I hate to see it come to this, as Feri was one of the Traditions I had an interest in, and a lot of respect for. But it did have to happen.
You cannot water down Mystery and sell it to the highest bidder, as though it was your own possession. When you inherit Tradition, it is not your belonging. You have to keep to the y'know, TRADITION part of Tradition, or else it becomes something different. And when it changes, it's name should change too.
i have noticed this split on the internets of late. it is quite umm.. *waves hands*.. informative? interesting? curious. i will be reading the various bloggs etc about it.
ReplyDeletei have quite an interest in it and like you a respect for it to.. unfortunately there is no feri or faery in NZ.. hmm..
*ponders thoughtfully*
From what I can tell, the main oomph is this: Some people are charging for training and initiation and some people are very, very, against that. I can't say what's "right", but I can say that I very much disagree with charging for initiation.
ReplyDeleteI can also say that calling oneself a Fairy, and then doing things which would classically piss off the Fair Folk strikes me as being the worst kind of self-inflicted suffering imaginable.
Mainstream Feri has become like mainstream Wicca - it has run away with itself. It's mostly only the big name Feris that charge. For them, it is their day job - but thousands of dollars for training and some don't even initiate you after? That's pretty questionable to me. T. Thorn Coyle used to charge five grand a head. In the line I was training in they never charge for teaching. Instead you become family and never part from your teachers in your lifetime.
ReplyDeleteThis is the site with the best, most truthful, and the closest to the original trad as taught by the Andersons: www.lilithslantern.com. Only one of the Anderson's direct initiates is still teaching, the rest have left the Feri community due to what it has become. Sad, but true.
See, this gets me.. if you want to be a full time clergyperson, okay. Full-time clergy get paid. But some Traditions do not have room for clergy - because every initiate is a Priest or Priestess.
ReplyDeleteTo me, charging for Initiation is like having an amnesiac family member and saying "I'll show you the family photo album for $2K, I'll give you names for another $1K, but to get everyone's phone numbers is going to be a additional $5K, not a penny less. My Time Is Valuable!"
It hurts my heart, suffice it to say.
There's always five swindlers per genuine person looking to make a buck off of what the first person started. History is full of examples, especially occult history. Tis sad, but we must truck on in spite of it so they don't get the better of us.
ReplyDeleteIt was coming, I think we all saw it.
ReplyDeleteWhen you describe something as a "particularly dark and juicy form of witchcraft", oooh does that turn people on. Wonderful sales angle, it is. And one of the double standards of the otherwise white-light-ish neopagan community that I don't fully understand.
Well that is most upsetting :(
ReplyDelete@Witchofforestgrove: Victor's initiates have not left the community. You likely don't know them.
ReplyDeleteJust wanted to let you know that there are several Anderson initiates teaching out there, but they prefer that the student find them. They do not have websites to guide you there.
ReplyDeleteMany many of these folks are now using the older spelling Faery (post-split), if they choose to identify themselves at all.
I agree with the sentiments expressed here. The split needed to happen and it was a long time coming.
@witchofforestgrove.com: Although I myself have, over time, come to feel that teaching a mystery Tradition like Feri for money in workshop or distance format makes an ineffective container for the work, I was Thorn Coyle's financial manager for a two-year training and for several workshops. She always charged on a sliding scale, never more than $200 per person per weekend (and usually less), and there were always work exchange and scholarships available for those for whom the bottom of the sliding scale was still too much.
ReplyDeleteIf we're going to criticize teachers who charge for training, we need the real facts. Even those who charge for teaching are hardly getting rich; that's not the accusation.
@Anonymous - Correction, only one of the Anderson's direct initiates from their last operational coven is still teaching. I never met anyone outside of the Vicia line and now that I see all the craziness going on I'm glad of it and glad I'm no longer a part of it.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the clarification Queenofhalves.
@Witchofforestgrove: That's not quite true either. The last coven the Andersons had has at least one other initiate that has a student at this time. I know hir personally.
ReplyDeleteThere are actually a couple of those initiates (in that last coven) who have made the split onto the private Faery side of things, a couple who have decided public Feri is where it is at, and still others have not taken a specific stand.
Most of these initiates do not use the term "Vicia", however- only the two initiates that you encountered use that term currently for their line/teaching.
I say these things here not to nitpick at you at all, but because there is history being rewritten by some in Feri that needs to be corrected for the public. Blessings to you.