Ramblings

hadows and

ight

The question is always innocuous, and generally phrased in an offhand way.� �So, what religion are you?�

For some reason, this question is so much harder for me to answer than �Do you believe in God?�� With the latter, I can usually just nod with a quiet smile, and since no one asks the follow up �Well, what do you believe God is?�, I�m safe from having to explain.� Usually.� When I do have to explain, due to some conversational context that makes dissembling gauche, I�ve always felt compelled to try and put it off, even so.� Don�t mistake me, it�s not that I�m avoiding the issue, well maybe I am, but it isn�t because I wish to evade, I just honestly believe that most folks do not give enough of a shit to hear out my actual response.� Too long winded for my own good .... Anyway, religion is pass�.� Not en vogue.� To hold forth about God and religion is not too strange, but it does seem relegated to polite dinner conversation or party-talk, and in those environs, any sort of meaningful depth is discouraged, merely the witticism is prized.� I don't believe this to be shallow, these simply are conventions that surround the topic.� One does not delve deeply into beliefs casually, such behavior is inexcusable.� This is due only in part to the fact that our most deeply held beliefs are merely shadows and phantoms that we ourselves have never sought to question for their internal consistency or coherence, and much less, are able to fully articulate. This may well be why we will brook no such examination by an outsider � �My beliefs are my own, and I have every right to believe as I see fit.�� Blatantly false as this �truism� is, it is simply bad manners to �get deep� with someone you�ve only just met.

So, with this diatribe, I am going to indulge myself in an entirely inexcusable manner.� As usual. It is my intent to pursue at some length and depth, my own thoughts and beliefs on God, Religion, Fate, Life, and the Meaning of it all.� And for those of you that know me, you can cheerfully say �Here we go again!�� You see, I have atrocious manners, stranger beware.

First, some caveats and ground rules.� I really don�t intend to be an Apologist.� By this, I mean that I am not preaching any gospel, or that what I have to say is not intended in any way to convert, convince, or denounce.� Well, maybe a bit of that last one.� Regardless, I have no agenda that must be explained in such a way that will make it accessible and appealing to the masses.� I am simply laying down my thoughts, in a not so haphazard sort of way.� Patience, grasshopper.� All will be revealed.

Perhaps the most appropriate place to begin would be to give you, Gentle Reader, a way of readily identifying my position on a sort of philosophical road-map.� So, let�s start by defining some boundary conditions.� It is my understanding that the term �Atheist� refers to one who holds a belief� that there is �no Deity�.� I disagree with this position.� An �Agnostic� is one that holds a belief such that they are uncertain as to the nature of the Deity, and/or uncertain as to the existence of a Divine force.� Agnosticism is something of a problem for me.� It�s not really a position, per se.� It�s more of a wait-and-see approach to Mystery.� �I�ve never seen God�s Hand, but I don�t want to say that there is no such thing as God�s Hand �.�� A waffle �� and a perfectly reasonable one.� To that extent, I think almost all of us are Agnostic.� With the notable exception of the Christian Coalition and any other fascist flavor of fanaticism, of course.� No, my problem with Agnosticism is not the doubt itself, it�s that the doubt hasn�t motivated a deeper look and a re-evaluation of the situation in the Agnostic.� Agnosticism is perfectly legitimate as a temporary position, but adherence to that position indefinitely speaks of something else, something not perfectly legitimate.� Not knowing is fine.� Refusing to look deeper is not.� So much for tolerance .....

So, now that I�ve established that I�m not a Atheist, and not an Agnostic (at least, no less than anyone else � I have no knowledge, just beliefs), the question remains: what do I call myself?� Continuing with my favored oblique approach let me answer an unasked question: I am not Christian.

