you i miss all the guys down there jack um what i'm
00:04:53.480 saying is yeah we got uh i've loaded up a lot of stuff from 2002 to 2005.
00:05:02.280 so go check up there see what you can see um take a look i'm hoping when i post those articles on uh
00:05:11.400 on afa history and what we've been up to that it provokes some kind of you know questions you guys
00:05:17.320 wondering you know any of those things so do make sure you take a look and if you have anything you
00:05:23.240 want to talk about i'd love to love to chat with you about it if you want hey gabriel we missed you
00:05:29.880 this weekend. I hope you and your family are doing really good. Actually, I hope everybody
00:05:40.400 had an amazing charming of the plow. It's been really nice to watch all of the event
00:05:44.420 pictures go in from everybody's local events, some bigger, some just a family in their living
00:05:51.140 room. But seeing all of our AFA family across the country and around the world celebrating
00:05:56.140 together is really a special thing and it's something that just about every weekend we
00:06:00.220 can look forward to and those pictures mean a lot not just to me but to the other folks out there
00:06:05.660 that are you know wondering if it's something they can do or how to get started really participating
00:06:11.340 in those kind of events especially if they don't have something going on in their area
00:06:15.260 it's very encouraging to see our kindreds and folks get together and celebrate those things
00:06:20.940 and share a meal and get together at you know a park or at a restaurant or wherever they might be
00:06:27.980 and uh and celebrate together there's something special um
00:06:34.860 something really special that simultaneously around the world we have
00:06:38.780 our people standing together worshiping our gods honoring one of our fallen heroes
00:06:43.340 just kind of as a thought exercise, imagining that, you know, those heroes of Ausatru and we
00:06:53.740 have some modern ones, but we also have some ones from the Viking age that we celebrate. Imagine them
00:06:59.340 a thousand years later, having people around the world and in lands they'd never heard of,
00:07:08.940 raising a horn in their name and celebrating their deeds. I think that's really important
00:07:13.000 that we do that. And hopefully, you know, if we prove ourselves worthy, we'll have people a
00:07:21.600 thousand years from now gathered around singing our praises of deeds that we've done. At least
00:07:26.920 that's the goal. Welcome to folks who have just joined us. Yeah, these things are usually kind
00:07:35.320 of a question and answer deal. So does anybody have anything they want to ask or anything they
00:07:40.380 want to get my take on or anything like that. Okay, well, please chime in if you do.
00:08:10.380 Excellent. Thank you, Katie. You saved me there. There's a lot of dead air. Thoughts
00:08:34.880 the next hoff and have we chosen a city so since the last time that we've talked there have been
00:08:40.960 some some developments and it's gotten out in the ether a little bit about hoff two and what our
00:08:46.080 plans are um i've been i've been trying to keep that under wraps as best i can so as not to build
00:08:55.680 up false hope because we tried on it for a really long time um you know i i swore to you guys that
00:09:02.160 as soon as we paid off Odin's Hoff we would be setting out on trying to find that second Hoff
00:09:07.840 and I told you guys that the best way to get a Hoff in your area is to help us pay off Odin's Hoff 0.78
00:09:13.120 and I want you guys to know we paid off Odin's Hoff the first of the year 2000 or yeah 2019 or 0.93
00:09:21.840 we tried to time it so we did it right at right at New Year's there so either on the 31st of
00:09:26.560 2018 or the first to 2019 depending on how you look at it but anyways from that day I think
00:09:34.720 that month as a matter of fact we started seriously looking at that second half and we
00:09:41.760 made a lot of efforts a lot of those didn't pan out so that's why I don't want to get everybody's
00:09:47.140 hopes up but we did have to talk about it a little bit and the way it looks right now in our sincere
00:09:53.500 plan we are in a very serious arrangement um on a fantastic property in north carolina
00:10:02.380 it looks absolutely amazing if everything goes according to plan and if it's approved by the
00:10:09.500 gods hopefully that'll that'll be coming through here real soon and i'll have some very very good
00:10:14.060 days for you um and when i say real soon we should know something definitive on that here and here
00:10:20.540 in the next couple of weeks but yeah to answer your question we've put a lot of thought in case
00:10:26.380 anything were to go awry we have a couple of other things to look at as far as plan b's on it
00:10:32.460 but as it is right now a really amazing property in north carolina we have some people who put in
00:10:37.980 a lot of effort to make that happen so i'm excited to be able to tell you guys some really really
00:10:42.380 special news here soon oh wow i didn't realize you were coming you're part of the caravan going down
00:10:54.780 to uh ostara that'll be great i'm looking forward to seeing you there um it's always good to see
00:11:00.620 you guys uh anyone not watching the side chat um looks like we've got a really sizable contingent
00:11:07.500 of folks coming from the dakotas and from minnesota all the way down to south carolina for our
00:11:14.460 ostara in the south so that's going to be a it's going to be a really special thing to have those
00:11:19.180 guys there i think it's it's some of our very best members from different parts of the country
00:11:24.780 getting to meet each other and spend time with each other for the first time and that's that's
