Ok, I call myself pagan. Why? I spent a large part of my formative years working on farms, paying for my horse riding. It is difficult to interact with nature so closely without being aware of something inherent in the environment that could be categorised as divinity. I chose to focus on that aspect of the divine and "worship" nature. I ask no-one else to follow my path or say I am right. That's where my fundamental problem lies. Key to the practice of monotheistic religions is the denial of any other god (Christianity - worship no craven idols, Islam - There is no god but Allah) but this leaves a difficulty - why is one correct, and one not? Can't get my head round that one - sorry!
But I am not overtly pagan, why? Ok, paganism is seen in the same light as new ageism, and it is largely bollocks. Take as an example Wicca, one of the larger pagan paths. Developed in the 1950's by Gerald Gardiner (look him up) as an initiatory tradition based on masonry and the golden dawn (look them up to!) yet apparently there is no problem being a solitary wiccan! Fluffy thinking!! As long as this goes on, paganism as a movement will get nowhere. There have to be rules in order to be taken seriously. If wicca is an initiatory path (as prescribed by Gardiner) then you can't be a solitary wiccan (Sorry and all but there it is) you can follow a broadly wiccan path but you are not wiccan if you are not in a wiccan coven.
Paganism is far too liberal in it's views of what is acceptable. There is no way I should be able to call myself pagan, but I can. If the movement wants any credibility, it must become more hardline and start to define what is and is not paganism.
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