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Materiality, Authority, and Digital Religion: The Case of a Neo-Pagan Forum Giulia Evolvi, Erasmus University RotterdamORCID iD: 0000-0001-6928-5903AbstractThe study of material culture increasingly pays attention to digital religion, but there are certain aspects, such as religious authority, that remain under-researched. Some questions are still open for inquiry: What can a material approach contribute to the understanding of religious authority in digital venues? How can authority be materially displayed on the Internet? This article shows how religious authority is affected by material practices connected with digital media use through the qualitative analysis of a Neo-Pagan forum, The Celtic Connection. Neo-Pagans tend to hold a non-traditional notion of authority, accord great importance to material practices, and extensively use the Internet. The analysis of the forum suggests that Neo-Pagans use digital venues to look for informal sources of authority and strategies to embed materiality in online narratives. The article claims that it is important to develop new frameworks to analyze non-traditional authority figures and new definitions of media that include both physical objects and communication technologies.Keywords digital culture; digital religion; Neo-Paganism; Wicca; authority; materiality; media; Internet.IntroductionReligious practices are embedded in people’s everyday lives and manifest in a variety of tangible forms. It is for this reason that scholars increasingly pay attention to material culture in relation to religion. Material culture participates in what Birgit Meyer ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"NkQlUtBI","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Meyer 2010)","plainCitation":"(Meyer 2010)","dontUpdate":true,"noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":1215,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":1215,"type":"book","abstract":"This book examines the incorporation of newly accessible mass media into practices of religious mediation in a variety of settings including the Pentecostal Church and Islamic movements, as well as the use of religious forms and image in the sphere of radio and cinema.","edition":"2009 edition","ISBN":"978-0-230-62229-6","language":"English","number-of-pages":"278","publisher":"Palgrave Macmillan","source":"Amazon","title":"Aesthetic Formations: Media, Religion, and the Senses","title-short":"Aesthetic Formations","editor":[{"family":"Meyer","given":"B."}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2010",10,17]]}}}],"schema":""} (2010) defines as “mediation,” where a “medium” is an object charged with religious meanings that helps believers to bridge the distance between immanence and transcendence. For instance, writes Meyer, a Catholic icon may be carved from wood by a person, but it is considered as the embodiment of a sacred presence by believers who touch or kiss it (13). Mediation is not limited to images but includes a large array of material objects, such as artworks, books, television, the Internet, as well as embodied practices, multisensorial experiences, and religious spaces ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"FV2TlWMr","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Hutchings and McKenzie 2016)","plainCitation":"(Hutchings and McKenzie 2016)","dontUpdate":true,"noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":1566,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":1566,"type":"book","abstract":"Material culture has emerged in recent decades as a significant theoretical concern for the study of religion. This book contributes to and evaluates this material turn, presenting thirteen chapters of new empirical research and theoretical reflection from some of the leading international scholars of material religion. Following a model for material analysis proposed in the first chapter by David Morgan, the contributors trace the life cycle of religious materiality through three phases: the production of religious objects, their classification as religious (or non-religious), and their circulation and use in material culture. The chapters in this volume consider how objects become and cease to be sacred, how materiality can be used to contest access to public space and resources, and how religion is embodied and performed by individuals in their everyday lives. Contributors discuss the significance of the materiality of religion across different religious traditions and diverse geographical regions, paying close attention to gender, age, ethnicity, memory and politics. The volume closes with an afterword by Manuel Vasquez.\"","event-place":"New York","ISBN":"978-1-4724-7783-5","language":"Englisch","number-of-pages":"260","publisher":"Theology and Religion in Interdisciplinary Perspective Series in Association With the Bsa Sociology of Religion Study Group","publisher-place":"New York","source":"Amazon","title":"Materiality and the Study of Religion: The Stuff of the Sacred","title-short":"Materiality and the Study of Religion","author":[{"family":"Hutchings","given":"Tim"},{"family":"McKenzie","given":"Joanne"}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2016"]],"season":"Dezember"}}}],"schema":""} (Morgan 2016). A material approach to the study of religion compels the study of media technologies as part of material culture. Media, and especially the Internet, might be considered as “intangible” and disconnected from materiality. The notion of “virtual” is often employed, indeed, to describe exchanges that do not involve material objects and physical encounters between people. However, many scholars agree that the Internet does embed materiality in various ways and can activate practices that involve embodied and sensorial experiences ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"Swrfkvv5","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Houtman and Meyer 2012)","plainCitation":"(Houtman and Meyer 2012)","noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":1567,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":1567,"type":"book","abstract":"That relation has long been conceived in antagonistic terms, privileging spirit above matter, belief above ritual and objects, meaning above form, and \"inward\" contemplation above \"outward\" action. After all, wasn't the opposition between spirituality and materiality the defining characteristic of religion, understood as geared to a transcendental beyond that was immaterial by definition? Grounded in the rise of religion as a modern category, with Protestantism as its main exponent, this conceptualization devalues religious things as lacking serious empirical, let alone theoretical, interest. The resurgence of public religion in our time has exposed the limitations of this attitude. Taking materiality seriously, this volume uses as a starting point the insight that religion necessarily requires some kind of incarnation, through which the beyond to which it refers becomes accessible. Conjoining rather than separating spirit and matter, incarnation (whether understood as \"the word becoming flesh\" or in a broader sense) places at center stage the question of how the realm of the transcendental, spiritual, or invisible is rendered tangible in the world. How do things matter in religious discourse and practice? How are we to account for the value or devaluation, the appraisal or contestation, of things within particular religious perspectives? How are we to rematerialize our scholarly approaches to religion? These are the key questions addressed by this multidisciplinary volume. Focusing on different kinds of things that matter for religion, including sacred artifacts, images, bodily fluids, sites, and electronic media, it offers a wide-ranging set of multidisciplinary studies that combine detailed analysis and critical reflection.","event-place":"New York","ISBN":"978-0-8232-3946-7","language":"Englisch","number-of-pages":"482","publisher":"Future of the Religious Past","publisher-place":"New York","source":"Amazon","title":"Things: Religion and the Question of Materiality","title-short":"Things","author":[{"family":"Houtman","given":"Dick"},{"family":"Meyer","given":"Birgit"}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2012",9,12]]}}}],"schema":""} (Houtman and Meyer 2012). For example, in studying Pentecostalism in Ghana, Meyer (2005) explores the use of mass media in church services, which participate in mediation by making believers materially approach the religious experience. In the late 1990s, Meyer writes, a number of Charismatic Churches produced recordings of sermons and even performances of miracles, something that confirmed and increased the authority of the pastor by providing people with a tangible testimony of spiritual power (440). Material aspects in religious mediation persist, and are enhanced, in the Internet age. Tim Hutchings ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"cO56vjVT","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Hutchings and McKenzie 2016)","plainCitation":"(Hutchings and McKenzie 2016)","dontUpdate":true,"noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":1566,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":1566,"type":"book","abstract":"Material culture has emerged in recent decades as a significant theoretical concern for the study of religion. This book contributes to and evaluates this material turn, presenting thirteen chapters of new empirical research and theoretical reflection from some of the leading international scholars of material religion. Following a model for material analysis proposed in the first chapter by David Morgan, the contributors trace the life cycle of religious materiality through three phases: the production of religious objects, their classification as religious (or non-religious), and their circulation and use in material culture. The chapters in this volume consider how objects become and cease to be sacred, how materiality can be used to contest access to public space and resources, and how religion is embodied and performed by individuals in their everyday lives. Contributors discuss the significance of the materiality of religion across different religious traditions and diverse geographical regions, paying close attention to gender, age, ethnicity, memory and politics. The volume closes with an afterword by Manuel Vasquez.\"","event-place":"New York","ISBN":"978-1-4724-7783-5","language":"Englisch","number-of-pages":"260","publisher":"Theology and Religion in Interdisciplinary Perspective Series in Association With the Bsa Sociology of Religion Study Group","publisher-place":"New York","source":"Amazon","title":"Materiality and the Study of Religion: The Stuff of the Sacred","title-short":"Materiality and the Study of Religion","author":[{"family":"Hutchings","given":"Tim"},{"family":"McKenzie","given":"Joanne"}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2016"]],"season":"Dezember"}}}],"schema":""} (2016), for instance, argues that digital software also functions as material objects. Hutchings explores, among other examples, Bible apps that visually mimic printed books and paper Bibles with QR codes that connect to online resources. In both cases, materiality is taken into account and embedded into digital practices, and both “virtual” and “tangible” characteristics coexist. Despite the importance of materiality within Internet practices, the existing literature on material culture and digital religion still needs to thoroughly address some questions. Hutchings (2016) notes that while scholars generally agree that the study of material culture should pay attention to digital media, they seldom provide precise definitions of material aspects embedded in Internet practices. This paper focuses on religious authority as one such aspect, which is often dependent on material objects (e.g. texts and religious spaces) but is usually not explored in relation to materiality in literature about digital venues. Some questions are, indeed, still open for inquiry: How can a material approach add complexity to the study of digital religion? What can this approach contribute to the understanding of religious authority in digital venues? How can authority be materially displayed on the Internet? A material culture perspective can help to understand some facets of “digital religion,” a term Heidi Campbell ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"HvbcXxR7","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Campbell 2012)","plainCitation":"(Campbell 2012)","dontUpdate":true,"noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":1627,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":1627,"type":"book","abstract":"Digital Religion offers a critical and systematic survey of the study of religion and new media. It covers religious engagement with a wide range of new media forms and highlights examples of new media engagement in all five of the major world religions. From cell phones and video games to blogs and Second Life, the book: provides a detailed review of major topics includes a series of case studies to illustrate and elucidate the thematic explorations considers the theoretical, ethical and theological issues raised. Drawing together the work of experts from key disciplinary perspectives, Digital Religion is invaluable for students wanting to develop a deeper understanding of the field.","event-place":"Abingdon, Oxon ; New York","ISBN":"978-0-415-67611-3","language":"English","number-of-pages":"288","publisher":"Routledge","publisher-place":"Abingdon, Oxon ; New York","source":"Amazon","title":"Digital Religion: Understanding Religious Practice in New Media Worlds","title-short":"Digital Religion","editor":[{"family":"Campbell","given":"Heidi A."