Drifting Out, Spiraling Back Home: Americans’ Motivations for Converting to Paganism

Abstract

The question of why a person leaves one faith and converts to another is far from a simple one. In cases where the convert adopts a non-mainstream religion such as Paganism, the issue becomes potentially more complex. This thesis explores the question of why Americans have adopted Paganism as their chosen faith. It begins by examining what modern-day Paganism is and how it evolved, then provides an overview of the motivating factors behind previous “waves” of conversion during the latter half of the twentieth century. An online study was conducted to explore converts’ motivations—both in earlier periods and especially among those who have converted since the year 2000—and was supplemented by interviews with a selection of survey respondents. The survey and interview results are then combined with the earlier analyses (predominantly based on the research of Margot Adler’s Drawing Down the Moon and the work of Helen Berger et al in Voices from the Pagan Census to derive insights into the motivations behind Pagan conversion and to assess whether those motivations have changed over the decades or maintained a sense of consistency.