Friday, June 3rd, 2011
“I consider myself a Wiccan, a witch, and a pagan. I am also a druid, but that’s another story. For me, paganism is a term of solidarity. I use it to describe our earth-centered belief system that tries to honor and restore our basic human roots when we lived by the land, and the cycles of the sun and moon were very important.
“I started studying Wicca in high school in Ohio. Someone handed me a book and it talked about the mother goddess, the divine feminine, and the divine in nature. I had just been confirmed as Lutheran, but that book really shook me. Before, I had no idea that the divine could be feminine or how important nature was to spirituality. The book questioned the core of everything I believed as a Lutheran.
“I had an internal struggle because the church says that witchcraft is bad, and I got told I was going to hell a lot, but I still decided to pursue Wicca. Once I read its words I knew that I had to keep going. My family was amazingly supportive and I started to meet other people in the pagan community. We would gather to do ceremonies and rituals while I went through the self-conversion process.
“When I tell people about Wicca, the first question I usually get is, “Are you a witch and do you cast spells?” Yes, I am a witch and cast spells, but we have a strict code of ethics. We don’t do magic that harms people. People think magic is a big deal, but it is just the willed movement of energy. For me, it is akin to prayer, but more active. Rather than will someone or something to intervene on your behalf, with magic you seek out the action yourself. The hard thing about spells is that you can never really know if things happening can be attributed to your work, but I don’t believe in coincidences and sometimes the gods like you and may work in your favor.
“I try and keep this side of my life separate from my life in the workplace. Once you get to know me, you will know that I work really hard and will give away my last dollar to someone in need. That is all that matters. Still, people find out. I work in news, and during the whole Lebron James moving to Miami news, a morning news show in Cleveland hired a witch doctor to cast a spell on Lebron to break a limb before his first game. Our sports department wanted to talk to a real witch about hexes and spells. They Googled ‘DC witch” and found me. I ended up outing myself to the entire sports department. I’m fine with it, but it was a little scandalous for people in my office to know that I am also a a witch.
“I find that people are really open-minded here. D.C. has over 50 pagan groups and just as this city is diverse and multicultural, it also represents the diversity of the pagan community. Now, I am working through The Open Hearth Foundation to build a community center for pagans in Washington, D.C. We want to give pagans in the D.C. region the opportunity to gather and celebrate our traditions in a safe space. We want to have a place where we can be outdoors, engage in community service, use candles, and dress in garb with no one looking at us funny.”
Learn more about pagan groups and events in the area through Witchvox.
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Comment by Carly — June 3, 2011 @ 10:36 am
As a queer Witch woman, I’ve come all the way out of the gay “closet.” However, it’s still daunting to come out of the “broom closet.” My family, co-workers, and many friends still don’t know I’m a Witch. It’s interesting how LGBT rights have advanced to where coming out is easy and facilitated, while most of us Witches and Pagans are still afraid for anyone to know our religion. So Iris’s experience on the job strongly resonates with me. Iris brings so much awesomeness to our community, I’m so glad she’s one of us!
Comment by Joanna — June 11, 2011 @ 3:34 pm
I totally dieargse with Mike S! I think that magic REALLY DOES exist! Seriously!Oh, and I can’t help myself I have to say it: Ask Hermione Granger [from Harry Potter] she might know. I’m j/p with you.Witches have been around for a long time.Many people claim witches don’t exist, or their powers are simply deemed as fake or staged.It is hard to really explain or describe a witch. A stereotypical witch would be an old,craggy,ugly wrinkled woman, with a large nose and a huge wart somewhere on her face, the witch would constantly wear black would have a black cat as a companion . BOY HAVE THINGS CHANGED!! Witches nowadays could be anybody, of any age. They can look like anything, they could be your girl next door, you would never tell.Of course witches have maintained their old trademarks with spells, and rules. Being a witch doesn’t mean being Evil. Witches are usually peaceful spiritual beings in touch with the world, YET i must fret that there are witches that tend to be evil, witches that have pleasure in doing evil things, and cursing peoples, and unfortunantley that rule doesn’t always seem to apply, the Witch doesn’t always get it back X3, infact it is like a person that is fearing of God, the person would know that if he was to murder another human, they would be deemed to Hell ..After the murder, God hasn’t seemed to do anything. Since the 16th Century witches have been claimed as being evil, and being part of Satan, often women that had a suspicion of being a witch, would have her hands tied together, she would be thrown off a bridge to a raging river. If the witch was to float, she was to be picked up at the other end of the river and un-tied and let free. Yet if you didn’t float back up, you were guaranteed to be a Witch, they often died of Drowning Yet many would be sure that this method must have killed many Innocent females. Another Method of being able to tell if one was a witch or not was simply from Physical appearance, if the woman had two Crowns on her head, she would instantly be noted of being a witch and would be killed off. Most witches by the 17th Century were killed off by being burnt at the Stake. One thing I personally was awkuard about was the fact that there haven’t been many movies based on Witches. I find the topic of witches to be VERY interesting, as they have had many centuries of being Evil and a trecherous part of the Society, when often they were not. I have seen the Blair Witch Project, i enjoyed it thoroughly. The Blair Witch was an interesting witch to study, as many Facts Myths surround the witch, she was one of the most famed Witches, along with the Bell Witch. I have written a film based on Bloody Mary, it is based upon a witch called Mary Worth, she was an Evil Witch that supposedly died at the Stake. Yet after many harmless experiments by harmless children (Particularly Girls) Fun Jokes usually turned into Deadly Nights. Now im very sure most of the Population has seen the famed Film The Blair Witch Project . As soon as the opening notes came in, people were drawn into the film. The Introduction reads In October of 1994, three student filmmakers disappeared in the woods near Burkittesville, Maryland, while shooting a documentary. One year later, their footage was found. Instantly this would draw us to think that the Story is based on a true story, the Documentery look and feel also dragged us into the film and made us feel sorry for the Characters. Yet now, news has it that the Entire Blair Witch project was STAGED. The official Blair Witch page, that was filled with myhtical photos of the witch and its alleged witnesses is said to be entirely FAKE. Yes thats right, even at the end of the film, the produces even point out that it is entirely based on Non-Fiction. The characters you saw in the film, are alive and well today, infact moving on to future endeavors.
Comment by Senayt — September 24, 2012 @ 8:30 pm