This feature originally ran in the October 25, 2023 issue of The Riverfront Times The year was 2015, and I’d been trying to set up an interview with Janet Kolar, Alton’s hearse-racing “Mistress of the Macabre” and proprietor of the Historic Museum of Torture Devices. I had first been drawn to Alton while exploring…
Spirituality
A Witch’s Guide to Clearing the Funk from Your Home
You ever walk into your home and feel like something’s just, off? Like the energy’s crusty and maybe something’s lurking that doesn’t pay rent? Over time, the energy in your home, just like everything else in it, needs a good cleaning. The trick is knowing when that time has come. Here are a few signs…
The MAGA Movement Embodies the Real Sin of Sodom
For generations, the story of Sodom and Gomorrah has been weaponized to justify discrimination—particularly against LGBTQ+ people—by those who claim the cities were destroyed due to sexual deviance. But a closer reading of both the Bible and historical religious commentary reveals a different, often overlooked truth: the real sin of Sodom was a brutal inhospitality…
Eron Mazza: Queer Joy is Magic!
Let me be clear: Queer joy isn’t just a vibe—it’s a full-blown magical working. A spell. A hex against hopelessness. It is a monkey wrench tossed into the gears of A system that says we aren’t allowed to exist, let alone find joy in this life. We live in a system of oppression that would…
The spell begins the moment you decide
Picture it, a stretch of I-40 at night. I’m one of only a few cars on the road. I am driving to my hometown from Oklahoma City to feed the animals at my mother’s house. Inside the car I am coming to a decision. Do I live as myself? Or do I continue to live…
We Rise Together, Not Alone: Community as Sacred Practice
Spirituality these days is often marketed like a solo journey with a crystal starter pack. You meditate alone, journal alone, light your candles alone, and if anyone disrupts your peace? Cut them off. Block. Banish. Repeat. But what if the spirituality of isolation they are marketing to us is not very spiritual at all? Throughout…
Eron Vito Mazza: You’re Not Blocked. You’re Burnt Out
Let’s clear something up. Your aura isn’t blocked because you forgot to charge your water under a full moon or skipped affirmations last Tuesday. You’re not hexed because you didn’t buy that $88 citrine wand from a spiritual influencer who’s never worked a retail shift in their life. You’re burnt out, baby—not broken. You’re just…
Initiated by Grief: The Rites No One Asks For
Grief is an initiation no one asks for—but it finds us all eventually. And when it does, it changes everything. When we think of spiritual rites, we often picture the joyful or solemn ceremonies that mark the great turning points of life: a baptism, a bar mitzvah, a wedding, a child’s first steps into community.…
Mazza: The Strength of Gentleness
There’s a kind of strength that doesn’t roar. It doesn’t stomp its feet or shatter glass ceilings in a blaze of thunder. It whispers. It steadies. It holds. It’s a gentle magic. In a culture obsessed with dominance, productivity, and spectacle, softness is often dismissed as weakness. But in magical and spiritual traditions, gentleness can…
The Sacred Pause: Spiritual Rest as Resistance
I’ve been thinking a lot about rest lately. Not collapse. Not zoning out. But real, intentional rest. The kind that lets your nervous system exhale and your spirit come back into your body. And let me be honest—it’s hard. As a queer, trans, neurodivergent witch, I’ve spent most of my life running on survival mode.…
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