October 31st

PART II Contemporary Paganism

Our world today is far from being free. The ferment and divisiveness concerning alternative ways and expressions of thought, worship and understanding God and our world are still being met with prejudice, fueled by bigotry and kept alive by ignorance. We are forcibly reminded that more open-minded, open-hearted approaches to life, faith, and religion are practiced only by a scattered minority, and so it is still an elusive cultural dream. We are still appalled that in today’s world, witch hunts based on religious intolerance are still being held. 

Additionally, the word most often associated with witchcraft is, magic, also needs our attention. If we can rule out sleight of hand and stage illusions, we can recognize three distinct definitions of the word, magic, and they run the full range from the delightful, to the dastardly, from the divine to the despicable. 

Magic is:

1) The rites and rituals associated with intuitive learning and with enhancing our empathetic attunement with nature, our response to natural wisdom, nonmedical healing, and our alignment with the governing laws of the Cosmos.

2) Practices that teach you how to alter your awareness or your consciousness, thereby training yourself to increase your awareness and understanding of the energies of life and how best to open your heart and mind… Such as meditation, visualization, etc.

3) Sorcery or practicing ways to manipulate, design, or otherwise control the thoughts and feelings of others for self-serving ends. Any form of spiritual materialism that uses spiritual methods for selfish needs or to strengthen egotistical ends.

Since I have had direct experience with many kinds of occult groups, and with many varieties of spiritual and metaphysical practices, I can confidently state that among the witches, members of Wicca, and the Craft that I have met, 90% accept only the first or benevolent definition, and many accept the neutral second one. However, they abhor and utterly reject the third or pernicious approach, that usually involves a person in some form of bastardized Christian rituals that are used to arouse fear and that are aimed at gaining mental control and emotional power.

Next, I would like to introduce the meaning and the inspiration that can be found from affirming the female image for divinity. As many of you know, I have spent considerable time extracting those teachings from early Christianity, and it is remarkable how well they support and uphold much of what is being taught in Wiccan circles today. 

Wisdom, you see, is timeless. I believe and have come to know that She has been embodied throughout the ages, as Holy Spirit, and that She is calling to us still. The idea of a Goddess or a cosmic Mother in the religious traditions of the West is still troublesome for some of us. Part of the reason for this difficulty is the exclusively male images, and the language choices that we have inherited and that much of the Judeo-Christian-Islamic Scriptures maintain.

This is operationally true, even though modern scholarship finds much more room for gender inclusion in interpretation. Another reason for the awkwardness many Westerners feel with the Goddess image, is our own lack of comfort with intimacy and with the ultimacy that the feminine holds within itself; especially concerning our issues with our own bodies and our relationship with the great goddess-Gaia, the Earth. 

In the kind of symbolic polytheism known to witches, it would be wrong to state that the Goddess rules the world. Instead, we can affirm that She IS the world! She can be known by each and every person in a radically equal relationship, and each person can find her through their own inner work, and in the heartfelt recognition of their inner and most sacred truths. 

In the West, sacred sexuality remains troublesome and problematic. However, in the Craft, sexuality is not our source of conflict, but acts dynamically and lives within us synergistically as our positive polarity with Spirit, and provides a way that leads us toward finding our cooperative wholeness. In that way, the Goddess religions such as witchcraft teach that the depths and riches of life are found by how well we link or connect ourselves to all others, to our relationships, our communities, and to our world.

Now let me share a reading from Starhawk that explains the Goddess even further as to expand our appreciation and awareness:

“The Goddess can be seen as the symbol, the normative image of immanence. She represents the divine embodied in nature, in human beings, in the flesh. The Goddess is not one image, but many… She includes the male in her aspects. For he becomes the child and the consort, the stag and the bull, the grain and the reaper, part of the light and the dark.

Yet, the femaleness of the Goddess is primary, not to denigrate the male, but because the female represents the bringing of life to the world. [and the valuing of the Creation] The Goddess, the Mother, as the symbol of that value, teaches us that the world [in all its complexity and majesty] has true value, it is our heart and soul. …

For women, the symbol of the Goddess is profoundly liberating, and restores a sense of authority and empowerment to the female, to her body, and to all life processes: birth, growth, lovemaking, aging, and death. … The Goddess of nature is also the Muse, for she is the inspiration behind much of culture, the arts, literature, music, and wisdom. The female image of divinity does not, however, provide a convenient justification for the oppression of men. For it is the female that gives birth to the male, and includes the male in ways that a male divinity cannot. … The Goddess gives birth to a pantheon that is inclusive, not exclusive. She is not an insecure or jealous deity. ….”

Starhawk goes on to attest to the importance of social action and prophetic witness as a part of the craft and as a crucial consideration among eco-feminists and Wiccans. She states:

Immanent power, power from within, is the source of the power that is among us. We can choose to cooperate or withdraw our cooperation with any system, [culture or world view.] 

And it is our choices and our decisions that must recognize the inner connectedness of individuals in a community [or a council of all beings] and that every person has an inherent value.     We are of the world, and we are of each other. The power among us and within us is great. Though we are hurt, we can heal… Within and among us is the power of renewal. And there is still time, time to choose that power, and to share it among us.” ( From Dreaming The Dark)

I prize the memory of doing a spiral dance with Margo Adler and Starhawk and approximately 300 U-Us at the GA in New Haven in 1990. Joan Borysenko was my partner, and we danced into the wee hours of the night … I could feel the sense of immanence and connection with the natural forces as we danced around the Moon, and through the arms and across the faces of one another. The energy that can flow from eye to eye, hand to hand, heart to heart is truly remarkable!

Lastly, I admire witches I have known, for they have always conveyed a sincerity and a caring altruism that is honest and noble. There is nothing of the “gypsy” fortuneteller preying on the gullible, or the slick charlatan who is offering expensive classes among them. Most feel that to take advantage of one’s spirituality for material gain goes directly against the intent of their teachings or the lifestyle and values they are seeking to promote. 

Then who are the witches? They are, in large part, women dedicated to reclaiming a positive sexual and spiritual identity; people who are committed to ecological awareness and environmental protection, to community outreach and service, and to alternative forms of healing and wholeness that are beyond the usual medical methods. In short, Witches and Wiccans seek to honor the earth, honor themselves, and offer respect and caring for anyone who enters their lives, or who chooses to join their circle. 

They deserve our support!. Amen, Blessed Be!