00:11:29.020 always a great thing um what else do we got going on guys is there anything else that you want to
00:11:39.660 talk about or any questions or anything on y'all's mind
00:11:47.100 I got a couple of things on my mind with everyone celebrating the charming of the plow and now with
00:12:00.600 us heading into springtime. As the year kicks off, one thing I think is so important to our
00:12:10.120 fault to who we are is that we we make things happen we don't sit idly by and let things happen
00:12:20.560 to us we don't sit back and hope for the best we go out and make our will manifest in the world
00:12:30.080 so much of charming the plow is about
00:12:32.840 charming an implement of our will that breaks that hard soil that breaks through blockages
00:12:42.340 and forces the seeds of what we want to occur in this world to happen forces those things to be
00:12:49.820 implanted in the ground to take root it's so important that we have the willpower and the
00:12:55.340 motivation within ourselves to inflict our will upon the world, to make the things we happen,
00:13:02.880 to make our dreams come true. And that's really fundamental to what this season is all about for
00:13:09.860 us. So I want us to be mindful of that as we go into spring. With everything, all of the new life
00:13:16.860 that's about to explode in the coming month or two, all of the blooms and the blossoms,
00:13:23.000 Let's go out and hit the ground running, making things happen, doing great deeds, planting seeds and watching them grow.
00:13:32.000 Joined by Johnny, Johnny Larson, one of our newest folk builders.
00:13:42.680 Those of you who haven't taken note of it this last two weeks, we've got Johnny stepping up as our newest apprentice folk builder in the Northwest region.
00:13:54.920 He's going to be helping Joe out. He's going to be covering a lot of that area.
00:13:58.040 Like I said, from the Charming of the Plow I went to, it's a very vibrant region, a lot of interest, a lot of really great people.
00:14:06.740 And Johnny's going to be a big part of capitalizing on that momentum and really making stuff happen. 0.93
00:14:13.880 Something else for you guys to note since last time we talked, we have another Prentice Folk builder that's joined us.
00:14:21.920 We have Massimo Nobili in northern Italy, and he's our first folk builder we've ever had from Italy, and he's going to be helping Andrews over in AFA Europe.
00:14:34.220 And he's got a big job ahead of him because it's not just his job to build Italy, but to work on building our AFA family in all of Europe.
00:14:41.720 And I'm very excited to have Massimo on the team.
00:14:45.060 I got to meet him at Ultima Thula.
00:14:47.240 He went all the way up to Sweden to be at our event.
00:14:51.600 just a tremendously devoted guy i mean you can you can see it in his face you can hear it in his
00:14:58.080 voice he's so proud and so happy to be part of what we're doing and i'm very very excited to
00:15:04.000 see all the success he's going to have over there um also and i mentioned it and i shared
00:15:08.560 something on the afa page massimo's hosting our first ever afa event in italy and he's looking
00:15:14.640 to bring together all of our afa europe members there in northern italy to have a have a weekend
00:15:19.520 event and he's already got a lot of people signed up for it i know a bunch of our scandinavian folk
00:15:26.240 are going to go join him we also have some people from ireland come to go see him over there a
00:15:31.840 member from switzerland going to go be part of that so um if you have the ability by all means
00:15:39.440 go over and support that and see what you can do to make that happen it's very very exciting to see
00:15:44.960 our people coming home uh in our ancestral homelands um also since last time we've talked
00:15:57.520 uh we've got the ask a folk kindred which i talked to you about johnny a second ago but that's his
00:16:04.080 kindred going on in um coastal oregon and that's very excited uh those guys have been working on
00:16:12.560 putting together a kindred for a long time now so uh we're very excited to see them grow and see
00:16:18.640 them be successful we also have a new kindred in norway finally our first ever norwegian kindred
00:16:25.520 um verner put that together along with roger and some other gentlemen that we have in norway and
00:16:35.360 very excited to see that happen i got to meet some of those guys when i was
00:16:39.360 uh on my way to ultimatula last year flight ended up stopping in oslo and we met some of those guys
00:16:44.480 for for a little bit there and visited the the viking ship museum and it was amazing so
00:16:50.400 announcing the the establishment of of noriger kindred in uh in norway um very proud to have
00:17:01.040 that happen uh i say this a lot but for those that hadn't heard it before the afa has got
00:17:08.320 membership now in 15 different countries around the world so that's something really special and
00:17:14.560 it's you know it always amazes me when people think that the afa is just a west coast phenomenon
00:17:21.360 um that hasn't been the case for for a very long time um over these 25 years the afa has expanded
00:17:29.440 certainly across the united states in a big way but also around the world and we see that
00:17:35.360 certainly reflected in our kindred program hey brad good to see you now we have sheila joining us
00:17:46.400 good to see you sheila sheila did an amazing job hosting uh charming the plow at odin's
00:17:51.760 off this last week um that was fantastic so many new faces at our uh odin's off event
00:17:58.960 this last weekend it was really something great to see
00:18:01.600 On the topic of new faces, one of the thing about the newest of faces is the continuing
00:18:11.120 AFA baby boom.
