History of Wicca in Canada - Timeline

This was the timeline that accompanied my articles published in 2008. I'd love to update it. If you have significant dates that you feel should be included, please leave me a comment with details.

• 1959: It is believed that Wicca comes to Canada through a Gardner initiate (Dayonis)
• 1960s: Roy Blunden, one of Gardner's Initiates (1960) emigrates to Canada and settles in southern BC
• 1972: Alexandrian Coven in Vancouver, BC, goes public (Sion Davies)
• 1972: Public coven in Victoria BC Mark Fedoruk (later Lion-Serpent Sun)
• 1973: Public ‘flame war’ in Green Egg magazine among Toronto-area Wiccans and Pagans; as well as a public debate about homosexuals in Wicca with Toronto HP Roy Dymond as a leading opponent
• 1979: Founding of Wiccan Church of Canada in Toronto
• 1981: Wiccan Church of Canada receives pastoral rights from Corrections Canada
• 1982: WiccanFest, Canada’s oldest Pagan festival, founded north of Toronto
• 1986: Charles Arnold wins the right to take Beltaine as a paid religious holiday in the Ontario courts
• 1987: Founding of BC Witchcamp
• 1988: Kim M. of Winnipeg, MB, becomes the first declared Wiccan in the Canadian Military
• 1988: Lion-Serpent Sun libel suit versus David Maines and 100 Huntley Street 1988 
• 1988: Publication of Kate Sandilands study of Wicca and Neopaganism in Canada
• 1989: Kaleidoscope Gathering, Canada’s largest Pagan festival, founded in Eastern Ontario
• 1989: Publication of the Law Enforcement Guide to Wicca by Canadian police officer Kerr Cuhulain
• 1992: Calgary court overturns decision to deny visiting rights to Wiccan George Gay because of his involvement in witchcraft.
• Date?: Temple of the Lady in BC is the first Pagan organization to get “Marrying rights”
• 1994: Human Right grievance, religious discrimination, against the BC NDP filed by Sam Wagar (settled out of court). 
• 1997: First National Pagan Census administered by sociologist Sian Reid
• Date?: Canadian Military Chaplaincy Handbook includes Wicca
• 2000: First festival in Alberta (maybe prairies), Panfest, founded
• 2000: Canada’s first Pagan Resource Centre, the Montreal Pagan Resource Centre, founded
• 2005: Gaia Gathering, Canada’s National Pagan Conference holds its first annual gathering in Edmonton, AB
• 2007: Wiccan ritual performed on the Canadian military base in Khandahar Afghanistan

History of Wicca in Canada - Rights

It is fairly easy for us to learn about the history of the Wicca and contemporary Paganism in the United Kingdom and the United States through books and scholarly articles originally published in those countries. It requires a bit more digging to discover the history in Canada. Only one book, Witches and Pagans and Magic in the New Age, written by a non-Pagan journalist (Kevin Marron) really exists; and it is out of print. This article, the second in a series that traces some of the roots of Wicca in Canada, was originally published in the magazine WynterGreene in 2008. It relies primarily on interviews and newspaper clippings. The first part of this article looked at some of the early figures of Wicca in Canada. This second segment looks at Wicca in the Canadian courts and public opinion.

Part II – Rights

Marie Joséphine Corriveau. In 1763 she was the first woman to be tried and found guilty of Witchcraft in Canada by the military courts after New France fell to the British. She was suspected of at least one other murder, before being convicted for the death of her husband. After her execution her body was left to rot in a cage at the crossroads to the city. It is believed that her trial was as much political as it was about la sorcellerie. This was not the only witchcraft conviction in early Canada, but it is believed to be the first.

But Wicca is not the witchcraft of La Nouvelle France. When Wicca started to arrive and be openly practiced in Canada in the 1960s through to the early 1980s, there was very little distinction between the different kinds of Wicca. Craft was simply Craft. Initiates recognised each other through shared ritual ‘markers,’ and it was not uncommon for an Alexandrian, Gardnerian or other High Priest or Priestess to borrow a partner to perform ritual or initiations if no one else was available. Wicca was also much less distinguished from Satanism and other form of witchcraft that it is these days. This is quite evident from a couple of highly publicised court cases of the time.

