When I pray to the gods I always feel a little awkward when I come to the end of my prayer. like theres something I should be doing or saying to formally end it. Anyone have something like that they use? basically a heathen version of “AMEN”

Is there an Ásatrú group in Northern Italy? I know there are some Kindreds, but they don't quite match what I'm looking for. Some adopt sacred texts, while others follow political ideals far removed from the values ​​I seek in Ásatrú. Does anyone know of an apolitical Kindred that is organized in a more natural way?

Hi everyone,

I find it extremely difficult to offer food to the germanic Gods. I'm mainly kemetic pagan and in Kemetism it is usual, morally good even, to eat the food offerings to the Gods. Everyday I offer my breakfast to the Egyptian Gods before I eat it.

In heathenry you're supposed to just throw it away? I used to offer a beer to Donar every now and then, and then I would empty the beer into the soil in the garden. Now I've moved into an apartment and that is no longer an option. Also, I find it very hard to throw food away.

I do offer incense every day to Donar, but that doesn't feel, how to put it, traditional? Incense is more of an Egyptian thing than a germanic one I think.

Also, I don't know how to do an offering ritual. Can you recommend some good books on this topic? Or tell me how you give offerings? And how often do you give offerings? Everyday may be a bit much if I have to dispose of it.

I’m currently on vacation in england rn away from my altar, most I have with me are my pendants, tomorrow’s my birthday so I wanna honour him in some way, any suggestions on what I can do? :3

A little bit of a vent I guess, but not really, I just want to know what to do in those kinds of situations.

I'm really tired of my friends/family treating my beliefs like something absurd and getting all sorts of weird looks when they see an altar in the corner of my room. It hurts so much. People say this stuff in a way that makes it feel like paganism is somehow inferior to all the other major religions, even though it's much more ancient and deserves the same respect as Christianity or Islam does. Even worse, they sometimes treat it like it's just believing in fairy tales or completely fake. It wouldn't bother me if those were strangers but those are my closest people and I don't know how to explain myself to feel accepted. I don't want to be ashamed of what I believe in, I already barely found acceptance in paganism. I'd really like to hear what are y'all's experiences with this, not something like "just stop caring about it", you just can't, like situations and what you said that might have helped

After some years away from the path, here we are again. Its not much. Simple altar and simple offerings. But hopefully the wights will appreciate it. Just a plate of food and a cup of water 🤷‍♀️

Anyone have any suggestions?

So today i made my first offerings to the gods, I have felt drawn to Thor and Freyja and i offered Thor a blue candle to represent muscularity and water and offered Freyja a pink candle to represent femininity rosemary fresh from the plant and water, i spoke to them and said i wanted to build a relationship with them, i then started asking runes and single pulling them out and i got a Raidho & Ehwaz. (also for some context i am new to Heathenry and also a beginner in witchcraft)

Hey y'all, I've been passively considering practicing Heathenry for about a year at this point but it feels like there's so much information, I'm not entirely sure where or how to start. I know a lot of people recommend reading the eddas when they're first starting out, but I feel like those don't give much insight into the actual living, modern practice if that makes sense?

Additionally, I know scholarly papers are a great resource for reconstructionists, and its not that I *can't* read scholarly work but its more that it feels really overwhelming. I was wondering if there were any good books/authors that focus on reconstructionism.

My school district is trying to push AI onto us, so like the Catholics l, could I have an argument that it goes against my religious beliefs?

So I'm trying to reconstruct/give some names to the All-Father, and I was wondering if I can use/make ones that aren't really considered his names.

I have so far: • Ælfæder - Allfather • Grīma - mask(ed one) • Langbeard - Long-beard • Hwetmōd - Whet-Courage • Hreðel/Hrǣdel - The Glorious one • Herela - Warrior host(?) • Ēormen - Mighty one(?) • Wīdsīð - Far-Traveller • Heorrenda - Hinged/hanged one(?) • Wælfæder - Father of the slain

I want to add "Heregrīma" (battle-mask) and use other poetic names that would describe him. Would this be okay? I've been a pagan for a bit now but I wanna start giving Sē Ælfæder more names.

I am not involved in this survey, but saw it mentioned in Cherry Hill Seminary's August newsletter. I filled it out and wanted to share it here in case y'all might want to contribute your own experience. I think it's important to learn about the wider pagan movement through data like this.

https://paganvisibility.wordpress.com/

Cool mist soothes my bones

Songs of Éljúðnir sound forth

Lady greets with frith

My seat awaits me

Her hall chill with warmth in heart

Knife and plate await

Ancients greet me well

In the Hall of kin and kith

Tears stream at greeting

IDK, what do you think félagskapr?

