When I was Lost

Since my childhood, I can remember searching for a religion that I could claim as something I believed in wholeheartedly. I was baptized Episcopalian due to the fact that at that time, my mother was rebelling against the Catholic church and refused to baptize me Catholic. However, to the best of my knowledge, my baptism was the only time I had ever been in a Episcopal church.

In later years, my mother returned to the Catholic church, and I would accompany her on Sundays and Midnight Mass on Christmas Eve. But I can remember looking around that church and seeing people I went to school with. Simply put, I knew these people, and they were not nice. I came from a lower middle class family, and most of these people came from upper middle class or higher. If they deemed it worthy enough to notice me at all, it was to look down their noses at me. Not really people I wanted to share any truly religious experiences with.

So I moved on. At another point in my childhood, we attended a small Baptist church as a family for awhile. This is where I first experienced "being saved" and I must admit it was a euphoric experience. It left me feeling buoyant, for all of about two hours. I was about fourteen years old at this time. It didn't take me long to start having what may be considered impure thoughts of all kinds, as I'm sure most kids that age do. So it left me feeling dirty and unworthy, not exactly what I was looking for in a religion. Was I to go the rest of my life feeling guilty for every other thought that went through my head? Was this really what a religious experience was supposed to be like? In my heart I felt that religion was supposed to make you feel good, not guilty.

At another point I attended a Lutheran church with a friend, and I was interested, up to a point. I have to confess I never delved too far into the Lutheran religion after this visit because they completely lost me at one point in the service where it was said that animals don't have souls. What? I am an animal lover, we have always had pets of some kind who were full fledged members of our family. How could you expect me to believe that they would not continue on to the afterlife and be faithfully waiting for us when it was our time to cross over? I didn't believe it, so strongly, in fact, that from that point on, it was a specific point that I would look for in any religion I looked into.

By my late teens I had become disillusioned when it came to religion. I stopped looking and filled that empty feeling of missing something in my life with all sorts of less than fulfilling activities. This continued on for about ten years. During that time, I was married in a church to a self proclaimed atheist. When I balked at this, and suggested we get married in a court house because he didn't believe in God, he replied that he believed in justice even less, so we were married in a church. As for me personally, I didn't mind getting married in a church, because I knew I believed in a higher power, I just didn't know to what affiliation that higher power claimed, if any at all. Over the years I had sort of created my own religion, with my own beliefs, sifting through what was given to me and claiming what I believed and disregarding what I didn't. So we were married, and went on to have two beautiful sons.

Before our first son came into our world, we agreed that we would not baptize our children, going against the usual customs in this Midwest town. With his lack of religion and my personal unfulfilled quest, we agreed that this should be a personal choice for our children, one that they needed to make for themselves. I disregarded the idea that if something were to happen to our children, they would be punished for our lack of faith. Surely no God would do this to an innocent child, and if it did indeed happen, then I would be more than willing to spend eternity as a "lost soul" with my children.

In my late twenties, I read a book called "Lilydale" by Christine Wicker about a community in the state of New York that dedicates itself to the religion of Spiritualism. Spiritualism, according to Wikipedia, is a belief that spirits of the deceased can be contacted through mediums and provide those still living with guidance from a higher plane. This intrigued me enough to start looking into it. This research in turn led me to Paganism and Witchcraft. Now I have to admit when I first started this portion of my quest, I had a delicious shiver of the forbidden. Just the very thoughts of Witchcraft and spells brought forth all the taboo that society drives into the conscience. So like a sibling who finds their sister's secret diary, I read on and devoured any information I could find on it. After getting past the more superficial claims of witchcraft and actually getting to the heart of the religion, I had a moment of revelation. This was it...this is what I had been searching for my whole life. Everything I read wasn't so much of a "I can believe that" thought. It was more of "Yes! This is what I have always believed, but never had a name for it." In short, it felt like coming home.

Most, if not all, Pagans do not believe in Hell or the devil. This made sense to me because I believe that humans create their own hell here on earth, and they are quite effective at it, too. It also made sense to me to have a God and a Goddess, because there are very few things in nature that can be created without a male and female form. So it made sense that the start of life was created by both, also. I also liked the fact that most will say what one believes is neither right nor wrong, it is a personal choice that you alone can make for yourself. And your actions are only the result of your intent...you alone are responsible for the choices you make in life, be it good or bad. Another important factor in my newfound religion was that pagans believe animals have souls, and when their time comes they cross over the rainbow bridge and they faithfully await your presence.

I must admit, witchcraft and Wicca intrigued me in the beginning. I liked the rede which basically states "do what you will, but bring harm to none" and which also states that what you send out, whether it be good or bad, will come back on you..karma. Kind of like the Christian philosophy "do unto others..." But this intrigued me because if you clung to this idea, you had to put thought before your actions. You could not go forth and sin and then claim repentance and be forgiven. In my beliefs, once you put it out there in the universe, its out there and there are no "take backs". So what you do and what you say is on your shoulders. However, as intriguing as witchcraft was to me, I do not claim to be a witch first, and I can count on one hand the number of spells I have done in the last five years. I am a Pagan first, and I will take into account other sects of Paganism, such as Shamanism, Animism, Spiritualism and various others. I still basically weed through what I discover and disregard what I don't believe in and claim what I do.

Perhaps the most appealing aspect of my religion is the convenience. If I want to worship, I have only to step outside and worship in the most natural temple in the world. I don't need a beautiful chapel or cathedral, and I don't need a "middle man" who claims to be closer to God than I am. I only need myself to be close to the Lord and Lady. I have only to look around and see all the beauty and magic that they have put forth into our world and know that they exist, and that we are cherished. After all, seeing is believing.