In an article^* for the Spotlight Ministries website, Vincent McCann attempts to address some Pagan ideas. While this is a laudable thing in and of itself, McCann’s article falls short of creating any actual understanding between Pagans and Christians and instead relies upon some of the very misconceptions that Christians have about Pagan religions. Though he claims at the end to have addressed those misconceptions, he has only reinforced them.

First off, he seems to conflate Wicca and Paganism. Whereas Wicca can be considered a Pagan religion, Paganism is the shorthand term used for all Pagan religions. There are many of them and though they share similar approaches to life and of conceiving the divine, their expressions and rituals are widely variant. The Pagan family includes Wicca, Asatru, Celtic Polytheism, Hellenismos, Discordianism, and other religions. Conflating Wicca and Paganism is a common enough mistake to make however and has nothing to do with the author’s Christianity in the least. Many in mainstream society also tend to conflate Wicca and Paganism. Though someone who publishes an article anywhere to be read by others should at least do cursory research before attempting to use terms such as Paganism or Wicca so that they can learn the difference.

McCann makes some observations about certain issues he feels are relevant to both Christians and Pagans and claims to address them “in a fair and balanced manner.” These observations center on what he categorizes as “Ecology,” “The Church,” “The Devil – A Christian Invention?” “Rituals,” “The gods, goddesses, and spirits of Paganism,” “Patriarchal Issues” and his conclusion. He claims to have written the article from a variety of sources, but it is clear that if he has relied on various sources as inspiration, he has read into them his own misconceptions.

How unfair and unbalanced his observations really are become readily apparent. His above-mentioned conflation of Wicca, a distinctive Pagan religion, with Paganism as a whole, betrays a lack of real interest in what Pagan religions have to offer. It would be like conflating Christianity, a distinctive monotheist religion, with Abrahamic faiths (Judaism, Islam, and Christianity) as a whole. How does such a lack of interest result in addressing issues “relevant” to both Paganism and Christianity in a fair manner? If McCann is addressing the more general broader conceptions that exist among most Pagan religions, then perhaps he should just stick with the more general term “Paganism” which refers to an entire family of religions.

In his first observation, “Ecology,” he makes the same mistake that many Christians make in assuming that Pagan reverence for nature stops short of revering the Creator. Some Pagans see the world as being created. Others see it as evolving over time. Still others view all life as the creator and thus we are all active participants in what we call existence. McCann’s metaphor of the sculpture is apt but is wrong because Pagans don’t view the world as an inert work of art made by a craftsperson or artist. The world to us is a living being in and of itself. So when we revere it in any of its forms, we are revering the divine. My own apt metaphor: Imagine the love of your life as a living self-wrought canvas of glory including the beautiful and otherwise. Would it be right to view them as an inert work wrought by another?

Since we conceive of nature as intrinsically divine or sacred and we humans must do what we can to live from the land and environment, this means we are to take care and exhibit responsible consumption of resources in gratitude and celebration. This doesn’t mean we are to rule over or do as we wish with the natural world. In fact, many if not most Pagans wouldn’t see humans as being essentially separate from nature except via cultural or social spheres of development. (This accords well with the findings of many scientific fields.) In fact some Pagans believe that animals and plants are akin to humans, if not just because of having life, but in other ways. Some Pagans conceive of the world not only in pantheistic (all is divine) terms but also in animistic (all is alive) terms. None of this presents problems to us in terms of having to eat to survive, since we see this as natural. Life feeds off of life in an interdependent fashion. Even human beings’ living bodies, at the top of the “food chain,” eventually die and contribute to this process.

In a lot of Pagan conceptions, whether or not the world was created is irrelevant. In fact, to talk of “origins” or of a “creation” that started it all would be an entirely false approach that could lead to more misunderstanding. Many Pagans see the world and the passage of time in cyclical terms, since many of our rituals and observances are based off naturally reoccurring events such as seasonal changes, solstices or moon phases. We see the ebb and flow of tides, the sun and moon cycles, the turning of seasons, and living and dying as cyclical. Thus, for us, there is no ultimate beginning or end. There is only endless life expressing itself in ceaseless change throughout the patterns and cycles which we can observe, mark, and celebrate as we take our part in it. Many Pagan religions do have myths of creation or origins, but these are understood as stories which refer to deeper aspects of existence.

His quoting of Romans 1:25 “…they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshipped and served the creature rather than the Creator…” serves to support a Christian misconception of Pagan approaches to the environment and divinity, but McCann doesn’t address the fact that Pagan religions are not beholden to Christian ideas nor are they beholden to Christian misunderstandings of Pagan concepts. Pagans don’t see any religious scriptures as having any sort of divine importance. For us, our “scripture,” if you will, is the natural world around us. While Pagans respect the notion of sacred writings, we would feel it erroneous to rely on them in order to get in touch with any divinity. (Some would call such heavy reliance on scriptural authority “bibliolatry.”) I can understand why McCann might feel that in his version of Christianity, scriptural authority is of importance. However, he should seek to understand how or why Pagans don’t agree with such an idea. He should also be aware that using his own religion’s scripture to excuse his misconceptions about Paganism can be construed as insulting.

To be fair, McCann does suggest that Christians become more concerned with the natural environment and in this is a good lead for some Christians or perhaps McCann himself to follow through with the idea that since they believe their God created the world, then Christians should learn to cherish it better.

The second observation, “The Church,” touches on some of the perceptions and historical accounts of persecution by institutional Christianity throughout the centuries. The bloodstained conflicts and persecutions wrought upon Europe and many other places by Christianity is well documented and educated Pagans know much of the history. Not many of us are ignorant of Christians persecuting other Christians. Many Christian sects, denominations, and traditions were oppressed and hounded with hundreds of thousands killed. But we should also remember that in the beginning, even while the nascent Roman Church was sinking its teeth into other Christian groups in the Roman Empire, it was also making quick work of Roman laws to allow for the persecution and eventual destruction of Pagan religions, many followers of which were not converted peacefully at all.

McCann’s assertion that those in the Church were not true Christians seems like a good argument, but it is false. Even by the tenets of the Christian faith, McCann should not be willing to cast out those Christian persecutors who may have felt they were really defending their faith against evil. I agree that perhaps some of those people who caused so much suffering and death would have been better served had they taken a look at the more peaceful visions of their master, Jesus Christ, and followed those more closely, but even those peaceful ideas are not consistent. Christ Himself said He came to bring not peace but a sword. (Matthew 10:34 “Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace but a sword.”) Perhaps this statement is allegorical, but how are non-Christians supposed to know that, especially when throughout history such leaders as Martin Luther claimed the more violent meaning as the real one? And what are we to make of other verses such as Luke 19:27 which seem to command persecution? (“But those mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring them hither, and slay them before me.”)

I am tempted to pose this question to McCann: “If all of those hundreds of Christian leaders and hundreds of thousands of Christian people throughout the centuries who advocated and participated in persecution of heretics and non-believers have not been ‘true Christians,’ what is it about Christianity that seems to engender so many ‘false Christians’?” Many would argue as McCann does and claim that such vile people are not true Christians. Others would say that nobody is perfect and this includes Christians. You can not have it both ways. I tend toward the second explanation since there is nothing about being a Christian or a member of any other faith that would prevent someone from being a murderer or an abuser, and some people even use their religion to justify their actions.

To be fair to McCann, from the end of the old Paganism in Europe (this varies from place to place, but by around 1000 CE most of the old Pagan religions had disappeared) until modern times, the vast majority of people killed by Christian institutions were other Christians, especially after the Protestant Reformation. (Protestants and Catholics killed one another readily at that time.) Christian crusades first hacked and burned their way through Eastern Europe, which was largely Christian Orthodox. But in modern times millions of non-Christians have been killed, enslaved, or starved under forcible conversions during the great European imperial expansions after 1492. Native American nations were decimated by these Christian conquests. The issue that McCann skirts around here is that many of the Christian leaders and people involved in the persecution of other groups of Christians thought that destruction and persecution of heretics and heresy was divinely sanctioned. (Thomas Aquinas, as one example, advocated death for heretics.)

McCann is unfair in implying that the Protestant and Catholic communities in Northern Ireland are simply killing each other due to religion. There are social, cultural and political issues involved in that conflict and religious persuasion became simply one of the most salient markers of which side a person tended to be on. But the issue in Northern Ireland is really one of either loyalty to the United Kingdom or the ideal of Irish nationalism which seeks to reunite Ireland and revive the native culture. The killing is largely over now since the cease fire and Good Friday Accords have put into place a very real political process where all sides can have a say. I should add though that two thirds of the civilian deaths in the conflict were caused by the UK loyalist paramilitary groups (and not the IRA) and that the loyalist community is closer to the biblical fundamentalist version of Christianity.

Back to the issue of ‘true Christians’, even they make mistakes and do horrible things. I would hope that they would not, but even so, I don’t assume they are false Christians. I do admit that many people involved in faith are doing so for greedy or violent reasons. The Pagan religions also have people of this sort. But whether a person can stay true to their religious tenets or not isn’t the issue here. The issue is that Christianity had its say with its dominance of Western Civilization for centuries and the bad result was suffering, conquest, and death. Nothing can disguise this. In terms of social freedom and democracy, the ideals of liberty were fought against by most Christian institutions for centuries until the torch was lit in America with its secular republic. Now all across Western Civilization, everyone, including Christians, benefits from secular democracy. (A side note of evidence: The Third Reich was a Christian Fundamentalist state, contrary to the claims of many.) Many of the supposed shining exemplars of Christian history were in fact violent men who advocated death and suffering for others. Martin Luther is one of those. (He advocated killing all Jews, as an example.) But even this is not the main issue.

The main issue is that Pagans of all sorts are not rejecting the church or Jesus because of the actions of some bad men or because of the persecutions. Any Pagans who give these reasons are shallow in their own faith. I myself am Pagan because Paganism speaks the truth to me. It resonates deep within my soul and sustains my spirit with a connection to the divine, wherever that divine is. I am not a Pagan because I “reject Christ” as many Christians would believe. My being a Pagan does not mean I reject Christ. Not believing is not the same as rejection. To say one must either accept something as true or reject it is inimical and leads people to think that any disagreement is due to evil or “refusal” to see. My not believing in Christ is not a rejection of anything. It simply means I believe differently. I am Pagan because I revere my Gods and because my worldview sees existence as pulsating with life. If I believed in the God of the Bible or in Christ, then I would be Christian. I see validity with a Christian believing in what they do, so Christians should see validity with me believing in what I do. If I was to use McCann’s argument here but turn it around, then that would mean that I could say that Christians are not Pagans because they have rejected our Gods. Can anyone see the absurdity? My being of one faith doesn’t mean I have rejected another faith. It simply means that I will continue being of my faith. Christians wouldn’t like it if I tried to convert them to my version of Paganism, so why do they think that Christian attempts at converting Pagans or others is to be encouraged?

In “The Devil,” McCann refutes the notion that evil was a Christian concept. And this is right. Evil and personages of evil are pretty much global and occur in many societies and cultures. However, outside of Abrahamic faiths (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) the only other religions to have a “Devil” character are Mithraism (which died out) and Zoroasterism. The Pagan idea is that there is nothing that could be the essence of evil personified. Sure there may be malevolent beings, as there are malevolent humans (and some of us can point them out, or think we can), but we don’t see evil as being permanent in any essential way. The Pagan approach to evil is situational. Obviously those who profit from suffering (like criminals and others) are being evil and should be stopped. Those (humans or other beings) who would seek to enslave and coerce others are being evil and should be resisted and stopped. But we don’t attribute anything evil to natural forces, no matter how destructive. As for spirits, it turns out that humans have minds of their own and should use them to be discerning when dealing with any such beings. Much like when dealing with other humans.

