Last month the Tulsa City Council opened proceedings with a prayer exhorting the council to “find within themselves the embodied divine, the sacred essence of the spark of the universe” as they engaged in “the sacred work of protecting the sovereignty and autonomy of all our people.”
The prayer asked for divine light that “they may walk the path of justice, protected and prepared, illuminating the darkness. Endow them with the fire of courage, the waters of compassion, the air of truth and the strength of the Earth itself.”
Pretty normal stuff. But wait, brethren and sistren. The woman offering these good tidings was not a Christian. In fact, Amy Hardy-McAdams identifies herself as a “Third-Degree High Priestess of the Artemisian Faerie Faith Tradition of Witchcraft.”
Does that taint her message? In a state and nation that were founded on the principle of religious diversity, equality and inclusivity?
Well, since Hardy-McAdams invoked the Gorgonea, Medusa and Awen, without any mention of Christianity, she and the council were assailed by Oklahoma’s self-anointed Christian Nationalist spokesmen.
After hearing of the Tulsa prayer, Stitt fumed: “Satan is trying to establish a foothold, but Oklahoma is going to be a shining city on the hill. Tulsa City Council needs to stand strong against actions like this, and Tulsans need to remember who allowed this at the ballot box.”
[This was allowed because outgoing councilor Crista Patrick, a six-year council veteran, “wanted to share one little part of myself before I left office.”]
State School Supt. Ryan Walters, like Stitt, wants taxpayers to fund religious schools, but he also calls for Bibles in every public school classroom, mandatory religious instruction and making every student in the state listen to his own prayers.
Walters responded to the prayer by posting, “Satanic prayers are welcome in Hell but not in Oklahoma. Satanism is not a religion.” [Well, actually it has been proven so in various court cases.]
Walters probably still smarts over his failure to become the Secretary of Education Donald Trump chose to destroy the Education Department. Using state tax money to hire a public relations firm to generate publicity, Walters forgot that no narcissist such as Trump wants anyone to get more attention than he does.
Three observations:
First, it is not these guys’ business as to what a member of the Tulsa City Council believes – or any other person in the state for that matter. That should be obvious to any priest, rabbi or preacher who walk into a bar together – and anybody else capable of reading federal and state constitutions.
Second, our religious bullies compound their arrogance with ignorance in confusing an obviously Wiccan prayer with Satanism. Satan has no standing in the Wiccan community – as he does with those who embrace the Bible, which also acknowledges the power of at least one witch, she of Endor, who conjured a vision of Samuel for Saul.
It is just this kind of ignorance Stitt and Walters promote in their attacks on education. The history of religions and the stories that shaped them are fascinating topics. Turning public schools into Sunday Schools serves only one religion. Their next step would be to root out Christian heretics.
Ironically, the third revelation of these Christian Nationalists is their own disbelief in what they preach.
If they were true believers, if they embraced their message, they would teach it and live it, and not feel the compulsion to force others to conform to superficial trappings that discourage conversion.
They would trust the message and the examples they should be living to convert the minds of non-believers. They do not. Instead, they want to use the full power of the state to force everyone else to observe their subjective beliefs.
To put the situation into religious terms: Stitt and Walters are more obsessed with controlling the bodies of others than enlightening their souls.
The prayer in question as I transcribed it:
As a priestess of the Goddess, I invoke the Gorgonea – champions of equality and sacred rage. I call to Medusa, monstrous hero of the oppressed and abused. I open the eye of Medusa, the stare that petrified injustice.
I call upon the serpent that rises from this land to face the stars, the movement of wisdom unbound. May these leaders find within themselves the embodied divine, the sacred essence of the spark of the universe and the breath of the Awen.
Place in the hands of these leaders the sacred work of protecting the sovereignty and autonomy of all our people.
Gorgon goddess, make them ready and willing to be champions for all in this city, not just those in power.
Shine the light for them that they may walk the path of justice protected and prepared, illuminating the darkness.
Endow them with the fire of courage, the waters of compassion, the air of truth and the strength of the Earth itself.
As above, so below. As within, so without. As the universe, so the soul. May there be peace among you all. And so it is.
– Amy Hardy-McAdams Nov. 20, 2024, Tulsa City Council
