Reader Mail: Where Are the Vampires?

Ow… The stupid…. It hurts.

I DO NOT envy your email inbox around this time of year!

I would not say stupid, simply ignorant of what Paganism and Wicca are.. Both are real, these are our paths to follow in our lives. Vampires are fictional characters of darkness portrayed in books and movies as romantic beings.

This sounds like someone new to the path and just wondered if they fit into our religion.

If you read so many books,why do you think we don’t mention vampires,they simply don’t belong to our religion,i think you should start reading comics.

I’m a little taken aback by the comments here. Name calling and the slight elitist tone will get us nowhere. Many books on our religion talk about psychic work….perhaps the person is asking about psychic vampires, which many consider real. Perhaps we shouldn’t be so eager to make fun and be a bit more open minded.

True, but I sort of wonder how many “Halloween pagans” there are out there. Sort of like “Christmas Christians”. A passing fancy/fantasy that comes around once a year.

I think a lot has to be down to how Paganism & particularly Wicca is portrayed in today’s teenage fiction. I’ve lost count of the amount of novels & TV that intertwine Paganism, Wicca, Goth, Vampirism & Werewolves altogether in one big confusing ball.
We cannot really be surprised that people starting out in the Pagan path can be confused.
There are never any stupid questions, only stupid answers.

There are definitely stupid questions, but this doesn’t happen to be one of them

patti

” I like avocados, cute shoes and Irish pub tunes”… Cute shoes – I’m with you on that one. Irish pub tunes? You’re getting a little weird here. (But then, I’m into Renaissance Madrigals, so I’ll try to keep an open mind.) But Avocados? Seriously? That’s torn it. I’m OUTIE !

Clearly, you’re not a REAL follower of the Grand High Church of the Holy Avocado. Blasphemy, I say!

patti

Probably one of the same people who are dressed up in Goth clothing at a Ren Fest.

Poor, confused kid! It’s just another sign that this is the “Twilight” of our civilization and though we pray that this passes like the days before the “New Moon” it seems as though all critical thought and logic has suffered an “Eclipse” by the incessant bombardment of a pop culture that has taken the monsters of old and made them over as misunderstood and angsty teenagers. May we all live to see a new and “Breaking Dawn” of enlightenment.

*chuckles* I love how you used the book titles. One great big cliche from the first page of the first book to the last page of the last one. Meyers beat the horse corpse with a surprising amount of finesse considering the nature of the cliche. Going to go read them again (I refuse to destroy it for myself by seeing the preteen-geared movies with thinly veiled sexual tension everywhere). I’m sticking my reply to the post here too, less clicking. Psychic vampires are everywhere from people one would term ‘attention whores’ who are often whiny little brats to the ones who actually know what they’re doing, you could sit next to one on a daily basis and not know it. Some say psychic vampirism is a side effect of some sort o permanent energy imbalance (they either have not enough, or too much of a certain ‘flavor’ of energy), like a chemical imbalance in the brain but involving the subtle body and energies rather than your physical brain and chemicals.

Well…as Patti said, vampyrism (the spelling used to differentiate pop culture “vampires” from dark culture “vampyres”) isn’t a general part of Paganism and is therefore not really talked about. In fact, I can guarantee you that if a person introduced themselves on a Pagan blog or forum (including this one) as a “vampyre” that other people would raise figurative eyebrows before launching Twilight and True Blood based insults.

However, dark culture has creeped into Paganism (kinda hard for it not to) and there are certainly “dark Pagans” (I’m one of them) and among those dark Pagans, there are those who are vampyres. Most are energy/psychic vampyes but there are a few who are sanguinarian (“blood-drinking”) vampyres. However, it is unethical in vampyre culture to take either blood or energy from a person without their knowledge (perfect love and perfect trust is also prevalent here) and anyone who claims to run around drinking blood from random people is deluded/crazy as hell and not part of the vampyre culture.

To someone interested in vampyrism (without the pop culture spice), I suggest “The Psychic Vampire Codex: A Manual of Magick and Energy Work” by Michelle Belanger. I also HIGHLY recommend “Goth Culture” by Raven Digitalis (I have read the book several times). In this book, he combines dark cultures (including vampyrism) with Paganism, allowing those interested in both to marry the two in their lifestyles and rituals.

This reminds me of a young man who came to me wanting to learn magick, real magick! He was very earnest about it. His mother is a dear friend and Sister of mine who has just begun her path in Wicca and felt unable to help him.

As I began to explain to him the necessity to learn about using one’s own power, he became very frustrated and said he didn’t want to learn about any of the “religious stuff”, he wasn’t into that and didn’t see any reason for it. I asked exactly what he wanted to learn and why. He had no answer. I told him that when he figured what he wanted and, most importantly why, I would help him. Just because it’s “Cool” doesn’t make it right, effective or reasonable.