Perhaps the best-known court case is the libel charge that Lion-Serpent Sun brought against David Maines and the evangelical television program 100 Huntley Street in 1988. Four years earlier, the show had aired an interview in which Pentecostal minister Len Olson told the tale of how he found Jesus: He claimed that in 1972, Mark Fedoruk (now Lion-Serpent Sun) had tried to kill him and his wife during a satanic ritual in Victoria, BC. Sun sued. His version of events was that in 1972 he was practicing Wicca, not Satanism, and that on the night in question Olson had smoked a significant amount of pot following a ritual and simply had a ‘bad trip.’

The case offered Canadians a fascinating, if somewhat slanted, look into the beliefs and practices of witchcraft in BC in 1972, as well as at the time of the trial. Among the evidence presented was Sun’s own Book of Shadows. As well, during the testimony of Gary Gage-Cole, a coven-mate of Sun’s, a photograph of the ritual room on the night in question was brought into evidence. The room had a pentacle with symbols around it painted onto the floor. During his testimony, Cole explained that the symbols in the darker shaded ring between the inner and outer circles were Hebrew letters that stand for names of God, but also are symbols of fire, water, wind and earth. He also said that some of the symbols were for angels and bats, or devils. “It's a balance, or a blending of opposites. As with everything in life, there is a duality,” he testified.

Several prominent BC witches also testified at the case, including Jean Kozocari and Robin Skelton, a professor of English at the University of Victoria. Skelton was the first witness in the trial to refuse to take his court oath on a bible, suggesting it would be inappropriate. After 15 hours of deliberation over two days, the jury decided that Sun did not attempt a human sacrifice, but that it was also substantially true that Sun was a Satanist. With their verdict, hey awarded Sun $10,000 in damages, plus court costs to be paid by the 100 Huntley Street. The verdict was both a victory and defeat for Sun, who said after the trial, “I do resent being called a Satanist in the sense that it's been explained in so many ways as being such a negative thing. […] I find that difficult.'' Later, a judge over-ruled the jury’s awarding of damages and ordered that since there was “divided success” on the allegations of libel, that the costs be split between to two parties. This was a decision that ultimately left Sun out-of-pocket financially.

Elsewhere in Canada, courts were busy trying to decide if Wicca was a religion. In 1986 Charles Arnold, with the support of the Ontario Public Service Employees Union, filed a grievance against the Ontario Labour Relations Board. Active in the Wiccan Chuch of Canada, and an initiate of several traditions, Arnold was employed as a secretary at Humber College in Toronto. In April 1986 he put in a request to take Beltaine off work as a paid religious holiday. The request was denied on the grounds that Wicca was merely an excuse for “frivolous and morally-questionable acts.” The case went to arbitration in 1987 and Arnold won his case. In its ruling, the court stated that “Wicca is obviously a religion,” and in so doing set the first tangible precedent of a government body in Canada recognising Wicca as a legitimate religion.

A similar challenge in Calgary in 1992 involving visiting rights in a custody battle also put Wicca on the centre pedestal. In a court hearing, George Gay was denied visiting rights with his son because he was “involved in black magic”. In his appeal, Gay admitted to practicing Wicca, which he described as a religion involving worship of nature and pagan deities. Testifying on behalf of the defence, Rev. Paul W. Newman of the Toronto office of the United Church of Canada's Division of World Outreach, said in a letter of support, "I wish to testify the Wiccan religion is an authentic, respectable religion that works for the health and well-being of its followers." Gay won the appeal his visitation rights were restored. In their ruling, the Alberta Supreme Court said that religion could not be considered a factor in deciding custody of a child. This ruling is one of many that solidifies that ultimately it is behaviour rather than belief that is important to the Canadian courts.¹

A couple of years later in BC, Wicca was once again publicly challenged. In 1994, Sam Wagar had won the nomination as the provincial New Democratic Party candidate for Abbotsford, in BC’s ‘bible belt.’ His nomination was later challenged on the basis that he was a witch and that he failed to declare this during the nomination process. Wagar had been quite visible as a public witch for over 15 years and felt that his religion was irrelevant to the nomination. He agreed to a second nomination race, but lost. Wagar filed a human rights complaint against the BC NDP on the grounds of religious discrimination. The case was settled out of court. It also appears to be last time that Wicca has been publicly challenged I the court or in the media.

