Breaking Craft Stereotypes:
An Urban Pagan Speaks Out
Too many people involved with Neo-Paganism in general and with Neo-Pagan Witchcraft in particular have some serious stereotypes when it comes to what is actually involved in living a "Pagan" lifestyle. Whatever a "Pagan lifestyle" can be said to mean.
My own life is a case in point. I am urban. I always have been. And while I enjoy being out in nature, the vast majority of the energy and inspiration that motivates me has nothing to do with 'nature,' or at least nature as an imaginative construct fostered by those unwilling to live a fantasy free life. I have been irritated by Pagans who told me flat-out that life in the city was evil and had a deadening effect upon one's soul. I have heard this so many times it's starting to sound like another one of those bumper-sticker slogans. Life in the city is evil? Heh. I don't believe in absolute things like evil. As for soul-deadening, I am sure it can be for certain people. I am not one of them. I revel in the energy of the traffic and the motions of the people. I am also captivated by the flux of the transient and twisting nightlife, as both a participant and an observer. I also have a strong connection to the natural pulse symbolized by the Wheel of the Year...but my Wheel is obviously very much mutated by its urban observances. The city is very much alive and those Pagans who slander it should rethink their stupid opinions.
Granted, there is a lot of pollution here in the city...noise, chemical, emotional, and psychic, but as a child of chaos, I have learned the art of surfing through all of it. I know that under the current economic and social systems, many cities are sucking the life out of the earth around them. However, my city is not one of them. Compared with other US cities, Chicago has some of the cleanest air and we have our own water and ecosystem. We also have trees, shrubs, flowers and all sorts of green things growing all over the place. (Not to mention the hordes of birds, squirrels, possums, skunks, rodents, nutcases who ride the subways at night, and the odd coyote - I shit you not.) One time I had to listen to a Pagan rant on about how I was wrong in my assertion that the city was life. He was trying to convince me that the pollution would kill me and that as a Pagan I would be so much more happy out in at least the suburbs. You want to know what I responded with, don't you? I said "I noticed you drove in here to the city in an SUV. I bet you shower every day and use electricity too. Your life isn't more sacred then mine. I bet I know more about natural energies and spirits then you do, pal. You think my life is deadened by my attachment to the city? What else did you just learn in whatever book you are reading? So why don't you take your overfed comfortable middle class ass back out to your natural paradise where you belong?" Or something to that effect. His face reddened and just to head him off, I zapped him. It was a lesson that needed to be taught.
It never ceases to amaze me how some of the 'sensitive' Pagans get all teary eyed and sad when they have to endure living in the city for a long time. I have heard complaints about how they can not 'feel' the earth, or any of the elemental forces. And this makes me just want to slap them silly. Way to go, Moon Flower or whatever you call yourself! You ever heard of casting a circle? There is a reason for the practice, you know. Ground and center yourself for once! I never had a problem feeling the 'earth' or the elements, or even the spirits, in the city...even with all the extra psychic and magical fray of the endless fragmentation of certain people who get lost in the traffic. To me, the buildings are living and breathing. The spirits of the land are still there too, albeit mutated a bit differently than their wilderness cousins. The Gods I invoke come just as strongly as if I was out in the middle of nowhere. (Yes. I have done ritual invocations in both types of environments.) The Gods are wherever you are, or have you forgotten that? The thing about it is, I wonder where these 'sensitive' Pagans have gotten their sensibilities from. Because upon talking with them a bit, I discover their backgrounds are either urban or suburban. I feel sorry for them, but their feelings of isolation are their own damned fault, because there is life and dazzling energy all around....yes, even in the city. ESPECIALLY in the city.
Perhaps I am being too harsh. You see when I got introduced to Neo-Paganism, via Witchcraft, the group I learned from and with were all a bunch of urban people with similar sensibilities to mine...So I was quite surprised when I started running into Pagans who were all into the nature kick and were fundamentalist about it to the point of going around trying to make us urban Pagans feel less than real because of our urbanity. (Which is funny since we urban Pagans DO make up the large majority of Pagans.) And since when did Paganism become exclusively identified with ruralized or even wilderness-type fantasy expressions? I can answer that. Can you? (It's called historical and literary research if you need to know the name of the tool you would use to figure out the answer.)
