Some Thoughts on the Idea of "Magic" and Other Pagan Practices

My recent interactions with the community down at Oak Spirit Sanctuary have prompted in me some reflections on some pagan ideas and practices that have historically been seen as problematic in Christian circles.  Two areas I particularly have in mind are 1. the practice of magic, magical rituals, spells, incantations, calling on spirits, etc., and 2. the worship of pagan deities.  As I reflect on these ideas and gain further experience regarding how they are understood and practiced in Neo-Pagan communities, I have come to have a clearer awareness of the need for nuance in reflecting on these things.  There are aspects and interpretations of these ideas and practices that are antithetical to a Catholic Christian worldview, but there are others that are not only compatible with Catholicism but could also aid as a source of positive inspiration for spirituality that may be overlooked because of fear of the more negative.

This article is not intended to be a complete overview of the Neo-Pagan culture and worldview.  It is a brief analysis of a few specific areas of pagan thought and life (at least as I have come to understand them) in reference to historic Christian concerns, looking at them from a Catholic point of view and trying to understand them better in the context of Catholic categories of thought.  If you want a more holistic introduction to pagan thought and life from a pagan point of view, you might take a look at this article and these two videos here and here.

As with my previous article dealing with paganism, I am very conscious that I may have both pagan and Christian readers, and I recognize the trickiness of trying to articulate these kinds of ideas in view of these two very different audiences.

I want to acknowledge the help of my friend Fae Leach, who has read various drafts of this article and has provided very helpful feedback (though I alone am responsible for the views expressed here).  Thank you!

I think it is important to be careful, accurate, and nuanced in our understanding of pagan ideas and practices for three main reasons:  1. Truth is important.  We must not bear false witness about reality, and oversimplifying aspects of reality to the point that our understanding or articulation of them is misleading is a form of this.  2. If we oversimplify, and in particular if we let fear of negatives blind us to positives, we miss opportunities to connect with things that can benefit our spiritual lives.  3. Charity (love of neighbor) requires us to be accurate in our understandings and descriptions of what other people believe and do.  I think this is particularly important to emphasize when we are talking about Christians understanding paganism.  My impression is that the Neo-Pagan world is a world that is very poorly understood in Christian communities (and even in large parts of the broader culture).  I think the idea most Christians have of what "paganism" is is very superficial, shallow, and fear-based.  It is understandable that a lot of Christians don't know much about Neo-Paganism, as many have had very little interaction with that world; but, if we are ignorant, we must recognize our ignorance and avoid oversimplifying and over-negativizing Neo-Pagan beliefs and practices.  We must be diligent to treat all our fellow human beings with the respect and empathy that they deserve, and, in part, that means making a real effort to empathetically understand the complexities of what they believe and practice - just as we would hope they would do for us in return.

The Idea of "Magick"

Let's start with the idea of "magic" and related ideas and practices.  And let me begin by quoting from the Catechism of the Catholic Church, which has a short section devoted to warning Catholics away from what it considers to be false and dangerous ideas and practices.  This is paragraph #2115-2117:

2115 God can reveal the future to his prophets or to other saints. Still, a sound Christian attitude consists in putting oneself confidently into the hands of Providence for whatever concerns the future, and giving up all unhealthy curiosity about it. Improvidence, however, can constitute a lack of responsibility.

2116 All forms of divination are to be rejected: recourse to Satan or demons, conjuring up the dead or other practices falsely supposed to "unveil" the future.⁴⁸ Consulting horoscopes, astrology, palm reading, interpretation of omens and lots, the phenomena of clairvoyance, and recourse to mediums all conceal a desire for power over time, history, and, in the last analysis, other human beings, as well as a wish to conciliate hidden powers. They contradict the honor, respect, and loving fear that we owe to God alone.

2117 All practices of magic or sorcery, by which one attempts to tame occult powers, so as to place them at one's service and have a supernatural power over others - even if this were for the sake of restoring their health - are gravely contrary to the virtue of religion. These practices are even more to be condemned when accompanied by the intention of harming someone, or when they have recourse to the intervention of demons. Wearing charms is also reprehensible. Spiritism often implies divination or magical practices; the Church for her part warns the faithful against it. Recourse to so-called traditional cures does not justify either the invocation of evil powers or the exploitation of another's credulity.

Now this is obviously very negative.  I'm sure it sounds a bit irksome to pagans reading it!  These paragraphs are obviously not (and are not intended to be) a thorough, reflective analysis of Neo-Pagan culture, nor even of the particular issues they address.  The Church is here attempting to warn Catholics away from practices and beliefs she believes to be wrong and harmful.  So the Catechism's focus here is catechesis within the Catholic world regarding practices contrary to the First Commandment, not interreligious dialogue with Neo-Paganism.  Unfortunately, I think the Catechism's extremely brief and negative overview of these topics can have the side effect of reinforcing oversimplified and overly negative attitudes towards the complex, human phenomenon that is the Neo-Pagan world.  And it certainly comes across as very unempathetic from a pagan point of view.  However, despite these legitimate concerns, we should remember that the Church does teach her children to engage in a more robust and empathetic dialogue with people of other religions, and to recognize positive elements in other religions and even to promote, preserve, and learn from them, as can be seen by reading the Vatican II document Nostra Aetate.  I provided this quotation from it in my earlier article:

Likewise, other religions found everywhere try to counter the restlessness of the human heart, each in its own manner, by proposing "ways," comprising teachings, rules of life, and sacred rites. The Catholic Church rejects nothing that is true and holy in these religions. She regards with sincere reverence those ways of conduct and of life, those precepts and teachings which, though differing in many aspects from the ones she holds and sets forth, nonetheless often reflect a ray of that Truth which enlightens all men. . . .  The Church, therefore, exhorts her sons, that through dialogue and collaboration with the followers of other religions, carried out with prudence and love and in witness to the Christian faith and life, they recognize, preserve and promote the good things, spiritual and moral, as well as the socio-cultural values found among these men.

So the Church encourages us to delve into these matters with deeper nuance.  Even if there are things we must be critical of from the perspective of the Catholic worldview, we must also highlight and promote those things we can recognize as positive and beneficial to spiritual life.

So what is the Church critical of in "magical" practices?  I see two main things that are related:

1. The first thing is an inappropriate attempt to gain supernatural power or knowledge.  The Church sees in some "magical" sorts of practices an attempt to gain control of supernatural power, either through a kind of "supernaturally mechanical" means or through controlling or influencing spirits.

2. The Church sees #1 as partly reflecting a lack of proper trust in God, whose role it is to govern the universe.  To attempt to gain illicit supernatural power or knowledge through magical means is to attempt to "play God."  Instead of trusting God to run the universe, we try to take control ourselves as if we were gods over our own lives or the world around us.  This kind of supernatural power is not a power we were meant to have or that we can actually attain, but we ignore reality and try to grasp it for ourselves.

Of course, there are other more obvious dangers the Church mentions, such as attempting to use magical powers to harm people or attempting to work with evil spirits.  But I think #1 and #2 reflect the more fundamental and perennial problems the Church sees in things like "magic" and "divination."

