Wicca for Beginners - Thea Sabin

About Thea Sabin

Thea is a professional editor, writer, and Web geek. She has been practicing Wicca since she was a teenager, which was longer ago than she cares to remember. In college, she reluctantly co-founded an eclectic Wiccan-pagan student organization. After this intense lesson in Wicca 101, crowd control, interpersonal politics, academic red tape, and politely wrangling protesting fundamentalists, she took her practice underground and spent the next decade working with a private womens group. When that group disbanded, she sought out formal training in a British Traditional path, and over time was initiated and elevated to third degree in that tradition. Currently she and her husband run a British Traditional coven in the misty Pacific Northwest.

Thea has written for numerous pagan and nonpagan publications, and served as editor and astrology columnist for a large-circulation pagan newspaper. When shes not glued to a computer writing something, she likes to do tai chi and watch bad Hong Kong gangster movies (but not at the same time).

Llewellyn Publications

Woodbury, Minnesota

Wicca for Beginners: Fundamentals of Philosophy & Practice 2010 by Thea Sabin.

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First e-book edition 2010

E-book ISBN: 9780738717753

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Conents

Id like to thank my grandmother, who always believed I would write a book, so I finally did. She believed that the power of positive thought could conquer anything; that home-baked bread and strawberry jam were some of lifes finest treasures; that astrology shows us the pattern of our full potential; that its okay to allow yourself one cheat when playing solitaire; that the fairies and Harvey the rabbit made off with her glasses and an entire chocolate cake; and in scaring the living daylights out of little girls by reading to them in the dark about the giant spiders of Mirkwood Forest while illuminating her face in ghastly shadows with a flashlight held under her chin.

Id like to thank some of the other mystics and shamans who have had a profound influence on me and my spiritual pathShekinah, Otto, Eran, Akasha, Dot, Helga, Mary, Pajaro, Abuela M., Sylvana, Melanie Fire Salamander, Bestia, Star, Tom, Alicia, and Grace. Each of you has given me wonderful gifts, whether you know it or not. My love and appreciation to all of you.

Id like to thank my guinea pigsI mean covenerswho teach me a hell of a lot more than I teach them.

Id like to thank Pam for inspiration, low-rise jeans, Voodoo rituals, and toothless drag queens. Everyone should be lucky enough to have a friend like you.

Most important, Id like to thank my husband, a scientist, Zen boy, and priest whose life is a study of the arts of being rationally irrational and finding the spiritual in the mundane. He lived with me while I wrote this book, and he still loves me anyway. By that measure alone hed be a Wiccan saint, if we had saints. I love you, baby. Chop wood, carry water.

Whats Wicca?

Recently my husband and I went to a coffee house to meet a man who was interested in becoming a student in our Wiccan study group. Like many Wiccans who lead teaching groups, we always arrange for our first meeting with a seekersomeone searching for his or her spiritual pathto be in a public place, for everyones safety and comfort. Over tea, we asked the seeker why he wanted Wiccan training. We ask everyone who talks to us about training this question. If they tell us they are looking for a nature-based religion, a path of self-empowerment, a way to commune with deity, or something along those lines, we continue the conversation. If they tell us they want to hex their ex-lovers, brew cauldrons full of toxic stuff, make others fall in love with them, worship the devil, or fly on broomsticks, we tell them theyre out of luck and politely suggest that they seek out a therapist.

When we asked the question of this seeker, he told us about how he had searched for information about Wicca in books and on the Internet, attended public Wiccan rituals, and visited metaphysical bookstores, but there was so much information available on the topic that he wasnt sure what was Wicca and what was not. He was also at a loss about how to separate the spiritual stuff from the rest. As he put it, I know theres got to be a religion in there somewhere. He decided to find a teacher to help him sort it all out.

It was easy to understand why he was confused. During the last several years, Wicca and magic have stormed the American pop culture scene. Weve been watching Bewitched for quite a while, but Sabrina the Teenage Witch , the Harry Potter films, The Lord of the Rings , Charmed , and Buffy the Vampire Slayer have spurred a new wave of seekers, despite the fact that most of these shows and films have precious little to do with real Wicca. Its gotten to the point where someone has coined the term Generation Hex for all of the teenagers and twenty-somethings who have been turned on to Wicca by the current magical media blitz. There are more Wicca books on the market than ever, and more than 6,000 Wicca-related Web sites on the Internet. There are Wiccan radio shows, Wiccan umbrella organizations, and state-certified Wiccan churches. And theres even Secret Spells Barbie, complete with glittery costume, cauldron, and magic powder. Okay, technically shes not Wiccan, but she definitely contributes to the confusion.