On being a pagan pacifist in a christian world
An opinion

by Kimber ~ 2003

I was born in Illinois. My parents were born in Missouri and Idaho. My grandparents were born in Arkansas, Missouri, and Idaho. My great grandparents were born in Germany, Ireland, Wales, Missouri, Oklahoma...etc. My great great grandfather was a full-blood native american. I state all this so there is no confusion over the fact that I am, in fact, American. I'm not a foreigner. I was raised in the Nazarene Church. My mother was as well as my grandmother. I stopped going to church when I was 13. Then I spent the next 10 years searching. Agnostisism, Buddhism, Taoism...I studied them all. Some of it made sense to me but none of it spoke to my soul.

In 1994-ish, I met a wonderful woman who told me about Wicca. She wasn't recruiting me. I had to really pry information out of her. What she told me sang in my head and heart, like the sympathetic vibrations of metals. A light shone through the spiritual mist I had been wandering in and I found myself saying "This is right. This is where I belong. This is home".

I had no idea at that time what I was opening myself up to. On the one hand, the sense of wonder and oneness, the complete joy of knowing why I'm here and what my place is in the universe. On the other hand, the violent disdain of my fellow men. The accusations of satan-worship, hating god, corrupting children, sacrificing animals... My first thoughts were "Who ARE these people? What reality do they live in? They must just be an abberation." But as I grew more firm in my faith, I found more people firm in their hatred of me and what they thought were my beliefs. I say that because they never bother to ask what my beliefs are. They hear, pagan, wiccan, witchcraft and automatically draw up a picture in their heads of Shakespeares Weird Sisters scrying over a bubbling cauldron filled with animal parts.

I'm a 35 year old mother of 2. I live in a 90+ year old farm house in New England. I like pizza, coca cola and country music. I'm overweight, and I'm going prematurely grey. I wear blue jeans and baggy shirts (mostly denim). That is what a wiccan looks like. In the morning I meditate with the sun to bring myself strength and energy to face the day. At night, I meditate with the moon to bring myself peace and wisdom to learn from the day. I love my family and friends. I meditate to send them healing energy, possitive energy, love and strength.

Wiccans don't believe in harming anyone or anything. Our rede states "An ye harm none, do as ye will". The 3-fold-rule states that any energy you project into the world comes back to you 3-fold. Our worship is based on respect and reverence for all life. We believe that there are many paths to Deity and that all gods are one god. So Allah, Vishnu, Jehova and I Am are all just different names for the same being and anyone who follows any path sincerely will find Deity. The problem with wicca is that we are so reluctant to speak to others about our faith for fear of having someone think we are trying to alter their own spiritual path that no one knows us or who we are or what we believe. And that leaves us open for ignorance and presumption. And being glumped in with satan-worshippers. (We don't believe in satan by the way.)

This leads me into my next difficulty. I am also a pacifist. Because I revere all life, I decry all violence. War is violence. War is killing people. People with as much worth, dignity and value as me and my family and my friends. I feel that there is NEVER a justification for killing anyone and no war is a just war. But I can't say that in America. Anymore than I can say that I invoke the names of Brigid and Cernounos in my meditations to connect with the infinite. Because in the same breath I am condemned as a satan-worshipper and animal sacrificer I am also condemned as un-American, and a soldier-hater. "Who ARE these people? What reality do they live in?" I don't know, but unfortunately I live in it with them. I live in a free country where I can't worship the way I feel is true to my soul or speak my mind about killing people being a bad thing. No one wants to hear that I don't think we should have invaded Iraq. No one wants to hear that I think Lacie Peterson's husband shouldn't be executed. No one wants to hear that I don't want my children exposed to christian prayer in school or to be forced to sit through a christian sermon to get social services. And because they don't want to hear it, they don't want me to have the freedom or right to say it.

So, I have to pick and choose who I speak to and associate with. Even in an evironment where freedom and non-descrimination are supposed to be the rule, I have to censor myself. That's what it's like to be a pagan and a pacifist in America. It's hard, and it's painful and sometimes it is REALLY lonely. But it's who I am and who I always will be.