neopagan witchcraft

File:Paganavebury.jpg for a handfasting ceremony at Avebury in England]]

Neopagan witchcraft, sometimes referred to as The Craft, is an umbrella term for some neo-pagan traditions that include the practice of magic.{{sfn|Berger|1999|p=10}} They may also incorporate aspects of nature worship, divination, and herbalism.{{cite book |last1=Dunwich |first1=Gerina |title=Wicca A to Z: A Modern Witch's Encyclopedia |date=1997 |publisher=Carol Pub. Group |location=Secaucus, N.J. |isbn=0806519304 |page=148}} These traditions began in the mid-20th century, and many were influenced by the witch-cult hypothesis, a now-rejected theory that persecuted witches in Europe had actually been followers of a surviving pagan religion. The largest and most influential of these movements was Wicca. Some other groups and movements describe themselves as "Traditional Witchcraft" to distinguish themselves from Wicca.

In contemporary Western culture, some adherents of these religions, as well as some followers of New Age belief systems, may self-identify as "witches", and use the term "witchcraft" for their self-help, healing, or divination rituals.{{sfnm|1a1=Clifton|1y=2006|1p={{page needed|date=July 2023}} |2a1=Tosenberger|2y=2010 |3a1=Berger|3a2=Ezzy|3y=2009 |4a1=Kelly|4y=1992}} Others avoid the term due to its negative connotations. Religious studies scholars class the various neopagan witchcraft traditions under the broad category of 'Wicca',{{sfn|Doyle White|2016|pp=160–162}}{{cite book |last1=Aitamurto |first1=Kaarina |last2=Simpson |first2=Scott |title=The Oxford Handbook of New Religious Movements, Volume 2 |date=2016 |publisher=Oxford University Press |page=482 |chapter=36: The Study of Paganism and Wicca}} although many within Traditional Witchcraft do not accept that title.{{sfn|Adler|2006|p=230}}

These Neopagans use definitions of witchcraft which are distinct from those used by many anthropologists and from some historic understandings of witchcraft, such as that of pagan Rome, which had laws against harmful magic.{{cite book |last1=Dickie |first1=Matthew |title=Magic and Magicians in the Greco-Roman World |date=2003 |publisher=Routledge |pages=138–142}}

Origins

Most societies that have believed in harmful witchcraft or black magic have also believed in helpful or white magic or cunning craft.{{sfn|Hutton|2017|pp=24–25}} In these societies, practitioners of helpful magic provided services such as breaking the effects of witchcraft, healing, divination, finding lost or stolen goods, and love magic.{{sfn|Hutton|2017|pp=x–xi}} In Britain they were commonly known as cunning folk or wise people.{{sfn|Hutton|2017|pp=x–xi}} Alan McFarlane writes, "There were a number of interchangeable terms for these practitioners, 'white', 'good', or 'unbinding' witches, blessers, wizards, sorcerers, however 'cunning-man' and 'wise-man' were the most frequent".{{Cite book |last=Macfarlane |first=Alan |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lmfuwq0mQMUC&pg=PA130 |title=Witchcraft in Tudor and Stuart England: A Regional and Comparative Study |year= 1999 |publisher=Psychology Press |isbn=978-0415196123 |access-date=31 October 2017 |via=Google Books |archive-date=26 January 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210126013247/https://books.google.com/books?id=lmfuwq0mQMUC&pg=PA130 |url-status=live }} Ronald Hutton prefers the term "service magicians".{{sfn|Hutton|2017|pp=x–xi}} Often these people were involved in identifying alleged witches.{{sfn|Hutton|2017|pp=24–25}}

In the 1920s, the witch-cult hypothesis gained increasing attention in occult circles when it was popularized by Margaret Murray.{{sfn|Hutton|1999|pp=206-207}} The witch-cult hypothesis was the idea that those persecuted as witches were not workers of harmful magic, but followers of a pagan religion (the "Old Religion") that had survived the Christianization of Europe. This has been proven untrue by further historical research.{{sfnm|1a1=Hutton|1y=1993|2a1=Hutton|2y=2017|2p=121}}Rose, Elliot, A Razor for a Goat, University of Toronto Press, 1962. Though the theory of accused witches being followers of an organized pagan religion was discredited in academia, it spurred renewed interest in witchcraft.{{sfn|Adler|2006|pp=44-46}}