00:18:13.600 I think already this year we have on the docket 20 AFA babies scheduled to join us this year.
00:18:23.560 So that's something really amazing to see.
00:18:26.160 I think we were at 22 for last year and this year's barely started.
00:18:30.960 I know we'll have more and beat that number. So that's, that's a fantastic thing to see.
00:18:38.560 So anybody got any questions? Anybody got anything they want to talk about or anything
00:18:43.200 they want to ask? Any curiosities they might have? I can just kind of keep throwing stuff at
00:18:57.100 stream of consciousness here but i'd love it if anybody did have anything on their mind or uh
00:19:02.460 anything they uh-oh uh-oh my wife just chimed in i was incorrect when i said 20. we've got 21
00:19:10.220 scheduled for this year so far so uh that's that's fantastic news those are just the ones we know
00:19:18.540 about as some of them get a little bit closer to being born i'm sure we'll find out and uh still
00:19:24.940 got a little bit of time for people to people to make some new babies if they want to have them
00:19:28.780 on that list so uh y'all know what to do
00:19:35.820 hmm
00:19:54.940 All right. Well, while you guys are thinking up questions to ask,
00:20:00.520 a couple of things have come to mind. One thing that I've been thinking a lot about lately is our
00:20:14.000 a focus of pride in in Ausatru and pride as it relates to how we approach our gods
00:20:26.380 I think a lot has been made of standing proudly before the before the gods
00:20:33.940 and I think it's easy to see the outward reflection of you know standing self-assured
00:20:43.040 as you approach the divine and i know i've i've talked about the attitude that we need to approach
00:20:47.680 divinity with before but one thing as relates to pride that i think is fundamental is not just for
00:20:53.520 us to act proud but for us to make sure that we're the kind of people that ought to be proud of
00:21:02.320 ourselves but furthermore so much of what we do is about standing in ritual context
00:21:09.040 about interacting with each other in a sacred space and about approaching our gods. It's why
00:21:15.680 at AFA events, we like to start off with a greeting of the gods to make a meta ritual out
00:21:20.460 of it. So we're always mindful that we're doing something sacred. What I think is a really
00:21:24.520 important component of pride is wanting our gods to be proud of us, standing before them in a way
00:21:35.240 not that we, I'm trying to think of the best way to express this.
00:21:41.200 We shouldn't stand before them as if we're too good to be ashamed.
00:21:46.100 We should stand before them as if we don't have anything to be ashamed of,
00:21:51.480 not because that's not a concept, but because we have made ourselves people who can stand proud.
00:21:59.300 We've justified that stance by being good folk, by living right.
00:22:04.400 And I think the idea of living right, knowing that we are right when we stand before our gods and being able to look them in the face, for lack of a better term, is really important.
00:22:18.580 And we're not always going to be perfect on it. We all have a long way to go.
00:22:23.100 But I think keeping that in mind, wanting to stand before the gods as a folk, as a people, and as individuals that they can be proud of and that our ancestors can be proud of, that desire to want our ancestors and our gods proud of us should affect all the things we do.
00:22:42.580 And I think it's really important that we keep that in mind.
00:22:46.580 I think it's important we keep that in mind and help instill that in new folks and in kids.
00:22:51.800 And we want to be proud of ourselves because the gods of the ancestors ought to be proud of us too.