The “Twilight” series has brought a lot of interest to Wicca and Witch Craft as have many other really good movies and not so good. All we can do is our best. We have the “powers” to change people’s minds. Irish Pubs, cute shoes or whatever, These shows have gotten people interested and talking. It’s a start!

This reminds of a time a teenage boy came to me wanting to learn magic. Harry Potter magic. He thought he could learn to cast wonderous spells like Harry Potter and fly on a broomstick. I was speechless. I thought someone his age should know Harry Potter was fiction. I explained to him about Wicca the religion and true witchcraft. And no, I don’t fly on a broomstick, though I would love to due to the price of gas. He quickly lost interest.

We were all at the learning stage at one point. At least now this person has the correct information on the subject and was brave enough to ask what may have seemed like a “silly” question.

And…there is no mention of Witchcraft in “Twilight” with the exception of one quote, “If Angela turns out to be a witch, she can join the party too.” That’s it…just to clarify.

Makes you wonder what that person thinks Wicca is….

My opinion on vampires personally varies….I love Being Human and Buffy but hate twilight and all the overhyped boring shows.

But I’ll always owe something to buffy….the Wiccan character pretty much lead me to Wicca….I know buffy is all a load of rubbish (however much I love it!) and the magic of the Wiccan character was unreal. But I descovered Wicca and I noticed similarities….spirituality, connection to the world around you, difficulties. But I pretty much assumed that vampires weren’t part of the deal….seems like not everybody thought that way.

Never condemn someone for asking a question. It’s a good thing, ya know!

If I had a nickle for every novice asking me if Wicca were just like D&D/Xena/Charmed/Sabrina/Twilight, I’d be a millionairess by now.

This reminds me of when I was just starting to learn and someone reccomended the “Sweep” series by Cate Tiernan. I then asked someone who was answering some questions if there were such a thing as blood witches like the book mentioned. I didn’t know any better and since witch craft is so uncommon it’s not something you are taught from a little kid, like you are with a lot of the Christian values.

There are no vampyres. Just vampyre wannabes.

But Fairies are real.

Well…of course!

I understand that she’s wondering about vampires, I mean, come on they’re everywhere, twilight, Anne Rice novels, there’s even a fragrance called “Vampire.” But one thing that EVERYONE who comments here is that we shouldn’t judge people for what they believe in. I believe in psychic vampires because I AM ONE! It doesn’t make me evil or keep me from going to the beach, it just means that I use my chakra to take a wee bit of chakra from other more energenic people. I have to because my body isn’t very good at storing energy on it’s own. I’ve tried to go without taking other peoples energy before, you wanna know what happened? I passed out during my anatomy class (college), I fell, hit my head on the corner of a lab table, and landed on the concrete floor, just to wake up with my college professor staring down at me with a “OH MY GOODNESS ARYN! PLEASE BE ALRIGHT!” look all over his face. I have cast a spell on myself to try and make my body more efficient at storing my own chakra, but alas, it is not an “end all solution.” So to you who judge this individual and make fun of them for asking- SHAME ON YOU, WHO ARE YOU TO JUDGE? Prove to us that you have a right to judge others or be silent! Judging people and making fun of them out of one’s own ignorance is for the heathens.
Aryn

Well actually vampires were considered a type of witchcraft a long time ago. People used to think that there were vampires because when they dug up the corpses the bodies were bloated as if they had just eaten (due to the decaying process), there was sometime blood around the dead people mouths (due to body fluids making there way out of your body) and if they staked bodies some of them groaned (because air is trapped in your body when you die so when you compress a dead body it makes a sound). I learned about it in my religion studies class, and i think its definitely worth mentioning, at least about our pasts.

There are many myths about vampires all over the world before they turned up in written literature. However, the reason why they do not appear in many religions is because they are apart from the natural world. They are removed from the life cycle of life, death, rebirth, life, death, rebirth, etc. Means that to be a vampire you would have removed yourself, or someone else removed you, from the natural ebb and flow of life. Are there beings out there that most people do not believe in? Yes, many of them are included in the pagan religions, our Gods/Goddess, fairies, dragons, etc. Just because the normal person, or the ones numb from the neck up, cannot see them does not mean that they do not exist, for example, we cannot see sound waves, but yet our radios work.

I agree…I’m glad this person came here and asked. There shouldn’t be some belittling comment about asking a question. That’s what this sight helps people for no matter how silly you may think it sounds. I thought it was a good question. I never put the two together but I sure did learn quite a bit from all you others. And I want to thank you for all of you who have participated in giving and answering the question. For the rest who hate to be bullied by others for who you are, you sure arn’t far for bullying others. I agree..you should be ASHAMED! Be a true pagan or what ever you follow or get out. We have enough people in this world that ridicule us.
(Sorry just had to get that off my chest. Get tired of people who claim to be one thing and actually act as another.)