From the 1930s, occult neopagan groups began to emerge who re-defined the term 'witchcraft' and applied it to their religion. They were initiatory secret societies inspired by Murray's witch cult theory, ceremonial magic, Aleister Crowley's Thelema, and historical paganism.{{sfn|Hutton|1999|pp=205–252}}{{sfn|Kelly|1991|p={{page needed|date=July 2023}}}}{{sfn|Valiente|1989|pp=35–62}} The earliest group was the Bricket Wood coven of English occultist Gerald Gardner. Gardner said he had been initiated by a group of pagan witches, the New Forest coven, who he said were one of the few remnants of this pagan witch cult.{{Citation

| last = Phillips

| first = Julia

| title = History of Wicca in England: 1939 to the Present Day

| place = Canberra

| series = the Australian Wiccan Conference in Canberra

| orig-date = 1991

| year = 2004

| edition = 2004 Revised

| url = http://migrated.ifokus.se/uploads/5ba/5babf2f6bfd39bd99a85351f076a066f/history-of-wicca-revised.pdf

| archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20160305043918/http://migrated.ifokus.se/uploads/5ba/5babf2f6bfd39bd99a85351f076a066f/history-of-wicca-revised.pdf

| archive-date = 5 March 2016

| url-status = live }} His story is disputed by academics.{{Cite book |last=Heselton |first=Philip |title=Wiccan Roots |year=2000 |publisher=Capall Bann |isbn=978-1861631107 |author-link=Philip Heselton}}{{Cite book |last=Heselton |first=Philip |title=Gerald Gardner and the Cauldron of Inspiration |year=2003 |publisher=Capall Bann |isbn=978-1861631640 |author-link=Philip Heselton}}{{page needed|date=January 2023}}{{sfn|Kelly|1991|p={{page needed|date=July 2023}}}}{{sfn|Hutton|1999|p={{page needed|date=July 2023}}}}{{Cite book |last=Ruickbie |first=Leo |title=Witchcraft Out of the Shadows |year=2004 |publisher=Robert Hale |isbn=978-0709075677 |author-link=Leo Ruickbie}}{{page needed|date=January 2023}} Gardner's neopagan witchcraft religion, later known as Wicca, adopted many of the traditions ascribed to Murray's witch cult.Jacqueline Simpson (1994). Margaret Murray: Who Believed Her, and Why? Folklore, 105:1-2: 89-96. {{doi|10.1080/0015587X.1994.9715877}}

Gerald Gardner was not the only person who believed they were a member of a surviving pagan witch-cult. Others such as Sybil Leek, Charles Cardell, Raymond Howard, Rolla Nordic, Robert Cochrane and Paul Huson also said they had been initiated by surviving witch covens. They considered themselves to be following "hereditary" or "traditional" forms of pagan witchcraft.{{sfn|Hutton|1999|p=305}}{{sfn|Clifton|2006|p={{page needed|date=July 2023}}}}

English historian Ronald Hutton notes that neopagan witchcraft is "the only full-formed religion which England can be said to have given the world."{{sfn|Hutton|1999|p=vii}}

Following its establishment in Britain, Gardnerian Wicca was brought to the U.S. in the early 1960s{{sfn|Lipp|2007|p=13}} by English initiate Raymond Buckland and his then-wife Rosemary, who together founded a coven in Long Island.{{sfn|Hutton|1999|pp=205–252}}{{sfn|Clifton|2006|pp=24–25}} In the U.S., numerous new variants of Wicca then developed.{{sfn|Lipp|2007|loc=ch. 1}}

Wicca

File:Wiccan altar (1).PNG]]

