The Pagan Future Fund broke the $10,000 mark this July, relying on $4000 of contributions in the past two years from loyal donors and interest from our socially responsible investments. The current balance is $10,227.74. Now the funds are in the hand of a manager whose fiduciary responsibility is to make the fund grow. It is exciting to look ahead to where we will be in a few years!
Each and all of you, and any other person of good intent, wishing to contribute to this Pagan Future Fund is invited to do so, and as the Foundation is still a religious 501c3 nonprofit, with all of its paperwork up to date, all donations are tax deductible. The funds are invested in a Calvert socially responsible fund, one of the oldest and most reliable ethical investment vehicles, putting it to good use while earning interest which will add to its value. Now that investment has been turned from an automatic commercial product to one directly managed. This will improve the return on our investment. The Board of the Foundation will continue administering the Fund for now. As other people contribute, they will get a proportionate voice. As time goes on, our organization will mature, responding to the needs of the participants for foci or governance.
We have hope. We have hope in a Pagan future, where we can use our collective strength to support and enrich our spiritual community. Unfortunately that is not today, so we will plan for tomorrow. To what end? Why should we do this? We’ll let this money add to itself for a decade, while those who would nurture this future contribute to it. After that decade, the Board, or whatever successor governance holds jurisdiction, will decide if it is time to use the Fund, in part or in whole, and for what purpose. The Board or its successor will be responsible for the proper and effective use of the Funds for the mission of the Foundation, to the benefit of the Pagan community.
Greetings to all supporters of the Pantheon Foundation & the Pagan Future Fund!
With this annual report begins the simplified presentation of the Foundation’s work, currently limited to our investments in the future of our Pagan community.
As alluded to in our last annual report, we invested the money donated to the Foundation in Calvert socially responsible funds last year. We had originally deposited $6000 and since then several supporters have donated another $2000 across the last year. We have also earned $160.55 in interest. Our balance is $8160.55. Our first goal is to have a balance of $10,000 whereupon this account will be personally managed. Right now the system is managing the investment, but a human will do a better job.
Thank you to everyone who donated. We are rapidly approaching our goal. We have only $1840 to go!
Please consider the Pantheon Foundation in your charitable giving. All donations are fully tax deductible and the Foundation is a 501(c)3 religious non-profit. We will provide you with suitable documentation for your tax files.
Thank you to all of the supporters of our vision for a Pagan Future. Let us build it together!
The last few years have been quiet ones for the Foundation, and as a consequence we have not sent out regular bulletins or communiques. We have been researching and contemplating what to do with the donations given to the Foundation — a central concern of ours — in support of our religious community. We asked this distribution for suggestions and we researched other groups with similar aspirations to ours, but no appropriate beneficiary was found due to legal and ethical constraints. Being unable to find any suitable non-profit entity to give the funds to that would fulfill the Foundation’s mission of building and strengthening our Pagan community, for which we were given the donations, we found ourselves at something of a loss on how to proceed.
In earlier efforts the Foundation promoted the idea of the power of the coin, for which we received not a little criticism. The coin as the elemental tool of Earth is peculiar in its ability to grow, that is to accrue power over time, as well as combine with other coins and create even greater power. This is the power of community and collective action. This momentum is precious and not to be wasted. From these considerations the Pantheon Foundation Board has decided to suspend its planned work of fiscal sponsorship and that form of community development, as well as other initiatives we undertook in the past, including scholarships and online conferences. The community has made it clear it does not desire such services from the Foundation. Nonetheless we are left with something over $6,000 of donor funds, which are unusable in any other way.
Nonetheless we have hope. We have hope in a Pagan future, where we can use our collective strength to support and enrich our spiritual community. Unfortunately that is not today, so we will plan for tomorrow.
