SassyCon 2025: Full Schedule

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9:00am CDT

Jewish Magic-Ancient and Modern

Saturday May 10, 2025 9:00am - 10:15am CDT

According to Abrahamic spiritual traditions, the relationship between words and magic goes back to the very creation of the world. In this class, Tamar will focus on Judaism, the earliest of these traditions, and the deep and ancient magic it and its language hold. These include spoken and written practices, communal and solitary practices, in Hebrew, and English (and some Aramaic!). We will also touch on modern magical practices that derive from this ancient magic. She will explain the magic of the Hebrew letters (the Aleph Beit) themselves, the messages and meaning they contain, the words and sentences they make, and the ancient Hebrew writings that have survived into modern times.

Speakers

Tamar Baskind

Born and raised in Jerusalem, Tamar has been steeped in the city’s magic and energy all her life. This ancient place has shaped her development, as both a person and a practitioner. Always drawn to the unseen forces around and within us, she began consciously practicing at the age... Read More →

Saturday May 10, 2025 9:00am - 10:15am CDT
St. Ann's Cottage #2 717 Orleans St. Bourbon Orleans Hotel

Lecture

9:00am CDT

Magic of the PGM

Saturday May 10, 2025 9:00am - 10:15am CDT

St. Joseph's Room

Often referred to simply as The PGM, this refers to a collection of ancient Greek, Egyptian, Jewish, Roman magical practices from the late classical era, from about 100 BCE to the 400 CE. These papyrus manuscripts contained a curious assortment of both thaumaturgic and theurgic magical spells, hymns, and rituals that were in common use. This talk will highlight the sources and antecedents of this diverse magical tradition and focus on accessible workings for a modern practitioner.

Speakers

Emily Schumacher

Emily Schumacher is an educator, writer, and ritualist. She is an initiate of multiple traditions and oversees curriculum at Académie Gnostique, a school of magic and esotericism in New Orleans. Emily is also an artist working in textile and paper mediums creating tarot, book bindings... Read More →

Saturday May 10, 2025 9:00am - 10:15am CDT
St. Joseph's Room 717 Orleans St. Bourbon Orleans Hotel

Lecture

10:45am CDT

Standing at the Threshold: The Spirits, Lore, and Transformational Magics of the Doorway

Saturday May 10, 2025 10:45am - 12:00pm CDT

St. Ann's Cottage #1

Many who have an inclination towards magic may not have a room or dedicated space set aside for performing spellwork and ritual workings. However, most of us have a front door, and it is here that we are invited to engage with and perhaps re-enchant a part of our homes which is often taken for granted except when we find ourselves locked out or fumbling with our keys. In this talk we will explore the front doorway of our home as a locus for spirit work, practical charming, and magical workings. We will examine diverse perspectives, folklore, and approaches towards engaging with our doorway as a nexus of power and potentiality. This work is practical, effective, and at times incredibly illuminating and enriching. And may be seen as an extension of working with and relating to the home as both a spiritual entity and an ecosystem of spirits that we might better know and form closer relations with.

Speakers

Matthew Venus

Teacher, Author, Apothecary, Diviner, Spiritus Arcanum

Matthew Venus is an artist, folk magician, and traditional witch based in Salem, Massachusetts whose craft is centered around a deep heart of animism and a dedication to ancestral and land-based traditions. His practice is further enriched by his role as Tata Ndenge in a lineage of... Read More →

Saturday May 10, 2025 10:45am - 12:00pm CDT
St. Ann's Cottage #1 717 Orleans St. Bourbon Orleans Hotel

Lecture

10:45am CDT

Using For Sympathy: The Powwow and Hexerei approach to magical healing and spirituality

Saturday May 10, 2025 10:45am - 12:00pm CDT

St. Ann's Cottage #2

This presentation examines the inter-connected history of the magical practices employed by the American "Powwow doctor” or “Hex." This un-licensed counselor, spiritual advisor and community healer was and remains a powerful figure in certain areas of the rural United States. The practice of Braucherei or Powwowing, known in the America as “Using for Sympathy” or simply “using,” was brought from Europe and nurtured by people of Germanic origin who migrated from Switzerland, Germany and later from New England, Maryland, Pennsylvania and settled in rural areas of North and South Carolina and Georgia. Various magical procedures and incantations will be examined along with their relations with more conventional religious traditions. Famous Carolina and Pennsylvania Powwow doctors will be profiled, and excerpts from field transcripts will be presented to provide evidence and context to this unique and enduring folk magical/religious heritage.