Within Pagan conceptions of the universe, we don’t have a Devil, thus we don’t believe that one exists. So for us it is only logical to conclude that the Devil is a Christian idea, in as much as Western ideas of the Devil are Christian (and not Jewish or Muslim). Some make the further argument that institutional Christianity invented the Devil. This may be false, but institutional Christianity most certainly hyped up the concept for self-serving reasons. (Such as when one group persecuted another for heresy, or when Christians slander Pagans and blaspheme against our Gods by calling them “demons” or “devils,” or when some Christians lie and say we are Devil-worshippers. Or even when Christians try to tell us we are being deceived by the Devil.)

It is interesting to think about the Devil’s lie that he himself doesn’t exist. However if such a creature could pass that one off, how could any Christian be sure of their own God? Would not the Devil pass himself off as God?

McCann’s observations on “Rituals” falls short but does imply a valid point in that people should take care so that rituals don’t end up enslaving them. No individual is less important than any ritual. And no ritual, in any form of Paganism, is intended to make any individual abrogate their self.

Rituals serve many functions and I find that McCann’s observation should have addressed at least some of them. Rituals serve to build group cohesion through shared experiences. Rituals serve to express things in ways that mere language cannot – in this way they are much like art and theater. Rituals also mark passages through various stages of learning or through various life-cycle changes. Rituals can even cause the sort of changes in one’s heart that result in a person becoming liberated from habits or outlooks that are destroying them. In the Pagan view, the Christian conversion experience is a ritual, albeit improvised and personal.

I don’t like the implication McCann makes that rituals are merely for results in a magical or occult oriented way. Sure there are rituals enough for those sorts of things, but experienced practitioners tend to create their own sort of rituals for these things. The vast majority of Pagan rituals or religious ceremonies are for either celebration or for commemoration. So long as these reasons are remembered no one who participates in any ritual need go along mindlessly or out of a twisted sense of devotion. I myself practice and participate in rituals because I love doing so and they make me feel even more connected and empowered. Sure I would love to feel that way all the time, but it helps to have ritual to rely on when I need to recharge myself, or re-align myself, or to re-connect. It is much like prayer. (And we Pagans consider prayer, whether from tradition or spontaneous, to be a form of ritual.) That is what religion is about….connection. By the way, myself and the Pagans I know have done personal and group rituals that were spontaneous and out of love and celebration. (That’s what worship is all about for us.)

Many of the cyclical rituals that are observed anew every year allow us to more deeply understand the meaning the rituals point to. Thus we mature in our knowledge and understanding through such repetition. This is an aspect that those who shun all traditional or repeated rituals miss out on. To understand my point, compare it with being in love. Every time you get to spend time with your beloved, you get to know them in a deeper way (or you should be). Little by little, and eventually after time passes you realize how much closer you have gotten with your beloved. If you are both skillful in your cherishing of each other, than anniversaries and other cyclical commemorations become a way of further confirming and deepening your love and commitment. In this way, we Pagans see our rituals.

Pagan religions have exhibited a marked diversity and creativity when it comes to rituals and the experiences they engender. McCann should realize that when he speaks of rituals (I gather from his former practice of Witchcraft) not giving him liberty, then maybe that was because it wasn’t right for him. The fact that he is Christian now, and I assume happy with that, means that he of course gravitated toward a faith that was more fulfilling for him. But he should not assume that the way he feels about his faith is the same way for everyone else. Pagan faith, ideas and practices liberate me. I would feel un-free if I tried to bond myself to practicing Christianity, as I did in the past. So I understand the need to keep moving on until one finds one’s home, so to speak.

As to McCann’s observations about our Gods, Goddesses, and spirits (though he doesn’t use capital letters), he is right in saying we are mostly polytheistic. He quotes from Prudence Jones to this very idea. But then in the next paragraph he equates Pagan multiple deities with spirits and wonders as to whether they can be trusted. Of course they can be trusted in as much as a person gets to know them. It would be foolish to trust anyone or any being out of blind faith (which is really a symptom of personal irresponsibility).

McCann goes on to quote Prudence Jones again, but this time to support the fallacy that multiple deities and powers leads to a loss of focus and action. This is wrong. Polytheism is not to blame for a loss of focus or loss of personal action/responsibility. Many adherents of Monotheist faiths, Christians included, have been shown to have lost focus or a sense of personal responsibility. They attribute to God every sort of thing that happens and then refuse to make any personal choices because they leave it to God’s will. Prudence Jones “otherworldly forces whose influence can be read in every portent” can also be attributed to one God, such as in monotheistic faiths (especially when people add in the Devil and other beings like demons and angels). I seem to recall the Christian saying “So heavenly minded, no earthly good.” So even Christians have this problem, which I suspect is a psychological problem common to human beings and not inherent to any religion. It is the reason why some people join destructive cults after all.

Oddly enough, the Pagan emphasis on personal responsibility (since the divine is immanent) tends to keep adherents of Pagan religions from losing focus or from abdicating their own responsibility for their lives. In the relatively short history of modern Paganism, the whole family of religions has avoided the rise of various cults and sects that seek to brainwash and dominate their members’ every thought. The same cannot be said of any other religious family. Even modern Christianity has seen its own share of destructive cults and sects. Perhaps not only the Pagan emphasis on personal responsibility, but also its pluralism make it extremely difficult for Pagans in any large numbers to fall prey to any group or cult that would seek to dominate or control its members. It would be hard to convince Pagans that they must obey the words of some leader when they know very well that they themselves can also commune with the Gods and Goddesses. Any Pagan group that tries to enforce submission from its members would not last long since Pagans know that no one else but themselves can be responsible for their lives. Despite this, there will always be a minority of people who for whatever reason are gullible and would rather follow the words of fools then to be in charge of their own lives. As I mentioned above, this is a psychological problem, and though it has nothing to do with religion, a lot of the more institutional Christian groups have used this to their advantage.

Then McCann makes the mistake of conflating Pagan polytheism with occult practices, which is not only absurd but wrong. His claim of occultists losing power over the forces they deal with is unfounded since many occultists, as flaky or eccentric as they may be, are more in control of their lives and any forces than the average person. I know this for a fact from my own dealings with occultists. I have spent many years exploring the subcultures and people of the “occult” and so can speak from experience instead of prejudice.

But the occult and occultists are not the same as Paganism and Pagans. The occult refers to all sorts of magical and spiritual traditions and practices that deal with the so-called hidden knowledge. (But really not so hidden since anyone can walk into a bookstore and read up on any so-called secret lore.) Occultists are those people who consistently deal with such things. (Or claim to, anyway.) Paganism is an umbrella term referring to a family of religions. A Pagan is a member of one of those religions. While many Pagans are occultists, many are not. And while the Pagan religion of Wicca uses much that can be considered “magical” in its practices and rituals, this definition or term is argued over. Many occultists are members of religions and many are not. There are even atheist occultists (those who believe in no Gods or spirits). Pagan religions, being tolerant, are open to members exploring occult systems if that’s what such people wish to do. But there are many Pagans who have no time for such things and it is unfair to conflate Paganism with occultism, since the two terms refer to different things. It would be like conflating Christians with musicians.

In this observation, he remarks on spirits. But he doesn’t say a word about our Gods or Goddesses (even though he includes the words in his title). It’s almost as if he is skirting the issue that our Gods and Goddesses are valid. He seems to think that because he sees all these beings as mere spirits, that that is the truth. It may be the truth in Christianity, but it is blasphemous against our Gods and Goddesses. He calls them “evil spirit beings.” Need I say more?

It’s a shame that McCann doesn’t recognize the validity of Pagan conceptions and approaches to the divine. He probably would deny me my very real and valid experiences with my own personal Gods and Goddesses. And that’s a shame because I don’t deny his religion’s validity for him. I just disagree with him. I also know my Gods and Goddesses in a personal way and they act in consistent and trustworthy ways. I can rely on them if need be, but I also know enough to realize that I also have a brain and a life to live and so I can rely on myself. My Gods and Goddesses can also rely on me. That’s what relationship is all about between any beings.

McCann makes the same slander that most Christians make against we Pagans and our Gods and Goddesses: That they are really evil spirits that seek to deceive us. This dualist idea that one either believes in Christ or one is being deceived is a product of a mind that cannot accept that there are real differences and variations in life and that these variations and differences are intrinsically valid. McCann is repeating the ancient Christian slander of Pagan religions which states that all non-Christian Gods and Goddesses are really demons or the Devil deceiving people from the truth of the “One God.” But Polytheism, being at heart pluralistic, recognizes the validity of all conceptions of divinity. Polytheists therefore recognize that there are many Gods, Goddesses, and other beings worthy of respect, friendship and celebration. Because of this pluralism, we don’t accept that there could ever be one religion or spirituality that could ever explain away everything. Nor could there ever be one religion or set of spiritual conceptions that could ever satisfy or appeal to everyone. There is no “one size fits all” when it comes to religions, faiths, or the divine. Because of this, just because another person is following a different religion or God (or a different group of Gods and Goddesses) from me, doesn’t make that other person wrong. We have the space to disagree and this variety is not only essential to survival but is sacred.

McCann’s observation about Patriarchal Issues is slight and cursory. Jesus was a man. I realize that this was simply a factor of history and such. But what would have happened had He been a She? And if the creator needs to be addressed, what is wrong with using “She,” “Her,” and Mother? As a Pagan I see nothing wrong with female deity or Goddesses and I accord women the same rights, respects, and freedoms as men. Sometimes even more so, since women give birth to us. Addressing God as “Father” is all fine and good, but McCann needs to research why that was so. The ancient Israelites were a product of their times and culture. Being patriarchal, they would naturally think of the ultimate Divine Being as “Father.” (Patriarchy means “rule of fathers” after all.) They didn’t simply choose to call Him “Father.” They were making a point by it.

I concede McCann’s point that some Pagans view Christianity as a male religion but historical and institutional Christianity did much to take away women’s social rights and freedoms. There has been much misogyny in Christian history. Many of the religion’s heroes from Augustine to Luther, considered women to be evil creatures. And consider that women weren’t allowed to be priests in Catholicism or reverends in Protestantism. Why not? To be fair, the Jesus of the Gospels appeared to treat women much better than Christians did after Him. It seemed He treated them as equals to men. Perhaps Christians in history also forgot that in the start of Christianity, there were women priests, bishops, deacons, prophets and teachers. But that was only in the start of the religion. For centuries women were denigrated and denied equality with men. Christians justified this mistreatment saying that Eve was evil for tempting Adam (as if Adam wasn’t responsible for his own actions). So the Pagan viewpoint does have some merit and a basis in real Christianity as practiced throughout history as opposed to how some apologists claim it otherwise.

The salient point about calling the “One God” by male titles is that it normalizes the male and denigrates the female into some sort of “other” being that varies from such a sacred norm. No amount of semantic diddling about thinking that Christians call God “Him” or “Father” simply as a way of address can take away the very real psychological processes of denigration or devaluation of women that such a thing encourages. This “Father God” idea thus reinforces the male centered view of themselves as being the normal humans and of women as being the variants. Modern Paganism does away with this by recognizing the divine as female and male. There are Gods and Goddesses as well as some deities that can be both or neither. Since the divine is usually beyond human bounds of conception, we use imagery that we can understand in order to express what we know about our Gods and Goddesses.

Deities also communicate with us through these forms and ideas. Resorting to Pagan Polytheism also allows women to see the richness of femininity that exists beyond gendered stereotyping since Pagan Goddesses and Gods often do things or have roles that do not fit today’s feminine or masculine ideals. (Such as some Goddesses of War, or some Gods of Nurturing.) We learn that Gods and Goddesses are not beholden to our stereotypes as we grow in our faith and practice. Since the divine is not beholden, and the divine is also immanent and within us, then neither are we beholden to stereotypes or socially ascribed roles based on gender. Many women find this a liberating breath of fresh air after so long of being told what to do or how to behave as “women.” Pagan men usually celebrate this and encourage it since when women are liberated, then men have a better chance at becoming so themselves.

As an aside, in the present era, it seems that Christian women are gaining ground and taking back their religion from the men who would hold them from their rightful place. Hopefully, they will end the male bias in the religion. It doesn’t necessarily mean that Christians have to start calling their Creator “Mother,” but frees them to do so if they wish. But with women in Christianity liberated from male dominance, perhaps then the idea of a “Father God” will become less of a burden and less of a denigration of women. Then very new and fresh ideas can form.

I should make the point though that, as poignant as it is for a woman to seek a religion in which she feels she is not the variant to a male norm, that is not the only reason many women become Pagans. The Pagan conception of the divine being Gods and Goddesses allows no sanction for men or women to belittle one another since both women and men can represent the divine. But in doing so, both men and women are freed from gender stereotypes (as I pointed out above) and can explore the true strengths and weakness of themselves as individuals first. It is a valid enough reason for the initial choice, but there are other reasons that will sustain the practice as time goes on. Some of them include: very real experiences with the divine; the celebration of life and natural cycles of growth and death; and other spiritual or life issues. Remember that Pagan religions address those “deeper” issues such as the meaning of life, despite the obsessive focus by the mainstream society on what rituals we practice. The meaning of Pagan religion isn’t what we do, but what and how we think, feel and believe about such spiritual and life issues as “meaning,” “morals,” and how to value living beings.

Back to McCann’s point about addressing the divine. He addresses his God as “Him” and such. We Pagans have many ways to address our Gods and Goddesses, from Lady or Lord to personal names. For us, there is no wrong in saying “Him” or “Her” etc. It is when some people insist on the fact that there is One God and that such a being must be addressed as a male. It is when the very notion of a female God is laughed at, derided, or causes anger…then we see a problem. We don’t insist that Christians start calling their God by female addresses. We don’t insist that Christians should start worshipping any of our Gods and Goddesses. Nor should Christians insist that we accept and worship their God (regardless of His or Her gender or lack thereof).

In conclusion, McCann seems to offer a version of “True Christianity” but that is a misnomer. What he should call it is the version that he and those who agree with him claim to be following. There are many variants of Christianity. And not all Christians would agree with McCann’s claims of “True Christianity.” Not all Christians would see anything wrong with the fact that we Pagans believe differently from them.

As for the life and claims of Christ, what of them? Which version? Whose story? The four Gospels? The countless other versions of the Gospels that were silenced and suppressed (with the followers persecuted and destroyed)? Many of us Pagans are familiar with Christianity, even with the Biblical Fundamentalist or Evangelical forms of Christianity that consider themselves “True Christianity.” We live in a society in which the majority religion is in fact Christianity. Does McCann think us ignorant or that we don’t know of all the claims, counter claims, and issues with regards to his religion? What does he really mean by his observations?

It seems that he is attempting to tell Pagans that their own religions are wrong and that if they only see his message then they will come to see Christ as the only way to freedom and salvation and thus convert. But that is very wrong. I understand the Christian message and have looked at Christ’s life and claims myself, with out any misconceptions or prejudices, without thinking about the failures of Christians to live up to their ideals (it was the religion of my childhood after all), and I still disagree with the religion. I am not Christian, so no surprise there. If I agreed with and accepted McCann’s religion as being true for me, then I would be Christian.

I am a Pagan however, and see my religion as just as valid and true. The world, in religious terms, is not either/or. It is not either I accept Christianity as true or else it is false. It simply doesn’t say much to me. I am not beholden to it. Pagan pluralism accepts that other religions are valid in the same way that cultural pluralism accepts that other cultures are valid. To say that one either accepts Christianity and believes Christ or else one is either being deceived or is practicing a false religion is the same as saying that either one accepts Chinese culture and adheres to it otherwise one is practicing a false culture. Do you see the illogic with this line of reasoning? Using a set of scriptures from within a religion to try to prove that religion’s supremacy over other religions is simply being prejudiced. I don’t accept sacred texts such as the Bible as being divinely revealed wishes from any God or Goddess. They are the records of humans struggling to come to terms with their own religious ideas. Thus there is no way Christians who believe in the Bible’s infallibility can ever try to convince me that my religion is false.

I could go around writing observations about Christianity and issues that Christians should be concerned with in regards to Paganism, and I sometimes do so, but I am not seeking to convince Christians that their religion is false, merely that they have some misconceptions and prejudices against us Pagans and against Paganism in general. In calling our Gods and Goddesses “evil spirits,” McCann shows just such a prejudice. It boils down to that fallacy of dualism again. If the world is divided between Ultimate Good and Ultimate Evil, then obviously Christians are going to think that anyone who doesn’t follow Christ is either evil or being deceived by evil. They cannot see it any other way. They have chosen to see the world in a very limiting fashion that reduces all subtlety and nuance into the tired cliche of the tyrant which says “you are either with me or against me.” Life can’t be reduced to such things. Even wise Christians have said as much.

As a Pagan living in a society influenced and dominated by Christians, I have heard all of their excuses, stereotypes, and other expressions of their Spiritual Supremacism before. Frankly, I am tired of it. McCann needs to go back to the drawing board with this article. If he wants it to be as fair and balanced as he claims, then he should allow Pagan and Christian views about issues equal and fair allotment without trying to mold the discussion into one which attempts to slander Pagan religions. Yes, if you call our religions or our Gods and Goddesses false, you are slandering us and blaspheming against our Gods and Goddesses. If McCann is as truly concerned and interested in Christ as he implies then perhaps he should focus on his own religion and not worry about what other people from other faiths are doing.

Until he is ready and willing to accept us Pagans as equals, he would do well to learn how to speak to people of different faiths rather than the attempt at evangelism he thinks of as dialogue. Perhaps he should then research what we really think and believe as opposed to what he thinks we believe. Perhaps he would do well to learn what we really do and practice as opposed to what he may have thought we practice. Perhaps he should learn to know that just because he did certain things when he called himself a Witchcraft practitioner (he doesn’t specify what sort of Witchcraft or whether it was Pagan) doesn’t mean the rest of us Pagans, whether Wiccan, Witch, or some other, do the same things or think about them in the same way as he claims we would. Many so-called former Pagan Christians all seem to have similar ideas. Did they ever think that the reason they felt or thought the way they did when they tried Paganism was because they were in a religion that was wrong for them? And just because it was wrong for them, doesn’t make it wrong for the rest of us.

McCann claims to have addressed some misconceptions Christians have about Pagans, but I see little in his article that does so. It seems he simply wishes to get Christians to reinforce their idea that Pagan religions are false or deceptive.

McCann, until you learn to dialogue with us as true equals, thanks but no thanks.

Written from Litha to June 28th, 2006
-Irreverend Hugh, KSC
(Spokesbeing of the JAMs)

^*(You can read Vincent McCann’s article at
http://www.spotlightministries.org.uk/christianobpaganwicca.htm )

Originally posted 2009-11-10 14:37:39.

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Shamanism

It is unfortunate that some people have mixed Neo-Pagan Witchcraft and Shamanism, because as much as shamanism can elucidate what Wicca was aiming for, it can deceive.
Shamanism, contrary to the market values of the New Age, is culturally specific and in order for one to receive shamanic training one must become adopted into a cultural group
which has shamanic roles. I know that “shamanism” is also the latest buzzword for those instinctual magical/spiritual practices that are in evidence around the world, but using the word in this way is very deceptive.
The word refers to practices of certain people in mostly hunter-gatherer cultures who went through ritual/psychic dismemberment and rebirth. This experience gave such people the ability to leave their bodies and travel to
other worlds and planes, commune with spirits and ancestors, and heal those who were sick, or find lost souls and bring them home. Some East Asian societies still have surviving forms of this sort of spiritual specialist, but the word shaman should not be used
as the blanket term for all sorts of these specialists.



Wicca is not shamanic. Anyone who thinks otherwise is really deluded. There may be certain ritual practices that may seem like shamanic practices, but apparent similarities are just that.
Wicca is a religion first of all. This makes it very different from Shamanism, which is really nothing but a blanket term for a series of techniques and phenomena exhibited by certain
Siberian and Native American cultures. Shamanism is not a religion, nor is it a “world view” or any of the rest of the things that New Age writers have falsely ascribed to it.
This very simple difference should be enough to convince anyone that Wicca is not shamanic. I am sure that some people who call what they do “Shamanic Wicca” or whatever will argue with me.
But let me spell it out: Wicca may have some things that look like or may even be “shamanic,” but that doesn’t mean squat. Christianity has elements that could be called shamanic, too.
And if Shamanism was, as some anthropologists say, the earliest version of human spiritualities, it should be no surprise that modern religions would have certain elements that seem shamanic.

The only group or Tradition among Neo-Pagans that I have seen that even comes close to embodying “Shamanism” is the Feri Tradition started by Victor Anderson. But even then, I am reluctant to use the term because of its anthropological
significance and because of the term’s adoption by certain fluffy people and by the New Age.



Skyclad

This refers to participating in or working rituals in the nude. Some traditions, such as Gardnerian, practice almost exclusively skyclad. Most other traditions instead use special robes. Some Wiccans and Witches, solitary or in groups, practice in regular clothing.
Despite the opinions of some writers, ritual nudity wasn’t started by Gerald Gardner because he was a ‘dirty old man.’ Gardner had his reasons for adopting the practice when creating Wicca. The most commonly cited reasons are: energy is more effectively raised without clothing (magical effectiveness); the shedding of clothes is a part of the entrance into sacred space; when everyone is nude, there is equality (no rank or ego to be expressed through types of clothes).
It is up to you to decide whether to agree. Ritual nudity has been practiced off and on by various groups and religions for centuries.



Solitaries

A solitary is (surprise!) a person who does not, for whatever reason, practice with a group. Solitaries were the minority of Neo-Pagan Witches for the first couple of decades or so since the 1950′s. But nowadays (around 2005) it seems that solitaries are the
vast majority of Neo-Pagan Witches, even those who call themselves Wiccan. In Gardnerian Wicca (the earliest version of Neo-Pagan Witchcraft), coven members still make up the majority of adherents since
“one cannot be a witch alone.” But there are some exceptions.



Many older Wiccans have problems not with solitaries themselves but with the idea of self-initiation that many solitaries practice. Personally, I can see the merits to both sides of the argument around this. In my own experience I have found Wiccan groups are generally accepting of people who have self-initiated and who practice alone
so long as they admit to it. In my opinion, solitaries now make up the majority of Wiccans simply because there aren’t yet enough covens, either existing now or being formed, to handle the influx of newcomers.
It should also be noted that there are Wiccan traditions, such as Seax Wicca, in which self-initiation is the usual entry into the practice.



Sorcery

I put this entry here because people often associate this word with witchcraft. It’s time we come up with a concise workable definition of this term. Here goes: Sorcery is the art of manifesting your intentions.
It is the practice of materializing thought-forms. It is the empty-handed practice of magic. Sorcery is connecting with the divine or infinite within and actualizing that.
Some Neo-Pagan Witches have learned this art well, but the art is not necessarily connected with Neo-Pagan Witchcraft. Sorcery is practiced by many people from all walks of life
and from all religions. A sorcerer is one who is self-actualized and has the awareness/sensitivity to be able to summon up anything or any opportunity they need to accomplish whatever they set out to.
A sorcerer is the sort of person who doesn’t pray for rain when she needs to end a drought. She is the sort of person who prays “rain,” and it starts raining. Sorcerers live their lives on purpose. Contrary to the dogmas and beliefs that surround the idea of sorcery, the only difficulty in practicing this art is the belief that it is difficult. That said, work smart not hard.
If this is what you are looking for, you can learn to do this in many traditions. It doesn’t necessarily have to be Neo-Pagan Witchcraft.

Spellcasting, Spells, Spellcraft

These terms refer to the (occult) magical art that most people are familiar with: Someone mutters an incantation and burns some herbs, waves their hand, and “zap!” what they wanted to happen starts to happen.
Thanks to the mass media, popular misconceptions, and the dozens of fluffy books being published, most people assume that this is what Wicca or Neo-Pagan Witchcraft is all about. Unfortunately, in all of this it seems that some people
have forgotten that Neo-Pagan Witchcraft is a collection of religious traditions. The spurious fluffy authors who write their “intro to Wicca(-lite)” books seem to always leave most of the deep aspects out, such as: polytheology, divine ecstasy, energy, awareness, ritual meanings, actual history (as opposed to pseudo-histories), etc.



Casting spells does not make one a Wiccan anymore than it would make one a Buddhist or a Jew. Not practicing spellcraft doesn’t make one any less of a Wiccan. However, the art of spellcraft is a serious occult system which can be learned by anyone interested, if they have the time and dedication.
A lot of Neo-Pagan Witches learn spellcraft as an effective means of practice and change. But the vast majority of those will create their own spells. Reading a spell from a book of spells is considered sloppy practice, and contrary to the latest advertising spiel put out on the cover
of one of those glossy new books, it is an art that takes as much talent as learning, say, painting.
Also contrary to what many people assume, someone who has learned the art well tends to have a high accurate results rate.
(Like any art, each individual has their own style and preferred methods.)



The Threefold Law

This would be more correctly called the Law of Return, but I know many Wiccans are stuck on
traditional-sounding terms and the “threefold law” sounds like something old enough to be from a storybook. Contrary to what many fluffy writers have published, the Law of Return is not a moral code, nor is it an injunction. It is simply
stating what physicists have developed complex calculations for. If you take from the world, you will end up putting something back. If you do something violent, you increase the chances of that being done to you. This is much like the original idea of karma in which every action creates more conditions which reinforce and/or multiply the chances for that action to occur again.
Most people have assumed that karma is a moral underpinning, but like the Law of Return, it is simply a statement about how certain people have observed the world working.
If you eat something, you will eventually give something back to the environment that is useful to some other life. You inhale oxygen and exhale carbon-dioxide. There are many ways to pursue this observation.



An individual can choose to adapt the Law of Return into their own moral code, but keep in mind that doing good because you are getting good back is not very moral sounding.
Likewise, you should seek to avoid causing harm because of the empathy for other beings you have developed and not simply to avoid the harm coming back to you in the future. But that’s all I am going to say on the matter.



It should be obvious to you all why I have chosen to call this “The Law of Return” as opposed to the Threefold Law. I never took the Threefold Law literally like some people who then make asinine statements about it either pro or con. I just prefer the more
reciprocal sounding name of “Law of Return.” This version more adequately reflects the balance that is at the heart of Wicca. The “Threefold Return,” on the surface sounds like a runaway train. No versions of this Law should be taken at face value however.
They should simply inspire you to reflect on your own life. Sure, you may be able to get away with running that red light tonight, but perhaps your action caused anxiety in another driver who then does something stupid which results in you being late for work tomorrow morning.
Or perhaps you are not immediately affected but you have provoked anxiety and have added to the social level just that much and in some way it will affect you later on. Simply put, the Law of Return is the starting point for far sighted thinking.

I won’t say much about what this Law means magically because there is so much muddled pseudo-conceptual crap about magic out there now that it makes me sick. Just note that in magical practices, there is almost an exception for everything.
I feel that a lot of Neo-Pagans, Wiccans in particular, have deliberately misrepresented magic because of their marked lack of experience with it. So I won’t say anything about “not hexing” or about “interfering with other’s lives” or any of that crappola. Not because I feel it unimportant, mind you.
It’s just that you have probably heard it all before. Magically the Law of Return is simple: You need energy or art to get the results you want, i.e. you want something, then make something in return. Put some beauty back in the world. If you pay attention to just these last few statements, you need not worry about the Law of Return at all.



Traditional Witchcraft

This term can refer to two things. The first would be Gardnerian Wiccan traditions and their close relatives like the Alexandrians. This is sometimes, and more correctly, known as “British Traditionalist” or “British Traditional Wicca.”
The second would be people who for whatever reason are claiming to be Witches or Pagans from groups that are older than any of the Neo-Pagan groups since Gardner’s time. Such “traditional” groups
almost always practice rituals that can be shown to have come from Gardner’s Wicca or its derivatives since then. Most Traditional Witches would have us accept their claims on faith, but how do we trust people
who can be shown to be lying? And why the need to lie? The Neo-Pagan Witches and Wiccans who recognize that their own religions are only decades old are still having profound experiences that are as valid, if not more so, than any religion that
goes back in history for hundreds of years.



I am not saying that there can’t be any groups of traditional witches whose practices predate the Gardnerian ‘revival.’ But like unicorns and dragons, I have yet to actually see one of them in reality.
And websites don’t count as evidence.



Traditions

The word “tradition” usually refers to a distinctive ‘denomination’ of a Neo-Pagan religion, usually Wiccan. For instance, Gardnerian Wicca and Dianic Wicca are separate traditions, whereas Wicca as a whole and Asatru (Norse Paganism) are separate religions altogether.
This is the usual way the word is used, though some writers apply the word tradition to each and every Neo-Pagan group in a looser fashion.
The following are some of the more major traditions of Neo-Pagan Witchcraft. I have not included every tradition, just some of the more formative and/or distinctive ones. Anyone interested in looking at a more in-depth list of either Neo-Pagan Witchcraft or Wiccan traditions, and of Pagan paths in general, should visit
the Traditions page on the Witchvox website.

Originally posted 2009-11-10 14:28:01.

One thing that bothers me is the fact that Neo-Pagans, and those who call themselves Wiccan in particular, are virulently anti-Christian. Even the supposedly more moderate Neo-Pagan elders (who should know better) have made statements to the effect that Neo-Paganism is going to replace Christianity. (Not a very diplomatic expression. Not even an expression that shows any of Neo-Paganism’s supposed open-mindedness.) I must confess that such an event, if not coerced, would be fine by me. But frankly, despite the wishful thinking of many people who have probably themselves escaped or left the Christianity of their parents, I find no evidence that Christianity is going to be replaced by anything closely resembling Neo-Paganism. Christianity is not even disappearing, though its influence on several Western European nations has waned considerably in the last hundred years. Within American society, Christianity is stronger now than it has ever been since the founding of the nation.

The New Age movement exhibits a larger degree of influence on American society than any version of Neo-Paganism. But that’s only among those who are not strongly attached to Christianity. I hate to break it to some smug Neo-Pagans but Christianity is growing rapidly. It is the fastest growing religion in the world, despite the slow decline of some of the older denominations. Christianity is not going anywhere and we Neo-Pagans are simply going to have to learn to live with them. “What?” I can hear the gasps now. “LIVE with them?” Yes. Live with them. Unless Neo-Pagans are willing to form communities in which they are the majority faith tendency (unlikely even in the best of scenarios, but I’ll get to that later), we are just simply going to have to live with them and exhibit some of the (but rarely present with regards to Christians) tolerance and understanding that we claim to hold dear.

Despite the evidence that abounds all around Neo-Pagans, many still adhere to the invalid conceit that theirs is the tendency of the future… “the mammals who are going to replace the dinosaurs,” to use Isaac Bonewits’ expression. The growing popularity of Wicca (mostly Wicca-lite) notwithstanding, I don’t see any evidence that Neo-Paganism will ever become the majority religious tendency anywhere. I could be proven wrong in the future, but I really don’t care. I didn’t align myself with Neo-Paganism because I felt it to be the wave of the future, or because it was ‘alternative,’ or because I read some book on Witchcraft and thought “this is me.”

It took Christianity and Islam hundreds of years of fierce and violent evangelism and expansion to get to the positions of dominance that they now have over vast parts of the Earth. It could take Neo-Paganism at least a couple of generations to come to be even a socially recognized minority. And going around telling everyone, especially everyone who is Christian, that your religions are going to replace theirs is NOT the behavior of an open-minded people (even if by some fluke, it was true). Think about it.

I know this will piss off some of you fellow Neo-Pagans, but the fact is that without viable institutions and communities in the real world, Neo-Paganism could very well be just another fad. Have you ever thought about that? “Institutions?” I can hear you say. “But aren’t those what’s wrong with Christianity?” No. Flat out. No. Institutions are NOT the problem with any religion. Situations involving power and intolerance are what’s wrong with some religions. And Neo-Pagans can be just as power hungry and as intolerant as the people they like to accuse of the same.

You still disagree? You still believe that Neo-Paganism is going to replace Christianity, despite the evidence to the contrary and despite the fact that that belief smacks of all the hatred and intolerance of the Inquisition? Just look at the recent television coverage of Pope John Paul’s funeral and of the Roman Conclave to elect another Pope. What has Neo-Paganism in comparison? Every Halloween season, some of the local TV outlets grab a bunch of the local Wiccans to show that all witches aren’t evil and aren’t a bunch of old sea hags. That’s it. Catholicism is treated as the serious business it really is (having over a billion members and more wealth than Bill Gates) while Wicca (and by extension, Neo-Paganism overall) is treated as a quaint ‘alternative spirituality’ joke. In this climate, how can anyone of you stand there and tell me that Neo-Paganism of any flavor is going to be the religion of the future that replaces Christianity?

And don’t kid yourselves either. Christianity, especially the Roman Catholic version, has weathered hundreds of years of wars, social upheavals, revolutions, schisms, etc. Rome, as the center of the world’s largest religious institution, has seen all this shit come and go before. They have seen Pagan revivals. They have seen secularism come and go. They have withstood monarchies and democracies. And they have adapted to the so-called modern Age of Science. Until we Neo-Pagans have been around long enough to get the same sort of experience, how can we even be stupid enough to say our religions will replace anything? How? Because we are a conceited and vain lot. I know we don’t like to admit this, but in my experience of living with other Neo-Pagans, this is the truth. I have seen community potential absolutely wasted because of pathetic petty power struggles among people who claim to know better. I have seen little Witchcraft inquisitions break out. I have been witness to all sorts of the same behaviors we Neo-Pagans accuse the supposedly evil mono-theists of. I am sick of the bullshit. Frankly, cut the crap.

I practice Neo-Paganism and I don’t really care about what the Christian neighbors think unless they come over to ask me what the hell I am doing and why I am doing it. I also really don’t care about the whole “faddish get on the bandwagon” attitude I see exhibited by some of the rest of you. I didn’t become Neo-Pagan to get on some bandwagon of alternative spirituality, and to be honest if you are truly Pagan and not just shopping around for the most marketable faith, neither did the rest of you.

I have seen Christians come along to fire celebrations and rock it up with the best of us, all the while giving praise to their Lord Jesus, while we gave our praises to our gaggle of Gods and spirits and it was ALL GOOD. In situations like these there is a vision of hope for the future. It is called heresy, the Greek word for “choice.” If Neo-Paganism is to truly grow and become its ‘own thing’ it is time to stop trying to compete with or against Christianity. It is time we stop worrying about the other religions and their histories and to simply start doing ‘our own thing.’

It is time to stop being so bobdamned provincial-minded and exclusionary and learn to really respect other people’s religious choices. It is time for us Pagans to practice what we preach and stop being so hate-filled to the point where we could actually conceive of having glee at the illusion that someone else’s religion is disappearing. I can hear some of you Wicca-lite adherents start to sneer and say “But Christianity did all those horrible things to us.” Yep. Uh-uh. Sure they did. When? You ever hear what you sound like when you go on like that?

To start, let’s identify the real problem many of you have with your Christian sisters and brothers: Intolerance. And (cue the pithy truism music here) this is a problem with all of us. I am sure that their God and all of our Gods would agree on this.

-Irreverend Hugh, KSC
(April 18th, 2005)

Originally posted 2009-11-10 14:19:41.

Breaking Craft Stereotypes:
“Just because my religion gives me a cyclical view of life, doesn’t mean I’ll let you run me around in circles.”

