Post by JoannaL on Nov 4, 2020 17:16:57 GMT -5
Pandemic Obstructs Training/Initiation of Novice Witches
The moratorium on religious and other social gatherings in the U.K. also applies to witches’ covens, and Karin Rainbird, a pagan prison cleric, shared the problems she and her group are facing.
“Wicca is not really something you can do online,” Rainbird, who launched her coven in Pontypridd, Rhondda Cynon Taf, Wales, a few months ago, explained. “Because we just started the coven, no one is initiated yet apart from myself, so it’s really the training period.”
Training to become a witch involves attending the sabbaths, as well as various workshop during which novices learn to identify herbs and practice casting the circle. Not everything can be taught online and prospective witches must gather to complete their training and undergo induction into the coven.
Wales is currently in a 17-day “firebreak” lockdown and this is delaying training and recruitment, Rainbird said.
Witches are far more common in the U.K. than most would imagine. In 2011, approximately 85,000 individuals identified as witches, and in 2014, there were claims paganism was the fastest-growing religion in the country. The primary pagan faiths represented are Wicca and other forms of witchcraft.
While the media is wont to portray witches as ugly old hags who hex their enemies, most neo-pagans claim witchcraft is neither evil nor supernatural, but rather a faith of spirituality and connection with their deity.
Sources: The Great Dame, Folkspaper, November 3, 2020; The BBC News; and The Yorkshire Post.