Wicca is a syncretic modern pagan religion that draws upon a diverse set of ancient pagan and modern hermetic motifs for its theological structure and ritual practices. Developed in England in the first half of the 20th century,{{sfn|Hutton|1999|p=vii }} Wicca was popularised in the 1950s and early 1960s by Gerald Gardner. Gardner was a retired British civil servant, and an amateur anthropologist and historian who had a broad familiarity with pagan religions, esoteric societies and occultism in general. At the time, Gardner called it the "Witch Cult" and "Witchcraft", and referred to its adherents as "the Wica".{{cite book

|last=Gardner

|first=Gerald B

|authorlink=Gerald Gardner (Wiccan)

|title=Witchcraft Today

|publisher=Mercury Publishing

|location=Lake Toxaway, NC

|year=1999

|orig-date=1954

|oclc=44936549

|isbn=0-8065-2593-2}}{{third-party inline|date=July 2023}} From the 1960s onward, the name of the religion was normalised to "Wicca".{{cite journal

|url=http://www.thewica.co.uk/wica_or_wicca.htm

|title=Wica or Wicca? - Politics and the Power of Words

|journal=The Cauldron

|first=Melissa

|last=Seims

|issue=129

|year=2008

|access-date=2012-08-26

|archive-date=2010-10-20

|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101020161001/http://www.thewica.co.uk/wica_or_wicca.htm

|url-status=dead

}}{{better source needed|date=July 2023}}

Various forms of Wicca are now practised as a religion with positive ethical principles, organised into autonomous covens and led by a High Priesthood. A survey published in 2000 cited just over 200,000 people who reported practicing Wicca in the United States.{{Cite journal |last=Foltz |first=Tanice G. |date=2000 |title=Review of A Community of Witches: Contemporary Neo-Paganism and Witchcraft in the United States |journal=Contemporary Sociology |volume=29 |issue=6 |pages=840–842 |doi=10.2307/2654107 |jstor=2654107}} There is also "Eclectic Wicca", a movement of individuals and groups who share key Wiccan beliefs but have no formal link with traditional Wiccan covens. While some Wiccans call themselves witches, others avoid the term due to its negative connotations.{{cite book |last1=Lewis |first1=James |title=Magical Religion and Modern Witchcraft |date=1996 |publisher=SUNY Press |page=376}}

=Gardnerian Wicca=

Gardnerian Wicca, or Gardnerian Witchcraft, is the oldest tradition of Wicca. The tradition is itself named after Gerald Gardner (1884–1964). Gardner formed the Bricket Wood coven and in turn initiated many Witches who founded further covens, continuing the initiation of more Wiccans in the tradition. The term "Gardnerian" was probably coined by Robert Cochrane, who himself left that tradition to found his own.{{sfn|Valiente|1989|p=122}}

=Alexandrian Wicca=

Alexandrian Wicca is the tradition founded by Alex Sanders (also known as "King of the Witches"){{cite book

| author = Johns, June

| title = King of the witches: The world of Alex Sanders

| publisher = P. Davies

| year = 1969

| isbn = 0-432-07675-1 }} who, with his wife Maxine Sanders, established it in Britain in the 1960s. Alexandrian Wicca is similar to and largely based upon Gardnerian Wicca, in which Sanders was trained to the first degree of initiation.{{sfn|Rabinovitch|Lewis|2004}} It also contains elements of ceremonial magic and Qabalah, which Sanders studied independently. It is one of Wicca's most widely recognized traditions.{{sfn|Adler|2006|p={{page needed|date=July 2023}}}}

=Eclectic Wicca=

While the origins of modern Wiccan practice lie in coven activity and the careful handing on of practices to a small number of initiates, since the 1970s a widening public appetite made this unsustainable. From about that time, larger, more informal, often publicly advertised camps and workshops began to take place and it has been arguedHoward, Michael (2009). Modern Wicca. Woodbury, Minnesota: Llewellyn. pp. 299-301. that this more informal but more accessible method of passing on the tradition is responsible for the rise of eclectic Wicca. Eclectic Wiccans are more often than not solitary practitioners. Some of these solitaries do, however, attend gatherings and other community events, but reserve their spiritual practices (Sabbats, Esbats, spell-casting, worship, magical work, etc.) for when they are alone. Eclectic Wicca is the most popular variety of Wicca in AmericaSmith, Diane (2005). Wicca and Witchcraft for Dummies. Wiley Publishing. Pg. 125. and eclectic Wiccans now significantly outnumber lineaged Wiccans; their beliefs and practices tend to be much more varied.{{cite web

|url=http://www.newwiccanchurch.org/articles/btwfaq.htm

|title=British Traditional Wicca F.A.Q.