Let�s cauterize that wound.� There is a niggling distinction between being a Christian, and calling oneself Christian.� The basic Christian tenets of love and familial respect are too ludicrously noble to not admire.� I also feel that these are exactly the tenets that tend to be ignored, or at best applied as is expedient, by most Christians.� And this really annoys me.� I have no quarrel with Christianity, nor it�s fundamental truths.� I do have a problem with Christians.� Hence, I am not a Christian, and dislike being identified as one.� But neither am I Muslim nor Jewish, and for pretty much the same reasons.� Religious tenets tend to be generally acceptable, even unremarkable in their uniformity, it�s the followers� implementation of them that tends to render the whole as unpalatable.

On a more positive note, I have always had a sort of �romantic fascination� with some Eastern religions, and this treatise will reflect that influence, I�m sure.� Taoism, Buddhism, and Zen, most notably, but not Hinduism, Shinto, or Confucianism.� Those first three, blended with Western myth � it is in these somewhat austere pastures that my romantic�s soul lies.

If there is a signpost that marks the path I chose, I suppose it must read �Pagan.�� But again, I dislike the word, and find it just as limiting and as plagued by misrepresentation as any of the others I have discarded before it.� �Eclectic� is perhaps more accurate, but still, it is a hollow label to affix to myself.� The word I am fond of is Witch, and this is what I usually call myself.� I am a Witch.� Of a sort.

�What the hell does that mean?�, you ask.� To which my witty reply is: �What do you think it means?�� It is my fullest belief that witches do in fact have warts, fly on broomsticks, practice black magic, steal souls for their Satanic masters, and are invariably wizened spinsters.� But I don�t want to talk about them.� To distinguish them from the others that I will be talking about, I will refer to the latter group with a capital �W�. All clear?� Excellent!

Before I embark on a bit of explanation, a bit of self-revelation might be in order.� Yes, I'm a Witch. Yes, really. I'm also a very heterosexual, socially well-adapted (I suppose this is debatable) male (definitely not debatable � and I can prove it) with a large circle of friends, and yes, I do get out. Perhaps a bit too much, alas for my studies. I am also not physically repulsive (haven�t shattered a mirror yet), nor do I experience overweening desires to butcher small, furry animals, steal babies, or fuck sheep (though, I�m told � never mind). I am not a born-again fanatic, either, in that I am not militant about what I believe in, nor does it concern me a whit whether you, gentle reader, or anyone else buys my story, agrees with me, or holds anything resembling my particular take on anything.� Contrary to your gut reaction, I really have actually bothered to think about these things, things that most of you would never dream of questioning. I've thought about them in ways you might consider batty, and at a length and depth deemed morbidly unacceptable by most American adults. The few conclusions I have come to have been hard-won, are not lightly held, and I feel that they affect my life in a most profound way. Do I have an open mind? No, probably not, if what is meant by this is that I ought to actively and continually engage in "suspension of disbelief." Perhaps it would come as a surprise that I am an empirically minded philosopher (and I have the degree to prove it). I say all this by way of warning to those who tend to dip but lightly into these dark and unquiet waters; this is not a game to a great many folks myself not necessarily included, but quite a few of us do take these matters to be some of the only ones worth thinking about.

And now that I've been pleasantly brooding and nebulous, on with the show.

"What is a Witch?" Another unpleasant question. It makes me feel like someone just shoved a spotlight up my nose. To be fair, it is one of the most common, gut-reaction questions I get, next to a snort of derision and followed by the incredulous stare. Part of my problem is that I don't have a stock response, other than the always amazingly witty: "I'm a Witch." However, there is a point to the response that is invariably lost on most folks. The word 'Witch,' like the words 'game' or 'religion', picks out an excruciatingly unorganized group of folks, whose only defining feature as a set is that they choose to call themselves "Witches." I know, not helpful, but true nonetheless. Witches, like most other neo-Pagans, tend to have a rough sort of belief set in common, but whatever the individual elements in that set of beliefs, they aren�t universal. For example, I know of at least three "Christian Witches,� women who go to Mass every Sunday.� (Beginning to see my difficulty?)� A better -- but still not good -- question might be, "Why do I call myself a Witch?" This one I can answer: I call myself a Witch because I like the word. Seriously! As I say, it appeals to my romantic soul and no other reason is needed. But somehow I doubt that this is informative in the way it was expected to be. I don't mean to be overly nitpicky here, but the lesson I am not-so-subtly trying to beat into your head is that Witchcraft, like every other complex web of beliefs, is extremely personal. Everyone has a different take on it. You, you lucky devil, are reading mine.

