Coming out of the Broom Closet

[Riddle]

Re: Coming out about your religion

Well, I can understand that. It is kind of like trying to explain the Universalists to my aunt. I told her that the church in our town occasionally held Pagan ceremonies. She asked me if they killed animals lol. There are some things that you just aren't sure whether to be upset about their ignorance or just laugh it off.

[Claude]

Re: Coming out about your religion

Malfllick got it right. If my dad had been open minded and wanted to talk to me about it in a more calm way then I wouldn't have been nearly as insulted. Now every single time anything about my religion comes up he refers to it as Wicca or Wiccan even though I've corrected him each time.

[Quetzal]

Re: Coming out about your religion

My family is apathetic toward religion. I've mentioned paganism in conversation, but haven't told them my personal beliefs because, well, they just don't care. They wouldn't judge or ostracize me for it, they'd likely just go "That so?" and move on with no further questions. I kinda like it that way. I don't wanna discuss faith with family, I have like minded internet people for that :P

As for friends or strangers...I'd tell if asked, but who's gonna ask? Haha. I have discussed it with one particularly open minded and curious friend, that's all.

[Astrayus]

Re: Coming out about your religion

I'm 26 years old and I still haven't told my family what my religious beliefs are (or aren't). My ma and pa are both Jehovah's Witnesses along with the rest of my family save my sister. In order not to be shunned completely, I just claim a lack of religion. Sometimes they bug me about it, most of the time they leave me alone

Feel kinda silly hiding it still, but ah well. Have to keep the peace. lol

[callmeclemens]

Re: Coming out about your religion

Being out and open about my Path has always been easy, but the fact that six years ago, I was considering entering into the Catholic Priesthood, invalidates my faith, as rebellious anti-Catholic phase. Also my wife, is a woman of no particular faith, so while she always respects what I do and think, there's always that feeling of knowing she thinks its all a B.S

[lillywolf]

Re: Coming out about your religion

Well my fiancee knows and supports me my mum does not know but she is very open minded and so long as I am happy then she is happy. My kids are too young to understand but when they ask I will be open. The people who I have issues with are the people who live in this area. Everyone is Christian, not the nice ones the narrow minded type that feel sorry for me and and want to rate me and. So as you can imagine I get some funny looks and whispers when I in by but you know what I just smile and wall on by after all it is their problem, not mine .

[Azvanna]

Re: Coming out about your religion

For me, coming out about my religion is a bit of a slow process. I was/am extremely worried about dumping the whole truth on my Christian friends because my whole life revolved around and was built upon the social aspect of Christianity. I knew that talking about conflicting beliefs would cut me off from my world. However, I'm seeing now that as I just live what I believe, new things unfold around me. There's a correlation between the way I live and what kind of circumstances I find myself in. It's been a very gradual process of letting the old things fall away and awakening to new habits, acquaintances, etc. So, in my case there's not really a point of 'coming out,' but more like a progression of 'growing into.'

[callmeclemens]

Re: Coming out about your religion

For me, coming out about my religion is a bit of a slow process. I was/am extremely worried about dumping the whole truth on my Christian friends because my whole life revolved around and was built upon the social aspect of Christianity. I knew that talking about conflicting beliefs would cut me off from my world. However, I'm seeing now that as I just live what I believe, new things unfold around me. There's a correlation between the way I live and what kind of circumstances I find myself in. It's been a very gradual process of letting the old things fall away and awakening to new habits, acquaintances, etc. So, in my case there's not really a point of 'coming out,' but more like a progression of 'growing into.'

Beautifully said.

[Optimistic discord]

Re: Coming out about your religion

I never experienced any problems with people accepting my beliefs until I moved to a new school when I was in my mid teens ( the new town was very conservative and rural.... People were shocked that I read books for fun.. The bullies soon learned that their stereotyped world needed to find a new classification for "glasses wearing geek pagan who can also break you on the sports field"...)

Generally I think that because I made no big thing about it and was able to introduce people to it slowly , giving them time to assimilate the information and see that I was not turning into some deranged cultist over night.
It helped that my family are quite tolerant and as long as I did not start sacrificing puppies, or turn obviously nasty then they had no issue.

Be yourself, but dont be all "rebellious teen" about it.
Dont keep it a secret but equally there is no real need to go around with pentagrams inked on your face

Generally peoples dislike/anger is going to be routed in lack of understanding, help them to understand how you feel and what it is you are seeking.

[Erika]

Re: Coming out about your religion

I've mostly come out to friends, and only to a few family members. And to a friend's mom, but I don't exactly know how to count that, considering it was my friend who outed me, and the next time I came over her mom (a pastor) sat me down and very nicely explained to me that I was a sweet girl, a good girl, and she loved me, but the Devil had led me astray and I was going to burn in Hell if I didn't repent.

...I don't trust that friend with secrets anymore.

Coming out for me was very nerve-wracking at first. I had one friend I came out to almost immediately; we had clicked right away, and I frankly had no clue how to explain away whatever Pagan book it was I was reading at the time away. She was definitely a major comfort for me, and we would spend weekends doing witchy things and studying together. Her mom was very cool with it when we were at her house, and only asked that we leave a window open if we burned incense, since her husband was sensitive to the stuff.

Other than that, my much younger sister used to walk in on me doing rituals or spells or - anything, really, but she had an amazing knack for only ever doing it when everyone else was out of the house. I was about fifteen the first time she actually asked what I was doing (I was attacking the spice cabinet in search of some herb or other) and I nonchalantly responded that I was looking for something for a spell I wanted to do. She was about nine or ten at the time, and promptly asked me if I could fix her dream catcher, since it apparently wasn't keeping the bad dreams away. I agreed, and swore her to secrecy. Caused a couple funny incidents when she told dad that if he wanted the tv fixed, he should have me cast a fix-it spell on it, but he blew it off as her watching too much Charmed or some such.

