The wiccan and the witchcraft are popping up in pop culture these days, from teenage witches in tiktok, where 10 of the most popular witch accounts have more than three million followers, half of which were added last year. On TikTok, videos with the hashtag #witchtok have amassed over 15 billion views.
If you’ve browsed TikTok, you’ve probably seen some form of witchcraft or fortune telling on your screen. #WitchTok dates back to 2019, but has since taken over the app.
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Popular mystical practices include astrology, tarot card reading, numerology (any relationship between a number and coincidental life events), and manifestation methods. Nevertheless, WitchTok shows spells specifically for beginning and experienced witches. This community comes together and helps spread knowledge and advice to each other.
This community of witches supports each other in times of need. hashtags like #witchesforblm Y #witchesforbiden they draw attention to political and social movements and discuss emergency information and possible spells to help with the results of the event.
Wiccaan alternative minority religion whose followers, regardless of gender, call themselves witches, began in the United Kingdom in the decade of 1940. The wiccan and the Witchcraft are part of broader contemporary pagan movementwhich includes druids Y pagans, among others. All these spiritual paths, as the pagans call them, base their practices on religions and cultures pre-Christian.
Since Wicca came to the USA in the decade of 1960, has been growing, sometimes by leaps and bounds and others more slowly. It is estimated that there could be around 1.5 million witches in the US
However, as I know from my own research of over 30 years, not all witches are considered wiccans. According to data from my most recent survey, approximately 800,000 Americans are Wiccans. The rising numbers seen in polls and the growth of groups, such as those on TikTok, suggest that religion continues to grow.
Most controversial to outsiders is that Wiccans call themselves witches, a term most Westerners identify with Satanism.
What is Wicca?
Wicca is a complex religion that is often associated with witchcraft, the occult, and neopaganism. The way these words overlap can be confusing, so let’s dive into the dictionary.
wiccan: From the Anglo-Saxon word wicce. It means bending or molding nature at your service.
Witchcraft: The practice of magic or sorcery by anyone outside the mainstream religious stream of a society. This term is used in different ways at different times and places.
Occultism: Belief in practices such as astrology, alchemy, divination, and magic that are based on the «hidden knowledge» about the universe and its mysterious forces. Occultists try to harness this unseen knowledge to produce whatever effects they desire.
neopaganism: the recent revival of ancient European and Middle Eastern polytheistic religions. The neopaganism it is a loosely defined system of worshiping nature and nature gods.
Since different people use them to mean different things, it can be hard to keep them straight. What is important to note are the common themes of worshiping nature and using spiritual forces to get results. Most people who call themselves Wiccan, goddess worshipers, or witches practice these things. Another important thing to remember is that Wicca not the same as satanism. In fact, most witches don’t believe in Satan at all.
Additionally, Wiccans abide by a core rule called The Networkwhat does it say: «Don’t hurt anyone, do what you want». In other words, witches are free to do what they see fit as long as they avoid harming others. A closely related rule is the Triple Law, which says that «whatever you do will come back to you three times over.»
Other Wiccan beliefs
Wiccans worship «the mother goddess» and her companion «the horned god.» They say that both deities manifest themselves in nature. For example, Rebecca’s sentence recognized the sun as the female goddess and the moon as the god. You may have also heard of the goddess as Mother Nature. Wiccans believe that the goddess is in everything: in the rocks and trees, the earth and the sky.
Sometimes the goddess is represented by specific female deities, such as the ancient Greek goddesses Artemis (the goddess of the desert) or Gaia (the Earth goddess), which was celebrated in the film Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within . Some Wiccans even claim that the goddess is Mariathe mother of Jesus. The horned god is often represented by the lustful Greek god Bread or the Egyptian god of the dead, Osiris.
Most Wiccans celebrate eight holidays or «sabbats» centered around the solar cycles and «esbats» centered around the lunar cycles. These celebrations are supposedly times of increased interaction between the natural and supernatural worlds.
