- My Story Part 1 of 2.
In the instance that there might be anyone out there interested as to why I have taken up Wicca, I have documented this two part article based on my own experience. Should this fall into a category of assistance or adding comfort to anyone out there considering Wicca, I will consider this contribution a success.
I was born, raised and educated within the Catholic faith. By my late teens, I felt no real relation to the church, the clergy or the way the faith was expressed. This resulted in me just plainly not participating any more, when the question arose in discussions with friends or acquaintances as to what was my faith, I would say Catholic, or Christian, or non practising Catholic, and even once said “what difference does it make?”
You see, I got sick of the guilt, shame and fear of living that accompanies the God painted by the Catholic Church, in the Old Testament there is a vengeful, unmerciful God that never resonated with me. These attributes do nothing in my mind than drive away those who seek to live, we are not all meant for the road of an ascetic life.
In my twenties I had an interest in “the Church”, but no attraction to attend, you could say that the interest was more of a intellectual sort. I read up on the foundations of Christianity, the establishment of the Catholic faith in Rome and Europe, the Crusades, the middle ages through to the modern era. One thing I grappled with in terms of my faith was the Church’s changing meanings of things over time. A read through the history of the various Ecumenical council’s held over the past 1700 years gives a good example. It became apparent to me that Christianity appeared to be more about what ever some group of men decided it would mean, rather than the message of the person (Jesus) who was used to found the religion.
During this decade I married the love of my life, we both learned meditation (transcendental), started practising yoga and balancing ourselves with better eating (and drinking) habbits. We looked forward to a expanding our family and were quite career conscious.
By my early thirties and with the birth of my two beautiful daughters, a time when sociology statistics suggest a great “return to the faith” (read “the faith” – as any faith where the attendance, participation or practice ceased for a time and was reignited by something as miraculous as witnessing child birth); I felt no such desire. A feeling had replaced the need to say “yes, there is definitely one way to celebrate God” or “only Catholicism is truth”; instead the feeling was a warm knowing that there is more, but was totally devoid of any association to a building or organised religion.
It was around this time I started reading other religions holy books, the Qu’ran, the Bhagvaard Gita, The story of Buddha; the Christian Bible fell into a new category, institutionalised world religion. This was a big step and I felt no need to back away from it. I also was reading and working on myself through personal development material, seeking the “holy grail” of a balanced life between self, play, family, work, environment and spirituality… It was during this time I started taking my own development seriously.
On my personal development journey I started to read personal development “fringe” (fringe – books with a personal development theme, but not marketed as such) for example the “Hero with a Thousand Faces” by Joseph Campbell (which deals with symbols and myths across the world), which lead to other books on psychology and archetypes and this intern returned me to some of the material I had been reading on the invisible power we all have wihtin us. I was feeling liberated, along with my understanding of Hindu beliefs systems such as those documented in the Bhagvaard Gita I was understanding more, and started doing more that retuned a higher energy than I had previously experienced.
I have often felt a twinge of fear when I was considering picking up anything relating to Wicca, although I was curious, even drawn to a title fitting this category. It was just another example of irrational fear and prejudice I have placed on the subject by what I had been taught and what all kinds of movies have propagated around the world, mind you documentaries haven’t done any great service either. One day I received a sign; in broad daylight, it was beyond doubt, because this sign stayed in sight all day. I looked into what it could mean, researched on the topic, took photo’s even started to doubt my own instincts ignoring my own inner voice. The sign passed.
Three months later on my way home from work, my wife in the car, she smiled and informed me that she had bought me a gift. It was a book on the history of Grimoire’s. “I know your interested in this stuff” she said with a smile. Once safely home I flicked through the book, thanking her. I went out the back with a glass of wine, and there it was again – the sign. No doubting my instincts this time, too many coincidences for me to refute! I looked in awe, wanted to take a photo for keepsake, because no one would beleive me if I related this story, but my skill with a camera at night wasn’t up to scratch. I called to my wife, showed her there it was sitting there in the back, looking at me, now looking at us. The next day I made an investment.
The first truly Wiccan book I purchased was “Witchcraft” by Ly De Angeles (highly recommended by the way), I used this book more to find out what this Witchraft/Wicca stuff was all about. Then I then read up on Gardinerian Wicca, started attending courses at a wonderful place called the Witches House where I really started to understand.
Tags: Catholic to Wiccan, Wicca, Wiccan Books, Wiccan Life, witchcraft book
