The Free Spirit Alliance (FSA) is a non-profit spiritual networking organization serving the Pagan and Pantheist communities. Founded on May 21, 1986 and based in the Mid-Atlantic area of the USA, the Alliance's focus has been on presenting regional and local events where people from diverse backgrounds can learn and share ideas. Its promotional literature and website state that the organization has striven to develop a national reputation for being willing to work with often sensitive and personal issues in a friendly and safe environment.
FSA’s main event is the Free Spirit Gathering, held in June. It has also run a retreat event in the fall but this is currently on hiatus. All of these are currently held at a private campground near Darlington, Maryland. FSA previously ran Sacred Sexuality Beltane (held over five days at Beltane in May). This festival has been transferred to Turtle Hill Events.
The Free Spirit Gathering is by far the organization's largest event, attracting people from as far away as Washington, California, Hawaii, Texas, Minnesota and Canada. It is one of the oldest Pagan festivals in the country, celebrating its 25th year in 2010, and in peak years has had an attendance of over 800 people.
The Free Spirit Alliance previously hosted the unique, adults-only Sacred Sexuality Beltane Festival, which for several years following its inception was the only festival of its type in the country. Smaller in size than FSG, Beltane attracts about 350 people each spring.
FSA also sponsors several other smaller events and rituals in the Washington, DC and Maryland areas.
Famous quotes containing the words free, spirit and/or alliance:
“I believe that the members of my family must be as free from suspicion as from actual crime.”
—Julius Caesar [Gaius Julius Caesar] (100–44 B.C.)
“Debt, grinding debt, whose iron face the widow, the orphan, and the sons of genius fear and hate;Mdebt, which consumes so much time, which so cripples and disheartens a great spirit with cares that seem so base, is a preceptor whose lessons cannot be forgone, and is needed most by those who suffer from it most.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Ah! how much a mother learns from her child! The constant protection of a helpless being forces us to so strict an alliance with virtue, that a woman never shows to full advantage except as a mother. Then alone can her character expand in the fulfillment of all life’s duties and the enjoyment of all its pleasures.”
—Honoré De Balzac (1799–1850)