Sam, I am not much of a wiccan!!! In order to do so, one has to study and take it seriously. I do have a book on the history of Celtic witchcraft, which originated in Ireland, however. Contrary to the beliefs of almost everyone around here, wiccan belief systems are totally positive, and have to do with sweet domestic things like throwing cinnamon sticks and orange peels into the fire to bless your house, drawing protective circles around your house, and understanding the herbs which help in healing. The wiccan motto is to do no harm. It is not surprising that it is close to the one for physicians, since the "witches" were the doctors in medieval Europe.
One of the things most people are not aware of is that this kind of knowledge and power scared the Christians who were moving in, and laws were passed so that only men could practice medicine. Of course, at the same time the Christians started burning women at the stake. The estimates go as high as nine million over about three hundred years. It is this Holocaust for women, which Christianity has tried to keep secret, that is most disturbing to me and the highest example of the harm that religious belief systems can do. |
