AWC tickets now on sale

Tickets to the 2019 Australian Wiccan Conference are now on sale via the shiny new AWC 2019 website!

The Australian Wiccan Conference (AWC) was started in 1984, with the first gathering being held in South Australia. The Conference is traditionally held on the weekend closest to the Spring Equinox. Every year the conference is hosted in a different state by different British Traditional Wiccan Covens, or community groups supported by their local Wiccan coven. It is attended by Wiccans, Witches and Pagans from all over Australia to meet in fellowship and in celebration of Spring.

The conference takes place over a weekend close to the Spring Equinox and involves dormitory or lodge style accommodation, workshops and lectures throughout the weekend, a Spring Ritual, and evening entertainment.

Our theme

“By magic of old, be it done”
Our theme for AWC2019 is an exploration of traditional folk magic and witchcraft practices. We will be delving into some traditional folkloric magical practices and showing you how they can be incorporated into your own personal practice.

Special international guest

At this year’s AWC a Special International Guest will join us. We can’t announce who it will be just yet but to give you a hint – they are a highly-respected author on Traditional Witchcraft and Folklore…stay tuned for the formal announcement!

Dates

Friday 13th September to Sunday 15th September 2019

Australian Wiccan Conference 2019 Logo Unveiled

Check out our beautiful AWC19 logo, hand drawn by the very talented Sarah Morgan!

We will be hosting the 35th annual Australian Wiccan Conference this September 13th – 15th in Central Victoria, about an hour’s drive from Melbourne.

Follow the AWC 2019 Facebook page for updates.

Pagan Pyjama Party Episode 1.03: AWC 2018 Special

AWC18 LogoWe flew to the other side of the country for the Australian Wiccan Conference in September and it was BRILLIANT. So much so that the night it finished we held off face-planting our beds until we’d recorded this. Music this month is by David Rivett. Thanks again to Tree, Kundra, Combined Covens and our special guest, Michel.

(Click the episode cover image to listen!)


 

Psst! Support the Pagan Collective of Victoria on Patreon and get early access to episodes along with bonus Pagan Pyjama Party content…

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Pagan Pyjama Party Episode 1.02: Floating on a Biscuit at the Bottom of the World

S01e02 cover

This month we’re joined by Sarah Morgan of the Belgrave Pagan Hillsmeets as we wrap up our bumper review of Thorn Mooney’s Traditional Wicca: A Seeker’s Guide, discussing covens, outer courts, initiations and more! Our featured song this month is by those gods of Pagan rock, Spiral Dance.

(Click on the episode cover image to listen!)


 

Psst! Support the Pagan Collective of Victoria on Patreon and get early access to episodes along with bonus Pagan Pyjama Party content…

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Pagan Pyjama Party Episode 1.01: Keen Beans

S01e01 coverBlast off! We begin our review of Thorn Mooney’s Traditional Wicca: A Seeker’s Guide, using it as an anchor for discussions on covens, initiation, lineage and hierarchy within a Traditional Wiccan framework along the way. This episode also includes spiffy music from Matt Chapman.

(Click on the episode cover image to listen!)


 

Psst! Support the Pagan Collective of Victoria on Patreon and get early access to episodes along with bonus Pagan Pyjama Party content…

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Community Safety Month 2018: Advice for New Pagans

March is Community Safety Month for the PCV. Throughout this month we will be promoting safe, sane and inclusive Pagan community for all through the sharing of information, discussion topics and more.

We decided to start by sharing advice and information for people new to Paganism. These articles have been shared daily on our Facebook page.

PAN Safety in Circle Pamphlet: This brochure, by our friends at The Pagan Awareness Network, is essential reading for any Pagan new to face-to-face events and groups. It covers basic personal safety within the Pagan community and what to do if you witness or become the victim of illegal or unethical behaviour. PAN is one of the longest-running groups dedicated to Pagan networking, fellowship and education in the country, and we are proud to share this as the first of our Community Safety Month resources.

The Pagan Community – A Survivor’s Guide: In this piece, UK musician and storyteller Damh the Bard offers some pearls of wisdom for those new to the Pagan community. He also discusses the ideal motivations for seeking community in the first place.

