A little over a week ago, Meghan Crozier offered the following cheeky comment1 over on Twitter:
While Meghan’s tweet was cheeky, a lot of us in the deconstruction community tend to have complicated feelings about small groups as we experienced them within the evangelical church (and possibly in other related authoritarian religious settings). Such small groups can often be another mechanism of control over members of the church and religion. They can also force a sense of intimacy between members of the group that they are not ready for and may not feel safe with.
And yet, as always, I’m the kind of person who is not ready to just throw the baby out with the bathwater2 and when I typed up my own response to Meghan’s tweet I came to a realization: In witchcraft, covens are more or less small groups.3
Granted, there are a lot of witches and other Pagans that don’t like the thought of being in a coven. And I do have to wonder how many of them feel that way because they’re applying their baggage from past experiences in Christian churches to their perception of covens. But neither covens nor small groups have to be for everyone.
At its core, a coven is simply a small group of witches that get together to collectively work magic, explore whatever spiritual mysteries they might embrace, and serve any powers they might believe in. Also, coven members also meet together to learn and develop their witchcraft practice together. To my mind, this mirrors my experiences in church/Christian small groups.4
Personally, my experience with covens has been greatly positive, and think that kind of comradery comes with great benefits. I also think that there are a few key features of covens that typically prevent them from having the same problems as church/Christian small groups.5
The biggest difference is that the evangelical church (and similar churches) tends to be quite authoritarian in structure and outlook, and that tends to get replicated in their small groups as a matter of course. Such small groups have leaders that tend to be able to exert a certain amount of influence and power over the other members of the group. Then the group itself is typically under the authority of the pastor (and other members of leadership) of the church itself. In most churches, a pastor or the elders can pressure small group leader about how they run the group and even disband the group altogether.6
Covens tend to be far more autonomous. Indeed, most covens are an island unto themselves. Even in an initiatory tradition like Alexandrian Wicca, once a Witch7 is elevated to the third degree and establishes their own coven, that Witch is free to run that coven independently.8
Similarly, individual coven members are given the autonomy to stay or leave as they please. So even if a coven leader has ultimate authority on coven matters (and they often do), members who don’t like the direction being taken are free to “vote with their feet” and leave.9 Typically, since a coven with no members ceases to exist, this leads most coven leaders to at least listen to other members’ input and seek out ways to keep them around. (Though there is such a thing as a coven and an individual not being a good fit, and parting ways really is the best and only option.)
In my experience, the way that intimacy and vulnerability is encouraged and developed tends to be different between church small groups and covens. Many church small groups feel to me like they force the members to become vulnerable to and intimate with the rest of the group. The moment you join such a small group, it’s expected — and those expectations are often explicitly stated — that you will start sharing deeply personal details about yourself, experiences you’ve, and even “sins” you’re “struggling with.” This is a level of intimacy and vulnerability that could be weaponized against you (and many have experienced exactly that) and you’re expected to submit to it before there’s been any effort to build any assurance that it won’t be.
Covens also tend to require a similar level of intimacy and vulnerability,10 but much more time is typically spent building up the sense of trust and safety between members before then. To illustrate what I’m saying here, I want to talk about my own past a bit.
Back in the 2000s, I joined a Yahoo Group where initiates and seekers discussed British Traditional Wicca. I had learned about non-initiatory (“eclectic”) Wicca and had decided it wasn’t for me. At that time, I had also discounted initiatory Wicca, assuming it was basically the same thing. As I joined the list, I learned that the assumption was incorrect and found out that in many ways, the Wicca the initiates and elders of the group discussed seemed far more similar to the kind of witchcraft I practiced. So I became a fairly involved member of the group, posed questions, and even shared my own thoughts. As a result, I ended up making friends with a number of members in the group.
One of the people I made friends with was an Alexandrian High Priestess who was living in the province of Ontario in Canada. We began to exchange emails outside of the group and after about a year, she invited me to a public Pagan event in Ontario. I accepted and had a great time, not least of which because I got to finally meet a Witch I had come to admire and respect.
After that first in-person meeting, we continued to converse via emails and I think we even met in person in public a couple more times. Eventually, though, she invited me to come visit her and her husband at her home and even spend a weekend with them. I accepted and made the six hour trek on the appointed Friday. While there, I met her husband, and a couple of members of both her coven and her outer court. I even had the opportunity to attend one of her outer court rites, which was a deeply moving experience.
It was during this trip that we discussed the possibility of me training with and eventually becoming an initiate in her coven.11 Note that it took one to two years to even get to that first conversation. During that time, we had talked frequently, met a few times, and had already started building a relationship. And while the idea of joining an Alexandrian coven was still scary, I felt that if I was going to join one, this was the one I’d probably be able to trust.
And my would-be High Priestess was okay with my trepidation. She expected it. She did not chide me for it, but took it in stride. At one point during that weekend, the topic of ritual nudity came up once. Like most people, the thought of being naked around other people made me uncomfortable. She acknowledged that and simply said that it’s something we could work on in time if I wanted to pursue membership in her coven.12
I think this slow build-up without a sense of pressure to join, fit in, or become immediately intimate with a small group is vital to healthy small group dynamics.
I’d be interested to hear what thoughts my readers have on this topic. Do you think my comparison is a fair one? Do you think there are other ways that covens demonstrate ways to create and maintain a healthy small group? Do you think there are potential pitfalls that are unique to covens? If so, how would you recommend preventing them from arising or mitigating them? Let us know in the comments.
