Why The Current Pagan Revival is Doomed to Fail.
And Why Pagans will inevitably Prevail.
By I. M. Knosp
Paganism is weaker than it’s been in millennia, its’ traditions twisted, its devotees few in number, its roots struggling. Sure the census may have you believe otherwise. That Pagans are undergoing a revival, daresay, a revolution in the realm of religion. But this is alas not true, paganism has never been harder to accomplish and its followers never more marginalized. There are many reasons for this and admittedly there is no shortage of interest in Paganism if media and merchandise would have you believe. When was the last time Mjolnir amulets were so commonly worn? When was the last time that the Old Gods were so widely venerated? How could I dare say that this Great Pagan Revival is doomed to fail? Simple, because none of that is Pagan.
Sure, it has the appearance of paganism. Knotwork, both Gaelic and Nordic is everywhere these days, on car decals and keychains, on video game power ups and superhero films, on t-shirts and tattoos! But if one were to go forth and ask one who held or enjoyed these things if they were pagan most would answer resoundingly no, perhaps even take offense. The few who would answer in the affirmative would likely have found their Paganism from the same place the others found their fashion sense. From mass media and common understanding. It is not Paganism, the Mjolnir is nothing more these days than the Ankh of the era, an article of faith relegated to no more than a bit of jewelry.
But to those truly looking for more than a new aesthetic what is there for most of them to find? Most of the largest groups of pagans would more accurately be described as various new agers, and what is new age but a saccharine rebranding of the Occult for a larger audience. Most pagans fall into one of a few categories. Perhaps they are of the Wiccan persuasion, a belief system itself as blatantly universalist and anti-pagan as they come when examined beyond the aesthetic sense. Many may venerate a Great Goddess and her masculine aspect of the Horned God, but at its core it is simply a new religion aping the older pagan traditions. More so even then the Catholics and Christians are guilty of. Their pseudo-pantheon of personally chosen aspects includes such variety that one stands aghast at how flagrantly they mix and match their personal collection of the divine.
Should those truly looking to paganism successfully avoid being absorbed into or repulsed by the wiccans what they likely find is the many New Age Religions that pantomime the other Kith and Kin elements of Paganism and Heathenry. Some even absconding with the latter entirely as is the case with the modern religion of Asatru. Which venerates the Eddic Gods with the same vigor that most lapsed Catholics show up to Easter Mass. Many of the Gods are rendered to the status of subservient deities to their Christlike replacement of Odin, a God of Thieves made king of Heaven, or Asgard, it can be so hard to tell the difference by the time they’ve had their way with it. Whether the flavor present is more akin to that of the Hipster or the Neo-Nazi one thing is for sure, it is nothing like what once was nor could it be a natural continuation of it. Asatru, Rodnovery, Romuva and other new age religions if they can somehow avoid blending in the Dharmic Faiths, Siberian Shamanism or Alien Craze are at best modern religions even younger than Wicca and in most cases no less universalist. Ask the many Black or Spanish Asatruars if you have your doubts.
If they somehow have avoided or made their way through the latter what is left is a mixture of Neo-Nazis, White Hindus and Hippies. This… This is what the vast bulk of this Pagan Revival looks like, but this is not its’ cardinal sin, its’ greatest mistake is in fact that all Pagan Revivals have forgotten at their core what Paganism is. It is not merely a collection of older religious customs and Pre-Christian deities, nor is it politics. It is… far more meaningful than that.
Once all it took to be Pagan, was to stop going to church. This was all the Church decreed was necessary to render one down to their heathen nature. When the young children ran past barefoot on the rocks they were called Little Pagans, when those who were too young to be baptized or truly understand the Faith they were meant to be raised in died, they were said to go the Heathen Gods, being excommunicated rendered you a “Werewolf”. Any customs, lore, legends, spirits or deities were still there in the rivers and the woods, in the stories by the fire and in the tavern hall. The only reason modern pursuers of Paganism find themselves drowning in essays, books and decorative trinkets is because they themselves deracinated, cut off from their roots, so to speak. These average folks living day to day are the true Pagans and they are truly great in number. Though never so few as we see these days. Even the country folk, who were once those called Heathen, are stripped of their ways. Over a thousand years of Christendom did not do so much damage to Paganism as Television and property tax has.
Few of these pagans knew who Odin or Apollo was, even fewer venerated either. They were pagan just the same. Even now these ancient customs persist here and there, though many that have become popularized have lost their deep rootedness and become a commodity. For at the very essence of Paganism is Kin, at the very essence of Heathenry is a Homeland. Most traditions and customs practiced by the Catholic Church and by extension the less drab and dreary of its offspring are of Pagan origin. I could point to many, but they alone are not the point, the very customs or divinities continuance is not the point. It is that people held to their family and their homes firmly, so firmly that in the absence of standing in a single building the Heathen, the Pagan, would return as easily as removing a hat. Because at our core we are who we are.
The Neo-Pagan and Political movements fail, because they are often less pagan than many casual Christians. Neo-Pagan itself is a contradiction for it means New-Ethnic. How can anyone who wishes to return to their own traditions find such a way in something selling itself as a New-Ethnicity, an inherent denial of the very thing they are searching for. No. These are modern religions even less traditional than the Christian Faith they attempt to supplant.
But they are merely speed running the inevitable fate of Christianity itself. For when they attack the average Christian and Folk-Christianity they face the same immovable mountain that the Church once did, that of the sum-total of Kith and Kin that has occurred under the weight of what they wish to replace. Finding it too strong and unwieldy to fashion in their image they are instead content to paint a veneer. For no one will abandon their ancestors, their traditions for a New Faith, merely adding it in as a novelty.
Paganism will prevail for this same reason, without the Church, without regular mass it is only a matter of time before it falls away. Most who claim to believe it revel in more Paganism than many pagans, they tend to and celebrate a Prophetic Groundhog, they place a tree and adorn it in finery, they go to the grave of a loved one and speak to their ghosts, and it feels… right. Day by day, year by year, the Church loses its hold, universalism loses its grip. Because in the end just as few avowed Pagans are truly pagans, so too are most Christians rather poor examples of Christianity. The core of Faith, of living a full life, is the same as it has always been. Kith and Kin, and so it shall be til we vanish from all the realms.