The Wiccan “cosmology,” if you will, describing a twin axis between a double-aspected God and triple-aspected Goddess, and a deep yet seldom explored (at least by hordes of new and increasingly vocal Wiccans) four element schema cross-referenced by a yearly cyclical calendar based off of a creative interpretation of observable natural events is all a modern collective vision. Many of the things that make up this cosmology can be said to stretch back towards humanity’s self-consciously accepted “pre-history.” But this is nothing new in the history of religions. New religions often take up strands of older practices or viewpoints and synthesize them into new practices and meanings relevant for those doing task of weaving them together. Many of Wicca’s practices and certainly most of its belief structure can be correctly said to be modern developments. This is, in and of itself, the way things have always been with human spirituality and religion.

The problem is that many people don’t understand the subtleties and complexities of religious movements, especially the new religions. Many of the worst offenders tend to be the new religion’s own adherents, who seek justification in their identities by trying to prove claims of ancient lineages. The problem with Wicca in particular is due to people misunderstanding the basic premise that new religions always contain strands that may be ancient with the religions themselves being new. So people fall into the error that Wicca must either be shown to be, or defended as, ancient in order to feel any sense of validity.

Americans and other Westerners who practice Buddhism are less troubled by such problems simply because of the nascent traditions and strands of Western Buddhism having links to the historical movement of Buddhism which until fairly recently was mostly developed in various Asian nations. Lineage and traditions are emphasized, but not to the detriment of new developments and of the major Buddhist emphasis on direct insight and reflection. Thus for someone practicing dually…or one who both practices Buddhism and Wicca, my practice of Buddhism presents no comparable problems.

My practice of Wicca was always personally viewed by me as the practice of a New Religion that took inspiration from earlier forms of Pagan beliefs and practices. I didn’t much take stock in the idea that Wicca had to prove its existence further back into the past beyond the 1950′s. And in many ways any modern version of anything that calls itself “revived” is of necessity a new creation. Due to my familiarity and “membership” with a modern Celtic culture (and a decent sense of Celtic history from a Celtic viewpoint), I certainly had no illusions about Wicca being an ancient “Celtic-based” religion – as was often asserted by many misinformed Wiccans until recently. Wicca was always for me either a revived religion or a new creation. Wicca was my introduction to Neo-Paganism and though I have studied from and learned from many other forms of Neo-Paganism, Wicca has been the form I have been most comfortable with for the past ten years. Like a pair of well-worn boots, or an old friendship that remains a vital part of one’s social life, it is Wicca that will most likely remain the central focus of my Neo-Pagan practices and ideas, at least for this lifetime. (A sentiment that I also have towards my membership in the Western Buddhist movement, by the way. My adherence to Discordianism, which may or may not say anything, depending upon your perceptions, is a foregone conclusion, of course.)

I understand the tendency that all new religions are afflicted with in trying to assert some historical lineage that stretches back before their creations or syntheses. Christianity did so by using older Jewish scriptures and integrating them into a sense of a newer prophetic historical identity. (Without which the idea of Christ being the Messiah of all of humanity would lose its meaning.) Islam followed a similar course of integration within and upon the older Jewish monotheistic concepts. (Otherwise the assertion that the Prophet Mohammed is the “Seal of the Prophets” would lose its meaning.) But these are religions that I do not belong to and feel it is best left to scholars within those respective religions to reflect, study, and learn about how their own traditions have developed. Thus I will not go further discussion about them.

In this day and age, with a certain amount of availability and transparency of information, studies, and research, Wiccans can no longer try to claim with a straight face that Wicca is the “Old Religion,” no matter how old or perennial both some of our ideas and some of our gods and goddesses may be. This is why I also love Discordianism. In Discordianism there is no emphasis on trying to prove how ancient it is. (Eris Herself may be an ancient Goddess, but no Discordian worth her salt would try to convince anyone else that the modern practice and ideas of Discordianism are ancient, unless she is pulling your leg.) This is seen as an exercise in absurdity, to be done for the sake of absurdity, laughter, and for showing just how limiting and silly such mental gymnastics really are.

Wiccans need to remember that we need to balance Mirth and Reverence. What I see is a lot of reverence or willingness to revere any writer who agrees with the premises of the reader or practitioner. We need not take ourselves so seriously to the point of trying to establish any historical validity beyond the modern birth of Wicca in the 1950′s. There is no need to prove that we have any connection to any of the victims of the Great Witch Hunts of the early modern period. Especially since none of those victims were Wiccans in any meaningful sense of that word. They were not even “proto-Wiccans.” What the Witch Hunts can do that would be more useful for us, is to raise our awareness of intolerance and of what happens when some human beings attack and oppress other human beings for perceived or real differences. Besides that, there are very real struggles going on these days for Wiccans and other Neo-Pagans to have their religions respected with all the legal and social rights that other more established religious communities enjoy. Focusing on these real world and ongoing struggles is much better for us. Not only should we think about where we come from but we should also make better the lives of those who will come after us in the future.

In this Mirth, and understanding that we no longer need to prove historical validity stretching back in time to beyond modern human civilizations, we don’t have to go the other extreme and accept every new fad or newly marketed thing that calls itself Wiccan as Wiccan. Of the many things we need not accept, one of them is the marketing of the things known as “power beads” or “karma beads” which are as popular among many self-identified Wiccans as they are among many other so-called “alternative” spiritualities. As mentioned briefly above, I also practice Buddhism and that practice is more often than not my “public” religious affiliation (since I prefer to keep my Wiccan practices and viewpoints in my personal life, except for online such as this article). Those things marketed as “power/karma beads” highly resemble what Buddhists call a “mala.” Malas are sort of like the Buddhist equivalent of Catholic rosaries. They are religious tools, as sacred and distinctive to Buddhism as are Wiccan implements such as athames or chalices are to Wiccans. When I first started seeing the power/karma beads on various people, I would often ask the wearers if they were Buddhist. I would get all sorts of answers such as “Why would you think I was Buddhist?” Upon explaining that these beads resembled Buddhist malas down to the least detail, most wearers would respond with something like “So? How would you know? Buddhists don’t have the monopoly on malas.” This line of reasoning was not highly thought of by me, since I never wear anything resembling religious icons or jewelry without first knowing what the damned things mean and where they come from. As a Buddhist, the wearing of mala beads for “power” or “karma” or any other silly marketed superstition is mildly insulting. It is as insulting to me as if I would see a non-Wiccan use a pentacle for any equivalent silly marketing trick or as a consumerist fashion statement.

Silly flakiness of the above sort should not be accepted. While I do support your right to wear what you want and do as you wish, you must remember that what you wear and what you do communicates certain things to others. Thus you had better know what it is you are communicating. This issue of “malas” is not the only issue, it is just what touches upon my life at this moment. It also illuminates a lot of what is going on among those self-identified Wiccans (and other “alternative” religion sorts). In our quest for social validity, matched with our refusal to feel any need to fabricate historical identities that don’t really exist, we need not accept every new fad or fashion statement that some confused people insist upon inclusion as a general Wiccan trend or practice.

We need no “official” or “traditional” Wiccan clothing or garb, whether in ritual or not. Unless some groups eventually develop something we all may like to live with. We need no jewelry or any of the other outward signs of religious affiliation mirroring the ubiquitous crosses that many Christians wear. We need not have to prove ourselves to be as historically or traditionally valid as some of the older and more popular religions. We only need to show that our religion is valid in its own right because it is alive here and now.

I realize that the above was a romp through many issues that are related to the specific issue of Wicca being valid without proving our religion is as ancient as other faiths. The phrase that comes to mind is the title of this article. “Wicca. A New Religion of the Old Gods.” This can help us as a starting point as to how we conceive of ourselves in a conscious community identity and as to how we present ourselves to others who may be curious as to just what we believe, how we believe, and what we do. This is much more of a fruitful exercise than some of the tortured attempts of certain obstinate Wiccans who insist upon using any spurious data or information to mislead others into thinking that Wicca is ancient. Just because our Gods are ancient (even though many of our ideas and approaches to them probably are not) does not mean our religion need be. And it also restores the credit to where it is due: possibly to our Gods for the inspiration and definitely to many of early Wicca’s founders such as Gardner and others for opening up to that inspiration.

-October 16th, 2005 by Irreverend Hugh, KSC
(Ten years of Wicca, more years of Buddhism, and Eris knows how many years in Discordianism. I am told that this would mean something to some people.)

Originally posted 2009-11-10 14:46:27.

Much of the Neopagan community is woefully ignorant about magic and its terminology. I should point out the many in the occult or magical community also fall under this ignorance, but I haven’t run into many occultists who necessarily have problems with “black magic” unless they are pulling legs, or pretending to be infamous. This would normally not present any problem, since Neopagan religions are not necessarily magical systems, though they may use magical elements in ritual much as the majority of world religions do. The problem is that Wicca, and other Pagan religious variants under the Witchcraft rubric, consciously uses magical elements and practices and names them as such. This has led to the curious situation today where many Wiccans, self-professed Witches, and Wicca-influenced people will claim they do not practice “black magic.” Many older or more experienced people will often respond with the seemingly intelligent phrase “magic has no color.” But such a statement really says nothing new.

We know that magic has no color anymore than poetry or music has any color. So what? Many people, in using the terms “black” or “white” in reference to types of magic, are making a conscious value statement in clear lack of understanding where the terms come from and to what they really refer.

Victor Anderson, the co-founder of the Feri tradition of Paganism, said “White magic is poetry. Black magic is anything that actually works.” And he was right, not only in the attitude of his statement, but also historically. Magic came to be categorized broadly between twin poles of black and white, but not in the way you’re now thinking. Don’t make the assumption that white magic would refer to blessings, healing, and beneficial effects, while black magic refers to harmful intent. This current view is ignorant of both magic and its history. Magic with intent to harm is black magic in the sense that it works, not in the sense that there is an intent to harm. White magic refers to something altogether different than what most Neopagans think of today; it is not about blessings, or beneficial intentions.

White magic originally referred to “theurgia.” Which was in essence the high magic of the ceremonial practitioners which sought to align the mage’s will to a higher power, will, god, or self. Black magic referred to “goetia” (not necessarily the contents in the renaissance grimoire of that name). Which was basically both the low magic of witchcraft, popular sympathetic magic, spell casting, certain divinations, and also the high magical arts of evocation, necromancy, long ritual enchantments – thus, anything that a person did which sought to effect change in the environment and circumstances of the practitioner. The former was thought of as spiritual and the latter as worldly. And these two distinctions came originally from classical times and were carried through the renaissance straight away to modernity with a lot of bad religious propaganda thrown in for distraction.^{*[see note]}

Thus, most of what modern witches do, whether pagan Witches or of the various folk or ethnic kinds, could be considered black magic. Much of what ceremonial practitioners do is black magic. So is a lot, if not most, of what Chaos Mages do. (Hell, most of the world’s population is doing black magic, if you think about it.) Yes, when you bind someone, or banish a negative influence or entity, or when you cast a spell for a better job, or when you look to scry into something for information as to how to proceed with some action, or when you seek to ward off aggressive people, or when you construct shields or seals… you are, by the historical definition, practicing black magic. But because witches, as well as other magic practitioners have been getting bad press from Christianity for years, if not for centuries now, calling it black magic is a public relations nightmare. This is why you have many people, especially Wiccans, who will go to absurd lengths to state that they never intend to cause harm and therefore they practice beneficial or white magic. Frankly, it’s time people in the occult community, whether Pagan or not, stop using these fuzzy definitions if they are going to make distinctions between black and white magic at all. Maybe they should even go further and not use the terms.

Furthermore, intent to harm is not necessarily black magic, not only because people often bend rationalizations to fit their actions, but because sometimes harm may be the necessary and right thing to do. (How’s that for a logical twist?) Would you not seek to cause harm to another if you knew that it would prevent them from doing greater harm? Right or wrong, this line of thought is commonly used. Also, many people may do various reprehensible actions in order to bring about a blessing or a better relationship with god or the universe. How many people have harmed themselves in some twisted ritual to get closer to god or some higher essence? Intent to harm is simply intent to harm. Using magic to cause harm is simply that. It doesn’t make it “black magic” as opposed to “white magic,” no matter how many people ignorant of magic and its history may repeat the lie.

White magic as a practice came to be seen as better than the black varieties simply because of Western civilization’s 2000 year long flirtation with the spiritual / worldly split which posited spiritual goals as being higher, better, or selfless and worldly goals as being baser, lower, or selfish. God was seen as light or white and the absence of god was seen as dark or black. That’s where the terms came from. (And though they were polished by Christianity, they didn’t originate from there.) From the view of magical theory in the post-modern world, this white/black dualism is obviously false and Neopagans especially should strive to eradicate its influence since the material world, the physical, is seen as spiritually valid, if not the essence and expression of spirituality in itself. In this vein, black magic would thus take on spiritual worth in the same way as other worldly goals such as financial success, enough to eat, and certain comforts/enjoyments. Remember that Wiccans, among other Pagans, are enjoined and encouraged to enjoy life to its fullest. Celebration is as spiritual as any other activity.

Since “black magic is anything that actually works” then we may either come to the conclusion that we have nothing to fear from actually wanting to use our talents or art to change our environment or project our will into it, or instead to seek to solely align ourselves to divinity or the universe. This latter goal is admittedly religious or spiritual, but I wouldn’t fault you for it. It’s just that, for me, even such an alignment would demonstrate a wanted or needed change which impacts the environment. Otherwise, it’s just playing intellectual games. I don’t care to separate the so-called material world from the so-called spiritual world. Since my life view unifies (or collapses the distinctions between) the spiritual and worldly (which is the heart of Neopagan religious practice), I can’t see what good it would be for me to distinguish between the two. But if I must make a distinction, then I would have to go with “black magic.” Sorry, but that’s the way it is. Without doing something that actually works and gets results, what is the point?

So if you find yourself asked about black magic and you just don’t know, don’t assume that it means magic with intent to harm or selfish magic, and then go on to answer that you never ever practice it. That simply displays both your abdication to political correctness and your willingness to collude in keeping ignorant prejudices alive. It also shows many of us experienced practitioners that you probably have no idea what you are going on about.

Reject the spurious notions that others may have about you because you practice magic that gets results in this real world as opposed to on some higher postulated spiritual plane; the practice of historically “black magic.” Reject the invectives of criticism that others may level against you because you admitted using magic to cause change in your environment or to interfere with another’s will. Reject the false notion that all magic you do should be for a higher purpose than your own life and its circumstances. This sounds selfish, but remember, even if you want to help others, you yourself must first be well and strong. Those who would try to tell you that sacrifice of your needs for some higher purpose is a lofty goal are only fooling themselves into thinking that their life-denial is spiritual.

We come from the dark of the womb and will one day pass into the darkness of death, all the while the light that is energy, chaos and life, is both everywhere immanent and transcendent. Without light there is no darkness and vice versa. Without night, day is meaningless. Magic is life itself and since any magic that has so-called worldly aims is black magic, then we must all be black magicians.

“Thou hast no right but to do thy will.”

-Irreverend Hugh, KSC
October 1st, 2006

^*note:
At this point, many experienced occultists may bring up the whole ‘left hand / right hand’ dualism (left hand = black or selfish magic; right hand = white or selfless magic) and think to themselves that they have a better handle on this topic. But only apparently, since the terms right hand and left hand when referring to magic are not historical and cannot be shown to be much older than the Romantic Era and the writings of Eliphas Levi. The terms as they are used today by most people, aren’t even accurate. They originate in both Buddhist and Hindu forms of Tantric practices and refer to both literal and symbolic ritual approaches. Aleister Crowley and many of his contemporaries were familiar with Tantric practices and symbologies and many modern ideas and practices can be said to be influenced by Tantra. Unlike what many Western occultists think today, the left hand approach was a way of honoring someone. Modern Western occultists simply grafted the term ‘left hand path’ to the idea of ‘black magic’ and it assumed ‘selfish’ or even diabolical connotations. This comes from the historical attitudes towards the left side and left-handed people. The very word ‘sinister’ which is today used to mean evil, is nothing more than Latin for “left handed.” So it is time that occultists stop using even the left/right hand dualism when referring to magic and magical paths.

That the terms left hand and right hand in reference to magic are arbitrary becomes clear when you realize that ‘left’ can also refer to the feminine principle and ‘right’ to the masculine principle, as occurs in some Tantric rituals. Thus, at least for two hundred years, occultists in the West have gotten it all wrong. This is only to be expected as Crowley and others who wrote of the left/right hand path differences were consummate leg pullers. This was so that students would eventually learn to think for themselves beyond the socio-cultural conditioning of their respective upbringings. In modern or post-modern times it seems that the Chaos Magicians, advanced Feri practitioners, and many experienced Wiccans have learned to see through the left/right hand canard, while the vast majority of people involved with the ‘occult’ have yet to come to this realization.

(Note from Daven: This article prompted me to write the following blog post: A Brainstorm.)

Irreverand Hugh did some articles for his website a while back, and one that he posted was about Black Magick

http://www.geocities.com/tribhis/blackmagic.html

Unfortunately since his site went down, there’s no more site to pull that article from. I checked on Archive.org and with Google Cache and I can’t find it anyplace.

Anyone know where I can find a copy?

Found it. A friend pointed me to a copy at http://webspace.webring.com/people/ug/goldenmonkey/blackmagic.html, which, oddly enough, is the site that they wound up moving to.

I’ve reprinted it at On Black Magick here on the Journal.

I kinda feel silly now.

(Note from Daven: Please note, this is NOT my article, but it is THE best article I have ever seen dealing with who Eris is and why we should care.  Do not make the mistake of dismissing this goddess just because she seems scary like other trickster/chaotic deities (like Loki, Coyote and Discordia) have been in the past.  They are CRITICAL to our world.  I made a comment when I read this article, and the author said it was one of the best summations of how a Discordian sees Chaos:  “Creative Chaos. Without chaos, no inventions can happen, no progress can be made, for it is the spark of the Chaotic that prompts inspiration. Total Order is stagnation. ” So, keep that in mind.)

Eris, the Goddess of Confusion, Chaos, and Laughter

by “Irreverend Hugh (otherwise known as Triskell), KSC, of the Discordians for Softer Sandpaper Society”

“Eris doesn’t want your soul. She only wants to talk to you.”

Eris/Discordia was feared and maligned, we think unfairly, by the ancient Greeks and Romans who saw in Her the personification of every thing that was a threat to their sense of a well-run, neat, and ordered Cosmos. Some Greeks adhered to the idea that there were really two deities known as Eris. (This double divinity of Chaos was known collectively as the ‘Erites’. Not to be confused with the Furies who are the ‘Erinyes’.) The ‘first Eris’ was the same old malignant ‘bitch’ Goddess from patriarchic fantasy who reveled in the causes, effects, and general confusion of warfare. The ‘second Eris’ was more of a benign ‘spur’ in people’s sides to get them off their lazy butts and start doing things to change their world in whatever way that meant. Other ancient Greeks thought that both of these aspects were one and the same Eris. Today’s Discordians usually agree with the latter approach, though the Eris of today is conceived of in ways that the ancients never did, at least according to remaining written Classical Hellenic evidence.

Traditionally, Eris was seen as the daughter of Chaos, though Her genealogy is a bit confused. In modern times, however, She is viewed as a personification of Chaos. The Greek word ‘Eris’ literally meant ‘strife’ or ‘discord’. Unless this is explained, people will get a nasty impression of Eris. To start with, Eris can be nasty, but who can’t be at times? But that is only one of Her moods, and most of the nastiness that the ancients attributed to Her was really their own damned fault. People often like to blame deities for their own shortcomings, and Eris gets blamed for causing a lot of things that humans themselves have willfully and gleefully created. The Discordian tendency is to see Eris as the mere catalyst, or agent of instigation, if you will. She simply picks at those with pompous and self-righteous attitudes and behaviors until they finally let it all out and act out their true vile desires. The Discordian adage “If people don’t want wars, why do wars keep happening?” sums this up nicely. We humans do all the deeds to each other, and then bicker over who is to blame – as used to the idea of ‘finding and denouncing the no-good-shits’ as we are. Eris is here for us to see that we are the ones to blame. Simply put: Stop your whining and take some responsibility for the mess you have created.

Today’s Eris, as is often said by Discordians, shows more of Her mellow aspects, at least to Her ‘co-conspirators’ who sometimes tend to err on the side of attributing to Her every sort of weirdness that intrudes into their lives. Eris is said to be responsible for generating bureaucracies among human societies to both keep the tyrants confused and to keep the intelligent perplexed. She is also here to tell us that, contrary to the religious, spiritual, and theological dogmas of the past centuries, We Are Free. Humankind is not inherently flawed, spiritually blocked, or sinful. Any flaws, blocks, or sins as may exist are entirely our own doing, and as such, they can be overcome, outgrown, or avoided if we decide so.

Today’s Eris is said to have returned to humanity after She had left back in ancient times. She has returned because humans are now socially, emotionally, and intellectually capable of growing up and finally learning how to live in the world. Our species’ ‘psychic development’ is ‘nearing completion’ as the oft quoted Principia Discordia line says. Many Discordians, of course, argue about just what the hell this means. Some of them reject it entirely, pointing out that human beings are no less capable of stupidity then at any other time before. The main difference between nowadays and ‘before’ is that human stupidity is now so dangerous that it can destroy all life on Earth. Perhaps that is the reason for Eris’s return. (Though many Discordians would ask “Why would Eris care about that?”)

Eris is, besides all that, a Goddess of laughter. And laughter is what Discordianism is mainly all about. The key insight that humanity can solve its problems when it stops taking itself so seriously is what keeps Discordians fluid and humorous. It also helps those Discordians who practice the mind-discipline of magic from succumbing to the occult mental illness known as ‘magusitis’, whereby magical practitioners begin to believe themselves to be ‘above the herd’ or better than the rest. Laughter is the most important component of Discordian practices. It is considered by some to be the central way of reverencing Eris Herself.

Eris is a paradoxical being Herself, and each Discordian has their own perspective, or set of perspectives, about Her – either due to Her shenanigans, the pineal gland of the Discordian in question, and/or some weird combination of both. She does exhibit some of the qualities associated with other divine beings. She does ‘smite’. She visits people in their visions and dreams, if not in other ways. She tends to reserve a special spot in Her heart for those Discordians who can cause the most amount of activity on Her behalf. She also reserves a place in Her heart for people who have lost their minds, either willingly or not. She appears when Her ‘followers’ least expect it, despite the ritual or lack thereof.

In terms of imagery, Eris is usually portrayed as a disheveled haired women in an equally disheveled white dress. Sometimes, however She wears slick urban night life clothing. Her hair and eye colors tend to vary from depiction to depiction. She is chaos, after all. She is shown sometimes holding a golden apple with the word ‘kallisti’ (Greek for ‘to the prettiest’) inscribed thereupon. Discordians also like to think of all women being physical embodiments of Eris. This was originally because most Discordians were heterosexual men. But such a masculine heterosexual numerical dominance of a Goddess-centered ‘irreligion’ was bound to evaporate due to its inherent absence of sexism. The Discordian Society of today actually has a higher proportion of women than men and a good number of them are of many sexual preferences. (And due to the non-focus within Discordianism on such sociological categories as above, this is the only place in this whole treatment you will find them discussed.)

Eris also represents the active principle of standing up for oneself in the face of exclusion, betrayal, or injustice. In Discordianism, getting ‘even’ is considered a valuable experience in one’s ability to recognize a need for redress without having to rely on so-called authority or parent figures to tell them so. How a Discordian goes about gaining redress is left up to each person. The Myth of the Golden Apple (discussed below) is often cited as a prime example of doing so.

Eris is freedom, creative chaos, and laughter itself, as discussed above. The following is a piece written years ago for my home-group’s website which takes quite a different angle of approach with Eris. I include it merely to show how conceptions of Eris can vary. (And not, I promise, to pan out this treatment with filler.)

