Summer Camps for Pagan Children: The Absence of Adventure

You would think that summer camps and Pagan children would go together like ice cream and waffle cones. Unfortunately, there is a serious gap in getting summer camps appropriate to Pagan children, particularly ones that are affordable.

Why? Well, because so many summer camps are sponsored by religious organizations. Pagan organizations tend to be sparse and/or ill-funded. Christians, however, have church groups in spades.

This means that affordable choices are often reduced to A) day camps for art or technology, B) 5-day or week-long camps for one sport or another, or C) 5-day or week-long summer camps that start and end each day with a prayer service.

Don't get me wrong. I don't begrudge other religions their beliefs, but I attended one of these camps with a "prayer service." We went horseback riding, swimming, canoing. We played Capture the Flag, and roasted marshmallows over a campfire. And nearly every single attendee was convinced to "accept Jesus into your heart" through individual prayer and counselling by the camp staff.

The point is, having a traditional camp experience, with a variety of outdoor activities, is incredibly difficult to find without the strings of (often Christian) religion attached. Attempts have been made to create Pagan-centered summer camps for kids but, so far as I can tell, they have all fallen away.

It might be worth it for us, as a community, to consider what the core issue is. Is the community just not family-oriented enough for kids' summer camps to be a priority? Is it that Pagans aren't supporting our spiritual organizations to the degree that such a sponsorship would happen?

Growing as a community means we need to start considering the needs of our future generations. We are seeing more and more Pagans raised in the Craft, and surely we will see even more in the future. Let's give those kids some memories and adventures, too.

Left Turn, No Blinker

There are two ways to approach having children: a) they will fit into your pre-existing life, and b) your life does a 180, loop-the-loop, barrel roll, screetching halt, speedy reverse with drifting...

Anyone who thinks that they can go with A is in for a shock. It just doesn't work that way.

Children are like bank robbers who get trapped with the bank CEO, surrounded by SWAT. They are desperate to get their own way and somewhat delusional that they might actually do so. Any negotiation with the hostage takers will only result in encouraging their behavior. DO NOT NEGOTIATE. They will NOT release your life to it's previous existence.

For pagans, this is even more so the case. We used to go to ritual, engage in various activities for achieving altered states, some form of "free lovin", a little bit of nudity, playing with fire and bladed weapons, staying up all night, dancing around fires...

Now? Supper is at 6, pj's and books at 7, and bedtime is 8, and the goddess split the skull of anyone who dares to disturb that most sacred of rituals.

Where solstice used to be a revelry of unprecedented Bacchanalia, it now consists of barely getting the kids outside before the sun sets (cuz you disrupted the sacred ritual, silly!), trying to light a fire in the firepit with wet firewood (cuz it's been raining for a week and you were just happy that all the family was indoors - forget worrying about the wood!), while using free limbs (arms, legs, head) to keep the kids from sticking their "helpful" fingers into the flames, then trying to make up a story about the sun on the spot (cuz you certainly haven't had any time to PREPARE) and having it interrupted every 30 seconds by questions you may or may not know the answer to until you don't know which way is up.

But it's all worth it because every family member joined in waving goodbye to the setting sun and that seems far more spiritual than turning in a circle to address each of the cardinal directions.

Happy Solstice (late, of course)!!