Ritual Differences

I'm writing this section on ritual differences to dispel any misunderstanding that people may have learned about Druidry. The traditions as practiced by most Druid Groves/Colleges today will validate the information I wrote here. I do not speak for all Druid Groves, but the larger Druid organizations do agree with this information. I will compare Druidry with Wicca to try to dispel any ignorance anyone may have about the Wiccan practice being Celtic. Comparing Druid craft and Wicca is not meant to be a put down to the Wiccan path. We do have similarities. Both honor the Mother Earth. There are distinct differences though and that must be taken into account by anyone exploring Pagan religions.
*Druid ritual is mostly inclusive or open to visitors during seasonal rituals. In Druid ritual, participants stay in the present by staying on the earthly plane in grounded space. The Wiccan and others often do astral travel during ritual, and sometimes they relocate their magic circles to another realm.
*Druids remain on this Middle Earth plane during ritual. The "Between the Worlds" to a Druid is the Earthly plane, or Middleworld, the Underworldly sea being below, and the Otherworldly Sky, above. Instead of transporting ourselves to deity, as many other Pagans do, Druids open the veil between the worlds with the helping hands of the voyager Manawyddan or Mannanan (see table p.#), inviting the deity into our sacred space to be with us in the here and now
. *Most, but not *all* Druid rituals are inclusive and open for non members and non-Druids to participate during ritual, as long as they are respectful and keep the harmony laws required to participate.
*Druids do not cast magic circles or protective barriers around our ritual sites. Instead we build, create, or hold our rites in Nemetons or sacred space, which have their own place in nature. The four quarters are usually not called in or invoked as they are in many Wiccan circles, they are called in and opened. We also call the Celtic Triads of land, sea, and sky, that is not the same as the quarters of earth, air, fire, and water. The reason it is that most Pagans cast a circle at the beginning of their ritual to ensure protection from invading entities when journeying or transporting space is done during ritual. The circle that is cast creates a containment field for holding the energy that is manifested during their ritual. The circle that gets cast must be undone at the end of the rite. This works well for certain types of magical workings that are part of the practices in Wicca. In Druid craft, sacred space is marked by stones, or wood.
*In Druidry every aspect of nature and the universe, visible and invisible, is respected and revered as a necessary part of the whole. All is seen as equal in Druid ritual. All of Earth's nature and the universe is sacred space. We are not concerned that unfriendly entities invading our space will try to take possession. Through the three world calls/invocations, Druids bring deity into our Nemeton while staying in the here and now. The centering and grounding that most Pagans do with the four corner invocations is done to help participants establish their place. Centering and grounding is something that Druids do during the world tree invocations in ritual and the tree meditation. In Druid ritual, the sacred fiery center within the Grove and within each of us is directly connected with the Otherworld. After many rituals the divine spirit of the Groves sacred fire grows, so does ours. When this Otherworldly fire grows stronger, it strengthens our connection with the illumination of the Otherworld.
*Most of Druidry is omnitheistic (poly-pantheistic), meaning we have many gods and goddesses. We also have Nature Spirits that exist in Nature. We also honor our Ancestors. Surrounding and flowing through it *all*, we have a boundless, unlimited spiritual energy with a consciosness of it's own called Craiad wen. The Wiccan are dualistic, believing that all the gods and goddesses are different faces of their lord and lady. Even though the order of the Boundless One in Gwyddon perception flows through our gods and goddesses, the deities each have their own gifts, seasonal connections, and lore. While the Boundless One embraces every aspect of light and dark, masculine and feminine, life and death, all depending on one another, walking hand in hand, always merged. All is seen as valuable, all is holy and necessary to wholeness. This perception is unifying and non dualistic, it is All and One. The energy of the circle moves in both directions simultaneously, pro and con.
*There seem to be many Wiccan teachers and book writers who are teaching their students that there is such a thing as Celtic Wicca. Wicca is not Celtic. While some Wiccans may call on some of the Celtic deities, they also use practices and call on deities that come from many other different cultures' traditions. Many of these other practices come from works such as Aradia gospel of the witches, Crowly, the Key of Solomon, Masonic rituals, Carmina Gadalica, and other cultures' traditions. All of these listed works are part of the training that Gerald Gardner learned from, and with which he formed the tradition of Gardnerian Wicca back in the early 1900's. Gardnerian Wicca is where a lot of today's Wiccan practices come from. There are many Wiccan practitioners who believe that Wicca is as old as Druidry, or that it's practices date way back before Gardner, it may but only for a few decades. From the lineage of Gardner's training anyone could see that his practices were put together from different sources and traditions and he found a way to mix these traditions to make a new one.
*Gaelic traditionalists say that the practice of borrowing other traditions' ways is disrespectful to that tradition and cultures' ancestors, and dishonorable to the modern day traditionalists who work very hard learning and preserving the ways of their traditions. The cultural pantheon of deities a Druid chooses to work with usually will come from a deep heart felt moment or realization that they've lived another life, or many lives in that culture. They may also have ancestry from that culture. The traditional Gaelic, view a person's dedication to their family, cultural and spiritual, as an oath of utmost importance. This is also where immense value is placed on the honoring of the Ancestors in Gwyddon Druidry. In the Celtic world tree, the Ancestors have an entire world of existence that is honored and respected in Druidry(please see our- cosmology). To stick with one culture's tradition and honor their ancestry is quite uncommon in the Wiccan practice because of the eclecticity of the Wiccan way. Traditional Druidry today tries to keep and practice from the traditional cultures' ways. Because there are many Wiccans that borrow concepts, icons, and sacred relics from other traditions, it causes much tension and resentments to exist between the other traditions and Wicca. This can take upon itself such things as the Lakota Declaration of War. Which was created by Lakota traditionals against those who take words from their spiritual leaders.
*Spiritual differences exist between all practices whether they are rooted in a tradition or not. I am just drawing on factual information from the research I've done on both Wicca and Druidry. This does not reflect all of Druidry or Wicca, but most. If you really want to find out if these statements are true, then please do some of your own research to find out.