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29 April 2020 13:25![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
haptalaonBut as an offshoot of this, it has to be said that a lot of paganism is profoundly self-centered. I don't mean that in a rude way, so much as, centering the self.
Courses on personal magical development, rituals where one's self-improvement or personal situation is mapped onto annual cycles, the desire to deepen relationship with deity, and so on. Post "solitary Wicca" as a concept, a lot of how we write about/teach paganism is about solitary individuals having individualist relationships with parts of their personal consciousness.
It takes us very far away from traditional roles for the witch/priest/mystic/shaman as profoundly embedded in community. The real relationship the witch has is not to other witches, but to her community. In other words, I'm not learning tarot to do tarot for other pagans: I'm learning tarot to do tarot for non-pagans in my village. If the way of magic is that "anyone can cast spells", then my traditional witches relationship is with ordinary members of the public who do not study magic.
We do try and use various models to compensate for this: fraternal orders in ceremonial paths, covens in witchcraft, open circles as quasi-congregations. But still. There actually isn't a lot of focus on paganism as something one does in/with/for a community. And this is especially true for what Shauna is talking about - teaching classes. I can imagine a pagan community in which skills are shared and knowledge passed on. But an attendee attending a class on a topic, that whole dynamic is already an individual one, and the topic of the class almost certainly on an individual development topic, and the participants of the class almost certainly strangers to one another who will not meet again.
(As I'm writing this, I suppose I'm perhaps coming around to a much more formalised, hierarchical, closed, traditional "coven" model of paganism vs something freeform. Like, maybe there should be a community expectation that everyone ally themselves to one of many guilds. Just to start creating connections where there are none. I found Hellenion today, which is very positive in my opinion - a community of Hellenics, who are publishing a ritual calendar, an educational path for clergy, and an open book of hymns and prayers. Something like that, where we are associated with *something*, at least.)
Courses on personal magical development, rituals where one's self-improvement or personal situation is mapped onto annual cycles, the desire to deepen relationship with deity, and so on. Post "solitary Wicca" as a concept, a lot of how we write about/teach paganism is about solitary individuals having individualist relationships with parts of their personal consciousness.
It takes us very far away from traditional roles for the witch/priest/mystic/shaman as profoundly embedded in community. The real relationship the witch has is not to other witches, but to her community. In other words, I'm not learning tarot to do tarot for other pagans: I'm learning tarot to do tarot for non-pagans in my village. If the way of magic is that "anyone can cast spells", then my traditional witches relationship is with ordinary members of the public who do not study magic.
We do try and use various models to compensate for this: fraternal orders in ceremonial paths, covens in witchcraft, open circles as quasi-congregations. But still. There actually isn't a lot of focus on paganism as something one does in/with/for a community. And this is especially true for what Shauna is talking about - teaching classes. I can imagine a pagan community in which skills are shared and knowledge passed on. But an attendee attending a class on a topic, that whole dynamic is already an individual one, and the topic of the class almost certainly on an individual development topic, and the participants of the class almost certainly strangers to one another who will not meet again.
(As I'm writing this, I suppose I'm perhaps coming around to a much more formalised, hierarchical, closed, traditional "coven" model of paganism vs something freeform. Like, maybe there should be a community expectation that everyone ally themselves to one of many guilds. Just to start creating connections where there are none. I found Hellenion today, which is very positive in my opinion - a community of Hellenics, who are publishing a ritual calendar, an educational path for clergy, and an open book of hymns and prayers. Something like that, where we are associated with *something*, at least.)
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Date: 29 April 2020 13:08 (UTC)