As a starting point, it will probably be helpful if I tried to stop being obnoxious.� To that end, let me lay out some more ground-work before I get around to my own views.

Let�s begin with Paganism.� Paganism is just a religious classification that Witches tend to (but not necessarily) get lumped under.� Paganism, classically speaking, is simply non-Judeo-Christian.� Hinduism is a pagan religion.� So is Buddhism, Taoism, and strictly speaking, Islam (though I tend to waffle on this).� Neo-Paganism, helpfully shortened to �Paganism� (to distinguish it from the �Paganism� just described), is a recent beast, owing to some middle-20th Century developments which will be described and ridiculed below. Anyway, Witchcraft, at least in the conception I�m going to be talking about, stems from this late-date neo-Paganism.

For those that didn�t know, Wicca is also a common name for Witchcraft.� An attempt to anesthetize the concept and practice that lays behind the much more interesting label of Witchcraft, in my humble opinion.� You�ll most likely see the word used in a lot of that really sensitive New Age rat barf you can buy at any cheesy bookstore.� Can I just tell you how much I hate this word?� The only people that use it are the more squeamish of the silly morons I happen to know, and I lump the word into the same dung heap I toss all the other idiotic PC words like �wait-person� or �flight attendant�.� Everyone that thinks that language is inherently sexist, and that that inherent sexism is somehow detrimental to the dignity of either sex, or that the language in its currently sexist form should be somehow �sanitized�, please stand up so that I might beat you about the head and face until you bleed.� Gods, but do I despise �Political Correctness.�

As I was saying, Witchcraft is commonly called a �nature-based religion.�� What is meant by this is that the religious calendar is set to the seasonal cycle, sometimes called the Wheel of the Year, and what gets celebrated is this continual natural evolution of life into death into life again.� The upshot of this is that Life, that is, all life, is held as sacred.� And that death is sacred as well, and that both must exist for there to be balance, and it is this Balance that a Witch strives for.

Following that up, let�s extend the Balance analogy to what Christians bandy about when they use concepts like GOOD and EVIL.� GOOD is good, we�d like more of it to be sure, and being good somehow exemplifies in a straightforwardly Platonic way, the GOOD.� If you�re good, you go to heaven.� If you aren�t good, you�re evil, and you�ll burn in Hell for all eternity, your skin flayed from your body, your eyes burned from your sockets with coals, your genitalia stripped of skin, dipped in acids, and torn from your body by the teeth of rabid, slathering beasts.� Over and over and over again.� What a pretty religion!

Here�s a dilemma for all you would be theologians.� First, the Bible says that God is all Good, that is, He is the Source of all that is good, He is the Embodiment of the GOOD, all that is of the GOOD comes from God and nowhere else, yadda yadda yadda.� Second, the Bible says that God is All-Powerful, that there is nothing He cannot accomplish were He to simply wish it to be so.� Third, the Bible says that God is All-Knowing, that there is no deed that escapes His notice, however small and inconsequential, all things lay before God, past, present and future.� With these three premises, how can we arrive at the following conclusion: Bad things happen to good people.� We philosophers and theologians like to call this problem, The Problem of Evil.� Several thousand pages could be written on merely the permutations of this crusty old biscuit, so I�ll not bother here.� Suffice it to say that the problem is unsolved by logical standards, and the loophole that the Jesuits tend to favor is simply to throw up one�s hands and say, �I can�t understand it.�� It goes without saying that this is the only response that I find acceptable to this problem (and I in fact wrote a thesis logically proving this very point).� The reason that I mention it at all, is that this thorny little philosophical puzzle is like a Gordian knot that the Witch merely hacks apart with a cleaver.� To the Witch, God is Evil.