|publisher=New Wiccan Church International

|location=Sacramento, CA

|accessdate=2009-07-22

|url-status=dead

|archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20110727122512/http://www.newwiccanchurch.org/articles/btwfaq.htm

|archivedate=2011-07-27

}}

Traditional Witchcraft

Some strands of neopagan witchcraft refer to themselves as "Traditional Witchcraft",{{sfn|Doyle White|2016|pp=160–162}} "Traditional Pagan Witchcraft"',{{cite book |last1=De Blécourt |first1=Willem |last2=Hutton |first2=Ronald |last3=La Fontaine |first3=Jean |title=Witchcraft and Magic in Europe, Volume 6: The Twentieth Century |date=1999 |publisher=A&C Black |pages=55–58}} or the "Traditional Craft". Their beliefs and practices are similar to Wicca, but they use these terms to differentiate themselves from mainstream Wicca. They may wish to practice neopagan witchcraft differently from mainstream Wicca and outside national Wiccan networks. Religious studies scholars consider these traditions to fall under the umbrella or broad category of Wicca;{{sfn|Doyle White|2016|pp=160–162}} treating Wicca as a religion with denominations in the same way Christianity has denominations like Catholicism and Protestantism.{{sfn|Doyle White|2016|pp=160–162}} Religious studies scholar Ethan Doyle White described Traditional Witchcraft as:

a broad movement of aligned magico-religious groups who reject any relation to Gardnerianism and the wider Wiccan movement, claiming older, more "traditional" roots. Although typically united by a shared aesthetic rooted in European folklore, the Traditional Craft contains within its ranks a rich and varied array of occult groups, from those who follow a contemporary Pagan path that is suspiciously similar to Wicca, to those who adhere to Luciferianism.{{sfn|Doyle White|2011|pp=205–206}}

= Cochrane's Craft =

{{Quote box

|title = Genuine Witchcraft is Defended

|quote = I am a witch descended from a family of witches. Genuine witchcraft is not paganism, though it retains the memory of ancient faiths.

It is a religion mystical in approach and puritanical in attitudes. It is the last real mystery cult to survive, with a very complex and evolved philosophy that has strong affinities with many Christian beliefs. The concept of a sacrificial god was not new to the ancient world; it is not new to a witch.

|source = Roy Bowers incognito, November 1963 issue of Psychic News{{sfn|Valiente|1989|pp=120ff}}

|width = 33%

}}

Roy Bowers, a.k.a. Robert Cochrane (1931–1966), founded a strand of neopagan witchcraft known as "Cochrane's Craft", in opposition to Gardnerian Wicca. Cochrane's Clan of Tubal Cain worshipped a Horned God and a Triple Goddess, much akin to Gardner's Bricket Wood Coven. Cochrane himself disliked Gardner and his strand of Wicca, and often ridiculed him and his tradition.{{sfn|Valiente|1989|p=122}} While Cochrane's Craft uses ritual tools, they differ somewhat from those used by Gardnerians, some being the ritual knife (known as an athamé), a staff (known as a stang), a cup (or commonly a chalice), a stone (used as a whetstone to sharpen the athame), and a ritual cord worn by coven members.{{sfn|Valiente|1989|p=123}}

At a gathering at Glastonbury Tor held by the Brotherhood of the Essenes in 1964, Cochrane met Doreen Valiente, who had formerly been a High Priestess of Gardner's Bricket Wood Coven.{{sfn|Valiente|1989|p=117}} The two became friends, and Valiente joined the Clan of Tubal Cain. Cochrane often insulted and mocked Gardnerians, which annoyed Valiente. This reached an extreme in that even at one point in 1966 he called for "a Night of the Long Knives of the Gardnerians", at which point Valiente "rose up and challenged him in the presence of the rest of the coven".{{sfn|Valiente|1989|p=129}}

= Feri Tradition =

The Feri Tradition (not to be confused with Faery, Fairy, Faerie, or Vicia, which are different traditions) is an ecstatic (rather than fertility) tradition founded by Cora and Victor Anderson. Scholars of Paganism like Joanne Pearson and Ethan Doyle White have characterised Feri as a Wiccan tradition.{{sfnm|1a1=Pearson|1y=2002|1p=38|2a1=Doyle White|2y=2016|2p=46}} The latter noted however that some neopagans restrict the term Wicca to British Traditional Wicca, in which case Feri would not be classified as Wicca; he deemed this exclusionary definition of the term to be "unsuitable for academic purposes".{{sfn|Doyle White|2016|p=161}} Instead, he characterised Feri as one form of Wicca which is nevertheless distinct from others.{{sfn|Doyle White|2016|p=162}}

