PHOENIX - Are there real witches in Arizona?
As a new fall show -- called
Eastwick -- launched this week on ABC15 we decided to do a little research.
What we learned might be new to you.
Witches can actually be male or female, according to Rosemary Szymanski. She's a high priestess for the
Sacred Spiral Pagan Church of Arizona.
They don’t worship Satan; in fact they don’t even believe he exists, said Szymanski.
Right now, she is working on getting a
501c from the Federal Government and also a physical building so that groups like hers can worship together under one roof.
She said she’s working for freedom of religion and the freedom to practice her nature-based religion just like other groups practice their own religions with out persecution.
Witch Nancy Allocca said the problem is too many misconceptions generated by the media that people are afraid of witches and don’t truly understand what witches believe.
For example, Szymanski and Allocca said a common misconception is the popular image of a wicked witch who uses magic to hurt people.
Szymanski said other myths include, “that we cast spells to do evil and that we hex people and curse people.”
“We are not evil," Allocca says. "We try to live our lives for the good because we believe whatever we put out comes back to us now, in this life, as we are now and we live with it and have to deal with the consequences pretty much immediately. Instead of being if I am a bad person in this life I’m going to go hell, if I’m a bad person in this life I’m going to have bad problems in this life. So we try to live for the good so that way good things happen to us.”
Szymanski said they believe in Karma.
“The basic premise is our faith is you harm none, do what you will," she says. "We don’t do things to hurt people. We believe whatever you do comes back to you threefold and therefore we are responsible for our actions and if what we do is no good it’s going to come to come back on us so, you know, the more good you can put out the more good is going to come back."
Both said witches do magic and they cast spells, but not the sort you see on television.
“We do spells but those spells is just a way of raising and manipulating energy,” explained Szymanski. “Kind of like a prayer it’s no different than going to church and lighting a candle and saying what your intent is and asking God to help you. Spellwork is not all that different.”
Allocca described it this way.
“Magic and spells are prayers," she said. "When you go to the Catholic Church you light a candle and say a prayer, all it is is asking the universe, in that case God, to bring something into your life that you want, that’s all a spell is. I burn some incense, I light a candle, I focus on what I want to bring into my life or what I want to get rid of, whether it is bringing in a good habit or getting rid of a bad one. Making myself less afraid and being able to stand up for myself if I need to, things like that. Everything I do is on myself and don’t do any kind of magic on anyone else because I am the only person that I can affect change on. “
Szymanski said some spells are also cast to improve health too.
"I’m personally a Reiki master, a lot of witches are very learned on herbal medicine and things like that so healing is a big part of it," said Szymanski.
We sat down with both Szymanski and Allocca and transcribed additional sections of their interviews for you to read on the next page:
