How do you feel about animal or blood sacrifices? In terms I’m speaking about using your own blood as a sacred object during a spiritual working, and using all parts of an animal (hunting deer for meat/pelts) rather than solely for ritual sacrifice. Though if you want to speak about plain animal sacrifice, by all means.

Despite the equivocation stuck in the middle there, this is still a question of what witches believe about sacrifice. I started to respond with a rant about how it was irresponsible of Witches Weekly to pose such a question when so many of us are frequently forced to dispel the common misconceptions that witches are out here drinking blood and sacrificing kittens and babies. But then it struck me that perhaps avoiding tough questions is even more irresponsible. We should never stop asking questions for fear of what the answers might reveal the truth to be.

That said, I do want to make one thing absolutely, unequivocally, crystal clear: Wiccans do not believe in sacrificing animals - human, feline or otherwise. If there are people who call themselves witches or other pagans who are out there committing these kinds of heinous acts, they are going against the most basic tenet of the Wiccan faith: harm none!

There are many stories from mythology that deal with sacrifice - human and animal - that are revered and ingrained into tradition by Pagans and Christians and many people of other religious faiths. Modern practice of these faiths often finds a way to symbolically represent those sacrifices in ritual. Wicca is based on ancient religions, mostly Western European, about which little is known. Some believe that the ancients did perform sacrifices but as there is no written record or conclusive archaeological proof one way or the other, we have no way of knowing what the truth really is.

Should Christians be prohibited from giving or taking communion because it represents the sacrifice of human flesh and blood? Of course not. By the same logic, Wiccan rituals should not be condemned if the sacrifice they acknowledge is mythical and symbolic in nature.

As far as the use of blood is concerned, I'm sure there are certain traditions and solitary witches who do use their own blood for rituals, spells or potions. I've heard of women using menstrual blood for various magickal purposes. And Santeria and Voodoo are entirely different subjects altogether. I don't know enough about the various traditions to give examples of what they do and do not practice and, frankly, am not in the mood to research blood rites at the moment.

Personally, none of my training thus far has required me to use blood nor have I been taught about any work that uses blood. Most witches I know find the use of herbs and other substances is more than sufficient to bring necessary power to the work they are doing. Speaking about blood symbolically is typical in many religious practices. It is part of one of the holiest of Christian sacraments: communion. So Wiccans certainly cannot be accused of doing anything untoward if we use wine to represent blood in a ritual.

Regarding the second part of the question - using animal parts - well, my feeling on that subject is that whatever ethics guide you in the consumption of meat or the wearing of leather, etc. should guide you in the context of your magickal work. Lots of witches love to cook and consider the preparation of food to be a ritual unto itself. If you don't have a moral objection to eating meat, then what is the harm in cooking meat as part of a ritual or using it in a potion for your own personal consumption? However, if some spell or potion required you to use ivory (I'm making this up; I have no idea if such a spell exists) and you believe that it is wrong to buy, own or use items that have been banned because the animals they come from are endangered (I do), then I think it would be unethical to work that particular magick. This all just seems like common sense to me.

Thank you to Witches Weekly for the Q&A.

Posted by Angela-Eloise at 6:51 PM