On Magic and Religion (Pt. I)

A little over two months ago, during the discussion of my post “A Question: Who’s Pagan?“, Psyche over at Plutonica.net and some guy named cartweel* got into a little bit of a spat over the distinction (or lack thereof) between magic, on the one hand, and religion on the other. Psyche even posed the question on her blog, asserting that, “magick can be practiced within a spiritual framework, often in tandem with religion, but it is by no means necessary and conflation of the two is in no way desirable.” I disagree.

I’d like to take this question up again, in order to present my side of the argument. My basic assertion continues to be that, “No distinction between “magic” on the one hand and “religion” on the other has ever been made successfully,” and now I’ll try to explain why.

I have three arguments why magic and religion are actually the same thing. The first of these arguments is more theoretical, the second and third more historical.

“Empires of Food”

I caught this show on NPR today. The program, concerning a new book Empires of Food: Feast, Famine, and the Rise and Fall of Civilizations, touches on a few issues I’ve been thinking a lot about recently, and echoes some topics brought up in the blog posts I pointed out yesterday. Particularly interesting is co-author Evan Fraser’s assertion that economy trumps ecology only at our great peril.

How we eat, produce food could bring down society. – with Guy Raz

I’m feeling s-l-o-w…

I’ve been tooling around the internet for a few hours now and stumbled acrost a few blog entries that have got me thinking about the “slow movement,” about sustainability and the future, and about my relationships with body, space, and time. I don’t have time* to write at the moment, but before the mood leaves me I thought I’d lead you to these web pages to see whether you might be inspired, too…

A snatch of old song. – from Paul at The Dark Mountain Project. (I’m recently in love with TDMP.)

Is adaptability more important than art in architecture?

Technology sabbaths and other strategies for the digitized world. – from Michael Sacasas at The Frailest Thing, which I have just added to my blogroll.

Have a beautiful day, my friends.

(*: Only now, a day later, does the great irony of that statement occur to me…)

A Question: Who’s Pagan?

So, obviously you can tell that what is bugging my mind recently are issues of definition. My sense is that in order to set about defining paganism as a concept we need to figure out who we’re trying to talk about when we try to use the word pagan.

I say that we need to establish a clear in-group. So, I have a question for all of you: What groups and individuals can we safely say fall squarely and entirely within the bounds of paganism?

Of course, I plan to problematize these bounds later; so right now I’m just asking for your instincts, based on your interactions with communities and gatherings. We can talk about who may or may NOT be pagans later (Satanists, Voodooists, Thelemites) but right now I want to know who’s unambiguously pagan.

My gut tells me that Wiccans can be considered unambiguously pagan. I’ve never heard of an individual who claims to be a Wiccan, though not a pagan. Thoughts?

My plan, after getting y’all’s help in finding a few more examples (Druids, maybe?) is then to see whether or not these groups stack up against several proposed definitions of “pagan”.

EDIT: Perhaps a more useful way to phrase my question is, “Members of what group or groups unanimously identify as pagan?”

Why I Hate “Project Pagan Enough”

I could not have planned this better if I had tried. Project Pagan Enough, a “movement” initiated by Pagan blogger Fire Lyte, is a stark example of exactly the sort of lack of maturity within the Pagan community that I talked about in my last post. You see, there are really three things going on with Project Pagan Enough.

First, Project Pagan Enough calls for tolerance regarding the way that people dress or the choices (including musical taste, for example) that people make that may make them appear “too mainstream” to Pagans who think that Paganism necessarily needs to stand outside of the mainstream. Indeed, this seems to be the main thrust of PPE:

If you listen to Lady Gaga right alongside Kellianna, you are still pagan enough. If you don’t mind wearing Abercrombie & Fitch, Prada, or other name brand, mainstream clothing to the local pagan festival, you are still pagan enough.

Okay, I get it. Some people don’t dig the idea that, as participants in alternative spiritualities, our choices regarding music, clothing, etc. should necessarily be alternative. And I agree! I don’t think that any decision made merely for the sake of being unlike someone else can be productive: That’s just negative definition, which I’m against. However, I DO think that a case can be made that Pagans should be making decisions that happen to be counter-cultural. For example, I don’t believe that rampant consumerism can be compatible with an earth-based spirituality and, therefore, I think that Pagans (who claim to be earth-centered, or at least should do so) should eschew practices that embody this (i.e., buying Prada).

