Paganism, witchcraft on rise in UK

MSNBC ^ | 06/19/03 | Reuters

[bedolido]

TV shows, Internet, Harry Potter boost membership

LONDON, June 19 — Paganism and the ancient art of witchcraft are on the rise in Britain, experts said on Thursday as the summer’s most celebrated Pagan festival approached.

TELEVISION, THE INTERNET, environmentalism and even feminism have all played a role in the resurgence, they say.

Soaring Pagan numbers have churches worrying and calling for stricter controls on cult TV programs and films that celebrate sorcery like “Harry Potter,” “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” and “Sabrina the Teenage Witch.”

Record attendance is expected at dawn on Saturday morning at the mystical megaliths of Stonehenge, where Pagans have celebrated the summer solstice for thousands of years.

The trend has worried some of the Protestant church’s more traditional elements. “The rise of interest in Paganism is damaging because it normalizes spiritual evil by presenting it as mere fantasy and fiction,” said Reverend Joel Edwards of the Evangelical Alliance, a grouping of some one million UK Christians.

Who's going to die in Harry Potter? “The Evangelical Alliance calls on government and TV regulatory bodies to monitor programs which promote or glamorize Pagan issues,” he told Reuters.

Thirty thousand are expected to dance in the sunrise on summer’s longest day at Stonehenge, says English Heritage, which manages the site — nearly four times the number in 1990, when it re-opened to the public after many years.

Scholars believe the ring of 20-ton stones was built between 3,000 and 1,600 BC as a sacred temple. Many of the revelers will be there just to party, but among them will be druids, who believe in spiritual enlightenment through nature, and witches who practice Wicca — harnessing nature’s power as magic.

[Coleus]

http://www.news.scotsman.com/uk.cfm?id=712452003

Exorcist calls for crusade against occult

TOBY MCDONALD

AN EXORCIST yesterday called for a ‘crusade from the pulpits’ against the growing power of the occult.

Father Jim McManus said paganism and witchcraft were intertwined with evil and needed to be stamped out.

The 62-year-old priest - the only Catholic clergyman to perform the service of "deliverance" regularly - said devil worship could only lead to tragedy.

The profile of paganism will get a boost next month with two festivals and an academic conference on the subject are held north of the Border.

	Witchcraft has as its basis an evil source - devil worship Fr Jim McManus

On Saturday, Scotland’s largest ever festival to celebrate followers of Wicca will be held in Glasgow, and next week Glasgow University is hosting a two-day conference to discuss the significance of the film The Wicker Man and the rise of the occult.

It coincides with the Wicker Man Festival in Galloway, which will culminate with the burning of a giant pagan wicker man, as in the film.

The Pagan Federation alone claims over 2,000 devotees in Scotland - rising by 20 per cent in the past six months.

Fr McManus said: "Witchcraft has as its basis an evil source - devil worship. In the end it only cons its devotees, it does them no good at all.

"People just stumble into this by accident. They are fascinated by it, it hooks them and then ruins their lives."

Fr McManus, who is a monk in the monastery of St Mary’s in Perthshire, added: "If people are looking for a sense of purpose and fulfilment in life, they are not going to find it at the end of that road."

We are no more encouraging paganism than a conference on Steven Spielberg’s Amistad would be promoting slavery Dr Benjamin Franks

In the west of Scotland alone, membership of the Pagan Federation has boomed by a fifth to around 500 this year. About half its members are witches.

The 1973 film The Wicker Man - starring Edward Woodward as a god-fearing police sergeant who is burned to death by pagans, shot in Galloway - has built up a cult following.

Now Glasgow University has launched the first academic conference, under the title Rituals, Readings and Reactions.

Dr Benjamin Franks, a philosophy lecturer who is organising the conference, said: "The organisers are not promoting one theological view over another. We are no more encouraging paganism than a conference on Steven Spielberg’s Amistad would be promoting slavery."

