Druidism vs Celto-Gaelic Orthodoxy, where do we draw the line?

This will be a fun one i assure you, i thank you for your patience.

Searching for differences the more we will find, each one increases the distance between us. looking for commonalities will bring us together, all the better to work towards a common goal.

One of the greatest abilities of the Human being is our ability to adapt. This is why we have been able to populate every climate the earth mother (Anu) has blessed us with. Indeed the ability to adapt to the world in its time (whilst simultaneously bringing forward the great wisdom of the past) is a major mechanism of evolution. Religion, like science, must update and adapt to the contemporaneous, there is no exception.

Hoder's dart would make Baldur akin to Jesus (.i. Esus), both are the son of the "High God" (Ard Dia / Mahadev), making them akin to Ganesh. There are some interesting homologies of ritual practice (Orthodoxies), and ritual concepts (Orthopraxies) between the Hindu Yasna, the Zoroastrian Yajna, the Gaelic Iobairtean (Dheas Gnath), and the Norsk Blot whose origins may be interesting. I have been studying them all intently in order to develope a syncretic rite.

On a meta level there appear to be commonalities which may stretch to similarities (silmacritudes). In cross-cultural mythological comparisons (J. Campbell style) they may occupy some archtypical positions. To be fair, they may have descended from a common root (such as ceremonies to celebrate the seasonal cycles. Common to all though each have there own orthodoxy, and orthopraxy), they have each developed as distinctive branches of a common trunk, but they are still distinctand are generally best approached from the lineage of their own custom, both for purity of learning and out of respect.

Though it may be possible, here at the dawn of globalization to draw in those common threads to build a new tradition, based on the good of the old (remembering the bad, with an eye to not repeating it) to honour the tree through its individual branches.

Did anyone hear the primal AUM, or the Tetragammeton expressed?

Does anyone know what Od whispered into his sons ear as he bore him to the pyre?

Only Vali (Valour) van bear Hodr Blindi (Blind Aggression) to the pyre.

1)Was there a western orthodox church?

Yes, St. Kentigern/Mungo

being one of them. The beehive huts on Inis Micheal stand testament to this.

2)Was there a church before Padraig? An Orthodox group of escetics no doubt. i doubt that they would have been counted as "people of the book" since their arrival preceded St Jerome's publication of the unilateral traslation of the biblio sancto the Biblia Vulgata. i would imagine that their influence can be felt in the production of the Slatair na rann, and the Missa breva of the Stowe Missal. web.archive.org/web/20050204114716/www.celticorthodoxy.org/document022.shtml

3)For whom was the Sarum Usus Candensis written, and why?Begining with reading material:

Here's my present theory:

as the legend goes, Following the crusifixion and subsequent resurection following Golgotha, Joseph of Aramathea, as well as Mary Magdalene fled north into the Celtic lands ( and eventually to Britain. "and did those feet in ancient times walk upon England's mountains green?") seeking sanctuary amongst the Druids of Albion from the Roman persecutions. It was said that they brought with them the "Holy Grail", the substance of which is sometimes in question (Was it a cup by which Iesus Supped his last? or was it a child (by the name of Malachy {As recorded in the First book of Mathew in the book of Kells - possibly the oldes redaction of the New testament in existence} what better vessel would there be to carry the blood {read: Bloodline} of the Christ?). Fascinating corollary: In the Arthurian legend (roughly contemporaneous) the Fisher king whom Galahad dines with twice, whos has a glorious cup in the middle of the table which flows like the Dagda's cauldron, who is wounded on his right side as if by spear point, whose land is baren due to his injury (the old Druidic "the king is the land" trope), is named Malachy.

