Values

Something To Aim For

IF WE ATTEMPT to diagnose the sickness from which we find our society to be suffering we will find that Christianity has much to answer for. Christianity has been tried and it has failed and the need for a remedy is urgent and essential. We of the Odinic Rite know that we are in possession of that remedy. But we must first of all know how to prepare ourselves in order effectively to administer it.

Most of us have grown up in a Christian environment, in a world of alien standards, values and behaviour. We are used to being in disagreement with the world order in which we have to live. The Christian concept of behaviour is today overwhelmingly materialist. But there was a time - and let us be fair about this - when Christian values often equalled heathen values and the principles upon which human life was based were, at least superficially, much sounder than they now are.

Looking back over the years, we can see that the 15th and 16th centuries of the Canton Era marked a decisive turning point in our spiritual history. It was when the heathen worm at last began to turn, a time rather like our own, of upheaval and transition, a clearing of the ground for some new growth. What emerged, of course, was the old heathenism heavily disguised beneath a mask of reformed Christianity, breaking loose in a very limited way from the framework of orthodox Catholicism by which it had been confined and controlled for so many centuries.

Today, four hundred years later, few people have any illusions left that Christianity will ever be capable of healing the world's malaise. Even believers know in their heart of hearts that it is a spent force. The future is thus left wide open for grabs. This means, in effect, that the future really can belong to the Odinic Rite - if only we can learn how to take it. If we are to have a real chance of capturing the empty ground we must start by looking at our own style of behaviour.

The qualities upon which an Odinist should pride himself are essentially those that divide him from Christianity. For a start, he should be conscious of himself as representative of an elite. Such representation is not by any means automatic and determinate in the herd sense to which we may have become accustomed by Christian indoctrination but should be contingent on some special quality. This implies a point of honour, an obligation which should be one of duty to neighbours and to the community but, above all, to his family and himself. His life should be moderate, harmonious, balanced.

With this broad ideal there must go a reasoned pride, an n easy consciousness of effortless superiority. Thus, when he or his children take first prize at anything he shows no emotion because that is what he should expect (unlike the sportsmen who punch the air and kiss one another at intervals throughout a game of cricket or football - if only they could be persuaded to reverse their targets). Television coverage of current events frequently brings into our homes poignant scenes from Middle Eastern countries of funerals where each mourner seems to be trying to outdo the others with exhibitions of wailing and breast beating. Soon perhaps our own people will feel that they have to fall in line. How much more seemly is the unwritten code of our Odin-descended royal family 'never to cry on parade'?

The Odinist should surpass others in precisely those qualities which he most values and is taught to value in self-control and moderation and self-respect. He should know what is due to himself and to his comrades and will, in so far as he lives up to his principles, be careful to apportion their relative claims justly without either being unfair to himself or forgoing his rights. For undue humility is a distasteful relic of Christian teaching.

The Odinist should always be guided by what used to be called good taste, a sense of what needs and what should be done, of what is fitting, always governed by good form and a sense of honour. He must take up unhesitatingly the challenge that is offered (not forgetting the Odinist Charge not to became involved with the drunken fool). He must know his own worth and be aware of his duty to himself as representative of the Odinist code of behaviour. In other words, what he prizes most is intangible and non-material.

All these things are attainable ideals (unlike the impossible demands of Christianity which have never been achieved by anyone who is not a virginal hermit living an unnatural life on starvation rations).

The Odinist has every expectation of approaching his ideals. 'An Odinist cannot rum away' may not be a statement of fact. But it is a statement of value.