While some Wiccans and witches were busy defending their rights and freedoms in the courts, other individuals were using the power of networking and the written word to take a more pro-active approach to securing acceptance for their religion.

Not long after the Lion-Serpent Sun and Charles Arnold trials, the The Law Enforcement Guide to Wicca by Canadian Wiccan policeman, Kerr Cuhulain was published in 1989. This book was “an important Canadian first step towards normalising relationships between Pagans and the police,” according to Professor Lucie Dufresne of the University of Ottawa. It has also become a classic text and widely distributed around the world in many languages. Cuhulain also founded the Wiccan Information Network (WIN) in 1989 to help counter the negative public perception of witchcraft, after having become involved a few years’ earlier with the Witches’ League for Public Awareness. It is believed that he is the first police officer to come out of the broom closet.

In 1994 the Pagan Federation Paienne Canada was founded as a multitraditional organization to “protect and promote the reputation of Pagans and Paganism in Canada.” It later incorporated in 1997 as federal nonprofit organization. Over the years the PFPC has provided Federal and Provincial governments with an understanding of contemporary Pagan religions, and been instrumental in getting Wicca and other Pagan paths included in the Canadian Military Chaplaincy handbook, as well as initiating chaplaincy programs in a variety prisons and hospitals. They have also been advocating for a repeal of the witchcraft law, which still exists in the Criminal Code of Canada (section 365).

These cases, as well as the efforts of many others too numerous to mention in this brief article, have opened the doors to the acceptance of Wicca as an almost mainstream religion in Canada. Wicca is currently one of the religions listed in the Canadian Military Chaplaincy Handbook, and indeed, earlier this year a Canadian military chaplain gave permission for a Wiccan Ostara celebration to be held outside the Christian Fellowship Centre at the NATO base in Kandahar, Afghanistan. One Canadian and six American Wiccans participated. Wiccan clergy have been allowed to visit Canadian prisons since 1981 to offer pastoral care to inmates, and several Wiccan or Neo-Pagan temples in BC have managed to meet the requirements for religious establishments, complete with ‘marrying rights;’ although attempts in other provinces have met with much less success.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS: I am also enormously grateful to everyone who took the time to answer my questions and share their stories. I am especially indebted to Castalia, Hawk, Richard James, Shelley Rabinovitch, and Sam Wagar for their help with this article series. These articles would not have been possible without their patience and time spent with me in person or online, or the valuable resources and contacts they provided.

Endnotes: 1. In Canada, religion is a freedom and cannot be contested in court. However, religion cannot be an excuse for behaviour that is excessive, dangerous or contrary to Canadian laws. (Lucie DuFresne. Lecture on Religious Rights in Canada, Gaia Gathering, 2007.)

History of Wicca in Canada

I realised recently that since WynterGreene is no longer in existence and its website no longer exists, that this series of articles that I wrote in 2008 are no longer available anywhere except in print. I think that they are worth re-publishing here to make them accessible. Please note that this work is copyrighted. I earn my living as a writer. I'm happy if you post a link to the article, or quote from it with credit. But please do not reblog it or republish it in its entirity without getting in touch with me first.

A Web in the Weaving: A Brief History of Wicca in Canada

It is fairly easy for us to learn about the history of the Wicca and contemporary Paganism in the United Kingdom and the United States through books like Triumph of the Moon (Ronald Hutton), Drawing Down the Moon (Margot Adler) and, most recently, Her Hidden Children (Chas Clifton). It requires a bit more digging to discover the history in Canada. Only one book, Witches and Pagans and Magic in the New Age, written by a non-Pagan journalist (Kevin Marron) really exists; and it is out of print. This article, to be published in two parts, aims to trace some of the roots of Wicca in Canada, as well as its history and growth. It relies primarily on interviews and newspaper clippings. The first part of this article looks at some of the early figures of Wicca in Canada.

