GO JESUS!
Posted on 03/08/2006 10:13:29 AM PST by NYer
Witches have returned to the German forests, dancing naked in groups under the full moon and calling to their gods.
The covens vary in size and in how seriously they take their calling, but the numbers are rising, particularly amongst the young.
Their religious ideas are described as "pagan" rather than Satanist, and many of the older practitioners have a history in the environmental movement, where they learnt a passionate love of nature.
In some cases this has led on to a belief in the natural powers of the forests. The women are convinced they can work magic.
"The witches' scene is experiencing a powerful revival," says Lutheran theologian Hansjoerg Hemminger. He says the covens range from "girlie witches" to the so-called "Wicca" covens. Wicca is an old Anglo-Saxon term for a group of witches.
Christian theologians are inclined to see the latter as a manifestation of a new heathen movement. The women tend to be members of associations like the Pagan Federation or the Stone Circle.
Maddalina, a 44-year-old witch, is high priestess of a witches' coven in Berlin, who became interested in Wicca about 15 years ago.
The former doctor's assistant, who declines to provide her real name, says she began looking around for women with similar interests.
"Today you are just a mouse-click away from making contact," she says, and she estimates that the number of witches has quadrupled in her time as a witch.
Conceding she is uncertain, she guesses there are several hundred Wiccans in Germany.
Maddalina is scornful of the teenagers interested in the witch cults. She gets e-mails daily from 13- and 14-year-olds, almost all of which she rebuffs.
Her own coven numbers just eight and the youngest trainee witch is 25 years old.
Most of the teenagers interested in witchcraft gain their information from the media, the internet or from books. Television series on witchcraft are currently popular in Germany.
These sources offer love potions aimed at curing shyness, or magical formulas spoken in the light of the moon to help with schoolwork.
Hemminger insists that these methods are never solutions to real problems.
But Maddalina is true to her beliefs. "We are heathens and believe in the power of magic," she says.
She and her coven go into the woods around Berlin several times a year to stand naked in a circle and call to Baldur, the god of light.
Their requests are of a banal sort; wishes for a better job, a new flat with a balcony, for good health.
By contrast with the teenage witches, the Wicca covens tend to be older women with a background in the women's movement.
Most commentators do not believe the groups have any links to Satanism and black magic. But Hemminger sounds a note of warning.
"Some of these circles operate in complete secrecy. We really don't know what they are up to," he says.
In general he regards the Wicca covens as a means to overcome personal crises that only cause concern once the cult begins to take over a person's life.
Maddalina insists her coven's activities are harmless. "We are not hurting anyone," she says.
And the Berlin forest authorities are taking a similar view, allowing the witches to dance under the moon.
You left off the hair. remember wiccans are naturalists
You've GOT to read the whole thing, to get my point!
Yes, it was all through the looking glass.
The fellow said that he stopped going to church because he was signing a hymn about "Daystar shine on me".
Daystar is Jesus, he was told. He looked up Daystar, it's a synonym for Morning Star, which is the Satan of the Old Testament.
He saw that in Revelation, Jesus refers to himself as the Morning Star.
And so he made the connection: My GOD, Jesus is SATAN, because it says so right there.
And he stopped going to church.
I picked up his logic and took it to the full conclusion.
It started with "Assume Jesus IS Satan, like you think..."
And came to the conclusion that even if Jesus is Satan, he's more worthy of worship than anyone or anything else.
It was a hard argument, and long, and I said right in it that there would be people deeply offended by it.
That's what all that was.
To really get what I was getting it, you have to read it all.
And it's probably not worth the effort.
Ok, so Jesus is Lucifer.
Worship Lucifer, then, because if Jesus is Lucifer, there's nobody more worthy of worship than Jesus.
"we're at work so don't do that!"
Umm, do WHAT?
I didn't post any pictures.
Somebody else "thoughtfully" did.
(Ick!)
You must not have paid attention.
Dang that sounds like me. But nekkid in a forest? I don't think so. Actually, it might be illegal.
Different cultures have indeed given different names to supernatural beings, but there is a surprising consistency in the basic self-regarding moral laws of nearly all cultures, however far separated.
Thus you have Confucius stating that the highest principle was to be other-regarding, to not do to another what one would not want done to one's self.
And you have the prince in the Bhagavad Gita breaking down suddenly in battle when he has an epiphany and realizes that the men he is fighting are really akin to him, like cousins, so how can he kill them?
The golden rule of the Christians and of the Jewish Hillel are famous.
The 27 commandments of the Chippewa were very similar in moral tone.