Speakers

Jack Montgomery

Professor, Coordinator, Acquisitions and Collection Services, Western Kentucky University Libraries

Jack G. Montgomery: Biography Jack was born in 1953 in Columbia, South Carolina. His family though Christian, practiced elements of folk religions which he later came to learn stemmed from his maternal great-grandfather who was a Powwow Doctor who specialized in healing animals through... Read More →

Saturday May 10, 2025 10:45am - 12:00pm CDT
St. Ann's Cottage #2 717 Orleans St. Bourbon Orleans Hotel

Lecture

1:30pm CDT

Crystals: How to use them to enhance everyday life

Saturday May 10, 2025 1:30pm - 2:45pm CDT

St. Ann's Cottage #2

This is a Crystal 101 class. We will cover how to choose crystals and which ones will suit you best. How to use them in everything from your spiritual practices to where to place them in your home to invite in abundance and peace. We will discuss the historical usage of crystals and the meaning behind these little pieces of the earths DNA.

Speakers

Kali Maxwell

Kali is a spiritually eclectic psychic medium. She was a solo practitioner for several years, owning and working at her shop in California, she then decided to move to New Orleans to expand her knowledge and to experience the vibrant spiritual energy of the city. She specializes in... Read More →

Saturday May 10, 2025 1:30pm - 2:45pm CDT
St. Ann's Cottage #2 717 Orleans St. Bourbon Orleans Hotel

Lecture

1:30pm CDT

Love Work

Saturday May 10, 2025 1:30pm - 2:45pm CDT

St. Joseph's Room

Love work is one of the most requested magical workings I receive. Love is a powerful force that can bring people together or tear them apart. I understand why so many people would wish to control the tides of love, but the truth is that real and lasting love cannot be controlled. From my experience of working with this incredible force, I can confidently say that it is not up to us when and how we fall in love; that responsibility belongs to a higher being. God knows why our hearts pump harder for one person opposed to another, but the creation of a true and lasting bond is beyond human understanding. That being said, I still perform love drawing workings for my clients. There are nuances in this vein of work that can lead to a client meeting that special person, and I work with those nuances to produce results. There are two main ways love can be worked with from a spiritual/magical perspective. One path of drawing love is what I call “good” and the other path is what I call “bad”. I’ll be using these two terms for clarity, but I want to make it clear that the philosophical understanding of those two polarities become “grey” in this context.

Speakers

Sen Elias

Sen Elias’ journey to Hoodoo began with his grandmother’s guidance and wisdom and ancestral Gullah blood. Hereditary spiritual practices empower Sen Elias’ work. In 2015, he founded Crescent City Conjure, a full-service Hoodoo shop in the heart of New Orleans. Sen Elias is a... Read More →

Saturday May 10, 2025 1:30pm - 2:45pm CDT
St. Joseph's Room 717 Orleans St. Bourbon Orleans Hotel

Lecture

3:15pm CDT

Introduction to Traditional Astrology

Saturday May 10, 2025 3:15pm - 4:30pm CDT

St. Ann's Cottage #2

Astrology is more than a means of predicting the coming month and assessing compatibility; astrology is both a worldview and a complex set of tools that informed the ancient world to the early modern world from around the time of Alexander the Great until the 1800s. The older form of astrology, which we call traditional, is as lean as it is complex; it uses only seven planets and four aspects and ignores outer planets, asteroids, and minor aspects. Despite this, it has a reputation for predictive accuracy and dependable tools to forge a path toward hope, knowledge, and success from when life was far more dangerous and difficult than today. The four pillars or expressions of traditional astrology were Horary, which used a horoscope chart (a distillation of celestial motions) as a means of answering questions like tarot cards, Electional astrology which is the picking of lucky and unlucky times, Natal astrology which predicts the character and health of a person born at a particular time, and Mundane astrology which explains and predicts world events. In this lecture, we will describe an overview of these views and practices and learn the basics of how we can use these ancient tools in the modern world.

Speakers

Clifford Hartleigh Low

Clifford Hartleigh Low is the impossible man who does impossible things. He’s been described as a living encyclopedia of the arcane, and is recognized by his peers as one of the most accomplished practitioners of magic and divination alive; summoning spirits in front of witnesses... Read More →

Saturday May 10, 2025 3:15pm - 4:30pm CDT
St. Ann's Cottage #2 717 Orleans St. Bourbon Orleans Hotel

Lecture

SassyCon 2025

From $101.87