Truth and Tales about Paganism: This is another excellent brochure from our friends at The Pagan Awareness Network. This one busts some commonly believed myths for newbies to Paganism and Pagan Community.

Pagan Pathways:  Continuing on with our overview before we delve into more complex subjects, this brochure by the Pagan Awareness Network explores and demystifies many different Pagan traditions. Essential reading for anyone new to the community or to Paganism in general.

Wicca and Witchcraft – Which is Which?: The last PAN brochure we looked at explored and explained a variety of Pagan paths. This one sets out to define the differences between Wicca and witchcraft, which are two very different labels that are often confused with one another.

Paganism for Beginners – Controversies: UK Wiccan Yvonne Aburrow’s Paganism for Beginners pieces are all wonderful, but this one is especially useful to anyone just discovering the Pagan community and all its intricacies.

Sacred Ground and Acknowledgement of Country: Pagans in Australia are practicing on a land already rich with spiritual history. In this brochure, the Pagan Awareness Network discuss the importance of acknowledging the land’s traditional custodians, as well as other ways we as Pagans can show respect.

Sacred Knives: Athames and other sacred blades are used in rituals by some Pagans. But what are they used for exactly? Is it legal to carry one or use it in a public place? Our friends from the Pagan Awareness Network have got the answers in this handy brochure.

Five Things I Wish I’d Known as a Beginner: In this article, US author Thorn Mooney has some great advice for anyone new to Paganism or the Pagan community.

Skyclad – the Bare Facts: Some Pagans practice naked, or Skyclad. This brochure from the Pagan Awareness Network contains important information about the whys, the hows, the shoulds and the should-nots of ritual nudity.

The Pagan-est Day Ever!

Pagan Pride Day and Spiral Dance Concert

By Alex and Josie

On the 18th of March The PCV hosted our first Pagan Pride Day, in Edinburgh Gardens. It was an amazing day filled with amazing people and a great sense of community. The event started at 12pm. People started arriving and what was initially a small amount of people grew: we ended up with around 50 people attending.

At 2pm the talks about the various paths started. Our first speaker was Shaz. She spoke about ADF Druidry and Silver Birch Grove. Josephine talked about Alexandrian witchcraft, and we then had Dean who spoke about Asatru (Norse paganism), followed by KC guy who spoke about OBOD Druidry. Next, Fio Talked about the Reclaiming path, then Luca Talked about Wildwood, and Dorian Talked about Chaos magic.

After the talks on the different paths we moved on to our ritual for the autumn Equinox which was run by Josie and Ryan in a Alexandrian inspired style. The quarters were called by Fran (Air), Sarah (Fire), Alex (Water) and Mark (Earth). It was a beautiful ritual that included a meeting dance and lovely music.

After the ritual we moved on to our second session of talk which were about the different meetings and gatherings around Victoria we started off with Ryan talking about the CBD pub moots, then Sarah talking about the Monthly Hills Pagan Coffee Meets. Next was Mark who talked about the Central Vic meetups, and we then had Dean who talked about the Heathen meetups, which include a ritual. This was followed by Nickole talking about Earthsong Witchcamps. We then had Dorian who talked about the newly started Frankston/Cranbourne Meetups, and Shaz then talked about Druid Coffee. The Queer Pagan Men’s meetups where then talked about by Buck, Michel then talked about the  Mount Franklin Pagan Gathering, and finally we finished off with Seline talking about Into Me I See.

It was an absolutely amazing day filled with friendship and community spirit. As a fairly new member of the Pagan community I found it to be a great way to learn more about what is available in Victoria and also to meet more like minded people. I would also love to thank the amazing PCV for running the day especially Sarah for being MC and making sure everything ran smoothly. I would also love to thank all the speakers and those who ran the ritual and finally thankyou to everyone who attended as without you it wouldn’t have happened.

— Alex

“I just saw a Reclaiming witch, a Druid and an Anarchist eating grapes together. And they were LAUGHING.”
– overheard at the Pagan Pride Day picnic

After a busy and marvelously social day at Pagan Pride Day, we headed on down to Bar 303 in Northcote to see Spiral Dance and KC Guy live in concert, presented by the PCV.

