The Song and the Flame

Piety. Eusebia. Giving the Gods their due and appropriately recognizing their role in our lives. This is important; that seems fairly self-evident to me. If I don’t think the Gods are active in my life, what am I doing here? And if they are indeed, then how can I ignore them?

But… what does that mean? How do I do this? What are the parameters?

I suppose I should start out with what “piety” is not to me. I mean, if I start talking about a “pious” person, it can bring up some pretty strong and fairly negative connotations. Piety starts to look like a person who’s all God(s), all the time. Every smallest blessing is “from God”, even those that are products of the person’s own efforts. Any trial is an ordeal that God helps one through, or maybe a part of God’s plan. And you hear about it all the time, because the other thing is, God’s glory should be spread by the pious person. Right?

I don’t think so. I’ve talked about personal responsibility elsewhere here. I don’t think piety is giving that up. Piety is not giving the Gods credit for every single good thing and for your surviving every single bad thing. Piety is not about abasing yourself, about surrendering all free will and credit for anything (good or bad) that happens.

What piety is, is acknowledging the Gods’ role in your life, in honest terms. Honest not just about what they do for you, but also about where the boundary is where it’s no longer what they’re doing, it’s just your own skill or dumb luck or whatever. In my case, it’s a quick recognition each morning, with especial attention paid to those who are important to my life in general terms or who have some connection to something going on that day. It’s pouring a libation following some particularly good thing — to Hermes after a successful journey, for example. It’s formally recognizing and honoring a deity when I’m in their space, such as pouring a libation to Poseidon when I come to the ocean on vacation. It’s even smaller things, too, thinking of Zeus in a thunderstorm.

But it’s not surrendering your entire life to the worship of the Gods. There’s a difference between living mindfully and living slavishly. Piety is the former, and not the latter.