The Silver Serpent Coven is the Mother Coven of the Serpent Tradition, and is led by its High Priestess Becca. The Serpent Tradition consists of two other Covens at this time: Circle of the Stone Serpent & The Shadow Serpent Coven. The Serpent Tradition’s Members are all very dedicated to preservation & conservation issues of both Mother Earth and her children, and proud members of such organizations as Covenant of the Goddess, The Witches Voice and The Pagan Federation.
http://www.serpenttradition.com
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1) Could you tell us when and how your practice of witchcraft began?
I first became interested in Witchcraft when my mother gave me my first set of Tarot cards. She had no idea what she was really giving me – she thought it was just a game. I began exploring then not a lot … a little here, a little there. We left Illinois shortly after that and moved to Oklahoma. My life got in the way after that. AS interested as I was in witchcraft being 16 overpowered everything in my life. At 18 I married a military man and even though I was still interest in witchcraft I didn’t delve much further … at that time the craft wasn’t accepted in the Military and I was a military wife. As soon the as it became obvious (13 1⁄2 years later) that the divorce was imminent I began looking back into witchcraft. My hiatus was over.
It started slowly – I attended billet readings and had my cards read, I even went to psychic fairs. Finally a door opened. I was invited to take a class on Tarot. From there – as they say – the rest is history. I couldn’t get enough … I read everything I could, went to festivals, and began attending rituals at a local metaphysical center.
I really count the time of my learning and training as beginning in 1991. I was a huge sponge. I talked to everyone I could and read everything I could get my hands on. Everything I heard, read, saw all struck a note of familiarity with me. I “knew” what they were talking about; I “knew” what ritual was like even though I had never attended one. I wasn’t freaked out … I felt like I had finally come home.
2) How can witchcraft aid us in our everyday life?
How can a Witch not include the craft in her everyday life? It should be a part of their basic makeup. It affects everything we touch and it shapes our daily routines. Let’s say you are at work and you go into a meeting and the whole room is in Chaos – you reach down and touch your center core of calmness and begin radiating the calmness outward to the whole room blanketing the others in the room with some calm. Even if you’re not the chairperson of the meeting you can affect the energy in the room.
You’re cooking dinner … adding herbs to your dish. You not only add the herbs for taste but as you stir the herbs into the food you release their principals into your meal to be absorbed by your family and friends who will partake of the it. Those energy principals then go to work helping your family and friends as they go about their daily lives. You can help them with their general health, prosperity, relationships with out interfering in their free will – the energy is there for them to do with as they want – even if they don’t know you gave it to them.
If you are a witch it should be something that is part of your everyday life and not just reserved for gatherings, sabats and esbats. You see the beauty and the harshness of the Mother daily and you understand there has to be balance. It is hard to see the harsh part of life but as a witch we accept that without the harsh their can be no good and visa versa
3) What stereotypes and mistruths may the average person have about witches?
Where should I start? We’re evil, we’re in league with the devil, we kill black cats and babies, we’re horrible misshapen green faced hags with scraggly hair and warts. The average person probably never really things about who or what we are they just accept anything they might have been told over the years. I don’t hide who I am but most people have now idea I am a witch and once they do find out they are literally taken aback because they can’t believe that I am one of those “horrible” witches they have always heard about.
4) Is there an attempt by Christian Fundamentalists to dissuade the public form getting involved in witchcraft?
There are still unfortunately a great number of religious groups & individuals out there, Christian & otherwise, that has agendas of their own & will do whatever it takes to persuade people to come around to their way of thinking. There have been allegations surfacing for quite a number of years from several different Christian Fundamentalist sources about Paganism & Witchcraft being the cause for everything from the destruction of “the moral code” of the country, the decomposition of “decent family values”, child abuse, and even contributing to the cause of terrorist activity. I find it sad & pitiful that because people are so desperate to find a cause for many tragic & horrible events occurring all over the world, they base all their suspicions on fear, ignorance of the facts & intolerance. Those kinds of actions lead to nothing but senseless destruction & pain of innocent people. The need for religious tolerance is all around us & we need to continue to do all we can to try & put the false accusations & negative connotations of all our faiths to rest.
5) Could you tell us what the Malleus Malleficarum is and perhaps tell us a little about the work of Gerald Gardner?
The Malleus Maleficarum (Latin for “The Hammer of Witches”, was a horrific book written in 1486 by Heinrich Kramer and Jacob Sprenger. This book was a tool used by the Dominican Order and Inquisitors for the Catholic Church in that day and age to judge, torture & execute people accused of being Witches. There is entirely too much information about this book to go into in an interview, but I would suggest anyone who isn’t familiar with the in depth history of this book to do some research on this subject. If you are a practicing Witch it will certainly give you an appreciation for the generation in which we live today. On the subject of Gerald Gardner, he is widely recognized for his influence for the revival of modern Witchcraft and the birth of the Wiccan faith. There are people out there much more qualified that I am to go into details of Gardner’s works as I am not an expert on the matter personally. He is certainly a figurehead in the world of Witchcraft that is worthy of research and study.
6) Could you tell us the difference between “Black” and “white”witchcraft, or black and white magic?
There is no “black” or “white” magic. All magic is performed by manipulating energy. Energy is all around us; energy is a part of everything in our lives. Energy knows no color and has no intent – it is the soul of the witch that determines if the magic is positive or negative.
