Paganicon 2025 – Re-enchantment and Neopaganism [Excerpts]

Some have asked why we attend events like Paganicon. After all, we are Christians, not pagans. Some of the leadership at Paganicon asked us the same question; why were we attending their event? They were concerned we might stir up trouble. We have covered this in previous articles like “Walking in Their World,” “Mission to Paganistan,” and others. The answer is fairly simple. We want to know what it is that Pagans truly believe? As we point out in both of the linked articles, the best way to find out what someone believes is to go where they are and ask them directly. We also were interested to know if they came out of some sort of Christian tradition, and if so, what caused them to leave and how did they come to embrace one of the various pagan groups. We were not there to accost anyone. Their workshops are another good way to understand pagans and their beliefs and practices. The Western world and even churches are very quickly adopting pagan ideas, and it behooves us to understand why.

Paganicon offers a variety of workshops, such as “Money Drawing Magic.” It turns out that their teaching on that subject is not all that different than the Word Faith/New Apostolic Reformation’s teaching concerning acquiring wealth. Another workshop, entitled “Coming Out as a Pagan,” covers the question of whether a pagan should or should not let their family and friends know of their new faith commitment, how that might be done, and how those they care about may react.

As it turns out, many of those that are now embracing a variety of neopagan beliefs and practices grew up in or had at some point been part of a church. There is, as John Daniel Davidson’s puts it in his article, America Becoming Less Christian Is A Problem For Everyone, an ongoing “de-Christianization of American society.” He comments on a recent headline from an article by Pew Research Center, “Decline of Christianity in the U.S. Has Slowed, May Have Leveled Off.”: “It’s easy to misread the study, or misapprehend what’s important about it, which is that the de-Christianization of American society is not going to stop anytime soon, in part because it’s being driven by a younger, less Christian, increasingly neopagan cohort of Americas as older Christians die off without being replaced and aging Christian parents fail to pass the faith onto their children. Pew itself seems to misapprehend its own survey, giving it the rather optimistic headline, “Decline of Christianity in the U.S. Has Slowed, May Have Leveled Off.”

Quite a few pagans that we have had the opportunity to speak with at events like Paganicon or the Parliament of the World’s Religions or Burning Man feel betrayed, angry, or, as one of the organizers of Paganicon put it during a conversation with us, have experienced “spiritual trauma” for a variety of reasons. One I spoke with was raised in the Missouri Synod Lutheran Church, but was caught up in the Quiver Full movement. As we spoke, it became clear that she was also very familiar with Bill Gothard, who is closely tied to the Quiver full movement. The faith and the God she rejected based on her experiences was most definitely not the God of Scripture, but she was not interested in discussing it more fully.

Others may not have really known much about the faith they were rejecting. One woman I spoke with grew up Roman Catholic but said she never really understood it. Catholicism was her family tradition, but she believed there had to be something more; in her search, she eventually embraced Wicca. She hasn’t told her family yet. She also said she really likes Jesus. I asked her if she realized Jesus and the apostles were calling the nation of Israel to repentance while He walked the earth. I went on to say that Jesus offered redemption from sin and is the one who died to pay the debt for our collective sin and raised Himself from the dead to defeat death itself. She was interested and said she did not recall hearing these things before. We spoke for a while and I able to share the gospel. I am not sure what she will do with it, but perhaps God will water that seed.

https://midwestoutreach.org/2025/04/03/paganicon-2025-re-enchantment-and-neopaganism/