00:23:00.520 We want to have pride in ourselves and we want those who look upon us, who stand with us, and who look back across the veil, we want them to be proud of us as well.
00:23:10.220 It's kind of rambling. I hope I hope I got the point across. But that idea of being people worthy of that pride is really important.
00:23:24.120 David, that's unfortunate. I'm sad that you're not going to be able to attend the the star in the south.
00:23:30.820 I'm trying to think of any ways that you might get help.
00:23:33.780 The man that you really want to reach out to is Goethe Blaine Qualls.
00:23:38.680 He has done so much to set up this event and make it successful.
00:23:42.400 He might have some ideas on some last-minute things that we could use help with as far as that event.
00:23:48.640 I appreciate you stepping forward.
00:23:50.760 It really says something when somebody can't attend an event themselves or reap the benefit,
00:23:56.280 but they're still willing to step up and offer their help.
00:23:59.680 It's a really good thing. Thank you for that, David.
00:24:03.780 Brad, I'm glad you asked me about that.
00:24:10.340 So trying to think of what time timeframe that I told you guys we were going to do that
00:24:18.220 or when we talked about it, but it's been very important to me certainly throughout
00:24:22.420 this last year that we establish a place and a process for entering the ashes of our loved
00:24:31.780 ones and of our folk in holy ground in in a place that's sacred to us um i think that's fundamental
00:24:40.020 with any religious practice is that ceremonial burial um so in doing that we looked into it a
00:24:48.740 lot as far as rules regulations how it all works as far as being able to do that because we have a
00:24:56.500 section at Odenshof set aside that we'd like to do that with well as dealing with most governments
00:25:04.340 without paying money and submitting to something it's very very hard to get a yes
00:25:09.220 but we were unable to find any no's so we're committed to being able to
00:25:14.420 inter ashes at Odenshof we have an area set aside to do that and we have a plan going in
00:25:20.980 But, and this is, you know, we don't want that to fill up too quickly because hopefully our people all live very long, full lives.
00:25:34.340 But as the need develops, that spot's there.
00:25:37.700 We have one family that has talked about putting the ashes of their daughter there.
00:25:42.680 They've held on to these ashes for a very long time because until now there was no way to put them in a sacred place for us.
00:25:50.980 we didn't have our spot, our burial ground. But I'm glad to say that we do now. But we're waiting
00:25:58.100 on that family to feel comfortable and be ready to inter those ashes. But the moment we have
00:26:04.740 somebody that needs to be interred, we have a spot, we have a plan, and that's absolutely going
00:26:09.840 down at Odenshof. And it's good that you mention it because this last weekend I had a really great
00:26:15.480 interaction with a guy. It's such a cemeteries and tombstones and the science of how we deal
00:26:26.320 with the dead is such a specialized thing. And it's not every day that you run into someone who
00:26:33.760 does that professionally, who's made their life on that. But we have a good friend of the AFA here
00:26:40.140 that came out and went over some plans with me uh his family has been in the cemetery business
00:26:46.820 for generations going back hundreds of years into the old country but here you know i say here but
00:26:53.480 by the hof in uh in california they've been doing business there since his grandfather for a hundred
00:26:59.120 years next year so this gentleman talked with us a lot about best way to lay it out how to do that
00:27:06.480 some kind of pro tips on on ways to make it uh ways to make it special and kind of best practices
00:27:12.720 on how to do it so we're we stand ready as soon as we have remains that uh that need to be interred
00:27:19.120 there and in the meantime we're going to be building a better better laid out better put
00:27:24.960 together spot so we're prepared for the future and we have uh space we have spaces and a process
00:27:32.480 laid out to where it's easy when other families need a place for their loved ones um we would
00:27:38.640 love to have them at odenshoff and we'll have a spot for them
00:27:49.920 katrina that is a really really good idea um i know that some folks do that in their local areas
00:27:58.240 as like a um like a book study group but they've done it over live chats if they haven't been
00:28:05.520 close enough i know some guys have talked about doing that regionally um i think that would be
00:28:10.960 a really nice thing uh i would love to see some of that happen i think some of that's going to
00:28:17.200 end up happening organically in our youth program but yeah i would i would really like to see some
00:28:22.960 of that happen and if you want to reach out if you have any ideas on it or ideas on exactly what
00:28:30.720 you want to see i'd love to see some of that get put together in the near future um
00:28:38.480 live streams are a really really interesting tool and a really uh
00:28:43.280 fun and i think effective way to use social media um been doing these myself now for
00:28:52.960 I think this is the 14th one I've done of these monthlies talking to you guys, and I know it's something I look forward to every month, and I've gotten a lot of good feedback, and we've got a lot of people who've become interested because of them, so, yeah, I think they're great, and I think doing one on educational topics would be a really, really nice thing to do.