}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2012",12,1]]}}}],"schema":""} (2012) employs to describe a type of religion that is influenced by digital culture. This article presents the case study of a Neo-Pagan forum to illustrate how material culture participates in the negotiation of authority in digital venues.The following sections explore religious authority in relation to media, with particular attention to the Internet. The article proceeds by describing Neo-Paganism, a new religious movement that often relies on non-institutional forms of authority and Internet-mediated communications. The analysis of “The Celtic Connection” (), a Neo-Pagan forum, provides examples of how religious authority is negotiated and materially displayed online. In conclusion, the article presents reflections on how to develop new frameworks to analyze non-traditional authority figures and definitions of media that include both physical objects and communication technologies. Discussing Authority, Media, and ReligionThe question of authority is central to many academic inquiries on religion. When discussing religious authority, scholars often refer to Max Weber’s ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"LGXON7Gf","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Weber 2013)","plainCitation":"(Weber 2013)","dontUpdate":true,"noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":4213,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":4213,"type":"book","abstract":"Published posthumously in the early 1920's, Max Weber's Economy and Society has since become recognized as one of the greatest sociological treatises of the 20th century, as well as a foundational text of the modern sociological imagination. The first strictly empirical comparison of social structures and normative orders conducted in world-historical depth, this two volume set of?Economy and Society―now with new introductory material contextualizing Weber’s work for 21st century audiences―looks at social action, religion, law, bureaucracy, charisma, the city, and the political community. Meant as a broad introduction for an educated general public, in its own way Economy and Society is the most demanding textbook yet written by a sociologist. The precision of its definitions, the complexity of its typologies, and the wealth of its historical content make the work an important challenge to our sociological thought: for the advanced undergraduate who gropes for her sense of society, for the graduate student who must develop his own analytical skills, and for the scholar who must match wits with Weber.","edition":"First Edition, Two Volume Set, with a New Foreword by Guenther Roth edition","event-place":"Berkeley","ISBN":"978-0-520-28002-1","language":"English","number-of-pages":"1712","publisher":"University of California Press","publisher-place":"Berkeley","source":"Amazon","title":"Economy and Society","author":[{"family":"Weber","given":"Max"}],"editor":[{"family":"Roth","given":"Guenther"},{"family":"Wittich","given":"Claus"}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2013",10,11]]}}}],"schema":""} (2013) categories of legal, traditional, and charismatic authority. From this perspective, authority is not solely a form of domination, but also a system of legitimation gained through social performance and symbolic construction. It depends on power dynamics that support a dominant worldview within the particular religion ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"lh7EDXia","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Hoover 2016)","plainCitation":"(Hoover 2016)","dontUpdate":true,"noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":54,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":54,"type":"book","abstract":"As the availability and use of media platforms continue to expand, the cultural visibility of religion is on the rise, leading to questions about religious authority: Where does it come from? How is it established? What might be changing it? The contributors to The Media and Religious Authority examine the ways in which new centers of power and influence are emerging as religions seek to “brand” themselves in the media age. Putting their in-depth, incisive studies of particular instances of media production and reception in Asia, Africa, Latin America, and North America into conversation with one another, the volume explores how evolving mediations of religion in various places affect the prospects, aspirations, and durability of religious authority across the globe.An insightful combination of theoretical groundwork and individual case studies, The Media and Religious Authority invites us to rethink the relationships among the media, religion, and culture.The contributors are Karina Kosicki Bellotti, Alexandra Boutros, Pauline Hope Cheong, Peter Horsfield, Christine Hoff Kraemer, Joonseong Lee, Alf Linderman, Bahíyyah Maroon, Montré Aza Missouri, and Emily Zeamer, with an afterword by Lynn Schofield Clark.","edition":"1 edition","event-place":"University Park, Pennsylvania","ISBN":"978-0-271-07322-4","language":"English","number-of-pages":"304","publisher":"Penn State University Press","publisher-place":"University Park, Pennsylvania","source":"Amazon","title":"The Media and Religious Authority","editor":[{"family":"Hoover","given":"Stewart M."}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2016",8,2]]}}}],"schema":""} (Horsfield 2016). According to Stewart Hoover (2016), media create new venues for religion to become public and visible, also in material terms. Media are involved in legitimating authority because they can, in certain circumstances, confer authenticity and plausibility to a given person or institution by producing, distributing, and shaping information. For example, the Pope’s Twitter account constitutes a strategy to enhance Catholic leadership among certain audiences and to reinforce a specific system of power legitimation ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"eyeNJOpa","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Narbona 2016)","plainCitation":"(Narbona 2016)","noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":67,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":67,"type":"article-journal","abstract":"The Internet reproduces and strengthens our model of social dialog. Just as in the physical world, the online public conversation and, above all, the ideological debate, requires leaders who can be a point of reference to either foster values or contradict them. The concept of leadership has drawn the attention of several studies concerning communication management. Leaders are neither all equal nor do they exercise leadership by means of the same tools. This article studies both the concept of digital leadership as a guide for online conversation and the use that microblogs, such as Twitter, can provide for this purpose. Among several public figures using Twitter, we have focused our study on the @Pontifex account to have an insight into the type of leadership exercised by the Holy Father and the impact of his teaching. The analysis shows that the Pope uses Twitter for catechetical purposes and that he is aware that his message can reach a large audience. Moreover, although interaction between the Pope and his followers on this platform is a fact already known, we have further found that some messages arouse followers’ interest more than others do.","container-title":"Church, Communication and Culture","DOI":"10.1080/23753234.2016.1181307","ISSN":"2375-3234","issue":"1","page":"90-109","source":"Taylor and Francis+NEJM","title":"Digital leadership, Twitter and Pope Francis","volume":"1","author":[{"family":"Narbona","given":"Juan"}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2016",1,1]]}}}],"schema":""} (Narbona 2016).While media have historically always participated in the legitimation of religious authority (Horsfield 2013), the diffusion of communication technologies compels new theoretical efforts to understand authority in contemporary settings. The abundance of information in online environments, indeed, makes it more challenging for users to recognize trustworthy and credible sources of information (Metzger and Flanagin 2013). Stewart Hoover ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"YBE7whnD","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Hoover 2016)","plainCitation":"(Hoover 2016)","dontUpdate":true,"noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":54,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":54,"type":"book","abstract":"As the availability and use of media platforms continue to expand, the cultural visibility of religion is on the rise, leading to questions about religious authority: Where does it come from? How is it established? What might be changing it? The contributors to The Media and Religious Authority examine the ways in which new centers of power and influence are emerging as religions seek to “brand” themselves in the media age. Putting their in-depth, incisive studies of particular instances of media production and reception in Asia, Africa, Latin America, and North America into conversation with one another, the volume explores how evolving mediations of religion in various places affect the prospects, aspirations, and durability of religious authority across the globe.An insightful combination of theoretical groundwork and individual case studies, The Media and Religious Authority invites us to rethink the relationships among the media, religion, and culture.The contributors are Karina Kosicki Bellotti, Alexandra Boutros, Pauline Hope Cheong, Peter Horsfield, Christine Hoff Kraemer, Joonseong Lee, Alf Linderman, Bahíyyah Maroon, Montré Aza Missouri, and Emily Zeamer, with an afterword by Lynn Schofield Clark.","edition":"1 edition","event-place":"University Park, Pennsylvania","ISBN":"978-0-271-07322-4","language":"English","number-of-pages":"304","publisher":"Penn State University Press","publisher-place":"University Park, Pennsylvania","source":"Amazon","title":"The Media and Religious Authority","editor":[{"family":"Hoover","given":"Stewart M."}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2016",8,2]]}}}],"schema":""} (2016) argues that media can produce alternative forms of authority because believers can find new perspectives on traditional power hierarchies in the media and negotiate religious meanings without the guidance of a recognized authority. As a result, some traditional religious institutions lose control of religious symbols and truth claims. Religious leaders may no longer retain exclusivity on religious interpretation because as mass-mediated conversations are increasingly more public, they need to defend their claims in the public sphere rather than in private settings. Therefore, Hoover proposes that the media age affects Weber’s three categories of authority to different extents, and claims that leaders who emerge on media platforms tend to hold charismatic and traditional authority rather than legal authority. The diffusion of the Internet further impacts religious authority. This happens because, as Campbell ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"4bvUSfN0","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(H. Campbell 2007; H. A. Campbell 2010)","plainCitation":"(H. Campbell 2007; H. A. Campbell 2010)","dontUpdate":true,"noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":1156,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":1156,"type":"article-journal","abstract":"While many themes have been explored in relation to religion online—ritual, identity construction, community—what happens to religious authority and power relationships within online environments is an area in need of more detailed investigation. In order to move discussions of authority from the broad or vague to the specific, this article argues for a more refined identification of the attributes of authority at play in the online context. This involves distinguishing between different layers of authority in terms of hierarchy, structure, ideology, and text. The article also explores how different religious traditions approach questions of authority in relation to the Internet. Through a qualitative analysis of three sets of interviews with Christians, Jews, and Muslims about the Internet, we see how authority is discussed and contextualized differently in each religious tradition in terms of these four layers of authority.","container-title":"Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication","DOI":"10.1111/j.1083-6101.2007.00362.x","ISSN":"1083-6101","issue":"3","language":"en","page":"1043-1062","source":"Wiley Online Library","title":"Who’s Got the Power? Religious Authority and the Internet","title-short":"Who’s Got the Power?","volume":"12","author":[{"family":"Campbell","given":"Heidi"}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2007",4,1]]}}},{"id":1444,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":1444,"type":"article-journal","abstract":"It is often argued that the internet poses a threat to traditional forms of authority. Within studies of religion online claims have also been made that the internet is affecting religious authority online, but little substantive work has backed up these claims. This paper argues for an approach to authority within online studies which looks separately at authority: roles, structures, beliefs/ideologies and texts. This approach is applied to a thematic analysis of 100 religious blogs and demonstrates that religious bloggers use their blogs to frame authority in ways that may more often affirm than challenge traditional sources of authority.","container-title":"Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication","DOI":"10.1111/j.1083-6101.2010.01519.x","ISSN":"1083-6101","issue":"2","language":"en","page":"251-276","source":"Wiley Online Library","title":"Religious Authority and the Blogosphere","volume":"15","author":[{"family":"Campbell","given":"Heidi A."}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2010",1,1]]}}}],"schema":""} (2007; 2010) writes, digital religion becomes “networked,” meaning that aspects of religion such as authority increasingly depend on new modes of interaction and connections between users and narratives. On the one hand, the Internet can reinforce existing authorities when traditional religious institutions are able to use digital venues to establish new channels of communication. On the other hand, digital culture may disrupt traditional authority by creating new forms of leadership based on online visibility and digital expertise. For example, as for the work of Hanna St?hle in the Russian context ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"T9NVtQUf","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Staehle 2018)","plainCitation":"(Staehle 2018)","dontUpdate":true,"noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":4198,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":4198,"type":"article-journal","abstract":"Media have become important arenas where religious institutions, alongside other players, articulate moral values and seek to shape societal norms and identities. Patriarch Kirill recognised early on the potential of using the media in spreading the Russian Orthodox Church’s mission and reaching out to wider audiences. From the very first days of his enthronement on 1 February 2009 he has taken the lead in developing a comprehensive media strategy aimed at increasing the Church’s presence in the public sphere. Both his words and deeds provide evidence of a momentous turnaround in the Church’s information and communication policy. His pursuit to endorse a revisited media strategy is determined by attempts to influence and control the way Russian Orthodoxy is portrayed in the public sphere. Moreover, the development of a large-scale media policy is motivated by the rising criticism towards the Church, voiced most notably on the internet. Based on the analysis of original and previously unexplored sources, this article illustrates the impact of media on a traditional religious organisation such as the Russian Orthodox Church and the response of the Church’s leadership to emerging challenges in a radically changing media environment.","container-title":"Religion, State and Society","DOI":"10.1080/09637494.2018.1510213","ISSN":"0963-7494","issue":"0","page":"1-18","source":"Taylor and Francis+NEJM","title":"Seeking new language: Patriarch Kirill’s media strategy","title-short":"Seeking new language","volume":"0","author":[{"family":"Staehle","given":"Hanna"}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2018",9,28]]}}}],"schema":""} (2018), the Moscow Patriarchate needs to understand new media logics facing the rise of alternative authority figures that extensively use social networks and might disrupt traditional structures of authority. With regard to Weber’s categories, the Internet offers a space for the display of traditional authority, while at the same time facilitating the emergence of charismatic leaders. This does not mean that offline authority connected to religious institutions disappears, but that religious authority becomes more fluid and nuanced. As Heidi Campbell and Mia L?vheim ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"XQSFiQI0","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(H. A. Campbell and L\\uc0\\u246{}vheim 2011)","plainCitation":"(H. A. Campbell and L?vheim 2011)","dontUpdate":true,"noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":4194,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":4194,"type":"article-journal","container-title":"Information, Communication & Society","DOI":"10.1080/1369118X.2011.597416","ISSN":"1369-118X","issue":"8","page":"1083-1096","source":"Taylor and Francis+NEJM","title":"Introduction","volume":"14","author":[{"family":"Campbell","given":"Heidi A."},{"family":"L?vheim","given":"Mia"}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2011",12,1]]}}}],"schema":""} (2011) write, [C]urrent research shows that the issue is not so much a shift from ‘old’ to ‘new’ forms of authority, but rather, the integration and reconstruction of existing ones in which some relations of power remain and some are reconstructed. In this process, we also see how recognizing the importance of online literacy and leveraging of connection resource become crucial for offline religious leaders and communities. (1089)The quote suggests that the study of digital religion needs to consider power relations between established authorities and new forms of Internet-based hierarchies. While Weber’s distinction of institutional, traditional, and charismatic authority may remain valid in some circumstances, it is also important to keep in mind that new roles emerge outside traditional institutions. I agree with Hoover (2016) that academics need to think about religion, media, and authority in new ways (4). In this regard, I would argue that religious authority in a networked society, while remaining a system of legitimation that includes human and non-human sources, can be better understood from a material perspective. By discussing the case of the Neo-Pagan forum The Celtic Connection, this article shows how religious authority is not only affected by the logics of media but also by the material practices connected with media use. Neo-Pagan Authority and Online PracticesThe term Neo-Paganism refers to a variety of spiritual and religious practices and beliefs that emerged in the second half of the twentieth century. It is generally considered a new religious movement, even if it is inspired by ancient beliefs. It includes different traditions, such as Wicca, Druidry, Heathenry, and Neo-Shamanism. A common characteristic of these traditions is the belief in magic – sometimes spelled “magick” – and in the interconnectedness between natural and human worlds ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"TqLrpyYh","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Harwood 2007)","plainCitation":"(Harwood 2007)","noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":1342,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":1342,"type":"article-journal","abstract":"This article begins an ethical analysis of Eclectic Wicca. It outlines the basic concepts within Wiccan morality as told through current Wiccan writers. The Wiccan morality is based on the belief of interconnectedness between every part of reality and asserts that human beings, as willful beings, have a responsibility to help whenever feasible, while avoiding harm, if possible. Further, this article discusses preliminary problems with the Wiccan moral system, such as its simplicity, ambiguity, subjectivity, and the hyper-responsibility it places on the practitioner. This article also suggests philosophic avenues that could alleviate many of these theoretical dilemmas.","container-title":"Journal of Contemporary Religion","DOI":"10.1080/13537900701637528","ISSN":"1353-7903","issue":"3","page":"375-390","source":"Taylor and Francis+NEJM","title":"Beyond Poetry and Magick: The Core Elements of Wiccan Morality","title-short":"Beyond Poetry and Magick","volume":"22","author":[{"family":"Harwood","given":"Brandon J."}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2007",10,1]]}}}],"schema":""} (Harwood 2007). This means that practitioners, who may self-identify as “witches,” often believe in the power of employing nature’s energies to change their lives and connecting their existences with the universe. Because it is highly heterogeneous, it is difficult to find a comprehensive definition of Neo-Paganism and correctly estimate the number of practitioners, which is nonetheless believed to be growing in Europe and the US ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"TZrIHsm0","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Saunders 2013)","plainCitation":"(Saunders 2013)","noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":4222,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":4222,"type":"article-journal","abstract":"Focused on religiogeographic practices in contemporary western paganism (neopaganism), this paper aims to fill a gap in the existing literature through a critical assessment of how neopagans imagine, delimitate, and interact with space, place, and territory. Employing a novel categorization of religious space along four overlapping geographies (numinous, poetic, social, and political), this essay addresses the need for geographers to produce publicly relevant studies that analyze religiously rooted ideologies and define cultural interpretations of places, terrains, and landscapes. Furthermore, I put forth a tentative research agenda for subsequent studies of how neopagans conceive of and interact with real and imagined geographies.","container-title":"Progress in Human Geography","DOI":"10.1177/0309132512473868","ISSN":"0309-1325","issue":"6","journalAbbreviation":"Progress in Human Geography","language":"en","page":"786-810","source":"SAGE Journals","title":"Pagan places: Towards a religiogeography of neopaganism","title-short":"Pagan places","volume":"37","author":[{"family":"Saunders","given":"Robert A."