Church of All Worlds
Encyclopedia
Neopaganism
Neopaganism is an umbrella term used to identify a wide variety of modern religious movements, particularly those influenced by or claiming to be derived from the various pagan beliefs of pre-modern Europe...
religious group whose stated mission is to evolve a network of information, mythology, and experience that provides a context and stimulus for reawakening Gaia
Gaia (mythology)
Gaia was the primordial Earth-goddess in ancient Greek religion. Gaia was the great mother of all: the heavenly gods and Titans were descended from her union with Uranus , the sea-gods from her union with Pontus , the Giants from her mating with Tartarus and mortal creatures were sprung or born...
and reuniting her children through tribal community
Tribalism
The social structure of a tribe can vary greatly from case to case, but, due to the small size of tribes, it is always a relatively simple role structure, with few significant social distinctions between individuals....
dedicated to responsible stewardship and evolving consciousness
Consciousness
Consciousness is a term that refers to the relationship between the mind and the world with which it interacts. It has been defined as: subjectivity, awareness, the ability to experience or to feel, wakefulness, having a sense of selfhood, and the executive control system of the mind...
.
The key founder of CAW is Oberon Zell-Ravenheart
Oberon Zell-Ravenheart
Oberon Zell-Ravenheart is a co-founder of the Church of All Worlds, as well as a writer and speaker on the subject of Neopaganism. He completed a Bachelor of Arts degree in psychology from Westminster College in Fulton, Missouri in 1965...
, who serves the Church as "Primate
Primate (religion)
Primate is a title or rank bestowed on some bishops in certain Christian churches. Depending on the particular tradition, it can denote either jurisdictional authority or ceremonial precedence ....
", later along with his wife, Morning Glory Zell-Ravenheart
Morning Glory Zell-Ravenheart
Morning Glory Zell-Ravenheart is a Neopagan poet, author, lecturer, and priestess. She is of Irish and Choctaw Indian ancestry.-Early Life:...
, designated High Priestess. CAW was formed in 1962, evolving from a group of friends and lovers who were in part inspired by a fictional religion of the same name in the science fiction
Science fiction
Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...
novel
Novel
A novel is a book of long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late 18th century....
Stranger in a Strange Land
Stranger in a Strange Land
Stranger in a Strange Land is a 1961 science fiction novel by American author Robert A. Heinlein. It tells the story of Valentine Michael Smith, a human who comes to Earth in early adulthood after being born on the planet Mars and raised by Martians. The novel explores his interaction with—and...
by Robert A. Heinlein
Robert A. Heinlein
Robert Anson Heinlein was an American science fiction writer. Often called the "dean of science fiction writers", he was one of the most influential and controversial authors of the genre. He set a standard for science and engineering plausibility and helped to raise the genre's standards of...
; the church's mythology includes science fiction to this day. The headquarters are presently in Cotati, California
Cotati, California
Cotati is an incorporated city in Sonoma County, California, U.S.A., located about north of San Francisco in the 101 corridor between Rohnert Park and Petaluma....
.
CAW's members, called Waterkin, espouse paganism
Paganism
Paganism is a blanket term, typically used to refer to non-Abrahamic, indigenous polytheistic religious traditions....
, but the Church is not a belief-based religion. Members experience Divinity
Divinity
Divinity and divine are broadly applied but loosely defined terms, used variously within different faiths and belief systems — and even by different individuals within a given faith — to refer to some transcendent or transcendental power or deity, or its attributes or manifestations in...
and honor these experiences while also respecting the views of others. They recognize "Gaea," the Earth Mother Goddess
Mother goddess
Mother goddess is a term used to refer to a goddess who represents motherhood, fertility, creation or embodies the bounty of the Earth. When equated with the Earth or the natural world such goddesses are sometimes referred to as Mother Earth or as the Earth Mother.Many different goddesses have...
