Lupercalia (aka Valentine's Day)

Now that the Valentine's Day hoo-ha is all over and the leftover heart shaped boxes of chocolates are on sale at your local drug store, I thought it would be great to talk a bit about the pagan origins of Valentine's Day. After all, all the fun holidays are pagan (at least I think so) and "St. Valentine" (if he indeed ever existed) is a modern Christian spin on this ancient holiday.

They have yet to show that there was a priest called Valentine who married people in secret. (In the context of today's evangelical Christianity beating the drum for "traditional marriage", I find it hilarious that marriage was also not Christian in those days- it was a pagan rite that St. Paul opposed.)

Lupercalia was associated with Pan, Romulus and Remus (who were raised by a wolf to later found Rome), fertility (read: lots of sex), and whipping/flagellation with dead animal skins (to stimulate fertility). How romantic, no? I can just imagine the early Christian dialogue around keeping the hliday: "Hey- it's always fun and sexy to dress as a goat, sacrifice a dog, and then get it on in the woods- so how can we make this more Christian?"

These days, the holiday has been properly sanitized and lost a lot of its "edge". Hot and steamy sex with everyone and anyone has now become the exchange of flowers and chocolates with one specific someone, and sex only happens after a nice dinner. Decidedly less lusty, but accessible to more people, I suppose.

What, if any, are your Valentine's traditions? This year, I helped some kids at the local UU church make valentines for their friends and families, then went out with my family for a nice Dim Sum lunch and then my sweetie bought me a gift at a local pagan shop. We snuggled on the sofa watching a movie later that night. Simple togetherness- that's my new ritual.