Balance, Darkness, and the Hypocrisy of “Light”

Yesterday I watched the Charlie Kirk memorial coverage live on TV and I was struck not by reverence or compassion, but by the same tired venom being spewed in the name of Christ.

Tucker Carlson took the stage and smugly delivered a story, sketching a lamp-lit scene: powerful men in Jerusalem sitting around ‘eating hummus’ and plotting Jesus’ death. Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate Tucker — but that phrase, hummus eating, is the part that stung. It felt like a dog whistle, a way of othering Middle Eastern people, reinforcing the post-9/11 script that tells us who we’re supposed to hate. And yet, the crowd applauded. (Link Here)

This is what I find so offensive—and heartbreaking—about much of modern Christianity in the political sphere. The hypocrisy. Those who claim to be defenders of love and light, while their words drip with division and contempt. And lately, I’m seeing the same people weaponize words like pagan, witch, witchcraft—as if these are synonymous with evil. As if anything outside of their box is darkness to be feared.

But let’s be clear: paganism is not evil. Witchcraft is not some sinister plot. These words describe ancient, earth-based ways of living—agricultural, celestial, cyclical. Ways of marking time by the moon, the harvest, the turning of the stars. Ways of honoring balance.

And balance is exactly what the Autumn Equinox invites us into.

I turn here to Niki van der Kaar, who writes in The Wheel of the Year:

“The Autumn Equinox, a time of balance when day is equal to night, is not the doorway into the light, but rather into darkness. All the growing and striving and work we've done since Ostara can finally be laid to rest. Mabon stands as the final harvest of the year, the point at which we must survey what we have gathered and determine whether it will be enough to see us through the long winter… Darkness is more than a place of fear and uncertainty. It also allows us to rest… In the night, we dream and gain secret knowledge about ourselves, about what might be possible in the world.”

These words are medicine right now. Because what the loudest voices in our politics forget is that darkness isn’t the enemy. Rest isn’t weakness. The feminine, the cyclical, the earthy, the intuitive—these are not threats to be stamped out.

As we cross into autumn, let’s reclaim what balance really means: to stand in the tension between light and dark without demonizing one or sanctifying the other. To honor rest as sacred. To dream as an act of resistance. To refuse the lie that only one story, one religion, one way of being is “good.”

This equinox, I choose to lay down the hypocrisy and take up balance.
I choose dreams over dogma.
I choose love over fear. 🍂

With Love & Liberty 🏹

Jen Coombe alias ~ Jennadea