An Overview
of
Contemporary American Paganism
According to most dictionaries, a pagan is anyone who isn't a Jew, Christian, or Muslim (including, sometimes, atheists). However, in contemporary America, the word is typically used an umbrella term for several clusters of overlapping belief systems.
One challenge in describing these groups is in finding the edges, because there's a good deal of overlap between them. Also, any statement about any group is likely to be representative of tendencies, since beliefs vary much more broadly between pagan paths than between Christian denominations.
Four major clusters which can be somewhat readily identified are Wicca, Goddess-spirituality, Ceremonial Magick, and Reconstructionism. All statements below should be taken as statements about tendencies, as no belief is universally held; also, a minority who identify as Pagan in contemporary America do not identify as one of these four groups.
Wicca
The currency of the term "Wicca" is generally associated with Gerald Gardner, a British practitioner who first brought Wicca into the public awareness in the first half of the Twentieth Century. Many Wiccans feel that the religious practice itself dates back millennia; Gardner originally presented the faith as being generations old, although in later writing he claimed that he also fabricated much of the history. Because it is an oral tradition that does have at least some roots in folk tradition, it's difficult to know how much dates back before the Twentieth Century.
Theology
Traditional Wicca, also known as Witchcraft or the Craft of the Wise, recognizes a God and a Goddess. As Janet and Stewart Farrar present it, all Gods are one God and all Goddesses are one Goddess, so the God and Goddess may be invoked by any of Their names in ritual.
Wicca is based on the natural cycle, tied to the moon and the sun. There are therefore two types of rituals. Esbats are held on the full moon and focus on magickal working; these tend to be small rituals, involving single covens of around a dozen people or solitaries (people working alone). Typically, Esbats involve requesting the attention of the God and Goddess, so They may assist in accomplishing some goal (known as "magick"). For instance, during a springtime Esbat, the group magickal work may be to work on personal growth or on creative fertility; in the late fall, the working may involve laying the year's losses aside.
Sabbats are held on eight high days throughout the year and focusing on celebration of the God and Goddess. When possible, these rituals involve multiple groups, and are often open to the public. In Traditional Wicca, the God and Goddess go through an annual cycle where the God couples with the Goddess, He dies, and She gives birth to Him so that He may grow through the year. Likewise, the Goddess has three manifestations, as young virgin (Maiden), as nurturing caregiver (Mother), and as wise elderly widow (Crone).
However, there's also a competing myth cycle where there are two sides of the God - the Oak King and the Holly King - who compete for the Goddess's attention, the King alternating killing the other one every six months.
In either case, the functional theme in the annual cycle is the importance of nature and the centrality of the life cycle in the Wiccan mindset. Wiccans also identify four "elements" in nature which are identified in all rituals: Earth, Air, Fire, and Water. These four elements are seen to make up all things in the universe, while every person is composed of metaphoric equivalents (Body, Intellect, Ambition, and Emotion, respectively).
Holidays
Yule, or Winter Solstice. December 21. This is the longest night of the year, and is most frequently identified as New Year. Celebrations don't differ significantly from Christmas: Gifts are exchanged, and the evergreen is honored for giving us hope through the long winter.
Imbolg, or Candlemas, or Brigid. February 2. "Imbolg" means "in the womb," and represents the Goddess' pregnancy with the God. During this time, creative impulses are being brewed through the ongoing winter.
Ostara, or Spring Equinox. March 21. This is one of the two days of the year where there are exactly twelve hours of daylight. The creativity brewed during the winter is realized as the snow melts and the flowers begin to grow. The God is born.
Beltane (pronounced "Bel-taine" or "Bel-chin-a"). May 1. This is a fertility ritual. A major part of the celebration is the Maypole, a clearly phallic symbol coupled with a sexual criss-cross dance.
Litha, or Summer Solstice. June 22. This is the shortest day of the year. Growth is at its fullest, and celebrations focus on the glory of the sun-based God. Lammas, or Lughnasadh.
August 1. The first harvests are coming in, and at this point our ancestors would have a sense of how good or cruel the winter was likely to be. This is a good time to shore up existing works against the coming tides of distress.
Mabon, or Fall Equinox. September 21. As with Ostara, there are twelve hours of daylight. This is the secondary harvest festival. Samhain (pronounced "SOW-in," not "Sam-hain").
October 31. This is a time of death, including that of the God. The veil between the living and the dead is thinnest, so it's a good time to speak to the ghosts of ancestors, especially those that may have died during the year. For some, this is the New Year.
Philosophy
There is little uniform dogma to Wicca, but there a few notable trends:
Other issues
Wiccans tend to be highly defensive about comparisons to Satanism. Satanism is a formal response to Christianity, and has a self-centered ethic. Wicca, in contrast, is an independent formation and has an ethic steeped in good works. This is hard to see in superficial readings of the Rede, but Wiccans overwhelming hold that it is their responsibility to try to help others, since sitting by and doing nothing is a form of harm.
Wiccans are divided on the issue of the Afterlife. The most common belief is that there is a Summerlands, where souls go between incarnations on this plane; others, though, believe that the Summerlands is a permanent dwelling place. In either case, there's no belief that there's a place of punishment where bad souls go.
Nudity and sexuality are as sacred as all other divine gifts. It is written in the Charge of the Goddess (a common prayer used to call upon the Goddess in an Esbat): "All acts of love and pleasure are my rituals" and "Let you be naked in your rites." Wiccan rituals are often clothing-optional; Wiccans are tolerant of a wide variety of sexual orientation and lovestyle expressions.
Wiccans eschew drugs in ritual settings. It is believed that drugs interfere with the individual's ability to interact with the divine.
