I found the book, Wicca’s Charm, written by Catherine Sanders and subtitled “Understanding the Spiritual Hunger Behind the Rise of Modern Witchcraft and Pagan Spirituality,” in the Pagan/Wiccan section of the bookstore — which is most certainly where it does not belong, as it’s not truly about Wicca or Paganism. It’s about the reasons why some Wiccans had become disillusioned with Christianity, and a primer on how Christians can understand and convert Pagans to Christianity.

That was really disappointing, because when I first saw this book, I was extremely hopeful that it would provide an objective view to the topic that the subtitle states: understanding the spiritual hunger behind the rise of modern Witchcraft and Pagan spirituality. And it doesn’t.

Although the author makes her Christian faith clear on page 5 of the preface, as I was reading through the first couple of chapters, I had high hopes that she was making an objective investigation of Wicca despite (or perhaps in light of) her devout personal beliefs, without disparaging or disrespecting another faith. But that simply wasn’t the case. It’s a somewhat subtle disparagement and disrespect, but it’s nonetheless present. Here are a few examples…

On the very first page of the preface, she refers to teenage girls who “take drugs, perform Wiccan rituals, and celebrate Wiccan holidays. They tell me that their behavior would cause alarm among most students at their high school, but they see themselves as progressive — breaking new religious ground.” My initial thought was, How sad that the author felt it necessary to associate illegal drug use with Wiccans. Of the dozens, if not hundreds, of Wiccans I’ve known, of course I’ve known some of them to use illegal drugs — but certainly not a greater percentage than that of the general population.

I hoped the reference to drug use would be a “teaser” — to get people interested in the book (because we all know that train wrecks attract attention, even if it’s not positive attention!) — but, unfortunately, the references to illegal drug use among Wiccans crop up time and time again. There are at least 8 references to illegal drug use by Pagans in this 200-page book, 7 of them in the first half of the book. If a Pagan journalist wrote a book about Christianity and made reference to illegal drug use among Christians that many times, I suspect most Christians who read the book would be appalled at the inference that many or most Christians are drug abusers, or that Christianity was inherently linked with illegal drug use.

There is also a pervasive negative view on Pagan sexuality throughout the book. In the section on the roots of Wicca, there are several negative references to Gerald Gardner’s nudism, and Aleister Crowley’s sex magic and use of women sexually. Instead of detailing anything about Crowley’s contributions to Paganism, there’s a statement that Crowley believed children should be required to observe sexual activity, and in the very next paragraph it’s stated that Mussolini expelled him from Italy for “lurid behavior.” I don’t understand how this is helpful to anyone trying to understand Paganism. It’s comparable to a book about Christianity giving more focus on some Appalachian Christians snake-handlers rituals, or Jim Bakker’s unethical behaviors, or the rapes committed by Christian soldiers in any number of “holy wars,” than to the words and beliefs espoused by Jesus Christ.

A “maidening ceremony” is described as a ritual that celebrates the springtime of a girl’s life, and “can happen as young as nine or ten,” or else when they begin their menses (although I’ve never heard of anyone giving a girl a “maidening” or menarche ceremony prior to puberty). That sounds pretty innocuous, until you read the next paragraph — where a “maidening ceremony” is described in which a seventeen-year-old girl is undressed, anointed with oil, and whipped and kissed by coven members. I cannot stress enough that no ethical Pagan group allows ritual nudity or sexual activity with minors present, observing, or participating. If the ceremony the author describes (which she claims she “read about,” rather than observed or was given eyewitness testimony regarding) actually happened, it was as unethical as a Catholic priest sexually fondling an altar boy. No religion is without its deviants, sad as that may be.

However, virtually all of the portrayals of sexuality in this book are negative. The only references I could find to homosexuality in the book regarded lesbians who supposedly manipulate young women into bad behavior involving sex, drugs, and shady rituals. Negative references to BDSM (though not by that term) cropped up several times with the mention of “whips and chains” in reference to erotic practices, and the term “ritual sex” was trotted out regularly as if this were a commonplace Wiccan practice, which it is not.

A sad and startling aspect of the disrespect shown to Pagans in this book is that our beliefs are highly misrepresented. In the first chapter, the author states that the following four tenets are the most common Wiccan beliefs:

1. “Wiccans hold the monistic and pantheistic beliefs that all living things are of equal value… humans have the same value as flowers, trees, or grass.”
2. “Wiccans believe they possess divine power within themselves and that they are gods or goddesses.”
3. “Personal power is unlimited — Wiccans believe that their power is not limited by a deity.”
4. “Consciousness can and should be altered through the practice of rite and ritual.”

With the exception of the fourth “tenet” on that list, this is totally inaccurate. Wiccans do not believe that human life is equal to plant life, and the vast majority of Pagans do not believe humans are equal to animals. Wiccans do not believe they are gods or goddesses, except in the figurative sense of honoring the divine spark within all people. The issue of personal power (which is left conveniently undefined in this book) being unlimited or not is simply not a Wiccan tenet or teaching. As for altering one’s consciousness, worship in Christian churches does the same thing, through prayer, hymns, and focusing one’s attention on sermons & their meanings. Altered consciousness may possibly be the only constant found in all religious practices!