We have made the decision — that we hope you will agree with us to be a sound one! — to invest this money, shifting it into the future, where it will become more, and therefore more useful. It will be invested in a Calvert socially responsible fund, one of the oldest and most reliable ethical investment vehicles, putting it to good use while earning interest will add to its value. At $6,000 we can only purchase a ‘commercial’ product, which is not actively managed, so our goal will be to increase this amount to more than $10,000 where a professional manager will be set to maximize its value.
The Board hereby publishes its final resolution for the Foundation, here
The Board of the Foundation will take on the responsibility of administering the Fund for now. If other people contribute, they get a proportionate voice. As time goes on, our organization will mature, responding to the needs of the participants for foci or governance. Immediately, the Board will report the relevant numbers as the primary content of this Annual Report henceforth, as these duties will be the on-going operations of the Foundation until such time as the Fund becomes operational. We will also have an annual meeting announced through these channels if you wish to get involved.
Currently, we have exactly $6347.12, a round $6k in the Calvert Fund and the rest as cash in the Foundation’s bank account. To this bank account is regularly being added small deposits from Amazon.Smile. Through the Amazon Smile program, you can select a beneficiary organization, and each time you make a purchase at Amazon, they will make a small donation to your chosen recipient. (Go to https://smile.amazon.com/ for more information on how to use this service.) The Pantheon Foundation participates in this program and, if you buy things from Amazon and if you so desire, please use the Smile site and designate the Foundation as a beneficiary. It costs you nothing, but the future will thank you for putting aside a wee bit with each purchase you make.
Each and all of you, and any other person of good intent, wishing to contribute to this Pagan Future Fund is welcome to do so, and as the Foundation is still a religious 501c3 nonprofit, with all of its paperwork up to date, all donations are tax deductible. The faster we can get the balance to $10,000, the faster it will grow, thereafter being managed.
To what end? Why should we do this? We’ll let this money add to itself for a decade, while those who would nurture this future contribute to it. After that decade, the Board, or whatever successor governance holds jurisdiction, will decide if it is time to use the Fund, in part or in whole, and for what purpose. The Board or its successor will be responsible for the proper and effective use of the Funds for the mission of the Foundation, to the benefit of the Pagan community.
As we all look toward the future and inevitable evolution of this organization, I am poignantly reminded of its inception and the lofty but practical purpose for which it came into being. I therefore want to address you on a more personal note.
As the Executive Director and originator of this project, my sole intention in building this organization has always been to create a means whereby the community in which I’ve lived all my adult life might articulate its power in the larger world effectively, taking its place as one of the Great Religions, influencing the world for good, which for the last nearly 600 years it has. The Foundation is a communitarian project, and I’m committed to decentralized authority structures, as well as consensus decision making. However, to get something built usually requires at least one person who will drive it into being, and for this project I’ve been willing to be that person, that driver, together with my fellow board members.
I’ve also been putting my money where my mouth is, as the saying goes. I invested a great deal of my personal financial resources to jumpstart the Foundation, anticipating that the fees generated from fiscal sponsorship and other endeavors would allow me to be repaid. Given that this didn’t happen, a natural choice would be to shut down the corporation and pay off what debts it could, ceasing operations. The amount currently in the Foundation’s bank account would in no way compensate me or repay me for my original personal investment.
However, I can’t justify refilling my pockets when there is a collection of funds all donated for a purpose. When that collected power could make something good—if not now, then at some future time—it should stay dedicated to that purpose. That reflects my values. So I’m forgiving the entirety of the Foundation’s debt to me, and taking only a $4,000 tax deduction. I’m also making an immediate donation of $500 to the Fund. This is all too important to waste. Some people, particularly in our community, find matters of money somehow to be distasteful or demeaning. To me all is holy, the rest mostly depends on what you do with it. I see no justifiable reason to abandon one of our great Elemental Tools, called the disk, or pentacle, but also the coin. This is an era in which money is the most abstract and universal power that humans regularly wield. I want my values represented in action. Do you? Few things can make reality happen in the way that money can. Every contribution is a step towards making a future safe for Pagans. If and when you are able to make charitable contributions, I hope you will remember the Pantheon Foundation.