So Catholics ought to avoid these practices which are (looking at things from a Catholic point of view) rooted in lack of proper trust in God or an attempt to gain godlike control over one's life and world.  But now we need to ask the question, do these paragraphs of warning in the Catechism really reflect what is actually going on in Neo-Pagan "magickal" practices and rituals?  (I deliberately used an archaic spelling of "magick" there because I've observed that pagans sometimes prefer this spelling to distinguish their idea of "magick" from "stage magic" or other thing that are different from what they are practicing.)  I think there is much more nuance here that can be brought out.

One thing that is crucial to note is that, within the Neo-Pagan community, there is a wide variety of views regarding the meaning of pagan ideas and practices.  Although, if you attend a pagan ritual, you will see a group of people all doing the same things, if you dig deeper you will find that there is great diversity in terms of how the participants understand what they are actually doing and what is actually going on.

Let's consider a concrete example of a pagan ritual - particularly, an example of the practice of "casting a spell."  In order to be able to print a spell in full that I could remember while avoiding copyright issues, etc., I asked ChatGPT to create a good example.  What it came up with matches what my experience tells me is fairly typical of the genre:

Example: Protection Spell

Materials:

• A black candle
• A piece of obsidian or black tourmaline
• Sea salt
• A small bowl of water
• A sage smudge stick or incense
• A piece of paper and a pen

Instructions:

Preparation:

1. • Choose a quiet space where you won’t be disturbed. Cleanse the space by burning sage or incense and allow the smoke to purify the area.
   • Arrange your materials on an altar or a small table. Place the black candle in the center, with the obsidian or black tourmaline next to it. Position the bowl of water and the sea salt nearby.

2. Casting the Circle:

   • Stand in the center of your space and visualize a protective circle of light surrounding you. Move clockwise and use the smoke from the sage or incense to trace the perimeter of your circle, saying:

     “I cast this circle of protection, 
     A sacred space for my intention. 
     No harm shall come, no evil here, 
     Only love and light, pure and clear.”
     

3. Grounding:

   • Sit or stand comfortably within your circle. Close your eyes and take several deep breaths. Visualize roots extending from your body into the earth, grounding and connecting you to the earth’s energy.

4. Stating the Intention:

   • On the piece of paper, write down your intention for protection. Be specific about what you are seeking protection from.

5. Charging the Spell:

   • Hold the piece of obsidian or black tourmaline in your hand. Focus on your intention and visualize a bright light surrounding you, emanating from the stone. Say:

     “Stone of protection, dark as night,
     Guard me with your shielding light.
     Keep me safe from harm and fear,
     Protect me now, both far and near.”
     

6. Empowering the Spell:

   • Sprinkle a pinch of sea salt into the bowl of water. Dip your fingers into the water and flick it around the candle, saying:

     “Water and salt, cleanse and protect,
     By earth and sea, negativity deflect.”
     

   • Light the black candle and focus on the flame. Visualize the flame burning away any negative energy surrounding you.

7. Releasing the Energy:

   • Hold your written intention over the candle flame and let it catch fire (be careful and use a fireproof dish to catch the ashes). As it burns, visualize your intention being released into the universe. Say:

     “By fire’s light and smoke’s ascent,
     My will is cast, my energy sent.
     Protection surrounds me, strong and true,
     As I will it, so mote it be.”
     

8. Closing the Circle:

   • Thank any deities, spirits, or elements you called upon. Move counterclockwise and visualize the circle of light fading away. Say:

     “I close this circle, the work is done,
     With gratitude, I thank everyone.
     The circle fades but the protection stays,
     Guarding me now and all my days.”
     

9. Final Steps:

   • Allow the candle to burn down completely or snuff it out if you need to leave. Keep the stone with you or place it in your home for ongoing protection.

This example combines several elements common in pagan spell work, including the use of natural materials, visualization, and spoken incantations. The exact process can vary depending on individual beliefs and practices.  (ChatGPT, personal communication, June 16, 2024, copy codes removed)

So this is a good example of a typical spell that one might find in pagan practice.  But what is understood by the practitioner to be actually happening here?  My experience suggests that the answer to that is going to differ from pagan to pagan.  Some will probably understand the spell in the most literal and straightforward terms:  Actual supernatural power is being attained and utilized for protection by means of magickal actions involving incantations, stones, salt water, spirits, etc.  This interpretation of the spell is going to be seen as problematic from a Catholic point of view, for reasons we articulated earlier when we looked at the warnings in the Catechism.  If there is an attempt to control or attain supernatural or godlike powers or knowledge, or to manipulate spirits, that will be an issue.  But another pagan practitioner might understand the spell as a set of symbolic actions intended to facilitate communication with "the divine" in order to request protection (see this short TikTok video for a really clear and helpful example of this).  In this interpretation, the spell is not fundamentally different from what Christians would call a "prayer."  Instead of using mostly just words, the prayer is communicated more by means of symbolic actions, but the basic intention and activity are fundamentally the same.  This understanding of the "spell" is not inherently at odds with a Catholic worldview, even if some of the language and symbolism might seem alien to what Catholics are used to and some Catholics might (understandably - there is a real danger here to be guarded against) be wary of a way of talking and acting that they fear might tend to lead people back to the sorts of things the Catechism warns against.  Yet another pagan practitioner might understand the spell in a more naturalistic way - as a set of ritual actions intended to affect a person's psychological mindset, helping them to relate to the world in a way that is more conducive to personal safety and success.  This, too, is not inherently problematic from a Catholic point of view.  (And we could add, of course, that the various interpretations are not necessarily mutually exclusive.  An individual practitioner might combine several of them.)

While I was conversing with ChatGPT, I also asked this question:  "Do pagans believe that spells really work?"  This was its answer:

Yes, many pagans believe that spells really work, but their understanding of how spells work can vary widely. Here are some common perspectives within pagan communities:

1. Psychological Influence: Some pagans believe that spells work primarily through psychological means. The process of casting a spell can help focus intention and reinforce belief in a desired outcome, which in turn can influence a person's behavior and decisions in ways that help bring about that outcome.

2. Energy Manipulation: Many pagans believe in the existence of a subtle, unseen energy that can be manipulated through spells and rituals. By directing this energy, they believe they can influence events, people, or the environment in accordance with their will.

3. Symbolic Action: For some pagans, spells are symbolic actions that represent a desired change. These symbolic actions can serve as a form of communication with the divine or with the universe, petitioning for assistance in achieving a goal.

4. Interconnectedness: Some pagans believe that everything in the universe is interconnected. By casting a spell, they are tapping into these connections to create a ripple effect that can bring about the desired change.

5. Faith and Tradition: For others, the effectiveness of spells is rooted in tradition and faith. The belief in the power of spells can be part of a larger religious or spiritual worldview that gives meaning and efficacy to these practices.

