Pagan Priests and Priestesses don't ask for money. It's not in the Rede, it's not covered by the Threefold Law, it's just one of those rules that's been in place since the beginning. The reason is obvious-- a lot of our number were turned off by the money-grubbing image that certain people give Christianity. Furthermore, we are a religion of clergy, and thus don't need to pay someone to do it full-time.

It is not unreasonable for a church, however, to ask for money. I know of no religion whose god pays the utility bills and maintenance costs, and the staff of a church is just as entitled to food and rent as the staff of a pizza parlor. I know of covens that have membership dues to cover ritual supplies, food for gatherings, and in some cases rent.

This is the real world, and in the real world it takes money to get things done. It's not pretty, but it's a fact. Most of us Wiccans have managed to avoid this unpleasant truth for a while, but this is largely because our community hasn't been close enough to organized to need it. We've started to change that, though, and to change much further is probably going to require that we start writing a few checks. My friend Meghann MacMurphy recently wrote a very good piece on the subject called It's Broke, So Let's Fix It!.

Meg even goes so far as to endorse tithing. I know we tend to think of that as a nasty word, but it's not a bad thing in and of itself.

Tithing is an answer, and despite the negative connotations, a good one. But it's not the only answer. Meg is tithing to a Pagan community center, which is something most of us don't have. Many of us who do have this fortune don't have the money, but Meg offers another answer-- Donate time. Help them clean, help them paint, help them any way you can.

For those of us who don't have a Pagan community center (and even those lucky few that do), we have other options where we can donate both time and money.

The opportunities for time donations are limited by your own imagination. Don't think like a loner, think like a member of the community. Find a need and try to fill it. If it's not something you can do by yourself, so much the better-- get some friends. Thanks to the magic of the Internet, you can work with people from anywhere, and reach people from everywhere. (Case in point-- my next attempt at providing a service to the online community is Multicastings, an online pagan advice column. I've gathered some friends for multiple viewpoints, and one of them (Iambe) lives in Canada. We've never met.)

Here's a suggestion-- somebody start a web page specifically for those organizations and situations that need assistance. Have a mailing list for those that run such sites to discuss such work. Have a subscriber list for people that want urgent bulletins. It would be a lot of work, but it could do a lot of good. If anyone is interested in doing such, contact me... I've been putting some thought into this and I have some ideas. I may take this up myself, but if someone wants to take the bait, I'll kick in for the domain name and I might even be willing to help with hosting fees. (This offer is contingent on my agreeing that the person I help actually stands a chance of accomplishing something good.)

Not all needs are purely pagan in nature. I recently recieved a letter from a woman who has started a pagan charitable organization called In Her Name [This site is no longer in operation], which is by pagans, but for anyone. I was thrilled to see that someone is taking such an initiative, and I'm dying to see what she can do with this... with our help. Wouldn't it be great if the next time a disaster struck, we could send in a group of strapping pagans to help clear debris and hand out food and blankets we've collected? This has such potential.

Some of us have specialized talents that can serve the community well. A wonderful example of this would be Drak.Net. Lhiannon runs this webhosting company, not for profit, but to support various websites and to run the free webhosting service that Drak.Net also provides, as well as a few other free services for the pagan and internet communities. By the way, if you run a pagan business that has a web presence, I urge you to take out an ad on Drak.Net. I took one out partly to help support Drak.Net, and partly just for the hell of it, and you wouldn't believe the traffic I get. The ads aren't on the member pages themselves, so you're not spamming, but you would be amazed and how much of my traffic comes from their 404 error page.

What do you do? Are you maybe a lawyer? Or a therapist? Maybe you're a carpenter and can help a community center expand or even just repair. Maybe you can get goods at wholesale prices (or perhaps below, with your help) that a center or organization can use.

Now, I know there are those of you out there that can't spare time or money. But there are also a lot of people that can. Maybe you'll have to tighten the belt a little bit. Need an excuse to quit smoking? Send the money to The Witches' Voice instead. Trust me, they can use the money. As far as I know, there is no greater service to the community, online or off, than that provided by Witchvox.

There's lots of reasons to do this. The Threefold Law, if nothing else. And certainly it could lead to simple and obvious payback such as increased business or just friends. But you know what? I'd really hate to look back on my life and say the only thing I ever cast was a shadow.

© 1999 by Cather "Catalyst" Steincamp