Promoters of the Wicker Man Festival, at Dundrennan near Kirkcudbright, last night denied they were promoting paganism. This year it expects to sell 8,000 tickets over three days. It promises an alternative festival with attractions including extra-terrestrial artwork and a standing stone pyramid.

[Alamo-Girl]

Thanks for the heads up!

[Doctor Stochastic]

The great god Ra whose shrine once covered acres
Is filler now for crossword-puzzle makers.
- Keith Preston (1884-1927)

[Aquinasfan]

England seems to be spiritually dead or dying, and it appears that the vultures are circling.

[rattrap]

his parents wigged out

LOL, what i would give to see te look on their face when a 5 year old said that.

[Aquinasfan]

“The rise of interest in Paganism is damaging because it normalizes spiritual evil by presenting it as mere fantasy and fiction,” said Reverend Joel Edwards of the Evangelical Alliance, a grouping of some one million UK Christians.

Bingo. That's been my objection all along. It's about desensitization and normalization. First the former, then the latter.

[Richard Kimball]

I prefer Shakespeare. You know, "The first thing let's do is kill all the lawyers."

[Xenalyte]

So for us, we prefer to avoid witchcraft and spells.

Tell me: have you ever met anyone who managed to perform a Harry Potter spell successfully?

I'm curious, because it's very hard to get unicorn tail hair and dragon heart strings here, and I'm looking for a supplier.

And if your answer is no, then I need to know why all the hullabaloo over a book that has non-working spells in it.

[Xenalyte]

Harry Potter is for the troubled child. Studies have indicated that.

What studies would those be? Xena's Mom is a librarian, and she doesn't want to deal out more trouble.

[Aquinasfan]

"When people cease to believe in the one, true God, they don't just believe in nothing. They believe in anything."

G.K. Chesterton

True.

[Xenalyte]

She can just about kick a quarter off her bellybutton.

When one of my best friends was pregnant, about a week off her due date she decided to take a hot bath, and she likes 'em HOT. She got into the water, and the baby hustled from one side to the other.

To this day, her daughter would rather shower than bathe.

[jejones]

Seems to me these folks are several decades late...or did they think Mary Poppins was Satanic, too?

[CatoRenasci]

Well, it sounds like Merrie England is finally catching up to where the US was in the '60s and '70s with the Church of All Worlds and all the neo-pagans in LA, SF and NY: One thinks of the Gardnerite witches, the CoG blend of Trad and Feminist Wicca (remember Z Budapest?), Feriferia, New Reformed Order of the Golden Dawn, CES (the Egyptians), etc. Very, very curious. Lots of decent people, disenchanted with traditional Christianity, searching for some non-Eastern religious, mystical and magic traditions, with some environmental trappings, as a reaction to the utter vapidness of suburban American life and the emptiness of the drug culture.

I guess it's time to drag out the Margaret Murray again, tart up Gardner a bit more, and find that book on sex magick in time to see the naked young things at Beltane....

[Coleus]

England seems to be spiritually dead or dying, and it appears that the vultures are circling.>>

And judging from the recent SCOTUS decisions, laws on gay adoptions and unions, abortion, transgendered kids, new age movement, gay pride parades, etc. we are catching up.

[ninenot]

It's about desensitization and normalization. First the former, then the latter.

Worked GREAT with sex ed and "Tommy Has Two Mommies," or whatever that classic lit piece was...

[ninenot]

unicorn tail hair and dragon heart strings

Sears catalog, PP. 955-956

[Aquinasfan]

we are catching up.

Unfortunately, yes. And the process seems to be picking up speed.

[Coleus]

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http://www.cnsnews.com/ViewCulture.asp?Page=\Culture\archive\200306\CUL20030627a.html
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http://www.cnsnews.com/ViewCulture.asp?Page=\Culture\archive\200306\CUL20030630c.html

[fatima]

Coleus,These people have no idea what they are walking into,thank you Father for trying.I have seen things first hand.