This concert was the perfect way to finish off a day of the Pagan community coming together. KC Guy’s voice is truly enchanting, and just what we needed to chill out and lose ourselves. Spiral Dance has a decades-long track record of bringing Pagans together with their beautiful and very danceable music, and dance we did!

The hot, sticky night didn’t stop any of us from busting out our best daggy Pagan dance moves to tunes like The Quickening, Faerie Tale and our favourite, Black Annis.

By the end of the night our throats were raw, our clothes were heavy with sweat and every last one of us were wearing enormous watermelon-slice grins as we exploded out into the cool night air of High Street.

A million, squillion thankyous to KC Guy and Spiral Dance for travelling from South Australia to perform for us and provide the perfect ending to a perfect day. Thanks also to Bar 303 for having us, to everyone who helped out on the door, and to Mark Hayes for his beautiful photos of the night.

Josie

You can download a copy of the Pagan Pride Day Flyer here: PPD 2017

Photo Reuse Policy: You are welcome to use these photos for *personal use* on social media, etc, but please credit/tag the Mark Hayes Photography Facebook Page when you do.

 

 

 

Meeting Minutes, November 2016

Thankyou to our intrepid secretary Mark for putting these together!

PCV Committee Meeting 26th November 2016

Meeting Start: 1.32

Attending: Ryan, Nickole, Josie, Seamus, Dean, Alex, Mark, Shaz, Ang, Lucas and Fran Apologies: River, Fi, Dorian
Absent:

President’s Report
The PCV has put on over 30 events this year, which is a lot, 25 – 26 of these were coffee and pub meetups. In addition to this we had some public rituals as well as pagans in the park. There is a heap of stuff cooking up for next year which is really exciting.

Secretary’s Report
Memberships keep rolling in, up to about 209 membership now as well as over 900 likes on Facebook.

Treasurer’s Report
Nothing new to report, money in the bank is the same as the last few meetings, the PCV has not been running events that make money.

Meet-Ups
CBD Moot
This moot is getting really busy, with 2-3 new people pretty much every time that have not been met before, it is exciting to see lots of new faces. The moot is changing venues to the Last Jar for next year to accommodate the fact that we need more seats for the events. Should be slightly more disability friendly with a bathroom on the same floor, however there are still the steps at the front and a narrow door. For 2017 the moots will be running monthly but taking a break for September.

Central Vic
The Central Victoria Pagans in the Café had four meets this year, with an average of 4 – 8 attendees at them. For 2017 the Pagans in the Café and the Central Vic Heathens will be combining the coffee meets and aiming for quarterly coffee meets.

Central Vic Heathens
The Central Vic Heathens in addition to combining with the Pagans in the Café are looking at trying to run some different events next year beyond coffee meets. More to be announced as they come.

Hills Meets
These meets are going from strength to strength, running in a lovely new venue (Earthly Pleasures), getting about 10+ attendees at each meet, people attending are happy with the format, these meets will be running monthly for 2017.
Two other meet ups in the works – Hamilton, which is trying to get up and running with some support from us and will hopefully start running next year. Also Frankston which Dorian has kindly volunteered to get going next year, at this stage it will probably be bi-monthly in the Frankston area. More will be confirmed as it is organised. 
ACTION: Need to get a start date sorted with Dorian for 2017
ACTION: Need to make sure that the meets that are near each other don’t conflict with each other, PCV or otherwise so as to not make it too hard for attendees to choose what to go to.

Memberships
Seven new memberships have been received since last meeting, no objections to the members were raised, so all new people were approved.

Dates for 2017

Committee Meetings CBD Meet-Ups Hills Meet-Ups Sabbats Other
  15th January 8th January    
26th Feb (attach to Druid Coffee, Northcote) 19th February 5th February 5th February Lughnassa (Silver Birch)  
  19th March 5th March 25th March Mabon (Wiccans) Pagan Pride Day 18th March Pagan Concert 18th March
8th April (Central Victoria) 16th April (needs to be changed) 2nd April    
  21st May 7th May Samhain (May date TBC)  
4th June (attach to Hills Meetup, Belgrave) 18th June 4th June Yule Dinner 24th June  
  16th July 2nd July    
20th August AGM (attach to CBD meet-up) 20th August 6th Aug    
  17th September (needs to be changed) 3rd Sept 24th September Ostara (Silver Birch/Heathens)  
14th October (Central Victoria) 15th October 1st October    
  19th November 5th November    
3rd December (attach to Hills Meet-Up, Belgrave)   3rd December    
PCV Hiatus 24th Dec – 7th Jan        

