I have read a great deal of modern pagan and/or neo-pagan writings; and have some acquaintance with such people. Indeed at one time, for several years and some twenty years ago-plus, that is what I might well have called myself.
This movement is, unfortunately, permeated and motivated by a resentment against Christianity that ranges from cold contempt to burning indignation - a phenomenon that leads to the deep and perception-structuring bias I have termed "anything but Christianity".
I have recently been exploring some different and new (to me) avenues and individuals within the neo/ pagan world; and was again struck by this structuring bias.
This anti-Christianity is expressed so strongly that one would suppose that the writers and speakers had been brought up in either a medieval theocracy or the Puritan Geneva of Calvin - or (often) some unholy combination of the two)... Instead of having been raised in one of the overwhelmingly atheist-materialist nations of the West; during the 1940s, 50s, or 60s!
Furthermore, this is combined with depictions of the pagan past so fantastically wishful that they seem to have derived from Pollyanna wearing rose-tinted spectacles in Disneyland!
Anything and everything bad in reports of the pagan past is ascribed to spiteful Christian misrepresentation; anything and everything good about past Christian societies is attributed to residual paganism!
What seems to be happening is that these folk are approaching "paganism" from within themselves: in a creative spirit directed at individual participation...
While simultaneously regarding and representing Christianity in the most literal, institutional, external terms; focusing on sometimes-real but "worst case" scenarios of tyranny, cruelty and atrocity; and making their definitions and descriptions of "Christianity" citing the most childish and/or obviously-manipulative time, places, and sources.
They subjectively engage-with "paganism" in highly positively-selective, personal and optimistic fashion; while adopting a detached, cynical and condemnatory attitude to negatively-selective, cut-and-dried, "Christianity".
While this is very, very obvious to me (given my hhistory); almost by definition there is no persuading against such attitudes - which are common to much of modern life; and which pagans share with the mainstream of atheist materialists.
Yet is is atheist materialists who run this world and have done so for many decades; and atheist materialists therefore are, or ought to be, the real spiritual enemies of sincere pagans...
In other words, by their revealed preferences and their ludicrous insistence on fighting dead battles and wars that Christianity lost long ago; pagans (despite any counter protestations) are actually of-the-Left and of-the-mainstream.
Pagans indeed share the characteristically and definitively Left fundamental concern with this-worldly hedonism and therapy - i.e. seeking personal pleasures and happiness here-and-now, alleviating personal miseries and suffering; justified by a utilitarian altruistic ideology of "making this world a better place".
What I eventually did, and would suggest to others; is that they instead approach Christianity in something of the same positive, subjective and engaged spirit with which they approach paganism; which ought to be a spirit of discovery and creativity.
2 comments:
i've noticed this too, and it is amusing at times and disheartening at others (depending on the intelligence of the expositor). as i see it, the reason why they won't approach anything christianity with the same creativity is the same reason christians won't approach anything else with reverence that is not sanctioned by the orthodoxy. that is, they believe they are 'following', not creating. until they understand they are creating, and must be creating, they won't allow themselves the freedom to go beyond their prejudices.
@Laeth. You are correct about Christian church "orthodoxy"- but that also applies to every other religion. And the fact that there is a pretty wide range of "Christianity" (especially if Mormonism is considered) *ought to be* enough of a clue, to someone who was positively motivated; instead of someone motivated by de facto hedonism - self-justified by resentment.
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