Wiccan Theology Through a Queer Lens

5-Week Intensive Syllabus

Course Description

This graduate seminar examines the theological foundations of Wiccan practice through the analytical frameworks of queer theory and queer theology. Students will interrogate how Wicca’s theological structures—its cosmology, ritual praxis, ethics, and embodied spirituality—resist, subvert, and reimagine Western religious assumptions about gender, sexuality, divinity, and the sacred body. Using Scott Cunningham’s Wicca: A Guide for the Solitary Practitioner as our primary theological text and Gerard Loughlin’s Queer Theology: Rethinking the Western Body as our methodological lens, we will explore how Wiccan theology functions as an inherently queer religious system that decentralizes patriarchal authority, honors polymorphous divinity, and sacralizes the body as a site of revelation rather than shame.

Prerequisites: Graduate standing in Religious Studies, Divinity, Gender Studies, or permission of instructor.

---

Required Texts

• Cunningham, Scott.Wicca: A Guide for the Solitary Practitioner. Llewellyn Publications, 1988.
• Loughlin, Gerard (ed.).Queer Theology: Rethinking the Western Body. Blackwell Publishing, 2007.

---

Course Objectives

By the end of this seminar, students will be able to:

1. Articulate the core theological tenets of Wicca as a modern pagan religious system
2. Apply queer theological methodologies to non-Christian religious traditions
3. Analyze how Wiccan cosmology challenges binary gender constructs in Western theology
4. Evaluate the role of embodied ritual as queer theological praxis
5. Construct original arguments about the intersection of nature-based spirituality and queer identity formation

Assignments & Assessment

Weekly Response Papers (40%)

500-word critical reflections due before each session, engaging one primary text, one secondary text, and one multimedia resource.

Midterm Essay (25%)

1,000-word essay due Week 3: “The Body as Theological Text in Wicca” — comparative analysis using Cunningham and Loughlin.

Final Project (35%)

1,500-word research paper ocreative theological project (ritual with 2,000-word theological exegesis). Must engage both primary texts and at least three secondary sources.

Instructor Notes

The student should be prepared to address the following tensions:

1. Cunningham’s heteronormative language: The 1988 text occasionally assumes a heterosexual, cisgender practitioner. This is itself a site of queer critique.
   
2. Loughlin’s Christian focus: Most essays in Queer Theology address Christian contexts. Students must be guided to extrapolate methodologically rather than assume parallel theological content.
   
3. Cultural appropriation: Wicca’s relationship to indigenous spiritualities (particularly regarding shamanism and the inclusion of living traditions) requires critical examination.