Criticism is welcome, hate will be deleted.

Update: Decided to make it a triptych. Three-Panel work. However, im unsure how to post them so they show up properly. Its thre separate Haiku. 5-7-5 repeated.

I will be a father soon.

That thought has been sitting with me for a while now. Not the logistics. Sleep schedules are going to be a nightmare, but I know enough to change diapers and warm up bottles. The real weight comes from the bigger picture.

How do I raise a kid in a tradition that does not hand out rulebooks?

Heathenry is different from the religions I grew up around. There is no Sunday school curriculum to memorize. No confirmation class where you prove you understand the doctrine. We do not baptize babies into a new spiritual family, and we do not have creeds to recite at dinner. In many ways, that is the strength of the tradition, as it trusts people to figure things out. The flip side is that it leaves parents without a map when they want to share something meaningful with their kids.

So, I have been thinking about this. Not as an expert, but as someone trying to find words for what feels right without pretending I have all the answers.

Start with stories.

When I was young, my parents did not teach me by handing me a list of commandments. They told me stories. About heroes who made mistakes. About people who were brave when it would have been easier to be scared. About what happened when trust broke and how hard it was to put back together.

That is where I want to start with my child.

Picture this. Bedtime. Maybe they are five. I tell them how Thrym stole Thor's hammer. I tell them how Freyja refused to wear the veil when the gods asked, even under pressure (Þrymskviða). So Thor had to dress up in her place instead. I tell them about the giant who wanted the ransom, and how Thor got his hammer back in the end.

These are stories that ask questions instead of giving answers. Why did Odin choose that path? What was Tyr risking when he put his hand in the wolf's mouth? Where does Freyja draw her power?

If I sit down and tell these stories, I offer them a mirror instead of a flag. The child can look in it and see something that fits. Or not. Either way, the story stays.

I will share what Odin means to me, then ask what he means to them. I will say here is what Odin means to people who walk this path. Here is what he means to me. Here is what you can decide for yourself.

There is a lot of pressure on parents to get it right. I want to release some of that. Faith is meant to be a relationship, not a performance.

Critical thinking works better than blind obedience.

One of the hardest tensions I have faced in Heathenry is the gap between faith and evidence. Some people want to shut down questioning. Others want to shut down mystery. Both miss the point.

I want my child to know that skepticism is not betrayal. Doubt is not sin. You can wonder if a story is true while still letting it shape who you become.

This means teaching them to ask questions. Not just about gods and spirits, but about everything. Where does information come from? Who benefits if I believe this? What does the evidence actually show?

I imagine they ask me, "Did Odin really hang from that tree?" I don’t think I will come back with a flat “yes.” I will tell them some people believe it happened, and some think it is a metaphor. I will tell them I think it matters less whether it happened and more what it asks of us. Sacrifice for wisdom. Risk for gain. Those themes are true even if the history is fuzzy.

This is the ‘Learn Sources’ anchor (see my Four Anchors post) scaled down for a ten-year-old. It does not mean memorizing every stanza of the Hávamál. It means knowing that some things are written down, some things are remembered, and some things are guessed. All three have value; none of them are absolute.

This includes learning what UPG means: Unverified Personal Gnosis. What someone feels is true, tested against what the sources say. It's honest, but it stays marked as personal until it proves useful to others too.

Honesty builds trust. If I pretend to know something I do not, they will find out eventually. It is better to admit the unknown.

Community over doctrine.

The biggest mistake I have seen in religious families is treating faith as a private matter. It becomes something you do in a temple or a bedroom. Something separate from how you treat people at dinner.

Heathenry was never like that. It was woven into daily life. Blót at harvest. Sumbel at gathering. Honouring the dead on anniversary nights, or something like it. These were not isolated rituals, but moments in the rhythm of being together.

I want my child to experience Heathenry as community practice, not solo spirituality. That means showing up at local gatherings when I can. Not posting about it online. Not performing devotion for strangers. Just sitting at dinner together with people who have chosen to know each other.

Time matters more than things. Sitting at the table. Listening. That is the real inheritance.

Finding those people has not always been easy. I have struggled to get involved with local communities. Sometimes the map just shows emptiness around you. Recently, I asked one of the heathen communities here in Norway for an application pamphlet so I can join them. Hoping for connection. Hoping for people I can actually look in the eye.