In the late sixties and during the seventies, a series of ‘Wicca seeds’ were planted across the country from various sources—including initiates of Gerald Gardner, Maxine Sanders and the Farrars who emigrated to Canada, bringing their Craft with them, as well as influences and initiates from the United States. In some cases these seeds grew into practicing groups and covens, who later came into contact with each other through similar interests, early Pagan magazines or occult shops; and eventually some of these groups or individuals became more public. These are some of the seeds.

Part I - The Early Years

Gardnerian Wicca arrived in Canada quite early, possibly even prior to its arrival in the U.S via Raymond Buckland.

Originally from the Isle of Man, Jim Davies was initiated into the Craft by Gerald Gardner and his High Priestess, D.P., in 1960.[i] He later emigrated to Canada settled in Toronto. A talented custom machinist by training, Davies was known for his ability to create some fine Craft tools.[ii] Reports of his impact on the early Craft scene in Toronto are varied. By some accounts, it is through Davies that many seekers were introduced to Gardnerian practice;[iii] others describe him as a bit of a “lone wolf” with few initiates.[iv] In the early 1980s, Davies initiated an Italian woman, Raven, and for a short while in 1983 they ran an occult shop called “The Witchy Shop” on Harbord Street.[v] He remained visible on the scene for some time after the store closed. Davies died in the early 1990s.

Another initiate of Gardnerian Wicca who emigrated to Canada was Roy Blunden. His first encounter with Wica was in 1954 when he picked up a copy of Gardner’s Witchcraft Today. It was another five years before Blunden was able to find a coven practicing in London, England, through a chance encounter in an occult bookstore. In the 1960s, Blunden brought his style of Wicca to the west coast, where he led a quiet life practicing as a solitary as well as belonging to various covens. A geoscientist, Blunden describes his approach to Wicca as pragmatic. He is also fascinated by “the complex symbolism used to express Wicca as a transcendental religious faith,”[vi] and has spent close to 50 years exploring this in depth. Along with his wife, an American initiate, he taught and initiated many students.[vii]

If Gardnerian witches in Canada remained true to the epithet ‘her hidden children,’ Alexandrian Craft was much less hidden. Public Alexandrian witches and covens were well known in Vancouver, Toronto, and possibly Halifax.

Sion Davies was a very public witch in British Columbia who claimed Alexandrian initiation by the Farrars in Ireland. He was a merchant seaman with a broad Irish accent and a penchant for the “spooky side of things.”[viii] Davies ran a public coven in the early 1970s in Victoria, and was in the news a few times during that period. He also held public rituals: A bit of publicity in The Georgia Straight, a well-known Vancouver weekly newspaper, (date unknown) invited the Vancouver public to join “witches and warlocks from the Vancouver area” to “celebrate a Black Mass at midnight” in Stanley Park in honour of Hallowe’en. Other bits of publicity included discharging lingering spirits from haunted houses.[ix] By 1981 his approach to publicity had softened somewhat. In an interview with The Ubyssey,[x] he described as being “bothered by the lack of distinction between witches and satanists, [sic]” and cautioning that many symbols used by stereotypical Satanists actually come from the Wiccan faith. He is also quoted as saying  in 1981 that “All environmentalists are actually Wiccans who aren’t initiated, because anybody who cares about mother nature is a witch.” These days Sion Davies maintains a low profile, but he still runs a coven near Mission, B.C., where he has lived for the past 20 years.[xi]

Meanwhile, in the Toronto area, Roy Diamond, also known as “Cock Robin” or “Rob Roy” was the early Canadian face of Alexandrian Wicca.[xii] Originally an initiate of the Long Island (Buckland) Gardnerian line,[xiii] he later took an Alexandrian initiation and is better known as the ‘grand-daddy’ of most of the early Alexandrian initiates in the area.[xiv] It is believed that he took this third degree with Maxine Sanders herself.[xv] Dymond was not media shy and an article about him is said to have appeared in MacLean’s magazine in the 1960s. [xvi] He also had very strong traditional beliefs, one of which was chronicled quite well in a ‘Witch War’ that took place in the Green Egg magazine in 1973. A traditionalist, Dymond believed that homosexuality had no place in a fertility-based religion,[xvii] which was not an uncommon stance at the time.  Many traditionalists perceived Wicca as a fertility religion requiring polarity and not necessarily a nature religion.[xviii]  Dymond remained well-known and active on the Toronto Pagan scene until his death in 1983 or 1984.[xix]

