I've been unable to post for almost 2 weeks--mostly spending time getting kids back off to college and getting writing done. But I'm really glad to see this topic. Thanks Meredith and Dotsie for starting it.
My form of Wicca is very much like Pattyann's--in fact I've really enjoyed comparing notes with her a little. I consider myself a Dianic wiccan which means it is basically woman based. I have a group of women I meet with a few times a year for a weekend at a time and we have a lovely time. We're mostly boomer women, though we do have younger women who meet with us also. I have been through training through a woman's spirituality organization and am considering taking the final training to become ordained.
Pattyann described things very well--nature is our main focus.
I appreciate the opportunity to share here. If you believe in astrology at all, I suppose it's the libra in me--I like things to be balanced and get to hear from all sides of things.
Smile--I loved your saying that you believe your prayers to your God will be answered by their Gods (and might I just add, Goddesses). That's the way I've always felt about it, especially since I played music for many different faiths as a substitute for years. Part of my training was to do a comparative religions study and I spent time attending different services. It was fascinating to me.
The only hard time I've had was when I went to a program that a particular church put on near Halloween that they advertised as a "real" explanation of Halloween. I went out of curiosity and a naive belief that I could somehow share in the way I see this group doing. They turned out to be one very scary bunch who whipped themselves into a frenzy over a movie and talk about Wicca being devil worship and witches eating babies at Halloween. And they were serious. I was sad for days after that there was no way to get through to them that there were many different paths for people to take and that that is a good thing. Plus, I'm a vegetarian so I've had to forgo the baby eating. (Okay, bad joke I know.)
Pattyann mentioned that Wicca is a fast growing religion. I think people would be surprised at how many people around them are wiccan. Most of us don't stand out--we're just like everyone else with the same worries, families, joys and sense of caring.
Okay, enough now. I have to catch up on some of the other forums and start posting again.
Dahti

Dream of the Circle of Women
by Dahti Blanchard
published May 2004 by Spilled Candy Books
visit: www.dahtiblanchard.com

As a Baha'i, I only believe that there's one Supreme Being, whatever name you use (God, Goddess, Allah, Dio). I'm gathering from what Smile is saying that she perceives there to be many gods and goddesses ("Prayers to my God will be answered by their god.")and that others agree with this. So I'm wondering whether folks here perceive there to be multiple gods? lesser gods? competing gods (goddesses)?

I personally believe there is one God/Supreme Being...I call Him God, but I believe He/She loves us so much and wants so much to be a part of our lives that She/He goes by many different names and wears many different faces in order to reach us and be a part of our lives right where we're at.

How many forms of wicca are there?
And if it's not too personal, Do you call yourselves witches, or wiccans?

DJ,
I believe there is only one God. I believe people see their god or gods as different because they experience him/her in different ways.
smile

Dotsie, I was profoundly attached to visualizing God as male, and only male, for much of my early life. When I challenged and questioned a girlfriend why she insisted that her God had to be female, she told me that she would never be able to visualize God as anything but female, because of the horrible abuse she had suffered throughout her childhood from significant male figures in her life. I had known her for years, knew her family, worked with her and never even suspected her devastating background.

It humbled me, and I promised God that I would never again question how He chooses to reveal Himself to other people. It was an epiphany for me, that one conversation, of His incredible unconditional mercy and compassion for us...that this God knows how most lovingly to reach into the heart of His beloved and be for each person exactly what he/she need Him/Her to be.

It also made me investigate the possibility that my own attachment to God being male may well have to do with all the problems I had with my Mom while growing up. But in the end, the truth is that I just really love visualizing God as my Daddy, always have and probably always will. I look forward to the day when I finally get to run and jump into His waiting arms!

I have always pictured one God as a man, but I think it is only because that is what i was always taught. this forum is really opening up my eyes. Thanks Dotsie!

This is a great conversation. I recently graduated from a Christian college (yep, took me almost three decades to finish one measley degree) and oddly, came away with feeling less secure in the beliefs I had held all my life. While I subscribe to the "no design without a designer theory" (I mean, really, how can ALL this be happenstance?) I find that I now question so much that I never did before. Do I believe in God. Yep. Can I describe God? Nope. It's just one more area of my life where I find myself more confused than ever. The difference is that I'm old enough now to realize that questions need not be threatening. They can act as catalysts for appropriate change.
Ooooh, don't I sound all grown-up and philosophical today.

I think that's a good point, Fiftyandfine. How can we possibly describe God, or even conceive of a Being as vast as God Who has always existed and will always exist? and Who made us? and who transcends the time and space that circumscribe our puny 3-dimensional existence? It's like the analogy of the painting never being able to conceive of the painter.

I know that a lot of people picture God as a human being. Does this derive from the notion of God creating humans in the image of God? I've always understood this to mean the spiritual image (capacity to love, trust, nurture, be just, etc.) rather than the physical image of God, and thus have not been hung up on the notion of what God's sex is. If God has a sex, then God must have a counterpart of the opposite sex, which would make two Gods, right?