~ ERIS Festival 2005 ~

Fall Festival Thanks! For those who missed the fall festival, you missed the first beautiful weather all week! (And who could have doubted it? Get a group of Pagans together, and magick happens!) And for those who made it out to Schodack Island, an enormous *THANK YOU* for making our very first event an unqualified success!

About Us

We're proud and excited to introduce a new Pagan service organization that has formed in the Capital District. Called Earth Religions In Service, Inc. (E.R.I.S.) , we are dedicated to the goal of service to both our local Pagan community, and the general communities we work and live in.
 
E.R.I.S. was formed in January, 2005 by a diverse group of local Pagans who shared one common vision: To provide educational opportunities to help dispel misconceptions of Paganism and to foster a positive image of Paganism to the public. We recognize that Paganism is still misunderstood in the community at large, so we decided to form Earth Religions In Service to help provide information on Pagan lifestyles and practices in order to promote tolerance and dispel myths about Paganism in general.
 
This shared vision urges us to a common goal: To create an opportunity for the Pagan community to come together to celebrate our diversity, and provide the public an opportunity to see a friendly, positive side of us that isn't often portrayed in the media. We aim to accomplish this by hosting Pagan community festival days. Planning for our first event is well under way.
 
Earth Religions In Service is not affiliated in any way with the Pagan Pride Project, Inc., but we philosophically support their mission to foster pride in Pagan identity through education, activism, charity and community. We have seen that the Pagan Pride Project model has been very successful in uniting communities across the country, so we have gratefully borrowed event planning ideas from the Pagan Pride Project. As such, our event will be open to the public, feature a public community ritual, and also include a charity component.  However, we have specifically chosen an event date in October so that our event will not conflict with any other local or regional Pagan Pride Day activities. We are grateful to the PPD for the inspiration for our own event, but we currently have no affiliation with that organization, or any other. E.R.I.S. is a local organization formed by local people to serve our local communities.
 
We’ve come a long way in a short time. Since our first meeting in January, we have made great strides. We received our Certificate of Incorporation in April, 2005, and have been moving forward on event planning ever since. Our first major event will be a Fall Festival to be held on October 15, 2005 at the Schodack Island State Park, which is located on the Hudson River just south of Albany. We hope to feature workshops on a variety of topics of interest to both the stranger to Pagan ways and to the more experienced Pagans among us. We also hope to feature local Pagan craftspeople and vendors to showcase the wide range of talent among us. This is a great opportunity for  seekers/curious folk to come and learn more about what our incredibly diverse community has to offer.

The ERIS planning committee has been meeting twice a month, and we're  excited by how far we've come. We are hoping to hold a variety of fund-raising events over the summer to help provide the means for us to plan a great event. Expect to hear an announcement soon for a  " Poker Night ," where you'll be able to spend a fun evening playing cards with a bunch of crazy pagans and support a worthy cause at the same time. Gee! What more could you ask for?
 
We invite you to browse our website where you can meet the members of  the planning committee, get updated information on our upcoming Poker  Night , as well as check on our progress with planning for the Fall Festival in October. Many hands make light work, so if you're interested in lending a hand at an event, please feel free to drop an email to generalinfo@erisny.org and introduce yourself.
 
So here we are. A group of diverse folks who are working together for a common cause. We recognize and honor the wide diversity of the Pagan community. We seek to foster stronger ties within the community and beyond. We believe that being in service to our communities is a goal worthy of our best effort. In that spirit, we are proud to announce  "Earth Religions In Service."
 
 In Service,
 Janean Sylvester & Tina Martinez
 Co-Chairs, E.R.I.S. Planning Committee