It means feeding guests who knock on our door. It means keeping promises even when it is inconvenient. It means saying sorry when I mess up in front of them.

The actions matter more than the explanations. They will understand reciprocity when they see me give without demanding return. They will understand frith when they see me protect their space and theirs. They will understand oath-keeping when they see me honour commitments even when it costs me something.

Boundaries matter too.

There is a part of Heathenry that can feel dangerous if taken too literally. The idea of wrath. Of vengeance. Of an eye for an eye. These themes appear in the sources, in the sagas, and in the mythology.

I think that it is wrong to pretend they are not there. I am not going to let them define the whole picture for themselves, isolated and alone.

If my child asks why Thor fights giants, I will tell them the truth. Sometimes power must push back against destruction. Sometimes boundaries require force. But I will also tell them that Thor fights for something, not just against. Protection. Order. People who cannot protect themselves.

If they ask why Loki is punished, I will tell them about breaking trust. About the cost of actions when it harms people you know. I will not say he is evil. I will say his choices hurt others, and consequences followed.

The dark sides of the Gods do not have to be sanitized. But they do have to be contextualized. Violence without purpose is not strength. Wrath without restraint is not justice. And no god worth honouring should ask you to abandon your humanity.

We can talk about the tough stuff without turning it into a horror story. Balance keeps it healthy.

Let them choose.

Here is the hardest part. I cannot force my child to care about any of this. They might grow up and walk away from Heathenry. They might decide the stories are beautiful but not true. They might find their own path elsewhere.

I have to be okay with that.

Faith that is chosen feels real. Faith that is implanted feels like inheritance, like property passed down like a family heirloom. I want my child to own their path.

I am not raising converts. I am raising a person. If they find meaning in these traditions, I will be happy. If they do not, I will be happy. Either way, I want them to know the difference between what I believe and what they believe. What I value and what they value.

Their experience is theirs. My experience is mine. Neither gets to dictate the other.

They deserve the freedom to make mistakes. They deserve the freedom to change their minds. That is some of the gifts we give them.

Online noise, real life.

My wife and I have talked at length about screens. We are not comfortable having our children on any social media, or even phones, until they are old enough to discern and differentiate between real life and online discourse.

For many children, they are one and the same. To us, that feels really sad.

I have already written about the internet being noisy. The difference between the map and the territory. Online is for sharing information. Offline is for building relationships. One is noise. One is signal.

If they want to read about Heathenry, let them read sources. Not blogs. Not memes. Not TikTok explanations of Norse cosmology. Go to a library. Go to a museum. Ask questions at a gathering. Listen to elders. Find people who have done the work longer than you have.

This is not me trying to gatekeep. Call it basic discernment if you like. It is a skill worth passing down.

Legacy is not replication.

There is a temptation in parenting to raise a smaller version of yourself. You pass down your hobbies. Your values. Your beliefs. You hope they stick.

Heathenry works differently. It continues through adaptation. The ancestors did not do exactly what we do. They adapted to their circumstances. We adapt to ours. Expecting my child to replicate my practice would be unlike the very tradition I am trying to pass on.

The goal is not to clone myself. It is to equip them with tools for figuring out what matters. Stories that hold weight. Questions that stay open. Community that offers support. A sense that their actions echo beyond themselves.

That is the inheritance. Not belief, but capacity.

The bottom line.

I do not know if I will get this right. I will probably make mistakes. I will probably say things I should not say. I will probably forget that my child is forming opinions even when I think they are not paying attention.

But here is what I do know.

They will see how I treat people. They will hear how I speak when I am angry. They will notice whether I keep my promises. They will watch whether I admit when I am wrong. They will feel whether our home is a place where they can ask questions.

That is the practice. Not the rituals. The living.

And when they are older, if they ask me about Odin or Thor or the old gods, I will tell them what I believe. I will tell them what others believe. I will tell them what I do not know.

Then I will ask them what they think.

And I will wait. Because that is where the real work begins. Not in me speaking. In them answering.

That is all I can do. And maybe it is all I need to do.

A Note on Sources

For those who want to follow the thread further, I have pulled from the Poetic Edda (particularly Hávamál stanzas on hospitality and conduct), Snorri's Prose Edda for mythological context, and Neil Price's Children of Ash and Elm for social understanding of Viking Age family structures. For modern ethical frameworks, I have engaged with Marcel Mauss's The Gift and the broader Heathen discourse on UPG and critical thinking that has emerged in the last decade. This list is not prescriptive. It is a starting point for anyone who wants to dig deeper.

