One of the places I want to visit, and soon, is Nashville, Tennesee. Not for country music at the Grand Ole Oprey. Nor for the Southern hospitality, or the cuisine, or any of the other myriad reasons most folks might normally flock to the capital of Tennessee.
No, I want to see the Acropolis. The Temple, that is, of the Goddess Athene. My Goddess, whose temple has been reproduced down to the most minute detail possible. Not the ruins that are left now in Athens, but the Temple as it actually was, right in the beginning. Before a great lot of the statuary was either lost, destroyed, or carted of to Great Britain (thankfully) sometime in the 1800's. Even the giant sized idol of the Goddess has been faithfully reproduced, and sits now as before, as though surveying her realm with her own unique aspect of severe serenity.
Severe serenity? I know that sounds like an oxymoron, but after all, Athene was the Goddess of War and Wisdom, among other things. This description is an apt one. Especially when you consider what she has been through over the last couple of millenia.
The descendants of her original devotees, after all, are either preventing her worship, or being prevented from it. An adherent to the religion of Hellenismos, during the recent Athens Olympics, was lowered to having to diplomatically describe his beliefs not as a religion, but as a "philosophy", while the leaders of the Greek Orthodox Church bemoaned the general attention being shown to their own ancestral deities during the event.
Another current day follower of the ancient faith, has recently filed suit in court to demand the right to practice his faith, despite the fact that Greece, as a signatory to the EU charter, has in effect agreed to guarantee freedom of religous expression.
I am reminded that our own American ancestors came here to a large extent for precisely this purpose, freedom of religion, and that this was eventually put into our own Constitution. And so we have it. At least, on paper.
Freedom of religous expression. In all states, for all peoples. Not just Protestants, Catholics, and Jews, as a great many, though not all, of the proponents of the theory that our country was founded on Judaeo-Christian principles, would seem to imply. When you get right down to it, Jews and Catholics were not exactly welcomed here with open arms, at first. Though they were gradually accepted. Welcome, even. Now, they are as big a pain in the ass as the Protestants. As is the case with the Muslims. As no doubt will be the case with all who follow.
Well, I demand my right to be a pain in the ass. And I will do so. When I make my trip to Nashville, I will gaze in adoration up at the image of the Goddess, as I contemplate the true principles this country were founded on, and for. For democracy, for example, which was originally formulated in Athens, while our concept of the Seperation of Powers was formulated in the neighboring Greek city of Sparta. For the continuation of Graeco-Roman law and culture, ethics, and philosophy, by way of English comon law, the Rennaissance, and the Enlightenment.
Finally, among the other reasons too numerous to mention, it was founded on the principles of freedom of religion, including the minority ones such as mine. And I will thank for that not some insane Middle Eastern God whose adherents seem never at a loss to promote war, and tyranny, and oppression, including the suppression, not protections, of religions other than their own.
No, I will thank the Lady Athene, my Goddess of Severe Serenity, as I stand in reverence before her in her new Temple. Once my time there is over, I will doubtless vow to return, yet for now I will leave in a newfound sense of spiritual renewal, as I start on the return home, after stopping long enough perhaps to catch a glimpse of Shania Twain.
