Curses!

It appears though that Wicca has made it into the Big Leagues in America. As in Major League Baseball. Not so strange since most sports types are superstitious and after all witchcraft and magick is commonly used in Soccer.

Garner can’t find right voodoo doll

Looking for a way to slow down Chicago Cubs ace Carlos Zambrano, Houston Astros manager Phil Garner decided to try voodoo.

“I’m confused,” Garner told Chicago’s Daily Southtown. “I went online and looked for my voodoo guy and I’m going to have to pick one and try to get it. Most of these curses are against lovers … I’ve got to find one that puts a curse on a baseball player.”

Of course there are other ways to curse a ball player.

“It wasn’t voodoo. I stayed away from the voodoo. I can’t go into the details. I’ll just have to tell you Wicca (a form of witchcraft),” Garner said to the Houston Chronicle, explaining his latest plan.

But Voodoo ain't Wicca. The former does claim on occasion to use curse magick the latter says it doesn't.


Voodoo is Black Magick, as in originating in Africa, while Wicca claims to be White Magick, as in Eurocentric.

A Witchcraft suppression bill, currently being drafted by the Mpumalanga legislature, has struck fear into the hearts of South Africa's witches, who fear the dark days of medieval witch-hunts may soon return.

The bill, leaked in June to the South African Pagan Rights Alliance (Sapara), threatens to undermine the freedoms and rights of a religious minority by criminalising and prohibiting their right to exist and practise their religion, says Sapra convener Damon Leff.

The draft, titled the Mpumalanga Witchcraft Suppression Bill 2007, states in its introduction that it is "to provide for the suppression of witchcraft in the province".

In Chapter 6 it states any person who "professes a knowledge of witchcraft or the use of charms" or "for gain pretends to exercise or use any supernatural powers, witchcraft, sorcery or enchantment" shall be guilty of an offence.
One of the major causes of the Western pagans' upset, according to Leff, is the failure of the bill to recognise the doctrinal and ethical gap between Western pagan and some forms of traditional African witchcraft.

And according to Vos, by lumping the two religions together the bill has overlooked how differently they approach the issue of ethical responsibility.

"While in rare cases (some in Mpumalanga) murder has been committed to get hold of human tissues, such as hearts and genitals for muti practices, the furthest a Western pagan would go is to collect human hair and nail clippings," he claimed.

Another serious criticism Western pagans in the country harbour is the bill's stereotyping of witches and witchcraft as being harmful and dangerous to their community.

The bill defines witchcraft as "the secret use of muti, zombies, spells, spirits, magic powers, water, mixtures, etc, by any person with the purpose of causing harm, damage, sickness to others or their property".

Leff has asked the Mpumalanga advocates to replace it with the definition: "a religio-magical occupation that employs the use of sympathetic magic, ritual, herbalism and divination".

AIDS, Witchcraft, and the Problem of Power in Post-Apartheid South Africa

As an epidemic of AIDS sweeps through this part of Africa, isidliso is the name that
springs to mind amongst many in the epidemic’s path. To the extent that this occurs, the epidemic of HIV/AIDS becomes also an epidemic of witchcraft. But the implications for a witchcraft epidemic are quite different from those of a public health crisis, at least as such things are conventionally conceived in western discourses of social and political management.

In this paper I will examine some of the implications of interpreting HIV/AIDS
infection as witchcraft and ask what they might mean for the legitimacy of public power in post-apartheid South Africa. For when suspicions of witchcraft are in play in a community, problems of illness and death can transform matters of public health into questions of public power, questions relating to the identification and punishment of persons deemed responsible for bringing misfortune to the community, that is: witches.

So instead of using pins in dolls to curse his opponent perhaps Garner should have found a witch who was good at casting Lucky Mojo Spells.

Like this guy.

Wiccan Wins Lottery

Wiccan instructor Elwood "Bunky" Bartlett says a New Age book store made it possible for him to become an overnight multi-millionaire.

The Maryland accountant, who claims to hold one of four winning tickets sold for Friday night's estimated 330 million dollar Mega Millions jackpot, says he made a bargain with the multiple gods associated with his Wiccan beliefs: "You let me win the lottery and I'll teach."

Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
Huston Astros, MLB, baseball, Phil Garner, USA,
sports, , witchcraft, magic, magick, South Africa, sorcerer, rituals, AIDS, superstions,

Soccer Not War

Once more the common people in Iraq make a poignant political point about the national solidarity created by sports. In this case the victory of the Iraqi Soccer Team winning the Asian Cup this weekend unites the Iraqi people as I pointed out the other day. Proving once again that sports are an alternative to war and a great national unifier.

"Those heroes have shown the real Iraq. They have done something useful for the people as opposed to the politicians and lawmakers," said Sabah Shaiyal, a 43-year-old policeman in Baghdad's main Shiite district of Sadr City. "The players have made us proud. Once again our national team has shown that there is only one, united Iraq."

Spontaneous celebrations broke out in religiously mixed Baghdad as well as in Basra and the holy Shiite city of Najaf in the south and northern Kurdish towns like Arbil and Kirkuk.

Fans cried and danced in the streets, waving their shirts in the air and hugging.

Soldiers with their rifles slung over their shoulders danced with ordinary Iraqis in Baghdad while children, their faces painted in the Iraqi colours, held up pictures of their heroes.

While mainly comprised of Shiites, the team was captained by a Sunni Turkman from Kirkuk — goal-scoring hero Younis Mahmoud — and also contained Sunni Arab and Kurdish players in a broad representation of Iraqi society.

In Baghdad's Sadr City, a sprawling Shiite slum, women threw sweets to gathering fans and poured water over crowds in sweltering summer heat.

"A thousand congratulations for all Iraqis," another fan said.

Television presenters, draped in the red, white and black Iraqi flag, dissolved into tears. One Iraqiya television reporter was engulfed by a crowd in Baghdad and re-emerged on the shoulders of chanting fans.

Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
UK, US, Saudi Arabia, al-quaeda, bin-laden, oil,Iraq, terrorism, petrochemicals,
CIA, conspiracy,
Soccer, FIFA,
World-Cup, Soccer,
sports,

Soccer Surge A Success In Iraq

It is not the U.S. Military surge, nor the Iraqi government, nor the Shia, Sunnis or Kurd politicians and imams, its not Al Qaida in Iraq, it is soccer that is a success and unifier in Iraq. And the irony is they beat the terror state Saudi Arabia, which funds the Sunni insurgents, in the Asia Cup.

So perhaps the U.S. congress should fund the Iraq Soccer Team instead of more money for Iraqi politicians and George Bush's surges. Certainly it is the only successful thing to come out of the Iraq war.

Iraq's triumph in the Asia Cup signals a soccer program rising from the ashes, even as the country descends deeper into civil conflict. The resurgence of Iraqi soccer is one of the few untainted pieces of good news to emerge from post-invasion Iraq. A powerhouse in the 60s and 70s, the national team faded in the 1980s as Iraq's young men were killed and maimed by the hundreds of thousands in Saddam Hussein's war with Iran. Saddam's son Uday vented his sadism on soccer players and other athletes, forcing them to kick immovable stones and imprisoning them in medieval torture devices. Says Abu Ahmad: "I can't express my feelings. We are so happy, those 25 men brought happiness and hope to 25 million Iraqis, the thing our politicians couldn't do."

Iraq knocks off favored Saudi Arabia to win Asian Cup

Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
UK, BAE, Prince Bandar bin Sultan, US, Saudi Arabia, al-quaeda, bin-laden, oil,Iraq, terrorism, petrochemicals,
CIA, conspiracy,
Soccer, FIFA,
World-Cup, Soccer,
sports,

Muslims and Christians Refuse To Play Ball

Hmm, I wonder if it was because the women priests wouldn't wear hajibs.

A soccer game bringing Muslim imams and Christian priests "shoulder to shoulder" on a field in Norway was cancelled Saturday because the teams could not agree on whether women priests should take part.

See:

Witches Play Mullahs To A Draw

Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:

soccer, Christian, priests, imam, footbol,
sports, magic, hajib, Islam, sorcerer, rituals, rites, women priests,