Modern Views
During the Age of Enlightenment, belief in the powers of witches and sorcerers to harm began to die out in the West. But the reasons for disbelief differed from those of early Christians. For the early Christians the reason was theological—that Christ had already defeated the powers of evil. For the post-Enlightenment Christians, the disbelief was based on a belief in rationalism and empiricism.
It was at this time, however, that Western Christianity began expanding to parts of Africa and Asia where premodern worldviews still held sway, and where belief in the power of witches and sorcerers to harm was, if anything, stronger than it had been in Northern Europe. Many African Independent Churches developed their own responses to witchcraft and sorcery.
The situation was further complicated by the rise of new religious movements that considered witchcraft to be a religion. This view does not claim that witches actually consciously enter into a pact with Satan because most practitioners of Wicca and other modern witchcraft do not even believe in Satan.
Read more about this topic: Christian Views On Magic
Famous quotes containing the words modern and/or views:
“To the modern spirit nothing is, or can be rightly known, except relatively and under conditions.”
—Walter Pater (1839–1894)
“The word “conservative” is used by the BBC as a portmanteau word of abuse for anyone whose views differ from the insufferable, smug, sanctimonious, naive, guilt-ridden, wet, pink orthodoxy of that sunset home of the third-rate minds of that third-rate decade, the nineteen-sixties.”
—Norman Tebbit (b. 1931)