| Beyond the Ritual: The Religion of the Craft
Kay Steele 2005 Please note, not all pagans are witches and not all practitioners of witchcraft look at their craft as a religion. This essay is for those that do and consider neo-paganism a religion. When you start out on the path, pursuing new knowledge of Wicca, Witchcraft and other forms of neo-paganism, among the first things you learn, is ritual. It�s usually very overwhelming, learning to cast circles, evoke deities and gathering together what seems like an endless list of tools, candles and other supplies. After a while, you�ve got an athame and a chalice, you know a variety of circle castings and evocations, a laundry list of god and goddess names and have a cupboard full of herbs and oils. You can probably tell anyone who asks what you use a wand for and the reason you wear a pentacle or other symbol, but when someone asks you the proverbial question, �Why?� it can throw you for a loop. It�s so easy to get caught up in all the stuff that the real heart of your new path gets lost. You lose the religion in your religion. The word religion, from the root �religio� means �linking back.� The word essentially means that religion is a way of linking back to the source, to the very heart of the purpose of life. In this series of articles, I�m going to go beyond the ritual and delve into the �why� of what some witches� and neo-pagans do and their purpose for doing it. Of course, my take on the faith is going to be just that, my take; my opinion. My goal isn�t to tell you what to believe to be a �real� pagan, but to light that spark and help you delve deeper into your own practices and discover for yourself just why you do them. It�s entirely possible that you will read this entire work and decide I�m a nutcase. You may say I have no idea what I�m talking about. That�s fine. At least I�ve got you thinking. If your goal is a religious connection, this may be a place to start you own thinking about what religion actually is a what it can mean to be a religious neo-pagan. And pleast notcie I use the word �neo-pagan.� I can accept groups of traditional or heritage witches who believe their path is derived from ancient roots. I wish them the best. For me, I haven�t found any evidence in my family of an secret tradition or craft. It may have been there, but if it was, it was gone long before I came around. So I�m just a person following a neo-pagan path. I�ve studied, I�ve experienced and I�ve made my own conclusions about what it means to be a neo-pagan. I�m just a baby on the path in my estimation � as of now, 2005, I have been studying actively for 15 years and held a self dedication ritual in 1996. In the big scheme of things, this is a pretty minor length of time. I�m not saying that if you are new to all this that your opinions are invalid, but I must admit I do get tired of the constant regurgitation of half knowledge I see so often. So please don�t email me telling me about the rede or the threefold law. This essay is NOT about Wicca. I am NOT a Wiccan, nor do I claim to be. If you are interested in Wicca, there are plenty of other sites for you to check out. Good luck. ?But on to the point of my ramblings. This is intended to be the first of a whole series of essays about the nature of neo-paganism as a religion and tries to delve under the surface of all the trapping and find something more. In my opinion, it takes more than a pentacle and some cool witch stuff to connect to something as major as religion. �Faith� in the sense of � I believe in this, therefore . . .� is spectacular, but my brand of neo-paganism requires more than that too. At the heart of any religion is deity. Even in faiths that try to connect with the nature of �god� within the individual, such as Buddhism, there is a central figure or figures that personify the goal, the higher power or the higher self. Neo-paganism is no exception. However, unlike many other faiths, the neo-pagan figures at the center of the faith differ by being dual in nature. With the exception of a few pagan paths, we honor both a god and a goddess � equal in power and status, but each personifying different qualities. |
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