Imbolc – *stare at Reclaiming and Lucas*

Pagans in the Park/Pagan Pride Day
18th of March is the proposed date for the event. Some of the concepts discussed were – having stalls, a festival feel and less picnic feel, showcase for traditions (someone gets up and talks about each tradition and talks about what they do and who is good to talk to if you want to go further) Need to get the ideas, for location, format etc. then scale back.

ACTION: Shaz will talk to her contacts/arch-druid to get some ideas for running it and what resources are available, possibly Fitzroy/Treasury gardens for the location, if so we need to make sure to follow all the protocols with paperwork etc. for running in such a public location
ACTION: The working group need to have a meeting for this, a date will be set.

Yule Dinner
Going to run as the same format as the 2014 one, it was ritzy, nice and well catered, Ryan is hoping to get the prices down to about $35 – 40
ACTION: Ryan is going to look for a venue and nut out a menu in the next few weeks. Going to see about getting Casey over for it again to do the entertainment.

PCV Businesses/Relationships
Is it possible to get us thinking about our kind of relationships with the businesses, loyalty programs, advertising, think of a way to have a financial exchange, perhaps have a charge for being listed on the website?, or the donation of raffle prizes for things like Yule dinner in exchange for a write-up for them in the newsletter, listings for actual health practitioners for pagan friendly businesses (mental health, physical health etc.), hire a pagan (pagan friendly employers) [Get Witch Quick]
ACTION: receipt book

Newsletter
Due to a number of issues the newsletter has become untenable; a lot of work, hard to get content in and on time from contributors and the amount of time needed to format all the content.
As part of the overhaul we would like to move to a more online format, have it set with schedule of posts hosted on a blog, still have articles and stuff that come on, keep it accessible, drive traffic up more, part of making our resources even more accessible and easy to find.
Action: Josie – make a schedule of posts etc. to try and get the format roughly laid out. Volunteers for articles and content will be organised by the committee.

Calendar
Josie has made a master document for the calendar, if you give Jo an e-mail to sign up, you can then go in and add your events and change them as need be to help with keeping our calendar as current and accurate as possible.

Julie Brett’s Book Tour
Action – Start a conversation on the PCV committee page for locations etc. for the book tour, Sooki Lounge – Hills, Norcote – Druid Coffee, Central Vic/Ballarat as well as seeing if people would be willing to play host to her while she is over to assist in making it a successful venture for her.

Samhain 2017
Seline has asked if she can run it again in 2017 – don’t have a date yet, hopefully not actual Samhain, more will be released as it is known.

PCV Concert
Spiral Dance and Kacey Guy concert at bar 303 on the evening of Pagan Pride day $25 normal entry or $20 concession. Ryan is setting up an Eventbrite, and we are thinking of running a tin around at events prior to get donations to help get this to happen (it will cover essentials for the performers such as fuel/flights, accommodation, etc.) Adrienne is making poster designs, the posters should hopefully be available for January

PCV Morris Side
We now have a Morris Side, who are planning to do their first thing at Mt Franklin, dancing the sun up at Mt Franklin on the Sunday. Any committee members wanting to join let Josie, Sarah or Mark know so they can be added to the planning group.
ACTION: Alex has now joined the Morris Side

New Committee Members
ACTION: Alex, Dean and Lucas are now committee members for the current period.

Working with Children Checks
Action – Can committee members please send copies of your WWC to us so we can make sure that we have a database of proof for legal reasons. They can be e-mailed to the official Collective Gmail account, all details will be kept confidential. Other Business Fundraising – sell the tickets prior to spiral dance and then do the draw and give out at the concert, advertise it well and it will help raise funds for the PCV, potential idea is a pagan hamper with items donated (shirt from Silver Birch and Mt Franklin) items made by committee members etc.

Grants – are there grants that we can get access to as the PCV? Fran is going to look into the grants situation as a friend of the PCV (non-committee member)

Meeting Closed: 3.02