Eris was much maligned and feared by the Greeks and Romans. It is suspected that they feared and maligned Her because She wasn’t a weak willed Goddess of Beauty or some other such patriarchal construction. Like the ancient Celtic Goddess, Macha, She embodies all the aspects of human femininity from a time before the advent of dominator cultures and their insistence upon endemic warfare. She would not fit into the mold that the warrior castes needed. Thus they slandered Her and attributed to Her all of the negative aspects of warfare that they saw in themselves. (You can witness this behavior today when women get slandered by rejected suitors and such.) Being the dominators that they were, they turned Her love of Creative Chaos and Disagreement into something evil. And what is more evil to dominators than disagreement and loss of control? People who consider themselves Discordians/Erisians are befriending and getting to know Eris (and that’s about all they agree upon, if they even agree on that). She delights in confounding the intelligent, confusing the seeker, and illuminating the lover…all for the purpose of getting us to open up to the possibility that play is one of the highest celebrations in life. As to warfare, She has told humanity that if they didn’t want war then they should stop it. She also provides a good example to everyone who has ever been snubbed or maligned. She didn’t sit there and accept it. She took action by throwing Her golden apple of Discord among the other Goddesses who then proceeded to fight bitterly over it because it had “to the prettiest one” written on it. If only those Goddesses knew the simple truth that we are all the prettiest ones…but our history is littered with the slaughter of people fighting each other to prove that they are the prettiest/best/perfect/chosen ones and all the others are no good shits. The Erisian Movement is dedicated to stopping such stupidity by subverting the means by which people choose to remain locked into stupid behaviors.

Here is another Discordian’s take on our Goddess which is found in the Book of Eris:

“Eris is beyond mere words. [For example,] Discussing the glass [as half-empty or half-full] can never replace the experience of drinking from it; describing the various perspectives will never get you closer to the actual act of savoring the water.”

Even though the essay was focused on the old proverbial glass of water metaphor, it is a succinct way of exposing many of our approaches to the world and Eris Herself. (I must also parenthetically mention that the essay is also one of the freshest and creative takes on the old glass of water metaphor.)

Another Book of Eris section entitled “Seeing Eris” goes: “How can the divine Eris be seen? In beautiful forms, breathtaking wonders, awe-inspiring miracles? Eris is not obliged to present Herself this way. She is always present and always available. When Speech is exhausted and mind dissolved, She presents Herself. When clarity and purity are cultivated, She reveals Herself. When sincerity is unconditional, She reveals Herself. If you are willing to be lived by Her, you will see Her everywhere, even in the most ordinary things.”

As a final insertion of examples of approaching or viewing Eris, here is a text on the issue which I wrote for a sermon entitled “Erisianity”. It deals with five major aspects of Eris as revealed to myself and those of my Discordian home-group. As the above examples, it is in no way meant to be taken as the ultimate definitive statement. Again, these are merely for the reader to understand the plethora of possibility in Discordian approaches to Our Lady.

Many people like to believe Hesiod (that old Greek writer) when he wrote that there were two deities called Eris; one a spur in your side to get you off your ass; the other a violent and angry war-causing spiteful power that strikes fear into the hearts of humankind—or probably just ‘mankind’ as women usually had no reason to fear Eris. However, Hesiod was just fiddling around with semantics. We know both descriptions of Eris are about one and the same being. And She is your Goddess. Of course, the description of Her being the one who spurs you to get off your ass, fits well with modern Discordian ideas, in as much as it can be said that we have ideas, in as much as it can be said that ideas can be possessed. But we know that the angry spiteful description of Eris fits Her as well. Snub Her and watch how She gets. (I must add that insulting Her really doesn’t anger Her, especially if you are one of Her Children, and She sort of expects that sort of thing from people going around calling themselves Discordians anyway.) Hesiod, though ancient and long dead, really didn’t know what he was talking about, and his mindfuck, while possibly effective back when he wrote, has no effect on we Discordians today. Though it might still be useful to use on THEM.

Let’s forget about Hesiod. In keeping with the law of fives, or something of that sort, there may be five main aspects of Erisian manifestations or visitations; Chaos, discord, confusion, bureaucracy, and the aftermath. Chaos being Eris’s usual aspect of laugh-happy freedom and the dynamic balance between creative order and disorder—the Hodge and the Podge. Discord being what happens when Eris and/or Her Children are snubbed, ignored, or attacked—Eris gets angry and She gets even, and so does Her Children. Confusion can be considered both the result of this discord started by Eris and Her Children (otherwise known as ‘us’), and the result of THEM—the snubbers, etc.—trying to manage the ‘problem’. But we know THEY can’t really manage the problem now, can THEY? Because of this confusion, THEY start to make laws, procedures, and ideas to cover every possibility in a feverish attempt to use confusion to get out of confusion, a.k.a. bureaucracy—and it’s because of ‘us’ that THEY do so. Of course bureaucracy is Eris simply making THEM look silly, and we are, of course, in on this gag. Eris also gets us to stuff the society at large with so many papers, files, reports, revelations, and ideas. So many uncategorizable damned things start popping up everywhere that society at large must use vast resources (such as paper or file space) to try to keep up. (Remember that when faced with Eris’s bureaucracy aspect of confusion trying to solve confusion, THEY begin to go bananas, whereas ‘we’ tend to laugh.) It is inevitable that the bureaucracy becomes so large and unwieldy by THEM that THEY begin to succumb to Eris’s whispers or shouts of freedom—the aftermath being the aspect of Eris turning on the pineal gland. Many of THEM become ‘us’ and do not even know it, unless we tell THEM. Or Eris tells THEM.

With the above examples, one can see clearly that Eris is, always can be, and will be a profound being who reveals Herself in many ways to Her co-conspirators and worshippers. Those non-Discordian Neo-Pagans, or even non-Pagans, can begin to see that their oft leveled accusation that the worship and reverence of Eris is shallow and silly is plainly wrong (and a stupid prejudice at that). Eris and the practice of Discordianism is as profound as any other religious tradition, probably even more profound than many of them. We Discordians would agree with the ‘silly’ part, however. What’s the point of reverence if it can’t be humorous?

One of the silliest accusations leveled by many Neo-Pagans is that Eris is a completely modern invention of the Discordian Society. Such Neo-Pagans then assume that they are in a better position in relating to the Divine, because, of course, their own Deities are verifiably ancient, and therefore not modern inventions. (This is the old “Ancient is better” fallacy, yet again rearing its ugly head.) The accusation is dead wrong, as Eris appears, albeit fragmentarily, in Classical Greek writings. As to any modern Discordian ideas and practices relating to Her worship, reverence, and invocations; of course they are ‘modern’. But then again, so is the vast majority of other Neo-Pagan practices relating to other deities, regardless of the ‘ancient feelings’ or the scraps of remaining older pre-Christian practices that they contain. That some religion, spiritual system, or even ‘irreligion’ went ahead and created a set of traditions and practices, does not invalidate the insights or the profundity of it. Wiccans, of all the other Neo-Pagans, should know this fact first hand.

Also, since the accusation of the Discordian Society ‘making up’ Eris from scratch is so silly, who do you think is really responsible for that little gem of dis-information? (Besides all that, isn’t the argument over Who is a Real Deity™ as opposed to all the ‘fakes’ a bit similar to the same old Monotheist arguments? Aren’t Neo-Pagans supposed to be beyond all those theological territorial pissing contests anyway?)

Those of you Neo-Pagans who are concerned that such a being as Eris, the Goddess of Chaos, Confusion, Laughter, and Discord, could even exist, should really look at some of the other deities such as Thor, Diana, and the others. Those of you Neo-Pagans who are concerned about the effects of people going around worshipping Eris (the ‘oh-my-gods-they’re-revering-a-goddess-of-chaos’ line) should really ask yourselves why you are so prejudiced. Let me reiterate that each person who invokes Eris, has a slightly different idea of Eris. But that’s no different from any other relationship. All those who say that Eris was invented by modern Discordians should really learn to do their research- something that Neo-Pagans are notorious for avoiding, I know. And hey, if modern Wiccans can call upon an Italicized Goddess called Diana which either came down through folk tales from the Roman times during which She was worshipped, or was artfully created by Charles Leland (who wrote Aradia) -and the Romans learned about Diana from the Scythians, by the way- then obviously our Eris of today is of course going to be different from the way the old Hellenes thought of Her. (Diana and Eris get along well enough, I’ll have you know. At least, that’s what They both tell me.) Let me conclude by saying that many of us Discordians couldn’t give a hoot about whether or not Eris was ‘invented’ or not, and anyone who thinks She was made up in modern times are victims to some special line of bullshit that She-Who-Done-It-All has whispered into their ears.

Hail Eris!

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Breaking Craft Stereotypes:

An ye harm none, do as ye will. There are too many stupidities arising from the misunderstanding of this most famous Craft saying. Fluffy-bunnies often take the Rede to mean that one who is Wiccan can not harm any other being under any circumstances. Some people try to explain it away by saying that the Rede in fact only refers to magical practices (though they never provide any sound argument for this idea). Many teachers and writers attempt to explain it away by saying that the Rede is really just a line of advice and not a strict moral injunction. (Those who take this approach are actually on more solid ground since “rede” can be taken to mean “advice” or “admonishment.”) But all of these ideas about the Rede are really missing the point. The Rede is not a negative command, such as in the Ten “Thou-Shalt-Not” commandments from the Bible. Nor is the Rede any sort of commandment at all. The Rede is a challenge to act. It basically says that actions that do not harm others are fine and should be encouraged. It is in no way meant to imply that those who adhere to Wicca can not ever harm anyone else in self-defense or in times of dire need. The Rede is meant to be understood in the following way: “You are free to do as you wish. Refrain from harming except when it is a greater harm to refrain.” The Rede does NOT mean one can not defend oneself through force if need be. It does NOT mean one can not eat meat. It does NOT mean that the true nature of the world is all white-light and fuzzy-critter and thus Wiccans must turn the other cheek at all times. It does NOT mean that one can not use hexes or other magic to zap others when they most certainly have it coming. What it DOES mean is that one should stop and think about what one is doing…and how one’s actions contribute to atmospheres of hostility or malice. If your action will only add to the harm being done, then perhaps you want to find another angle before you go ahead and act. What it CAN mean is that, say, you need to really zap an ex-lover to get them from bothering you, then at least think upon it a while and decide if it is something you must do. What it DOES mean is that, regardless, you must take full responsibility for your actions. You can not go around saying that the Goddess wanted you to do it. You must own up to your own life. What the Rede also points toward is that people may want to think about DOING SOMETHING to prevent harm from being done around themselves. Sitting back and doing nothing while harm is being perpetrated is still only an individual choice that must be owned up to. You can NOT just simply say “I can’t do anything about that.” You must look into the situation and remember that you have been named a “Witch.” As such, there are always a few more options for you than may be readily apparent on first glance. Before I go any further I must address the issue that some of you outside of the Wiccan milieu may raise: The fact that the Rede is really the Law of Thelema. Just how the Rede can be taken to supposedly be the Law of Thelema which states “Do What Thou Wilt Shall Be the Whole of the Law. Love Is the Law. Love Under Will.” is beyond me. Thelema and Wicca are very different systems as is readily apparent to anyone familiar with both, despite the claims of some supposed “occult” experts who write bad histories. The Law of Thelema was written down by Crowley in 1904 in “The Book of the Law.” The Wiccan Rede became known about five decades later through Gerald Gardner. So perhaps the reason why some people have assumed that the Wiccan Rede is really the Law of Thelema is because it is likely that Gardner was influenced or inspired to write the Rede from it. Wherever Gardner found inspiration for it, the Rede now refers to an entirely different belief system than that of the Law of Thelema. So will some people get this through their heads finally? (Probably not.) Now that that’s settled… Keep in mind that any written or oral system or code of ethics is never meant to be taken at face value, unless it is something like “Touch fire and you will get burnt.” The Rede is meant to spur Wiccans on to reflection about themselves and their situations. It is purposely broad so that it is NOT taken as a blanket statement by any sensitive thinking being. It would help Wiccans in particular, and Neo-Pagan Witches in general, to speak only if you truthfully know about something, otherwise refraining. All of the mindless “i-know-Wicca-and-you-don’t” fluffy white-light chatter is truly a harm that ye should not will to do. In this way, perhaps instead of being the source of interminable arguments, the Rede could be of some use. -Irreverend Hugh, KSC
May 9th, 2005

Breaking Craft Stereotypes:
To start with, I practice Wicca. I am a modern Pagan. (Or Neo-Pagan, as I prefer.) This means you can consider me Wiccan. You can most definitely consider me Pagan. But why would you assume that I have no spiritual life outside of the religion known as Wicca? Why would you assume that because I am a Pagan that I cannot be into any other practices? What part of “poly” in the word “polytheism” do you not understand? The last couple of years, I went through a period of not wanting to use the “Wicca” moniker on account of all the bullshit and fluffy nonsense that I saw among people who call themselves Wicca. Then recently, the thought occurred to me: Why should I let all of those suckers take away what I (and others) tend to call my religion?