Wiccans practice divination, usually in the form of tarot cards or runes. However, divination isn't seen as a way of reading a definite, pre-determined future, since the future is malleable. "Wicca" is believed to derive from a Saxon word meaning "to bend," and Wiccans practice divination to help them bend, or guide, the future; if the omens are positive, then no work need be done, but if the omens are negative, it's time to do something.
While there are specific Wiccan traditions, some people also integrate what they like, and even incorporate details from other traditions, such as from the East. One notable example is the Church of All Worlds, which includes several major tenets taken directly and admittedly from Robert A. Heinlein's Stranger in a Strange Land. Wiccans who don't follow a specific path are called Eclectic.
Goddess-Spirituality
Goddess-spirituality rose out of American versions of Wicca, but quickly took on noteworthy differences. For this reason, much of the ritual practice is the same as in Traditional Wicca, but the beliefs are different.
While Wicca traces itself back to the folkways of non-Christian Europe, Goddess-spirituality claim an even older pedigree. Goddess worshippers believe they are reconstructing the religious beliefs which precede patriarchal influence in Europe, predating all cultures including Sumeria and Babylon.
The keystone Goddess-spirituality concept is that there was a time when society was directed by women, and everybody lived in peace with each other and with nature. It was patriarchal influence that caused all of our modern problems, including war, pollution, and racism. This is not to say that men in and of themselves are evil, but rather that the ideal situation is that all should pay homage to the female, especially the Mother Image.
Goddess-spirituality is also more focused on nature than even Wicca is, identifying the Goddess as the Earth and the center of all reality. This is best summed up by a common chant: "The Earth is our Mother, we must take care of Her." This reflects the roots Goddess-spirituality has in modern American environmentalism, including the so-called Gaia Hypothesis that the Earth is a living entity, and the resurgence of Pantheism.
The largest overlap between Wicca and Goddess-spirituality is in Dianic Wicca, which resembles Traditional Wicca but for its avoidance of the God and masculine energy. Other forms of Goddess-worship depart from the Wiccan ritual framework, or modify it with Native American stylings.
Other than these differences, Goddess-spirituality and Wicca share many of its core beliefs (especially those represented in the Rede, about personal responsibility and avoiding negativity).
Ceremonial Magick
Ceremonial Magick (CM) is less of a religion than it is a practice style. While the theology of Wicca is central to the way that it is practiced, CM focuses much more on the proper way to do magick. Wiccans tend to feel that "it's the thought that counts," and don't expect practitioners to memorize lengthy, verbatim spells. In CM, in contrast, words are seen as powerful in and of themselves, and even mispronunciations can have severe effects.
The most well-known form of CM is probably Thelema, developed by Aleister Crowley (an associate of Gerald Gardner's) and attributed to his revelations from the Divine. The central Thelemite tenet illustrates its philosophical differentiation from Wicca: "Do as you will shall be the whole of the law." This does not mean that Thelemites are indifferent to personal responsibility, though, because "will" means something different here than in the Rede. In the Thelemite version, one's Will is their purpose for being in the universe; the goal of life is to find one's Will and to live by it, even in the face of obstacles and personal desires which go against it. In other words, if I'm living fully according to my Will, and you're living according to yours, then I can't harm you unless the universe intended that to be, in which case I'd be delinquent if I tried to stop it.
Thelema, and other forms of CM, takes much of its iconography from QBL, or Jewish mysticism. The Tree of Life is a central symbol of the tradition.
Reconstructionism
While Wiccans and Goddess-spirituality rely mostly on assumptions about oral traditions, and following a generic path, Reconstructionists focus on targeting a specific, archaic cultural tradition, usually from the Indo-European spectrum. The most common Reconstructionist traditions are Druidism (the British Isles, and less often France and Spain), Asatru (Germany and Iceland, and less often Scandinavia), Kemeticism (Egypt), Hellenism (Greece), and Romanism (the Roman Empire).
Because Reconstructionists differ on the culture they study, it's not possible to give a single list of beliefs or holidays; however, they're generally in accord with published historical texts on the various cultures. Most Reconstructionists are not striving to completely rebuild their cultures, as if the intervening years had never happened, but rather strive to rebuild the relationship those cultures had with their Gods.
Reconstructionists place a heavy emphasis on scholasticism and accurate research. While they allow room for personal interpretation and visions, they ask that people clearly identify visions as such. Edred Thorsson, an Asatru writer, classifies three factors in determining what a modern Reconstructionist should believe: The historical record, modern society, and personal opinion/revelation. For instance, on the issue of female priests, the historical record and modern society are split, and so personal opinion would cast the deciding vote.
Reconstructionists also frown on "eclecticism," in the form of mixing-and-matching from a spectrum of cultures (as opposed to "syncretism," which is incorporating Deities from other traditions into your own).
Overwhelmingly, while Wiccans and Goddess-worshippers are pantheistic, Reconstructionists are polytheistic, recognizing all Gods as independent entities on another plane. They become defensive when told, for instance, that Zeus, Jupiter, and Odin (Father Gods in Greece, Rome, and Germany) are "the same God, after all." One source of friction between Reconstructionists and Wiccans, especially, comes from this: Wiccans are religiously tolerant because they feel that all paths are the same path with different scenery, while Reconstructionists are religiously tolerant because nobody can dictate the correct path, but the paths are different.
Also, Reconstructionists differ on the reverence they show for the Earth, based on their own paths, and so do not generally identify as readily as the Wiccans and the Goddess-spiritualists as having a "nature-based" tradition. However, like the other groups, most Reconstructionists also have a strong sense of personal responsibility and liberation of will.
©2001 Paul Kershaw for ClearingHouse of the Gods