and the Father God, as well as the realm of Faeries
Fairy
A fairy is a type of mythical being or legendary creature, a form of spirit, often described as metaphysical, supernatural or preternatural.Fairies resemble various beings of other mythologies, though even folklore that uses the term...
and the deities
Deity
A deity is a recognized preternatural or supernatural immortal being, who may be thought of as holy, divine, or sacred, held in high regard, and respected by believers....
of many other pantheons. Many of their ritual celebrations are centered on the gods and goddesses of ancient Greece
Ancient Greece
Ancient Greece is a civilization belonging to a period of Greek history that lasted from the Archaic period of the 8th to 6th centuries BC to the end of antiquity. Immediately following this period was the beginning of the Early Middle Ages and the Byzantine era. Included in Ancient Greece is the...
.
Formation
CAW began in 1961 with a group of high schoolHigh school
High school is a term used in parts of the English speaking world to describe institutions which provide all or part of secondary education. The term is often incorporated into the name of such institutions....
friends. One of these was Richard Lance Christie from Tulsa, Oklahoma
Tulsa, Oklahoma
Tulsa is the second-largest city in the state of Oklahoma and 46th-largest city in the United States. With a population of 391,906 as of the 2010 census, it is the principal municipality of the Tulsa Metropolitan Area, a region with 937,478 residents in the MSA and 988,454 in the CSA. Tulsa's...
. Christie was fascinated by the "self-actualization" concepts of Abraham Maslow
Abraham Maslow
Abraham Harold Maslow was an American professor of psychology at Brandeis University, Brooklyn College, New School for Social Research and Columbia University who created Maslow's hierarchy of needs...
, a renowned American psychologist
Psychology
Psychology is the study of the mind and behavior. Its immediate goal is to understand individuals and groups by both establishing general principles and researching specific cases. For many, the ultimate goal of psychology is to benefit society...
, and after meeting then-Timothy Zell at Westminster College in Fulton, Missouri, he began experiments in extrasensory perception
Extra-sensory perception
Extrasensory perception involves reception of information not gained through the recognized physical senses but sensed with the mind. The term was coined by Frederic Myers, and adopted by Duke University psychologist J. B. Rhine to denote psychic abilities such as telepathy, clairaudience, and...
. It was during this time that the group they formed read Heinlein’s science fiction novel, Stranger in a Strange Land, which became the inspiration for CAW.
Heinlein's book, combined with Maslow's self-actualization concepts, led to the formation of a waterbrotherhood that Zell and Christie called Atl, the Aztec word for "water", and also meaning "home of our ancestors". Atl became dedicated to political and social change and the group grew to about 100 members.
Zell formed CAW from Atl, and filed for incorporation as a church in 1967. It was formally chartered on March 4, 1968, making it the first Earth religion
Earth religion
Earth religion is a New Age term used mostly in the context of Neopaganism.It is an umbrella phrase that is used to cover any religion that worships the Earth, Nature, or fertility gods and goddesses, such as the various forms of goddess worship or matriarchal religion. Some find a connection...
to obtain full United States recognition as a church.
Early organization and beliefs
CAW modeled its organization after the group in Heinlein's novel, as a series of 9 nests in circles of advancement that were each named after a planet. The basic dogmaDogma
Dogma is the established belief or doctrine held by a religion, or a particular group or organization. It is authoritative and not to be disputed, doubted, or diverged from, by the practitioners or believers...
of the CAW was that there was no dogma – the basic "belief" was a stated "lack of belief". Within their religion, the only sin was hypocrisy
Hypocrisy
Hypocrisy is the state of pretending to have virtues, moral or religious beliefs, principles, etc., that one does not actually have. Hypocrisy involves the deception of others and is thus a kind of lie....
and the only crime in the eyes of the church was interfering with another person.
By 1970, CAW placed greater emphasis on ecology
Ecology
Ecology is the scientific study of the relations that living organisms have with respect to each other and their natural environment. Variables of interest to ecologists include the composition, distribution, amount , number, and changing states of organisms within and among ecosystems...
and nature, applying the term pagan
Paganism
Paganism is a blanket term, typically used to refer to non-Abrahamic, indigenous polytheistic religious traditions....
to nature-lovers in general, regardless of religion.
