Altars...Help Plz
-
chatterbox661
Altars...Help Plz
i'm a newbie at all this so nobody know what i do, but most of the rituals i read about include using an altar, which i don't have as it would kind of give me away, does it make much difference if you have an altar or not so long as you have faith in the words???????
-
[GeekyPagan]
- Posts: 60
- Joined: Tue Aug 08, 2006 12:42 pm
- Gender: Female
- Location: Philadelphia PA
Your alter can be anything - from the ground under our feet (which is appropreate, Gaia is our Mother) to a cardboard box to a magnificent wooden deal with inlaid pentagrams and runes 
Whatever you feel comfortable with and whatever works well with you. Sometimes I like to use the ground beneath my feet. Helps me feel closer to the Goddess. Just be careful with candles and such. If you use the ground or a box or any other flamable object use proper caution and make sure your candles are stable, as is your cauldron (if you use one) if there is a fire burning inside. Same with incense as well. We don't want burns or fires!
I hope this helped!
Blessed Be!
Whatever you feel comfortable with and whatever works well with you. Sometimes I like to use the ground beneath my feet. Helps me feel closer to the Goddess. Just be careful with candles and such. If you use the ground or a box or any other flamable object use proper caution and make sure your candles are stable, as is your cauldron (if you use one) if there is a fire burning inside. Same with incense as well. We don't want burns or fires!
I hope this helped!
Blessed Be!
if you want your altar to be easily concealed, you have some options...
1. set up your altar on a dresser top, trunk, box etc where you can put the items away inside when not in use- you can buy wooden boxes of many sizes at craft stores, usually pretty inexpensive too- and embelish them any way you like- or if you like to go more elaborate, places like Pier One Imports and the like often have large jewlery boxes that are really beautiful- pier one has a gorgeopus enameled metal one lined in blue velvet that I've been drooling over for a while now
2. set up an altar in an inconspicuous way. I have no need or desire to hide my altar, but most people wouldn't realize that my main altar is an altar at all to look at it, unless they were familiar with the symbolism of the items. (If you're setting up a Wiccan altar, it's going to be a bit more obvious to a lot of people than mine would be though)
I also used to have an altar at work....no one knew it. My computer was the centerpiece, and I had a rotating set of backgrounds that were images of the deities that I follow. If anyone commented and I didn't want to explain what it was, I just said that they were scenes from Greek mythology. No one questioned it. Now I had been working in a VERY liberal place where no one cared what anyone's religion was, though I didn't want to stretch the limits too much by setting up a really obvious altar or anyhthign...actually, it just kinda grew up on it's own...a glass of water or other beverage nearby, rocks and crystals, a plant, images of the gods, some music playing on the computer...et voila!
(Some religions are easier to conceal than others, especially the ones that are more recon for a specific culture like Hellenic, Norse etc because VERY few people ever think to question someone running around with books on mythology or the literature of a specific culture...it looks like schoolwork...lol...Certain aspects and tools of Wicca can be harder to have in the open, but still be inconspicuous...you haven't said, but I'm guessing you're talking about a Wiccan or Wiccan-influenced practice here...but it can be done.)
That said...whether you need the tools or not, there are a couple of schools of thought on that one, and most Wiccans that I know do tend to lean towards the "they're just tools to focus your concentration, you don't *need* anythign more than concentration" school of thought.
In my own tradition, there is much more of a split between whether you literally need certain things, or whether it's all symbolism.
1. set up your altar on a dresser top, trunk, box etc where you can put the items away inside when not in use- you can buy wooden boxes of many sizes at craft stores, usually pretty inexpensive too- and embelish them any way you like- or if you like to go more elaborate, places like Pier One Imports and the like often have large jewlery boxes that are really beautiful- pier one has a gorgeopus enameled metal one lined in blue velvet that I've been drooling over for a while now
2. set up an altar in an inconspicuous way. I have no need or desire to hide my altar, but most people wouldn't realize that my main altar is an altar at all to look at it, unless they were familiar with the symbolism of the items. (If you're setting up a Wiccan altar, it's going to be a bit more obvious to a lot of people than mine would be though)
I also used to have an altar at work....no one knew it. My computer was the centerpiece, and I had a rotating set of backgrounds that were images of the deities that I follow. If anyone commented and I didn't want to explain what it was, I just said that they were scenes from Greek mythology. No one questioned it. Now I had been working in a VERY liberal place where no one cared what anyone's religion was, though I didn't want to stretch the limits too much by setting up a really obvious altar or anyhthign...actually, it just kinda grew up on it's own...a glass of water or other beverage nearby, rocks and crystals, a plant, images of the gods, some music playing on the computer...et voila!
