raised Roman Catholic. I found too many things about Catholicism in particular and Christianity in general that I didn't like, particularly its intolerance of people who believe differently, and its active conversion strategies. My view is that if people have an interest in your faith, they will seek you out. There is no need to actively recruit. For some reason, many christians are intolerant of other religions to the point of feeling threatened by them. Other religions, however, for the most part tend to be rather tolerant of christianity. I don't care what path you walk as long as you don't try to trample on mine. Open dialogue is good. "You're going to hell if you don't convert!" is bad.
I found Wicca/Paganism in high school. Nobody "recruited" me. I found it on my own in a book, found the ideas in the book meshed with everything I already believed, and actively sought out others on the same path. What really struck me was the two main ideas. The first is "There is no one true way." Each person needs to follow their own path. No path is better or worse than anyone else's, just different. We're all different people, and naturally, we will approach the concept of god and religious faith differently.
The second was "If it harms none, do what you will." This means that your actions shouldn't cause pain or suffering to anyone or anything, yourself included. What it pretty much amounts to is that if your actions don't help someone out, make someone feel good, or spread a little love around, it probably isn't something you should be doing. It also stretches to include inaction. If anyone (yourself included) is harmed by your failing to act, then you've still violated the rule, so you can't just say "I don't want to get involved." because by being human and a member of society, you are already involved. The problem I always had with the ten commandments is that I found people doing evil things and justifying them because they weren't forbidden by those rules.
Wicca really doesn't have any "sacred texts" or bibles or whatever. I've found that religions with large texts can twist the text to mean whatever they need it to mean to suit their purpose through selective editing. They also don't always take into account the historical times in which the documents were written, and even if those documents were divinely inspired, they were still written through a human "lens" and human beings are just that. Human.
"Harm none" is kind of hard to screw up. Its more a way of life than a way of religion. Being Wiccan means that I see God in everything and everyone. It makes me accountable for my actions.
Many people are afraid of Wicca and Wiccans (who sometimes call themselves "white witches") mainly because they don't understand. Wiccans sometimes use the term "witch" because it relates to the pre christian European idea of the "wise woman", "witch" or "herbalist". we don't fly on broomsticks and turn people into frogs. We have no "magic" beyond that magic that every human being possesses. What we call "spells" are nothing more than prayers and prayer rituals, just like church, and many of the christian rituals have pagan roots... you know Easter? the name comes from the pagan festival of
Eostara (EE-star-uh), the spring holiday. That's why you eat chocolate rabbits, think about little baby chicks, and color eggs...they're pagan fertility symbols. The early christians set their festival of life at the same time and adopted the same symbols.
Pagans and Christians are two branches of the same tree. We both respect life and the world we live in, and want to change it for the better. We love our friends, our families, and our world, and would never harm another human being without due cause.
If you have a question about wicca, ask a wiccan. please. don't assume. don't generalize. and please don't assume that what your priest or pastor says about us is correct, because they probably don't know any more than you do.
Good books to look at for more information are:
anything by Silver Ravenwolf
anything by Scott Cunningham
Pagans and Christians (forget author's name...its written by a christian, though, and is a very interesting read. the man has done his research well on both sides of the issue).
respectfully,
-N-