Different pagan traditions may emphasize one or more of these perspectives, and individual beliefs can vary widely even within a single tradition. Ultimately, the belief in the effectiveness of spells is a deeply personal aspect of many pagans' spiritual practice.  (ChatGPT, personal communication, June 16, 2024)

I found it interesting how closely ChatGPT's answer parallels my own personal observations of the variety of understandings that exist in the pagan community.

This great diversity of views within the Neo-Pagan community regarding how one understands the meaning and intention of rituals makes it very tricky to evaluate pagan practices from a Catholic point of view.  In short, there are ways of understanding them in which they are certainly incompatible with Catholic values and beliefs.  But there are often other ways of understanding them in which they are not.

I mentioned above how some pagans see ritual work as a way of communicating with the divine, as a form of prayer that makes use of the language of symbolism and symbolic actions.  This should not seem all that foreign to Catholic sensibilities.  This is an integral and historic part of Catholic practice as well.  Think about all the things Catholics do in public worship and in private devotions.  The Mass is full of intentions stated and prayers made through symbols and symbolic actions.  We use incense to symbolize the presence of God and sending prayers up to heaven (without believing that the incense is literally, physically, carrying our prayers or making it possible for God to hear them).  We use candles to symbolize the presence of Christ and his light, and Catholics privately often light a candle as a symbolic way to indicate "I'm sending prayers up to God."  Priests wear robes to symbolize their role as representatives of Christ.  We make the sign of the cross as a prayer to God.  We genuflect to show devotion and reverence.  We crown Mary in May as an expression of honoring her (and therefore the God who makes her honorable by his grace).  And we could go on and on.  We should also add that this works both ways.  That is, God communicates with us as well by means of symbolism and symbolic actions.   In the Catholic worldview, God gives us sacraments because we are physical, temporal-spatial beings who find it very helpful to have an invisible relationship with an invisible God and invisible grace communicated to us through tangible objects, events, and activities.  And beyond the sacraments, there are a host of "sacramentals."  Anything can be a means by which God communicates with us and gives himself and his grace to us.  We can experience God in nature, in other people, in the events of our lives, in stories, in myths and symbols, in music, in other forms of art, etc.  God reaches us through the created world.

Before I leave this subject, let me refer you to the famous "St. Patrick's Breastplate" - a well-known prayer coming from the tradition of Celtic Christianity.  Read through this prayer (which you can find at the link).  If you are familiar with the forms and language of pagan rituals, what you read in this prayer is going to sound very familiar.  The language of this prayer is reminiscent of a pagan "spellcasting."  The author "binds" to himself the power of God and all sorts of natural powers as well.  He calls on these powers to protect him, to encircle him (very reminiscent of the idea of "casting a circle"), etc.  This prayer sounds like it could be interpreted as a kind of magical incantation, and yet it has been widely recognized as an honored Christian prayer for nearly two millennia.  But, of course, it is not an attempt to practice "magic" in the sense condemned by the Catechism.  I bring it up as an example, on the Christian side, of how a variety of forms of language can be used to express Christian spirituality.  Similarly, the language and practices of Neo-Paganism can often be interpreted in different ways and are in fact interpreted in various ways within the Neo-Pagan community. 

Brief disclaimer here, just to be clear:  I am not saying that pagan language or rituals, even understood with the best - from a Catholic point of view - intentions, or interpreted in ways consistent with a Catholic worldview, should necessarily be adopted by Catholics.  There is serious danger of confusion, scandal, etc., as a lot of these elements carry a lot of cultural baggage.  I do think that it is possible to safely draw on some elements of pagan culture in some contexts (see the USCCB's comments on popular piety and its relation to culture for an example of Church teaching that encourages a prudent and careful assimilation of some cultural ideas into devotional practice), but this must be done with great care and prudence, with spiritual guidance, following Church teaching, rules, and authority, properly avoiding occasions of scandal or any inclination towards confusion or syncretism, etc.

But while we must be aware of the dangers and the need to be prudent, I want to end this section on a positive note:  One danger of failing to bring nuance to our evaluation of "magick," "witchcraft," etc., in the Neo-Pagan world is that we can end up rejecting things that are positive and good that are a part of these ideas and practices.  The pagan world has wisdom that we can learn from.  The "witchy vibe," so to speak, is associated with an appreciation for nature and a desire to interact with it.  It is associated with respect for natural cycles, for the environment, and for the human body.  The practice of herbcraft, in addition to its symbolic and ritual value, is useful for medicinal purposes.  The witchy aesthetic is one that is appealing to many people (because of its association with the sorts of things we've just mentioned, and because of its own unique cultural beauty).  We've already mentioned the value of symbolic and ritual practices in human psychology and in the spiritual life.  People are drawn to paganism and witchcraft because of these kinds of things, and they are good things.  They are things that a Catholic worldview, full-orbed and properly balanced, should lead us to as well.  We should be grateful to the pagan world for reminding us of these things and calling us to practice them more fully and consistently.

Polytheism and Idolatry

The other thing I wanted to talk about in this post is the pagan practice of worshipping other deities.  Paragraphs #2112-2114 in the Catechism provide a set of warnings on this subject similar to the warnings we looked at earlier about "magic" and "divination":

2112 The first commandment condemns polytheism. It requires man neither to believe in, nor to venerate, other divinities than the one true God. Scripture constantly recalls this rejection of "idols, [of] silver and gold, the work of men's hands. They have mouths, but do not speak; eyes, but do not see." These empty idols make their worshippers empty: "Those who make them are like them; so are all who trust in them."⁴² God, however, is the "living God"⁴³ who gives life and intervenes in history.

2113 Idolatry not only refers to false pagan worship. It remains a constant temptation to faith. Idolatry consists in divinizing what is not God. Man commits idolatry whenever he honors and reveres a creature in place of God, whether this be gods or demons (for example, satanism), power, pleasure, race, ancestors, the state, money, etc. Jesus says, "You cannot serve God and mammon."⁴⁴ Many martyrs died for not adoring "the Beast"⁴⁵ refusing even to simulate such worship. Idolatry rejects the unique Lordship of God; it is therefore incompatible with communion with God.⁴⁶

2114 Human life finds its unity in the adoration of the one God. The commandment to worship the Lord alone integrates man and saves him from an endless disintegration. Idolatry is a perversion of man's innate religious sense. An idolater is someone who "transfers his indestructible notion of God to anything other than God."⁴⁷

As you can see here, what the Catechism is concerned about with reference to "idolatry" and "false pagan worship" is the making of something that is not God out to be God and treating it as God, or leaving behind the concept of "One Supreme Being" for a plurality of independent absolute deities.  This is a deadly sin from a Catholic point of view, because God is the sole ultimate source of life and goodness.  To treat something that is not God as if it is God, then, is like turning away from a pure spring of water and instead trying to drink from an empty hole of sand.  It is gravely dishonoring to God, who deserves our supreme love, and fatal to our spiritual life and happiness.  (Although it should also be noted that the Church teaches that a person can potentially be in a right relationship with God without necessarily being able to explicitly recognize and articulate this reality.  See, for example, Lumen Gentium #16.)

