In the wake of all
the popularity of the Da Vinci Code, there has been a Christian
fundamentalist backlash. It is amazing that there are actually
protestors outside the theatres demanding a ban of the movie.
I really thought that book burning, well movie banning, was abandoned
years ago in this country. It’s not just the movies, this
ugly monster is raising its head in all areas of life. These
fundamentalists are poking their noses in everybody’s business
and demanding to run other peoples lives and thoughts across
the board.
While delivering our magazine to the merchants in Cumming and Cartersville
Georgia, I was faced with something that I seldom experience due
to my insular environment at The Inner Space, located in Sandy
Springs, Georgia.
Sandy Springs is and has long been a hub of Atlanta’s holistic
and metaphysical community, supporting two major metaphysical bookstores,
a plethora of holistic healers, Chinese medicine, Tai-Chi and Qu-Gong
studios, a reflexology school, and our magazine’s headquarters.
Health food stores and a Whole Foods Market are bustling with activity.
We have a monthly psychic fair at our center, which has been welcomed
by the community for over fifteen years.
The fanatical element of the evangelical Christian movement is
alive and well in the outlying areas of Cartersville and Cumming
(seemingly progressive suburbs). In Cumming, a metaphysical bookstore
called Simple Strands operates in the same shopping center as a
Christian bookstore along with a general interest bookstore called
Humpus Bumpus Books. We have long distributed in Humpus Bumpus,
the Antique Mall and Simple Strands, until this month… The
owner of the Antique Mall was accosted by a fanatic evangelical
who demanded that he remove Oracle 20/20 Magazine from his market.
He was so intimidated that he agreed. The management of SWheat
Market, a healthy grocer and lunch bar in Cartersville had the
same experience. She was so intimidated by the fear of losing business
that she agreed to remove the magazine. The same thing happened
in Holly Springs at Cherokee Custom Scrip, but you can always pick
up the magazine at The Herb Shop of Holly Springs just around the
corner on Jackson Street.
By the way there is a great herb shop just down the street from
SWheat Market. The Herb Shop of Cartersville carries our magazine
and holds a monthly psychic fair. We picked up another drop point
there as well, Maximum Nutrition, just around the corner from the
other two stores and another merchant, M’Vorneens Irish Pub,
on Museum Drive, called us about being a distributor in Cartersville.
Look for the distribution to continuously expand in your area,
even if it is in the Bible belt buckle.
I am not suggesting that our publication is right for everyone,
quite the contrary. It takes an intelligent, open minded, progressive
reader to appreciate the articles and regular columns. I should
not expect a fundamentalist to begin to approach the open mindedness
required, but I do not try to eliminate this element from society
by any other means than education and information. Why should the
fundamentalists be so threatened by our magazine? The other Atlanta
metaphysical publication remains in SWheat Market. What is it about
us that is so repugnant to these individuals? Perhaps it is the
possibility that we will reach out and change others through enlightenment
and information. The shackles of ignorance cannot restrict an open
mind. The bondage of guilt and fear can only restrict those who
operate from a fear-based religion.
As metaphysicians, we are taught the law of allowing yet by allowing
the fanatics to behave in such a self-serving manner, we are allowing
ourselves to be enslaved by their dogma.
If you have been picking up our magazine and fail to find it in
its usual place, please ask your merchant to give us a call and
we will be happy to restock. If you don’t like to take a
chance of finding it, we will be happy to deliver it directly to
your home by snail mail.