I will close with a final thought: people asked me why we named the organization a foundation. I reminded them of the Foundation in Isaac Asimov’s famous trilogy of the same name, and its purpose: to prepare for a coming dark age and thereby shorten it. Is there any doubt as to why we need to take steps and plan for the future?
With my best wishes,
Sam Webster and the Board of Directors Pantheon Foundation
Here in Northern California, since the end of the Ancient Ways festival at Harbin Hot Springs, we have not had a pan-Pagan outdoor gathering. After many discussions with folks we met at Ancient Ways ‘back in the day’ and new friends from PantheaCon, and from the various clusters of Pagan and polytheistic folk, we know it is time to create a new one!
SunWard Gathering is…
to draw together our community of fellow Polytheists, Pagans, Witches and Magi,
to gather our strength in this time of great need,
to learn from each other by sharing and listening,
to cultivate the good, to clear away and transform the bad,
to share good food and drink, art, and laughter.
What we are doing…
Worship
Our focus is religious and on the Gods and Goddesses we have built long relationships with, and we welcome all who come to respectfully share our event, for our goal is building community. All too often we experience each other through the screen of computer or phone. How different it is when our interlocutors are right before us!
In the manner of the Twilight and Spiral Gatherings, our main rituals will be a thematically connected cycle with opening, main, and closing rites. Our goal for this year is creating the container for opportunities to creatively meet the Gods.
Saturday’s main ritual will feature altars built to each Deity, or Deity-complex, or Pantheon, or Principle, we hold dear, and we will move among them to meet their Inhabitants, make connections and receive Their blessings.
Outside of those rites we will also have a cycle of offerings made at Dawn, Noon, Sunset and Midnight, to keep the Divine Ones close.
Community
In addition to the religious focus, we aim also to provide a setting in which attendees can meet in heart-space, so there will be time set aside each morning for such connection. Community is different when we have touched each other. Having learned from the Fairies, every morning we will have a Heart Circle to make the time to see and connect with each other.
In the Late Afternoon we will inaugurate the custom of a Symposium. This is time to stop, pour a libation to Hermes, have a libation of yourself, and then be presented with a knotty question to inspire conversation and discourse.
Later in the evening, after the main ritual, we also hope to have drumming, dancing and music into the night.
Teaching
We are seeking a limited amount of teaching for this time, while hoping for success and to extend our stay another day next year. In keeping with our focus, we are especially looking for teachings that center on the Gods and how to work with Them. Please contact Sam Webster with your offering.
Schedule the current draft
Where we are staying…
We have found a lovely venue for this springtime, sun-ward gathering, the Saratoga Springs Retreat Center (https://saratogasprings.com) 20 miles outside of Ukiah. Ritual spaces include the Main Meadow in the center of the property to the huge Heart Lodge, with its heated wood floors, arched ceiling, and stone fireplace, to the Fire (safe) Circle, and the Yurt for more intimate groupings. Many other small mystic places and paths adorn the land. There is also a vast hot tub along with an olympic swimming pool, another set of showers and washrooms, with a shaded canopy area.
Main Lodge
Inside main lodge, social and discussion space
Heart Lodge indoor ritual space
Approaching the Heart Lodge
Inside the Heart Lodge (without the chairs and tables)
Fireplace in Heart Lodge
Behind the Heart Lodge
Pool, Gazebo,
…and Hot Tub
The amenities…
Saratoga Springs has lovely meadows for camping, bunk rooms in the historic Main Lodge, multi-room Cabins with comfy! queen, full, and twin bunk beds with bedding, including showers and toilets for groups of 4 to 8, and private Sleeping Sheds for two which have queen beds and privacy.
The base price is $295 for your stay from Friday to Sunday. This includes all meals, and space to camp.
