Wicca and the European Tradition

What is Wicca?

Wicca is a neo-pagan religion based on the pre-Christian traditions of England, Ireland, Scotland, and Wales. It seeks to find its roots further back to Paleolithic peoples who worshipped a Hunter God and a Fertility Goddess. Cave paintings found in France (and dated at 30,000 years old) depict a man with the head of a stag, and a woman with a swollen, pregnant belly. They stand in a circle with eleven mortals. These archetypes of the divine are worshipped by Wiccans. It has a shamanistic approach.

We report some words from "The Wicca Spellbook":
Wicca encourages free thought, artistic creativity, individuality, and personal, spiritual, and psychic growth. It is a celebration of the cycle of seasons and of life. Wicca is respecting and living in harmony with all living things. Wicca is light. Wicca is love. Wicca is called "Craft of the Wise" and is both ancient and new. It is a path unlike any other in the world.
Wicca is not anti-christian; however, it does not acknowledge the existance of sin, the Devil, or a judgmental and avenging god as defined by Christianity.
Wicca is a positive journey to enlightenment through Goddess-worship and the mystical art of white magick. It is a shamanistic nature-oriented religion and a unique and exciting blend of the traditional and the eclectic that seeks neither to convert, conform, or control.

How it connects to other traditions?

The modern incarnation of wicca was born in 1951 and it is an amalgam of different western traditions. What we find interesting in this tradition on the anthropological point of view is the use of some rituals in a new fashion. We think people practicing wicca could find a deeper understanding of what they do, and enhance the results connecting themselves also to the other european traditions. It is interesting the use of rituals done by wicca. Our institute in Europe is now doing a comparation between the efficacity and the symbolism of different european rituals.

For more informations on this research, call us or e-mail us.