I keep hearing about Wicca/Wiccans. Is that considered a religion? What do Wiccans believe and practice?

Like, is the pentagram part of Wicca? I’ve always wondered what that stood for. I’ve been shopping for rocks and crystals because I want to collect them, and I see a lot that are categorized as “Wiccan.” How is that a part of the practice? Also, is “Wicca” the same as “paganism”? All these different names are confusing!

Wicca is a religion without laity, this means that it is only consisting of priests and priestesses, so it is more accurately called a priesthood, some people would also call it a cult – cults have a bad reputation, they are not bad, cult simply means a small religious grouping with a charismatic leader, even Christianity was once a cult.

Wicca is not an officially recognised religion, when people say a religion is recognised what they usually mean is that it is included in the Army Chaplain’s handbook for ministering to people of various faiths or that some religious organisations can incorporate as a church and attain tax-exempt status. It is not possible to have a recognised religion because to recognise one religion and not another would go against the U.S. constitution. Within the U.S there is no such thing as an officially recognised religion.

Wicca is an initiate-only oath-bound priesthood, those who are Wicca are brought into Wicca through a British Traditional Witchcraft coven, and this means a coven with a direct line back to the founder of Wicca Gerald Gardner or the New Forest coven. The line back to Gardner or the New Forest coven is important because the information about the beliefs, practices, doctrines, mysteries and gods of Wicca are only taught to those within Wicca to maintain the integrity of their path so if the line is broken the full information about Wicca is not known to the coven so cannot be passed onto new members.
The information you find online is ‘outer-court’ material, this means things that are taught to those outside of Wicca that are not oath-bound, often placeholders are taught rather than the real beliefs just to make it easier to explain their beliefs to those outside of Wicca.
Many people claim to be Wicca when they are in fact not, there is a new faith known as ‘Neo-wicca’ this is a belief system based upon the outer-court teachings of Wicca, many of these Neo-wicca call themselves Wicca because misinformation has lead them to believe this is what they are, there is a lot of misinformation about Wicca.
Wicca is a mystery tradition; the mysteries are the Wicca insight into life.
Wicca are hard-polytheists meaning that they believe in their own specific gods, they don’t disbelieve in other peoples gods; they simply don’t follow other gods but their own. Wicca gods are known as the Great Mother Goddess and Horned God, these are the outer-court names.
Wicca are often thought to follow the rede, this is a poem that describes their belief but a line most often quoted is ‘an if it harm none, do as thou wilt’ some people take this as ‘harm none’ however it is actually to do with cause and effect – meaning you can’t do as you wish as it could harm others – it is most often taught to those new to Wicca to make them realise the potential outcomes of their actions, Wicca themselves are largely dependant on their own personal morals and ethics, the rede is more commonly followed by Neo-wicca as meaning ‘harm none’ or try not to intentionally cause someone harm.

Here are some good sites on Wicca & Neo-wicca;

http://amberandjet.spiralpaths.org

http://www.geraldgardner.com

http://www.sacred-texts.com/pag/gbos/index.htm

http://www.starkindler.org

http://www.tradwicca.org

http://www.newwiccanchurch.net

http://www.thewellhead.org.uk

http://www.mothersmagic.net

http://www.asiya.org

http://janus.spawnfar.net

http://www.angelfire.com/co2/evenstar/faq.html

The pentagram is a common symbol of Wicca but it is also included in other religions such as Satanism and Christianity, as well as a symbol used within Paganism in general, there are various reasons why the pentagram is used as religious symbolism.
Within Wicca and Paganism the pentagram tends to symbolise the four elements [earth, fire, water, air] with the addition of the fifth point at the top symbolising spirit, the circle surrounding them as binding them in harmony. Within Christianity the pentagram represents the five wounds of Christ. Within Satanism it represents Baphomet with the point showing downward, or similar to the inverted cross with the three points of the pentagram representing the trinity of Christianity pointing downwards.

Gem stones and crystals are commonly used within Wicca for their magical and healing properties, people tend to categorise them as ‘Wiccan’ because people know they can cash-in on the fad of Wicca – those interested in Wicca are more likely to be attracted to something labelled ‘Wiccan gemstones’ than ‘gemstones’. Crystals are used throughout a lot of occult and new age practices, for example they are used in healing such as crystal healing or charka-related practices.

Wicca is not the same as Paganism but part of Paganism.
Paganism is an umbrella term that is used for any religious path outside of Christian, Jewish or Muslim faiths, however generally when people say Pagan they are referring to Neo-Paganism. Neo-pagans are either pantheist or polytheist.
Pantheist means someone who believes the divine is present in all, everything living or throughout everything within the universe or world. Polytheist is someone who believes in many different deities, for example someone who is Asatru is polytheist because they believe in the gods within Norse mythology.
Wicca is a polytheist religion, thus Wicca is a Pagan religion, but not all Pagans are Wicca, Wicca actually makes up a very small percentage of Paganism it is just because it is one of the better known Pagan religions that it is so often heard of.

Wiccan and the Crystal Bible by:Judy Hall – May 21, 2009 PM

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