As a Pagan whose appearance might be construed as “mainstream”–I wear jeans and black t-shirts; I have no piercings or tattoos; my hair is blonde and cropped–I have to say that a “movement” to end harassment against this is ludicrous. Any individual must be able to stand up for him- or herself concerning the choices that he or she makes. If someone is making fun of you for the clothes you wear, do something to deal with it! Call them out on it! Argue! Stand up for yourself! The fact that the online community has reacted to this pledge while continuing to ignore issues of actual importance displays quite clearly the childish behavior of those involved. This isn’t middle school, folks.

But this isn’t the only point being made by Project Pagan Enough. Additionally, PPE seeks to encourage interfaith tolerance:

Also, Project Pagan Enough seeks to encourage members of the pagan community to be more tolerant of other religions, beliefs, and practices. What do I mean? Aren’t we the most tolerant of all faith-based communities? Well, what happens when you hear the word ‘Christian?’ Are you still that tolerant, loving, inclusive pagan?

[…] Project Pagan Enough seeks to say that we should be secure enough in our beliefs and ourselves to truly tolerate other religions and stop laying blame for what we consider to be the evils of the world on the doorstep of other faiths.

How exactly this interfaith message is related to being “Pagan Enough” eludes me. On the one hand, I think that it is essential for Pagans to work toward getting over the rampant anti-Christian bigotry that I see plaguing our community; on the other hand, I think that the sentiment of Project Pagan Enough is exactly that shallow sort of “tolerance” that I railed against in my last entry [linked to above].

And here’s why: The third and most inconspicuous of the facets of Project Pagan Enough is its insistence that Pagans should be all-inclusive not only regarding clothing and music choices, but also including practice and belief:

You are pagan enough, despite how you look, act, smell, dress, believe, or are.

You recognize that others are pagan enough despite their appearance, smell, manner of dress, belief, practice, or other aspect.

In other words, here we are again: “Paganism” is meaningless. If it is possible for anyone who believes anything and does anything to be “Pagan Enough”, Paganism is a so-called “religious tradition” that has neither set beliefs nor set practices and therefore cannot be viewed as any sort of religious tradition at all. By the parameters of Project Pagan Enough, anyone that has ever lived is “Pagan Enough,” including all Christians, Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, Jains, Hindus, Sikhs, Scientologists, Raelians, or Atheists. Anybody.

Project Pagan Enough is an immature attempt to solve immature problems. I hope that those who have engaged in this “riot” will further examine their own choices and their relationship to Paganism and begin to ask why it is that they have involved themselves with something that they themselves assert to be ultimately baseless. I hope that others will look at Project Pagan Enough and see in it an excellent example of the real problems facing contemporary Paganism, and that they will work toward a deepening, rather than a shallowing, of Pagan discourse.

Open Questions Concerning WBC

Westboro Baptist Church is coming to the University of Chicago, where I am enrolled. They were here last year to protest one of the many divinity schools in Hyde Park, Chicago; this time, they’re here to protest the campus Hillel center. The fuckers.

As I choke back the vomit that is steadily rising in my throat (just as it does every time that Fred Phelps takes up more than a microsecond of my time), I’ve begun to start asking myself a few questions about ethics, magic, and activism. I want to curse Fred Phelps and his cult, you see.

Now, to be honest, I know full well that cursing and my views about pacifism are fundamentally at odds with each other: To curse someone is necessarily to take an action that is meant to cause that person harm, and causing harm is antithetical to pacifism. But, at the same time, I’m not sure that cursing someone is the same as punching them; is there, or is there not, some qualitative difference?

Recently I heard a statement concerning magical ethics that I thought I could get behind. It was something like, “You should only perform a magical act on someone if you would be comfortable doing the same thing to them physically, in person.” So, while I might be sorely tempted, I don’t think I’d ever walk up to Fred Phelps and kick him in the face; therefore, I won’t be sending any immediate physical harm. Okay. But, would I be okay if he got some disease (though not a fatal one) that affected his ability to organize his followers?—would I sit there and smirk while he was comatose? Probably—I’m no saint. So, might I send him a good ol’ coughing-up-spiders-and-ants-for-life curse? Hmm…….. tempting. Would I shut him up if I could? Certainly. So, can I send him a working by which he looses his ability to speak? Hell yes… maybe.