The Catechism clearly has "paganism" and "pagan worship" of some kind in mind as examples of idolatry.  But does everything that goes on under the label of "Neo-Pagan" belief and practice fall under this condemnation?  Again, it is not the intention of the Catechism here to be providing a holistic evaluation of every aspect of the actual culture of Neo-Paganism.  This is not an attempt at interreligious dialogue with a concrete, particular group of people.  When we move beyond simply providing some warnings about dangerous "pagan" practices out there and begin to evaluate an actually-existing body of people and their culture on a more holistic level, honesty and charity require us to recognize all the existing nuances and complexity.

In the previous section, I talked about how different pagans differently understand pagan rituals and magickal practices.  The same thing applies to pagan ideas about gods and other supernatural entities.  Some pagans take a more "literal" view of pagan beliefs and believe in various gods and other entities who are actually-existing beings and exist as supreme and absolute principles in their own right, independent of one Supreme Being.  Other pagans might believe in a single Supreme Reality of some sort and see various gods as manifestations or as personifications of different aspects or attributes of that One Being.  Yet other pagans might be more naturalistic and view the gods and other supernatural entities not as actually-existing entities (or even as manifestations of aspects of some real Entity) but as personifications of certain natural phenomena or values or ideals.  (Listen to this pagan podcast for an interesting conversation about the different ways pagans can relate to pagan "mythology.")  Once again, this diversity of viewpoints within paganism makes it difficult to evaluate pagan beliefs from a Catholic point of view.  If I believe that Artemis is an actually-existing person who exists independently from the Supreme Being and who is to be worshiped as a supreme principle in her own right, my beliefs fall into the category warned against in the Catechism.  This way of thinking and worshiping is going to be incompatible with Catholic faith.  However, what if I view Artemis as a kind of mythic symbol, a personification of nature and the wildness of nature, and I interact with her as a symbol in a non-literal way in order to more concretely think about and interact with the natural world (and perhaps also with the Supreme Ultimate Reality behind nature that is the source of nature)?  Or what if I see Artemis as a portrayal of some particular aspect of the overall nature of the Supreme Being and, as such, a "ray of light" as if were by which that Being in part communicates itself to me and connects with me?  Or what if I view Artemis as an actually-existing entity, but regard her not as a supreme independent entity (and so not to be "worshiped" in the sense of "given the honor belonging only to the Supreme Being") but as a created being derived from God who reflects in a limited way certain aspects of God's divine life - like an angel - and I interpret her existence and role in other ways consistent with a Catholic view of the universe (C.S. Lewis provides an example of how one might do this in his novel That Hideous Strength where he makes gods like Mercury and Jupiter to be rulers over planetary systems - a kind of super-angel created by God and under God)?  In itself, I don't see anything in these interpretations that is contrary to the fundamental concerns of Catholic faith.  (Though, again, I am not saying that Catholics should necessarily adopt these ideas or practices.)  So if we've got a group of pagans having some kind of devotion to Artemis, I think we'll find, from a Catholic point of view, that some interpretations of what is going on might be inconsistent with a Catholic worldview while other interpretations might not be - again, making it difficult to evaluate overall what is happening from a Catholic point of view.

Pagan rituals often involve an acknowledgment of the elements of earth, air, fire, and water, as well as other creatures and forces of nature, sometimes personifying them.  Is this idolatry?  It can be.  And yet it need not be understood in this way.  Consider St. Francis of Assisi's famous "Canticle of the Creatures" (sometimes also called the "Canticle of the Sun").  This poem personifies and honors elements of the natural world, calling them "Brother Sun," "Sister Moon," "Sister Water," "Brother Wind," "Brother Fire," and "Sister Mother Earth."  There is nothing wrong, from a Catholic point of view, with personifying natural realities, recognizing God's beauty reflected in them, and giving them due honor (not worship), or even calling on created beings for help (as Catholics do when they pray to saints for their intercession).

As I mentioned in my earlier article as well, two great Christian authors in modern times who have recognized and promoted the value of myths, symbols, and stories, including ones drawn from paganism, were C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien.  I referred in that article to Tolkien's wonderful essay "On Fairy-Stories," and we can see the positive value of myths reflected, of course, in his famous Silmarillion and Lord of the Rings.  We see the same thing in C.S. Lewis.  For example, Lewis uses the word "magic" in a neutral way and refers to "good magic" and "bad magic" (I gave an example of this from The Silver Chair in my previous article).  In The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, Lewis refers to the principles and laws that allow Aslan to be sacrificed in the place of the traitor Eustace as "Deep Magic from the Dawn of Time."  He refers to the law that allowed Aslan to come back to life since he made himself, who had committed no treachery, a willing victim on behalf of a traitor a "deeper magic" from before the dawn of time.

There is a fascinating passage from Lewis's Prince Caspian (the second book in The Chronicles of Narnia) in which a bacchanal occurs and the god Bacchus and his companion the satyr Silenus show up.  This is about as pagan as you can get!  (Remember that, in the Chronicles, the lion Aslan is God himself.)

    The crowd and the dance round Aslan (for it had become a dance once more) grew so thick and rapid that Lucy was confused. She never saw where certain other people came from who were soon capering about among the trees. One was a youth, dressed only in a fawn-skin, with vine-leaves wreathed in his curly hair. His face would have been almost too pretty for a boy's, if it had not looked so extremely wild. You felt, as Edmund said when he saw him a few days later, "There's a chap who might do anything—absolutely anything." He seemed to have a great many names—Bromios, Bassareus, and the Ram were three of them. There were a lot of girls with him, as wild as he. There was even, unexpectedly, someone on a donkey. And everybody was laughing: and every body was shouting out, "Euan, euan, eu-oi-oi-oi."

    "Is it a Romp, Aslan?" cried the youth. And apparently it was. But nearly everyone seemed to have a different idea as to what they were playing. It may have been Tig, but Lucy never discovered who was It. It was rather like Blind Man's Buff, only everyone behaved as if they were blindfolded. It was not unlike Hunt the Slipper, but the slipper was never found. What made it more complicated was that the man on the donkey, who was old and enormously fat, began calling out at once, "Refreshments! Time for refreshments," and falling off his donkey and being bundled on to it again by the others, while the donkey was under the impression that the whole thing was a circus, and tried to give a display of walking on its hind legs. And all the time there were more and more vine leaves everywhere. And soon not only leaves but vines. They were climbing up everything. They were running up the legs of the tree people and circling round their necks. Lucy put up her hands to push back her hair and found she was pushing back vine branches. The donkey was a mass of them. His tail was completely entangled and something dark was nodding between his ears. Lucy looked again and saw it was a bunch of grapes. After that it was mostly grapes—overhead and underfoot and all around.

After the bacchanal dies down, Lucy and Susan have a fascinating brief conversation:    

    "I say, Su, I know who they are."

    "Who?"

    "The boy with the wild face is Bacchus and the old one on the donkey is Silenus. Don't you remember Mr Tumnus telling us about them long ago?"

