Modern Pagan religious conversion revisited

Vol.14,No.2(2016)

Dmitry Galtsin

Stable URL (handle):
http://hdl.handle.net/11222.digilib/138049

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Abstract
When modern Paganism emerged as a new religious movement in Western Europe and America in the 1950s and 1960s, its followers described the experience of conversion that alluded to the conversion narrative models that were already well-spread in the religious mainstream. In their conversion narratives from the 1960s to the 2000s, reflected both in their Pagan writings and scholarly literature, we can see motives recognizable from generic Christian prototypes. A Pagan "crisis" conversion is perceived as an altered state of consciousness, which helps gain access to some sort of ultimate truth concerning reality.

Keywords:
modern Paganism; religious conversion; new religious movements

Pages:
7–17
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