If anyone deserves to be cursed, it’s Fred Phelps. Yet, I recognize that Phelps’s pathological problems are not his fault; he’s a sick, sick man. I don’t really wish harm on his followers, because they have obviously been effected by the sort of brain-washing and mind-twisting that defines cult activity. These reasons are what keep me from going ahead and doing my worst, really, and yet… and yet… I find that I am still tempted, nonetheless. My gut wants to act, my hands itch for sand to throw in their faces…

So, here are some open-ended questions: Would you curse Westboro Baptist Church? Have you? Would you use magical techniques to cause a change in any political figure or ideologue? Given that civic cursing has been a practice since Greek times (to my knowledge, and I assume since before even then), why don’t we, as Pagans, set about taking magical action against our opponents? I don’t have answers to these questions right now, but I’m super-interested in other peoples’ thoughts!

My Thoughts on Pagan Religious Dress

Ever since learning about Sailor Mars, I’ve always wanted to be a monk (err, I guess a Nun. Specifically, one of these). Now, that was at a very impressionable young age, and since then I’ve wanted to be many other things “when I grow up”: Archaeologist, architect, cartoonist, porn star, scholar, revolutionary. But the monastic urge has never left me. Now, I could (and will) write a whole post about what a Pagan monasticism might look like, and what some Pagans have done in order to begin such traditions. All I want to talk about right now, though, is clothing.

You see, one of the aspects of the monastic life that has always appealed to me is the idea of formal dress, dress with a purpose. Dress that comes out of a tradition; dress that others like you have worn before.  Dress that is a constant reminder to one’s-self and to one’s community of a commitment to religious life.

Back when I almost converted to Islam, a not-insignificant part of my reasons for potentially doing so was that Islam has a thriving culture of—if not exactly “monastic”—traditional religious garb. Hijabi women I know (that is, women who wear Islamic head coverings) often explain that their decision to wear the hijab comes out of a recognition of tradition, a fulfillment of (what they themselves interpret to be) religious obligation, and a commitment to expressing their religiosity at all times. Of course, these same women must continually negotiate issues concerning the oppression of women through prescribed clothing, and that is an ongoing (and raging) discussion that I won’t go into here.

Men in Islam might also wear religious garb; hats like skullcaps are the most recognizable form of this. They do so out of respect for Allah and, again, in order to keep themselves mindful of their faith. This idea of “mindfulness” is one reason (along with religious dictation–it’s built into the system) that Jewish people might wear tzitzit (fringes).

And so, like I said just a second ago, these ideas of 1) constant mindfulnessand 2) affiliation with tradition appeal to me. Concerning the first point, this can be managed by anyone privately, I think, and Pagans often wear jewelry to this effect. I and many others wear necklaces or rings with specific personal or cultural meanings that remind us of, say, our commitment to certain Gods or practices. But to me, this is on too small of a scale. Everyone’s jewelry is different; it’s all personal, not communal, and therefore it does not imply a relationship with a group. The only thing we have that comes close to this is the iconography of the pentacle, but it’s not like we -all- wear pentacles, or the same pentacles, nor do all Pagans recognize the pentacle as meaningful!

Now, the examples of religious dress that I just described from Islam and Judaism all come out of the interaction between religious law and cultural norms. As American Neopagans, we have neither law from which we gain ideas about dress, and a large part of our ethos is the rejection of the social mores of the dominant culture. So, two questions arise:

What statements would we want to be making with our choices about religious garb, and what source(s) might we draw from in order to design the clothing?

Now, just to be clear, I realize that trying to work out common practices for Neopagans to adopt is like trying to herd anarchist zombie kittens that have rabies and are all on fire. Still, I think that it’s an exercise that’s worth doing, especially since I am by no means suggesting that ALL Pagans should (or MUST!!!1!) conform to any sort of dress practice. I’m just saying that we should think over the possibilities of starting a few practices that, over time, could grow into meaningful and optional practices among certain kinds of Pagans. ((There, caveats done!))

For me, Paganism is all balanced on two pillars: Earth-centered spirituality and respect for ancient Pagan traditions. So, I think that as Pagans our goal in creating religious garb should be to highlight these two things, while at the same time creating that sense of communion that I’ve discussed above.

I think that clothing choices based on Earth-centered spirituality must be ecologically aware, but that could mean many different things. To me, this implies a rejection of capitalism (being a plague on the planet, frankly) and so a movement toward clothing that is not branded. Personally, the aesthetics of a simplified, smaller, even plain wardrobe speaks to me; however, it is also true that a joyous grokking of the Earth calls out in a language of mess and vibrancy, and so one’s Earth-centered clothing might reflect that fact through color and texture. Truthfully, the negotiation of this conundrum might be one of the most productive sources for ecotheological dialogue in Paganism, and so I won’t try to draw any conclusions on the topic here.

Regarding the ancient traditions from which we take inspiration, there are many things for us to look at, including the proto- or pseudo-religious orders that existed in the past. As one example, this book details traditions relating to devotees of Isis, including the donning of black skullcaps. The problem with this, of course, is that each ancient practice that we might draw upon is necessarily culturally inflected, and so I can anticipate that it would be difficult for us to build any pan-Pagan traditions out of these.

All of this means, then, that I might have set myself to an impossible task. We may never be able to devise any sort of Neopagan religious garb, and that’s fine. I realize that my impulse toward head-coverings and simple clothing is my own, although I’m aware that it’s not JUST me. I guess what it comes down to is this: We can’t set about trying to make up these things; instead, it might be that we have to wait until inspiration hits us and decidedly “neo-” practices come about. Sure, now monks wear apron-like robes, but that came about practically and then spread. I think that this is how all of this must come about—the problem is that all that takes time, a -long- time, and I’m impatient! We also have to ask ourselves what sort of clothing choices we make generally (and not necessarily out of a devotional impulse) that might later inform such a practice; as for me, I’m not looking forward to seeing any sort of Pagan monastic orders that wear tie-dye Celtic knot robes with pewter sandals and crushed velvet hats!!

((Now, I do have ideas floating around in my head, don’t get me wrong! The most productive idea I’ve had, I think, is that Pagans could adopt the practice of devotional scapulars. These have a form that can remain constant while supporting the individuality needed in any Pagan practice.))

Thinking About The Rede

Hey there. Have ya missed me? I’ve missed you…

What I’ve got to say here has been inspired by this post. Or, rather, by the reactions to my own comment that followed that post. You can check all that nonsense out if you feel like it.

It’s gotten me to start thinking about the Wiccan Rede, you see. Now (as you probably know), I am not a Wiccan, though, like most of us, there was a time at which I self-identified as such. Wicca is, of course, the “gateway religion” that has led most Neopagans today into various forms of alternative spirituality; this is why, I’ve determined, ecumenical Pagandom (as visible at festivals, say) so often takes Wiccanate forms.

Because of Neopaganism’s relationship to Wicca, the Rede is everywhere. Like our impulse to go stand in a circle any time that someone starts talking loudly, we can all quote it, even if we don’t agree with it: “An it harm none, do what ye will.”

And so, we’ve all had conversations about the Rede, and it’s a particular turn that these conversations often take that has got me thinking today. Inevitably, while discussing the Rede, someone asks a question akin to, “Well, if you’re supposed to ‘harm none,’ how far does that extend?” The follow-up questions are usually (in my experience) of two types: “I mean, what do you do if someone has a knife at your throat/gun at your head? Can you harm them then?” or “Well, even in breathing you’re killing thousands of micro-organisms, so you can’t not harm something!”

These two questions point in two different directions. The first (“he’s got a gun!”) concerns personal safety and really looks at the Rede as a call for pacifism. I’ll come back to this…

The second question above (“what about micro-organisms?!”) is what I’d really like to look at here. In my experience, when people suggest that it is impossible not to harm anyone, they mean to say that it is best not even to try. In my opinion, this is akin to saying (with arms thrown up into the air), “Well, it can’t be done. So, let’s just keep doing what we were doing.”

But let me suggest an alternate reading. Instead of the impossibility of absolute harming-none becoming a license to harm whomever, why doesn’t the Rede become a challenge? Sure, it may be impossible, but why don’t we do everything in our power to harm as few as possible? I can’t help but think of the Jain tradition of holding brooms in front of one’s feet so as to sweep away small insects lest they be stepped on. I haven’t seen any Wiccans even getting close to this sort of commitment to harmlessness. Why?

Why aren’t more Wiccans vegetarian or vegan? Why don’t Wiccans participate in anti-military organizations? Why don’t Wiccans make commitments to stop wearing leather, or fur? Why don’t Wiccans carry those oft-forgotten besoms and sweep away the bugs?!

I’m not here trying to mandate that every Wiccan MUST do these things. Really, I’m just trying to tease out why practices like these haven’t already been extrapolated from the Rede. All I see is so much walking around the point with so much individualism: If Wiccans are all about harming none, why isn’t it obvious?

Now, as I said I’m not a Wiccan and I don’t want to try and extrapolate an utterly pacifistic philosophy from the Rede. The Rede itself is too puerile for that. But I think that, at the very least, one should extrapolate from the Rede an ethic in which, say, large-scale, industrialized warfare is unacceptable. I don’t know how I would act upon the Rede if someone was holding a knife to my throat; In fact, I’m pretty sure that I’d engage in a whole lot of harming.  I think that this is an interesting conversation for Wiccan ethicists to engage in. However, I believe that this conversation can only take place in the midst of actual (not simply metaphoric) application of the Rede in daily life.

The Kabbalah Fallacy

I’d like to comment on something very particular that I’ve heard come out of the mouths (or fingertips) of several Pagans lately: Namely, that Kabbalah was the original form of Judaism, and that Judaism has, since its Kabbalistic foundation, well-neigh degraded into something restrictive, totalitarian, evil, etc.

WTF, mate. Here’s a good example of what I’ve been calling the ‘Kabbalah Fallacy’: “I’m no expert on the Kabbalah, but I know enough to realize that Jewish mysticism is very different from modern Judaism and Christianity.  (How something so full of wisdom managed to give birth to dogmatic, patriarchal religions is beyond me; I’ll just point out that humans have a way of royally screwing things up and that this is a classic example!)”

I’m talking specifically about the “something so full of wisdom managed to give birth to dogmatic, patriarchal religions” part. The historical fact of the matter is that the exact opposite is true, that is, that that which this author is calling dogmatic and patriarchal is, in fact, that which itself gave birth to “something so full of wisdom.” Judaism as such developed alongside ancient Levantine polytheism and, by 586 BCE when Solomon’s temple was destroyed, the tradition was highly developed and supported. Only six centuries years later, in the 13th century, can we begin to speak of Kabbalah as such, setting aside various traditional ascriptions to biblical figures. Kabbalah grew up in Spain out of various Jewish influences as well as Neo-Platonism and influence from Islam. Kabbalah is the outgrowth; it’s not the other way around.

Though Kabbalistic literature obviously grew out of previous sources, among them Jewish Apocalyptic literature and oral traditions, it is impossible to speak of Kabbalah as it is known today–and ESPECIALLY of the Hermetic Kabbalah and the even later New Age Kabbalah (which incorporates various “Eastern” concepts like the Chakras)–as if it pre-dated Judaism itself. It strikes me as inane that the same groups of folks who constantly berate Abrahamic faiths cling so powerfully to what is essentially a flow-chart of YHVH’s attributes.

So, to all the Wiccans or Thelemites or Ceremonialists or Chaotes out there (among others) who “Just hate Abrahamism, no reason” (as I heard an acquaintance blather a few weeks ago), put down your wands and stop casting your circles and let go of the Kabbalah. The Kabbalah, that is to say, essentially JUDAIC esotericism, is where ALL of the Wiccanate Pagan religious structures come from. So, and this is just reason number 1, I think we need to shut up about Abrahamism because the hypocracy is making me sick.

Redefinitions: The Parliament and “Re-establishing” Ourselves

I’m sure a lot of folks are obsessively reading about the Pagan presence at the Parliament of World Religions happening in Australia right now. I haven’t been as caught up on things as perhaps I’d like to be, but hey, it’s Finals Week and I’ve got other things to think about!

Anyway, Ruby Sara sent me this link, which leads to the blog “Pagans at the Parliament” and an article on questions of definition and redefinition within the Pagan community. The author describes an event at the Parliament in which Paganism was defined as “a collective term that most aptly defines Indigenous cultures of pre-Christian Europe”; and then the author discusses the implications that this definition would have within the community and the community’s changing relationship to both “indigenous religions” and “New Religious movements.”

Now, this definition takes a knife to the current Pagan community, leaving out Wiccans, and Chaos Magicians, Reiki-ites, and a bunch of other folks whom identify as Pagans (or might) but whose practices are definitely not Indigenous or pre-Christian, and which have little to do with ancient European culture. This is, of course, quite close to a few things that I have proposed myself: Elsewhere I, too, have supposed that Paganism would do best to redefine itself as consisting of those pre/para-Christian (for lack of a better word) practices and belief systems and then that other folks (Wiccans, etc) would need to find themselves new labels. It’s because I don’t think Wicca or Chaos Magic or Reiki – or Chakras, Thelema, purple velvet, quartz crystals, Angel magic, the Goetia, and a bunch of other things that are now acceptable Pagan practices – really have anything to do with earth-centered spirituality, awareness of the Earth as Mother, or religious Polytheism. And so, for earth-centered, Mama-revering, polytheistic religious movements to evolve into anything worth anything, they need to leave behind this  extra baggage.

So then we’re left with at least two groups. The ‘new’ “Pagans” and the other folks; and I suspect that, if this splitting of the current Pagan community were to take effect, the Ceremonial Magicians wouldn’t hang out for too long with the Reiki-ites and the Crystal Healers, and so we’d end up with a lot of smaller communities. The question that the article from the Parliament goes on to raise, then, is how would the international, interreligious community come to identify these communities: As indigenous religious movements, or as “New Religious” movements?

While I’m not sure it’s at all very useful to try and put these movements into any of various categories – especially if we’ve only got two choices – I do think it’s inevitable that the discussion will come up, and that both “indigenous” and “new religious” are categories that would come up in that discussion. Personally (and this is where I’m disagreeing with the folks at the Parliament and the article I linkd to above), I don’t think any of us have any business identifying as “indigenous” practitioners. Why not? I have several reasons:

(We have no business identifying as indiginous:) 1) Because it would distract the entire interreligious community from the plight of already extant and, overwhelmingly, endangered indiginous religious communities. I think that it is nothing less than a further cultural appropriation for Pagans to set themselves beside groups that have struggled literally for their lives in the face of colonialism, of language extinction and the loss of cultures, and who are still struggling.

Of course I am not arguing that the ethnic peoples of Europe (or North Africa or the Middle East, for that matter) never struggled to keep their traditions alive. I am saying that those struggles were by-and-large lost, and that any reclamation of these traditions is at best a successful reconstruction and at worst a disrespectful parody. So,

2) We are not indiginous because we do not represent the survival of living traditions, but are fundamentally reconstructions. To deny the impact of this reconstructive process on our traditions today would be lying to ourselves. I think this applies equally to what we can call “hard” reconstructionist movements like the modern “Recon” Pagan traditions (Nova Roma, Norse Reconstruction, Natib Qadish, etc) as well as to “soft”* reconstruction movements like Traditional British Witchcraft or Rumova, which downplay the role of reconstruction per-se in their practice and, I think, can claim a greater degree of affinity with the past. ((Take a look at this old news report that chronicles the re-establishment of Rumova in Lithuania, and note that it takes place in Lithuania at an ancient site, with Lithuanians and not in the back room of some American occult bookstore. It’s an important difference, I think.))

So, then what are we? Personally, I have no problem being part of a New Religious movement (which is a semi-technical term used in various fields to describe religions that have cropped up over the last few hundred years, and which covers well-established New movements like Tenrikyo but also various UFO traditions like Raelianism and other things). We must admit to ourselves that all of the stuff we do now is new – otherwise, we’d already have gone through all the growing pains we’re experiencing now!

But perhaps New Religious movement doesn’t fit either, since we are so concerned with practices and beliefs from the past. Perhaps, then, to put us into one of these pre-existing categories isn’t useful at all, and maybe we should (as a community) put forward another designation. Perhaps “Re-established.” Think about it: “We, Pagans, practice re-established religions.” Here we aren’t tredding on the toes of living indiginous traditions, nor are we ignoring our link to the past. “Re-established” conveys our past and our present, and speaks to both “soft” and “hard” reconstructionist communities.

Just thoughts, my friends. Tell me what you think!

(*) Note: What I’m getting at here by making a distinction between “hard” and “soft” reconstructionism is really a spectrum, and I’m just trying to make a point that there are those among us whose primary concern is reconstruction and those who are more concerned with living in modern ethnic traditions. Though now I’m wondering whether the distinction is really one between Paganism today in Europe vs. that in America… hmm. Perhaps.