There are some Wiccans who have no problem with some of us practicing other elements of Neo-Paganism. But there is something wrong with many others. I could go on about the problems that my membership in the Discordian Society has caused among some Wiccans who should know better. I could go on about the time one of my Wiccan friends decided to no longer talk to me because of my Chaos Magic practices. But I will keep it simple enough by discussing two of my religious affiliations which many would assume can never be practiced by the same person.

I have met more than a few Wiccans who have sneered at me when I told them that besides being a Pagan Witch for years, I have also been an ardent practitioner of the buddhadharma. After several repeats of this basic theme with few unentertaining variations, I can only say that some Pagans in general, and Wiccans in particular, really need to take a good hard and long look at themselves and their attitudes towards other religions- especially since Neo-Pagan religions are supposed to be legendary in their openness.

Some other Pagans have expressed a mild condescension towards me, as if I can not really be a Pagan Witch because of my Buddhist alignment. I have gotten all sorts of statements such as “Really? Can you really do both?” “Oh. So you’re not sure of where you stand?” “You know that Buddhism is life denying and Paganism is life affirming, right?” (Yeah, speak to me as if I don’t know my own fucking religions. And, by the way, I do know where I stand and if you insist on dealing with me by using labels and becoming so bewitched by your own preconceptions of them, then you are in a sorrier state than any of us imagined.) I am usually polite because as a dharma practitioner I have a responsibility to represent the enlightenment movement in the best way according to the situation. I usually state that anyone who thinks that Buddhism is life-denying has misunderstood the message. (You know, like how some of you Pagans feel that Christians misunderstand you all.) Buddhism is life affirming in its endemic (yes, endemic) insistence upon becoming free from suffering. Sacrificing one good thing to get another good thing is not looked highly upon in the Buddhist traditions in which I participate. (Look me up if you want to learn my lineage and school.) But I am safe to speak of Buddhism in general when I say this as well: Buddhism is about infinite life affirmation. There is no life denial among those who are becoming free and learning how to awaken from the dysfunction that holds us. Buddhism is actually open to people of other faiths sharing in the practices.

One time I remember in particular, I was at a gathering in which a new Wiccan was talking with me. We got along well enough until it was time for us to meditate. When she saw me pull out my mala (a type of Buddhist ‘rosary’) and begin to chant Chenrezik’s mantra (which is one of my oldest pre-meditation habits), she looked at me in shock (a disdaining sort of shock) and said “Oh, you’re Buddhist.” After that, she would have no more to do with me. I just continued about my business, feeling like I shouldn’t even have to bother explaining. I suppose I wasn’t pure enough in my Wicca-hood for her. (But what did I care, I had been doing what she was just starting to learn years before she probably ever knew what Wicca was.)

Allow me to compare and contrast these types of responses with what happens when fellow meditators at Buddhist centers find out about my Pagan Witch (or “Wiccan”) allegiance. I usually get the “How interesting!” type of statement. Which among Buddhists is usually genuine because they actually think it is an interesting combination. I suppose it is. But I just chalk it up to my own weird personality. A lot of them were actually able to even ask me a bit about the Pagan side of things and I was happy to explain it, from my point of view. A few even said something like “Oh you’re a Wiccan. That would fit nicely with what we are doing here.”

Wouldn’t it be nice if some of the same sort of openness could be displayed among other Pagans in general and Wiccans in particular? The problem is easily identified. It is the same problem some Christians have when dealing with other religions: Spiritual Supremacism.

Some Pagans have gotten it into their heads that Neo-Paganism is the supreme spirituality and that anyone who isn’t into what they are doing is not as “fun” or as “advanced” as they themselves are supposed to be. In fairness, I have to say that I usually don’t see this problem among elder Pagans as much as in the newer adherents. Though a few elders have had problems with me and my Buddhism, as if by some fiat, my dedication to Buddhism makes my dedication to Wicca or any other Pagan spiritual practice (such as Discordianism) somehow less valid or secure or what-have-you. Many who know me well enough know how much bullshit that line of thinking is.

I don’t know. I think of my Paganism and my Buddhism as separate things that I love doing equally. And besides all that, isn’t Paganism supposed to be about openness to various tendencies and practices? I would never suggest to another person trained and familiar with Wicca and any of its derivatives that they couldn’t be practitioners of any other paths in addition to their Wiccan commitments…so I expect the same consideration and respect. My practice of the buddhadharma adds to my appreciation of my practice of my Wiccan-centered Paganism and vice versa. And in each ‘faith’ I have some measure of experience…more than enough to trump any naysayers and fanatics who would try to tell me that I can’t be a member of both ‘faiths’ and learn from them as profoundly as those people who stick to one ‘faith.’

Despite all of my evidence to the contrary, such naysayers have not been convinced. And why should they be. Their minds are already made up. Their single-minded dedication to whatever it is they are doing makes them so much better than I. And not only I but also to any other of those poor benighted souls who have yet to learn that whatever the latest version of one-size-fits-all Paganism they follow is really “it” and is the most fun, most advanced, most marketable….whatever.

There are Witches who will vouch for me if I ever asked them to do so. (I can usually handle myself though.) There are some other types of Pagans who have known me for years who would stick up for my ardent Pagan practices. They know me. When it comes to me personally, stick to the rule of not assuming you know a damn thing about me or my practices and how adequate or lacking they are until you actually take the time to get to know me as an individual first. In terms of the general Pagan attitude of Spiritual Supremacy, please now indulge me in some spiel:

It is the monotheist idea that one must only practice or adhere to one religion or one god or set of gods and that if any one else is doing something differently, such as adhering to more than one religion, then they are doing it wrong. In the polytheistic (or even non-theistic) worldview, one can be an adherent of as many cults, traditions, and religions as they can stand. In theory, the followers of Isis or of Dionysos could care less if some of their co-religionists also followed other religions or deities. You could yourself think that Isis is the be all end all, but you wouldn’t look down on your Isisian neighbor who also worships Eris or Diana or some deity you never heard of before. (Or a whole bunch of them.)

What is Wicca? Is it a brainwashing-cult in which one cannot be a member of any other spirituality, or have any other ideas, especially those traced to non-Wiccan sources? Are we not allowed to be all we can be? For some of us, that ‘being’ means practicing more than one system or path. I can understand those who would think that I am watering down both my buddhism and my pagan witchcraft by mixing them, but really…I don’t mix them at all. I practice both of them separately. I take care not to mix them since the only place for any insights that may take place by mixing the two religions is in my own mind. I would never suggest trying to cobble the two systems together into some watered down crap that gains no insights from either. This is also part of the polytheistic worldview, where, say, an adherent of the Isis religion practices those rituals specific to the cult and at other times they practice rituals related to other cults, not even taking care to not mix and match rituals because it comes naturally to polytheism that different systems of rituals go with different deities or religions.

You can think about it as this: I am part of the Pagan community with Wicca being the ‘region’ where I reside. That ‘region’ also consists of Discordianism, so I participate in that equally as well. I am also a part of the Buddhist community which is next door – and I have lived there at times as well. In my own ‘home,’ so to speak, there are certain personal practices I do as well, such as honoring certain deities or practicing certain rituals, which are not applicable to the communities at large around me.

In life I have many interests, like poetry and photography, that have separate and distinctive modes and approaches to practice and expression. I can and often do both of these well. Likewise the rest of my life. My outlook is informed by my practice and adherence to the two religious outlooks (Pagan and Buddhist), but I take care to keep rituals and ideals separate…that’s simply how they both work effectively. I adhere to both, because -as a polytheist Pagan- why should I choose between them? I am attracted to the religious elements of both and that’s that. It’s my own personal problem because this means I have to practice more religions than one…but as a polytheist Neo-Pagan, this means I can practice as many ‘cults’ or ‘faiths’ or ‘paths’ as appeal to me…and in the company of others in each respective path I can share the respective practices and insights.

We Neo-Pagans have no jealous gods. Even within Wicca there is no evidence of jealous gods. So when any of you try to suggest to me that I am a lesser sort of practitioner or I have somehow misunderstood Wicca when all you have to go on is my allegiances to different faiths, well…you are being a bit of a smug little prig who is just as much of a Spiritual Supremacist as all those Fundy Christians you whine about incessantly. I don’t care what Silver Ravenwolf has written. I don’t care what Starhawk has written. Hell…I don’t even care what your High Priestess has said. If you feel that my adherence and practice of different religions somehow makes me less of a Wiccan or some-other-Pagan than you, you have misunderstood the term “Pagan.”

It is especially absurd for those of you Wiccans who like delving into or practicing the Kabbalah, which last time I checked, was still a part of Judaism. Yet none of you Kabbalah practitioners who also practice Wicca seem to see the irony. You don’t like it because I practice other things outside of Wicca, yet you can practice Kabbalah, Tarot, Ceremonial Magic and other non-Wiccan traditions and systems? I don’t have a problem with you doing that, so why should you have a problem with me? What is your problem? Is it that my Buddhism isn’t as “witchy” feeling as all those “spooky” occult systems from the heresy side of Judeo-Christianity? (That’s okay, I practice Chaos Magic. Is that “spooky,” “witchy,” or magical feeling enough for you?)

No one religion or path contains the whole truth about existence. I am of the opinion that there is no such thing as “the whole truth.” There are a bunch of clues and pathways to follow, each one an aspect of existence. Each one is just as true for its people as any other one is true for its people. Some of us are weirdos in that we learn more than one path and more than one “truth.” When I am casting a Wiccan circle, I don’t invoke dharma guardians. When I am practicing mandala visualizations, I don’t use Pagan deities. Each path has its own profundity and set of truths for me. It may seem like a fine balancing act to not merge the two together, but because of my relative experience in each one, it comes naturally to me. When I am Hailing Eris while practicing the Discordian irreligion, that’s another thing altogether. (And its own set of issues to be taken up in a future essay.) Perhaps I take the ideals of Polytheism to heart, and that’s the problem you have with me. You are serious in your playacting, yet you never feel secure. Thus you dislike my polycentric lifestyle and outlook because you intuit that I am not playacting. Then you transfer your feeling of insecurity onto me and judge me as not being adequate. Or it is because I don’t need to be a fundamentalist prat like you.

Just remember that the next time you are jumping around with your feathers and crystals doing quarter calls just like Ms. Bunny Author told you to do, all the while trying to pass yourself off as in-tune to both Native American wisdom and (somehow) the Ancient Celts. And as you go around town talking about how good all of us Witches are supposed to be – except for when it comes to talking shit about Christians, then anything goes – remember our own fucking Law of Return. What goes around comes around. If you look down upon me, or dislike me for not being EXACTLY LIKE YOU or for not practicing Wicca EXACTLY LIKE your BUNNY authors say, I may just return the favor.

Just saying.

-Irreverend Hugh, KSC
[June 12th, 2005]