Not only Evil, of course, but necessarily so.� The Judeo-Christian neo-Platonic ideal of monism is discarded by the typical Witch in favor of duality.� Good and Evil, life and death, male and female, light and dark, fire and water, earth and air.� Everything Balanced with it�s Opposite, and Peace is found only when Balance is.� Rather poetic, actually.

(Aside:� This does not necessarily mean that technology is bad, and de-evolution is good.� Personally, I don�t give a flying fuck about the Spotted Owl, or the Rainforest, or Saving the Earth, the Whales, or the Baby Seals.� The book that is the history of the universe i s filled with images upon its pages of things which the Watcher says �This will not come again.� Nor this � nor this � nor this �.�� Extinction is natural, unavoidable, and not terribly interesting.� I smile every time I say this, with my appropriate Darth Vader type voice, for I can hear the legions of the righteous unwashed left-wingers crying out in one magnificent voice � �For shame, for shame!� It will be your own doom you wreak by such neglect!� Forget not your Mother, lest she forget you!�� Yeah, yeah, whatever.� Eco-freaks have always bugged the piss out of me.� What is so natural and good about disrupting the natural progress of creation and extinction?� How can we be sure that humanity isn�t supposed to be the mechanism by which some species were destined to end?� I am not saying that we should engage in mass slaughter of the innocents, just that we shouldn�t waste the energy in our short lives mourning those that are already lost.� Get over it, already.� Our understanding of biology and biological systems is so wonderful at the low level analysis and so pathetic at the highest.� We don�t know if there is a purpose to a race, we only can place them within a schema.� When one element from the schema is removed, yes, the schema will either break, or find another equilibrium point.� If we are so stupid as to eliminate ourselves from the schema, what does this matter to the Earth?� Or Life as a whole?� Our only duty is to survive, and to do that by any means necessary.� Even at the expense of the rest of the schema.� It�s what life does.� Survive.� -- End of aside.)

Anyway, back to the story.� This does naturally bring us to reincarnation.� An interesting topic, and one in which most religions have a rather vested interest.� I don�t take much comfort in the idea of �Life after Death�, the contradiction there means something to me that seems lost on most religious folk.� Regardless, a typical Witch might well hold to something akin to a resurrection of spirit, somewhat along the Hindu line.� Life is a series of lessons to be learned, and based on how well one learns the lessons one is allotted in this life, dictates their position and form (and lessons to be learned) in the next.� I find that this has some pull for me, but in the end I don�t have much faith in this.� Personally, I�d rather not die, I can see why its important � I still don�t want to, though.� For me, mortality is what gives everything its hue and depth.� It�s a sort of poignancy that I have come to appreciate more and more.� If there were no endings, how interesting would beginnings be?� And what care is taken of the things in between?� For me loss and sorrow define the shape and color of the world, and lend it an overwhelming, paralyzingly fragile beauty.

To continue, Witches hold either to pantheism or to polytheism, but most hold to some blend of these two.� Pantheism is the view that all things are divine; polytheism is the view that there is more than one Divinity.� (Note that the former entails the latter, but not vice versa.)� What this means to an individual Witch, typically, is that all things in Nature are to be cherished and are worthy of worship; that worship tends to be channeled through a pantheon of deities that individually embody the various aspects of Nature.

Witches also tend to hold to a modified version of the Golden Rule, called charmingly enough, �The Wiccan Rede.� To wit: �Eight words the Wiccan Rede fulfill; if it harm none, do what you will.�� Rather elegant, as far as general principles go.� Of course, this Rule is held about as inviolate as the tenets of brotherly love, charity and goodwill are, as held by good, God-Fearing Christians ....� But perhaps I�m being uncharitable.� Anyway, Witches also tend to hold to some version of karmic law, as well.� You know, that whole �what goes around, comes around.�� This is usually called the Law of Three: rewards and punishments (for actions) tend to be threefold.� This is, I suppose, analogous to the notion of Hell and damnation in Christianity, all without the fire and brimstone, namely, that you end up reaping what you sow, sooner ... or later.

