Norwich Pagan Sphere exists to raise the bar in Paganism. It seeks to encourage and promote the following.

• Higher standards in scholarly endeavour, ritual practice and crafts.
• Respectable and responsible Paganism.
• Intellectual and academic rigour.

The Sphere is a small, meritocratic group of serious Pagan magicians. Membership is by invitation only, to those whom the members feel would make useful contributions to the Sphere and its work. Meetings involve serious study and serious magical practice.

Norwich Pagan Sphere engages with the Pagan community and wider society by various means, including the following.

• Maintaining a relationship with moots and the Pagan Federation.
• Offering training through Hollystick College.
• Occasional public talks.
• A web-site with well-written and well-researched texts.
• Engagement with the wider community, by membership of Norwich InterFaith Link and other means.
• Other projects in development.

The sphere as a symbol represents the following.

• A holistic approach, reflecting the roundedness and cyclical nature of life.
• The World, the Otherworld, and the celestial orbs: the Sun, the Moon, the Planets, and the other Shining Ones.
• The magical or ritual circle in its full, three-dimensional manifestation.
• A homage to the Sphere Group, which was at the (controversial) cutting edge of the work of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn in its heyday.

Norwich Pagan Sphere seeks to be inclusive in its outlook. Its ritual practice is based upon Natural Magic, Traditional Witchcraft and Ceremonial Magic, but it recognises these forms as structures on which to build ritual space, not rigid boundaries. It honours the Lord and Lady of Norfolk, local manifestations of the Divine Masculine and Feminine, Flint and Chalk, Land and Sky. Again, the Sphere is not constrained by this; it is polytheistic and pantheistic. It also accepts ‘dual observance’, as there is no one, exclusive path to the Mysteries; Christian Saints in particular are honoured.

However, the Sphere’s work is founded upon the Grail and the Green Chapel – the spiritual heart of the place in which we dwell – inspired by the upwelling green energy of the Earth and the brilliant gold energy of the Sun. This is the fundamental polarity on which Earthly magic is based: Light and Dark, Being and Non-being, Fire and Ice… Here stands the primordial magician, shape-shifter, iconoclast and Fool: Merlin, Prometheus, Lucifer…

Into the Grail cauldron at the heart of the Green Chapel flow the streams of wisdom that have been brought, and are still being brought, by the great cultural influences on the Isles of the Wise. We work with these streams to make an integrated whole, so that newer streams can also find a welcome in this land. The ancient great streams are represented by the colours of Sovereignty.

• The Red Stream of the Celtic cultures – the red of the Welsh dragon, and the fiery Irish and Welsh heroes.
• The White Stream of the Germanic cultures – the white of the Saxon dragon, distant lands of snow and ice, and the surf of the North Sea.
• The Black Stream of those cultures that have come from the Mediterranean and beyond – the black of Al Kem and the ink of written traditions.

And there is indeed a newer stream, a Blue stream brought across the oceans over the last half millennium from all those exotic lands across the world explored, colonised and exploited by Europeans - a stream of guilt and shame as much as joy and inspiration.

The Sphere acknowledges the heroes and heroines of this land, such as Boudica, Raedwald, Julian of Norwich and Robert Kett. We also acknowledge our magical ancestors, particularly Doreen Valiente, Robert Cochrane, Dion Fortune, Florence Farr, Moina Bergson Mathers, Maude Gonne, Annie Horniman and William Butler Yeats. Of those now living, we acknowledge our debt to such as Marian Green, Nigel Pennick, John and Caitlin Matthews, Gareth Knight, and Ronald Hutton.

The success of Norwich Pagan Sphere will be measured by its influence on standards within the Pagan community and by its influence on perceptions of the Pagan community in wider society. We dedicate our work, the outpouring of creative energies in intellectual, ritual, craft and artistic activities, to the greater good.

This site and its contents, unless otherwise stated, are copyright © Norwich Pagan Sphere and individual contributors, 2017.