Footnotes
- I should note that while that Tweet was cheeky, the thread she was quoting from when making it was quite serious. In that thread, Meghan was talking about one manifestation of the all-too-human tendency for many of us who are deconstructing our white evangelical Christian backgrounds to recreate some of the problematic elements and patterns from those backgrounds in our new spaces and communities. This is a real problem and one that Meghan and Cortland Coffey discuss somewhat frequently, both on social media and in various episodes of the podcast they host together. ↩︎
- I daresay that when I left my evangelical faith, I threw out just about every shred of doctrine, but kept a few nuggets of subtle theology, a handful of values I still found useful, a few ideas about community I found helpful, and some spiritual techniques. Not much of it is particularly Christian anymore, but I like to acknowledge where i picked these things up from, as it’s a part of my history. ↩︎
- I suspect a similar argument could be made about at least some Heathen kindreds and Druid groves as well. Though both of those are at least theoretically allowed to grow to any size. However, covens are typically expected to be kept rather small. For example, in Wicca, the maximum size for a coven is traditionally set at thirteen members. It’s expected that a coven that grows larger than that will spit into two or more independent (yet related) covens. ↩︎
- A lot of my experience with small groups doesn’t come from church, but from my involvement with InterVarsity Christian Fellowship while I was earning my bachelor’s degree. ↩︎
- Note that all-important word “typically” in that statement. There are covens and Pagan groups and organizations that are imperfect and absolutely have the same problems as many evangelical (and similar) churches. This is why it’s important to take note if a particular organization, group, or coven doesn’t fit the broad brushstrokes I’m painting with here. If it doesn’t, then what I’m saying will not apply to that particular organization, group, or coven. Also, covens often have their own problems that are different from the problems many of us have with Christian small groups. Those are just beyond the scope of this blog post. ↩︎
- Technically, members of a small group would be able to continue meeting without the official blessing of the church. However, given the authoritarian nature of evangelical Christianity (and similar Christianities), I suspect most members would consider this rebellious. Authoritarian followers often feel the need for the approval of the person in authority. It’s one of the things most of us who leave such religious environments need to deconstruct most. ↩︎
- While I do not capitalize “witch” in general or when speaking about myself, I am making a conscious effort to do so in this instance. This is because it is a common (though not universal) practice in Wicca to treat “Witch” as a religious term for its members similar to how followers n Christianity are called “Christians” and therefore capitalize it accordingly. ↩︎
- There are a few caveats to this. For example, if a coven’s founder starts practicing a different tradition in their coven or changes the practices of the tradition to a degree, the leaders of the coven that taught them may determine that the new coven is no longer practicing the same tradition and not recognize it’s new members/initiates as members of the original tradition. But they cannot stop the leader of the new coven from doing so. Similarly, most new coven leaders tend to seek the advice and guidance of their initiators, appreciating their past experience and wisdom. But again, they are ultimately free to run their own coven as they see fit. At least this is what I’ve learned from the initiatory Wiccans I’ve spoken to. I’m sure if any of them see this and disagree, they’ll be sure to voice their dissent with my assessment. ↩︎
- Technically, this option is available to members of Christian small groups as well. However, given the authoritarian nature and claims of exclusivity (i.e. the idea that the very fate of your eternal soul depends on belonging to that particular religion and possibly even that particular church), the thought of just leaving becomes much scarier than it is for a witch, most of whom know they will not suffer for eternity if they’re not part of any coven, let alone a particular coven. ↩︎
- I’ll note that witches don’t seem to be as obsessed with “sin” or moral failings though. Our tendency in with regards to moral failings is to take an attitude of, “I messed up. I need to do what I can to clean up after myself and learn from it so I do better in the future.” So conversations within a coven or other group of witches about such things is going to be more focused on asking for advice or assistance in cleaning up with oneself rather than endless self-recrimination and confessions of guilt and shame. This seems to be a common theme of “bonding” among Christian small groups, however. ↩︎
- For a variety of reasons, that never manifested. A huge reason for it was that I simply wasn’t ready to take that kind of plunge at that time. By the time I might have been ready, both of our life circumstances had changed so it was no longer an option. I still think of her regularly and often feel a deep sadness that I’ve lost contact with her since then. I’ve made efforts to find her again, but to no avail. I hope you’re doing well, C, wherever you are. (I don’t want to mention her name, as I feel weird doing so, as if I’m name-dropping.) ↩︎
- I’ll also note that she had acknowledged me as a fellow witch worthy of respect long before this point. I simply was a different kind of witch. She was simply offering me an invitation to join her family and learn her tradition alongside my current witchcraft practices. I think that a lot of people mistakenly assume that British Traditional Wiccans don’t think the rest of us are “real witches,” but that hasn’t been my experience at all. ↩︎
My experience with evangelical “house groups” (what small groups were called in the mid 1980s in the UK) was that they were more exciting than church services. They were for the committed people. They were very intense. I went to two kinds of these: a Koinonia Group that was part of a United Reformed Church; and a house meeting of the Community Church. The structure was still sort of a hymn sandwich but with choruses instead of hymns.
I have also attended Unitarian engagement groups in England (these are called covenant groups among Unitarian Universalists in North America), and the way they’re organized is excellent. They are centred around a topic and meet to engage with that topic for a set period of time, e.g. ten weeks. They start by establishing agreements with the group so that everyone feels safe. I think if deconstruction groups were looking for a model to base their group discussions on, UU covenant groups would be an excellent way to go.
Covens are a lot more similar to UU covenant groups / Unitarian engagement groups than they are to evangelical Christian house groups or small groups. There is an expectation once you’ve joined a coven that you show up to as many meetings as possible (but I think that’s also true of covenant groups). The similarities lie in the ethos of the groups, the respect for members’ autonomy, and the desire to help people find their own truths.
I appreciate your insights on this Yvonne. I’m not familiar with UU covenant groups. However, I have a bit of experience with UU church more generally and can see how they might run excellent small groups as well.