[Serious] Opinions on paganism?

[Methamphetamine]

What are your opinions on paganism and connecting with the nature? Also do you think a pagan is an atheist or no? 

[FrustratedFool]

Some pagans are atheists, but most believe in divine beings.
Some pagans are physicalists/materialists but most believe in the supernatural.

I think belief in either deities or the supernatural is most likely erroneous, and that is an issue for me. I'd be more sympathetic towards agnostic or atheistic paganism.

Other than that, the term 'paganism' is very broad and can encompass a huge range of beliefs/ religions which can vary enormously in detail. Some branches have ethical issues which bother me, like the neo-nazi connections of certain kinds of wodenism, or those forms that have animal sacrifice or whatever.

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

What are your opinions on paganism and connecting with the nature? Also do you think a pagan is an atheist or no? 

These are difficult questions, as the term 'pagan' is tricky to define. It is possible to connect with nature without being a pagan. Most classical and modern pagans were/are religionists, but it's still possible to be an atheistic pagan.

Boru

edit: Yeah, what FF said.

[Thumpalumpacus]

If they believe in spirits etc, I see them as woo merchants. Otherwise, yeah, being in touch with, and in awe of, nature is a normal and yet sublime feeling.

[Anomalocaris]

Paganism seems to me to refer to all practices that posits the existence of some interventionist supernatural forces, but which do not accept the supremacy of the doctrines of dominant monotheistic imperial religion or their kin in things pertaining to these supernatural forces.

There is by definition no connection between the supernatural and the natural, even if the former advertises itself as the veneration of the latter.

[The Grand Nudger]

What are your opinions on paganism and connecting with the nature? Also do you think a pagan is an atheist or no? 

Some are, some aren't..like others have said.  Absent dogmatic or scriptural baggage and with a hefty focus on individual expression, the only thing common to nearly all pagans are a set of distinctly life affirming values.   There are "traditional" systems for genuine™ theists, wicca (and suchlike) in the middle as a bridge, and a religion of nature on the other end for committed atheists.  Contemporary pagan religions don't have much to do with gods even when gods are present, so it's hard to find a nominal pagan compared to finding a nominal christian.  It's easy to find a christian that doesn't believe in christ.  Tad bit harder to find a pagan that doesn't believe in nature.  

There are more pagans in the us than presbyterians, almost all of them millennials.  In a few years time, expect an(other) exponential increase in pagan demographics as the children of pagans grow up to be pagans themselves.  The big spikes came in the 50/60s.  90/00's.  There'll be another census in 2030.  I wouldn't be surprised to see paganism become the single largest religion in the nat citizen demo, in the us, by that time or shortly thereafter.

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

Paganism seems to me to refer to all practices that posits the existence of some interventionist supernatural forces, but which do not accept the supremacy of the doctrines of dominant monotheistic imperial religion or their kin in things pertaining to these supernatural forces.

There is by definition no connection between the supernatural and the natural, even if the former advertises itself as the veneration of the latter.

Some varieties of paganism don’t require interventionist supernatural forces, but view the non-natural world as existing side-by-side with the natural one (the pages of a book analogy). In these views, supernatural forces are not interventionist, but immanent. 

Boru

[The Grand Nudger]

Paganism seems to me to refer to all practices that posits the existence of some interventionist supernatural forces, but which do not accept the supremacy of the doctrines of dominant monotheistic imperial religion or their kin in things pertaining to these supernatural forces.

There is by definition no connection between the supernatural and the natural, even if the former advertises itself as the veneration of the latter.

Some varieties of paganism don’t require interventionist supernatural forces, but view the non-natural world as existing side-by-side with the natural one (the pages of a book analogy). In these views, supernatural forces are not interventionist, but immanent. 

Boru

Even more to the point, nature intervenes, and the sacred is immanent. Gods, even for those who believe in them, tend not to be supernatural. A god isn't over nature or in nature and beyond nature. It -is- nature. When a god blows, that's the wind at work.

[Silver]

I identified as pagan for a brief period of my youth. It's certainly preferable to most belief systems, but in the end it's still just nonsense.

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

Some varieties of paganism don’t require interventionist supernatural forces, but view the non-natural world as existing side-by-side with the natural one (the pages of a book analogy). In these views, supernatural forces are not interventionist, but immanent. 

Boru

Even more to the point, nature intervenes, and the sacred is immanent.  Gods, even for those who believe in them, tend not to be supernatural.  A god isn't over nature or in nature and beyond nature.  It -is- nature.  When a god blows, that's the wind at work.

Exactly. A tree doesn’t grow because it gets magicked into doing so. A tree grows because it is magic.

Boru