Calling all pagans...?

Question

Were you raised pagan?
If not:
What religion were you raised with?
When did you break away from the religion of your youth?
Would you say you were enticed away by something new or pushed away by something you disagreed with?

Answer 1

Oh...I'm not a pagan. sorry.

By your post, I thought maybe you were having like a Pizza Party or something.

bummerrrrrrr

O'well.
.

Answer 2

I was not raised pagan. I was brought up as a sincere Christian in a mainline Protestant church and parted ways with the religion in my late teens after much struggle and consideration. I left because I realized that many of my beliefs and values did not match up with the core tenants of the faith.

I was not pushed or lured away, I simply decided that I needed to leave and avoid organized religion while I sorted some things out. Pagan religions did not come into the picture until a couple of years later, when I started my search for a religion that encompassed what I valued and believed more fully.

Answer 3

I wasn't raised with a certain religion. I was told that God didn't exist (which I still believe firmly) and that Karma happens to everyone and some really basic Buddhist principles. At age 11 I began to research religion, because I wanted to belong to an organized religion, per say. So I came across Wicca, and had always wondered about it (never thinking it was Satanic!) and studied it for approximately 6-8 months before deciding I wanted to be a part of it. I am now an Eclectic Wiccan and am proud!

Answer 4

No.
Assemblies of God (conservative Evangelical Christian)
When I was 18.
I discovered Paganism at 23, after church-shopping and then a period of "apatheism". I'm glad I had that break, because I may have entered Paganism for the wrong reasons. As it was, I was enticed by the descriptions I read in Marion Weinstein's Positive Magic and what my boyfriend at the time was telling me about worshipping a Goddess.

Answer 5

I grew up in the 70's with metaphysics---a philosophy called Macro Philosophy. It isn't a religion though so I had unnamed spirits and deities that I talked to and celebrated the turning of the seasons. My parents always allowed me to take the first day of spring off from school even though they believed in Christianity (they encouraged me to seek out what I felt was right). I have always been a lucid dreamer, burned candles for protection and incense for purification. I've never believed in absolutes.

I haven't broken away from what I believed back then, but I have added to it and defined it better. About half of my deities have names now instead of just titles. My practices have slowly evolved but my foundation is still the same. It's all I have ever known.

Answer 6

I was raised Catholic

I stopped considering myself a Catholic about 7-8 years ago

I was frustrated with some of the Christian beliefs (abortion, gay marriage). I felt like I couldn't just ignore these things when they were important issues to me.

I started reading up on lots of different religions. I didn't set out to find a new one, more to find out why the Christian God was the "right" one, and why other people, no matter how wonderful, were doomed to eternal "hell" just for seperate beliefs. The more I read on other religions, the more the one I raised with seemed wrong. I just kept reading and learning and feeling further away from my Christian/Catholic upbringing.

Answer 7

I was raised Methodist. I stared to become bored with it and to question the non answers that were given to questions In Jr.High
something told me their was more that what was preached to life
that stale sermons and contradictions between the spoken word and the written words.looked into several religions before settling on Celtic Paganism

Answer 8

I was exposed to Jehovah's witnesses, Catholics and southern baptist, but my father was a pagan. I broke away from the baptist church when I was 13. Took me til the age of about 20 to get rid of the church imposed guilt and have been a pagan ever since. Peace.

Answer 9

I was raised Catholic. When I was 11 I left the Catholic church and visited several other Christian denominations. At the age of 15 I realized I didn't believe what the church taught me. I felt empty and as if there was a huge secret being kept from me.

Blessings )O(

Answer 10

I'm not pagan, but I sympathize with ancient paganism. Polytheism is just more aesthetically pleasing: warring consciousnesses makes more sense when you're a conflict theorist. But I like Zeus and Odin and Ra and all of them folks, not this new wicca stuff.

Answer 11

i was born southern bapist and i left that completily when i "came of age" means legal age to have my own oppinion <18> i was neither draw away or actually repulse i just stumbled apon a website that spoke the words i had been saying for years so i guess i was born pagan but i couldn't say what i was til i was grown.