(Some religions are easier to conceal than others, especially the ones that are more recon for a specific culture like Hellenic, Norse etc because VERY few people ever think to question someone running around with books on mythology or the literature of a specific culture...it looks like schoolwork...lol...Certain aspects and tools of Wicca can be harder to have in the open, but still be inconspicuous...you haven't said, but I'm guessing you're talking about a Wiccan or Wiccan-influenced practice here...but it can be done.)
That said...whether you need the tools or not, there are a couple of schools of thought on that one, and most Wiccans that I know do tend to lean towards the "they're just tools to focus your concentration, you don't *need* anythign more than concentration" school of thought.
In my own tradition, there is much more of a split between whether you literally need certain things, or whether it's all symbolism.
-
Awakened1
-
Tinu
-
Awakened1
That is very beautiful. I love stones, thay call to me, mostly the ones i find, i collect them almost evey where i go.
But i dont keep my ideams together. Only my fionce comes in the apt. but i still hide them but no one else evey comes in ( to my mom its "if i dont see it then is isnt a one bed room, then it means there not sleeping in the same room"....she dosnt like me liveing with him) So i really dont have to hide anything, but i keep my chalise and salt in the kitchen, my stones in the liveing room and on my dresser, and my 3 BOS are in 3 differnt places, one i keep in my perce, one in the bookshelt, and one under the coffee table. My candles are.....i forgot acculy.... and i do my work on my floor. So just walking into my place, its like i have strange tasts in decorating. When we move i am going to make atlest a hide away alter. I want all my stones out for eveyone to see though.
I do have a half made set of runes sitting on the window, my sister came in and picked at them then asked me what the little pictures where, i just said its a project. She didnt ask anymore, she just looked at them all.
But i dont keep my ideams together. Only my fionce comes in the apt. but i still hide them but no one else evey comes in ( to my mom its "if i dont see it then is isnt a one bed room, then it means there not sleeping in the same room"....she dosnt like me liveing with him) So i really dont have to hide anything, but i keep my chalise and salt in the kitchen, my stones in the liveing room and on my dresser, and my 3 BOS are in 3 differnt places, one i keep in my perce, one in the bookshelt, and one under the coffee table. My candles are.....i forgot acculy.... and i do my work on my floor. So just walking into my place, its like i have strange tasts in decorating. When we move i am going to make atlest a hide away alter. I want all my stones out for eveyone to see though.
I do have a half made set of runes sitting on the window, my sister came in and picked at them then asked me what the little pictures where, i just said its a project. She didnt ask anymore, she just looked at them all.
Merry Part
~Addalaide
~Addalaide
-
Awakened1
-
WolfWitch
- Posts: 313
- Joined: Tue Mar 07, 2006 9:57 am
- Gender: Female
- Location: Virginiabeach Va.
- Contact:
Chatterbox661: My mentor suggested this and I have recomended it to others. It's stealthy and, depending on your sence of humor, kind of ironically funny.
Go to the store and buy a pair of the tall glass votiff candles that have religeous iconography or portraits on them. We have them here in the grocery stores. Get one of Christ and one of the virgin Mary. Real simple, easily hidden as no one knows what they "really" mean.
Good luck.
WW.
Go to the store and buy a pair of the tall glass votiff candles that have religeous iconography or portraits on them. We have them here in the grocery stores. Get one of Christ and one of the virgin Mary. Real simple, easily hidden as no one knows what they "really" mean.
Good luck.
WW.
The greatest advice I was ever given: It matters not what you believe. Only that you believe it wholeheartedly.
-
Alison
I've seen pictures of folks setting up altars on shelves, or dresser tops. It doesn't have to be huge or fancy, It just has to mean something to you. Possibly start with pictures that represent the elements and put them somewhere you're around, in your bedroom or your computer desk. Accumulating altar supplies is sortof an ongoing thing, we're just starting construction of our actual altar table but we've been collecting peices for it for a while 