Most people who come to Paganism from a Christian context are familiar with the idea of unified belief. Some of them are attracted to Paganism because the movement lacks a strong core of shared beliefs; others find this concept unsettling in its unfamiliarity. What differentiates Paganism from Christianity is its focus on practice rather than on belief. That’s not to say that Pagan faith paths don’t have a belief structure; they certainly do! But these beliefs aren’t unified across the movement or even within particular traditions. No one is policing what’s in your head or your heart. Your actions, on the other hand, are judged far and wide.
My crone and good friend Susan Stoddard once told me, “Righteousness is a patriarchal construct. Pagan philosophy isn’t concerned with convincing others that our reality is the correct one. It is concerned with maintaining the integrity of the shared reality we all participate in.” Even after years of being her witchy apprentice and walking my own spiritual path, the idea that unified belief wasn’t a primary concern of Paganism was strange to me. I grew up in a church where everyone recited the Nicene Creed in unison every week at Eucharist. There was no question about what the people believed — or, at least, what they were supposed to believe. It was a structure that I found comforting and even tried to impress in some way on the Wiccan traditions I was trained in. The idea of orthodoxy was alluring to me, and it took a great deal of reflection and personal growth to realize that I could believe in my heart all I wanted, but that didn’t maintain the altar or feed the spirits or put knowledge in my head and it certainly didn’t improve my magickal skills or strengthen my spiritual authority. Only actions in the real world did that. Moreover, I realized that the collection of beliefs and practices that worked for me was not guaranteed to work for anyone else, so it was unreasonable for me to confine others to using a limited set of ill-fitting tools. How could people become miracle-workers if they didn’t have the right tool for the right job? After a while, orthodoxy became personal instead of communal. I became concerned only with what the right belief structure was for myself.
One of the distinctions I learned about Paganism that ended up being very beneficial to me as I dechristianized myself was the difference between a belief and a practice. Beliefs are ideas that we psychologically and emotionally accept as and know to be true, whether or not we have verifiable evidence to back that knowing up. Beliefs can be, and oftentimes are, stronger and more persuasive than facts because of this emotional content, whether the emotional content is lived experience that validates the belief, attachment to or investment in the belief, fear that the belief is true, hope that the belief is true, or anger or resentment toward the fact that the belief exists at all. It is even possible, and in fact common, to have beliefs that you don’t want to have. Beliefs pervade our thinking both mundanely and spiritually, and it can take a great deal of reflection to identify them and the basic values that are at their cores in order to reinforce or modify them.
Practices, on the other hand, are the application of ideas, beliefs, and methods, and they generally have a customary or expected way of being done. Zen meditation is a practice. Hatha yoga is a practice. Pottery is a practice. Your morning get-ready-for-work ritual is a practice. Training in a specific tradition is a practice. They don’t require deep, heartfelt adoption of the ideas or beliefs underlying them in order to be effective, although some practices may encourage lived experiences which reinforce those ideas or beliefs. Practices simply require you to commit to the process of doing. The power of practice is in repetition, familiarity, subtle qualitative distinctions that you learn to pick out and adjust for, and experiential wisdom that is gained over time.
One thing it took me a long time — and some choices that sadden me even now — to learn is that it’s impossible to be a practitioner of something you don’t actually do. If you’ve never quilted, even if you’ve read a lot of books about quilting and know all the techniques through study, you’re not a quilter but rather a quilt enthusiast or maybe a quilt scholar. However, even if you’ve never read a single book on quilting but have cut out squares and pieced them together and stitched designs into the top and batting and back of a quilt to hold the layers together, then you’re a quilter. You might not be the most knowledgeable or the most skilled, but you’ve done the actual work of making a quilt, and if you keep at it, you’ll gain that knowledge and skill through practice. The same is true of the Craft.
Transitioning From Belief-Based Religion to Practice-Based Religion
As a younger witch, I thought it was of supreme importance to do battle with old beliefs in order to break them down and build new ones in their place. It was a very adversarial way of going about things, and it wasn’t the slightest bit effective. Now I realize that the best course of action is to work with those beliefs, accepting them, gently modifying them over time, and meanwhile engaging wholeheartedly in practices that support the life and spirituality that one wants to have.
Practice takes time and physical effort. It takes the willingness to keep appointments with yourself and expend energy on real-world tasks. It is, in a lot of ways, more difficult than believing abstractly in something or only visiting those beliefs for an hour or so once or twice a week. In teaching seekers and less-experienced witches, I tell them early on that walking this path and gaining experience in magickal skill is a student-led, action-oriented endeavor. The student must demonstrate through their actions the willingness to pursue the wisdom they seek. Just as my very first teacher, Marcia Young, taught me through gentle reminders and the consequence of missed opportunities, it is one’s actions that define who we are.
As you transition from belief-based religion to practice-based religion, one of the actions that it’s worthwhile to take is active reflection on what led you away from your former spiritual tradition. Journaling can be a powerful tool in this regard. Asking yourself what felt wrong to you about your previous religion, what actions or practices you saw that were in opposition to its stated beliefs, and what your ideal religion would look like are just a few ways to start identifying your own belief structure and finding inspiring ways to bring those beliefs to life through practice. Taking the time to physically document these reflections — whether through journaling on paper, through an audio recorder, through video blogs or art, or whatever creative outlet speaks to you — helps to get the reflections out of the head and into the world, where they can be observed and analyzed and the rich wisdom they contain harvested.