}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2013",12,1]]}}}],"schema":""} (Saunders 2013). Gregory Price ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"J1IuQiRF","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Grieve, n.d.)","plainCitation":"(Grieve, n.d.)","dontUpdate":true,"noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":4191,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":4191,"type":"article-journal","language":"en","page":"17","source":"Zotero","title":"Imagining a Virtual Religious Community: Neo-Pagans and the Internet","author":[{"family":"Grieve","given":"Gregory Price"}]}}],"schema":""} Grieve (1995) proposes five broad characteristics that apply to most of Neo-Paganism. The first two characteristics are non-Abrahamism and polytheism, expressed by the belief in pantheons, such as Norse or Greek, that precede Judeo-Christian-Islamic traditions. The third characteristic is a reverence for the Earth, exemplified by attention to ecology and an idealized idea of nature. The fourth characteristic is feminism, which can be found in the worship, or at least veneration or honouring, of the feminine principle symbolized by the Goddess. Lastly, Neo-Paganism privileges ritual over beliefs, which results in the creation of spaces and communities of practice.These characteristics make Neo-Paganism a compelling case study to understand materiality and authority in digital venues. The importance accorded to rituals and nature often results in embodied and material practices ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"2JF66eZE","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Rountree 2012)","plainCitation":"(Rountree 2012)","noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":1568,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":1568,"type":"article-journal","abstract":"‘Love for and kinship with nature’ is the first principle of the Pagan Federation and putatively provides the foundation for contemporary Western Pagans’ relationships with the natural environment and other-than-human beings. This article explores the meanings of kinship with nature and animism for neo-Pagans and asks whether expressions of such a worldview are more than metaphorical, rhetorical or simply wishful. The meanings for some indigenous animist peoples are discussed and compared with neo-Pagan understandings. The article concludes that kinship with nature is meaningful for most neo-Pagans largely within the domains of religious belief, ritual, and recreational activity; it does not usually determine the rules of everyday life in the ways it does, or traditionally did, for indigenous animist peoples. This is not to say that it is not a relevant or useful proposition in the modern or postmodern world. A neo-Pagan worldview provides a model of social relations among ‘people’ of all kinds, along with an ideological and motivational charter for human action which has urgent, contemporary ecological relevance.","container-title":"Journal of Contemporary Religion","DOI":"10.1080/13537903.2012.675746","ISSN":"1353-7903","issue":"2","page":"305-320","source":"Taylor and Francis+NEJM","title":"Neo-Paganism, Animism, and Kinship with Nature","volume":"27","author":[{"family":"Rountree","given":"Kathryn"}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2012",5,1]]}}}],"schema":""} (Rountree 2012). For example, Neo-Pagans often worship at places that have for them a historical meaning and a religious value. This is the case with Stonehenge and Medway Megalithis, heritage sites in England whose stones are attributed religious agency and sacred narratives by many Neo-Pagans ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"ROHynHTm","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Blain and Wallis 2004; White 2016)","plainCitation":"(Blain and Wallis 2004; White 2016)","noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":4234,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":4234,"type":"article-journal","abstract":"Our Sacred Sites, Contested Rites/Rights project (.uk) examines physical, spiritual and interpretative engagements of today’s pagans with sacred sites, theorizes ‘sacredness’, and explores the implications of pagan engagements with sites for heritage management and archaeology more generally, in terms of ‘preservation ethic’ vis-a-vis active engagement. In this article, we explore ways in which ‘sacred sites’ – both the term and the sites – are negotiated by different interest groups, foregrounding our locations, as an archaeologist/art historian (Wallis) and anthropologist (Blain), and active pagan engagers with sites. Examples of pagan actions at such sites, including at Avebury and Stonehenge, demonstrate not only that their engagements with sacred sites are diverse and that identities – such as that of ‘new indigenes’ – arising therefrom are complex, but also that heritage management has not entirely neglected the issues. In addition to managed open access solstice celebrations at Stonehenge, a climate of inclusivity and multivocality has resulted in fruitful negotiations at the Rollright Stones.","container-title":"Journal of Material Culture","DOI":"10.1177/1359183504046893","ISSN":"1359-1835, 1460-3586","issue":"3","language":"en","page":"237-261","source":"Crossref","title":"Sacred Sites, Contested Rites/ Rights: Contemporary Pagan Engagements with the Past","title-short":"Sacred Sites, Contested Rites/ Rights","volume":"9","author":[{"family":"Blain","given":"Jenny"},{"family":"Wallis","given":"Robert J."}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2004",11]]}}},{"id":4228,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":4228,"type":"article-journal","abstract":"The Medway Megaliths, a series of seven archaeological monuments located in Kent, South-eastern England, are today viewed as “sacred sites” by practitioners of various contemporary Pagan religions, including Druidry, Heathenry, and Wicca. Examining how these Pagans understand the Megaliths as both ancestral spaces and sources of “earth energies”, this paper then looks at the forms of religious expression that are carried out there, and in doing so examines how this example fits within established understandings of “sacred spaces” in religious studies scholarship. From there it explores how these Pagans express a sense of guardianship over the Megaliths, and how they have interacted with commercial developers, heritage managers, and archaeologists. It thus deals with issues surrounding the contested nature of sacred space and the conflict that can arise when both sacred and secular interpretations of a site clash, before highlighting how areas of common interest have been successfully established between different interest groups, to the benefit of the archaeological sites themselves. In providing a regional case study of how Pagans interact with archaeological monuments, this article hopes to offer useful perspectives for those involved in Pagan studies, public archaeology, and studies into the materiality of religion.","container-title":"Material Religion","DOI":"10.1080/17432200.2016.1192152","ISSN":"1743-2200","issue":"3","page":"346-372","source":"Taylor and Francis+NEJM","title":"Old stones, new rites: contemporary pagan interactions with the medway megaliths","title-short":"Old stones, new rites","volume":"12","author":[{"family":"White","given":"Ethan Doyle"}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2016",7,27]]}}}],"schema":""} (Blain and Wallis 2004; White 2016). Some Neo-Pagan practitioners organize travel to what they consider as religiously charged places, such as temples in Greece, to celebrate ancient myths ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"8KpbCAjz","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Bittarello 2006)","plainCitation":"(Bittarello 2006)","noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":4223,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":4223,"type":"article-journal","abstract":"This paper focuses on the phenomenon of Neopagan ‘pilgrimages’, which are advertised on the Internet and directed to various ancient sacred sites in Greece and in the Mediterranean Sea. After showing how travellers to Greece in the Modern Age have been inspired by classical myths and have often represented their trips as ‘pilgrimages’, the paper examines how Neopagans, women belonging to the Goddess Spirituality Movement, use travels to ancient sacred places as a way to reconstruct their own identity. Therefore, the perception and representation of the tourist journey as ‘pilgrimage’ obscures the reality of the commodification of religious experiences, in a globalised context in which different consumers ‘buy’ different experiences of ancient Greece.","container-title":"Journal of Tourism and Cultural Change","DOI":"10.2167/jtcc054.0","ISSN":"1476-6825","issue":"2","page":"116-135","source":"Taylor and Francis+NEJM","title":"Neopagan Pilgrimages in the Age of the Internet: A Life Changing Religious Experience or an Example of Commodification?","title-short":"Neopagan Pilgrimages in the Age of the Internet","volume":"4","author":[{"family":"Bittarello","given":"Maria Beatrice"}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2006",9,1]]}}}],"schema":""} (Bittarello 2006). These connections to places and objects, including ritual tools, exemplify the importance of material culture in Neo-Paganism.The polytheistic character of Neo-Paganism allows practitioners to honour objects and places from a variety of traditions, sometimes simultaneously. In an exploratory study conducted in Colorado, US, I interviewed five Neo-Pagan practitioners. Each of them explained following a god or a goddess that suited their spiritual needs, greatly personalizing their practice while being part of the same Neo-Pagan community. The personalization of religious beliefs and the worshipping of objects and places from different traditions result in an innovative understanding of authority ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"VdMRjFkp","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Hope and Jones 2006)","plainCitation":"(Hope and Jones 2006)","noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":1350,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":1350,"type":"article-journal","abstract":"This paper addresses the place of contemporary British Paganism as part of Western culture. It is in two parts. The first explores Paganism theoretically and socio-historically and the second provides a ‘micro-cosmic’, ethnographic level of analysis. The first part focuses on the way in which the processes of modernity, manifesting within the West through such processes as individualisation and secularisation, have provided fertile ground for the inculcation of Pagan worldviews by effectively undermining cultural and institutional impediments to the adoption of overtly magical sensibilities. The second part examines more closely the group processes underlying British Paganism, using data from participant observation and in-depth interviews to illustrate the way in which late modern community forms can assuage potential areas of conflict among adherents. These two viewpoints combine to locate British Paganism as late modern culture.","container-title":"Journal of Contemporary Religion","DOI":"10.1080/13537900600926097","ISSN":"1353-7903","issue":"3","page":"341-354","source":"Taylor and Francis+NEJM","title":"Locating Contemporary British Paganism as Late Modern Culture","volume":"21","author":[{"family":"Hope","given":"Tom"},{"family":"Jones","given":"Ieuan"}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2006",10,1]]}}}],"schema":""} (Hope and Jones 2006). For example, some Neo-Pagans choose to be ‘solitary practitioners,’ meaning that they are not part of a religious community and perform rituals without the guidance of a religious leader or in the company of a likeminded group. This may connote Neo-Paganism as a religious movement that refuses traditional authority structures and finds alternative forms of legitimation ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"OHMdZaHm","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Rinallo, Maclaran, and Stevens 2016)","plainCitation":"(Rinallo, Maclaran, and Stevens 2016)","noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":4192,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":4192,"type":"article-journal","abstract":"This research explores how marketplace dynamics affect religious authority in the context of Neopagan religion. Drawing on an interpretivist study of Wiccan practitioners in Italy, we reveal that engagement with the market may cause considerable, ongoing tensions, based on the inherent contradictions that are perceived to exist between spirituality and commercial gain. As a result, market success is a mixed blessing that can increase religious authority and influence, but