Why can't Wiccan traditionalists can us?

Question

Why can't they accept Solitary Wiccans, those who never practiced with a coven, as their brothers and sisters? Why?

With in some traditions of American Wicca Gerald Gardner has absolutely say over our practices.

Answer 1

Because they want to feel special, and exclude others. But Not to fear. Not all BTWs or even Coven initated feel that way. Just a vocal Minority.

:)

Answer 2

I am the Priestess of a coven, but we are not Wiccan, our path is much older than that. That being said, I have never turned away from or disrespected anyone who chooses to practice solitary. I offer them equal respect as any other pagan.
I always extend the hand of friendship to all the solitaries I know. And our coven has an outer circle of pagans who normally practice solitary, but like to gather with others for the big festivals.

Blessings on you and stay strong. You will find what you need; just ask.

Answer 3

OK, here's the thing Wicca is an initiatory religious system, that means you have to be brought in to it by someone who is already practicing it. While one can dedicate ones self to the path of Wicca, you just can't claim you are Wiccan, it would be like calling yourself a marine without having been through boot-camp.

This having been said, are there Solitary Wiccans? Yes, after they have been trained.

Honestly, there is nothing wrong with saying that you are a Solitary Pagan or a Solitary witch, but there is no way to be a Solitary Wiccan without having been in a coven first.

I have no problem recognizing my brothers and sisters of the Craft, I just prefer that they know of what they are speaking when they call themselves Wiccan.

Answer 4

Well, hon...it really depends on a lot of things.

Honestly, if you go around calling yourself a big-W Wiccan, it means certain things, and if you've only learned from a book or books, you don't have those things. And, frankly, I don't recommend that within the larger Pagan community you EVER say you're "Wiccan", because 1. BTW's don't refer to themselves that way, thus what you're trying to lay claim to, it's obvious you don't have 2. BTW's have identification phrases that they use with each other, and if you don't know them, you just make yourself look silly 3. THERE IS NOTHING WRONG with identifying yourself as a solitary WITCH.

Please understand that I myself am not Wiccan. I am coven-trained and initiated in two different Traditions, but neither of them are British Traditional Wicca. I'm also at least half hedge-witch, which is a proud and good thing to be.

There is a lot of confusion over this, I know. So let me be really precise here. If you're not initiated into BTW, you're not a big-W Wiccan. You're a Witch (or you can say a small-w wiccan, but that's not well understood without explanation), and there is NOTHING WRONG with being a Witch. Not everyone wants or needs to be BTW. I know that I don't. Further, BTW are NOT the only paths to legitimacy.

Covenant of the Goddess, for example, accepts as members Witches from a variety of different traditions and paths. you do NOT have to be BTW to be accepted. And CoG accepts Solitaries as members. Yes, there are qualifications you have to meet, and it's unlikely that you'll meet them if everything you know you got from one or two books, but it's certainly not impossible for a solitary hedge-witch to be accepted for membership.

As for me, I was a Solitary for years. I could and would be a Solitary again if I had to. As a matter of fact, I would be FAR more effective as a Solitary now that I've gotten group energy training and the other things I've gotten from coven training and coven work.

What you may be experiencing is not so much a lack of acceptance of people *because they are Solitaries*, as a certain skepticism about your abilities and thealogy and such if you've only read books. Honestly, there are things you cannot get from reading. And those things are important.

It really doesn't matter that the books you have read have "Wicca" in the title - NO book has the inner court stuff, and no book has the mysteries, and no book can "take you into" Wicca, (which is what initiation is).