Other inaccuracies throughout the book are equally unfortunate. Some include a statement that the Wiccan pentagram is always used “point up” because the opposite display is a Satanist symbol; the truth is that many Wiccan traditions use the “point down” pentagram to symbolize the material plane, or the Second Degree (in some Pagan traditions which have three degrees of spiritual learning and development). Yes, Satanists use that symbol regularly; however, even Satanists are portrayed inaccurately in this book — as a cult which mocks Christianity for the sake of that mocking. (I’m no expert on Satanism, but I’ve discussed theology and philosophy with enough members of the Church of Satan to know it’s a very different thing than most Christians — and also most Pagans! — believe it to be.) Also, while stating that Pagans don’t believe in Satan, the author states elsewhere that, “By being essentially pantheists and monists, they have little basis on which to condemn anything. Charles Manson was at least honest when he said, ‘If God is one, what is bad?’ … But many Wiccans don’t want to take on the guilt those standards might bring to their own lives, except in some areas of their lives in which they feel comfortable making a change.” (And please note that Charles Manson was not, and is not, a Pagan or Wiccan, but rather a highly disturbed criminal.)

There are those responsible for not only their own actions, but for the effects those actions have on others, in all faiths. There are those who fail at that responsibility in all faiths, as well. A lack of ethical standards, and adherence to those standards, is not a Pagan thing. It’s a human thing — one which many humans, of all faiths and creeds, overcome.

The book also claims that Wiccan belief does not encompass good and evil. Perhaps not as a Christian would define “good” and “evil,” but Wiccans do believe in positive and negative forces, in constructive and destructive energies and actions, and in the basic (central!) theme in Wicca that (in the words of the Wiccan Rede), “If it harms none, do as you will.” (This rede, which is a word that means “advice or counsel,” is often stated in the pseudo-archaic language of, “An it harm none, do as ye will.”)

The stated theme of the book, understanding the spiritual hunger behind the rise of modern Witchcraft and Pagan spirituality, is glossed over with claims that the main reasons people turn away from Christianity to become Pagans are “love of nature, empowerment for women, frustration with consumer culture, and the draw of the supernatural.” This demeans the spiritual validity and sincerity of Pagan and Wiccan faiths, implying that Pagans and Wiccans are simple-minded or superficial.

The hypocrisy practiced by many Christians is briefly discussed as an additional reason for dissatisfaction with Christianity, but with the author also stating that no Pagan or Wiccan she spoke to had ever said a negative thing about Jesus, but many had problems with his followers and the organized Christian religions. I can certainly agree with that assessment of how most Wiccans and Pagans view Jesus Christ and his teachings; we respect his teachings and practice many of his positive philosophies, while simultaneously finding our spiritual home and center in another set of traditions. I believe that the biggest chasm between Christianity and Paganism is the Christian insistence that one can only come to God through his Son, and for many Pagans, that is a belief we cannot reconcile with our own experiences in knowing and worshipping God. It seems that many Christians find this offensive or insulting, but it’s certainly not meant that way by Pagans.

Something I was surprised to see entirely absent in the book (although perhaps I shouldn’t have been, considering that the book is written for Christians, who might be offended or upset with the concept) is the simple statement that Wiccans do not prostelytize (in the sense of urging their faith on others, as many other religions do), and that most Wiccans believe “there is no One True Way.” I suppose that idea might threaten Christians, whose faith is founded upon the certainty that theirs is the One True Way and that they must “spread the good news” to be proper Christians.

Another idea entirely absent in the book was the way that many Pagans and Wiccans feel Christians are hypocrites due to the fact that their faith teaches that any sin can be forgiven simply be asking God to do so, rather than by any necessary effort on an individual’s part. What is the point in refraining from “sin,” if it can be cleansed away with a few prayers or by going to confession & stating your repentence? While we Wiccans know that this is not necessarily typical behavior of Christians, we also often find fault in an orthodoxy which does not require personal responsibility as a guiding standard. Wiccans may not describe the Rede as such, but that’s clearly for which it stands.

What this all comes down to is that, despite a statement in the book that the Church of Wicca was recognized constitutionally as a religion by a federal court in 1986, the author of this book treats Wicca not as a religion, but as a soulless and pathetic patchwork of seemingly-unconnected beliefs that lack the sincerity, spirituality, or validity of a “real” religion. Put simply, the author’s attitude throughout this book dismisses Wicca as a genuine religion and positive force in the lives of many, and treats the spiritual convictions of Wiccans as nothing more than an immature “phase.” That seems to be a rather un-Christ-like attitude to me.

The writing of this book was subsidized in part by a grant from the Phillips Foundation, which offers a Ronald Reagan Future Leaders Scholarship Program, encouraging applications from, “…especially campus activists who are in the forefront of the battle against ‘political correctness’ and ideological conformity on campus.” The author has also written a book called Breaking the Spell: The Hidden Traps of Wicca, published by Focus on the Family, an extreme right-wing Christian group.

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