JaeIsGod

I have seen the term come up some times in the discussions here , but to be honest I have no clue as to what it means when someone is pagan.

Anyone wanne fill me in?

Biff the unclean

Pagan is Latin for a hick, a rube, country bumpkin, hill billy.

brighid

Jae,

It is very difficult to adequately define Pagan. Think of paganism as sort of an umbrella for numerous "denominations" of religious thinking.

I can give you some generalizations. Pagans tend to be ones who believe in the "old Gods", such as the Greek, Roman, Celtic and/or Nordic pantheon. Pagans tend to revere and/or worship nature. They celebrate the Solstices', the Equinox's, the full moon, and basically they cycles of life and nature.

There is no defined Pagan dogma, no real Church (although there are some Churches, but no real central authority) and paganism can be an individual mish-mosh of whatever beliefs one wishes to hold (but this is really neo-paganism.)

Paganism is really what the local, country/rural folk practiced as their religion and it was Earth/Season based. It was, and continues to be a rather derogatory term in Christian circles.

http://www.witchvox.com is a good source for information about paganism, modern witchcraft (which is a form of neo-paganism) and the religion of Wicca and its different sects (Gardenian, etc.)

Brighid