Having arrived on Albion's shores i find it notable that, if the Sarum Usus Cadensis was the oldest Christian ritual to have been performed on that vereable isle, that having just landed they would have developed a service requiring a minimum of 9 priests to perform. My belief is that there is some syncretism occuring here, meaning: that the new assylum seeking christians amalgamated the ancient Druidic ritual as a means of preserving their prescious new ideology. as well as potentially having a blood descendant of King David (which would have definitely have been of interest to the Druids of the time). The fact that there is a "fractioning" (and old term for dispatching, or sacrificing {this is the period of the service where the lamb would have been slaughtered}). Why is it important to "fraction" a cracker, and then divine from the crumb spread (Haruspex style)? Because, as new as it is, it is still a continuation of the ancient custom, as the venerable St. Bede calls it, " the old religion thinly veiled in Christianity".

It is for this reason that i'm using the Sarum Usus Cadensis as the back bone of the syncretic ritual of the Iobairt Mor.

4)What distinguished the Western church and Rome? (Tonsure, Collects, no original sin)

5)Why was Scotland called Rome's special sister?

6)Who are the Celtic saints?

7)s the western church, as Bede puts it, "the old religion thinly veiled in a mantle if Christianity"?

8)What happened after the Synod of Whitby in 668 AD/CE? (Massacre of the Culdees/ Celi De) Reading:

One of the most prominent features that has come to define the spirituality amongst the Celtic peoples is its adaptability. Their spiritual systems leave them neither stuck in the past, not lost in dreams of the future. Instead they have been shown throughout history to adapt the lessons of the past with the lessons of the present in their approach of a future with many more lessons to learn.

Much of what remains of Druidism are in the Greco-Roman writtings as well as the extant Irish, Scottish, Norwegian, French (Gaulish) and Lithuanian writings, as well as certain anomalously common folk practices amonst the various peoples lumped under the Celtic umbrella which loosely shows the commonality of spiritual practices among them. Also we can derive much from the archeological record and many Anthropological deductions made in the modern era concerning ancient practice.

Let me premise this by stating that, in writing this, I am assuming the reader has an already established understanding of Druidism, both Ancient and modern, and in the history of the world,s religions both the written and unwritten, as well as their practices. The Chinese histories (amongst the oldest surviving writings in the world) have records detailing how Gaulish Druids once traveled (Some time in the Bronze age) to China seeking their medical wisdom in order to bring meld it with their own understanding and bring it back to their people. I believe this intercultural learning. I also hold that their may have been a certaibn level of continuity amongst the religions of the bronze age peoples which may be evidenced in the tales and the myths or Sagas that have survived to us from that time.

The ancient past may be the ghostly image of a misty memory of our collective past, but it is not altogether forgotten, nor have we as a people abandoned it entirely. What is being attempted here is a work which will hopefully establish a thread of continuity that will link the spiritual developments of the Celtic peoples from the ancient past to the present moment. The intention here is by no means to infer that Celtic practice is in any way superior to any other practice, it is simply to respect it's uniqueness and to give it a place in this modern world. It is my hope that it can be an inspiration and example to other cultures that they too can bring the the spiritual practice of their ancestors into the modern age in a welcoming and respectful common forum. i feel that Orthodoxy has already established many of the necessary groundwork for this which is why it has been chosen as the foundation.

In my early years i was raised as a Protestant Christian, and later began my journey on the Druid path and in the fullness of time i have come to realize that these two paths are not incompatible but in fact run parallel and in many cases intersect, and in many ways bolster each other.

I understand that what i am about to write may be considered heretical, it is not for them that i am setting out on this endeavor. it is for those who will find solace, and communion, whose hearts will illumine with understanding that i set these thoughts and this long study to words, in the hopes that it will help to bring us into closer connection with the divine in all of its manifestations. Some of what i say will pander to established doctrine, but much will challenge it directly in the hopes that keys from our ancestral past will unlock deeper doors of understanding, and through their practice may bring us (even if a little) closer to the Divine and our godly source.

The Ancient Druids were famously the Graduates of religious studies, the Ollamhs were the Graduates in Law, medicine, and Lore, and the Bards

Pertinent Web Links:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Celtic_religion#Votive_offerings

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christianity_and_Paganism

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Druid

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Culdees

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saltair_na_Rann

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pelagius

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synod_of_Whitby

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Rite_Orthodoxy

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celtic_Orthodox_Church

https://orthodoxwiki.org/Gallican_Rite