The only other common characteristic of Witchcraft in practice is that Witches tend to be rather �eclectic� in their belief sets.� Sort of like theological/mythological/philosophical gigolos, most Witches will make free with �whatever works.� They can and do borrow freely from whatever and wherever, �if it feels right.� The result is, of course, chaos.� No two groups (or even individual beliefs) will be alike, and this is encouraged.� Witches, like most Pagans, emphasize individuality in their religion.� One ought to tailor make one�s own religion because it�s yours, and it�s for you, and it is you, or so the argument goes.

This point is and should be deeply troubling to a Skeptic, like myself.� Religion gets its power from being able to capitalize on our natural, non-Rational discomforts with our nature, and our place in the grand scheme of things.� Part of what make religion alluring is that it purports to have a way out of those doubts and fears, a path to the truth of the matter.� So, when you pull away the crutch of �the sure thing� and replace it with the notion that there isn�t One Path to Truth, that there may in fact be an infinite number of such paths, the problem becomes one of how does one ever know which of the paths are the right ones to take?� Out of an infinite set, any subset is going to be, by definition, statistically irrelevant to the set as a whole.� How can we ever find the way?� Another, further worry is along the same lines.� Assuming that there are many paths, what is to prevent you from assuming that there are many �Truths�?� That there is no One Truth? For if there isn�t any One Truth, how can we ever know the �Truth� we�ve hit on, is in fact the Truth?� There doesn�t seem any way for something to be both True and false at the same time, but how can we tell if one thing is True at all, if there are many Truths?

This is a philosophical worry, to be sure, but still fatal nonetheless, for there are no solutions, other than Faith.� But what are we to have Faith in?� Ourselves?� Perhaps, but isn�t that lack of faith in ourselves what prompted the entire search in the first place?� Should we have faith in the Truth?� Well, which one?

The reason I bring this up is not to simply dismiss it, for once entered into seriously, the Skeptic�s worry cannot be reconciled.� As an empirically minded philosopher, this sort of thing gives me the willies.� So, a very natural question to put to me is, �Aren�t you just shitting us? How do you possibly reconcile this result with the fact that you are a Witch, nonetheless?� Aren�t you being just a bit incoherent?� What are you, some sort of snake-oil salesman, a sort touchy-feely Feel Good artist trying to get us to abandon our Righteous Ways for the path to damnation?�

My reply to this is to call attention to the coarseness of your character, tell you your shoes are untied, ask �How many fingers am I holding up? Ha, that�s a thumb,� and change the subject.

No, there is a solution.� And this one caused me to lose a lot of sleep.� Here goes: I choose to believe what I believe.� I choose it consciously, against my empirical inclinations.� I choose it because it does justice to my pre-theoretic intuitions about Reality.� And most importantly, I choose to be a Witch because it pleases me to do so.� It soothes my Romantic soul.

Do I believe in God?� No.� At least, not in any interesting traditional sense.� I do not believe in an ineffable, omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent, omnibenevolent eternal Being.� The reasons for this are technical and philosophical, but due mainly to a lack of childhood indoctrination, I�m sure.

Here�s what I do believe.� I believe in Us.� It is my personal, heartfelt belief that there is a God, and that that Divinity stares at me out of the face of every person I have ever seen.� Every one.� I suppose you could say that we aren�t God, but that we could be.� The potential is there, dormant, in all of us.� Like a spark, waiting to bloom into full light.� I stole this from the Gnostics, I�ll admit that freely, but what this means for me is that there is a special relationship that ever person has to every other; namely, we are all, in a very limited but very real sense, God.

