Wicca & Christianity

The relationship between Wicca and Christianity has always been difficult. The roots of this animosity between both religions are quite clear. During the european christianization, a common process took place, in which the Gods of the older religions turned into the demons of the new one, and the christian priests identified the Satan of the Scripts with the Horned God of paganism, also called Cernunnos, similar in appearance to the greek god Pan, his atributes being goat hooves, hairy body and deer or goat horns.

As christianity evolved as the major religion for the european upper classes, and with the feudal system during the Middle Ages a religion such as the pagan ones, with their constant celebration of life and it's remark on the individual's responsibility upon his/her own destiny, turned up to be something less than desirable. The reason is quite simple: if each person was responsible of their own life and actions, all the perverse feudal system with it's dominion over land, life and body of the peasants had no reason to be, even less a sacred back up as it had with the Church. As a counterpart to this, documentation on the celitc pagan countries remain, stating the right of every inhabitant of the country to posses their own land, naming then a series of rights that sound amazingly similar to the modern Declaration of Human Rights. As we can see, a completely different approach on the subject.

Anyway, on December 1484 the Pope Inocencius VII edicted his infamous bule, naming two priests called Heinrich Kramer and Jakob Sprenger Inquisitors. These pair wrote the Malleum Maleficarum, a detail on the procedures allowed to use to make witches confess. These procedures included, among other delicacies, hanging the victims by their wrists, shaving their body hair looking for spots or "devil nipples" (simple moles or warts, usually placed on armpits or crotch), trying to prove their adherence to Satan. These moles were suposed to be the places through which women nursed the demons, thus their name. One would think the lack of such marks would prove the innocence of the acused. Nothing like the sort. The skin's inmaculate condition was considered another proof of evil doings. The truth is, the condemnation of the accused was more based on who and how the acusation had been placed for a start, more than in the "proofs". Let's keep in mind that after several different flavours of tortures, such as red-hot irons and boots that broke all the bones in the legs, anybody would confess anything just to make it stop.

But my point isn't making a retelling of one of the worst and longest butcheries humanity can recall. There is plenty of information available, perfectly documented, for those interested in finding out more.

Nowadays, the relationship between Paganism and Christianity hasn't got much better, even though it's almost a century since the last person was killed or jailed accused of witchcraft. It's becoming a habbit among fundamentalist groups to try to raise the multitude against paganism. If they kept it among their own members, or perhaps when trying to witness ocasionally to an isolated pagan, it wouldn't be that bad. The real problem starts, though, when declaring them at war with what they call the "devil worshipers", based on descontextualized facts and information that completely lacks historical accuracy. And then what is meant to be a pacific convivence turns into a battlefield.

I should make clear that I don't aim to suggest the general policy of christianity as a whole is to declare a new witch-hunt in the same style as the well known collective histery of Salem. But to state that is simply the message originated in some sectors, without the least respect for a religion which roots place it as almost if not older than judaism, another religion that predated christianity by far, and what makes it worse is the lack of REAL information. As an example of what could be a pacific convivence, we could name the new Catholic Apostolic Roman cathecism, that even though it considers a mortal sin to use traditional witches' practices such as divination or magick, it makes is so for it's own followers. That means, if you are a catholic, you should accept the church's views.

The influence of the so called pagan uses upon christianity are undeniable for anyone that cares enough to check them out without condemning them beforehand. As a clear example of this we can name the celebreation of Christmas on December 24th, a date astoundingly close to Yule, the celtic festival of the rebirth of the God. Another possible example is communion, this one taken from Ancient Egypt, where they also made the transubstanciation of the bread, just like what is today considered dogma by the Catholic Church. And if we carry on our research with historical and anthropological accuracy, we'll find the myth of the Sacrificed God, then Resurrected, has a high occurence all over the Middle East. There are way many serious studies made on the relation between the christian and pagan festivals. A more than coherent reason for this was the intent to ease the convertion into the new religion by using festivals similar to those the converts were already used to.

As anyone that knows the basic beliefs of Wicca would know, convivence between both religions is perfectly possible, though obviously you can't be both pagan and christian. Let's hope people understands this, and a near future finds us living in harmony.

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