Other traditions of witchcraft also play a key role in the history of Wicca in Canada. Jean Kozocari was a hereditary witch living in British Columbia who claims that she can trace her family’s witchcraft roots back to 1443. She was initiated by her grandfather at age 16, and sent her to study with a “teacher who had been a stockbroker with a seat on the Toronto Stock Exchange.”[xx] Witchcraft, she says, remained quite underground until the 1960s and 1970s when “more liberal thinking allowed her to come out of the broom closet.”[xxi] Kozocari, no stranger to being interviewed about witchcraft, was called as an expert witness during a B.C. Supreme Court libel hearing brought against the evangelical television show 100 Huntley Street by Wiccan and Gnostic priest Lion-Serpent Sun in 1988.[xxii] Four years earlier the show aired a segment where Pentecostal minister Len Olsen told how he had found Jesus after attending a ritual in 1972 where Sun (then Mark Fedoruk) tried to kill him as a sacrifice to Satan. Sun sued 100 Huntley Street for libel.[xxiii] During the trial Kozacari testified that witches must come ‘out of the closet and say that we don’t worship Satan,” and that there is a lot of “garbage about witches” in the popular culture and media. [xxiv] "We are the only people still judged by Mother Goose and Walt Disney fairy tale standards," she said.[xxv] She spoke of the Wiccan Rede, expressed as "And it harm none - do what thou will," and said that Wiccans believe that “all gods are one - we just have a different view about him, her or it. It doesn't matter what name we use. We could call it Ralph." [xxvi] Kozacari currently lives a quiet life in Victoria.[xxvii]

One of Kozacari’s initiates was well-known Canadian poet Robin Skelton. Also known as “Canada’s Merlin,” Skelton was a very public witch and the founder of the creative writing program at the University of Victoria. He was also a professor within the department. Skelton was initiated by Kozacari in 1981,[xxviii] and at the time of his death in 1997 was generally considered an elder of BC neo-Paganism.[xxix] He was also known as a local ‘ghost-buster’ and regularly performed ritual cleansing of houses, ridding them of spiritual disturbances. Together with Kozacari, he authoured a book on the topic called A Gathering of Ghosts. A prolific writer, Skelton published several books on magic and witchcraft as well as over 70 volumes on other topics, ranging from “poetry to criticism, from short stories to Greek translations,” during his lifetime.[xxx] He was described in the media as “peering out at the world from the midst of a majestic and unruly mane of grey hair and beard,”[xxxi] and by his daughter following his death as “dramatic, […] often wearing a black turtleneck and sometimes a black hat.”[xxxii] He was certainly one of the most recognizable faces of contemporary Paganism in Canada.

In 1979, Richard and Tamarra James moved to Toronto from New York. They quickly opened the “Occult Shop” and became quite active on the Toronto Pagan scene. Shortly afterwards, they incorporated the Wiccan Church of Canada (WCC) to be a public face of Wicca as opposed to the less open coven structure that was prevalent at the time. It was also hoped that a bit of public structure would give Wicca a legitimacy in the eyes of the public and give Wiccans ‘rights’ afforded other religions.[xxxiii], [xxxiv] Richard James now says that the name was a mistake, but at the time it seemed appropriate.[xxxv] In addition to the classes offered by the WCC, the James’ maintained a small coven. As the coven grew and hived off into smaller groups, a completely home-grown Canadian Wiccan tradition, the Odyssean tradition, was born. The name Odyssean is in recognition of the individual spiritual journal or odyssey, which is different for every initiate. Also, through the James, Toronto is also the official home for many of the artefacts from Gardner’s museum of witchcraft, including his original Books of Shadow, which they purchased from Ripley’s museum in 1987.[xxxvi] The documents are available to initiates and scholars to view.

