Pagans/Wiccans, what do you think Christians think we do that makes us "evil"?

Question

Er, that wasn't phrased very well, but hopefully you know what I mean.

This is a follow-up to a question I posted two weeks ago asking non-Pagans what, exactly, is IS that Wiccans do that is so "evil".

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=Am8.EgtEtyJKQB7qGxmtrcnsy6IX?qid=20070716150147AAyk6N8

It got next to no answers from non-Pagans stating that we do ANYTHING "bad", which suggests to me that beyond an ill-formed and general prejudice, most non-Pagans don't have any solid reasons for believing that we actually do anything "wrong".

What is your experience of this? Have you received any specific criticisms, beyond "You worship Satan!", about what exactly we do that is "evil"?

To Etheria... I don't know about that. I've met some vindictive and manipulative Wiccans in my time. Being Wiccan does not automatically mean we escape the flaws inherent in human nature.

To JY... Wiccans do NOT worship the Devil -- we have no equivalent being in our cosmology. As for more than one wife... *falls over laughing* Oh, dear, you're thinking of the Mormons, I believe... I've never yet a Pagan yet with more than one spouse.

To Wordy... I can only speak as a Wiccan (Wicca is one denomination of Neo-Paganism), but Wiccans, at least as I was taught, don't worship nature per se. We believe that the universe is the body of God/dess, and therefore that all things contain Divine energy and that the world itself is sacred. There can be no separation from God/dess. All things not only proclaim Their glory, but ARE Their glory. It's therefore more accurate to say that we worship the Divine as manifest in nature; we worship the Creator, IN the Creation.

Answer 1

My husband is Christian and doesn't believe Pagan's are evil. In fact he defends their right to religion and to practice and helps protect their rights. Most other Christians I know don't think that Pagans are evil.

Christians believe that Pagans are on the wrong path - that they do not know the one true G-d. Pagans don't do anything 'bad' in the sense of harming others etc. Instead they are on the wrong path, and Christians believe that they are both decieving themselves and others.

Maybe you got so few repsonses from Christians because they do not think you are evil, or bad. They may believe that you are worshiping Satan, but that you do not do this on purpose. Instead you believe you are worshiping your own deities. Christinans believe that these deities are merely Satan posing to trick you. But this does not make you evil or bad.

Answer 2

The following is my point of view:

Not all christians are evil. I will make the claim that there are elements of the christian hierarchy that are on power trips and/or are very uneducated on the history of the bible and the jewish religion.

I am not a christian because I read about the religion and the facts don't jive with the history. Also I beleive in evolution and I know psychic powers exist, so I can't be a christian and be true to myself.

Furthermore, if a human did all the things God did in the old testament he would be declared a murder and a terrorist. I also beleive that the god of the old testament is insane.

So.. why am I Wiccan? When I joined, they espoused equality of the gender, respect for the teachers and elders and had a training format so that having a "degree" meant something.

I am also not considered evil for any psychic abilities I may have and healing I do.

Blessed be

Answer 3

All in all I've been fairly impressed by the recent lull in "omg you worship Satan" statements on R&S (except for that one person who though she hates wiccans she has one of those 'fantasy faerie woman' avatars that usually only wiccans have... hehe)

I've read a fair few responses concerning Wicca and its supposed connection to Satan, and here's what I've grasped: Some people believe that though we don't realize it, our religion is of Satan, and though we are innocent we were foolish to believe that anything that has to do with magic is not evil. Now this is hardly justifiable or rational though not nearly as ignorant as the "wiccans are plotting against us they all worship satan omg" theory.

From my AP euro class I learned why so many people think magic is evil and it is this: during the witch hunts the black and white "if you're not christian then you worship satan" ideas started spreading. Now in actuality the clergy and pastors and whoever do practice magic (like transubstantiation), but since they're Christian, this magic is of God. So using the black-or-white mentality, that means that any magic outside of the church is automatically of Satan.

So that's my ideas... it's a little strange how silly propaganda from centuries ago never actually dies out but keeps going.

edit- haha I'm reading some of the responses... "well pagans have multiple wives, right?" ROTFLMFAO and he even said he didn't know anything about paganism to begin with...

Answer 4

I think it all gets rolled up into "We don't worship the Christian God" therefore we're evil... basically an "I'm right and you're wrong because you don't believe like I do" argument, which is totally pointless. =)


Wordy: "In a nutshell, you worship the creation rather than the true Creator" No, we don't. And this is part of what's so frustrating with people who put down Pagans/Wiccans as "evil"... 99% of the time they don't even have a clue what our beliefs ARE... so how can they make any determination about whether or not our beliefs are "evil"??

