I’m a pretty liberal person. “Live and let live” I say and I don’t care if someone is black, white, green with red spots, old, young, intelligent, poor, likes steak and kidney pudding or has a pet poodle. I don’t care if they’re Christian, Wiccan, Buddhist or even believe that pigs will fly. But I do care if they don’t allow others to follow their own chosen faith no matter how obscure or unusual.  

A few years back my daughter was enrolled in an otherwise great school with great teachers and equally as great kids. The curriculum was wonderful, the teaching quality without question and she was very happy there. Only one thing irked me. They had a policy that allowed all kids to wear a necklace with a cross on it (Australia like the UK and the USA is a Christian based country) but the kids had to provide a written letter from their parents if they wanted to wear any other jewellery like decorative earrings or perhaps a necklace with a locket on it. The idea was to ensure that kids didn’t come to school wearing dangerously long, dangly earrings or knuckle duster rings or so on. What’s wrong with that you ask? Nothing,… if you’re a Christian kid. 

That policy meant that coming from a Wiccan family, my daughter had to provide a letter from me saying I gave her permission to wear her much loved pentacle necklace. The Jewish kids had to provide a letter of permission to wear their religious jewellery and so on. Where does it end? Do the Sikh kids need to do the same for their turbans? What about the Muslim girls and the Jilbab?  

Hopefully we’re becoming more tolerant of others and maybe moving much more toward the “live and let live” approach and that’s great. But many of us are responsible for the development, or indeed the modification, of policies in the workplace, in our social clubs and groups, in our sporting groups and so on that enable people of all religions to have freedom to follow their path without prejudice or harassment. It’s our duty as Wiccans and simply as world citizens to make sure we foster greater appreciation and acceptance of the right for everyone to follow their faith as long is it doesn’t harm others. Wanting freedom to practice Wicca goes both ways. As we demand respect for the right to follow our Wiccan path, we must also demand the right for everyone to follow their own religion as well.  Live and let live is a right for everyone even if they do think pigs will fly. 

Smiles and blessings, Amethyst