Seminary Program

This is where we post the essays from many of our Universal Life Church Seminary students. When students finish a ULC course, they write a comprehensive essay about their experiences with the course, what they learned, didn't learn, were inspired by, etc. Here are their essays.

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Thursday, August 14, 2008

Paganism

This was another great course! The Master of Paganism started out with the creation of the universe. What a beautiful creation myth! I loved the spiral dance myth and can fully understand why and how the earth was considered a beautiful, magical place. Certainly, our ancestors had a great sense of creativity and romance!

It’s interesting to note that each culture had its own set of pantheons – gods and goddesses and many types of worship were popular. There are holidays, Sabbats and Esbats, and the wheel of the year (as in Wicca). The guardians of the four directions keep the universe stable and have different names depending upon the culture or branch of paganism. Their role is to guard sacred space.

There are magical beings like fairies, angels and spirit guides. Many different beliefs exist about the afterlife, also depending upon the culture. All believe there is life after death and that your actions in this life have some impact on the afterlife. It’s easy to see how some of these beliefs have influenced all modern religions, not just those of pagan origin.

In order to understand Paganism a little bit better, I bought some of the books referred to in the course. The one I found most helpful was The Spiral Dance. There are a few others that I want to check out like When God Was A Woman and The Golden Bough.

I really enjoyed studying about Paganism. It reminded me of Greek and Roman mythology that I studied in school that taught me about the different gods and goddesses and their personalities and stories in history. It was a lot of fun and gave me a good base to understand other Pagan traditions. I highly recommend this course.

Rev. Patricia Buben

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The Universal Life Church is a comprehensive online seminary where we have classes in Christianity, Wicca, Paganism, two courses in Metaphysics and much more. I have been a proud member of the ULC for many years and the Seminary since its inception.

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