Wicca Or The Witchcraft

This article is about witchcraft and its different varieties of practices in different cultures. This article explains how witchcraft exists and plays an essential part in structural and functional aspects of a society. It also sheds the light on the journey of witchcraft from being profane and wicked to acceptable part of a culture.

When comparing Wicca to Christianity there can be found a few similarities and many differences. To give a better understanding into the comparison of Wicca and Christianity this paper will focus on how the practitioners of each religion create order and meaning within their belief systems; their central beliefs and deities; their ritual practices and ethical views; and other differences and/or similarities between the two.

Witchcraft is a religion. Wicca is one type of Witchcraft, but the term "Wicca" is occasionally applied to Witchcraft in overall. In the United States, most people who practice this religion call themselves Witches or Wiccans. It is an earth-based religion and in some ways is similar to Native American spirituality. Wicca (sometimes called Wicce, The Craft, or The Old Religion) is based on an ancient religion of love for life and nature. The religion of Witchcraft or Wicca is recognized by most state governments, the federal government, and the United States Armed Forces. The courts have recognized the right of even prisoners to practice this religion on an equal basis with other religions. In ancient times, people appreciated the great forces of Nature and celebrated the seasons’ cycles and the moon. They saw spirituality in the sun and moon and in the Earth Herself. Basically, in all life.

Witch comes from ‘wic’ which means to bend of shape consciousness/events of life through meditations & chants.

     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

Religious, I am a very religious person, I go to church as much as possible and know a lot about the bible, I believe at one time when jesus walked the earth there was miracles or some may call magic taken place. He performed these miracles to show everyone who he was and the power he had through his father God. He raised people from the dead, fed thousands of people with five loaves of bread and two fish, gave blind people sight. However once he went back to heaven he said “It is written” which means he was done performing miracles, I think at that point the power to do things like that were over. Non religiously, well witchcraft is considered to be spiritual as its self, so there is no ways to describe it but other than explain it as close to a religion which is the belief in yourself as being the one with the god like powers and performing these magic miracles. However I personally do not believe in these or that they couldn't even be

It is important to know the roots of Wicca to be able to separate the good and bad facts about Wicca.

There is no real record of just how far back the Native American’s have been around. For as long as there have been Native American’s there has been some sort of Native American Spirituality (Joy of Sects). For Wiccan religion is unclear who specifically founded it. Wiccan religion is considered one of the oldest or one of the newest religions in the world depending on whom you talk to. The first known records have been traced back to around the 19th century. However there is not a lot of recorded history because most practiced in secret (World Religions Professor). Many people have a lot of negative associations with Wicca’s and witchcraft, so to avoid being burned at the stake many Wicca’s practiced in secret and in

As with altars having comparable traits to a shrine, there are other comparisons of the Wiccan religion to the more traditional religions of the United States and the rest of the world. For instance, praying is comparable to meditation in Wiccan society. Even with this comparison of prayer and meditation, Wiccans pray to their God and Goddess. This will be elaborate later on. Another comparison is initiation. Most, if not all Wiccan, go through initiations which is a ceremony that initiates them fully into the dedication of Wicca. One can do this alone, but it is recommended to be initiated with a Wiccan group, instead of solidarity.

I don’t know about you, but for me so far, all of our author’s attempts to get an explanation about what witchcraft is has failed. We know that witchcraft is the cause of misfortunes and personal injury sustained by the Azande people through what they believe to be no fault of their own, but I think we have yet to have any understanding of what causes witchcraft itself. Where does it come from, who causes it, and is it in any way like a sort of karma believed to be punishment for bad deeds like in eastern philosophies? I think we need to take a deeper look into witchcraft and what the Azande people are actually talking about, because from what I’ve gathered so far, the Azande believe that witchcraft is an unexplained phenomena of independent events that in no way should have had any reason to take place simultaneously

The Wiccan religion is one of the fastest growing religions in the United States as well one of the most misunderstood due to the controversies surrounding its history and mystery shrouding its beliefs and doctrines. Due to a series of popular TV series that have shown Witchcraft in a positive light, such as Sabrina, the Teen-aged Witch and Charmed, the popularity of Wicca has grown, especially amongst teenagers; but sadly this popularity has not been partnered with a growth in understanding and respect (Kaminer). Although Wicca offers a nature-oriented, egalitarian belief system with a rich collection of customs and rituals, ignorance and historically-rooted misconceptions still dominate public opinion.

There are many different branches, called "traditions", of The Craft, most of which are based on the religious practices of one or more ancient cultures. There are Celtic Wiccans, Egyptian Wiccans, and Greek Wiccans. One of the newest traditions is a hybrid of Celtic Shamanism and the tribal religions of Ancient America. There is, however, a basic outline for conducting worship services that is followed by all covens and solitaries. A standard Wiccan worship service, or ritual, which takes place on one of the eight yearly sabbats (the solstices, equinoxes, and four Ancient Celtic agricultural festivals) or at an esbat (full moon), consists of the creation of sacred space(called "casting the circle;" this is done through visualization), prayers, and offerings (these are usually material possessions, plants, or handmade items; Wiccans never sacrifice animals or people), and a sharing of a simple meal with fellow witches (if a member of a coven) and the Deities. Worship services have many important purposes, but the main reason Wiccans perform rituals is to gain understanding of the energies of the divine and, ultimately, the energies contained in the witch himself/herself. The harnessing

Debbie Wiseman, an anthropomorphic religious studies expert, refers to Wicca as “a modern religion based on pre-Christian Witchcraft traditions,” rather than coining them with the ever imposing term of “witches” itself. Wicca originates from numerous backgrounds but mostly, in part, from ancient northern European Paganistic beliefs like that of the Druids found in Scotland, Ireland, and Wales. Due to the publishing of the Books of Wicca by Gerald Gardner in 1951, anthropologists have come to the general understanding that these books were the beginnings of the mass movement that created the modernized variation of Wicca practiced today (Wiseman, 2015). One of Garder’s main influencers was an Egyptologist and anthropologist named Margaret Murray, who researched witchcraft during the first world war. She discovered that witchcraft was a “blend of many different polytheistic and/or nature revering religions and spiritual persuasions based on the belief system and way of life” (Wiseman, 2015). In short, Wicca is a nature based, multi-god worshipping religion that revolves around the cycles of the moon and the coexistence of the

Throughout the duration of the interview, Amy had accounted on various instances how magic and rituals are a key part to the Wiccan religion. Despite common misinterpretations, magic is not always on the basis of charm and hexes but is instead focused on ritualized prayers. These ideas are connected with the three principles of gods/goddesses, ethics and the natural world. By utilizing witchcraft, these aspect are interconnect with her daily life. Unlike many religious presented worldwide, prayers of such do not always involve a physical contribution, such as lighting candles, but is rather focused on mental ideologies. For further ideas, Amy emphasized that the Goddess of the moon, stars and sea or the Great Mother is a divinity that she

Unlike most religions thoughts on a divine ultimatum, Wiccans believe that the world shares the two alternatives of heaven and hell, in a glimpse of what was mentioned in the class group assignment, most Wicca’s believe that we have a shared space with heaven and hell. In Christianity and most other popular first world religions Heaven is the place where God dwells. It is a location that is a spiritual utopia in nature. That doesn’t seem to be the case with Wiccas,