If you prefer indoor accommodations, there are options:
The Main Lodge has two large shared rooms with twin bunk beds: $325
The Cottages have several rooms each for 4 to 8 people with queen and twin bunk beds. Some Colleges have en suite showers and toilets: $345
The Sleeping Sheds are private accommodations with queen beds, heaters and a/c: $365
Bunk house
Cabin Room
Tent in Meadow
Children
Families and Children are welcome. Depending on needs we would like to have child appropriate programming. Please connect with the producers to let us know about what you want for your children and what you may offer for their care. Between the ages of 5 and 12, children cost $149, and under the age of 5 are free.
Food
Food will be provided for all attendees. Our Chef, Kyle, will be providing scrumptious meals with vegetarian, vegan, and gluten free options. We’ll have ‘Coffee & Crullers’ (Continental Breakfast) to greet the early risers, Full Brunch starting at 11, and Dinner about 6pm. We’ll keep snacks available in the Main Lodge all the time.
Finances
The Pantheon Foundation, a religious non-profit organization, is providing financial and administrative support for this event. We do not expect to make a profit on this event, but hope to have seed money for next year, mostly the deposit.
The cost for accommodations is $60 per person for each of two days and the food is $90 for the weekend. Beyond that total expense of $210 are the insurance, and other facilities fees, ritual supplies, and expenses for the administering the event.
Policy
The producers of the SunWard Gathering are adamant that all who come to our event are comfortable and safe. Given the context of our day and the defence of maltreatment in even the highest offices, we are here posting our protocol. Our policy is simple:“All are Welcome, Abuse will Not be Tolerated”.
by All we mean all who come to participate and make a wholesome community occasion together are welcome, irrespective of body, origin, or viewpoint, except intolerance.
by Abuse we mean getting one person’s wants at another’s expense. What is not consented to is forbidden.
If there is any concern with respect to any of these matters, contact the Gathering Director Sam Webster (samwebster11@gmail.com) before the event, and on site contact any member of staff.
Register Now!
We need enough people signed up by February first, the next deposit date, to know that we have a viable event. Please stop by the Facebook event page and let us know you are coming, but it is essential that enough tickets are bought to make our fees. If we do not have sufficient interest by February 1, 2019, we will refund all tickets.
2018 has been a quiet year for the Foundation. We have supported our fiscal sponsorees, mostly the OSOGD. But the ebb tide eventually returns to flow, and action follows quietude.
For the past year members of the Foundation have been dreaming and planning for a new event. Here in Northern California, since the end of the Ancient Ways festival at Harbin Hot Springs, we have not had a pan-Pagan outdoor gathering. After many discussions with folks we met at Ancient Ways ‘back in the day’ and new friends from PantheaCon and from the various organizations of Pagan and polytheistic folk, we know it is time to create a new one: SunWard Gathering, to be held March 28-31 at Saratoga Springs outside Ukiah, California. This event will be the major Foundation project for the 2019 year, collaborating with our sponsorees and especially the OSOGD, so much of this annual report is devoted to it, as we look ahead to the future.
SunWard Gathering is…
to draw together our community of fellow Polytheists, Pagans, Witches and Magi,
to gather our strength in this time of great need,
to learn from each other by sharing and listening,
to cultivate the good, to clear away and transform the bad,
to share good food and drink, art, and laughter.
Our focus is religious and on the Gods and Goddesses we have built long relationships with, but we welcome all who come to respectfully share our event for our goal is building community. All too often we experience each other through the screen of computer or phone. How different it is when our interlocutors are right before us!
In the manner of the Twilight and Spiral Gatherings, our main rituals will be a thematically connected cycle with opening, main, and closing rites. Outside of those rites we will also have a cycle of offerings made at Dawn, Noon, Sunset and Midnight, to keep the Divine Ones close. Saturday’s main ritual will feature altars built to each Deity, or Deity-complex, or Pantheon, or Principle, we hold dear, and we will move among them to meet their Inhabitants, make connections and receive Their blessings.
