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"The heart of the wise inclines to the right, but the heart of the fool to the left."
Ecclesiastes 10:2 (NIV)

apparently lacking any historical information about their own beliefs, have tried to ban all hallow's eve everywhere throughout the south.

They suck, too, and just as much as these witch-wannabes.

Catz

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I'll get nicer when you get smarter.

The "witches" in the traditions of my country are mythical devil worshipers, a corrupted mirroring of the Christian faith. The Wiccans are something different entirely and very few of us here see any connection between them since basically there is none. Our witches has existed in our myths long before anyone ever heard about any Wiccans. Still, some Wiccan here do call themself witches but they are a different type of witches entirely. Still of course there are some religious fanatics that do make the connection in order to make the Wiccans look bad. On the other hand, the Wiccan religion may be based on something the church tried to wipe out by planting those myths.

Incidentally, we do not traditionally dress up they way you Americans do during Halloween here. Halloween here is when we revere our departed loved ones and places candles on their graves to burn through the night. On the other hand our kids dress up and do the "trick or treat" thing during the easter instead. The mythical explanation is that the witches are traveling to meet the devil and we are supposed to use fireworks to scare them of. In practice it's the dressed up kids that use the fireworks for fun. Some of them use illegal home made variants so we have a number of accidents every year with blown up hands and such. And my decreased hearing ability seems to be partly due to some kid detonating a firecracker near me sometimes during my childhood. It is even entirely possible I was that kid, I don't know. Kids and firecrackers are a fun but bad mix.

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Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he doesn't become a monster.
Friedrich Nietzsche

Halloween, as celebrated in the U.S., is really a uniquely AMERICAN tradition without a lot of historic roots, except in this country.

Catz

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I'll get nicer when you get smarter.

Man you guys are funny. Everything is “it’s the liberals fault” Pull your heads out from your behinds. Banning Halloween is quite possibly the stupidest thing I have ever heard, however it does not automatically mean “it’s the liberals fault”. Grow up.

And secondly, Wicca is not a made up religion. It is not a bunch of middle aged “witch-wannabes”. Perhaps if you actually went outside to meet real people occasionally, none of you would make such idiotic statements.

The practioners of Wicca are no different than those who follow the Reconstructionist religions – i.e. the Astaru, etc etc.

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“Been living here in galus for a life too long" - Matisyahu

Grow up? The reasoning behind this is utter and complete PC crap. And who loves PC crap? Liberals.

Um, yes...it is...Gardner made it up in the twentieth century, and it bears slight-to-no resemblance to the older religions it claims to be related to.

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What have you done for your people today?

We go from talking about the ridiculous banning of halloween to abortion? Does this make sense to someone else? Can someone explain it to me?

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“Been living here in galus for a life too long" - Matisyahu

basis for Wicca, whereas there is a rich tradition of mythology that underlays Asatru.

Catz

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I'll get nicer when you get smarter.

Bwa-huh?

"Real people" that claim Wicca is thousands of years old and the like? "Never again the Burning Times?" Wiccans that think they're Atlantean princesses?

Between the two of us, I think you're the one that needs to get out more...no offense (this time)...

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What have you done for your people today?

Wicca today is based on nature worshipping, g-ddess religions which are well documented. It is a bit of a conglomerated one, that's true. But it is based on myths and practices that came before it. And they have always existed albeit largely underground.

I dig reconstructionist religions. Very archalogical.

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“Been living here in galus for a life too long" - Matisyahu