Why is paganism hated

In and , 65 percent of Americans identified as Christians—down 12 percent from the previous decade. Occultism is also on the rise. In , the Pew Research Center found that 0. By , the number of practicing pagans in America is projected to triple to 6. To tell the story of the dramatic rise of neo-paganism in America, though, you quickly run into a roadblock.

In fact, Ahmed came to the world of paganism with his own set of preconceived notions. Paganism is an umbrella term. It comes from the Latin paganus, which refers to those who lived in rural areas.

Paganism , the catchall term, came to encompass many different cultures, including Greco-Roman, Celtic, Germanic, and Slavic tribes. According to the Pagan Federation , modern pagans can be defined as followers of a polytheistic or pantheistic nature-worshipping religion. They then argued that they alone could meet the need.

And they succeeded massively. Jesus cures a sick man who is unable to reach the pool at Bethesda, which contains healing waters. Everyone in the ancient world knew that divinity was all about power.

Humans cannot control whether it rains or an epidemic destroys the community or a natural disasters hits; but the gods can. They can provide for humans what mere mortals cannot do for themselves. This stood at the root of all ancient religion. And it became the chief selling point of the Christian message. Christians declared that their God was more powerful than any other god—in fact, more powerful than all the supposed other gods combined.

God alone was God, and he alone could provide what people need. The power struggle between the Christian and pagan gods is on full display in a wide range of ancient texts. At one point in the narrative, John visits the city of Ephesus and its renowned temple to the goddess Athena.

Entering the sacred site, John ascends a platform and issues a challenge to a large crowd of pagans: They are to pray to their divine protectoress to strike him dead. If she fails to respond, he in turn will ask his God to kill all of them. The crowd is terrified—they have already seen John raise people from the dead, and they know his God means business.

Although obviously legendary, the tale conveys an important truth. Jesus himself, the son of God, had performed one miracle after the other. He was born of a virgin; he fulfilled prophecies spoken centuries earlier by ancient seers; he healed the sick; he cast out demons; he raised the dead.

His disciples also did miracles—amazing miracles—all recorded for posterity in writings widely available. And the miracles continued to the present day. People became convinced by these stories.

Not en masse, but one person at a time. Christ and Doubting Thomas, painted by Paolo Cavazzola Christianity did not initially succeed by taking its message to the great and the powerful, the mighty Roman elite.

It succeeded at first as a grassroots movement. The original followers of Jesus told those close to them what they believed: that the great miracle worker Jesus had been raised from the dead, and that his wonders continued to be performed among those who believed in him. They convinced others. Not most of those they talked with, but some.

And as it turns out, small but steady growth from the ground up is all it took. If you chart the necessary rate of growth along an exponential curve, the Christian movement needed to increase at a rate of around 3 percent annually. There is no place in heaven for someone who is born into the faith and decides to reject it. You couldn't say you didn't know any better, you purposely stepped away from salvation. It wasn't that I don't believe in God. I often wish I didn't as atheism is a great deal sexier.

How rock n' roll to have the courage to know that you are alone and there is no rhyme or reason for you being here? It is the James Dean of philosophies. But unfortunately I do believe in God just not in a personal God — and I don't believe he's the only one up there. A moral code based on the Oscar Wilde quote "some people cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go" — strive to be the first kind of person and not the second. Transcendence — be that through ritual or prayer or eating marshmallows in woodland.

I gravitated toward paganism, specifically witchcraft. I liked that these were not "people of the book" and their only "book" was one that the follower created him or herself. I liked that there was a whole pantheon of gods and goddesses to engage with; it wasn't worship in the old sense of the word, it was co-creation. The only thing that troubled me about my new tribe was its propensity to want to organise into groups that then try to get mainstream recognition.

The lack of any structure, hierarchy as a solitary person I never joined a coven with a priest or priestess , or rules meant that I was free to do as I pleased. I followed the guidance I received in dreams.