= Sabbatic Craft =

The Sabbatic Craft is described by its founder Andrew D. Chumbley as "an initiatory line of spirit-power that can inform all who are receptive to its impetus, and which{{spaced ndash}}when engaged with beyond names{{spaced ndash}}may be understood as a Key unto the Hidden Design of Arte."

{{cite journal

|last1=Chumbley

|first1=Andrew D.

|authorlink=Andrew D. Chumbley

|last2=Howard

|first2=Michael

|last3=Fitzgerald

|first3=Robert

|title=An Interview with Andrew D. Chumbley

|journal=The Cauldron

|number=103

|date=February 2002

|url=http://www.orakels.org/media/occult/Wicca/Interview_with_Andrew_Chumbley.pdf

|quote=In essence, the Crooked Path Teachings intend a direct means of autonomous initiation into the Knowledge of the Magical Quintessence.

}}{{dead link|date=November 2016 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }} Chumbley sometimes referred to the Nameless Faith,{{cite journal

|last=Chumbley

|first=Andrew D.

|authorlink=Andrew D. Chumbley

|title=Cultus Sabbati: Provenance, Dream and Magistry

|journal=The Cauldron

|number=104

|date=May 2002

|url=http://www.xoanon.co.uk/xoanoncultussabbati.php

|url-status=dead

|archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20100619030458/http://www.xoanon.co.uk:80/xoanoncultussabbati.php

|archivedate=2010-06-19

}} Crooked Path, and Via Tortuosa.{{cite journal

|last=Schulke

|first=Daniel A.

|title=Way and Waymark—Considerations of Exilic Wisdom in the Old Craft

|journal=The Cauldron

|number=122

|date=November 2006

|url=http://www.xoanon.co.uk/xoanonwayandwaymark.php

|url-status=dead

|archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20110728050303/http://www.xoanon.co.uk/xoanonwayandwaymark.php

|archivedate=2011-07-28

}} He reserved "Sabbatic Craft" as a unifying term to refer to the "convergent lineages" of the "Cultus Sabbati," a body of neopagan witchcraft initiates.

Chumbley's works and those of Daniel Schulke on the Cultus Sabbati's "ongoing tradition of sorcerous wisdom" continue to serve as the prototypical reference works. The craft is not an ancient, pre-Christian tradition surviving into the modern age. It is a tradition rooted in "cunning-craft," a patchwork of older magical practice and later Christian mythology.{{citation needed|date=July 2023}}

{{Blockquote|'Sabbatic Craft' describes a corpus of magical practices which self-consciously utilize the imagery and mythos of the "Witches' Sabbath" as a cipher of ritual, teaching and gnosis. This is not the same as saying that one practises the self-same rituals in the self-same manner as the purported early modern "witches" or historically attested cunning folk, rather it points toward the fact that the very mythos which had been generated about both "witches" and their "ritual gatherings" has been appropriated and re-orientated by contemporary successors of cunning-craft observance, and then knowingly applied for their own purposes.|Andrew Chumbley defining Sabbatic Craft }}

In his grimoire Azoëtia, Chumbley incorporated diverse iconography from ancient Sumerian, Egyptian, Yezidi, and Aztec cultures. He spoke of a patchwork of ancestral and tutelary spirit folklore which he perceived amidst diverse "Old Craft" traditions in Britain as "a gnostic faith in the Divine Serpent of Light, in the Host of the Gregori, in the Children of Earth sired by the Watchers, in the lineage of descent via Lilith, Mahazael, Cain, Tubal-cain, Naamah, and the Clans of the Wanderers." Schulke believed that folk and cunning-crafts of Britain absorbed multicultural elements from "Freemasonry, Bible divination, Romany charms, and other diverse streams," what Chumbley called "dual-faith observance," referring to a "co-mingling of ‘native’ forms of British magic and Christianity".

