In such a large and diverse city, it is no surprise that the Craft is fairly accessible, if you know where to look. Nearly 80 covens and pagan organizations operate in the New York Metropolitan area, according to the pagan networking site The Witches’ Voice. Exact numbers of witches in the city are hard to come by, as there are many solitary practitioners, but coven and community leaders estimate that as many as 10,000 witches live and practice in New York. Nationally, about 734,000 Americans identify as pagan or Wiccan, according to a 2014 Pew Research Center survey.
Nancy Guzman, a board member of New York City Pagan Pride, which stages an annual Pagan Pride Day festival (this year’s is scheduled for September in Battery Park) described the city’s witches as a diverse and accepting tribe. “Any kind of modern practice you can think of is here,” Ms. Guzman said. “If you’re here and drawn to that path, it’s much easier to find your people.”
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Regardless, many witches, fearing judgment from family and friends, keep their practice a secret. The workplace can also be difficult to navigate, with some practitioners concealing pentacle jewelry and pagan-inspired tattoos that may raise questions from colleagues.
Ms. Cruci does not believe witchcraft will be widely accepted any time soon, though she notes it is much easier to tell people she is Wiccan now than when she first discovered it.
Actually, if we go by Gunter Bechly’s experience, it might be easier to admit to witchcraft than it would be to admit to thinking that the universe shows evidence of design.
Mostly, she just doesn’t want to see the tradition die, and her and others in the Temple of the Spiral Path hope to see their covens maintain healthy growth.
SanamYar, “Witchcraft in the #MeToo Era” at The New York Times
You can do better than that, girl. With enough inclusivity, it will soon be part of the science program at your local schools.
See also: How does the controversy over Darwinism play out in the wider culture? Public understanding of science has been paying the price for the elite’s self-indulgence in looking down on their “Neanderthal” inferiors ever since the Scopes Trial, claiming a science basis. For example, arch-Darwinist Richard Dawkins (of “selfish gene”) fame, was a professor of the Public Understanding of Science, when his notion of a “selfish gene” is essentially mystical and not historical.
Gunter Bechly: Decline of science? Imaged in a single paragraph
and
Skeptic asks, why do people who abandon religion embrace superstition? Belief in God is declining and belief in ghosts and witches is rising