Sometimes people are amazed when they find out that I too, like them, am Pagan, but unlike them I like all sorts of supposedly "un-Pagan" type things. One of them being my proclivity for grooving along to House music....which I picked up as a native of Chicago where that music was first developed. I have used this music as a dead-on way of training others in trance states and mandala generation. (For those of you not in the know: It sounds a lot like that clubby boom boom boom steady dance beat (which is a knock off), but has a lot of soul, melody, and artistry which you would not find at your average dance-pit.) Repetitive percussion-led music is one of the most potent tools of ritual and trance work that could be used. Especially for hours-long rituals. Some of my best ritual trances and ecstatic states came about through such music. Nothing captures the spirit of the living energetic city quite like this music...except possibly soul-touched jazz. (But jazz is more about the human drama in the city, whereas House can be said to be the actual expression of the city's breathing pulse.)
Another thing about me is that among myself you won't find a feather, crystal, or any of the other pseudo-tribal paraphernalia that is sadly still popular among many Pagans. I never much was interested in that crapperole. The only similarity between myself and some of those tribal-wannabes is my drumming...but, to be precise, it is African drumming that I practice and enjoy. Learning how to control emotional and physical energies through rhythms has been a very eye (and "I") opening set of experiences. Some of these tribal-wannabes should never even touch a drum, really. It's okay to just dance along. Not everyone has the gift of being able to be possessed while on the skin. And yes I do undergo that sort of scary possession that many Pagans shy away from. I am sorry but I do interact with my Gods this way. They are not just some psychological constructs to play with. I delve into them and let them delve into me. For me, without such ecstatic experiences, there is no point in calling oneself a Pagan, let alone a Witch. If that puts me in with all those 'dirty' fire-spinners that keep showing up at your gatherings and outdoing you in their ritual effectiveness, so be it.
Another thing is my altar. While it contains what could be identified as symbols of the four sacred things and such. It also contains a lot of urban found objects that I have taken an attraction to, or vice versa, if you're into that line of thinking. You won't find much of what many books tell you to include on one's altar. (I also have another altar for the Buddha and my quest for liberation, but we'll leave that can of worms for another day.) Speaking of altars and other magical items, I use whatever is available....and being in the city that means all sorts of things that you Pagan "naturalist" nay-sayers would cite as examples of my supposed error. Another thing, I care nothing for your aura of supposed ancient lineages going back to the Neolithic times. I don't view Paganism as a continuous set of ideals or spiritual practices stemming from those times. In my opinion, what we know of as the older Paganism (the pre-Christian era stuff) arose out of the cities. (Which is probably why a lot of you more nature-oriented Pagans love the whole Celtic side of Paganism, since Celts never had urban cultures until recently, so you can imagine them as your supposed spiritual ancestors, regardless of how THEY would feel about you.) It is very clear that Neo-Paganism (the post-Christian stuff) arose out of modern and post-modern urban life.
One advantage that being urban has given me is the ability to detect and see through all sorts of bullshit that people try to lay over on one another. I have seen some of the more ruralized fantasy types get ground up on the rocks of urban people's dramas. And all I can say is "Sorry, you should have known better." The intensity of the energy here in the city is such that many here do deaden themselves to the life and one of my little past-times is snapping them out of it. Everyone here in the city is trying to get by, looking for something, or simply, like me, surfing along the waves of energy. But my ability to thrive and be sensitive to the life around me here is precisely due to my active participation in Pagan practices. Any of you Pagans out there who wish to knock me, by saying that I can't be a Real Pagan(tm) because of my unrepentant urban ways, are just deluding yourselves. Who told you that Pagan practices were necessarily 'earth-based' or natural?
I know that the whole "urban-rural" debate has been going on for a long time in the broader Pagan community, so anyone out there with reactions to what I have written above, pro or con, are welcome.
-Irreverend Hugh, KSC
[May 3rd, 2005]
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