Evolution
Moving toward an emphasis on nature eventually led to a breaking of the relationship between CAW and Atl. By 1974, CAW had nests in more than a dozen states around the United States. That year, Zell married Morning Glory (née Diana Moore) and in 1976 he and Morning Glory settled in Eugene, OregonEugene, Oregon
Eugene is the second largest city in the U.S. state of Oregon and the seat of Lane County. It is located at the south end of the Willamette Valley, at the confluence of the McKenzie and Willamette rivers, about east of the Oregon Coast.As of the 2010 U.S...
and then at the Coeden Brith land in northern California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
.
When Zell stepped away from central leadership, the Church of All Worlds suffered internal strife that led to most of the church dissolving. By 1978 the focus and headquarters shifted to California with the Zells and the nine-circle nest structure was revamped. CAW then served for several years as an umbrella organization
Umbrella organization
An umbrella organization is an association of institutions, who work together formally to coordinate activities or pool resources. In business, political, or other environments, one group, the umbrella organization, provides resources and often an identity to the smaller organizations...
for its subsidiaries.
Subsidiaries
Morning Glory Zell founded the Ecosophical Research Association (ERA) in 1977 to research arcane lore and legends. Its first project of note was the creation of living unicorns in 1980, after noting that early art depicts the creatures as being more goat-like than horse-like. The Zells reconstructed what they claimed was an ancient unicorning procedure, a process involving surgically manipulating the horn buds of kids during their first week of life, and created several unicorns, some of which toured with the Ringling Brothers CircusRingling Brothers Circus
The Ringling Brothers Circus was a circus founded in the United States in 1884 by five of the seven Ringling Brothers: Albert , August , Otto , Alfred T. , Charles , John , and Henry...
for a time http://www.lair2000.net/Unicorn_Dreams/Unicorns_Man_Made/unicorns_man_made.html. The ERA sponsored a Mermaid expedition to Papua, New Guinea in 1985 and a later ERA project involved the May 1996 world-wide ritual to draw upon and re-activate the Oracle at Delphi. This rite involved a relatively early attempt at utilizing online community
Online community
An online community is a virtual community that exists online and whose members enable its existence through taking part in membership ritual. An online community can take the form of an information system where anyone can post content, such as a Bulletin board system or one where only a restricted...
and internet-facilitated virtual community
Virtual community
A virtual community is a social network of individuals who interact through specific media, potentially crossing geographical and political boundaries in order to pursue mutual interests or goals...
rituals conducted simultaneously across different time zones. Led by Maerian Morris
Maerian Morris
Maerian Morris is a Neopagan author, scholar, digital and performance artist, editor, and priestess. She edited Green Egg Magazine from 1993 to 2001, is a former High Priestess of The Church of All Worlds, and is the founder of Westernesste, a modern Neopagan church, and The Sidhevairs, a digital...
another former High Priestess of CAW, working from Delphi, The reactivation of Delphi was the subject of a series of six editorials in Green Egg
Green Egg
Green Egg is a Neopagan magazine published by the Church of All Worlds from 1968 through 1976 and 1988 through 2000, and restarted in 2007. It was created and edited for most of its existence by Oberon Zell-Ravenheart....
(issues 125 through 130) from November/December 1998 through September/October 1999.
In 1978 CAW merged with Nemeton, a Pagan organization founded by Gwydion Pendderwen
Gwydion Pendderwen
Thomas deLong , better known as Gwydion Pendderwen, was an American musician, writer, poet, conservationist and witch....
and Alison Harlow. In 1987 CAW also absorbed Forever Forests, another one of Pendderwen’s organizations. An outgrowth of Forever Forests was founded in 1983 by Anodea Judith
Anodea Judith
Anodea Judith is an American author, therapist, public speaker and expert on the Chakra system, bodymind , somatic therapy, and Yoga...
