tarot and guilt

Thread originally posted on the Aeclectic Tarot Forum on 13 Jan 2003, and now archived in the Forum Library.

le-mat	13 Jan 2003
hi first of all i want to introduce myself since i'm new in this forum. my name is Pablo, i'm 18 and i have been reading/learning the tarot for about a year. i went to a catholic school, and have always been a catholic christian until 2 years ago, when something just clicked inside me. i realized i was a catholic cause my parents were catholic and that was it. i changed my way of life completely, i started believing i was here on Earth to be happy and not only to serve others, and started to have a pagan-like approach to life. a few months after the "click" tarot came to me; i wasn't looking for it, i think the Universe put it in my way. after a year of reading i found that a part of me feels that using tarot or any form of divination is some kind of sin. you know, i have always been told that divination, magick, and stuff like that are sinful, and that god hates them. i realized this cause a part of me felt like a weird sensation when i read the post about teaching tarot to children. it's like there is a little catholic person inside me and he is telling me tarot is wrong, and that is not right to teach it to children. from my little experiencie with tarot i can say the cards are a wonderful tool to help people and yourself, but a part of me doesn't still accept them as a way of life. i want to know how could i get rid of this sort of "guilt" i feel, can i use affirmations or visualizations? i think the people who hides the cards from friends/family also have a guilty feeling. that's why a wrote this message, so people with the same problem could free themselves from the conditioning of a society which sometimes rejects tarot.

cuddles	13 Jan 2003
wow...not sure i can be of much help as i did not have a religious upbringing and it's never been a part of my life so i can't really understand the hold it has on you. but i do know when i am struggling with feelings like this i need to examine them closely. in this case, do you know what specifically the church objects to? what is it about tarot cards that would make them bad? it's hard to sort out your own feelings until you understand the reasons for their objection and can then decide whether or not it makes sense to you and your life. whether or not you need to take their objections seriously. i'm sure there are many people here with many thoughts on this subject. i hope you find your answer :-)

le-mat	13 Jan 2003
the catholic church says divination and magick are wrong but for no particular reason. i have a friend, his father is a priest, and he actually told me i had the demon inside me. when i asked why did he think that practicing magick was wrong he answered "do you think God likes magick?" i don't know if it sounds in english as it sound in spanish, but it is their way of making you feel guilty about what you do. if the Bible says it's wrong, they say it's wrong too. (nevertheless i know that many (true) catholics -even priests- are involved in mysthicism and occult practices.) thanks for your answer

cuddles	13 Jan 2003
sounds a lot like "because i said so" and scare tactics. but i can understand that when you have been raised to believe something it's very hard to let it go. and telling you it doesn't make sense doesn't really help that much. again, i hope someone has something to share that will help :-)

zorya	13 Jan 2003
welcome le-mat :D i think it's likely that the more you learn and the more you educate yourself about tarot, the more your guilt feelings will lessen. spend much time here at all, and you will soon discover that tarot readers are loving, caring people. there is a deck called the connolly deck, that you may find is more comfortable for you to start with. the devil card is called materialism, and has no devil image. death is called transformation. many christian readers find this deck to be comfortable for them. here is a link for the connolly; http://www.aeclectic.net/tarot/connolly/index.html funny how so many tarot readers started out as catholics.

Alex	14 Jan 2003
Pablo, Parental and religious conditioning are very difficult to get rid of. I grew up hearing that divorce is a sin (there was no divorce in Brazil until early 80's, via catholic church) and I have happened to divorce one day. Guess what: I don't feel very confortable with it either. The more information and contact with the subject matter you have, the easier it will be for you. Real knowledge will substitute the prejudice you were taught... God doesn't like magik? That sounds more like a joke. God has created magik. Alex. Quote: Originally posted by le-mat after a year of reading i found that a part of me feels that using tarot or any form of divination is some kind of sin. you know, i have always been told that divination, magick, and stuff like that are sinful, and that god hates them. i realized this cause a part of me felt like a weird sensation when i read the post about teaching tarot to children. it's like there is a little catholic person inside me and he is telling me tarot is wrong, and that is not right to teach it to children.

HudsonGray	14 Jan 2003
Being a former Catholic myself, I can verify that there'll be a LOT of stuff that the guilt will show up in, at various points in your life. They do an excellent job of sticking that into your thinking & it'll take years to root it all out. It's what the religion revolves around, in a lot of ways--guilt over the first sin (that Adam & Eve did & that WE have no way of getting out of, for instance), guilt over sex before marriage, over ANY sex in fact, guilt here & guilt there. Tarot is a connection to your inner mind or, as some think, to a higher plane. If it's a higher plane, then there are angels there & your connection is with them. If it's a connection to your inner mind, it's to your instinct & subconscious, which see & remember a lot more than your conscious mind does, so I see no connection to the devil in either one. Pagans don't believe in a devil anyways (another guilt to drop!). There's good & bad & everything in balance, but no devil as a direct opposite of the god/goddess. Drop the guilt, there's no need for it with tarot. Tarot isn't mentioned in the bible anyway, so it's something that was added during the Middle Ages. The Inquisition didn't include tarot cards on the list of proscribed items (feathers & sheepskins were signs of consorting with devils though, go figure). Probably because it was the upper classes who were playing with Tarot at that time & the church didn't want to pull their funding out from under them by targeting the rich. Rest easy that it's not something you need to be feeling guilty of doing. (And after all, there are SEVERAL tarot decks based on saints & angels. Makes you think.)

