A good witch?

Today, I was asked by a gentleman to have lunch. At the restaurant, his favorite apparently, I was introduced to a so-called witch. A lady who is in the practice of Wicca. For those who may not be aware, Wicca is the practice of pagan worship of nature. It is also, more commonly, referred to as witchcraft.

There are numerous things we should be aware of when it comes to witchcraft, if only to help others steer clear of this ancient deception of false gods and godessess. For more information I found this article: http://www.catholicculture.org/library/view.cfm?recnum=1289 which I think does a pretty good job of dispelling some of the basics of this pagan religion.

However, I found her arguments very interesting. The gentleman who introduced me to the waitress told her I was an "expert in Catholicism." To which she immediately began to attack the notion of Catholicism because of the death of so-called witches during the Middle Ages. What I find interesting about this position is two things:

1) Arguements based on the acts of adherants to a religion do not make a religion false. Certainly, there are many witches, Protestants, Muslims, & Catholics, et al. who do horrible or just bad things in the name of their religion. However, this in no way makes the religion somehow false. This is precisely what Jesus meant when he said, "Judge not lest you be judged," I think. We do not know people or their reasons for why they do things. The deeper and more fundamental question is what does a religion propose and is that teaching itself correct or erroneous. This brings about a whole slew of further questions, which I won't go into here.

Suffice it to say, Jesus teaches us, "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life." For this reason, a teaching which no other religion proclaims with its accompanying proofs, we Christians firmly can hold that the Christian Faith itself is certainly true. Jesus Christ has risen from the dead and established a Church for all, a universal Church (or in Greek a "Catholic" Church).

2) This lady's argument about the Catholic Faith was all based on emotion. She continued to return to the idea that Catholics had killed women in the name of religion. And she tried to also bring in St. Joan of Arc as an example of how bad the Catholic Church is. It was very interesting, because I noticed if I were her I would have at least begun to explain how Wicca was the superior religion, not in arrogance, but because I would want my listener to understand how good it is so that he or she might join too. We call this in Christianity an "apology." Not an "apology" as we understand it in English, which declares our sorrow for an action done, rather an apology in the Greek sense of an "apologia", that is a reason for why I believe what I do. This kind of apology aims at explaining that what I believe is sensible and intelligible.

At this restaurant, though it was painful not to, it would have been inappropriate to engage in a discussion of this because I was there with the gentleman who had invited me, and we were already engaged in a discussion, when this lady was introduced. For me this was an example of prudence, I had to choose which battle "to fight." It was clear this woman had a lot of issues with the Catholic Faith and no 2-minute conversation would clear anything up. Please pray for her, as I will.

Nevertheless, it was interesting that one other argument she tried to put forward was that 7 of the witches in her group, which I presume she was referring to her "coven", are former Catholics. As I said to her, it is not at all surprising since if we misunderstand the Catholic Faith then it is very easy to reject it outright. If we have half-truths about what it means to be Catholics, it is very easy to think one is wisely rejecting the "silly" Catholic Faith. But if one has the opportunity to fully consider what it means to be a Catholic then it can change our lives.

It is incumbent on each of us, as Catholics, to learn our faith well. The world is dying for the answers that Jesus provides in the Catholic Faith. For no other faith is so clear and so challenging as to ask us to "take up our cross, and follow [Jesus] daily." Yes, the Catholic Faith is challenging because we have to "die", so to speak, to our selfish way of thinking, and learn to live the all-encompassing love that God himself asks of us. BUT, we are not left to our own devices to do this! This is the whole purpose of the Eucharist - really of Jesus! God comes to us to teach us and give us the grace to overcome ourselves and to live a life filled with His love for humanity. But this means that we must first accept that gift! Many people have various reasons for why they reject the Catholic Church. If Catholics and Christians are to live the Christian Faith fully, then we must learn to live for Christ; we must be able to say, with St. Paul, "It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me (Col 1:13)."

By the way, the picture at top is a picture of St. Boniface taking a hatchet to a tree which the people believed was where their God, Thor, lived. St. Boniface famously said, "Where is your god now?" as he chopped the tree down! The story behind it is here!