Few Pagan institutions are as eagerly self-promoting as the Witch School in Hoopeston, Illinois. Co-founders Ed Hubbard and Don Lewis have no problem courting controversy within their own community, and often interject themselves as spokesmen for Wicca whenever the media allows. I usually ignore their barrage of press releases from free sites like eMediaWire but this time I felt the need to comment on something co-founder Don Lewis had to say about Wicca and its history.

“According to Witch School co-founder Don Lewis, there is nothing evil about Wicca. Wicca has been defamed for for thousands of years by mainstream religions, especially Christianity, and that has been a cause of great pain and ignorance. Many millions have died because of this irrational belief and blind hatred of religious leaders who denounce that which has always been a true mystery of life beyond their personal control. The only way to combat this destructive behavior is to use every tool, skill, and personal power to teach that God does not seek to destroy us, condemn us, or hate us for any form of perceived sin. Instead the school teaches unconditional love that the Lord and Lady embody and opens people’s heart to Perfect Love and Perfect Trust.”

Take a moment to drink in this rare example of a vintage Wiccan persecution complex, a complex that has thankfully become rare since academic study of Wicca and the persecution of “witches” by Christians has debunked most claims of this sort. First off, Wicca hasn’t been around for “thousands of years” by any reasonable stretch of the imagination. Even if you happen to be a believer in direct pagan survivals from pre-Christian Europe to now (a theory that has yet to be proven by anybody), those beliefs had to have changed to become “Wicca” at some point in our modern era because ancient Pagans in Europe didn’t practice Wicca.

Secondly, a reappraisal of the witch trials in Europe point to a figure closer to 40,000 executions instead of the millions alleged in several Pagan publications during the early decades of Wicca’s existence. Almost nobody believes that any significant percentage of these unfourtunate individuals held onto some sort of pre-Christian theology. Most died believing themselves to be good Christians (even if they were tortured to say otherwise). The “9 million” witches burned by fanatic Christians was merely propaganda first to inflate the exploits of the witch-finders of that day, and later to give modern Pagans a tragic past to rally around.

To see Lewis trot out these worn-out bits of pseudo-history does nothing for Wicca or modern Paganism and only serves to make us seem foolish. Surely Witch School can inflate themselves without relying on a history that never happened?

Tags: Paganism