… why aren’t its practitioners rich? While a double-wide trailer is a wonderful and economical form of housing, you don’t see Bill Gates living in one.
My wife thinks that the double-wide was a step up from the single-wide they had before they started witching about.
Well, Bill Gates sold his soul to the Devil. Oh wait, he is the devil. Sorry. Anyway, would you sell your soul to Bill Gates? ::ducking shots:: I know not all witches worship the Devil!
Well, if you know that their are witches that do not worship the devil then doesn’t it stand to reason that these same witches would also not use their spells to gain monetary riches? Do you think that maybe their spells are parallel with the prayers of Christians? For that matter, if praying works, why aren’t all Christians rich?
Evil, that’s deep. And if I were in a worse mood I’d think that it indicts both sides. But I’m too well medicated to care.
Hello Beth, I knew that I would find you here.
Okay Dropzone, things don’t exactly work like that. You could always go by the old standard to be careful what you ask for.
To me ritual work is a form of prayer. When I needed to monetary gain I took my resume and got my candles, gathered up a few coven members, did ritual under a full moon, and asked for guidance in finding the job with my best interests.
The Lord and Lady provided me with the job at Oscar Mayer. Great pay, great hours and great benifits.
My grandmother went to church and prayed for me to find a job to suit my needs.
Okay, right now in my current state I could use a million or so. But would I be that greedy? Would I be willing to pay for it in Karma? Nope. There are others who need it just as badly.
Is your wife a witch? Your last statement confused me.
well, the witch I know best seems fairly well off and has a pretty good life, nice house, nice spouse, nice life. What more is there?
Not everyone values material wealth over all else.
My mother was a very well known Psycic and did “old country magic” & card reading, what today we might call wicca. Her “powers/spells” was an exceptional insight into what the REAL problem was, and some good advice to solve it; and a method of focusing on candles to drive pain away. Neither one was outside science by more than a tad. Neither one could make her rich. And, the “spells” worked less & less if you did not believe- for both, ie if my mom was doing it “only fo the money”, it would not be as effective. So there is an example of a “real” “witch” (Mom hated that term, and insisted it belonged only to Devil-lovers), who had very real “powers” and could not get rich.
Perhaps I’m thinking more of the followers of the dark side than the followers of the First Faith. A bad choice of words on my part–sorry. But it got folks posting!
My wife sez that it wouldn’t work if she were to get greedy, like trying to win the lotto. But she’s only good with chronic headaches. Not her own, either.
As a bit of a Marianist, but one with an understanding of history, your Lady and mine are, or started out, as the same Goddess. But I am unfamiliar with your Lord. Has he other names, ones I might be more familiar with?
My family is all going Lutheran. My wife tells me that if I keep my mouth shut about my mongrel theology and show up for work projects there won’t be a problem. I don’t mind. I’ve never been evangelistic–if you’re not sure what you believe how can you convince others–and the people are real nice and I enjoy being around them. I even go to church. But I keep my mouth shut.
I believe in many Gods and Goddess’.
My priestess who just happens to be my best friend and my husbands ex-wife, follows Brigit and I like the ideals of Gaia.
It’s kinda weird but I feel that I believe in God, but he wasn’t alone. Not that the others are underlings or anything, just that he wasn’t alone.
I liked the people in church, and I like the people in the coven, I just didn’t like the way things are done and how they are sometimes hypocritical in church. Some are very intolerant and others are not.
I did meet a man who preached for an open bible church that was pretty cool. He came up to see my son in the hospital at his grandmothers request and asked me if I minded him visiting because of my faith. He saw my pentacle and instead of bulking (like I have had happen) he stepped forward. I explained to him that my children are free to choose, and as long as he didn’t scare him with fire and brimstone he could pray with him.
Before this starts someone ranting the only reason I asked about the fire and brimstone is because I had been to his church once with the grandmother and knew his sermons had a lot of feeling and passion in them. Not that that is a bad thing, but the kid was pretty terrified the way it was.
So far I haven’t see any intolerance out of the circle of friends I have that are Pagan/Wiccan, but I know it is out there.
I know this is off the op, so I will shut up for now.
I have a question though. Why do some people feel that they have to save us? If I am happy and healthy and not hurting anyone shouldn’t I be just fine? I think that Beth is going through this also.
Good point. I too know a number of Wicca, and from what I understand, the practice is more of a spiritual system than a utilitarian one. That is, not a means to an end specifically but the cultivation of a state of being. Many of the people I know respond in particular to the idea of ritual, or faith/spirituality as a practice and not merely a belief system. Many feel that the importance of ritual has been watered down in many mainstream religions. If you look into the more esoteric/mystical aspects of those religions (I think particuarly of Christianity and Judaism), you’ll find elements closer to modern-day witchcraft than I imagine many followers would be comfortable with. Conversely, a growing number of religious adherents seek out more ritualized, esoteric practices to deepen the imapct of their beliefs/practice. Interest in Christian mysticism and Kabbalist (sp?) studies has soared over the last 20 years.
But from what I know, it’s not about spells and broomsticks at all. The folks I know would go about getting that double-wide just like anybody else. They’d simply use their belief system to enhance their ability to do that (and their ability to enjoy it). I certainly don’t notice any extra-ordinary success or failure rate among them.
