Copy of post made to The Thicket

[kiya]

In an attempt to put it somewhere where it won't get bogged down in the stupid argument about whether being a priest means not having to have an intercessor between self and gods, rather than, y'know, having the obligations of clergy:

Wicca as originally conceived is an initiatory mystery priesthood religion. All dedicants had to have a certain level of focus and interest in pursuit of the goal in the early years, because training was hard to find. Levels of training/priesthood established depth and possibly to a certain extent direction of calling (though Wicca is far from the first religion to have clerical rank). BTW and the other traditionalist Wicca lines are holding closely to this original concept.

Historically speaking, mystery religions have existed on the edges of a mainstream of people sharing roughly the same cultural context. There would be a mainline complex of faiths, and then people who were interested in something more specific, there were the Mysteries. Sometimes the Mysteries were very large, encompassing major festivals or subsets of the population; sometimes they were very small and particular. Going through some of the Mysteries conveyed particular status or titles in everyday life. There was also a great deal of feedback back and forth between the larger community and its Mystery organisations, with bastardised forms of the idioms of Mystery becoming a part of the main culture (which in its way can deepen the effectiveness of Mystery).

As modern paganism grew and developed, it started developing a mainstream culture. (For better and for worse.) That mainstream culture, these days, is dominated by outer court traditionalist Wiccan practices, with some cross-fertilisation from other groups (feminist spirituality is a big one in the US). This has created a pool of shared idiom and cross-fertilising culture among modern pagans.

From that pool of shared idiom has developed what amounts to the mainstream complex of modern pagan religion, much like the ancient mainstream religious practices that supported the mystery cults on the side. It is very largely Wiccan in flavor, due in significant part to the power of the structure that Gardner and his compatriots put together. The symbolism, the structure, and the theology can carry meaning without that meaning being created by the mysteries, which is a great credit to the underlying vision.

So now we have the traditional Wicca on the side of a largely Wiccan-idiom mainstream, partially duplicating the historical position of Mystery cults. The mainstream has a dominant religion, which is eclectic Wicca, and there is cross-fertilisation in a variety of directions. The mainstream-pagan eclecticism has also spawned its own religions with their own priests, many of which refer to themselves as 'Wicca' in at least some form.

There will always be a spectrum of religious devotion in any group of humans. I believe the degree system of traditional Wicca is, in part, an attempt to register this, that even among folks with a calling some will be called to levels of more intensity, greater obligation, etc. When the mainstream is included, you get folks who range from secular religionists to heavily dedicated laity who don't want to take on the responsibilities and obligations of priesthood.

My feeling on the question of "What is Wicca?" is complex. I don't think that the traditionalist end of Wicca has necessarily adapted well to having a mainstream, a laity, of religious witchcraft folks who aren't engaged in their Mysteries, who just want to celebrate the Wheel of the Year and revere the gods. I also don't think that the mainstream eclectic Wiccans are as aware of the possibility that their experiences may not be the same experiences as the traditionalists' as they could be. (They may be, but without experiencing both sets of mysteries, there's no way to tell.)

I think it's important to recognise all these things: the importance of the mystery traditions, both historically and as options for those people who are called to experience those particular mysteries; the importance of a mainstream shared idiom and a community context in which a priesthood can exist; /and/ the broad pool of the laity who are called to the gods in ways that are not priesthood.

I think resolving the debate of legitimacy between BTW-and-similar and the eclectic Wiccans really needs that level of distance and recognition that these things are, at least potentially, really dealing with different things. I think the argument is too far gone for either to claim 'Wicca' exclusively, much though it would make some conversations earlier. I hope that at some point the traditionalist way is recognised as a legitimate calling rather than "elitism" and the mainstream-eclectic as a legitimate practice-set containing other legitimate callings rather than "bastardisation".

Comments

[elf]

More thots, maybe scattered:

Early Wiccans--the lineaged, initiatory lines--called themselves a "priesthood." Which was fine, and accurate... but when asked "what makes them a priest if there's no laity to minister to?" They wound up answering, "because we speak to the Gods directly, and perform rituals for them"--leading to the idea that anyone who does these things, must be a priest.

Some parts got left out. They do minister... to each other; a coven serves as an interwoven pack of spiritual advisors & trainers. They don't just "perform rituals"--they perform them according to a specific set of doctrines and purposes. And they don't get to invent or change those doctrines & purposes; those are built into the religion.

One problem in modern [non-recon] paganism is there seems to be no space for the devout layperson... everyone's pushed to be either clergy or fluffbunny. Even among recons, I run across some of this... people who want to be devoutly religious but not gather a master's degree in historical study of their religion are often disparaged.