    "Yes, of course. But I say, Lu——"

    "What?"

    "I wouldn't have felt very safe with Bacchus and all his wild girls if we'd met them without Aslan."

    "I should think not," said Lucy.¹

Lewis is making a fascinating theological point here.  He is presenting pagan-derived myths and symbols in a positive light, but adding that they are only safe when they are anchored to the ultimate reality of God and subservient to him.  I think this presents a powerful image of how a Christian can be enriched by the spiritual and cultural fruits of paganism if he/she takes them not in opposition to, but subservient to and as an expression of, the reality of the one Supreme Being who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  These are positive values of paganism understood and appreciated within the context of a Christian worldview.  (Though, again, much caution must be had here because of the danger of confusion and scandal.)

(For more on how Lewis and Tolkien were inspired by paganism in their works, see here.)

Conclusion

In conclusion, then, I hope I have shown some of the nuances that one must bring to the table when trying to understand and evaluate pagan beliefs and practices from within a Catholic Christian point of view.  And we've only touched on a few points.  We could certainly dive even deeper into an examination of various rituals and practices as well as other moral and cultural characteristics of the Neo-Pagan world.  I've been reflecting on these things recently not only in the interest of understanding and dialoguing with Neo-Pagans, but also as a way of enhancing my own spiritual life as a Catholic Christian, recognizing the challenges but also learning from, appreciating, and being enriched by what is good.

Merry meet, merry part, and merry meet again!  Blessed Be!

1  C.S. Lewis, Prince Caspian (New York: Collier Books, 1970), 152-154.

Published on the feast of St. Alban.

A Catholic in a Pagan Land: My Experiences at Oak Spirit Sanctuary

Likewise, other religions found everywhere try to counter the restlessness of the human heart, each in its own manner, by proposing "ways," comprising teachings, rules of life, and sacred rites. The Catholic Church rejects nothing that is true and holy in these religions. She regards with sincere reverence those ways of conduct and of life, those precepts and teachings which, though differing in many aspects from the ones she holds and sets forth, nonetheless often reflect a ray of that Truth which enlightens all men. . . .  The Church, therefore, exhorts her sons, that through dialogue and collaboration with the followers of other religions, carried out with prudence and love and in witness to the Christian faith and life, they recognize, preserve and promote the good things, spiritual and moral, as well as the socio-cultural values found among these men.

~ Nostra Aetate, Second Vatican Council

So I've been hanging out with pagans lately.

There is a pagan community and nature preserve about thirty minutes away from where I live called Oak Spirit Sanctuary.  I came across it about three-and-a-half months ago as I was looking to enhance my celebration of the Advent-Christmas season.  I'm a medievophile, and I've always been attracted to the ethos of the (European, especially English) Middle Ages.  I'm the kind of person who likes to hang out at Renaissance festivals.  I love Arthuriana, Robin Hood, Vikings, and all the rest.  I'm attracted to the seasonal and cultural celebrations that accompanied the celebrations of the Church Year in medieval and Renaissance times.  So, this past Christmas, I was looking for some kind of classic "Yule"-type celebration to enhance my other Christmas traditions.  Oak Spirit Sanctuary (OSS) was having such a celebration, so I decided to attend.

Anyone who knows me knows that this sort of boundary-crossing is nothing new to me.  I've always been inclined to wander out of my own circles to explore those of others.  I love crossing boundaries and bringing separate worlds together.  In my high school days I used to attend synagogue regularly, hang out at mosques, and go Christmas caroling with Latter-day Saints, among other things.  During my synagogue-attending days I began to learn some Hebrew.  When the members of Temple Beth-El (a small, Reform Jewish congregation in Sedalia, MO) found out about that, they invited me to join the rotation in leading Shabbat services on Friday nights.  The congregation was too small to keep their own rabbi during most of the year, so the members would rotate leading the services.

When I attended the Yule event at OSS, I very quickly fell in love with the place and with the community, and so I decided to continue to visit.  OSS follows a yearly cycle of celebrations common in some forms of Neo-Paganism, a cycle which tracks to a significant degree the seasonal celebrations in various parts of medieval Europe and which were, in various ways, often celebrated by Christians as well.  In fact, it is often very difficult historically to separate pagan and Christian strands out of these traditions because the two cultures became so intertwined.  In addition to Yule, I have now attended Imbolc and Ostara as well (I'll talk about these a bit more below).

As a Catholic Christian who believes in the value of crossing boundaries in this kind of way, I wanted to take some time to briefly describe my own experience and how this works for me and to provide some general reflections.  It is a bit tricky to write an article like this, since I recognize that I may have readers from both Christian and pagan backgrounds.  The different mindsets of these traditions (with their different beliefs, concerns, ways of using language, etc.) make it difficult to speak in a way that will communicate well to both groups at the same time, but I'll do my best!

A Nuanced Relationship

First of all, I am a mainstream, orthodox Catholic, faithful to the Catholic faith as taught by the Magisterium of the Catholic Church.  I have a friend who describes himself as a Catholic of a heretical variety.  He takes elements of Catholicism and blends them with elements of other religions in his own way without a commitment to be consistent with official Catholic teaching.  His experience is a fascinating one, to be sure, but it is not the same as mine in this respect.  My commitment to orthodox Catholicism provides both incentives as well as challenges to my attempt to make a religious connection outside the boundaries of the Catholic Church and Christianity.

There are incentives.  As my quotation at the beginning of this article illustrates, the Catholic Church recognizes that there is truth and beauty in other religious traditions, and she encourages her children not only to recognize that but to respect, and even to preserve and to promote, such goodness and beauty.  At the same time, there are challenges.  There are elements of pagan practice that are inconsistent with orthodox Catholic belief and practice.

What this means for me is that my participation with the community at OSS has to be carefully nuanced.  I want to join in with whatever I can, but there are elements from which I have to remain aloof.  For example, as a Catholic, I will not participate in the invoking of spirits, magical practices, or the worship of pagan or nature deities.

For Catholics, one of the concerns about invoking spirits is that there is a danger of becoming involved with evil spirits.  When I participate in events at OSS, I carry a rosary and cross and a pendant dedicated to Mary as well as praying for God's special protection and the protection of his angels.

But, while I must remain aloof from some things, I choose to see my relationship with OSS in an overall positive way, and I find much that I not only can participate in but that I find to be greatly enriching to my spiritual and personal life.