00:29:15.060 All right, guys, what else do we got? Do we have any other any other questions or any other things you guys would like to speak about tonight?
00:29:26.480 if we do um another thing to just note guys i know that sometimes after these people get
00:29:46.480 frustrated because they asked questions and somehow in a facebook filtering process they
00:29:52.440 never got through i am going to go over you know tonight and tomorrow any comments on this and if
00:29:59.320 people have questions that didn't get answered i'm going to do my best to answer them um if folks
00:30:05.220 have stuff they just think about or if folks miss it and ask questions on there i'll do my best to
00:30:09.740 answer them that way uh if your question doesn't get answered it's not it's not a slight to you
00:30:16.620 it's not because anybody's ducking you it's just simply because we don't get them all from facebook
00:30:21.760 somehow and we're working on tightening that up and figuring it out a little bit better
00:30:26.080 but like i said give it a little bit please feel free to ask afterwards and we'll get to it i know
00:30:32.320 we've had a couple of people in the past that asked questions and felt like they were getting
00:30:36.240 ignored and got a little bit grumpy about it so that's why i'm letting you guys know now
00:30:42.640 i absolutely will i was talking about massimo earlier it's really special to have
00:30:48.000 um such an amazing guy over there uh working for us in italy and and making that happen
00:30:55.120 he's doing he's doing amazing stuff i think very highly of him so i'm really excited to see what
00:31:02.080 and what goes on there well i mentioned it uh earlier and i might as well throw it out there
00:31:28.800 while i've got you guys if you have kids and if you want them involved with the afa youth program
00:31:37.120 we're entering into month three of that program and so far we've got a really good reaction um
00:31:45.280 it has evolved far beyond what you know we had initially thought possible in such a short amount
00:31:51.600 of time uh we got jessica lambert and brandy callahan working on that program and brandy
00:31:57.520 has put in so much work on really making that something special um her and her family's
00:32:05.120 participation in it has made all the difference and uh yeah i could not be prouder of how that's
00:32:11.360 working so far so please if you are interested youth at runestone.org um it's for kids six to
00:32:21.680 six to 18. So far, kids are loving it. One of the things we're trying to be really reflexive to is
00:32:29.020 the participants in it. Are the kids getting something out of it? Do they like doing it?
00:32:34.000 And we're trying to adjust accordingly. So it's a program that's going to continue to evolve
00:32:38.960 and, you know, step up to the occasion to meet the needs and the desires of our folk.
00:32:46.320 But yeah, Brandy's doing an amazing job and we would love to have more kids in that. That's
00:32:50.360 It's something we're very excited about and very proud of.
00:32:58.720 Rob, yes, we do need 25th anniversary merch.
00:33:03.060 Right now on the website, we have the 25th anniversary flag.
00:33:07.600 Get with me afterwards and we can try to figure out some merch ideas.
00:33:11.860 Sean Sandon, the guy that has run our store for a really long time, he has had a very,
00:33:16.860 very rough fall and winter.
00:33:19.560 been trying to keep up as best that he can but we're gonna have some changes in the store and
00:33:24.280 how that's working and uh hopefully we'll get some get some 25th anniversary merchandise up there
00:33:30.360 up there soon but if you don't have one go out and get the 25th anniversary flag
00:33:34.840 it's really nice and uh it's not going to be sold after this year so get yours today
00:33:49.880 So Katie's giving me a piece of wisdom here that she's got to look on her phone and at the stream on the side to get all the little comments.
00:33:57.780 I've tried that, too. I know it's distracting when I'm sitting here talking to you and then I'm looking down and staring at my phone.
00:34:03.340 I try to do it the best I can. Also, we've got Mandy downstairs in the room where she's at right now trying to help me monitor as well.
