Pagan or Wiccan? By: Unknown      The difference between a Pagan and a Wiccan is similar to the difference between a Christian and a Catholic. One is a subset of the other.      Back in time, there was no difference between Catholics and Christians. But the Reformation changed all that. Now we have many different types of Christians.      There are the Lutherans, who started it all.. there are Presbyterians,  Methodists, Baptists,  Jehovah Witnesses, all Christianity. You've even got the Covenant of Unitarian Universalist Pagans, an affiliate of the Unitarian Universalist Association especially for UUs who identify with earth-based spirituality.      The neo-pagan movement hasn't been around nearly as long as the Catholic Church or its offspring. But ancient pre-Christian traditions, divided as they were by geography and an absence of mass media, varied even more than today's Christian ones. Anthropoligist Margaret Murray's 1921 publication The Witch-Cult in Western Europe certainly laid the seeds for the neo-pagan movement. Her book made the case that witchcraft was a surviving pre-Christian tradition in the British Isles and the surrounding area.      Gerald Gardner, who claimed that an elder female relative initiated him into the Wiccan tradition in the 1930's, was a pioneer in publicizing Wicca. He first published a novel, High Magick's Aid. Later, after the repeal of the British anti-witchcraft laws in the early 1950's, he published two non-fiction pieces: Witchcraft Today  and The Meaning of Witchcraft.       There is debate  as to how much Gardner invented in his writings and how much has actually been passed down. Regardless, his writings and teachings gave rise to neopagan traditions, Gardnerian Wicca.