= Stregheria =

An Italian neopagan religion similar to Wicca emerged in the 1970s, known as Stregheria. While Wicca was inspired by Murray's witch cult, Stregheria closely resembles Charles Leland's controversial account of an Italian pagan witchcraft religion, which he wrote about in Aradia, or the Gospel of the Witches (1899). Its followers worship the Goddess Diana, her brother Dianus/Lucifer, and their daughter Aradia. They do not see Lucifer as the evil Satan that Christians see, but a benevolent god of the Sun.{{sfn|Rabinovitch|Lewis|2004}}

Feminism

Wiccans often consider their beliefs to be in line with liberal ideals such as the Green movement, and particularly with feminism, by providing young women with what they see as a means for self-empowerment, control of their own lives, and a way of influencing the world around them.{{Cite journal |last=Jarvis |first=Christine |date=March 2008 |title=Becoming a Woman Through Wicca: Witches and Wiccans in Contemporary Teen Fiction |url=http://eprints.hud.ac.uk/id/eprint/4140/2/CLE_Jarvis_Wicca_article_2.pdf |journal=Children's Literature in Education |volume=39 |issue=1 |pages=43–52 |doi=10.1007/s10583-007-9058-0 |s2cid=14030498 |access-date=2018-11-11 |archive-date=2019-01-05 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190105221552/http://eprints.hud.ac.uk/id/eprint/4140/2/CLE_Jarvis_Wicca_article_2.pdf |url-status=live }}{{Cite conference |last=Merskin |first=Debra |date=23 May 2007 |title=Joining Forces: Teen Girl Witches and Internet Chat Groups |conference=Annual Meeting of the International Communication Association |location=San Francisco}} Feminist ideals are prominent in some branches of Wicca, such as Dianic Wicca, which has a tradition of women-led and women-only groups.{{sfn|Tosenberger|2010}} The 2002 study Enchanted Feminism: The Reclaiming Witches of San Francisco suggests that some branches of Wicca include influential members of the second wave of feminism, which has also been redefined as a religious movement. As of 2006, many within British Traditional Wicca do not believe that feminist Witches should be called Wiccan.{{sfn|Adler|2006|p=230}}

Reclaiming is a tradition of feminist neopagan witchcraft. It is an international community of women and men working to combine neopagan witchcraft, the Goddess movement, earth-based spirituality, and political activism. The tradition developed in the classes and rituals of its predecessor, the Reclaiming Collective (1978–1997). It was founded in 1979, amidst the peace and anti-nuclear movements, by two neopagan women of Jewish descent, Starhawk (Miriam Simos) and Diane Baker, to explore and develop feminist neopagan emancipatory rituals.{{sfn|Salomonsen|2002|p=1}} Today, the organization focuses on progressive social, political, environmental and economic activism.{{Citation

| author = Starhawk

| authorlink = Starhawk

| title = The Five-Point Agenda

| year = 1995

| publisher = Reclaiming.org, Starhawk

| url = http://www.reclaiming.org/about/directions/fivepoint-agenda.html

| accessdate = 10 September 2012

| archive-date = 8 March 2012

| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20120308101322/http://www.reclaiming.org/about/directions/fivepoint-agenda.html

| url-status = dead

}}

Deborah Willis writes that "the magical practices of modern feminist and New Age witches closely resemble those of early modern cunning folk", whose work involved thwarting witchcraft. Yet she notes that the ideology of these neopagan movements "would be quite alien to the sixteenth-century cunning woman, whose magical beliefs coexisted comfortably with her Christian ones".{{cite book |last1=Willis |first1=Deborah |title=Malevolent Nurture: Witch-Hunting and Maternal Power in Early Modern England |date=2018 |publisher=Cornell University Press |page=24}}

Media

Some of the recent growth in Wicca has been attributed to popular media such as Charmed, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and the Harry Potter series, with their depictions of "positive witchcraft",{{sfn|Tosenberger|2010}} which differs from the historical, traditional, and Indigenous definitions.{{sfn|Tosenberger|2010}} A case study, "Mass Media and Religious Identity: A Case Study of Young Witches", found that the portrayal of positive witchcraft in popular culture is one reason young people are choosing to become Wiccans or self-identify as witches. The Internet is also thought to be driving growth in Wicca.{{sfn|Berger|Ezzy|2009}}