Logically, since God is Divine by nature and that which is Divine is by definition sacred, since we are all �of God� in that we share that Divinity, that Divine Spark, everything that holds that spark, every human life, is sacred.� Not some human lives, but all of them.� Even the bad ones, and the little ones, and the ones that seem rather pointless.� With respect to this, all of them are on a par, to me.� All human life is sacred, and therefore inviolable.� And this is a personal view, but you should buy into this and become my devoted slaves because I say so.

I tend to deny the bit about the non-existence of non-immanent divinity in my more Romantic moods (but not the bit about the sacredness of human life).� It pleases me to believe in the Story of Creation, in God and the Angels, in Lucifer and the Fallen Angels.� It is, after all, a beautiful story!� The most plausible Creation story I have ever read was Stephen Brust�s To Reign in Hell. Absolutely marvelous.� But do I believe it?� I really think that this misses the point.� Does anyone truly believe the Greco-Roman myths were true, that they actually happened?� It�s absurd!� Myths serve many useful roles in both secular and religious life.� (I highly recommend just about anything Joseph Campbell ever wrote, if this is at all unclear or interesting to you.)� To reify them is to be guilty of the same travesty that Christian Fundamentalists are.� But this is simply dodging the main barb of the question: do the entities postulated by Witchcraft (or any other religion) actually exist?� Well, no, probably not, at least in the way that we have conceived of them.� But wouldn�t it be cool if I was wrong?� God, I�d love that.

Moving right along, it will be useful to distinguish Witchcraft from other, similar, views.� First, as I mentioned before, Witchcraft is not Paganism.� Witches can be Pagan, but need not be.� Pagans tend to emphasize polytheism over pantheism, while Witches tend to do it the other way around.

Witchcraft is not Satanism.� As far as I know, Satanism, historically speaking, is largely a myth, cooked up by the Church, and still served up by the media and pop culture.� The putative activities of organized groups of Satan worshipers is a �fact� that the FBI likes to trot out as being wholly fictitious.� Don�t get me wrong, there are a lot of sick fucks out there.� But the ones that call themselves �Satanists� usually define themselves with respect to the Christian devil, hence the name. Witchcraft, at least in the modern incarnation, has little truck with Christianity at all.

Witches aren�t cultists.� They can be cultists, but to have a cult, you usually have to have a group of folks; most Witches choose to work alone. Sure, some groups, deliciously called covens, do form, and like any religious group, a coven is subject to the usual pycho-social forces.� Any group has the potential to become a cult.� But by and large, cults are one thing, religions another, all silliness aside.

There is a bit of egregious nonsense that keeps getting circulated that I�d like to bring up, harp about, and then dismiss.� It�s this notion that Witchcraft is a 20,000-year-old religion (this is the ballsiest quote I�ve seen printed).� The Party Line, probably derived from some drivel kicked out by Margaret Murray and/or Gerald Gardner in the 1950�s, runs as follows.� About 20,000 years ago, Witchcraft got its start as a set of rituals associated with necessary life sustaining things like fire, fertility, healing, and the hunt.� This somehow transmogrified �into a religion that recognized a Supreme Deity, but realized that at their state of evolution, they �were incapable of understanding it�.�� So, being the persistent little buggers they were, they didn�t just give up, but instead worshipped the various aspects, specifically the Great Goddess and her Consort, the Horned God.� This religion evolved in Northeastern Europe, and persisted down through the countless generations, surviving assaults by the Romans, the Norse, the Saxons and the Normans.� The Christians were the last, greatest threat, and nearly exterminated the religion entirely, which survived only by �going underground,� where it remained, withering away until the middle of this century, where it was reborn in the works of, you guessed it, Margaret Murray and Gerald Gardner.� (lifted, quoted, and paraphrased from the Wicca Page: http://199.246.2.10/people/ocrt/witchcra.htm).

