If you wished to improve the image of Wicca and Paganism in general, in the community at large, I'm afraid that this letter may not have been the most effective one that could have been written. If Mr. Adams wishes to damage that image, you've just handed him ammunition with which to do so.

You angrily refer to "historical inaccuracies" and then never present a counterargument against the position that Wicca originated with Gardner - the only historical point that Mr. Adams was arguing.

-> You state that, ""...there's lots of evidence that Wicca is a modern
-> invention."" Gee, I wish we could go back to the Christian Council
-> of NIcea,
-> circa 400-625 CE. That's how long they took to "invent" the
-> Christian religion.

Actually, there were a series of councils beginning in AD 325, and the continuation of the policy that the refusal to renounce Christianity should be a capital offense was dictated in a letter written by the emperor Trajan, who died in AD 117, 208 years before the first Nicene council. The documents in question are still, to the best of my knowledge, extant, ruling out fakery. Even if the post-Julian imperial administrations had decided to do so, they could not possibly have known how to throw off a Carbon 14 test, as the very discovery of atomic nuclei (and the concept of an isotope) were thousands of years off in the future. The only thing that was established at Nicaea was dogma for a preexisting religious community, and a drastic narrowing of what had once been a great diversity of theological thought.

Let us note that as you mention the recognition of the legitimacy of Wicca as a religion, that Mr. Adams did not deny that or make reference to theology in any way in the course of that article. So, comments regarding the acceptance of Wicca by other faiths were not germane here.

-> been one of battle and blood for the glory of "right", your column
-> was simply
-> more of the same 411 (right down to the jokes and snide comments).

Cecil, snide? Why, you could knock me over with a feather! But don't take it personally, he's snide to everyone, not just Wiccans.

-> What makes people from mainstream religions nervous about Wicca and
-> Paganism
-> is that we worship the Goddess and the God, that many of our clergy
-> are female

The Anglican church and Reform Judaism both ordain women, and are accepted in the mainstream. As for the god and goddess ... "Wicca" and "Paganism" are far from being synonomous. As synchretic Hellenic Reconstructionists, we worship a variety of gods and goddesses, not just one of each, and do not agree that the different goddesses are aspects of each other.

-> If you really wanted to present an informed view, you would
-> have contacted Wiccan or Pagan clergy from a near-by Wiccan or Pagan
-> temple.

Many of whom would have told him exactly what he told his readers. That the case for a pre-Garnerian origin of Wicca is shaky at best.

-> to the source. If this had been a letter about the Catholic or
-> Baptist or
-> Jewish faiths, your readers would expect nothing less.

Pardon me, Ms. (name deleted), but aren't you the one who, in a sidebar article in the (title deleted), proudly announced her refusal to accept an invitation to a Roman Catholic christening, because of persecutions that happened centuries ago? Where was this concern for interfaith understanding, then?

By the way, off hand, do you know what a "demipagan" is? Strictly speaking the term only implies are reincorporation of lost paleopagan elements, onto a core of non-pagan culture and philosophy, but in practice most demipagans are synchretists, either Judeo-Pagan or Christo-Pagan. Which is to say, that your persistance Christian bashing has been as offensive to half our membership as a matter of theology (and to the other half as a matter of respect and sympathy) as the anti-Pagan ravings of the Christian right, and for the very same reason.

Which is to say, that you might have been a little more careful when choosing to cc that indiscriminate broadside you directed against all of Christendom, to.

Aside from that, though, we can not, as a matter of principle, condone the practice of demanding to be shown respect that one scornfully refuses to return, or that of equating scholarly scrutiny of historical claims with that of persecution or mistreatment. As a closing note and a friendly piece of advice, if you truly believe that a religion must be ancient in order to be legitimate, as your argument seems to suggest, may I urge you to work out the contradictions that this will cause a neo-pagan to be confronted with, before they take the life out of your faith? Angry dogmatism and self-righteous denial aren't signs of a strong faith, they're signs of a faith that is being lost.

Blessed be.

(Onward and downward ...)