by: Rick Johnson 
PO Box 40451
Tucson, Az.
85717
RikJohnson@juno.com
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Consider the following situation if you would;
You are a convert to the catholic religion. Eventually, you become a catholic priest
and spend possibly decades studying the religion, doing your masses, taking confession,
giving absolution and the last rites and all the other things that are required of a cathoic
priest.
But, when you talk in public, be it in casual conversation or in print, you
consistantly insult the church, the pope and jesus himself. You state that the more liberal
churches are fraudulant catholics because they actually marry divorced people which, all
good catholics know is a sin. You refuse to allow any divorced catholic into your own
church, not to mention closing the church doors to anyone who wasn't baptized a catholic.
You state that the pope has no idea of what a 'real' catholic is or believes because
what he says is so different from what you do.
And you even state that jesus wasn't a catholic, wouldn't be allowed to attend your
church and most of what he said is outdated and flat out wrong!
So, what do you do? Do you listen to this guy? Do you accept what he says as true? Do
you live your life acording to the views of this one priest and ignore not only the vast
diversity of the church but also the official proclaimations of the vatican which is the
acepted head of the catholic religion?
And if you do, can you still call yourself a catholic?
To be somewhat cynical, if he so disagrees with the church, why does he still claim to be
a catholic? If he is in such obvious disagreement with the way the church does things,
why not just create a new religion with himself as head? Martin Luthor and King Henry
VIII did that.
To be more cynical, why should you even listen to someone who is so degrading to
not only the church he claims to serve but to the accepted leaders of that church and even
insults the one person who his church considers to the THE most mportant person in the
entire existance of the wrld?
Now lets compare this to witchcraft.
For good or for bad, Gerald Gardner and Doreen Valiente brought Wicca out of
oblivion and made it popular to the masses. They had a vision where witches could
worship The Gods in peace and freedom and they revised the Craft to make this possible.
And in all honestly, virtually all of us who are Witches are so because of the work
of these people. It doesn't matter if you are Gardnerian yourself or one of the obviously
derived Traditions like Alexandrian or Sheban or even one of the more obscure Trads that
can easily be traced to Gardner/Valiente's writings... the bottom line is that these people
are the founders of our Tradition and even our Religion as it is practiced today.
If you join any of the e-mail lists that deal with Gardnerianism or any of the other Traditions we lump under the generic title of British Traditional Witchcraft (BTW), you will read any number of messages from only a very few Gardnerian/BTWs who appear to spend far too much time insulting or attacking anyone who has ever written on the subject. And often when the names Gerald Gardner or Doreen Valiente are mentioned, these people immediatly attack both with comments that range from "they were not or are not Garderians so don't listen to them" to "they published 'oathbound' material so are traitors to the Craft/Tradition".
My personal response has always been, "If you dislike these people so much, then why
the **** do you insist on calling yurself a Gardnerian/BTW?" "If you hate the founders
of our religion that much, then leave it and form your own Tradition!"
Then I think that if the Three-Fold Law does exist, then the Initiates and Downlines
of these people will are doomed to receive three times the disrespect that these people are
showing to the founders of our religion.
Now everyone has an agenda when they become a Witch. It may simply to be able to
worship the Gods. It may be to become a better person. It may be to help others. Or it
may be to get laid and control people. Agendas can be good or evil and although most of
the people who become Witches have a positive agenda, there are some who see the Craft
as the chance to be a big fish in a small pond. And to be this, they need to restrict
knowledge and prevent people from thinking or communicating with others. And the
strongest way to do this is to convince others that they, themselves, know everything and
all who disagree are frauds.
Neither Witchcraft nor Gardnerianism is some monolithic entity where you can,
like the Baltimore Catechism, get the 'official' answer to all 'proper' questions. Rather,
like anything that has people involved, there are many Lines and many different ways to
express your devotion to the Gods. Some are more comon than others and there are some
who will claim that their own way is the ONLY way even when the evidence from others
of the Tradition or the writings of the founders say differently.
To the new people who are attracted to Gardenrianism/BTW and even to sme of
those who are older and more experienced, I will ask these questions:
So, to those who deride Gerald Gardner, Doreen Valiente and the other first generation
Witches who risked so much to found our religion, I would state that it is you, and not the
founders, who are the frauds. A true Priest/ess works for the Religion, not themselves.
To those who would seek BTW, be it Gardnerianism, Alexandrianism, Mohsian or
such, I would suggest that if your entry into these Traditions are those who have so little
respect for they who founded the religion/Tradition, then perhaps you should listen to
another.
Because like any form of bigotry, these who denigrate Gardner et al, are no better
than those who espouse anti-semitism, racism or such. They have an agenda that is by no
means in keeping with the Vision of the Founders of Modern Witchcraft or even of the
Gods Themselves. The vision of freedom and respect for all religions and people.
Witchcraft is supposed to empower people, to make them better. No to drag them
into the brier of religious fundamentalism.
I will end with one saying that is and always has been true.
So when you hear some "Lord high mucky-muck" who claims to be a High Prist/ess in a
specific Tradition yet shows so little respect for they who risked all for the Craft, perhaps
you chould consider that these people may not have learned what being a High Priest/ess
realy means and instead chose the Craft for personal power and material gain.
If so, you may very well wish to seek a teacher elsewhere, one who does believe
that the Craft is more than an ego/power trip.
Of course, we can always curse these people by seeing to it that they receive three
times the dis-respect from their Initiates that they have shown to they who risked their
lives to found our Tradition. But that would be wrong,.... maybe....
To contact me or to request topics to be covered, send to RikJohnson@juno.com
by: Rick Johnson
PO Box 40451
Tucson, Az.
85717
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Return to the Writings page.