, past president and High Priestess of CAW, called Lifeways.
The Holy Order of Mother Earth (HOME), founded in 1978 by the Zells, is another subsidiary, dedicated to magical living and working with the land.
Oberon and Morning Glory Zell-Ravenheart have appeared at over 20 Starwood Festival
Starwood Festival
The Starwood Festival is a seven-day Neo-Pagan, New Age, multi-cultural and world music festival presented in mid- to late July. Approximately 1,500 people attend including staff, speakers and entertainers. The Starwood Festival is a camping event which holds workshops on a variety of subjects...
s (and a few WinterStar Symposiums) over the past 25 years; because of this, there has been a Church of All Worlds presence at Starwood, called the CAWmunity, for over a decade.
First Renaissance
By the mid-1980s, CAW had practically ceased operation outside of Ukiah, CaliforniaUkiah, California
The average high temperature is 73.5 °F . Average low temperature is 46.1 °F . Temperatures reach 90 °F on an average of 65.6 days annually and 100 °F on an average of 14.4 days annually. Due to frequent low humidity, summer temperatures normally drop into the fifties at night. Freezing...
where the Zells relocated in 1985. Anodea Judith assumed presidency until 1991, and the structure of the organization was revamped with plans for more nest meetings, training courses, new rituals, and publications. By the late 1990s CAW had increased membership internationally, becoming particularly strong in Australia, where it was legally incorporated in 1992.
In 1998 Oberon Zell-Ravenheart took a year-and-a-day sabbatical
Sabbatical year
Sabbatical or a sabbatical is a rest from work, or a hiatus, often lasting from two months to a year. The concept of sabbatical has a source in shmita, described several places in the Bible...
from his role as Primate, and the church headquarters were moved to Toledo, Ohio
Toledo, Ohio
Toledo is the fourth most populous city in the U.S. state of Ohio and is the county seat of Lucas County. Toledo is in northwest Ohio, on the western end of Lake Erie, and borders the State of Michigan...
.
Attempted termination & Second Renaissance
On August, 2004, the Board of Directors decided to terminate CAW due to financial and legal struggles. In January, 2006, CAW was reestablished with Zells again assuming a leadership role. In 2007, Green EggGreen Egg
Green Egg is a Neopagan magazine published by the Church of All Worlds from 1968 through 1976 and 1988 through 2000, and restarted in 2007. It was created and edited for most of its existence by Oberon Zell-Ravenheart....
, CAW's influential journal, returned to publication in an online format. The "3rd Phoenix Resurrection of the Church" continues to the present.
See also
- Green EggGreen EggGreen Egg is a Neopagan magazine published by the Church of All Worlds from 1968 through 1976 and 1988 through 2000, and restarted in 2007. It was created and edited for most of its existence by Oberon Zell-Ravenheart....
- Neopaganism in the United StatesNeopaganism in the United StatesNeopaganism in the United States is represented by widely different movements and organizations. The largest Neopagan religion is Wicca, followed by Neodruidism. Both of these religions were introduced during the 1950s from Great Britain. Germanic Neopaganism and Kemetism appeared in the US in...
- Morning Glory Zell-RavenheartMorning Glory Zell-RavenheartMorning Glory Zell-Ravenheart is a Neopagan poet, author, lecturer, and priestess. She is of Irish and Choctaw Indian ancestry.-Early Life:...
- Oberon Zell-RavenheartOberon Zell-RavenheartOberon Zell-Ravenheart is a co-founder of the Church of All Worlds, as well as a writer and speaker on the subject of Neopaganism. He completed a Bachelor of Arts degree in psychology from Westminster College in Fulton, Missouri in 1965...
External links
- CAWeb – The Official Website of the Church of All Worlds, Inc.
- Church of All Worlds: A Brief History from The Pagan Library
- CAW Florida – an example of a CAW Nest
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