One of the most fascinating issues distinguishing Pagan spirituality from most forms of monotheism is that we see the world and its basic dimensions from birth to death as sacred expressions of the more than human, with which we seek to live in greater harmony.  This puts Pagan spirituality deeply at odds with mainstream secular thinking as well for it takes the monotheistic position that the world is made up of objects of no intrinsic value, adding only that these objects are governed by scientific laws that again are of no intrinsic value.

Consequently Pagan sensibilities have appealed to people who dislike secular modernity and the liberalism that brought it about as well as to more liberal folks who were sensitive to modernity’s blind spots.  Interestingly, many of the former were Europeans whereas many of the latter lived within the United States.   This explains, I think, why Pagan kinds of movements in early Twentieth Century Europe tended to be right wing whereas in the US they were first popularly associated with the ferment of the 1960s (though they pre-existed this time in very small numbers). Many or all of our most important early defenders of nature as valuable on its own terms, and even as sacred, were allied with progressive and democratic forces from Henry Thoreau’s abolitionism and anti-war activities to John Muir’s connections with American Progressives. In Europe nature’s defenders tended to ally with nationalists and those who had become fierce critics of modern liberal society.

These differences have not entirely disappeared to the present day.

In my Patheos post of this week I explore this issue in some depth (at least depth for a blog).