Some Beautiful and Valuable Virtues of Paganism

The spirit of modern paganism, at least of the sort encountered at OSS, I would characterize as one of joy and celebration.  It is a delightful spirit that fills my heart with great encouragement and joy!  When I listen to pagan folk music and participate with the community at OSS, I often find myself filled with the exuberance and joy of life.  There is a great spirit of festivity, but a festivity full of religious mystery as well.  It is difficult to convey this atmosphere in writing to someone who has not experienced it.  Ironically (or perhaps not?), as I search about for some way of conveying the atmosphere I am speaking of, what comes to mind is the many instances of fauns, dryads, nymphs, and others dancing and celebrating in Christian author C.S. Lewis's famous Chronicles of Narnia.  In The Horse and His Boy, the faun Tumnus describes the Summer Festival in Narnia, where "there'll be bonfires and all-night dances of Fauns and Dryads in the heart of the woods."¹  Here is a snippet of a description of the Narnian "Great Snowball Dance" from The Silver Chair:

The noises she had been hearing turned out to be of two kinds: the rhythmical thump of several feet, and the music of four fiddles, three flutes, and a drum. She also got her own position clear. She was looking out of a hole in a steep bank which sloped down and reached the level about fourteen feet below her. Everything was very white. A lot of people were moving about. Then she gasped! The people were trim little Fauns, and Dryads with leaf-crowned hair floating behind them. For a second they looked as if they were moving anyhow; then she saw that they were really doing a dance—a dance with so many complicated steps and figures that it took you some time to understand it. Then it came over her like a thunderclap that the pale, blue light was really moonlight, and the white stuff on the ground was really snow. And of course! There were the stars staring in a black frosty sky overhead. And the tall black things behind the dancers were trees. They had not only got out into the upper world at last, but had come out in the heart of Narnia. Jill felt she could have fainted with delight; and the music—the wild music, intensely sweet and yet just the least bit eerie too, and full of good magic as the Witch's thrumming had been full of bad magic—made her feel it all the more.

    All this takes a long time to tell, but of course it took a very short time to see. . . .  Circling round and round the dancers was a ring of Dwarfs, all dressed in their finest clothes; mostly scarlet with fur-lined hoods and golden tassels and big furry top-boots. As they circled round they were all diligently throwing snowballs. (Those were the white things that Jill had seen flying through the air.) They weren't throwing them at the dancers as silly boys might have been doing in England. They were throwing them through the dance in such perfect time with the music and with such perfect aim that if all the dancers were in exactly the right places at exactly the right moments, no-one would be hit. This is called the Great Snow Dance and it is done every year in Narnia on the first moonlit night when there is snow on the ground. Of course it is a kind of game as well as a dance, because every now and then some dancer will be the least little bit wrong and get a snowball in the face, and then everyone laughs. But a good team of dancers, Dwarfs, and musicians will keep it up for hours without a single hit. On fine nights when the cold and the drum-taps, and the hooting of the owls, and the moonlight, have got into their wild, woodland blood and made it even wilder, they will dance till daybreak. I wish you could see it for yourselves.²

In these descriptions, I feel like Lewis has captured the atmosphere I have often felt at pagan events.  There is a spirit there that fills the heart with a sense of exuberance, deep joy, freedom, and mysterious transcendence all at once, and which leaves one feeling one has encountered the Love and Joy that is at the root of all things.  This is something that we Christians can resonate with and totally get behind.  Christianity tells us that at the heart of all things there is a kind of Great Dance of love and joy - the Life of God.  The foundation of all existence is the Supreme Being who is a Trinity of Persons, whose Being is the fullness of Goodness, Truth, and Beauty.  The members of this Trinity - Father, Son. and Holy Spirit - eternally share this Divine Life and Beauty with each other in a relationship of supreme Love.  The creation of the world is the overflow and outpouring of that Life and Love filling up the nothingness with their beauty and joy.  And redemption in Christ is all about bringing all of us, who have been alienated from that Divine Life, back into full communion with it.  When I am at a pagan event, God uses the spirit of that celebration to help put me in connection with this Divine Life.

The pagan atmosphere I have experienced is also one of love, compassion, empathy, caring, community, and the celebration of differences and individuality.  One of the mottos of OSS is "Welcome Home!"  And they truly mean it and practice it.  Pagan spirituality and culture emphasizes the uniqueness of individuals and encourages the celebration of that uniqueness.  People of all sorts are welcomed and loved and appreciated.  From my first moments visiting at Yule, I felt at home.  I felt I was able to be myself and that I would be valued and appreciated for who I am.  We are one common humanity, and this is something one feels at OSS.  It has been deeply meaningful for me personally.  And, again, it is something Christians can get behind.  We are all made in God's image and reflect, to some degree, his glory.  We have value as our unique selves.  Christian imagery describes the Church - the people of God - as a Body, which has a unity but consists of many distinct parts which are all important in their own way.  "But God has so adjusted the body, giving the greater honor to the inferior part, that there may be no discord in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another.  If one member suffers, all suffer together; if one member is honored, all rejoice together" (1 Corinthians 12:24-26, RSVCE).³

Paganism encourages a deep connection to nature which I also appreciate.  The world is God's creation, and it is full of life from God.  It is something to be celebrated and protected and nurtured.  God connects to us through it.  During my time at OSS so far, I have already been encouraged to think more deeply about my own connection to nature.  At the Ostara event this past weekend, there was a lecture about native Missouri flowers and an encouragement to plant them and spread them.  I've had very little connection in my own life to gardening and planting, but I've been concerned for some time about the harm that our industrial society has done and continues to do to nature (not to mention the harm it does to our fellow human beings) and I have wanted to learn better how to live in a more nature-nurtuing way.  Paganism's interest in and love of nature provides a much-needed emphasis here and I look forward to learning more from various members of the community.

Appreciating the Sacred in a Pagan Context

Christians have often recognized that God communicates truth and grace through the myths and practices of other religions insofar as they are rays reflecting the truth and beauty of God.  I have encountered that at OSS in a number of ways.

I have already mentioned pagan celebrations and rituals.  Pagan rituals involve elements that, as a Catholic, I cannot participate in, such as directly invoking spirits, worshiping various deities, and practicing magic.  During these celebrations, I must bow out at certain times.  But even when I must bow out, I can recognize elements of truth, goodness, and beauty that are there.  At the Ostara festival this past weekend, the focus was on saying farewell to winter and welcoming spring.  This was made concrete by the burning of an effigy of the goddess Marzanna after holding a wake for her dead form (symbolizing the dying and passing of winter).  Another element of the ritual observances was an enactment based on the myth of Persephone, who lives with her husband Hades in the underworld during the winter but comes back to bring new life to the earth in the springtime, returning to her mother Demeter.  As a myth, I can recognize much truth and value in it, as I, too, live in the world and experience the changing of the seasons.  Enacting out these seasonal truths in a kind of concrete ritual celebration is not something that need be foreign to Christian sensibility, though Christians would not invoke or worship Persephone, Demeter, etc., as actual deities.  And these myths have a deeper significance also, as they point to the fact that, spiritually speaking as well, life leads to death, and new life cannot come about except through death.  To reach the Divine Life, we must die to self and to sin.  We must suffer and be crucified with Christ in order to rise with him.  God himself has died in order to bring us new life, and we must walk this path he has opened for us.  (Romans 6; Galatians 2:20; etc.)  The changing of the seasons is a temporal reality which points us to this deeper spiritual truth.  During these celebrations, while abstaining from elements incompatible with my Catholic faith, I was able to participate in and be enriched by elements that were not only compatible with but which also fed my own Christian experience.