In addition to the religious focus, we aim also to provide a setting in which attendees can meet in heart-space, so there will be time set aside each morning for such connection. The schedule will include brunch, time for teaching, and a cocktail/mocktail hour before dinner in the manner of a symposium (think drinking games with philosophical discourse) with a knotty question to inspire the conversation. Drumming and music are welcome!
Our goal for this year is creating the container with less emphasis on specifying the content and more on opportunities for creatively meeting the Gods. In keeping with our focus, we are looking for teachings that center on the Gods and how to work with Them.
We have found a lovely venue for this springtime, sun-ward gathering, the Saratoga Springs Retreat Center (https://saratogasprings.com) 20 miles outside of Ukiah. It offers a variety of comfortable, attractive accommodation, ritual, and meeting spaces, including a fire circle and roomy hot tub.
The team that is putting this together comes out of the OSOGD, along with collaborators from the broader Northern California Pagan Community. The Foundation is providing administration and financial support and oversight. Tickets are available through Eventbrite and through FaceBook, where most of our communications are happening. Just search for ‘sunward gathering’.
As mentioned at the start of this Report, SunWard Gathering is the Foundation’s main project for this upcoming year. We are also in discussion with various Pagan scholars around the country to start an academically focused conference that would move around the country and publish a collection of the papers presented at the event so that what is learned is shared and preserved. The coming year has much potential with these exciting projects!The Pantheon Foundation’s mission is “to provide organizational support for the practice of Pagan religion and the fostering of Pagan Ministry. To study the history, promote the culture, and advance the social welfare of Pagans and the Pagan community.” With a new festival on the calendar, and plans for a conference, we believe we are fulfilling that mission. We hope that you support this work and will join in the maturation and development of our religious community. And, come join us at SunWard!
The Foundation has been soul searching to reawaken its mission: To provide organizational support for the practice of Pagan religion and the fostering of Pagan Ministry. To study the history, promote the culture, and advance the social welfare of Pagans and the Pagan community.
We have recentered on our original core organization. The Foundation began as the need for the OSOGD to be non-profit strengthened, but why solve a problem for only one group? Why not create an organization that would require us to practice community development and network building? As other co-creators came in, the direction of that development had a social justice activism character to it from those collaborators. Without them, we have returned to our core strengths.
Our function is primarily religious. We create opportunities for folk to practice Pagan religion. We educate, mostly Pagan people about the history, culture, and practice of Pagan religion.
Our social activism has not ended, but re-centered on the power of religion to create, to critique, and to convey the values of individuals and society. By this we change the problematic element in our world today: humans.
The tool we are using for organizing and to collect the necessary power to cause change is the coin, most overlooked of the magical tools. We deliver financial (and other) services in exchange for a percentage of traffic (10% of deposits) as a way of paying for the professional delivery of those services. For the moment, because our needs are small we have suspended our work with Jitasa, an accountancy specializing in nonprofit organizations. Once we expand sufficiently we will reactivate that relationship.
Today we provide fiscal sponsorship for the OSOGD and the Temple of Innana and Demuzi, relatively small operations ($5k, $1k), and so generating $600 of operating budget per year. Over time as more groups or projects need 501(c)(3) coverage and the financial services to do that easily, we expect that number to grow.
Projects are a powerful way to make headway in the world. The OSOGD has just started a distance learning program using Zoom on the Foundation’s contract (costing $140 ann.). This brought in $500 its first month ($50 in fees). Eventually we will be back at Jitasa-level funding.
As ever, fees collected for services are how we fund our operations. All donations we have ever been given have been held for use in initiatives. For example, we have collected funds for specific usages such as the Diotima Fund, providing a small scholarship to Master of Divinity students at accredited seminaries. However, we also have a special fund of the seed money that we were given when we launched. This $3,000 is awaiting the right project or initiative. Do you have any ideas? Let us know at info@pantheonfoundation.org
Once we find a person with accountancy and bookkeeping skills we will certainly resume the Jitasa service. We are also seeking a skilled communications person, too. If you can recommend anyone or are interested, please contact us.