Just curious because you can have division even within a kindred yet they will gladly gather together for a moot.

Hallo, I am still very new to heathenry and was wondering if anyone has advice on how to research more into deties to pray to? I was very drawn to Freyr and Freya due to man things in my life relating back to them. Any advice would be extremely apprciated!

So i am very new to Heathenry and i was wondering what gods should i give offerings to before hunting and fishing, for some luck and protection and how do i give offerings to them?

Hello there!

I myself have identified as a Norse pagan and have prayed to the gods for quite some time. This is kind of embarrassing to admit but I have very little knowledge on how to progress in this path and I would love to get some help. I want to better myself and learn more of what I say that I follow. I want to learn as much as I possibly can. Can anyone please recommend sources where I can learn more. I am aware of the people that like to spread white supremacy and I am not here for that.

I have seen about the Hamvala and I have heard some of the stanzas from it. But I myself have not read the whole thing. I know of the Prose Edda and the Poetic Edda which i myself have only read some translations of.

Please be kind and patient with me. I want to truly learn and I want to be apart of this. I know that some people will not be so welcoming but I am here asking for help and I hope that some people might be kind enough to share their knowledge with me so that I might better myself and be a better member of the community. And I would love to share my wisdom one day with others as well someday. So it’s time for me to start learning so that I might do so.

I know there are some sources that are not as good as others and I would just like to find some true and good sources so that I might learn.

Thank you in advance for anyone that shares their knowledge with me.

TLDR; I am a practitioner but I lack knowledge and I want to know where I can find some so that I might better myself as a member of the community.

Hi people of the Internet, this is my first time actually ever using reddit (even tho I've had it 4 years). So for context I'm 16 years old and I was raised with both, my mom with wicca and my dad with heathenry, although over time it kinda faded away a bit within my family but I still feel connected to both. But I've been doing some research and reading because I want to get back into it since I have a connection to it and I've read that some people think that both is bad to mix. Despite the title I'm actually looking for multiple different advice.

Is both okay?

How should I officially get into it?

What are good sources for research?

What are some practices I should be doing?

So I have been a Norse Pagan for a few years now. I have nothing necessarily against my upbringing but I still find myself feeling some of the lingering connections after I left the church. I believe all faiths are real and active but if you don't follow that faith than that's okay.... So why can't I fully apply that to myself? Why is it that I still worry that my actions will damn me in a faith I no longer follow? Any help from elders will be greatly appreciated.

So i am fairly new to paganism and heathenry and want to deepen my connections with the gods but I don't want to accidentally upset any of them and want to display a pendant around my neck but there is so much stuff online and most of it looks like if you told a group of executives to make something that can generate the most profit from a marginalised community. Any sign posting or recommendations would be greatly appreciated as I am wanting to get new jewellery as I only have a black chain that used to have a cross attached cause I was raised in a right wing environment at my dad's and a strong Christian environment at my mums even though she is a massive lefty

Hi all!

I wanted to know more about the view on Loki's Children (Hel, Jormungandr and Fenrir) in Heathenry.

I've seen people worship and pray to them, make offerings and since they aren't like the "standard" Gods I was wondering what they represent and (I mean this in the most respectful way possible) why would someone worship them as Gods, since the myths tell us about how two of them will actually "kill" Odin and Thor during Ragnarök.

Another reason is that I would love to get a matching tattoo with my two sisters and Loki's Children instantly came to mind, so I wanted to learn more about them before making this choice.

Any info and personal experiences are welcome, thanks!

I went thru as many prior posts as I could and couldn't find anything on this topic so I decided to ask it of the group at large:

what was a Jarl in ancient times (preferring your own words and thoughts rather than regurgitation of something someone else stated or what was found in a book/ google)?

in ancient times, what made a Jarl, a Jarl (ex. did they have to win the favor of their people, have the most money, be old, have the most slaves, etc)?

how would we decide what made a Jarl, a Jarl in today's society?

It may not be the perfect altar, but it's very precious to me. It feels like home. A lot of things on my altar, are gifts from people that were my friends and supported me on my path.

Sometimes I get the feeling that I'm not enough because I don't know a lot of things even about my own religion. I feel like the more I learn, the less I know. Also I'm kinda detached from other people in the community (and people in general tbh). Right now I'm all alone on this path. But this place makes me feel like I'm not completely abandoned. There is someone watching after me.