St. Andrews Pagan Society Responds
In regards to yesterdays article on St. Andrews’ new policy for Pagan rites on school grounds, former St. Andrews Pagan Society president Victoria (who blogs about books over at Eve’s Alexandria) gives some background and clarification in the comments.
“As an ex-President of the St. Andrews Pagan Society I just wanted to clarify a few things however. For a start this whole bit of news is several years old: we were admitted to the Mansfield Interfaith building back in 2004. This current furore was only sparked by the university’s decision to finally allocate the society an outdoor ritual space (which was used for the first time at Beltaine this year).
Second, the university deserves little credit in the decision making process. The Pagan Society had been fighting an internal battle for equality with them since 1999 and was only admitted to the interfaith building after the Scottish Parliament passed legislation that made it illegal for them to discriminate against religious belief in the work place (the legislation specifically cited Paganism as an example of a misunderstood faith). They were forced to admit us.
During extended negotiations, which involved myself and also representatives from the Pagan Federation, the university chaplain asked us to sign a conditional document in return for access. The conditions are the same as those cited in the Sunday Times article.
The Society refused to agree to the charter (which the newspaper article fails to state) exactly because no other religious society had to sign up to a code of behaviour (other than that associated with the practical use of the building itself). Further to which many of the conditions were based upon misconceptions about Paganism and about the society’s activities. As it was access was guaranteed regardless.
I left the society after my graduation in 2005 and am not certain whether my successor has since signed a charter with the university chaplain.”
I have yet to follow up on whether the society has signed the discriminatory charter the school has drawn up (one hopes not). But what is clear is that St. Andrews has been dragged kicking and screaming into mere tolerance of modern Pagans on campus, and only by threat of legal action. No credit is due to them in this case, and once again we are shown how shoddy the reporting of this issue has been where reporters have overlooked the serious issues of this case in favor of sensationalism.
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