PollySis

Hello Starrgazzer! You inspired me to write a bit about 'liturgy', words set in stone, dogma and the whole paraphenalia of religion, which I think turns many of us into pagans in the first place.

You said:

But I think you know plenty! The beauty of all the various forms of paganism is that there is usually no liturgy, dogma, no chapter and verse - you come to it already with everything you need to know inside you... and you can be your own priesthood, if you like!

Where there are priests there can be ego - and ideas start being subject to prejudices, or set in stone, as someone sets themselves up as 'the expert'. That said, in some forms of paganism there are High Priests/Priestesses. My own Order has a Chosen Chief, but he is just that. For many druids, we believe we are the priesthood. There is an old Irish saying that wherever a druid walks is holy ground. Any druid! Those wiccans and witches who keep a Book of Shadows are often writing their own liturgy, their own prayers. There is no central font of all wisdom, either human or book you can touch. Our book is nature and our words are often our own - either spontaneously made up on the spot, or self-penned, or written by friends.

I was sitting by a ruined abbey in York, the other day. It was half demolished by Henry VIII as most of them were - to get rid of the corrupt monks and clergy - and I've often thought the ruins which are half gone back to nature have more of any God about them than the finished, perfect, supposedly awe inspiring places like York Minster, down the road, or say Westminster Abbey, Chartres, etc. High up, there were old passageways where no human feet have stood for 500 years - only the squirrels running along the broken passageways. Every single one of what must have been exquisitely crafted medieval stained glass windows now gone, just a bit of broken masonry and tracery, where they once were - which tells you more about the vanity of humanity than the finished, perfect product does. Our landscape in Britain has more of these than the rest of Europe, probably as we had the Reformation and later the English Revolution which did away with a lot of the fripperies as puritans ripped anything that looked catholic (statues, wall friezes, often stained glass windows) out of the remaining churches. It gives you a perspective on a dead/dying religion that used money and power to rule ordinary folk with fear. (Although they subverted it - every church round here has a Green Man carved somewhere or other - or 30!)

And all round, some huge old trees of various sorts. I could see what you might call 'god' for wont of a better word, instantly, in the trees and the sky and the beautiful day, and amongst the ruins. But take me to the Minster, five minutes away - I feel nothing. Nada. It's man made and even the stones have no spirit. Like many pagans, I for one don't need impressive buildings or priests setting themselves up above me, or any liturgy of any kind. I've felt a million times more power in a 3000 year old stone circle, than in any building.

I love Emma Restall-Orr's book about 'Ritual' which inspires us to create our own celebrations and rituals, in our own way and our own words. This is probably a fairly typical pagan approach to 'worship'.

Some folk outside paganism probably think that's a bit feeble or a cop out, but in a sense it's the hardest route to travel. For we have no maps! The more I learn the more I realise the less I know! Maybe we're closest to Buddhists in that way? On the other hand, I also think we already 'know' enough the day we consciously find our path. How many pagans of whatever path do you know who say they were always pagan, just didn't realise it? Most of us, probably!

I know many practising wiccans do have a liturgy in a sense - the Doreen Valiente things like the Rede which ends with the lines:

"Eight words the Witches Rede fulfill:
If it Harms none, Do what Thou Will!"

And many druids from different Orders use certain words, from time to time like the Druids' Prayer:


Or the oath of peace:



Many rituals have a set format - but the words can change. Some circles stick to their own liturgy. For many others, it's a fluid, ever changing thing.

I wonder if anyone has any favourite words from their belief system? Are you all spontaneous, or do you follow set rituals? Do you write your own prayers? And what about those pagans like many British/Irish traditional witches who don't have a religious side to their practice, at all? What do you think of the whole idea? Do those of us who are solitaries, use say Doreen Valiente's writings? Or others? Or do you use your own creativity? And where do you practice, if you do the religious side? Where is your 'church'? (Mine are the woods and fields around here where my ancestors for centuries have farmed. I also love beaches, especially Whitby and always have a word with the goddess there!)

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