Now, different rules always applies when dealing with other enemies outside the group, but the "group" has almost always been loosely defined enough to let others in by some process of conversion.
So, although men might call angels or demons by different names all the world around, yet there is a remarkable parallellism across cultures and times concerning the moral rules for the treatment of one's own, and in referring to various gods or divine inspiration for these good principles.
This is what allows various religions of the world, although quite hostile to each other in other ways, to recognize that the same god or gods have roamed the earth under many names, also the same demons, exhorting men to do or not to do the same things all the world around.
There is a reason why the conversion of Ireland and the North American woodland Indians was practically a walkover: the Irish already had the moral code and the inclination towards monotheism or a great spirit. The Christians merely gave those spirits names. There already was substantial "Christian" morality among the Irish and the Chippewa before the Catholic missionaries showed up.
The Christian improvement on these native revelations was to assign a name to God, and to suggest that the rules as applied WITHIN the group should also be applied to those OUTSIDE of the group. The Hindus in particular had the same inspiration.
To me (and to Hindus, Muslims and Chippewa animists), this shows One God at work, giving the same inspirations to each different tribe and group of people, distilled through the familiar cultural prisms of these people. The banal uniformity of evil and desire for it is also everywhere visible. This too is revelatory of something.
wiccan witchery is a 1880 invention of some upperclass brits.
when charlemagne came to germany and defeated the saxon tribes which lived under a constitution that knew no king until then (only a 'herzog' in times of war, name derivates from the fact that it was the person riding in front of the army), charlemagne destroyed the nature religion that had until then been practised there. that was 777 AD. so were not talking about wiccan pop witches here.
GO JESUS!
all a christian needs to know about wiccan religion:
http://www.malleusmaleficarum.org/
i think there was a duck picture before -.-
but of course i know some christians too and some of them are great people....honest, hard working...few of them even tolerant.
of course they are not responsible for, regardless what christianity may say, they have committed the greatest atrocities of all religions for spreading the message of someone that was without doubt a holy man preaching total non violence.
i dont hold the crimes of their religious masters that have been promoted by kings and slavemakers against them.
neither would jesus, i guess.
***************
LOL!
Very true. I dated a pagan girl some years ago. She did not have a hateful bone in her body. She has since come to Christ and is attending Mass with the intent of joining the Catholic Church. :)
Very good point!
I think most of the men here prefer women who shave their legs and armpits. :)
Or at least SEE their armpits.
cute song apropos of pagans:
DAR WILLIAMS
The Christians and the Pagans
Amber called her uncle, said "We're up here for the holiday,
Jane and I were having Solstice, now we need a place to stay."
And her Christ-loving uncle watched his wife hang Mary on a tree,
He watched his son hang candy canes all made with red dye number three.
He told his niece, "Its Christmas Eve, I know our life is not your style,"
She said, "Christmas is like Solstice, and we miss you and its been awhile,"
So the Christians and the Pagans sat together at the table,
Finding faith and common ground the best that they were able,
And just before the meal was served, hands were held and prayers were said,
Sending hope for peace on earth to all their gods and goddesses.
The food was great, the tree plugged in, the meal had gone without a hitch,
Till Timmy turned to Amber and said, "Is it true that you're a witch?"
His mom jumped up and said, "The pies are burning," and she hit the kitchen,
And it was Jane who spoke, she said, "It's true, your cousin's not a Christian,"
"But we love trees, we love the snow, the friends we have, the world we share,
And you find magic from your God, and we find magic everywhere,"
So the Christians and the Pagans sat together at the table,
Finding faith and common ground the best that they were able,
And where does magic come from? I think magic's in the learning,
Cause now when Christians sit with Pagans only pumpkin pies are burning.
When Amber tried to do the dishes, her aunt said, "Really, no, don't bother."
Ambers uncle saw how Amber looked like Tim and like her father.
He thought about his brother, how they hadn't spoken in a year,
He thought he'd call him up and say, "Its Christmas and your daughter's here."
He thought of fathers, sons and brothers, 'til his own son tugged his sleeve,
saying "Can I be a Pagan?" Dad said, "Well discuss it when they leave."
So the Christians and the Pagans sat together at the table,
Finding faith and common ground the best that they were able,
Lighting trees in darkness, learning new ways from the old, and
Making sense of history and drawing warmth out of the cold.
The Egyptians lived and died by the annual flooding of the Nile. Anyone who impeded the flood (which fertilized the soil along the river) was probably considered as evil as a murderer, in Egyptian eyes.
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