I didn't come out to anyone else until the start of my senior year of high school. I told my twin sister because, frankly, not telling her was eating up at me inside and I felt incredibly guilty and miserable all the time for hiding something so important to me from the one person I rely on most. She was slightly baffled, and started firing off questions and asked to thumb through my books and BoS. I insisted on being the one to hold and turn the pages of my BoS (because, possessive) and she agreed, mentioning that I didn't exactly hide it well; I had 'weird-y things all over your room, you know' and she'd suspected a couple of times before, but had figured I was just Agnostic and curious or something,. Mostly she had put it down to me being the weird twin.

I came out to a group of friends at a cast party/sleepover, when we were playing truth or dare, and one of us commented how odd a group we all were - the hard-core Atheist, the Agnostic, the Jew, the Buddhist, the Muslim and the 'Lovely Lutheran Twins,' drama geeks one and all, at which point I piped up that I was Wiccan, thankyouverymuch. I then had a bit of a panicking episode until they had all pretty much shrugged it off, saying that they hadn't known. After that, I came to the realization that most of the people in my life frankly wouldn't care/mind, and that I was freaking over nothing.

After that I was pretty open about it. I didn't flaunt my beliefs in people's faces, but if it came up, I didn't go out of my way to hide it or anything. Thee days, I still leave my Pagan and witchy things out and about, but my parents are apparently delusional, my one grandmother suspects but shrugs it off, and my eldest cousin and his family know, because he and I were going back and forth over both of our (Wiccan vs Norse-influenced Pagan, he's not entirely sure yet) beliefs in the car, and voices were raised... not the most secret of places to be talking, by any means!

Frankly, I'd love to tell my mom, she's very open-minded, and we're very close, but that openness extends to a total communication policy with dad, and he's made his opinions of non-Christians (and especially 'hippie New Agers') very clear.

So... yeah. That's my little coming out story. I'm still pretty open about it, and my main policy on the broom closet is that Dad doesn't know, thus Mom doesn't know unless she asks me directly, and Dad's conservative family members don't know, nor does Mom Born-Again Aunt Kathy. Oddly enough, I tend to discuss my beliefs more openly with perfect strangers in bookstores than I do my family. Huh. Is that weird, you think?

[Astrayus]

Re: Coming out about your religion

I agreed, and swore her to secrecy. Caused a couple funny incidents when she told dad that if he wanted the tv fixed, he should have me cast a fix-it spell on it, but he blew it off as her watching too much Charmed or some such.

That is too cute!

My sister doesn't care one way or another, she's not very religious. But she'll make me pull out the tarot cards and spirit board every time I visit nowadays.

[Erika]

Re: Coming out about your religion

I tend to think so, too - she's a total sweetheart, and honestly doesn't understand the concept of secrecy. She thinks I'm 'uber cool' and mostly just figures it's an Erika thing. To this day, she will pull out her dream catcher every few months for me to fix, and then we'll wash her room with lavender and rosemary to keep away bad dreams and monsters. It's really adorable.

[Red-Handed Jill]

Re: Coming out about your religion

I have only come out to two people. The first person is one of my very close friends. She's agnostic and was very cool about it. Asked me a few questions and even interviewed me for a school paper. The second person was an acquaintance-friend. She was also cool with it. Told me that she knew runes and gave me a reading.

Have not come out to any members of my family. I'm mostly worried because I don't feel like I know them well enough to predict what would happen if I told them. When I first began dipping my toes into pagan stuff, I figured my parents might be upset but would eventually accept it (they are both Baptists). But recently my dad's got a renewed interest in his own spirituality as well. I came home this week and he said we were going to church (for the first time in 10 years or more; it didn't make me upset or anything, but it caught me off-guard). It makes me feel guilty and selfish, but I kinda wish it hadn't happened because it makes me so much more afraid to tell them. I'm not so much worried about my mom, though (or maybe I care less what she thinks). But I definitely think I will come out to them eventually; I do not plan on hiding it from any future love interests or my children (when I have them), and I don't want them to find out from their grandchildren first. Aside from them, I don't plan on telling anyone else except for maybe my sister; I'm not actually sure what religion she considers herself, but I think she's pretty open-minded and would be able to keep it a secret.

[Ukiuq]

Re: Coming out about your religion

My mother knows and is unhappy but doesn't say anything to me about it. My father is that kind of atheist who thinks all religious beliefs are stupid, no matter what they are, so he considers it just as dumb as if I'd said I was Christian or something. My brother is uber-Christian so he's never going to accept it, and we've grown more distant now because of this. My sister is a Christian-Pagan mix so she's been really supportive.

But aside from them, everybody on my Facebook knows, and I don't flaunt or hide it. I'll hide something I'm ashamed of, thanks.

[Starlight]

Re: Coming out of the Broom Closet

I generally keep myself to myself, but I don't try to hide what I believe either. I suppose based on where I live and what I look like people automatically assume I am either a christian or an atheist, and people that get to know me figure out pretty quickly that I'm no christian. I would imagine most of my friends think I'm some kind of atheist, but that's mainly because I see no need to correct them and think it's pretty funny. I've had varied reactions from those who flat-out asked, like "Wait, so you like believe in trees?" and "Oh, so you worship many gods." Nobody's been hostile to me yet, but we'll see. If someone rejects you because you choose to follow your own path though, you probably don't want to spend time with them anyway.