“Queering the Flame” is
an as yet unpublished essay that will be released in 2015 in Laurie’s
collection of essays, interviews, and reviews.
Herself a keeper of Brigit’s flame, Laurie is an amateur
scholar whose work rests on diligent research and thorough citation, combined
with a carefully thought out,
ethical, and personal Polytheist sensibility.
She carefully distinguishes between her own ideas and what can be discerned
from the literature (hooray!), allowing the reader to reach informed conclusions
of her own.
The
impetus for writing this piece was a debate that arose within the Celtic Reconstructionist
(NeoPagan) community when a mixed gender Brigidine flame-keeping group was
proposed. Laurie asks, “What would make the act of tending a perpetual flame in
the name of a particular Goddess problematic or contentious? What are the
theological assumptions at work, and why is gender such a central issue within
some of those assumptions? More importantly for this essay, what does queerness
have to do with it? To address these issues, we need to look at the person and
place of Brigit as Goddess and saint, the practice of flamekeeping generally,
and the ritual traditions that surround this act. ”
Accordingly, in “Queering the
Flame” Laurie examines the ethical and ideological issues as she sees them, and
looks at perpetual
sacred flames in historical Pagan
religions and in medieval Christian Ireland.
“These sacred fires, both in [Pagan] Rome and
in Ireland, were considered community hearthfires, regardless of the gender of
the flamekeepers. Regional ritual fires were lit from the Irish flames, as were
household flames on particular holy days, and if a household’s flame were
accidentally extinguished, it also would be relit from the sacred flame. The hearthstone
at Inishmurray is specifically cited as a source for the relighting of
household flames, even after the church itself was long-deserted and the
physical flame extinguished”.
Having shown that in Ireland both men and
women tended perpetual sacred flames, and that Irish flame-tending practices
may well not have had Pagan origins, she argues that in Celtic
Reconstructionist practice the tending of Brigit’s flame ought to be open to
both men and women, with women-only groups coexisting with those of mixed
genders. “Queering”
of gender roles is examined as well, including, for instance, cross-dressing among
biddy boys and Bitel’s consideration of nuns as “masculinized” women in the context
of their time.
What separates Laurie’s
examination of flame-tending from other works in the Academic category is her
stated relationship to Brigit and her concern for the NeoPagan and Polytheist
communities: welcome additions, in my opinion.
She states, “Flametending has been a rhythmic,
almost tidal support to my spiritual and creative life. The regular presence of
the flame on the altar near my writing desk is a tangible reminder of Brigit
and of her patronage of poets, of the accessibility of inspiration, and of the
dedication necessary to nurture a life as a poet and writer. Each time I light
the flame, I renew my devotion to creativity as a deep and necessary part of my
spiritual path.”
“Queering the Flame: Brigit, Flamekeeping, and Gender in Celtic Reconstructionist Pagan Communities”, by
Erynn Rowan Laurie in
The Well of Five Streams: Essays on Celtic Paganism (
Immanion Press, projected release
2015) 17 pp.