EDIT: Some of what has happened in the US is that as Witches of various types got involved in Interfaith work, there was a kind of unspoken agreement to avoid the world "Witch", and so in addition to only talking about what we all have in common, the folks who joined Interfaith councils and organizations called themselves wiccans, or talked about the religion that they practice as "wicca". MOST of the folks who began to be involved in Interfaith work here were BTW...and when they brought in other Witches, they included them under the umbrella of "wicca" in order to avoid all those confusing discussion about BTW vs. hedge-witchery, heritage witchery, and non-BTW initiatory Traditions. This doesn't help any with knowing what Wicca really is, and in retrospect it probably wasn't the best idea in the world, but it is what happened. It is only in the last few years that Witches, Wiccans and other Pagans have begun to discuss, in Interfaith groups, the varieties of practice and belief that we have.

Answer 5

I am not a Wiccan, and would never claim such, I am a solitary Pagan (Celtic) but would also never claim to be a Druid.

I think that it is a 2 part problem. first off, Hollywood got ahold of Wicca and exploited it in movies such as "The Craft" and tv shows "Charmed" and turned it into a "Fad Religion". this led to countless teenagers "casting spells" and making little hidden altars in their rooms, as a way to be cool around their friends.

to Protect the religion the aTraditionalist had to enforce some boundaries, but in doing so many of them became very insular.
Most Wiccan's would never introduce themselves as such, and in general you can not pick them out of society. one of the beliefs of Gardner's Wicca is that you should not talk to anyone about Wicca, unless they are themselves Wiccan. how many teenagers use it as an attention grabber? and as a way to rebel against strict parents.

there are a lot of falsehoods about Wicca out there also. many books are written by people that clearly have no clue about Magick or the spiritual beliefs of magical traditions.

Answer 6

The traditional Wiccans that I know have no issues accepting those who choose to follow a Neo-Wiccan path---or any other neo-pagan path. They accept that others have found another path more satisfying than traditional Wicca. They are often very helpful in teaching the outer court tenets of their beliefs.
For a description of Neo-Wicca:
http://www.witches-tutorial.com/paths/neowicca.html

Traditional Wicca is an initiatory, mystery religion. People only get upset when folks use the name of Wicca when they don't practice that religion. It would be similar to me calling myself a practitioner of the Golden Dawn even though I have never been initiated into that group and know very little about the actual practices of those who have been initiated. This would be especially insulting if I didn't even bother to research the history of the Golden Dawn or keep an open mind towards what initiated members tell me about it. Can you imagine how upset they would be if I were to say, "Do whatever you feel like and just call it Golden Dawn"?

Answer 7

I didn't care for all the rules of Wicca, so I became a plain old Pagan. That said, the only ones with any "bragging rights" as far as witchcraft is concerned, are the ones who inherited The Craft through family members who practiced it for several generations, in my opinion. Also, I don't believe the Wiccans who practice in a coven generally look down on Solitary witches.

Answer 8

A Witch is someone who does witchcraft. A Wccan is someone who practices the "religion of witchcraft". It would be a bit hard to be a Wiccan of one but the last I heard there were no rules or foundations for that matter in Wicca. I have also heard people call themselves Christians who were solitary by choice. That is also pretty hard to understand because Christ by nature is all about the WE and not the I. I guess they lay down their lives for themselves or something.
Anyway. Call yourself anything you want. Solitary Wiccan works. Party on with yourself!

Answer 9

The 'Traditional Wiccans' do accept that all people should have their beliefs valued, however it is a simple state of fact that if a person has not been initiated into a British Traditional Witchcraft coven that they are not Wicca by any definition of Wicca other than their own.

Wicca is a priesthood first of all, this means that they are clergy and have no laity, so all those within Wicca are ordained priests and priestesses, in order to be a part of a priesthood such as Wicca there does need to be some sort of initiation process. Just like I cannot make myself a Catholic Priest a person cannot make themselves Wicca, a person requires formal training to prepare them for the information they will receive on initiation and for how their coven practices, when a coven feels that person is ready then they will be initiated by a High Priest/High Priestess.

