We started this rabbit by asking what happens when Paganism is inherited. Somewhere along the way, the rabbit turned around and began looking at us. Because if there is a second generation, eventually there can be a third. And by then something changes that contemporary Paganism has not had to think about very much. The people who rebuilt, revived, invented, argued over, organized, researched, practised, and carried these modern traditions will begin dying in large numbers. Some already have. The convert generation becomes the grandparent generation. Then the ancestor generation. That may be when contemporary Paganism finally stops being able to describe itself primarily as a revival. It will have its own dead.
There Is a Difference Between Ancient Ancestors and Our Ancestors
Pagans often speak about ancestors in enormous historical terms. The Norse. The Celts. The pre-Christian Europeans. The ancestors before conversion. Sometimes those ancestors are genealogical. Sometimes cultural. Sometimes imagined as spiritual predecessors. But the third generation of modern Paganism may have another category available to it. They may know the names. “My grandmother was Wiccan.” “My grandfather kept a Heathen hearth.” “My parents met at that festival.” “This altar belonged to my aunt.” “That song was written by someone my mother actually knew.” “Our family has done this at Samhain since before I was born.” Those claims are not ancient. They are stronger in another way. They are remembered.
We Are Creating Primary Sources Right Now
This thought makes me slightly uncomfortable as a writer. Every blog post, ritual script, argument, photograph, festival program, newsletter, social media archive, meeting minute, book, podcast, and personal journal may become somebody else’s historical evidence. We spend a great deal of time complaining about gaps in the historical record of pre-Christian religions. Meanwhile we are generating mountains of records about ourselves and still managing to lose context at astonishing speed. That means stewardship includes archives. Who keeps the records? What happens when websites disappear? Who preserves community newsletters? Does anyone write down why a ritual changed? When an organization closes, do its records vanish into somebody’s basement? When a founder dies, does the history become whatever the loudest surviving person remembers? These questions sound administrative until twenty-five years pass. Then they become history.
Our Fights Will Become Their Myths Unless We Explain Them
This may be one of the stranger inheritances. Every community has conflicts that feel enormous while they are happening. Years later, the details disappear. One side becomes the villains. One side becomes the heroes. A complicated dispute becomes a sentence. “They split because of politics.” “She ruined the group.” “They betrayed the old ways.” “That festival changed.” “Those people took over.” Future generations inherit conclusions without context. I have spent enough time trying to reverse-engineer Pagan networks and histories to know how frustrating that is. Perhaps one thing we owe the future is the humility to record conflict without turning our own interpretation into scripture. Say what happened. Keep the documents. Admit what we do not know. Let the next generation make its own judgment.
The Third Generation Will Not Be Impressed That We Were Pioneers
This is worth remembering. The first generation often has founder energy. We discovered things. We built organizations. We created festivals. We wrote books. We fought for recognition. We established spaces where Pagan practice could happen openly. That deserves recognition. But grandchildren are merciless historians. They may appreciate what we built while also asking why we tolerated obvious problems. Why did you let that leader behave that way? Why did nobody keep proper records? Why did the community fracture over something so small? Why did you repeat history you already knew was wrong? Why did you talk about nature while neglecting the land you actually lived on? Why did you say everyone was welcome when clearly everyone was not? I hope they ask those questions. It would mean they inherited the rabbit.
What Do I Want to Be Remembered For?
This is where the series stops being about Paganism in the abstract. Because eventually every legacy question becomes personal. I do not control whether anybody remembers me. I certainly do not control what they remember. But I can influence what I leave behind. I can leave polished certainty. Or I can leave the trail. I think I prefer the trail. Here is what I thought. Here is what I got wrong. Here is the source I found. Here is the source I could not find. Here is why I changed my mind. Here is the community I loved. Here is where I became disappointed. Here is the practice that still mattered afterward. Here is the tree. Here is the fire. Here is the rabbit hole. Keep going if you want to know more.
Maybe the Best Ancestor Is Not the One with All the Answers
There is a certain arrogance hidden in imagining oneself as an ancestor. It is easy to picture future people reverently quoting us. Reality will probably be much funnier. Some future Pagan may discover one of our old arguments and wonder why anyone cared. They may find our ritual unbearably wordy. They may laugh at our technology. They may reject half our theology. Good. An ancestor does not need to win every argument after death. Maybe a useful ancestor leaves tools rather than commandments.
The Seven Rabbits Come Together Here
What happens when Paganism is inherited? The seeker religion becomes a family memory. What does the first generation owe the second? Truth, usable practice, safer communities, and freedom. Can the tradition survive without a village? For a while, yes. But relationship gives inheritance depth. What happens when the village builds gates? Structure becomes necessary, and authority must remain answerable. Does the child have the right to leave? If our talk of spiritual independence means anything, yes. What happens when sacred place is lost? Memory carries the old place while relationship begins again where we stand. And finally: What happens when we become the ancestors? We lose control of the story.
That May Be the Point
A living tradition eventually belongs to people its founders never met. If it cannot survive that loss of control, it is not a tradition. It is a personal project. The third generation will choose what is useful. They will discard things we thought essential. They will revive things we forgot. They will misunderstand us. They will correct us. They will probably invent traditions and swear they have always done them. Human beings are remarkably consistent that way. But perhaps they will also inherit a healthier habit from us. Maybe they will check. Maybe they will say, “We do this because our grandparents began doing it in the early twenty-first century.” And perhaps that will be enough.
Keep the Fire. Leave the Rabbit Loose.
I began this series thinking about children raised Pagan. I end it thinking about dead Pagans. That seems appropriate. Religion lives in the movement between those two groups. The living receive something. They alter it. They add their own experience. Then eventually they hand it forward. My own Pagan journey has been one long attempt to connect dots without pretending the dots make a cleaner picture than they do. I suspect that is what I would want to pass on most. Not a demand that somebody arrive at my conclusions. A permission slip to keep asking. Question the history. Question the institution. Question the elder. Question yourself. But do not become so devoted to questioning that you forget to live something worth questioning later. Light a fire. Feed somebody. Remember a name. Plant something. Keep a promise. Write down what happened.
And when a rabbit disappears into the brush, follow it occasionally. You never know what the grandchildren may need to find.
References
Berger, H. A. (1999). A community of witches: Contemporary Neo-Paganism and witchcraft in the United States. University of South Carolina Press.
Bengtson, V. L., Putney, N. M., & Harris, S. C. (2013). Families and faith: How religion is passed down across generations. Oxford University Press.
Fennell, J., & Wildman-Hanlon, L. A. (2017). The children of converts: Beyond the first generation of contemporary Pagans. Social Compass, 64(2), 288–306. https://doi.org/10.1177/0037768617704165
Kermani, S. Z. (2013). Pagan family values: Childhood and the religious imagination in contemporary American Paganism. New York University Press.
Mazumdar, S., & Mazumdar, S. (2004). Religion and place attachment: A study of sacred places. Journal of Environmental Psychology, 24(3), 385–397. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvp.2004.08.005