"N2EY" wrote:

Perhaps something really bad would have
happened, but the spell prevented it.
Who can ever say?


The specific spell requested could only have resulted in something bad.


Who determines what is a "legitimate" religion
and what isn't? Who *can* determine such a
thing (other than God?)


You just love to ask the "who determines" question, don't you? Especially
when the answer is bloody obvious - like with most other things, people do.
People either decide it's a legitimate religion or not. A small, fringe,
group of supposed believers don't make a religion legitimate (Hale-Bop's
Heaven's Gate cult, for example), especially when the vast majority believe
it's a load of crap (and I do suspect the vast majority don't really believe
wiccas can actually cast spells, charms, and so on).


Why not?


Already answered in the paragraph you quoted (the paragraph taken as a
whole, not sliced up into individual sentences).


Couldn't the same be said of almost all religions
now in existence? Most are based on a book or
series of books written hundreds or thousands
of years ago. (snip)


However, the practices of today's wiccas seem mostly made up from images
and stories in FICTIONAL movies, television, and books, not religious
material and literature written by those who practice that religion. In
other words, since so little is known of the old pagan religions, wiccas
simply 'borrowed' things like black robes, symbols, supposed spells, and so
on, from relatively modern day fiction.


Would you say the same thing about the power
of prayer, miracles, transubstantiation, and other
central beliefs of modern Christianity?


It is one thing to pray for assistance from a God and quite another to
actually claim to have personal powers to cast spells, charms, and so on. I
would ask for similar proof from anyone, in any religion, who claimed to
have such powers (any powers).


Fine - but then why discriminate between "legitimate"
and "illegitimate" religions?


Words alone do not discriminate, Jim. Nobody has been deprived of anything
by my words.


Dwight Stewart (W5NET)

http://www.qsl.net/w5net/