It takes about an hour to set up. Women in long billowing cloaks trek back and forth from their cars to the shelter house, arms loaded with something new each trip: firewood, crates of sticks and candles, a bag of chips from Chipotle, a cauldron of ashes.
A woman wearing a flannel shirt sets to organizing the traditional alter. She lays the purple cloth across one of the picnic tables and begins strategically placing the items.
Grove stick? Check.
Candles for the kindreds? Check.
Candles for the deities? Check.
Chalices? Only two of three. But check.
Samhain bear? Check.
Money bank?
“Hey, Kelly, did you bring the little money bank?”
“Yes, I think I did.”
Check.
***
Black Bear Grove is a druid fellowship founded in 2003 dedicated to “connecting with our local land and honoring the spirits that reside around us, as well as working with and honoring the deities and spirits of ancient Indo-European religious traditions.”
In 2009 it became an official charter of Ár nDraíocht Féin: A Druid Fellowship. It’s a pagan church that began in 1983 with groves across America and Canada, according to its website.
Sunny joined the grove the same year it became recognized by Ár nDraíocht Féin.
Sunny began self-identifying as a pagan around 10 years old, influenced by Native American literature and her uncle’s interest in Shamanism.
“My parents were actually more or less atheists,” Sunny said. “A lot of people come to paganism from another religion but I came more as someone who was seeking any religion.”
Koronis, a senior druid of the grove, found her way to paganism in a similar manner.
“What started my spiritual path — this is so cheesy — is in 1990 I saw ‘Dances with Wolves’ and I went, ‘the Native American way, that is so cool!’” she said. “So I started reading a lot of Native American books, which in the ‘90s that was a big thing. A lot of Native Americans were writing about their spirituality at that time.”
Before druidry, Koronis studied Wicca but said it just didn’t suit her.
“Wicca it’s like it just wasn’t clicking,” she said. “And then when I got to this it was like ‘This is it! This is it right here.’”
At the grove’s autumn equinox Koronis said a difference between Wicca and druidry were their beliefs in deities. She called Wicca “soft polytheism,” as the religion recognizes a god and goddess figure whereas druids recognize multiple gods and goddesses stemming from various origins.
“Wicca is a gateway paganism,” Sunny said.
*****
Koronis remembers Sunny’s initiation into the grove. They drove to Hoosier National Forest and passed a small church along the way.
It was Easter Sunday.
They remember a man standing outside greeting people and directing them on where to park.
“You would not want to know what we’re gonna go do ‘cause you would freak out,” Koronis said.
Though they recognize the way people could react to them for their practices, Koronis and Sunny said they’ve never had a problem with anyone.
“We’ve never had someone come here to tell us we’re bad or wrong or preach,” Sunny said. “I think we’ve had maybe a passing heckler but that was at my house and they were like ‘hippies’ and we were like ‘tell me something I don’t know.’ I think people know, at least in this town, they know what they’re getting into.”
Even as the ritual is happening people who came to enjoy their afternoon in Cascades Park notice. They notice the fire, the cloaks, the chanting. They slow their pace as they walk by the shelter, children tilt their heads up for a better look. They stare. But no one says a word.
***
Outside of ritual, druidism plays a large role in their daily lives. For Koronis, it’s in her morning routine when she meditates and lights candles for her patrons. It’s in her dedication to recycling, her work at a wildlife rehabilitation center and her classical studies major at IU.
Sunny said she thinks it’s easy for everything to be all encompassing for those in a pagan lifestyle.
In her case her studies in anthropology and fine arts led to her career in stone carving. She said it’s common for her interests and her profession to overlap.
“I carve Green Men,” she said. “I also worship Green Men. And I carve a lot of gods and goddesses and I carve a lot of animals and nature imagery.”
Even the process of her carving is influenced by her spiritual beliefs.
“As I’m carving, it’s very meditative. I think a lot about how limestone‘s made out of fossilized sea life and about how the cycle of things about death and life and how this is a fossilized stone and now I’m creating it into new life and eventually I’ll be dead and that’ll still be here.”
It also stems into her diet. Sunny is a vegetarian, though she said it doesn’t reflect on all pagans. She said some have an animist philosophy in believing that everything has a soul, which makes it difficult for her to eat animals.
“In fact, I feel a little funny about plants some days but I gotta draw the line somewhere.
“It’s funny when people ask me ‘are you religious?’” Sunny said. “Usually that’s kind of a Christian associated question, but I’m always temped to say, ‘Well, yeah.’ Because every single thing I do and every single decision I make has a basis of my spiritual life and I think a lot of pagans are pretty religious people.”