is just as likely to decrease authority and credibility. Using an extended case study method, we propose a theoretical framework that depicts the links between our informants’ situated experiences and the macro-level factors affecting religious authority as it interacts with market-mediated dynamics at the global level. Overall, our study extends previous work in macromarketing that has looked at religious authority in the marketplace) and how the processes of globalization are affecting religion.","container-title":"Journal of Macromarketing","DOI":"10.1177/0276146716655780","ISSN":"0276-1467","issue":"4","journalAbbreviation":"Journal of Macromarketing","language":"en","page":"425-442","source":"SAGE Journals","title":"A Mixed Blessing: Market-mediated Religious Authority in Neopaganism","title-short":"A Mixed Blessing","volume":"36","author":[{"family":"Rinallo","given":"Diego"},{"family":"Maclaran","given":"Pauline"},{"family":"Stevens","given":"Lorna"}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2016",12,1]]}}}],"schema":""} (Rinallo, Maclaran, and Stevens 2016). However, Neo-Paganism does not completely reject religious authority. In Wicca, the biggest tradition within Neo-Paganism, there are priests and priestesses whose authority is generally sanctioned by a formal initiation, and who lead practice groups called “covens” ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"KBH6M7PW","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Hume 1998)","plainCitation":"(Hume 1998)","noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":1345,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":1345,"type":"article-journal","abstract":"This article gives a brief description of one of the sub‐branches of Paganism, Wicca. It describes how sacred space is established and it explores the sacred circle as a symbolic representation of Wiccan cosmology. Physical sacred space thus constructed becomes a ‘world apart’ from the mundane and a bridge between ordinary physical reality and metaphysical realms. The circle is the outer expression of an imaginai inner world wherein anything is possible. The connection between a bounded, physical space and a limitless otherworld is discussed, using the discourse of the witches and theoretical perspectives on sacred space.","container-title":"Journal of Contemporary Religion","DOI":"10.1080/13537909808580838","ISSN":"1353-7903","issue":"3","page":"309-319","source":"Taylor and Francis+NEJM","title":"Creating sacred space: Outer expressions of inner worlds in modern Wicca","title-short":"Creating sacred space","volume":"13","author":[{"family":"Hume","given":"Lynne"}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["1998",10,1]]}}}],"schema":""} (Hume 1998). Authors such as Scott Cunningham and Gerald Gardner, considered by many the founders of Wicca, published books that many practitioners use as source of authority and guidance. Therefore, authority in Neo-Paganism is often fluid, involves ritual practices, and includes various textual and material sources. Many Neo-Pagans employ the Internet to find sources of authority and talk about their practices and beliefs. Among the early adopters of the Internet already in the 1990s, Neo-Pagans use websites and discussion boards to get in touch with other practitioners and acquire expertise ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"MERl1ohk","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Kr\\uc0\\u252{}ger 2005)","plainCitation":"(Krüger 2005)","noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":1348,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":1348,"type":"article-journal","abstract":"Oliver Krüger discusses some empirical problems of Internet research in his contribution. Analysis of online discussion groups within the Wiccan and neopagan movement that refer to rituals indicates that new social and hierarchical structures also emerge within the ”online community”. Nonetheless, only subsequent interviews with users of those discussion forums could reveal some basic aspects of online communication and its social dimension. This gives rise to some further questions. How much can we tell about communication on religious Web sites? What are the limits of an immanent analysis of Web sites? What can we tell about social structures within online communities and about individual user preferences in a ritual discourse? How can we deal with the problem of identity of Internet users? What is empirically invisible for us? Acknowledging the limits of our conclusions on postmodern religion and religious people derived purely from online research, Krüger advocates combining online research with classical empirical fieldwork, such as quantitative surveys or qualitative interviews with users and Webmasters.","container-title":"Online – Heidelberg Journal of Religions on the Internet: Volume 01.1 Special Issue on Theory and Methodology","language":"eng","source":"archiv.ub.uni-heidelberg.de","title":"Discovering the Invisible Internet : Methodological Aspects of Searching Religion on the Internet","title-short":"Discovering the Invisible Internet","URL":"","author":[{"family":"Krüger","given":"Oliver"}],"editor":[{"family":"Krüger","given":"Oliver"}],"accessed":{"date-parts":[["2016",9,7]]},"issued":{"date-parts":[["2005"]]}}}],"schema":""} (Krüger 2005). While not all Neo-Pagans use the Internet to discuss religion, many do so to address the social stigma they experience as individuals and as a community. In certain contexts, indeed, believers may refrain from openly self-identifying as Neo-Pagans and cannot find a group with whom to practice. In addition, solitary practitioners are sometimes stigmatized even within Neo-Pagan communities. Many of them use digital spaces to discuss authority and practices, in some cases even performing rituals online through chats or communication software. As Adam Possamai and Bryan Turner ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"kM98OydZ","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Possamai and Turner 2012)","plainCitation":"(Possamai and Turner 2012)","dontUpdate":true,"noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":21,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":21,"type":"article-journal","container-title":"International Social Science Journal","DOI":"10.1111/issj.12021","ISSN":"1468-2451","issue":"209-210","journalAbbreviation":"Int Soc Sci J","language":"en","page":"197-206","source":"Wiley Online Library","title":"Authority and liquid religion in cyber-space: the new territories of religious communication","title-short":"Authority and liquid religion in cyber-space","volume":"63","author":[{"family":"Possamai","given":"Adam"},{"family":"Turner","given":"Bryan S."}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2012",9,1]]}}}],"schema":""} (2012) write, many Neo-Pagans go online to look for alternative sources of authority but often end up reproducing the same structures of offline covens or groups. From this perspective, the Internet does not necessarily disrupt traditional authority structures, but offers venues to enter into contact with people from different geographical areas and various traditions, thus fostering instances of intra- and inter-religious contact. Neo-Paganism, therefore, is characterized by the veneration of natural places and objects and an extensive use of the Internet. This may appear as a contradiction, if digital technologies are considered the antithesis of the natural world. ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"6qU9r7IM","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Grieve, n.d.)","plainCitation":"(Grieve, n.d.)","dontUpdate":true,"noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":4191,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":4191,"type":"article-journal","language":"en","page":"17","source":"Zotero","title":"Imagining a Virtual Religious Community: Neo-Pagans and the Internet","author":[{"family":"Grieve","given":"Gregory Price"}]}}],"schema":""} Grieve (1995) explains that a nature-based religion such as Neo-Paganism can make sense of technology by creating an “imagined community.” Referencing the work of Benedict Anderson, Grieve considers that online Neo-Pagan communities are the product of an imaginative effort. Similarly, Stephen O’Leary ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"vxJll0lx","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(O\\uc0\\u8217{}Leary 1996)","plainCitation":"(O’Leary 1996)","dontUpdate":true,"noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":1143,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":1143,"type":"article-journal","container-title":"Journal of the American Academy of Religion","ISSN":"0002-7189","issue":"4","journalAbbreviation":"Journal of the American Academy of Religion","page":"781-808","source":"JSTOR","title":"Cyberspace as Sacred Space: Communicating Religion on Computer Networks","title-short":"Cyberspace as Sacred Space","volume":"64","author":[{"family":"O'Leary","given":"Stephen D."}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["1996"]]}}}],"schema":""} (1996) argues that Neo-Pagans consider the Internet as a “theatre of the imagination” (797) and Arthur Cowan ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"90n41lTh","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Cowan 2005)","plainCitation":"(Cowan 2005)","dontUpdate":true,"noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":1346,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":1346,"type":"article-journal","container-title":"Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion","DOI":"10.1111/j.1468-5906.2005.00284.x","ISSN":"1468-5906","issue":"3","language":"en","page":"257-263","source":"Wiley Online Library","title":"Online U-Topia: Cyberspace and the Mythology of Placelessness","title-short":"Online U-Topia","volume":"44","author":[{"family":"Cowan","given":"Douglas E."}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2005",9,1]]}}}],"schema":""} (2005) describes Internet-based rituals as taking place in the “imagination of participants” (138). According to these scholars, it is through imagination that Neo-Pagans combine nature-based practices with the use of the Internet. While imagination is an important part of Neo-Pagan digital practices, I would argue that it also needs to be connected to material practices. Imagination, indeed, does not exclude sensorial experiences, but rather helps people to experience the supernatural as real through embodied practices which are connected to the practice of religion ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"e4ClF4wq","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Luhrmann 2012)","plainCitation":"(Luhrmann 2012)","noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":4231,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":4231,"type":"article-journal","abstract":"Why do religions that are in some sense invented out of the western scholarship on shamanism and paganism have such a hold on the western imagination? This article reviews four recent contributions to the literature on neo-paganism and neo-shamanism. As exemplified in the books under review, these religions have three basic characteristics—magical realism, playfulness, and experientalism—which are not unique to them, but shared by many modern faiths. The article argues that these are not primitive throw-backs but ways of responding to the doubt and skepticism of a modern pluralistic age.","container-title":"Reviews in Anthropology","DOI":"10.1080/00938157.2012.680425","ISSN":"0093-8157","issue":"2","page":"136-150","source":"Taylor and Francis+NEJM","title":"Touching the Divine: Recent Research on Neo-Paganism and Neo-Shamanism","title-short":"Touching the Divine","volume":"41","author":[{"family":"Luhrmann","given":"T. M."