Demographics

Neopagan witchcraft has been extremely difficult to pinpoint due to many religious surveys grouping it with general Paganism, stigmatization from much of the outside world, poor public opinion, and the secrecy prevalent among Neopagan Witches (and Pagans as a whole). This causes the demographics to fluctuate drastically and become difficult to track. Establishing exact numbers pertaining to witchcraft is difficult.{{sfn|Berger|1999|p=9}} Nevertheless, there is a slow growing body of data on the subject.{{Citation

| last = Robinson

| first = B.A.

| title = Estimates of the number of Wiccans in the U.S.

| publisher = Ontario Consultants on Religious Tolerance

| date = 4 April 2008

| url = http://www.religioustolerance.org/wic_nbr2.htm

| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121022083456/http://www.religioustolerance.org/wic_nbr2.htm

| archive-date=22 October 2012

| url-status=dead

| accessdate = 3 September 2012}} Based on studies conducted in the United States, all that can be said accurately of the growth rate of Neopagan Witchcraft in the U.S. is that "as of 2001 the ARIS organization reports that contemporary witchcraft saw a 1.575% growth rate between 1990 and 2001, effectively a doubling of adherents every two years."{{Cite book|title = Pagan Family Values: Childhood and the Religious Imagination in Contemporary American Paganism|last = Kermani|first = Zohre|publisher = NYU Press|year = 2013|isbn = 978-1479894604|location = |pages = 197}} The limited tracking by ARIS has kept Neopagan Witchcraft from being continually and accurately tracked. However, there have been spikes over the years. These are attributed to growth as well as an increase in practitioner’s willingness to report, and increasingly positive views of Wicca in America.{{Cite web| title = How many Wiccans are there?| url = http://www.religioustolerance.org/wic_nbr3.htm|website = www.religioustolerance.org| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160505062637/http://www.religioustolerance.org/wic_nbr3.htm| archive-date=5 May 2016 |url-status=dead| access-date = 2016-02-12}}

=United States=

Based on the most recent survey by the Pew Research Center, conducted in 2014, there are approximately 1 million Pagans in the United States, comprising 0.3% of the population.{{Citation

| last = Smith

| first = Gregory

| display-authors = etal

| title = America's Changing Religious Landscape

| publisher = Pew Research Center

| place = Washington D.C.

| date = 2014

| chapter = Chapter 1: The Changing Religious Composition of the U.S.

| page = 21

| url = https://www.pewresearch.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2015/05/RLS-08-26-full-report.pdf

}}

According to Dr. Helen A. Berger's 1995 survey, "The Pagan Census", most American Pagans are middle class, educated, and live in urban/suburban areas on the East and West coasts.{{sfn|Berger|1999|pp=8–9}}