00:34:12.220 so we catch stuff that i miss and she's really good about throwing up dates and and facts on
00:34:17.820 the side because she's got the time to look them up so uh yeah but thank you for pointing that out
00:34:23.260 katie um i'll try to use my phone a little bit more just to make sure you're on it
00:34:32.380 michael good i'm glad uh be sure to check it out and if it's something you get involved in
00:34:37.660 your kids are involved in be sure to let us know what you think um so the shout out on the afa youth
00:34:44.300 program not just if you got kids and you want them to join but also if you feel like you have
00:34:50.460 something to offer to the kids if you have ideas of stuff that would be you think would be useful
00:34:55.900 if you hear about stuff that's missing and you think you you're that missing excuse me that you
00:35:01.180 could be that missing piece please also reach out to youth evanstone.org these things are
00:35:10.300 their success or failure is based in large part on our volunteers
00:35:16.620 desire and willingness to step up and put in the effort right now it's going super strong because
00:35:22.380 we have some amazing people working on it if we want to keep it going super super strong then we
00:35:27.260 We need amazing people to continue stepping forward and wanting to make that happen.
00:35:33.360 So, like I said, you got any ideas or any feedback, that's always welcome as well.
00:35:41.980 Hail Mandy, indeed.
00:35:43.780 I am a very, very fortunate man.
00:35:50.180 See, look at that, guys.
00:35:51.720 Michael says the flag's awesome.
00:35:54.260 Yeah, I really like the AFA flag.
00:35:57.260 So inside baseball on it, it turned out to be a happy accident. It was misordered a little bit. It was originally going to be on a completely dark blue field, but it being on that white field really makes the AFA blue pop. And yeah, I think it looks so much better this way. So sometimes neat little things like that happen.
00:36:27.260 um no i'd david i'd be really glad to talk to you about that you've heard some of the crickets when
00:36:39.340 i ask for questions i'm happy to talk to you about that um there are a lot of people wearing hammers
00:36:45.420 today first just in general there are a lot of people wearing hammers today and that's fantastic
00:36:51.260 no equivocation no qualification people the increase in folks wearing uh mjolnir's is a great
00:37:02.460 thing now as you mentioned there's a number of people that wear a hammer that may not be on the
00:37:10.300 same page you and i are on and i don't think that's a bad thing assuming you know assuming
00:37:20.700 there are folk uh then wearing that hammer is certainly a gateway it opens up the conversation
00:37:28.220 it makes them aware of something and it plants that seed um
00:37:35.100 you know you you mentioned some advice on how to react to it
00:37:40.060 if people notice your hammer i think that's a fan a great thing i've noticed in the past
00:37:46.060 probably a little bit more, but certainly in the last five years, a lot of people have noticed my
00:37:53.980 hammer. And not just, oh, that's a nice hammer, but enough people even knowing the name Mjolnir.
00:38:02.020 I've even had people notice it and ask if I was an Odinist or if I was Ausatru.
00:38:07.180 So those are really great questions. And it means that people are starting to realize that we're
00:38:11.760 here that this is a viable a viable faith um and i think that's that's all very positive
00:38:19.120 in the worst case scenario if you ask them about the hammer you see the hammer you compliment it
00:38:23.800 you know ask them if they're also true and if they say what then cool that's a great segue into
00:38:30.220 it you know it's a little conversation it doesn't have to be deep but let them know what it is and
00:38:35.040 see maybe they're very interested maybe like no it's just a cultural thing i'm norwegian or
00:38:39.940 whatever they might say well great that means they're aware of their roots they're aware they
00:38:44.660 have a culture they're aware they have a history and that they're aware that before the abrahamic
00:38:51.300 faiths our people had gods our people had religion our people had that and that may awaken something
00:39:00.020 in them to realize that they may want that again for themselves and want to be part of you know
00:39:05.380 the things that we all are able to share so i think everybody wearing hammers it's a good thing
00:39:09.860 i don't think it really dilutes what we do um i mean maybe there's a point that it would but
00:39:15.140 i think currently it doesn't devalue anything that we're doing i think it's a good opportunity
00:39:19.940 to bring our folk home brandy you missed it we were just talking about what a great job you've
00:39:29.540 been doing on the afa youth program and i did encourage folks to reach out to you
00:39:34.740 if they've got kids that they want involved or if they want to help or have ideas that they want to
00:39:39.220 see see happening um someone is in apparently there was a question that got missed that somebody
00:39:52.100 i assume my wife is taking care of on the other end about how long it takes for the membership
00:39:57.220 process to go through to give you guys a little bit of behind the scenes on how that works
00:40:02.500 um when you apply to join the austria folk assembly you may not hear something back
