One of my Heathen readers suggested that I might interview Lee Brown, who is the founder of Heathen Nation. He kindly gave me a bit of this time.

Christopher: How would you describe yourself?

Lee: I am a Heathen, a husband, father, loyal friend, teacher, traveler and truth seeker.

Christopher: How long have you been a Heathen? What drew you to the Heathen path?

Lee: I have been a Heathen for about 10 years and the runes are what drew me.

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I never know what direction my interviews will send me. This time a Heathen reader suggested the Heathen Metal Rock group Hauk and its lead man.

Perhaps it should not surprise us that that our spiritual development should bleed over into our cultural values, creating a new culture in the process.

So how does Heathen metal music develop and how does being Heathen affect the music? I contacted Hauk and he soon responded with background information that led to this interview.

Christopher: First, what was your own musical path? How long have you been a musician and what was your training and experience before you became Hauk?

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The author of Runes for Transformation, Kaedrich Olsen, is a Godhi, a Heathen priest, who hails from Boulder, CO. He kindly gave me a bit of his time.

Christopher: First a little bit of background. How long have you been Heathen and how long have you been studying and using the Runes?

Kaedrich: My upbringing was very open to exploring spirituality. When I hit my teenage years, my parents let me have the freedom to explore wherever I felt led. Eventually, I was led to a Book of Runes by Ralph Blum. Of all the methodologies and spiritual systems I explored, the runes felt true to me. This happened about 20 years ago, when I was 16.

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Roswell, New Mexico is in the southeastern part of the state. It is probably best known to most Americans as the site of an alleged UFO crash back in 1947. In fact, the town makes a tourist event out of its annual UFO Festival.

But Roswell can be a conservative town and in September 1999 the school board banned the pentacle, claiming it was either a Satanic or gang symbol. It created quite a controversy when Pagans and Wiccans stood up for their children's right to wear their symbol and ultimately overturned the ban, due in no small part to the board's sense of equality and personal freedom.

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We all heard of the complaint. I was discriminated against and went to XWY Pagan Organization and they didn't take my case. They are only

interested in cases that....

Why are so many cases not taken and what are the real reasons? I thought I would ask Selena Fox of the Lady

Liberty League (http://www.circlesanctuary.org/liberty), one of the largest Pagan rights organizations.

Christopher: Does an organization's finances and number of volunteers set limits for how many cases it can handle?

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Frankly, I can tell you that most of the advances for the pagan, and heathen, community in America have come about through cooperation with individuals in the various other religions, and in the government who are moderate, or at the very least, tolerant enough to recognize mutual interests and mutual challenges. Maintaining religious rights in the United States has made for some interesting bedfellows. The Mormon Church as part of a coalition that included Catholic and Jewish foundations provided the legal counsel for Larry Flint; the publisher of Hustler which most of their members felt was pornographic. Why? Because it was not what he was publishing but that if his rights to freedom of speech and the press were restricted and repressed then so would theirs, and ours.

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