}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2012",4,1]]}}}],"schema":""} (Luhrmann 2012).In an exploratory study about space creation in digital Neo-Paganism, I have analyzed how Neo-Pagans tend to embed materiality in Internet-based practices without seeing a discrepancy between physicality and technology. For example, I interviewed a practitioner who leads online rituals and is therefore considered by many as an authority figure. This person explained that practitioners are required to employ material aids when performing online rituals (personal communication, 17 September 2016). They usually display candles, music, incense, and food in the room while they communicate via computer with the priest or priestess and other participants. The important part of the ritual is mental visualization, but material objects help practitioners – especially those who are beginners – to imagine a physical presence that risks being lost in computer-mediated communications. This shows how Neo-Paganism embeds both materiality and technology in the discussion and imagination of authority online, and creates spaces of practice between virtual and physical dimensions. This article explores these characteristics by analyzing the forum of the website The Celtic Connection, a venue where Neo-Pagans can embed materiality in online discussions of authority.The Celtic Connection: Analysis of a Neo-Pagan ForumThe previous section described Neo-Pagans as holding a fluid notion of authority, and often including in their practices both material objects and digital venues. Because Neo-Paganism is highly heterogeneous, it is challenging to find a representative case study that can account for all Neo-Pagan traditions. The website The Celtic Connection () can give some insights into how Neo-Pagans discuss materiality and authority online because – as written on its homepage – it is “one of the oldest and largest Wicca, Witchcraft and Pagan sites on the Internet” (retrieved on 12 July 2018). It was established in 1997 and is divided into many sections, including a forum that numbered 2311 members in October 2018. It is based in the US but puts practitioners from all over the world in contact, provided that they speak English, the language of the website. Considering that Neo-Paganism is a small (especially compared with so-called world religions) and largely non-institutionalized religious movement, The Celtic Connection can be regarded as a large and long-lasting online community.The Celtic Connection was founded by a woman who goes by the name of Kardia Zoe and her late husband Herne, as explained on the webpage of the site (2018). The website includes several pages that discuss various aspects of Neo-Paganism, such as Meditation, Pagan Holidays, Divination, Candle Magic, and Animal Guides. It also provides a link to a Wicca online store that sells books, supplies for building altars, and other Neo-Pagan objects. The Celtic Connection has a blog, but it seems that most of the interactions occur in the forum. The forum users employ nicknames that are designed to protect their anonymity, and which I mention in my analysis. The forum is moderated by people who are referred to as “Council Elders” and is divided in seven sections: two of them are dedicated to newbies for introductions and questions, while the other five include discussions about Wicca and Neo-Paganism, comparative beliefs and practices, Earth-based paths (Druids, Shamanisms and other traditions), Deities, and Holidays. The Celtic Connection mainly aims at people practicing Wicca but, as the different forums’ sections exemplify, it also puts in contact people from other Neo-Pagan traditions. While social networks and other Internet platforms partially replaced them in the last decade, forums can still provide compelling information about digital religion. The Celtic Connection forum, for example, has publicly collected discussions from 2010 and is still active. Posts usually contain long reflections or questions, can embed pictures and links, and sometimes attract hundreds of comments. They are written in an informal style reminiscent of face-to-face conversations. By analyzing forums, it is possible to plunge into discussions and follow their developments. With this in mind, I familiarized myself with The Celtic Connection forum by extensively reading its posts, focusing on those discussing authority and materiality. Because the users post anonymously and there are no references to their identities on the forum, I will mention their usernames in this article. Inspired by Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA), I performed a textual analysis (Wodak and Bush 2004) of these posts to explore the forum’s dominant narrative patterns. CDA is an approach that considers texts as illustrative of sociocultural practices and social discourses. In particular, it looks at the developments of discourses as pointing to hegemonic and non-hegemonic social elements (Fairclough 2013). In case of a minority religion such as Neo-Paganism, CDA illustrates the tensions between what is perceived as mainstream and non-mainstream religiosity. Future works may explore the online interactions of Neo-Pagans from a quantitative perspective, or perform a network analysis of their exchanges, but in this case, I was interested in conducting an in-depth study that could provide qualitative examples of Internet exchanges. The following two sections explore narratives about authority and materiality in The Celtic Connection forum.Authority in The Celtic ConnectionThe Celtic Connection is a website where users often discuss their practices and beliefs with other Neo-Pagans. Because Neo-Paganism is a heterogeneous religion that allows a great degree of personalization, believers tend to put together, in a creative and syncretic fashion, practices and beliefs from various religious traditions. This attitude is exemplified by the personal story of The Celtic Connection’s founder Kardia Zoe, who describes her experience as follows:As for my personal beliefs and goals, my spiritual background is in Christianity.??However, I do not blindly accept certain doctrine taught in many of today's Churches. (…) For the past twenty years I have journeyed with my inner-spirit through mounds of books and manuscripts. I explored everything from Christianity and the Dead Sea scrolls, to Gnosis teachings in the Egyptian Nag Hammadi Library.? I started seeing a lot of common ground between the EARLY Christian teachings and many other ancient religions, so I began to do further research into the teachings of Druids, Wiccans, Shamans and any nature based religion I found.?I was eventually drawn to the ancient Essene writings.? It became clear to me that?the Essenes were the very?same group we now refer to as the first Christians, and early manuscripts tell us they were a community whose lives were closely bound to nature.? A great deal of their scriptures focused on our connection with Mother Earth.?What I found most interesting, was that for them, their connection with mother nature, or?our?Earthly Mother as they called her, was directly linked to their connection with God.? This meant that at one time, Christians actually respected and followed the feminine aspect of the Divine too!? (The Celtic Connection homepage, retrieved on 11 October 2018)The quote shows how Kardia Zoe does not reject Christianity, the religion she was raised in, but tries to make sense of her spiritual needs against a Christian background. In so doing, Kardia Zoe creates a type of belief based on religious contacts by combining what she identifies as early Christianity with the worship of Mother Earth and the feminine principle. Being the founder of the website, Kardia Zoe is likely an inspiration for many people that visit The Celtic Connection, and an informal authority that shows how Neo-Pagans can personalize and negotiate their religiosity. The experience of Kardia Zoe is not unique. The Celtic Connection’s members, who often discuss their religious beliefs in the “introduction” section of the forum, usually come from predominantly Christian countries in Europe or North America. This is probably the reason why Christianity seems to remain an interpretative framework and a point of comparison for many of them. For example, a user that goes by the nickname “Callisto” writes, in a post titled “Worshipping across Pantheons”: I'm working through how I think about the gods, how to approach them, who they are.?I've loved the Greek pantheon since I was a child and identify with several of the Olympians as spiritual beings.?But I'm also drawn to the Norse gods and that worldview. I can't imagine it truly matters in the scheme of things, but it feels slightly odd in some ways to worship different sets of gods. Maybe this is just a holdover from my Catholic upbringing that demands loyalty to one alone. (The Celtic Connection forum, 14 October 2013)While Kardia Zoe makes sense of her Christian upbringing from a Neo-Pagan perspective, the user Callisto seems to find it problematic to reject some aspects of Catholicism, such as monotheism. The post received some answers from forum members, who share their own experiences in worshipping different gods and describe revelatory dreams or visions. These answers connote gods as archetypes that can be represented across pantheons and point to a transcendent dimension, but also sometimes as embodied and material entities that can appear in dreams and interact with practitioners. Some users advise Callisto to do research about the gods’ characteristics and offer suggestions on how to worship gods from different pantheons. Answers to Callisto’s question exemplify a type of informal authority often articulated in the forum. As believers decide to personalize their practice by following different religious traditions, they often rely on self-determination, a type of ‘authority of the self’ or ‘inner authority.’ By so doing, practitioners employ their own experiences and feelings to determine what is an acceptable and suitable practice or belief. As the case of Callisto exemplifies, practitioners may use The Celtic Connection forum to ask questions or receive clarifications, especially when they are new to Neo-Paganism, have misgivings about practices or beliefs, or do not know where to find information. In such cases, other forum members act as informal authorities in suggesting possible answers. Some of these members are Council Elders (website moderators), while others are people who claim to have offline experience and knowledge of Neo-Paganism. They usually do not frame themselves as absolute or exclusive authorities, but as experts in Neo-Paganism. Respecting the inner authority of other practitioners, these informal authorities rarely dictate correct approaches to Neo-Paganism, but usually suggest tactics to find suitable spiritual paths. The forum moderators are also clear in stating that The Celtic Connection does not organize online rituals, something that other websites do, or provide mentoring. When a user asks about the matter, Council Elder “Draconis Rex” writes: I'm afraid we don't really do individual mentoring here (…), but we all serve that purpose together. Take all the instruction, information and guidance you need from what you see here, any questions can be answered, but remember to search for the answer first. Chances are the answers are there already. (The Celtic Connection forum, 30 December 2013)This quote suggests that The Celtic Connection can function as a space of authority that gathers the collective knowledge of many practitioners. From this perspective, authority is framed as knowledge and information sharing from more experienced practitioners to the other users. Council Elders, indeed, often invite new users to read through past forum posts to gain knowledge of Neo-Paganism, connoting the forum itself as a textual source of authority. Many posts also encourage practitioners to learn the basic tenants of Wicca from other textual sources, such as books by Scott Cunningham and Gerald Gardner, some of which are listed in four pinned posts in the “Wicca Q and A” section of the forum. This type of collective and text-based knowledge shows how Neo-Pagans often hold a non-traditional view of authority but do not reject authority altogether. Authority in The Celtic Connection often emerges from a network of relations and actors. As practitioners put in contact elements from different traditions, they also negotiate their attitude towards gods and pantheons. They discuss practices and beliefs with other forum members, who often act as informal authorities in answering religion-related questions and in discussing offline practices, objects, and religious spaces. These informal authorities also recognize the need of finding mentors offline and consulting other texts. This type of authority is networked because it is based on interpersonal contacts, constantly negotiated and discussed, and not fixed in time. Discussions and displays of authority in the forum often refer to practices that occur in the physical dimension