Magic and spell casting are an integral part of Wicca. Wiccans say that spells are symbolic acts performed in an altered state of consciousness to bring about a desired change. There are spells to overcome loneliness, attract money, bring inner power, and bind an enemy, among others. Witches recognize that spells can be used for good or harm.
Wicca does not have a central book (such as the Bible) that explains its beliefs, so witches practice their religion in different ways. Some witches meet in groups called covens or circles, while others practice alone.
Spellbound Teenagers
Why are movies, TV, and magazines so obsessed with Wicca and witchcraft? And why are teens, especially girls, so excited to follow the trend? Here are some factors that may help explain this phenomenon:
Appealing to feminine power
According to their own myths, wiccan started more than 35,000 years into the first civilization on earth. In this culture, women ruled. Life was peaceful and prosperous, and the people worshiped nature and the goddess. The serene existence was supposedly shattered when the Male warriors invaded communities led by women.
Wiccans say that throughout history, they have been struggling to overcome the oppression of a society ruled by men.
Today, Wiccans claim that there is a revival of the goddess. They say that women are regaining their power after living under male domination for too long. They call for the women to usher in a new era of peace by throwing off the «shackles» of «male-dominated monotheistic religions» like Christianity and following the goddess again in all her guises. It is easy to see why this myth has broad feminist appeal.
Wiccans continually deny any connection to Satan or devil worship. Wiccans have also attempted to establish links with other polytheistic (Hindu) and nature-oriented (Native American) religious communities.
Is Wicca a religion?
The religion differs from more conventional religions such as Christianity by celebrating both a goddess and a god. Additionally, Wicca lacks a formal institutional structure, such as a church, and places more emphasis on ritual and direct spiritual experience than on belief. Adherents refer to themselves as practitioners, not believers.
An annual cycle of rituals, known as sabbaths, celebrates the beginning and the height of each of the four seasons of the northern hemisphere. Each ritual encourages participants to celebrate the changes that the seasons bring to nature and to reflect on how those changes are reflected in their own lives.
For example in Beltane which takes place on May 1At the height of spring, Wiccans celebrate fertility both on Earth and in people’s lives. The rituals are built not only to celebrate the season, but to put the participant in direct contact with the divine.
Wiccans have one overriding rule, «Don’t hurt anyone and do what you want«, and no single religious text from which they draw their beliefs. Most Wiccans practice alone and are free to develop their own unique practice. They are, however, in regular contact, networking on the Internet and congregating in large gatherings to perform rituals. , learn about magical and spiritual practices from each other and enter what they see as a magical space where they can more easily find and embrace divinity.
Wicca today
Although many Wiccans claim to draw inspiration from ancient cultures, such as pre-Christian Anglo-Saxon and Celtic traditions, it can be viewed very much as a religion of our time. The Goddess provides a feminine face for the divine, which appeals to feminists and those seeking the «feminine power«. The wiccans they see divinity in nature, which resonates with growing environmental concerns, particularly among the young.
Most Wiccans practice magic, which they believe taps into a spirit world often referred to as the «another world».
In the 1980s, it was estimated that there 50,000 Wiccans in Western Europe Y North America . Although the rate of growth slowed at the end of the decade, Wicca gained increasing social acceptance and diversified to include numerous variations on the original Wicca teachings and rituals. Gardner.
In addition, new Wiccan groups emerged independent of the Gardnerians, including one led by Alexander Sanders (1926–1988), the Dianic Wiccans who viewed Wicca as a women’s religion and the parallel Neopagan movement, which also worshiped the goddess and practiced witchcraft but avoided the designation of witch.
A major controversy developed in the United States in the 1960s and 1970s, when a faction of Wiccans broke with Gardner’s notion that clothing inhibited magical workings, and decided not to follow his practice of worshiping in the nude. Instead, ritual robes were donned, sources claiming pre-Gardnerian for their beliefs, and called themselves traditionalists.
As Wicca and Neopaganism moved into their second generation, belief faded into the notion that Gardner had inherited a set of witchcraft rituals and practices that had been passed down through a tradition with unbroken links to pre-Christian paganism. . Although many Wiccans once cited the work of Margaret Murray included The Witch-Cult in Western Europe…