jamesriouxctm	14 Jan 2003
Le-mat, As a Catholic myself I've wrestled with many of the questions you've had, not so much to assuage my own guilt (of which there is none... thanks to my scientific training I consider myself fairly adept at seeing past brainwashing) but to help convince others that I am not in fact going to hell. Consider that the ancient Hebrew priests - i.e. "God's Chosen" - used divinatory stones (called Umim and Thumim, I believe) to ascertain the will of God. They certainly didn't go to hell. Consider that both Joseph and Daniel were interpreters of dreams, a distinction that today usually borders on the "occult". Neither of them went to hell. Consider that the apostles drew lots after the death/suicide of Judas to determine who would replace him. I don't think any of them went to hell for that. The way I look at things, whenever you do something that will help bring the presence of Jesus to the world, you are doing the right thing and need not feel guilty about it. This applies to far more than just the Tarot, as you can probably imagine. The only true sin is when we fail to love others, love God, and love ourselves. Everything else is a special case of this, or a lie. Let me know if any of that was helpful to you.

paradoxx	18 Jan 2003
stichomancy-the divinitory act of using a book to analyize information for current events in ones life. I use the tarot and teh bible (although stored and used seperetly due to conflicting energies). That aside, the Catholic Church where i live has the phone number of 3666, unusual and strange for a christian, especialy(i think)a catholic church to have a christain based perversity integrated into their facility.

lunalafey	18 Jan 2003
Quote: Originally posted by jamesriouxctm The only true sin is when we fail to love others, love God, and love ourselves. Everything else is a special case of this, or a lie. perfectly short and to the point...... Everyone takes God's word in a different way, God's word, not someone elses. Everyone needs to have faith in some form, but if a belief causes guilt when doing something harmless....I would begin to question that...which is what you are doing. Tarot readers come from all walks of life, seeking peace with help from our faith and our cards.

divinerguy	18 Jan 2003
Dear Le Mat, What if its God's will that you read the Tarot? Wouuld it not be a sin to avoid it, if it has been preordained by God? Who knows, you may be God's next prophet.

Insomnia Turtle	18 Jan 2003
Hello le-mat, Could it possibly be that the guilt doesn't really lie in the fact that you use Tarot Cards, but more around what your parents feel about it (or, in the case of a closent user, what they would feel about it)? I know how you feel as I was raised to be the best catholic I could be. My mother made me attend church every sunday, as well as the occasional wednesday and saturday to get a good double dose of god. We had "bible study time" every night where she would read a section of the bible and make me and my sister take a written quiz to make sure we were paying attention and learning the "right" way. Because I asked too many "un-catholic" questions, she also enrolled me in two "after school" programs (both which ran once a week), one which involved a nun and a group of people my age who studied the Bible, the Catholic faith, and how it related to the world today and the other being a one-on-one session with the head father of the local Catholic church. Sounds a bit overboard? Well, I don't really blame her. Unlike my sister, I had a very questioning mind, and she truly felt that I was born with some demon inside of me tricking me into hell and it was her duty as a mother to save my soul. Despite the fact she put me through all of this, I care alot about my mother and I know that she did it because she really cared about me. However, though I retained my own views of the world, I did have the "Fear of Mother" lingering in the back of my mind. Everything I did was always accompanied by a little voice inside my head saying "Your mom would not approve of this". If this is what is causing your guilt, you might want to try telling your parents about your Tarot Cards and why you use them. They may get upset, they might even disown you (I've been disowned 5 times already, so if they do say something like that, it's probably just in a fit of anger and I wouldn't take it too seriously), but it could help.

Osher	18 Jan 2003
I am Jewish, and although not observant, I find myself to be religeous. Ironically, it partly via tarot that I came to this. You see, something it controlling tarot. However, when I have consulted my religeous friends they have said I should stop the tarot. When I asked why they couldn't come up with clear answers, just that it felt wrong. I did much thinking, and realised that religeon sees tarot as a threat. I suppose fear that we might see tarot as a religeon in it's own right is possible? I said to my religeous friends that God has given me a gift. Sometimes I wake up from dreams, that then come true. I never asked for this, but it happened. Tarot is for me a conduit to help me use my gifts. I think so long as you see tarot as being complementary to religeon, or even (in my case) strengthing it, then there is no need to feel guilt.

le-mat	22 Jan 2003
thanks to all of you for answering, it was really helpful. i just wanna make clear that i do not believe in god or in a similar diety, i do not believe in sin. so if i don't believe in sin, i shouldn't have guilty feelings. but i guess that what you're told as a kid is like the absolute truth to you. anyways, being in touch with you really helps, since you're all so "eclectic". peace

Kiama	23 Jan 2003
Quote: Originally posted by le-mat thanks to all of you for answering, it was really helpful. i just wanna make clear that i do not believe in god or in a similar diety, i do not believe in sin. so if i don't believe in sin, i shouldn't have guilty feelings. but i guess that what you're told as a kid is like the absolute truth to you. Firstly, welcome to the forum le-mat, and cool name! Secondly, I know exactly how you feel. I was raised Christian, and through choice became a devout Christian, albeit a very pen-minded one! When I was 9 I began studying Tarot, and all through my life to the age of 13/14 I felt guilt when I read or studied the cards. Not all the time, but every now and then. This feeling only really left me when I got to 15, and by that time I had spent a couple of years studying and practicing Paganism. I am 18 now, and know that the only way to get rid of feeling sof guilt which shouldn't be there, is to let time erode them away. And I agree with tarotlady: They will erod away quicker the more you learn about Tarot! Once again, welcome! :D Kiama

The tarot and guilt thread was originally posted on 13 Jan 2003 in the Talking Tarot board, and is now archived in the Forum Library. Read the active threads in Talking Tarot, or read more archived threads.