The Aunt Sadie Rant

Or, how do I explain to my relatives that I'm Pagan?

I am lucky in that I broke with my Catholic upbringing at 10 (I guess if you're hooting with disbelief in catachism classes, they've pretty well lost you...) and had a significant gap of "no religion" years before getting into the Craft. That way, no one thought I was a goth wannabe or acting out in some sort of reaction.

I think some religious downtime helps monothestic families accept the rekindling of the religious impulse in, say, a cauldron.

How can you help people in the craft to over come the fear that someday aunt Sadie will find out about them? Burning times has another catch to it in these days.

Burning times should refer today only to yeast infections. Aunt Sadie can stay in the dark until she asks, and then Aunt Sadie should be told and perhaps passed "Principles of Wicca" or some other basic "for dummies" book. Why is it that Xtian family, etc. are so fragile and insecure in the Godboy religions that they require precious handling from Wicca, when it is the majority of their society that regularly insults, downplays, mocks and occasionally persecutes our faith? Perhaps it is Aunt Sadie who should be shown the tools, starting with the broomstick. I understand the desire to let down relatives easy, but if they don't "get" how their religions of dead gods, unlikely conceptions and cannibalism-as-sacrament can scare the pants off kids, how are they going to "get" dancing under the stars?

Wicca can only possibly be a threat to the religiously insecure. I've never bought (obviously) that Xtian, Jewish and Muslim concern over us "going to hell" is anything more than a smokescreen...it's about bums in pews, folks, and the real threat that a non-proselytizing, non-guilt-dealing, pro-body, pro-personal responsibility religion might just cut into their action. So the Aunt Sadies of the world can get invited to a Yule open circle (it's probably the most familiar..gee, I wonder why?) and be invited to enjoy themselves. If they don't like it, too bad, because the time is passing when Aunt Sadie's opinion on what the Ill-tempered Sky Hebrew/Arab/Englishman thinks should matter to any one but poor, poor Aunt Sadie.

No real-life Aunt Sadies were harmed in the making of this rant.

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