Ever wondered why you can never find one when you need one?
Pagan police officers in some areas are being allowed to take as many as eight days leave a year for events such as the summer solstice and Halloween.
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so Pagan Police only get one day per event. Why do other pagan/druid groups Demand 3 or more days at Avebury from the NT for each event?
"Superintendent Simon Hawkins, of Hertfordshire Police, said: "While balancing operational needs, the force's religion and beliefs policy gives all staff the choice of re-allocating the traditional Christian bank holiday festivals to suit their personal faith beliefs and this has been very well-received from a number of faith groups including Muslim and Jewish."
It seems the police, on this occasion at least, are following a more enlightened path than the BBC who are presently being criticised guardian.co.uk/media/2009/jul/13/bbc-radio-4-thought-for-the-day-mark-damazer for only allowing people from the 'established' religions to express their thoughts on BBC's Radio 4 'Thought for the Day' programme. Perhaps the BBC should take a leaf out of Superintendent Simon Hawkins' book and allow pagans, atheists, agnostics, humanists, Shintoists, Zoroastrians, etc to broadcast their thoughts on a level playing field (or at least change the name of their programme to Religious Thought for the Day). Some of those belief systems have, after all, been around as long, if not longer, as Christianity and their believers do have thoughts worth listening to!
Meanwhile, in the some forty years since becoming aware of the pagan movement in this country, it's very good indeed to see pagans gaining an ever-increasing presence (and an ever-growing respect) in the wider community here.