A couple of things, to begin.� The assumption that Witchcraft has a 20,000 year history is, on the face of it, not even remotely plausible.� By way of comparison, the religion of the pre-Druidic Celts is almost unknown.� There is no text, as the society was almost entirely aural.� Even the Celtic Druids themselves are a mystery (for much the same reasons), and they vanished less than a millennia ago.� The claim reduces to the �fact� that modern Witchcraft has superficial characteristics in common with a prehistoric religion, and that this is based solely on scanty artifactual evidence.� But so what?� Even if it was based on no evidence at all, what does it matter that there are superficial characteristics in common?� This hardly amounts to a direct, causal chain.� What seems to be required for the argument to achieve respectability is some sort of access to knowledge and or evidence that appears to be completely beyond current historical and archeological science.

Anyway, who cares if it�s true or not?� It seems like Witches are suffering from Catholic envy � that which is old, must be good, and boy are we old.� This is ridiculous.� The whole point of Witchcraft, especially as it is practiced (and taught) is that it is individual.� If it doesn�t work, don�t do it, or change it till it does.� This doesn�t seem to be the sort of doctrine that would naturally lend itself to an unchanging set of principles being handed down through a score of millennia.� At the first stop in that very long chain that someone said, �let�s do this instead of this�, something would be lost.� This sort of �error propagation� doesn�t get easier to deal with the longer the chain, it gets worse.� On this view, the original will bear only an accidental resemblance to the current product.� The alternative is to say that nothing changed all through its 20,000 year history, and that only in the last fifty has any change (much less the radical sort currently indulged in with wild abandon) was introduced.� I don�t find either to be terribly convincing.� But like I said, who cares?� The �history,� as far as I�m concern ed could have started six years ago with my initiation into the coven I helped found.� I could care less, age says nothing about worth.� Sexism and racism are both old.� And both are perfectly worthless ideas.

Some related topics.� About Magic.� Yes, Witches practice magic.� They cast spells, perform rituals of varying intricacy, the whole nine yards.� No, not all Witches practice magic.� No, there is no such thing as �black magic.�� Magic can be used for good or ill, but itself it is neither.� People are good or evil, not tools.

So, what the hell is magic, anyway?� Something like duct tape, or the Force (it binds the universe together)?� I don�t believe this.� Asking a Witch if they believe in the efficacy of magic is analogous to asking a priest if he believes in the efficacy of prayer.� It�s a matter of belief, in the end.� Personally, I think the analogy to prayer in an exact fit, Christians pray, Witches cast spells.� They both rely upon the charity of the Divine Agent to which they are directed for their causal efficacy.� A Jesuit friend of mine told me once, �God answers every prayer.� It�s just that sometimes the answer is �No�.�� Draw whatever conclusions you like.� Personally, I don�t do much in the way of magic, except as a part of a ritual.

So, what�s with the Devil�s Star, anyway?� The �Devil�s Star� as your parents are likely to have called it, is a pentacle, a five pointed star within a circle.� Pentacles are relatively recent icons, probably dating from the rise of the Hermetic traditions in the Middle Ages.� Symbolically, the pentacle represents the four elements and spirit, connected and circumscribed.� Five aspects of the same Divine reality, or so it�s claimed.� Also, the pentacle is a stylized person, spread eagle: two arms, two legs, a head, with the bounds of nature.� The pentacle is usually not inverted, but this doesn�t have any inherent Satanic connotations other than what the media has kindly done for us.� The pentacle was and is used in rituals as a �binding seal�, a sign that purportedly has the power to contain summoned energies, entities, what-have-you, giving the summoner some measure of protection and control over the forces summoned � namely the power to release whatever so contained.� That�s the story, anyway.

How does one become a Witch?� By hook or by crook usually.� If you�re seriously interested, I�d recommend reading around.� If that sufficiently whets your appetite, then go to some local New Age bookstores, and pick up some newsletters and fliers.� I answered an ad six years ago, and not only did I survive, I�m here to talk endlessly about it!