and embed material forms in different ways. Materiality in The Celtic ConnectionThe Celtic Connection is a venue where users directly or indirectly discuss various authority sources. They do so in digital spaces, but they often refer to embodied and material practices happening in physical spaces. For example, many users ask information about rituals, but the performance of the ritual remains an offline experience. Similarly, The Celtic Connection has an online shop where practitioners can find books and other material objects that are advertised online but are aimed at offline religious practices. Therefore, even if The Celtic Connection is a virtual venue, it has a strong material dimension.The forum displays and negotiates materiality in various ways. While the Internet limits the possibility of sensorial experiences, there are some strategies that forum users employ to enhance existing characteristics of digital spaces. These strategies are often based on visual elements, which people can easily embed in posts. For instance, the user “Alyceavary” writes a post asking for Wicca-related creation stories for children (The Celtic Connection forum, 12 March 2012). The first response, written by a user named “Dark Magus,” appears as a long blank post. However, by highlighting it with the computer mouse, the post reveals a creation story written by Wicca author Silver RavenWolf. This simple strategy, achieved by writing the text in the same color of the background, gives the impression that the story magically appears, in what might be a metaphor of the world coming into being. In this case, the user not only acts as informal authority in providing a source for Alyceavary’s question but also employs a visual strategy to enhance the reading experience. Some discussions about material objects involve pictures. This is the case in a post titled “Making my first wand,” written by a user who goes by the name of “Spiritwalker.” The user describes the experience of making a wand as follows:So, I've begun making my first wand, its a work In progress. Im making it from the branch of a tree (which I believe is a nispero or mango tree, I played under it in my childhood) that my grandfather cut off due to it getting to close to powerlines. (…) Any suggestions? (Patterns, carvings,stones, etc.) (The Celtic Connection forum, 24 August 2013)In Neo-Paganism, people use wands during rituals to cast spells and enter in communication with transcendent beings. In this post, the user focuses on the material aspects of the wand: the type of wood, the aesthetic patterns, and other visual details. In the post there is also a picture of a partially carved wooden branch with a small knife and some stones. In the corner of the picture there is a cat. The picture probably aims at better describing the wand to other users, according great attention to material details. Other users comment on the post by explaining some of the technical characteristics a wand should have. For example, the user “Oldghost” writes:The length should be from the tip of you middle finger the to inside of you elbow. What you use for a stone or crystal or stone will depend on what you are doing . Different woods have different properties in magic as well as the stones or crystals you place in them . For your mango or nispero tree you will have to do some research , unless someone here has used them and can help you . (idem)With this answer, Oldghost acts as an informal authority in providing information about wands and calls for the expertise of other users to assess the characteristics of wood types. The answer suggests that making a wand goes beyond purely aesthetic criteria because the properties embedded in its materiality have an impact on the religious experience. Some posts include descriptions and pictures of religiously charged spaces. For example, the Council Elder Draconis Rex, in a post titled “Stonehenge,” asks: “What significance does Stonehenge hold for you in your path? (…) Would you consider a pilgrimage at some point? would you merely visit in passing?” (The Celtic Connection forum, 28 July 2013). The post attracts answers that describe visits to Stonehenge, including the feelings of touching the stones or the sounds heard in the site. Post author Draconis Rex also comments by giving additional information about Stonehenge: There is evidence that shows that Stonehenge was actually in use 4000 years earlier than when the stones were constructed. It was revealed that posts were erected in a crescent, the post holes are in evidence and there is organic material revealed to be wood.?The "Sarsen"? stones range from 7 tons to 45 tons, and the "bluestones" that mark the perimeter weigh in between 2 and 4 tons each.? (idem)?In providing this detailed and vivid description of Stonehenge, which includes practical and material details, Draconis Rex may be trying to arouse the curiosity of other users by showing expertise about the venue. In a subsequent comment, Draconis Rex posts pictures of Stonehenge, which probably aims at giving a more realistic impression of the site. Following Draconis Rex’s comment, other users shared images of the site. Some users never visited Stonehenge but contribute to the discussion by posting pictures found on Google. Visual elements combined with descriptions of offline materiality help to make the imagination of a religious place more realistic. From this perspective, the forum functions as a digital space of discussion where users can virtually experience physical and material spaces.Therefore, The Celtic Connection forum is a venue where some Neo-Pagans look for informal authorities that can help their religious practice. Forum exchanges can embed materiality in various ways. For example, they discuss objects and spaces that are relevant not only on an aesthetic level but also for the religious experience, because their intrinsic characteristics can affect the way religion is perceived and practiced. In addition, they employ the possibilities of the Internet, such as picture sharing, to help the imagination of these objects and places. This confirms the importance of materiality in Neo-Paganism and connotes the Internet as a space of networked exchanges that points to and embeds offline materiality. It is for this reason that the analysis of digital spaces such as The Celtic Connection can add nuances to the study of online authority and materiality. Discussion and ConclusionThe article discussed some material aspects of digital religion by way of the example of the Neo-Pagan forum The Celtic Connection. The analysis of the forum suggests that there are various strategies to negotiate formal and informal authority in material and networked ways. Through this case study, I would argue that a focus on material culture can be a starting point to think about religion, media, and authority in new ways, because it directs attention to practices that occur outside traditional institutions and between online and offline venues. Digital religion, indeed, is networked and relies on interpersonal exchanges, and creates instances of contact that tend to be fluid and rapidly evolving in time. Material culture and digital culture are not at odds with each other but can be entangled in creating narratives about authority that point to a variety of material objects. In other words, the material world remains a constant point of reference also for people who discuss their religious practices online. The case study of The Celtic Connection compels some concluding reflections about religious authority and media from a material perspective. Digital media embed many articulations of religious authority. Attention to digital and material practices can help to understand different aspects of religious authority because it focuses on interpersonal exchanges and material displays. Authority exists in digital venues on different interconnected levels: textual sources described and embedded in web pages, experts that offer suggestions on forums and blogs, discussions about objects that exist in offline spaces. For example, in The Celtic Connection forum, the moderators – Council Elders – discuss Neo-Paganism by giving advice about books, material objects, and offline rituals. In addition, the Internet multiplies the occasions for intra- and inter-religious contact: in digital spaces, people can gain new understandings of authority by entering into conversation with groups from other parts of the world (e.g. describing a place such as Stonehenge and discussing its meaning for different Neo-Pagan groups) and getting to know different traditions (e.g. combining Christianity and Neo-Paganism). From this perspective, authority is not only networked, in the sense of Campbell ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"qt1TNV4F","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(H. A. Campbell 2012a)","plainCitation":"(H. A. Campbell 2012a)","noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":132,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":132,"type":"article-journal","abstract":"This article suggests that religious practice online, rather than simply transforming religion, highlights shifts occurring within broader Western culture. The concept of “networked religion” is introduced as a way to encapsulate how religion functions online and suggests that online religion exemplifies several key social and cultural changes at work in religion in general society. Networked religion is defined by five key traits—networked community, storied identities, shifting authority, convergent practice, and a multisite reality—that highlight central research topics and questions explored within the study of religion and the internet. Studying religion on the internet provides insights not only into the common attributes of religious practice online, but helps explain current trends within the practice of religion and even social interactions in networked society.","container-title":"Journal of the American Academy of Religion","DOI":"10.1093/jaarel/lfr074","ISSN":"0002-7189, 1477-4585","issue":"1","journalAbbreviation":"J Am Acad Relig","language":"en","page":"64-93","source":"jaar.","title":"Understanding the Relationship between Religion Online and Offline in a Networked Society","volume":"80","author":[{"family":"Campbell","given":"Heidi A."}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2012",3,1]]}}}],"schema":""} (2012a), but also frequently mediated, or “hypermediated” ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"OH8KR4u7","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Evolvi 2018)","plainCitation":"(Evolvi 2018)","noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":"AChxfunV/pue2J5ih","uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":4019,"type":"book","title":"Blogging My Religion: Religious and Secular Media Spaces in Europe","publisher":"Routledge","publisher-place":"S.l.","number-of-pages":"200","edition":"1 edition","source":"Amazon","event-place":"S.l.","abstract":"Religion in Europe is currently undergoing changes that are reconfiguring physical and virtual spaces of practice and belief, and these changes need to be understood with regards to the proliferation of digital media discourses. This book explores religious change in Europe by analysing Atheist, Catholic, and Muslim blogs as spaces for articulating narratives about religion that symbolically challenge the power of religious institutions. The book has four main objectives. Firstly, it critically discusses the theory of secularization in Europe by taking into account the increasingly pivotal role of the Internet in shaping religious identities. Secondly, the book employs a comparative approach to consider religious change as the result of multiple entangled phenomena. Thirdly, the book reflects on a methodological approach to studying digital media. Finally, it adds theoretical complexity to the study of religion and digital media by employing spatial metaphors to conceptualize the Internet. This is an innovative study of an emerging phenomenon in contemporary religious expression. As such, it will be of significant interest to scholars of religious studies, the sociology of religion and digital media.","ISBN":"978-1-138-56211-0","shortTitle":"Blogging My Religion","language":"English","author":[{"family":"Evolvi","given":"Giulia"}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2018",8,22]]}}}],"schema":""} (Evolvi 2018). This means that authority