Respecting nature is not a Pagan expression

I have found that many individuals from Abrahamic faiths have a difficult time adjusting to nature-based spirituality within their own faith. To be clear, I do not mean Christians/Jews/Muslims leaving Christianity/Judaism/Islam. I mean individuals of those faiths that wish to be more nature focused, connecting with the creation of their creation, often have a hard time starting out. I intend to address why and tips to navigate those waters.

As someone who grew up very religious within the Abrahamic traditions, I can understand the hesitancy. I felt it myself. In many of the Abrahamic traditions there are laws against doing things which may even vaguely look like they’re following another religion. Not making kiddish while mars is visible or making a massive distinction between a Christmas tree and a Yule tree are some examples. Adding natural elements into one’s spiritual practice will often look like someone is mimicking paganism. Paganism is a trigger word for many followers of Abrahamic faiths and is often avoided at nearly any cost.

First, what IS paganism? Paganism is an umbrella term for faiths that are not Abrahamic and typically, but not always, are not a “world religion.” That is currently debated in pagan circles but typically Hindus or native tribes in North America do not prefer to be called Pagan. Some pagans will label all religions that are not Christianity, Islam or Judaism as Pagan, including major world religions outside of those three. Paganism can include Satanist, which oddly enough, do not worship or even believe in the Islamo-Christian concept of Satan. I could go pages into the different types of Pagan and what they generally believe but that is outside the scope of this post.

Nearly all pagan traditions have a strong reverence for nature. Many aspects of connecting to nature will overlap into common pagan practices and because of that, some followers of Abrahamic traditions hesitate. “Pagans are bad, they don’t worship (my) god, I cannot look like them” or as I call it, the “Hitler drank water” fallacy. Nearly every human alive today can agree that Hitler was not a good person, we don’t want to look like him in our actions. Hitler drank water…. But we also should drink water. Just because someone that we do not like does an action, does not mean the action should be avoided. In short, the discomfort felt as followers of Abrahamic traditions begin to spiritually connect with creation is caused bumping elbows with people they were often taught to fear. Pagans are often considered barbaric, performing human sacrifice, practicing cannibalism, sexual deviants and over all a spiritual and physical threat. The key to overcoming the discomfort is education and communication. Listening to, asking questions and learning from actual practicing pagans and then deciding if you still feel that they are a threat.

I have never met a single person who has done this and continued to feel threatened by the existence of a pagan.

What you will find when you open up and converse with a pagan, or pagans, will typically be a very tolerant individual that has no problem with your personal faith practice. They may even ask questions to learn about your faith. You’ll find a strong reverence for animals, plants and the ecosystem and depending on the tradition, they may even worship nature itself. You will not find human sacrifice though you may find some practitioners that will prick their finger tips with a lancet for a drop of blood to use in ritual. You won’t find cannibalism but you may find the slaughtering of livestock to be butchered and consumed by the group at a holiday meal. You won’t find rape rituals but you may find individuals in romantic and sexual relationships that you disagree with (such as polygamy and polyamory). You won’t find pagans looking to burn you alive but you will be faced with the personal dilemma of an absolute faith. This dilemma is faced when Christians or Muslims interact with anyone outside of their religion and is not unique to interacting with a pagan. Christians wanting Jews to find Jesus is a perfect example. You might be faced with the theology within your tradition that this pagan family will not join you in heaven. In my opinion, that’s just part of the faith. Most of the world is not Christian or Muslim (the two religions with the heaven/hell afterlife).

Beyond overcoming the discomfort with pagans, there may be the discomfort of treating something other than a human with dignity and respect. My goal in my work is to help as many people as possible over come this discomfort. You do not need to worship a tree in order to respect its life and all it does for this world. You can thank and honor a monotheistic creator God for creating the tree in the exact same fashion we thank doctors and nurses for their work in healing a loved one. Working with the soil and learning to appreciate it and what it can grow is not removing God from the equation nor is it adding to the equation. It’s looking at the entire equation. In the Abrahamic traditions we, humans, are stewards of this earth and frankly, we suck.

In the Jewish tradition, Hashem is everything and everything is Hashem. If that is to be held as truth than we must respect the rock as we respect the cow. It’s all part of the one Being called God.

That does not mean worshipping a rock. That does not mean you cannot end the life of something you respect, there are blessings over food for that very reason. Islam too has blessings to recite before slaughtering an animal. This is also found in many tribal traditions. It’s the organic way of connecting with existence. It’s found in the oldest laws of Torah because the Hebrews walking around 3,000 years ago lived in a nature-based way. For the Jew, maybe that is a good stepping stone.

We cannot connect with a creator if we are not regularly connecting with creation. Learning to respect, care for and even love creation is a vital part in our spiritual existence no matter our tradition or path.