These are not the only people who were practicing or teaching the Craft during the early years of Wicca in Canada. There were covens in Halifax, Montreal and Ottawa; and probably in other cities and communities across the country. This is only a small slice of our national Wiccan, and NeoPagan, story. I regret that I did not have the space in this article to touch on more of the individuals and groups that have played a part in our history. I hope to be able to explore their contributions in later articles. In the meanwhile, stay tuned for part II of this article: Rights.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS: I am also enormously grateful to everyone who took the time to answer my questions and share their stories. I am especially indebted to Castalia, Hawk, Richard James, Shelley Rabinovitch, and Sam Wagar for their help with this article. This article would not have been possible without their patience and time spent with me in person or online, or the valuable resources and contacts they provided.

---

[i] www.thewica.co.uk/wica/wica.htm Accessed April, 2007.

[ii] Richard James, interview at Gaia Gathering, May 21, 2007.

[iii] Rabinovitch, personal correspondence.

[iv] Richard James, interview at Gaia Gathering, May 21, 2007.

[v] Richard James, interview at Gaia Gathering, May 21, 2007.

[vi] http://www.wiccanweb.ca/wiki/index.php/Roy_Blunden. Accessed April 2007.

[vii] Paragraph adapted from http://www.wiccanweb.ca/wiki/index.php/Roy_Blunden. Accessed April 2007.

[viii] Sam Wagar, personal correspondence, May 11, 2007.

[ix] Georgia Straight, date unknown; received from Sam Wagar.

[x] The Ubyssey, Friday October 30, 1981.

[xi] Sam Wagar, personal correspondence.

[xii] Shelley Rabinovitch, personal communication.

[xiii] Castalia, interview at Gaia Gathering on May 20, 2007.

[xiv] This changed in the late 1990s, when another line of Alexandrians came to South Western Ontario via the United States, and started initiating students in their own line, and hiving off covens. (Castalia, interview at Gaia Gathering on May 20, 2007)

[xv] Castalia, interview at Gaia Gathering on May 20, 2007.

[xvi] Rabinovitch, MA thesis and  personal correspondence.

[xvii] Green Egg, 1973.

[xviii] For Wicca as a fertility religion versus nature religion, see Chas Clifton. Her Hidden Children.

[xix] Richard James, interview at Gaia Gathering, May 21, 2007; Castalia, interview at Gaia Gathering, May 20, 2007.

[xx] History of witchcraft told by expert witness. The Vancouver Sun, June 15, 1988. pg A10.

[xxi] Rabinovitch and Lewis, p141.

[xxii] History of witchcraft told by expert witness. The Vancouver Sun, June 15, 1988. pg A10.

[xxiii] See part II of this article for more on this trial.

[xxiv] History of witchcraft told by expert witness. The Vancouver Sun, June 15, 1988. pg A10.

[xxv] Witches not devilish, trial told. The Vancouver Sun, June 16, 1988. pg E15.

[xxvi] Witches not devilish, trial told. The Vancouver Sun, June 16, 1988. pg E15.

[xxvii] Rabinovitch and Lewis, p141.

[xxviii] TV preacher names 3 more as Satanists. The Vancouver Sun. June 30, 1988. pg. A17.

[xxix] Rabinovitch and Lewis, p251.

[xxx] The problem with ghosts? -- they think they're alive; Witches give advice. The Vancouver Sun. September 8, 1989. pg. G4.

[xxxi] The problem with ghosts? -- they think they're alive; Witches give advice. The Vancouver Sun. September 8, 1989. pg. G4.

[xxxii] Remembering poet Robin Skelton as only a daughter can. The Vancouver Sun. Vancouver, B.C.: Aug 30, 1997. pg. B3.

[xxxiii] Richard James, interview at Gaia Gathering, May 21, 2007.

[xxxiv] Note, in Canada, religion is a freedom not a right. All religions are ‘legitimate’ in Canada. The practices of a religion, however, must conform to Canadian law.

[xxxv] Richard James, comment made during a panel of church models for NeoPagans at Gaia Gathering 2007.

[xxxvi] http://www.sacred-texts.com/bos/bos324.htm. Accessed May 22, 2007.