00:40:08.020 immediately and the reason for that is that sometimes it takes we try to keep it to about a
00:40:15.700 week of you know looking into new folks that apply checking them out seeing if you know seeing if
00:40:22.500 they're who they say they are seeing if they're the kind of people that we want around our afa
00:40:28.340 family around our kids and around our members and seeing if there's any big red flags on those
00:40:34.500 and if we see a red flag it doesn't mean you know it's not an automatic exclusion but it does mean
00:40:40.100 we try to have a conversation and test that out there's only so much we can do and we can't be
00:40:48.180 perfect on screening everybody but we do try on the back end so that's why it may take up to a
00:40:53.620 week for somebody to contact you other thing is if you apply for the afa and you know nobody's
00:40:59.460 reached out to you in forever and you don't know why please make sure to check spam folders
00:41:05.140 one of the things that's really frustrating with afa emails
00:41:09.460 sometimes they just don't make it to people's inbox i don't know what it is i don't think
00:41:13.780 there's some big conspiracy behind it but at the end of the day our database and the software that
00:41:18.580 we have sometimes stuff just ends up in people spam folder so if you get curious or you think
00:41:24.020 somebody should have contacted you by now or hadn't or maybe if you reached out with a question
00:41:28.740 and you feel like no one ever answered you please check your spam folder just in case and in any of
00:41:35.780 those things if you ever feel like you've reached out nobody's got a hold of you or you want to
00:41:39.860 check on anything you can always get a hold of me i mean get a hold of me here on facebook you can
00:41:46.180 email mattflavell at runestone.org but please always feel free to reach out to me and I will
00:41:54.020 do my best to answer whatever you need or I'll get to the bottom of it or both so yeah if anything
00:42:00.820 ever gets lost in the system or whatnot please do reach out to me and we'll get it all figured out
00:42:06.260 If a youth program is amazing.
00:42:13.260 Yeah, Michael, I found that, too.
00:42:20.260 It is nice with everybody wearing hammer with so many people wearing hammers.
00:42:24.260 It's a really good conversation starter for us.
00:42:27.260 And same when somebody notices your hammer.
00:42:29.260 One of the best ways that you can let folks know that we're out there and spread out so true.
00:42:35.260 spread Ausatrue in your own, you know, in your own humble way is just wearing your hammer on
00:42:40.920 the outside, wearing your hammer outside your shirt when you go places and have people ask
00:42:45.840 about it. And when they do, tell them and tell them you're part of the Ausatrue Folk assembly.
00:42:50.320 Give them our website address and see where it goes. Maybe it won't go anywhere. Maybe it'll 0.97
00:42:57.300 be huge. It will get great members out of it. Very little to lose and there's a whole lot to gain on
00:43:03.000 got any other questions tonight or anything on folks mind they want to
00:43:14.220 want to talk about or discuss
00:43:16.720 I am I'm taking all questions right now
00:43:27.580 supposed to while people are thinking up some questions for me I suppose to
00:43:32.440 I don't know, piggyback on what I just said a second ago.
00:43:39.920 Not only if you, I don't know, something fell through the cracks and you need to get a hold
00:43:43.960 of me, please do. But just like this, any of these questions, I try to take them live because I feel,
00:43:50.080 I feel there's a better connection when, you know, I can quote unquote, look you in the eye,
00:43:57.820 when I can have my face and my voice and answer questions this way.
00:44:03.640 I think my intention and the answers comes across better.
00:44:08.940 But any time that you want to reach out privately,
00:44:11.840 if there's something you don't want to ask publicly like this,
00:44:14.380 or if you just didn't get a chance, I really, really mean it.
00:44:17.440 I love my AFA family. My door is always open.
00:44:20.660 If you guys have something you want to ask or something you need help with
00:44:23.480 or want to talk about, please do reach out to me.
00:44:27.820 But it's important and I will do my best to get you and get your answers or to get you somewhat to someone who has them and get stuff squared away. So, you know, every month I'm here to answer anybody's questions, but it doesn't just stop when the when the live stream stops. Please do keep that in mind.
00:44:57.820 Katie, you propose that we eventually have an AFA homeschooling program.
00:45:05.980 I second that.
00:45:07.660 Let's do that.
00:45:08.660 I don't know where we're at right now to launch that or anything, but I would love to do that.
00:45:14.540 I know we have a lot of AFA parents that homeschool.
00:45:20.020 I'm planning on welcoming my baby daughter into the world.
00:45:27.820 My new little baby daughter coming into the world on schedule for the 17th of April and she'll be homeschooled. So I know we have a lot of folks, a lot of parents homeschooling their kids. I would really like for us to be able to pull resources on that and make the best out of that. So yeah, Katie, get with me, get with me after this, get with me at another time. Let's try to work on making that a real thing.
00:45:57.820 OustreTrue's approach to diseases and viruses in general or this coronavirus going around.
00:46:08.840 I think one important thing to OustreTrue when it comes to disease control or anything else,
00:46:16.060 we are a practical people. Let's do stuff that works. Let's be, just as I said, let's not be
00:46:25.800 victims of letting things happen to us let's take steps we need to take to prevent things
00:46:31.560 from happening that we don't want um and be the masters of our own destiny in that sense
00:46:40.920 i don't have any great sweeping answer about diseases um or how you choose to handle them
00:46:49.400 but I think that us being cautious and seeing things before they become a problem is really
00:46:56.200 smart and I think that if we this is kind of a common sense thing but it goes you know it's
00:47:04.660 worth saying wash hands be clean people don't be filthy you know watch when you're around filthy
00:47:12.700 people to take precautions. But I think that that's strong. And I think that, yeah, I think
00:47:21.300 one of the other things is to hold the line when there's scary disease things. When we hear media
00:47:28.000 reports of this coronavirus and how terrible it is, and I don't want to take away from the gravity
00:47:32.400 of it at all, but keep your head about you and don't panic. I think that one of the noble things
00:47:39.920 that we can do as noble people and also true is not panic about disease and not panic um
00:47:49.120 not panic because the media tells you to panic keep our wits take appropriate precautions but
00:47:55.440 have a steely resolve to to live our lives and to uh to carry on and to not let um not let these
00:48:04.880 kind of things panic you and cause you to act out of fear we don't ever want to act out of fear
00:48:09.520 We want to act out of calculated, precise decisions that we've made on accurate information
00:48:15.920 and that we've made using wisdom. Wisdom needs to be our guide and never fear and panic. So I think
00:48:22.080 that's about the best I have to say about Astra's approach to disease, specifically with the
00:48:27.360 coronavirus situation yay fun you did make it i'm only with you guys for a few more minutes
00:48:40.720 because i've got a witten meeting that's busted or uh butting right back up against this so i'm
00:48:46.080 gonna have to let you guys go here at seven o'clock but i'm glad you're able to make it on just for a
00:48:50.320 a couple minutes. So any last minute things? Yeah, any last minute things anybody wanted to ask?
00:49:15.420 um and and i don't think i didn't see the comment about david lane's writings i'm happy to talk to
00:49:23.980 somebody about that but it's such a hot button thing just as that if there's a specific statement
00:49:29.660 or a specific idea of david lanes that you want some kind of a reaction on or you want to know
00:49:36.140 what i think on then please feel free to ask that i think you know with six minutes left it's too
00:49:43.180 big of a thing to just i don't know have some big blanket commentary on all of all of the man's
00:49:50.140 writings or all of the man's beliefs but if there's a specific idea or something that you
00:49:55.100 guys like to speak of or or whatever do email me that or message me that and and i would be glad
00:50:02.380 to talk to you about whatever you'd like wayne um hi aaron uh thank you guys so much for joining me
00:50:11.900 tonight on these um some nights we have more questions than others but i look forward to it
00:50:16.940 all the time um it's great to talk with you guys i really do love my afa family and i look forward
00:50:22.700 to this every month i do have a few more minutes here if anybody has has some quick questions or
00:50:29.980 anything they want you know want me to speak on i'd be happy to um yeah please do
00:50:41.900 Do let me know or do ask if you have anything here. We do have a couple of more minutes. And like I said, I don't want anybody to get left out if they have something and it hasn't been addressed. People coming in late or people that didn't hear me earlier, I will go over these things and try to answer stuff after this.
00:51:00.320 So if something occurs to you and I just didn't have time to get to it, or if you sent it and for some reason I didn't see it or it didn't get to me, Facebook kind of filters the comments strangely, go ahead and ask.
00:51:11.300 And I will try to get back to those in the next day or so.
00:51:19.180 Questions going once.
00:51:21.360 Questions going twice.
00:51:23.880 All right, guys.
00:51:25.060 Thank you very much.
00:51:28.340 I'm going to let you guys go.
00:51:30.320 I hope that I see you guys at Ostara in the South.
00:51:33.500 That's going to be a fantastic event if you can make it by all means you need to, because like I said, it really is going to be amazing.
00:51:41.300 We've got great people who put a lot of time into it.
00:51:45.280 Yeah, I look forward to talking to you guys in April if I haven't talked to you before then.
00:51:51.200 I hope you guys have an amazing month.
00:51:52.920 I hope you guys have a fantastic Ostara.
00:51:54.980 out. Hail the gods, hail the folk, hail the AFA.