Myths, symbols, fantasy - all of these have been and are used by God to reach us and connect with us.  Christians have often considered these things as "preparations for the gospel," and they can enrich our spiritual experience as Christians.  I have been greatly enriched here by the thinking of modern Christian writers C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien (the latter a Catholic), both of whom used elements of pagan-inspired myth to convey spiritual realities and believed that this is a valuable practice.  We've already seen this in my earlier quotations from The Chronicles of Narnia.  Pagan references abound in this series.  In Lewis's Space Trilogy, we see the gods and goddesses associated with various planets make an appearance in a positive way.  (See especially the chapter "The Descent of the Gods" in That Hideous Strength.)  And Tolkien introduces us to elves, goblins, and many other pagan-myth-inspired characters and creatures.  The characters in his mythology also include the Ainur, who are powerful beings that are involved in the creation of the world and are often honored and invoked by the elves.  In a fascinating and beautiful essay, "On Fairy-Stories," Tolkien laid out his vision of how all of these things are connected.  I highly recommend it.  In that essay, Tolkien says, "God is the Lord, of angels, and of men--and of elves."⁴

Nostra Aetate, the Church document from the Second Vatican Council I quoted from at the beginning of this article, after telling us that all religions "reflect a ray of that Truth which enlightens all men," goes on to say that the Church "proclaims, and ever must proclaim Christ 'the way, the truth, and the life' (John 14:6), in whom men may find the fullness of religious life, in whom God has reconciled all things to Himself."⁵  Catholics have often spoken of Christianity as the fulfillment and the fullness of all religion.  This sounds condescending to a pagan perspective, for obvious reasons, and yet what is meant is simply that Catholics see Christianity and the Christian gospel as true.  We believe it is true that there is one God, that he is a Trinity of Persons, that this one God created the world, that the world has fallen away from God, that God has reconciled and saved the world through Christ, etc.  If these things are really true, then all other truths must find their context in these great overarching truths.  For me, therefore, all spiritual practices and experiences direct me to God through Christ as their ultimate goal and context.  All the truth and goodness and beauty found in the spiritual and the natural world flow from the foundation of the blessed fullness of life and love found in the Trinity and ultimately lead us back to the Trinity.

There are many stone circles and fire rings at OSS.  Yes, there are elements in these things that Christians must remain aloof from.  But the symbolism of these kinds of places - like the myths and images drawn from paganism in The Lord of the Rings and The Chronicles of Narnia - can also be a means of divine grace and experience of the divine.  Because fantasy and pagan and medieval culture have been important parts of my own spiritual formation, I find myself deeply touched by these kinds of places, and I experience the sacred in them (cautiously!).  There is a beautiful ritual circle area at OSS called Redbud Circle.  I spent some time by myself there this past weekend and felt a deep connection to nature and to the sacredness of the place (sacred to me because of the symbolism connected to my background), and through these things to the divine life.  There was a wonderful moment where I was in the midst of this experience and I heard a flock of wild geese in the distance.  Wild geese are meaningful to me as a symbol of God's presence with me - something I derived years ago from Celtic Christianity which often uses the goose as a symbol of the Holy Spirit.  So the combination of wild geese with the sacredness and beauty of Redbud Circle was deeply meaningful to me.  My spiritual experience during this time also brought me in touch with difficult life-experiences I have been going through lately and had an encouraging and cathartic effect on me, helping to continue my healing.

There is another spot on the land called "Aphrodite's Grove" - a shrine area dedicated to the goddess Aphrodite.  The goddess Aphrodite has personal meaning for me because of my own personal history.  At the very beginning of my awakening to spiritual life and practice, back when I was thirteen years old, I got for my birthday a computer game (for my old Amiga computer - this was 1990) called Conquests of Camelot: The Search for the Grail.  In this game, the player plays King Arthur who is searching for the Holy Grail to save his kingdom.  The game designer, Christy Marx, clearly had a lot of Neo-Pagan influence.  A major portion of the plot has to do with the Great Goddess and her manifestations in other goddesses.  The Goddess particularly manifests as Aphrodite, and it is ultimately Aphrodite from whom Arthur must attain the Grail by passing a number of spiritual, mental, and physical tests.  This game played an important role in awakening my spiritual sense and helped form the symbolism and imagery that would be meaningful to me throughout my life, so Aphrodite has always been an important spiritual symbol for me.  Just to be clear - as a Catholic, I do not worship the goddess Aphrodite.  However, she is a symbol of what might be called "the divine feminine."  God connects to us in a variety of ways.  He connects to us directly, but, according to Catholic spirituality, he also connects us to through his saints (and through sacraments, sacramentals, and other tangible means).  There are Catholic saints who are patrons of various things, paralleling in some ways how pagan deities are gods or goddesses of particular things.  The saints are not deities, but they are full of God's grace and so reflect, to some degree, his glory and goodness, and we honor them because of the presence of the divine life manifested in them.  They intercede with us before God.  God blesses us through them.  The ultimate Saint is the Virgin Mary, the Mother of God, who is Full of Grace.  Catholic theology defines "grace" as the "gift of the divine life."  In Mary, we have an image - a feminine image - of a person filled with God's grace and thus with the divine life, reflecting the beauty of that life.  God communicates truth and beauty to us through the feminine person and image of the Virgin Mary.  So, while Mary is not God and not to be worshiped as God, she manifests the divine life and so can be called, in a sense, a manifestation - the manifestation - of the divine feminine.  Myths and images of the Goddess in paganism also manifest to some degree the beauty of the divine life (again, as God uses myths and symbols to communicate himself to us and connect with us, like I talked about earlier).  So there is a connection between pagan images/ideas of the Goddess and the Virgin Mary.  For me, therefore, there is a connection particularly between Aphrodite and the Virgin Mary, because Aphrodite, to me, is a mythic symbol that God has used to connect with me, manifesting the beauty of the divine through a feminine image, and the Virgin Mary also connects with that reality.  I was therefore delighted to find a shrine to Aphrodite on the land.  And I was even more delighted when I found that among the statues and images at the shrine, there is a statue of the Virgin Mary.  I had never encountered this connection before outside my own experience, so this was a very meaningful manifestation of God's providence for me.

The festival of Imbolc, which I attended last month, focused on the Irish goddess Brigid.  The central ritual involved calling on Brigid to bring hope in the coming year.  But Brigid the goddess is bound up with St. Brigid of Kildare, a famous Irish saint (the patroness saint of Ireland).  Imbolc is also called St. Brigid's Day.  This is a good example of the historical overlap and interwoven quality of pagan and Christian practices and celebrations.  While I could not invoke Brigid as a goddess, I was able to celebrate St. Brigid (whose associations parallel those of her goddess version to a great degree) and participate in that way with the community (while abstaining from the specifically magical and deity-worshiping elements).