A loaf of bread is the result of many seeds. From many small works comes great benefit.
For the Foundation,
)O+
sam webster, phd
executive director
pantheon fundation
The past year for the Pantheon Foundation has been a quiet one. We have been regrouping after the changes in our constituency. In this station-keeping mode, we have been supporting our fiscal sponsorees, consolidating our infrastructure, and preparing for our next cycle of work.
Drawing on our depth of skill and resources, the OSOGD will be launching a new distance learning program called the “Golden Dawn Academy” to serve the many interested students who have contacted the Order but who live outside the San Francisco Bay area. The program will deliver the classes using the Zoom video conferencing platform and record them for asynchronous use. The first of several planned courses will be the core Golden Dawn curriculum as taught by the OSOGD. Enrollment is currently open and classes start April 13, 2017.
Financially, we are stable, if lean. Donated funds have been segregated from operational finances and we are investigating various initiatives with which to benefit the Pagan community by deploying those funds. Suggestions and ideas are most welcome.
We will be at PantheaCon again this year. Come visit us in our suite shared with the OSOGD and the Am Duat Shrine, say hello and have a drink!
Friends and Supporters of the Pantheon Foundation,
I am pleased to release our first annual report. It is something of a mix, but it contains a real vision for the future. We would very much appreciate any comment or feedback you have to offer. We are especially interested in your views of how the Foundation could be of greater service to you and the Pagan community. Please write us at info@pantheonfoundation.org.
We felt it important that we release this report on the Solstice, but our accounting work is not complete. We apologize, and expect it to be complete and posted during the week between the holidays. Please check back at the turn of the year.
We here at the Pantheon Foundation wish you all the brightest blessings of the Yuletide Season, and all health and prosperity in the New Year!
)O+
Sam Webster, executive director
Pantheon Foundation
At PantheaCon this year, I had the pleasure of reporting on the Foundations activities since the last Con. We’ve come a long way in a year and we got the spreadsheet to show it! In an effort at transparency, we are publishing the accounting data for each of our major projects and the Foundation as a whole. You can find the report here.
If you are coming to PantheaCon this year, come stop by our hospitality suite #1060 and say hello.
Friday: 6:30-7pm Establishing the Altar of Hermes
7:30-8:30pm Foundation Reception
Saturday: 7:30-9pm, OSOGD Reception
Saturday & Sunday: 9pm to Midnight, Esoterica Lounge.
We will be establishing the Altar of Hermes, one of our Divine Patrons, Friday night from 6:30 to 7 p.m. Then, from 7:30 to 8:30 p.m. we will hold a reception for the Foundation welcoming our fiscal sponsorees, donors, supporters, friends and inquirers to report on our accomplishments of the past year, our hopes for the next one and open a dialogue on how the Foundation can better serve our community.
Saturday, from 7:30 to 9 p.m., the OSOGD will be holding a reception: “Curious about the Open Source Order of the Golden Dawn? Wonder what it is like to be a member? Well, come on up and ask! Meet with some of the fraters and sorors of the OSOGD in the Pantheon Foundation Suite. OSOGD members will be available to answer those questions and more. Plus we’ll have refreshments!”
Saturday and Sunday nights from 9 p.m. to Midnight is the Esoterica Lounge. Come relax with old friends and meet new ones in a “chill space” house of Gods and Goddesses. On Saturday, serving as a quieter atmosphere from the illustrious Green Fairy Party, the Pantheon Foundation Suite will be open to the public and invite you to come in, sip wine and converse about all things esoteric. Spend time in delightful devotion with Aphrodite, trade riddles with Hermes, wax philosophical with Baphomet …
Check the Schedule on the Door for more exciting events.