Wicca is initiate-only; this means that the beliefs, practices, doctrines, mysteries that make up the basis for their belief and even the identities of the gods which they follow are all oath-bound so only taught to people who have been initiated into a Wiccan coven. The purpose of this is to retain the integrity of their religion, if their religion was public knowledge it could be changed and perverted. Wicca has lineage, this means that there is a direct line from modern covens back to Gardner and the New Forest Coven, the information and teachings about Wicca are passed down through this unbroken line.

The way it stands at the moment all the information available on Wicca to the public is known as 'outer-court' material, these things are simplified explanations of Wicca or place holders meant to explain Wicca to Seekers (those seeking to become Wicca) the best they can without breaking oaths of Wicca until a person is initiated and so can be told all the 'inner-court' material. Even if the inner-court teachings were made public there would be no way of knowing what is correct and what is not without training by a Wiccan coven, training also makes sure a person understands the philosophy or Wicca and are capable of receiving the mysteries.

Without initiation a person cannot know what Wicca is let alone follow it themselves, thus a person cannot be defined as being Wicca.

Without by initiation into Wicca a person cannot know these 'inner-court' teachings only the 'outer-court' teachings, now you take a hundred people who call themselves 'Solitary Wicca' without having been initiated and you will notice each and every one of them will follow a different belief, different gods and practice in different ways – none of which are how Wicca practice or what they believe – so what has happened is the 'outer-court' teachings of Wicca have become perverted and changed, which is exactly why Wicca remains initiate only, to protect it's integrity.

When someone claims to be Wicca without initiation they are misrepresenting themselves and in doing so they are misrepresenting Wicca – by telling other people what they do is Wicca other people believe this is true of Wicca on the whole when it is not, thus spreading misinformation about Wicca, this is also disrespectful to those who have worked very hard, sometimes even moving to a whole new area or putting their lives on hold, to become Wicca – Wicca is a title that is earned and given by friends/family/teachers of their coven, not something someone can claim whenever a person feels like it.

This makes it more difficult for people to learn about Wicca as there is more misinformation around and more people claiming to be Wicca when they are not, so more people who can use the title 'Wicca' to gain power or use for other means – say for example someone wishes to become Wicca, they meet people who claim to be 'Solitary Wicca' so believe they can be Wicca without initiation, or worse they meet a coven claiming to be Wicca and because of so much misinformation they have no way of telling if they are actually a Wiccan coven or not, possibly getting into a dangerous situation.

Some people get into Wicca for fad-value, and if someone has not studied enough to know that Wicca is initiate-only it can cause some friction with other Pagans when people claim to be Wicca without initiation.

Unfortunately as a result of all this misinformation many people think they are Wicca when they are not, this also causes problems because these people support each other as by saying 'Yes you can be Wicca without initiation' they are in turn saying they too can make the claim to be Wicca without initiation.

There is nothing wrong with Solitary Wicca, but these are still people who have been initiated into Wicca to begin with, there is also nothing wrong with Neo-wicca who are people who follow a belief system similar to that of Wicca but without initiation into a British Traditional Witchcraft coven, they are just not Wicca.


Edit: Whether it is wiccan or Wicca is irrelevant, a word does not change meaning just because you capitalise or don’t capitalise the first letter of the word. That is ridiculous!!
As a side note on grammar it is actually Wicca, Wiccan is something belonging to Wicca – e.g. 'I am Wicca' 'This is a Wiccan book'.

Answer 10

I have never had any problem, but then I do not call myself Wiccan! Tho wiccan (small w) or Wittan would be ok. I am Pecti Witan (aka a form of Hedge Witch, definitely not Wiccan). And I have no problem stating that I am a witch! Pay attention to Raven's voice. I have a great deal of respect for her knowledge
BB
)O(

Answer 11

All the Wiccans I associate with know that I'm a solitary and they never say anything derogatory or look down on me. Maybe you should try making new witchy friends...like me!

PALOMNIK: Just so you know...you have no idea what the hell you're talking about. Witchcraft pre-dates Christianity by about 28,000 years. Thank you. Wiccans=Witches Get your facts straight first my dearest friend!

)O( BB!