Time for a very brief excursus:  Why do Catholics not consider the saints to be minor deities?  There is no doubt that there is significant overlap between how gods and goddesses function in paganism and how the saints function in Catholicism (especially when various deities are seen as manifestations of some higher Supreme Being).  The parallels are striking and obvious.  (Protestants are often happy to point them out as they accuse Catholicism of being too pagan!)  I think the difference is rooted in the different worldview-constructs of paganism vs. Christianity.  In paganism, polytheism is often at the core of the view of the world.  The universe is a place of chaos where various gods bring a limited order.  The gods have a kind of independence.  They are even often at odds with each other in the myths of various cultures.  Monotheism, on the other hand, roots the universe in the unified order of one Supreme Being (although Christianity makes that supreme reality one of relationship and love because of the Trinity).  There are no competing principalities.  Even Satan and his demons are fallen angels, deriving everything from God and only doing their works under God's permissive will.  In this view, only one Being has a right to be treated as Supreme.  There are no other autonomous or independent powers or authorities.  The Abrahamic traditions manifest this conviction by refusing to allow other entities besides God to be treated as deities, maintaining a strict ontological divide between Creator and creatures.  And yet, in these traditions, other entities exist and have limited supernatural powers (derived ultimately from God).  Angels are created by God.  The saints, including Mary, are mere humans who have been raised up to share in the divine life as a gift of unmerited grace (a destiny all of us are called to).  So, in Christian language, we do not "worship" angels or saints as "gods," and Christians must stay away from giving "worship" - supreme value and authority - to any being other than God.  (However, there are some forms of paganism in a broad sense - Hinduism being perhaps the most obvious example - where there is a strong recognition of a Supreme Being and that lesser deities are derived from him.  I think there is room for fruitful dialogue here regarding how we should understand the similarities and the differences between this kind of view and the view of the Abrahamic religions.)

My love of and history with Arthuriana also gives me a connection to paganism, as the legend of King Arthur is something both traditions have an interest in and the Arthur story has been told in both Christian and in pagan ways (and often involving a mix of the two).  In the early days of OSS, the community was called Ozark Avalon, a reference to Arthurian legend.

Catholic and pagan cultures also share the celebration of May and Maying traditions.  I've always been attracted to Maying traditions because of their connection with medieval culture and with Arthurian and Robin Hood stories.  Maying festivies have included things like maypole dancing and the crowning of a May Queen and sometimes a May King.  OSS, along with many pagan groups, celebrates Beltane, a pagan version of this Maying tradition which involves such historic customs.  While pagans at OSS will be crowning May royalty, Catholics in the community will be celebrating the Virgin Mary who is associated with the month of May.  In fact, one of the common traditions among Catholics during May is to give Mary a May Crowning where statues of the Virgin are crowned with wreaths of flowers, celebrating Mary as Queen of Heaven and Earth.  Mary is the ultimate May Queen!

A Beautiful and Loving Community

The time I've spent at Oak Spirit Sanctuary so far has been deeply enriching and meaningful to me.  I have been enriched by the connection to nature, the sacredness of the land, the spiritual practices, and, certainly not least, the wonderfully joyful and caring community.  OSS has given me an acceptance and welcome that has meant a lot to me.  Even in the short time I've been visiting, I have come to love this community.  One of my friends at OSS told me that people tend to find out about the community when they need it.  This has certainly been true for me, and I am forever grateful to the people of the community for their love and acceptance of me even over just these past three months.  I look forward to many years to come.  I mentioned above that one of the mottos of OSS is "Welcome home!"  It's on the sign on the front gate and people say it to each other frequently.  This, again, is personally meaningful to me because I have often remembered over the years since becoming Catholic how one of my RCIA sponsors who helped guide me into the Catholic Church back in 2016 wrote a congratulatory card to myself and my family upon our entering the Church, and in that card she wrote, "Congratulations and welcome home!"  Catholics often say that to those who have joined the Church, and I've always treasured that welcome.  I don't believe that anything happens by chance, and I am grateful to God for the parallel.

The Value of Crossing Borders

All of us are members of the same human family, but we all-too-often miss out on the full experience of that fact because, for most of us, it is our tendency to stay within our own borders.  We also often miss all the truth and beauty that we have to share with each other.  As a Christian, my spiritual life is greatly enriched because of my ability to draw from the rich spiritual experiences in pagan life and practice.  I am grateful to God that he has given me a personality that has a natural tendency to want to cross borders and bring people together, and I see it as a calling in my life to help build these kinds of connections.  The Church has encouraged us Catholics to get out and get to know our other human brothers and sisters, to dialogue, to collaborate, and to help build together a respectful and loving community.  This was a major theme of one of Pope Francis's recent encyclicals, Fratelli Tutti (which means "all brothers"), which closes with a couple of beautiful prayers asking God to help us remember our common humanity and to work together in love to better the world.

During the closing ritual at Ostara this past weekend, one of the celebrants reminded us that life is followed by death, but that through death comes new life.  I left that celebration to go to St. Thomas More Newman Center Parish in Columbia to celebrate Palm Sunday and the beginning of Holy Week, where Catholics celebrate how Christ's life led to his death, and how his death led to a resurrection of new life for himself and for all the world.  I can think of no connection more fitting!

St. Brigid, Holy Mary Mother of God, and all the saints, pray for us!

Blessed Be!

1  C.S. Lewis, The Horse and His Boy (New York: Collier Books, 1970), 72.

2  C.S. Lewis, The Silver Chair (New York: Collier Books, 1970), 191-193

3  The Revised Standard Version of the Bible: Catholic Edition (Washington, DC: The Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America, 1965, 1966), taken from the Bible Gateway website at https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1+Corinthians+12&version=RSVCE on 3/25/24.

4  J.R.R. Tolkien, "On Fairy-Stories", The Tolkien Reader (New York: Ballantine Books, 1966), 70-73).

5  Nostra Aetate (October 28, 1965) 2, http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vatii_decl_19651028_nostra-aetate_en.html.

Published on Monday of Holy Week

ADDENDUM 3/29/24:  Just to be clear, this article is autobiographical in nature, and is not intended as an overall catechesis on the Catholic view of non-Catholic religion.  If one is looking for a more holistic, objective catechesis of this sort, one might start (in addition to the content and the links already provided within the article, including the link to Fratelli Tutti) with Nostra Aetate #1, 2, and 5 (this is the Second Vatican Council document I quoted from in the article), and then one might look at The Catechism of the Catholic Church #836-848, 856.  If one wishes to go a bit further, one might also consult these documents here, here, and here.

While I'm "addending," let me also provide a link to Laudato Si, in which Pope Francis has laid out a case for the care we owe to nature (since I mentioned in the article how love of and care for nature is important in paganism).

ADDENDUM 6/22/24:  Since I wrote this article, I’ve been continuing to reflect on pagan ideas and practices.  My observations and reflections have led me to recognize greater nuances in how various concepts, like “magic,” are understood in the Neo-Pagan community.  See here for some further thoughts on some of these things, looking at them and evaluating them from the perspective of a Catholic worldview.

ADDENDUM 10/23/24:  See here for more on pagan inspiration in C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien.