A Basic Overview of Paganism Essay examples

Religions across the globe have their own distinctive rites and rituals, idols, traditions, and values. Each have in common a desire to explain something unexplainable by common wisdom, or attributing some aspect of life to some higher power. Many religions have at their heart etiological stories, which explain some sort of natural phenomenon through the physical manifestation of their deity or deities. From high winds and thunderstorms to love, fertility, and the sun, such religions focus on the physical world in this life. Other religions try to explain the "next" life or the afterlife. These religions usually give a moral code to live by, with stricter adherence to this code offering a better afterlife.

Despite all their similarities, The Greeks and Romans engaged in substantive culture differences. Their religions derived from a complex set of gods and goddesses, called deities, who were seen as regulating human life. Since the Romans embraced culture from the Greeks, many traditions were the same. However, the Greek and Roman culture, although similar, are very different and appealing. For instance, the Greeks did not acknowledge an all-powerful god; they believe that deities controlled everything that transpired on earth. In other words, the Greeks sought religious cults to explain the forces that shape the world (Bentley et al, 2008 p.143).

“Remove any of your fear with faith,” once exclaimed Elder M. Russell Ballard. Catholics and Pagans have always had an intricate relationship between their faiths. A few examples of differences and similarities are the number of gods they believe in, their places of worship, and their holidays. Although they bear some ostensible similarities, the contradiction between the two religions are prominent.

In both Greek and Roman civilizations, mythology played an important part in their empire’s success. Both of these civilizations were polytheistic religions. Likewise, they had major and minor gods and goddesses as part of their religion as well. However, since the Roman Empire conquered many cultures including the Greeks, their gods blended with many similarities with the gods that the Ancient Greeks worshipped.

The Greeks and Romans were accepting of other gods from different cultures, but had contrasting approaches for ensuring a place in their religion. The Romans took religion very seriously and performed everything precisely. They adopted different gods and made them a part of the Roman religion. This would soon change as the Christian religion began to rise in popularity. In

In myths we come across many names of gods and goddesses and strange creatures. All of them have many stories related to them. Different gods represent different aspects of life and the Earth is under their control.

Paganism branches off into : Wicca, Druidry, Astru, Kabbalah, Shamanism and Discordianism. Wicca now has the most followers of the branches of Paganism, it is a polytheistic practice and is prevalent most commonly in the United Kingdom. Druidry is closely aligned with the ancient practices of Wicca, it is based on ancient Celtic Druidism. Astru is rapidly growing but is still the smallest, it is most prevalent in Iceland, Germany, and Scandinavia. Even though Wicca, Druidism, and Astru are very closely related, they all developed independently. Kabbalah is a practice where the mystical and magical aspects came in, it was created by the Jewish during the middle ages. Shamanism is one more common among Native American cultures, they use drumming to send for the shaman to the

     Wicca and Pagan are two religions, which have many similarities as well as many differences within each area. Wicca is a sect of Pagan in which each has their own variations on the religion. A good way to put it; all Wiccans are Pagan, but not all Pagans are Wiccan. Witch is a term used for any practitioner of Wicca. The Webster's II Dictionary defines witch as 1. A woman who practices sorcery or is believed to have dealings with the devil, 2. An ugly, vicious old woman; hag. Wicca is described by the American Heritage Dictionary as the cult of witchcraft. Pagan is the religion under which many different religions are practiced. Webster's II Dictionary defines pagan as one who does not

Morvihschilu also says “ Many religions, such as Christianity and Catholicism, believe that we are guests of nature and that when we die, our true journey begins. Us Pagans believe this to be untrue. We are not guests of nature- we are nature. We interact with nature and respect and appreciate it as we do humans”. Morvihschilu is explaining that those of the Pagan sect treat nature as they would treat people and that this life, right now, is the only one we have. Morvihschilu then proceeds to explain that, like every other religion, each Pagan sect has ethics and rules. “ We follow our own virtues, for example, my religion is Asatru and we follow nine important values: Courage, Truth, Honour, Hospitality, Discipline, Fidelity, Self Reliance, Industriousness, and Perseverance. We honour the true turning of the seasons and the nature of the divine within us. We do not need ‘salvation’, all we we need is freedom to live our lives with courage and honour. Today, our minority has been able to stop hiding and to just let others believe what they want because we know who and what we truly are. Us Pagans, us Wiccans, Asatru, and Druids are family and, like everyone else, humans who worship life and death”. Decianna Morvihschilu proves that Pagans live in harmony with the Earth and raise their children and kin to honor the ways of Nature.

The North American community in today’s worlds has embraced Christianity, Muslim and other popular religious beliefs. Finding the ancient religious practices in action is rare, but not impossible. The communities had their own believes concerning gods and philosophies of good and evil before they were colonized. The communities have lost most of their beliefs and practices as they took place in the earlier community to popular religions which were introduced during and after the colonialism periods (Bonvillain and Porter 23-43).

The following paper will talk about Wicca and Paganism as a religion within the United States. Wicca is a diverse community as a religion, but is not yet considered by any Supreme court case but some aspects such as traditions are recognized by the federal and state courts. This will be further touched upon further later on.

There are many who are Wiccan today that do not believe that the origin of their religion is in Witchcraft; while others believe that these religious practices are part of the foundation of Wicca. Because paganism was not an organized religion and was primarily passed on through oral traditions, there is questionable historical evidence to support a direct connection between the two.

The Pagan religion has been around for forever and is thought to originate from Europe. Paganisms traditions place an importance or homage for nature. Most Pagan groups can trace their roots to around the 1960s. Paganism is not a traditional religion because it does not have any official ideology, but it does have some familiar traits. Growth in the Pagan religion is thought to be based off of the cycles of the earth and the earth’s ecological status.

Most scholars think "The Wanderer" first appeared as a piece of oral poetry during the 5th or 6th century, a time when the Germanic Pagan culture of Anglo-Saxon England was undergoing a conversion to Christianity. It contains traces of both traditional Germanic warrior culture and of a Christian value system. The speaker for much of the poem is a warrior who has had to go into exile after the slaughter of his lord and relatives in battle. Now, he contemplates what the experience of the exile teaches him about life.

When this word “myth” is used, the term is usually related to a fable, invention or a fiction story. Over the years, many scholars started approaching the study of myth differently. These scholars have approach myths in a way their meaning was traditionally regarded. In many traditions these myth are true stories and never refer to as false stories. ( http://ancienthistory.about.com/cs/grecoromanmyth1/a/whatismyth.htm )