References

=Works cited=

{{cite book |last1=Adler |first1=Margot |title=Drawing Down the Moon; Witches, Druids, Goddess-Worshippers, and Other Pagans in America |date=2006 |publisher=Penguin Books |isbn=9780807032374 |url-access=registration |url=https://archive.org/details/drawingdownmoonw0000adle}}
{{cite book |last=Berger |first=Helen |author-link=Helen A. Berger |title=A Community of Witches: Contemporary Neo-Paganism and Witchcraft in the United States |place =Columbia, South Carolina |publisher=University of South Carolina Press |year=1999 |isbn=1-57003-246-7}}
{{Cite journal |last1=Berger |first1=Helen A. |last2=Ezzy |first2=Douglas |date=September 2009 |title=Mass Media and Religious Identity: A Case Study of Young Witches |journal=Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion |volume=48 |issue=3 |pages=501–514 |doi=10.1111/j.1468-5906.2009.01462.x |jstor=40405642}}
{{cite book |first=Chas S. |last=Clifton |year=2006 |title=Her Hidden Children: The Rise of Wicca and Paganism in America |place=Lanham, MD |publisher=AltaMira Press |isbn=0-7591-0201-5}}
{{cite journal |title=Robert Cochrane and the Gardnerian Craft: Feuds, Secrets, and Mysteries in Contemporary British Witchcraft |journal=The Pomegranate: The International Journal of Pagan Studies |last=Doyle White |first=Ethan |year=2011 |volume=13 |issue=2 |doi=10.1558/pome.v13i2.205|doi-broken-date=14 April 2025 }}
{{cite book |last=Doyle White |first=Ethan |title=Wicca: History, Belief, and Community in Modern Pagan Witchcraft |publisher=Sussex Academic Press |location=Brighton |year=2016 |isbn=978-1-84519-754-4 }}
{{cite book |last=Hutton |first=Ronald |author-link=Ronald Hutton |title=The Pagan Religions of the Ancient British Isles |place=Cambridge, Mass. |publisher=Blackwell Publishers |year=1993}}{{ISBN?}}
{{cite book |first=Ronald |last=Hutton |title=Triumph of the Moon: A History of Modern Pagan Witchcraft |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=1999 |isbn=978-0192854490 |url-access=registration |url=https://archive.org/details/triumphofmoonhis00hutt}}
{{Cite book |last=Hutton |first=Ronald |title=The Witch: A History of Fear, from Ancient Times to the Present |date=2017 |publisher=Yale University Press}}{{ISBN?}}
{{cite book |last=Kelly |first=Aiden A. |author-link=Aidan A. Kelly|title=Crafting the Art of Magic, Book I: A History of Modern Witchcraft, 1939–1964 |place=Minnesota |publisher=Llewellyn Publications |year=1991 |isbn=978-0875423708}}
{{cite encyclopedia |contribution=An Update on Neopagan Witchcraft in America |last=Kelly |first=Aidan A. |title=Perspectives on the New Age |editor1-first=James R. |editor1-last=Lewis |editor2-first=J. Gordon |editor2-last=Melton |contribution-url=https://archive.org/details/perspectivesonne0000unse_m6u6/page/136 |pages=136–151 |publisher=State University of New York Press |location=Albany|year=1992 |isbn=978-0791412138}}
{{cite book |last=Lipp |first=Deborah |title=The Study of Witchcraft: A Guidebook to Advanced Wicca |place=San Francisco |publisher=Red Wheel/Weiser |year=2007 |isbn=978-1-57863-409-5}}
{{cite book |last=Pearson |first=Joanne |chapter=The History and Development of Wicca and Paganism |title=Belief Beyond Boundaries: Wicca, Celtic Spirituality and the New Age |year=2002 |isbn=9780754608202 |editor=Joanne Pearson |pages=15–54 |location=Aldershot |publisher=Ashgate }}
{{cite book |last1=Rabinovitch |first1=Shelley |last2=Lewis |first2=James R. |title=The Encyclopedia of Modern Witchcraft and Neo-Paganism | publisher=Citadel Press | year=2004 | isbn=0-8065-2407-3}}
{{cite book |last=Salomonsen |first=Jone |year=2002 |title=Enchanted Feminism: Ritual, Gender and Divinity Among the Reclaiming Witches of San Francisco |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-0415223928}}
{{Cite journal |last=Tosenberger |first=Catherine |date=2010 |title=Neo-Paganism for Teens |journal=Jeunesse: Young People, Texts, Cultures |volume=2 |issue=2 |pages=172–182 |doi=10.1353/jeu.2010.0037 |id={{Project MUSE|406886}} |s2cid=163061063}}
{{cite book |last=Valiente |first=Doreen |author-link=Doreen Valiente |title=The Rebirth of Witchcraft |year=1989 |publisher=Robert Hale Publishing |location=London |isbn=0-7090-3715-5 |oclc=59694320}}

External links

[https://www.learnreligions.com/wicca-witchcraft-or-paganism-2562823 Wicca, Witchcraft or Paganism?] at Learnreligions.com
[https://digitaloccultlibrary.commons.gc.cuny.edu/witchcraft-and-wicca/ Witchcraft and Wicca] at the CUNY Academic Commons

Category:1930s introductions

Category:Contemporary history

Category:Wicca

neopagan witchcraft

Origins

Wicca

=Gardnerian Wicca=

=Alexandrian Wicca=

=Eclectic Wicca=

Traditional Witchcraft

= Cochrane's Craft =

= Feri Tradition =

= Sabbatic Craft =

= Stregheria =

Feminism

Media

Demographics

=United States=

See also

References

=Works cited=

Further reading

External links