Witches aren’t necessarily rich because that is not where we put our primary focus as with anything. I hold the same idea of spells as evilbeth does, they are simply a way of expressing our desires to the gods and require our own actions to have them be fulfilled. Spells are more successful than Christian prayer in all of the covens/groves that I have ever been involved with simply because the way they are viewed. In my experience, Christian prayer is more of a passive request (most of the time, not necessarily all of the time) and a spell is an active request. Spell work generally is the start of an affirmation to action process. It is like saying “I am going to do such and such” and then actually getting out and doing it.
HUGS!
Sqrl
*red_dragon60: Anyway, would you sell your soul to Bill Gates? *
Not today, especially if part of the payment was Microsoft stock options. :D:D
My kids are dragging me to an Evangelical Lutheran church. Extremely tolerant of most Judeo-Christian churches. I noticed in one book that they even welcomed various Anabaptists, although the Amish were notably missing. As were the Mormons.
I like Wicca. Its followers seem to be extra-special nice. And they don’t want my money. Which are about all I look for in a religion/belief system/model for behavior. And I can understand and relate to their non-greediness.
I’m just wondering why the wierdos who torture cats and worship Satan (which makes them just another Judeo-Christian church, in a way) don’t seem to be succeeding in the manner they wish. And why they persist in this unproductive belief system, like I wonder about certain branches of Christianity that emphasize greed in the worshipers, not just the ministers. They are aimed at poor people, but the people stay poor, in part because of all the money they send to the ministers. I would think that persisting despite the results would be insane.
Saw one of those “God wants us to be rich” preachers the other day, but he seemed too corporate. I miss Rev Ike.
Um, how would you know? I mean, most Satanists aren’t exactly going to advertise the fact. The only one I know of who does advertise it is, in fact, rather successful in his field (Marilyn Manson). Considering his degree of actual musical talent, there’s got to be some diabolical intervention there…
If you live in Baltimore there is an Interenational Church of Satan there. In actuality modern Satanists (those who follow the teachings of Anton Levay) do not sacrifice animals or anything to Satan. They basically believe in the divinity of themselves and are thus capable of doing and achieving what they want on their own. On a side note, there was a paradoxical relationship between human divinity and the human animal. They also thought of as a human being completely animal but capable of divine. They tended to think of animals as tools for their use even if it was simply being a pet because a pet is a tool for individual happiness. The Satanists that you are thinking of are either stupid highschool kids or media inventions.
The essence of what you say about Satanists sacrificing animals is self-destructive and would not support itself as a long-term religion. The Satanists I knew in the past (many covens ago) were basically normal people who were a bit more obsessed with the dark side of life, extremely driven, and very intelligent. They aren’t interested in recruiting. They really aren’t interested in other people. It is a very selfish religion because of the over-emphaisis of the self at the expense of others.
This was just my experience.
HUGS!
Sqrl
Not true, most of the world’s religions have roots in animal and even human sacrifice and they seem to have done ok in the long run. As to leaving people alone and not proselytizing, sounds more like tolerance than “selfishness.”
HLF, my point was that most of the religions that had animal sacrifice in them have since been replaced with a more peaceful mentality. Sacrifices are still made but they tend to be either, money, plants, or foodstuffs derived from animals such as milk. I know most religions developed some type of animal human sacrifice imagery or action in it. Hell, even Christianity has ritual eating of human fflesh and blood drinking albeit in a symbolic state. What I was trying to say and obviously wasn’t clear on, was ritual sacrifice of animals is viewed as really unpopular right now and thus religions with any mind of keeping their status had best avoid it. Just think about all the press Voodun receives currently. None of it is good except in areas where they actually practice it and even then is it hardly spoken about.
Anyway, for those interested, the below links outline some of the Satanic dogma. To call it Satanism is really misleading because eventhough it has some similarities to Christianity, the tenants as a whole are more unique unto themselves. They don’t follow a Christian model nor do they actually believe in the Christian Bible.
The actual indoctrination of Satanism (not surprising, I went through that phase), http://www.geocities.com/oshaitan/findex.html has a lot of information but the homepage http://www.churchofsatan.org will provide you with more information. The information below can be found on the above links.
There are nine tenants of Satanism which are outlined below:
The Nine Satanic Statements by Anton Szandor Lavey
Seems pretty much in line with what I have said. Also, with the sacrifice thing look at number 10.
The Eleven Satanic Rules of the Earth by Anton Szandor LaVey
1)Do not give opinion or advice unless you are asked.
2)Do not tell your troubles to others unless you are sure they want to hear them.
3)When in another’s lair,show him respect or else do not go there.
4)If a guest in your lair annoys you,treat him cruelly and without mercy.
5)Do not make sexual advances unless you are given the mating signal.
6)Do not take that which does not belong to you unless it is a burden to the other person and he cries out to be relieved.
7)Acknowledge the power of magic if you have employed it successfully to obtain your desires. If you deny the power of magic after having called upon it with success,you will loose all you have obtained.
8)Do not complain about anything to which you need not subject yourself.
9)Do not harm little children.
10)Do not kill non-human animals unless attacked or for your food.
11)When walking in open territory,bother no one. If someone bothers you,ask him to stop. If he does not stop,destroy him
HUGS!
Sqrl
In Santería, a sister religion to Voodun, ritual animal sacrfices are still performed, although rather more sparingly in the US than in Cuba and the other Caribbean countries where it’s practiced. Santería is also still very much cloaked in secrecy like Voodun.
Isn’t there another similar arm of these religions parcticed in Brazil? I know I read about it recently, but I can’t recall the specific name at the moment.
It’s time for this thread to go to Great Debates. Actually, it was time a while ago, but I have this annoying “job” thing. Sorry 'bout that.
Right again, Oh Great Moderator! 