Incognitus wrote:

Can you link a specific post with my name? I've never been to that forum. Sorry. I looked at your link and my name appears nowhere.

Interesting that you are denying it.  His link took me to Post #44 of the thread, which had your name, avatar, and the whole kit and kaboodle.

[QUOTE=KeaErisdottir;619985]Any claim to know what Wicca is and how/what Wiccans believe is already completely false, because the range of belief in among actual Wiccans, about the nature of the Divine and what it is we actually do is completely individual.  Wicca is an Orthopraxy.  [/quote]

If you read my posts carefully, I was only addressing the biblical mischaracterizations. I really don't care about Wicca.

[QUOTE=KeaErisdottir;619985] Hawkins, as usual, proves his approach and motive are sloppy, unprofessional, and only meant to demonize, because everything he says and does is tinged with his considerable biases and presumptions. [/quote]

Have you read his books? Or do you always make judgements prior to examination? He could be totally wrong on his information about Wicca. But he is totally right in his biblical treatments. But I don't grant he is wrong about Wicca. You have yet to prove that. In fact, I invite you to give me one example where he mischaracterized Wicca. Give me page, chapter and verse from one of his books.

[QUOTE=KeaErisdottir;619985]I thought you guys were not supposed to bear false witness.[/quote]

It appears that is what you are doing.



[QUOTE=KeaErisdottir;619985]Hyperbole, especially since you basically betray yourself as nothing but a syncophant for Hawkins.  [/quote]

Let's leave him out of it. I can [and have] refuted the notion of this thread on biblical grounds alone.

[QUOTE=sacrificialgoddess;620538]Interesting that you are denying it.  His link took me to Post #44 of the thread, which had your name, avatar, and the whole kit and kaboodle.[/QUOTE]

Which thread? What's the title? His link was to the forum not a thread.

[QUOTE=Incognitus;620573]If you read my posts carefully, I was only addressing the biblical mischaracterizations. I really don't care about Wicca.

Since most of us would agree that a Christian Wicca is impossible, there is no debate on that point.  All that the "Christian Wicca" phenomenon proves, with any certainty, is that in removing the Mysteries and the real Theurgy from what generally passes for Christianity these days has left a lot of Christians wanting.  Without the path to an ecstatic communion with the Christian God, you're going to find some of the most valuable believers looking in magical traditions for it.

However, at the moment you invoke the writings of Hawkins, and call him authoritative, and start telling people who have been practicing Wicca for decades that he knows more about a religion that wasn't even on his radar when they started practicing it(he was 2 years old or younger in some cases, according to his MySpace bio), you're spoiling to have all your arguments discredited out of hand.  I'm happy to oblige, because we've gone around before with the disingenuous doubletalk before.

[QUOTE]Have you read his books? Or do you always make judgements prior to examination? He could be totally wrong on his information about Wicca. But he is totally right in his biblical treatments.

I've read Hawkins.  He's intellectually and spiritually bankrupt generally, and especially at the point he claims any expertise about my religion.  I personally find his biblical arguments stilted and lifeless--which is typical of the faux intellectual Christian crusader.

But I don't grant he is wrong about Wicca. You have yet to prove that. In fact, I invite you to give me one example where he mischaracterized Wicca. Give me page, chapter and verse from one of his books.[/QUOTE]

First, I don't really care what a promoter of Hawkins has to say about a religion that I have practiced since he was a boy.  You cannot grant any expertise to Hawkins about Wicca, because it is clear that you actually don't know anything about it yourself--you have admitted as much by saying that you don't care about Wicca, beyond what Hawkins and his sort have to say about it.

[QUOTE=Alysoun;620571]DAH54,

No. I don't think there is *any* faith that you can become an "expert" in or have any true understanding of by reading.  Even Christianity, which holds to the mission-critical belief in the bible, must be experienced, yes?

True.  You can't have a testimony of the either The Bible, or in Jesus Christ himself through reading alone.  To say that merely reading The Bible confers either is a gross misunderstanding and misrepresentation of the process of the Mysteries by which testimony of -either- comes. 

[QUOTE]Salvation as understood in the faith cannot come through READING Jon 3:16 (or the many people onthis board who have read the bible would be perforce, Christians); but through the EXPERIENCE of accepting Christ.[/QUOTE]

Back when Christians were largely illiterate, all they had was the experience to go by.  The modern elitism and hubris that accompanies modern Christian commentary is simply evidence that there is a lot of denial and over-braining of the plain and precious truths of the faith.

Same with Wicca. NO ONE who is not a Wiccan could, with a straight face or any validity, be an expert in Wicca.  And merely reading "The Meaning of Withcraft," or "The Spiral Dance," or "Eight Sabbats for Witches," does not make one Wiccan.[/QUOTE]

Right.  If you have not undergone the process that the Wiccan Mysteries takes a person through, then there is no point from which to even open a discussion of what is or is not Wicca.