Answer 5

Nandia's got it pretty much spot on. We don't worship their God - that's something we and they agree on. However, many of them take a binary worldview - either worship their God, or be a tool (willing or not) of their anti-God. And since we've already agreed that it's not the former, we're stuck with the latter.

A number of more extreme fundamentalists make all sorts of lurid claims about sacrifice, cannibalism, etc - pretty much the same claims levelled against Christianity when it was young. Remarkably little proof of any of that - but those folks normally claim that there's some vast conspiracy suppressing the evidence.

Your average Christian who considers us evil typically just thinks that we're immoral Satan-worshippers, which seems to be more than enough in their book.

Answer 6

My experience has us Wiccans being evil because we do not worship what others have defined as "God". What we worship must be from the devil since it is not "God" or everything good and right as defined by their faith and/or church leaders. That makes us logically evil.

Most of this oversimplified logic mostly comes from the belief that there can only be one true god. All the rest are false and overly simplified again as evil or, to the slightly more open minded, misleading.

Answer 7

No one has taught them any better. If something is not understood, it must be killed, feared, or explained in a way that can be understood. The witch trials didn't help us much,. It seems to be the most anyone knows about reality for those called “Witch”. No one knows that we can do what we will, but harm no one. Many Christians have their hands full in their feeble attempt to understand The Christ. I mean no disrespect for those who have studied, followed His teachings and have a relationship with Him. I believe in many different religions, all of them based on unconditional love, which Wicca already does, to the best of my understanding. The only real problem I have with Bible Thumpers is that they want to kill us! Otherwise, I think they’re fine people who are just confused.

Blessed Be

Answer 8

Wiccans come in for a lot of stick from certain, unenlightened, Christians. There's a line in the Bible which is often translated to mean "thou shalt not suffer a witch to live", so there' s essentially a mandate for shunning wiccans, irrespective of any explanation of what being a wiccan means, or what we do. The book says we're evil, so we're evil. lol

You've hit the main accusation on the head though - that wiccans "worship the devil". We do try to tell 'em that that'd be a little tricky since the Devil's not someone we actually believe exists at all, and in fact THEY believe in him a heck of a lot more than we do. And, come to think of it, more than Satanists do.

They believe we invoke demons because they don't believe in spirit communication, so anything other than their God that "speaks" to humans from a non-corporeal dimension is necessarily "evil".

Some of the freakier extremists, like author Jack Chick, appears to believe we conduct black masses (err...dude, that's really not us!)...attempt to poison children on Hallowe'en (I mean, I know Trick or Treaters can be a pain in the neck, but come on!), and cast curses at anyone showing "Christian purity". Technically of course, curses would be possible, but given the rule of threefold return, they'd also be ultimately pointless.

There's a feeling that all spellwork is inherently evil because it's invoking powers that are not from God to "dabble in the supernatural". So that's another potential damnation on our heads.

Friend of mine's a spiritualist and she gets regularly pelted with extreme Christian spittle on the grounds that she "consorts with demons". Fun, fun, fun...

Answer 9

I live in the middle of the country...the 'bible belt' as it's referred to. The heart of the nation. There is MUCH prejiduce here--I think a lot of people would still burn us at the steak if it were legal! And, from their standpoint, any religion that beleives in anything other than one male god-head being omni-potent is heathen, satanic, or just flat out ridiculous. They actually feel SORRY for US!!! (I've laughed at that for years...) What I hear most often is, "But you couldn't have been raised that way....what happened to you?" And, "Are you really that lost that you don't know there's a god who loves you and took away all your sins..." blah blah blah. Basically, their lack of understanding, or even a basic knowledge of anything outside of how they were raised, has caused them to be very closed-minded individuals.

I consider myself more neo-pagan or agnostic than anything else...but, honestly, I don't agree with all they say, either.

Answer 10

This of course only applies to Christians who do have a problem with us...

Our association with "witchcraft," which they take to be a very negative thing. Those who object generally hold that all magic must come from Satan. I think perhaps they think we're taunting them with the word as well. These Christians frequently believe all non-Christians do the devil's work, but they are particularly objecting toward self-described "witches". (They also frequently assume all Wiccans and Pagans are witches, thanks to decades of us equating the terms)