Resolving Belief-Based Tension
As you transition from one spiritual tradition to another, you may experience excitement and elation at finding a path that suits you, or you may experience doubt and worry about whether you’ll be spiritually punished for leaving your previous religion. You may even experience both of these feelings at the same time. This reaction is normal and is the result of tensions between beliefs. Resolving this tension comes from accepting that the beliefs you have are real. Maybe you really do believe in Jesus. Maybe Hell is an actual place in your mind. Maybe you’re afraid God will strike you down if you sin by worshiping or working with other gods. Whatever the belief, acknowledging that it exists and accepting it for what it is isn’t a failure to be Pagan enough but rather an opportunity to identify and heal from beliefs that were imposed upon you. This tension can take months or years to resolve, and it can still crop up at times, but it resolves itself as you build beliefs that are rooted in practices that reflect your identity, values, and aspirations. And those beliefs are built through your own personal practices, both spiritual and mundane. While you don’t have to say the Lord’s Prayer backwards (though this is historically attested in a number of documents as one of the bona fide ways to become a witch), ceremonially cutting your ties with your old religion, closing one chapter and opening another, can be psychologically helpful in confronting some of these fears and embracing the excitement of a new phase of your life.
One practice that some people find beneficial is the process of renunciation. This can be a cathartic experience, especially for those whose experience with their previous religion was traumatic. It may involve engaging in practices that are considered blasphemous or ritually unclean, such as consuming ritually forbidden food and drink, destroying sacred items, or engaging in rituals such as the Black Mass. The power of these practices comes in the fact that by your actions you are declaring that your previous religion holds no power over you any longer and that you no longer abide by its beliefs, customs, and taboos. But renunciation does not have to be the stuff of sensational documentaries; it can be as simple as entering your own sacred space and calmly and quietly addressing the deities of your previous religion, letting them know that you’ve chosen to walk a different path and explaining to them the terms under which you’ll be interacting with them in the future. This sort of renunciation, or perhaps it’s better called renegotiation, can help in situations where you’d rather not offend the dignity of the deity in question.
Another practice that can help in the process of resolving belief-based tension is the process of dedication, which is a ceremonial declaration of your intent to open a new chapter in your spiritual life. It can be done as part of a group — my tradition has two specific rituals, called Affirmation (by which a seeker affirms their desire to learn more about the Craft but not to commit to the religion) and Dedication (by which an affirmatant dedicates themselves to the Craft and, optionally, to our group) — or it can be done on one’s own. Anyone can dedicate themselves at any time, or rededicate themselves after a period of going in a different direction. All it takes is some ceremony — simple or complex — that is meaningful to you. Dedications can be as simple as wearing clothes that you intend to be ritual garb, creating sacred space, and lighting a candle in honor of your new life as a witch. Or they can be as complex as full-coven rituals where the dedicant lays aside the physical trappings of their old religion (such as Bibles, crucifixes, or religious clothing) and receives the blessings of each element before dedicating to a specific deity or deities and declaring the intent to learn a specific Pagan tradition. Whatever the format, the power of dedication is in taking those first steps into a new spiritual practice, in taking action and addressing any fears or worries that come up in the process of that action. The ceremonial marking of the end of one religious path and the beginning of another can be a meaningful first step in building a practice that reinforces present or desired beliefs.
Building Practice-Based Beliefs
Building practice-based beliefs is a long-term project; it cannot be completed in weeks or even months. Like all types of self-transformation, you may only realize how far you’ve come after years of day-to-day development. But, like all types of self-transformation, a roadmap can be sketched out to guide your steps on the path.
First, identify a few practices that you would like to see fully integrated in your life in five years. Do you want to journal regularly? Have a regular contemplative practice? Joyously celebrate the Esbats and Sabbats? Live in a serene home? Do daily yoga? Meditate? Devote time to a creative endeavor? What does your dream spirituality look like to you?
After you have identified a few practices — start with no more than three — then make plans to integrate them one at a time over a six-month period. This spacing-out technique will give you adequate time to build one habit (and it takes about three weeks to build a new habit) and get comfortable with it before you add a new one to the mix. Engage in those practices. Make note of how they make you feel when you’ve done them and how you feel when you forget or if something comes up. Let those feelings guide you to refining your scheduling, and don’t feel bad if what you end up with is not what you envisioned. Some people plan a weekly practice but end up with a daily one. Some people plan a daily practice and end up with a monthly cycle of things they do each week. Some people may find that they liked the idea of a practice more than the reality of the practice itself, and in those cases, they can assess whether the practice is really reflective of what their spiritual needs are at this point in their lives. There are no failures in this process, only moments of clarity. Let the process grow itself with you, taking shape according to what your lifestyle and personality will really support.
Finally, keep those practices up. And make a note in your calendar to look back after a year, three years, five years, ten years to see how far you’ve come in your path. You will most certainly find that you have changed in ways you did not anticipate or plan for, which is one of the transformative purposes of a healthy spirituality.
Loving the Journey
It’s important to remember as you embark on your path that the secular world preaches instant gratification but spiritual growth takes time and a willingness to do the work. There are no quick fixes. Even in Paganism, some paths preach that you can become a living god or attract to yourself all manner of wealth, love, and security. For some, these objectives are of supreme importance. For others, they ring false, or at least misguided. What your path is, is for you to decide, but be aware that true spiritual growth is subtle, takes time, and involves action in the physical world. Also know that your needs will change over time, and so too will your path in order to accommodate those needs. What came before is not worthless but rather is rich with lessons about yourself and your relationship with the Divine. So, as you dechristianize yourself, look back on the past with love for yourself and the truths you came to realize as you journey forth into Paganism.