can exist in a variety of settings that are interconnected through digital technology and involve many actors and actions.This suggests that authority in digital venues includes some peculiar characteristics. First, it is conditioned by the current proliferation of media technologies, which Nick Couldry defines as “media supersaturation” ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"eMG6R4N8","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Couldry 2012)","plainCitation":"(Couldry 2012)","noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":811,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":811,"type":"book","abstract":"Media are fundamental to our sense of living in a social world. Since the beginning of modernity, media have transformed the scale on which we act as social beings. And now in the era of digital media, media themselves are being transformed as platforms, content, and producers multiply. Yet the implications of social theory for understanding media and of media for rethinking social theory have been neglected; never before has it been more important to understand those implications. This book takes on this challenge.Drawing on Couldry's fifteen years of work on media and social theory, this book explores how questions of power and ritual, capital and social order, and the conduct of political struggle, professional competition, and everyday life, are all transformed by today's complex combinations of traditional and 'new' media. In the concluding chapters Couldry develops a framework for global comparative research into media and for thinking collectively about the ethics and justice of our lives with media. The result is a book that is both a major intervention in the field and required reading for all students of media and sociology.","edition":"1 edition","event-place":"Cambridge ; Malden, MA","ISBN":"978-0-7456-3921-5","language":"English","number-of-pages":"242","publisher":"Polity","publisher-place":"Cambridge ; Malden, MA","source":"","title":"Media, Society, World: Social Theory and Digital Media Practice","title-short":"Media, Society, World","author":[{"family":"Couldry","given":"Nick"}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2012",6,18]]}}}],"schema":""} (Couldry 2012). While religious institutions can decide to trust the Internet to different degrees, they cannot ignore that digital technologies have changed some interpersonal communication dynamics. As a result, authority becomes inevitably dependent on the logics of fast and interconnected media platforms, as happens in The Celtic Connection forum. Second, it exists both as human authority and as authority of the Internet. As exemplified by The Celtic Connection, users can write forum posts to gain advice from other believers, but also consider the Internet itself –almost as a personified entity – as a source of authority. Some Neo-Pagan users may decide for themselves, relying on their “inner authority,” which practices and beliefs to follows. At the same time, they may also read long forum threads as textual sources of information. Third, there are new authority figures that emerge and that need to be analyzed and theorized. For instance, The Celtic Connection’s Council Elders and other experienced users might not be considered authorities in the classical sense, but can be understood as informal charismatic authorities, to draw from Max Weber’s terminology. Their expertise comes from offline knowledge of Neo-Paganism, but also from the network of social interactions they create on the forum, their ability to navigate media logics and communicate effectively with other users, and the understanding of different traditions in a situation of religious contact. Therefore, it is necessary to go beyond traditional categories of authority and develop new frameworks that can account for non-traditional forms of authority in digital spaces. Changes in religious authority also involve material practices that compel reflections on the role of media. Material practices, indeed, include both physical objects and communication technologies (as discussed by Entangled Religions’ working paper “Media”). The Celtic Connection forum offers a venue to describe offline material practices, such as the construction of a wand or a visit to Stonehenge, as well as revelatory dreams where gods are connoted as material and embodied entities. These descriptions can help Neo-Pagans’ imagination, as suggested by Grieve (1995) and O’Leary ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"gB0tBoHE","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(O\\uc0\\u8217{}Leary 1996)","plainCitation":"(O’Leary 1996)","noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":1143,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":1143,"type":"article-journal","container-title":"Journal of the American Academy of Religion","ISSN":"0002-7189","issue":"4","journalAbbreviation":"Journal of the American Academy of Religion","page":"781-808","source":"JSTOR","title":"Cyberspace as Sacred Space: Communicating Religion on Computer Networks","title-short":"Cyberspace as Sacred Space","volume":"64","author":[{"family":"O'Leary","given":"Stephen D."}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["1996"]]}}}],"schema":""} (1996) and ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"HNKxwqX8","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Cowan 2005)","plainCitation":"(Cowan 2005)","noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":1346,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":1346,"type":"article-journal","container-title":"Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion","DOI":"10.1111/j.1468-5906.2005.00284.x","ISSN":"1468-5906","issue":"3","language":"en","page":"257-263","source":"Wiley Online Library","title":"Online U-Topia: Cyberspace and the Mythology of Placelessness","title-short":"Online U-Topia","volume":"44","author":[{"family":"Cowan","given":"Douglas E."}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2005",9,1]]}}}],"schema":""} (2005). This type of online experience is different from offline happenings, but it is not disjointed from reality or disconnected from materiality. On the contrary, it arguably points to a different way of experiencing religion that might be real and authentic for some practitioners. The popularity of The Celtic Connection forum suggests that users consider its discussions meaningful and connect them to offline material religious experiences in a tangible and authentic way. Therefore, it is important to analyze the connections between online and offline spaces and consider the Internet as a medium that potentially allows for material and authentic religious experiences, as we are reminded in the work, among others, of Campbell and L?vheim (2011). Online spaces participate in mediation when they help believers to experience religion by offering venues to describe and negotiate material practices and beliefs. Henry Jenkins defines the circulation of media objects on different platforms as “remediation” ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"RWwnMFUV","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Jenkins 2008)","plainCitation":"(Jenkins 2008)","noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":55,"uris":[""],"uri":[""],"itemData":{"id":55,"type":"book","abstract":"Henry Jenkins at Authors@Google (video)Winner of the 2007 Society for Cinema and Media Studies Katherine Singer Kovacs Book Award2007 Choice Outstanding Academic Title Convergence Culture maps a new territory: where old and new media intersect, where grassroots and corporate media collide, where the power of the media producer and the power of the consumer interact in unpredictable ways.Henry Jenkins, one of America’s most respected media analysts, delves beneath the new media hype to uncover the important cultural transformations that are taking place as media converge. He takes us into the secret world of Survivor Spoilers, where avid internet users pool their knowledge to unearth the show’s secrets before they are revealed on the air. He introduces us to young Harry Potter fans who are writing their own Hogwarts tales while executives at Warner Brothers struggle for control of their franchise. He shows us how The Matrix has pushed transmedia storytelling to new levels, creating a fictional world where consumers track down bits of the story across multiple media channels.Jenkins argues that struggles over convergence will redefine the face of American popular culture. Industry leaders see opportunities to direct content across many channels to increase revenue and broaden markets. At the same time, consumers envision a liberated public sphere, free of network controls, in a decentralized media environment. Sometimes corporate and grassroots efforts reinforce each other, creating closer, more rewarding relations between media producers and consumers. Sometimes these two forces are at war.Jenkins provides a riveting introduction to the world where every story gets told and every brand gets sold across multiple media platforms. He explains the cultural shift that is occurring as consumers fight for control across disparate channels, changing the way we do business, elect our leaders, and educate our children.","edition":"Revised edition","event-place":"New York, NY","ISBN":"978-0-8147-4295-2","language":"English","number-of-pages":"368","publisher":"NYU Press","publisher-place":"New York, NY","source":"Amazon","title":"Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide","title-short":"Convergence Culture","author":[{"family":"Jenkins","given":"Henry"}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2008",9,1]]}}}],"schema":""} (Jenkins 2008). Diffusion of narratives and pictures on The Celtic Connection, such as images of Stonehenge shared and commented upon by multiple users, may be considered a particular type of remediation, or “double mediation.” It is, indeed, a mediation that allows symbolic connections to material objects and spaces by enhancing another mediation already occurring in physical venues. For instance, the wand is a medium because people use it as a tool of mediation to experience transcendence during offline rituals, and it is further mediated (or double mediated) through discussions and displays on another medium, the Internet. This perspective compels, on the one hand, the elaboration of a broad definition of media, as articulated in the working paper “Media” on Entangled Religions, that includes all material objects invested with religious meaning. On the other hand, the computer and the Internet need to be considered not simply as communication tools, but material objects that can be embedded in various ways, and in some cases make possible, the religious practice. Therefore, the Internet has an impact on religion by offering believers venues to get in contact with each other and tools for the religious experience. The diffusion of digital culture does not radically change religion and religious authority because these aspects continue to be connected to material experiences in physical settings, even if in different ways. The understanding of these facets of digital religion can benefit from methodological and theoretical efforts that accord attention to materiality. For example, it is important to recognize the existence of alternative types of authority and consider their role even when they act informally and in non-traditional venues, such as the Internet. Furthermore, the study of virtual spaces needs to take into account the connections with physical spaces (and vice versa) and the material practices connected with digital technologies. By so doing, it is possible to gain a more nuanced understanding of religious practices and authority in digital venues and – to quote Stewart Hoover, in this volume – to analyze “the way that religion is produced and circulated in the new century.”References ADDIN ZOTERO_BIBL {"uncited":[],"omitted":[],"custom":[]} CSL_BIBLIOGRAPHY Bittarello, Maria Beatrice. 2006. “Neopagan Pilgrimages in the Age of the Internet: A Life Changing Religious Experience or an Example of Commodification?” Journal of Tourism and Cultural Change 4 (2): 116–35. , Jenny, and Robert J. Wallis. 2004. “Sacred Sites, Contested Rites/ Rights: Contemporary Pagan Engagements with the Past.” Journal of Material Culture 9 (3): 237–61. , Heidi. 2007. “Who’s Got the Power? 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