Pagans worshiping the Goddess
Here's a few things about Paganism that you may or may not know:
1. Paganism includes all earth-based religions and involves a huge diversity of beliefs. Pagan literally translates to one who dwells upon the Earth, which really if you think about it, is all of us.
2. Witches are pagan, but not all pagans are witches. That’s because Paganism is the umbrella term of all the earth-based religions of the world.
3. Pagans don’t believe in the Christian version of god, but Christian mythologies borrow heavy from the Pagan experience, which pre-dated Christianity.
4. Pagans do not believe in the Devil or Satan. That concept originated with Christianity.
5. Pagans are not Satanists. Satanism was born out of a response to Christianity. It has nothing to do with the Pagan mythologies that pre-date Christianity.
6. Pagans don’t sacrifice animals or humans. In ancient times, all religions, including Christianity, practiced rites of sacrifice. Today’s Pagans left that part of their ancient belief system in the past because we now understand that honoring life is where it’s at.
7. Holidays come from the Pagan’s holy days, and many of our favorite holidays, like Christmas, Easter and Halloween, are borrowed from Pagan mythologies.
8. Pagans don’t hate Jesus, but they don’t worship him either. Most think he was a good man who tried to make the world he lived in a better place, but Pagans do not see him as a god.
9. For Pagans, magic and spellcasting are the acts of focused prayer with intention.
10. Pagans are a peaceful people who prefer to practice their religious ideologies outdoors in Nature closer to the Earth they love.
Want to learn more about Paganism and Goddess worship, visit The Goddess.
Comments
I love it, thanks. Most religious rituals, creeds etc, can be traced back to paganism: Druidism, Wiccan and the like. I thought "Pagan" meant people who lived an agricultural life outside big city, hence, away from church.
"6. Pagans don’t sacrifice animals or humans. In ancient times, all religions, including Christianity, practiced rites of sacrifice."
The only rite of sacrifice Christianity has ever practiced is the one it still practices, the eucharist or communion.
Pagan means country dweller. Back when Constantine decided Christianity was to be the official religion, it was practiced in cities. So the agricultural folks were indeed the Pagans :) Most Pagans follow a path that attempts to reconnect with the cycles of the Earth.
err..Theods and Asatruar are pagans, and they DO sacrifice animals. So do some of the Eastern religions, like the Hindu, who some also classify as pagan. Read The Wild Hunt for more on this, and please be accurate on what you publish..
Do you have to go through a special ceremony to become a pagan? or do you just do it?
You do realize most of your facts are very relative to which pagans your talking about right? Some of the more clear examples:
2: This would read better as Not all witches are pagan and not all pagans are witches. After all historically the word witch means ONLY a practicioner of magic (its tie to the modern religion of Wicca is like Wicca itself a modern apelation most historical sources and many modern anthropologists use witch as a general term for spell casters or some to mean only spell casters who act against the tribe i.e, black magicians). Their are satanists who consider themselves witches, gypsies and Christians who consider themselves wtiches without considering themselves pagan.
3. Depends on the pagan really. Some accept that Jesus and God (in the Judeo Christian sense) exist alongside other deities. Historically, and today, polytheistic religions generally adopt other gods its how they get to be the large pantheons they are now thought of as (take Greek mythology originally probably Athens worshiped just Athena and a few other deities then they go to war with Sparta and now Ares is seen as a god to just not the god they follow, when one group defeats another the gods of one become the gods (or demons this tradition long predates Christianity) of the other with the winning tribes gods being the ones on top). A really good example of this can be seen in Voodoo and Santeria where Christian saints were adopted when the slaves needed (continued)
to hide their tradtional beliefs from the white slave owners to the point that Voodoo and its related religions are now deeply tied to Christianity and Catholicism in particular. As far as Christianity adopting paganism only in its later holiday traditions. Most of the actual doctrine of Christianity draws on Judaism not paganism (yes Christmas, Easter, All Hallows Eve and other festivals draw on paganism as do several Catholic saints but these practices are not major aspects of Christian doctrine Christians can and do practice Christianity without christmas trees, easter eggs, or Halloween and the teachings don't actually change).
4. By the name Satan? Not generally but many pagans recognize the reality of the demonic by one name or another (see John Michael Greer's Monsters for a particularly well written example of a druid's take on demons). Also no the name Satan itself predates Christianity by a good thousand years or so as does a chief demon (by a different name admittedly). While its popular today to pretend Islam, Christianity and Judaism are the same religion its also a gross over simplification involving a general ignorance of the teachings of the three religions. For one thing Judaism predates Christianity by at least a thousand years and probably much longer then that and Judaism still exists as a distinct religion.
5. I'd agree that Satanism isn't the same as paganism but demonolatry did not begin with Christianity. Belief in (continued)
evil spirits is as old as mankind as is belief that people associate with those spirits and draw power from them. What we now call white magic was originally mostly focused on protecting people from these kinds of spirits (bringers of disease and death) and protecting people from the curses of black magic.
6. Yes Christians used to practice animal sacrafice although not so much on the human end. Some non Christian religions do still practice animal sacrafice for that matter and that isn't the terrible thing people tend to imagine it is either. As an interesting perspective consider kosher law. Kosher requires an animal be killed in a manner dictated by religious tradition, that specific prayers be said over the animal before and after and it dictates other religious aspects regarding diet. Is it animal sacrafice? I don't think so but it relates. In tradtiional African ceremonies the animal must be killed quickly and painlessly (as in kosher), and the blood must be drained and left for the gods (Judaism holds with the importance of removing blood from the animal although for different reasons). One is to honor the divine the other is to follow dietary laws from the divine a relationship does exist certainly.
9) Magic and prayer are two different things although yes a lot of pagans disagree. Magic seeks to control the world prayer seeks to glorify the divine and ask for aid. The result is similar but the intent is very different.
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