Welcome to Gaia! ::

So this may sound a little odd, but how familiar are most nature-worshippers with nature? It's just one of those things I sometimes wonder. I hear a lot about people who worship nature deities (I'm looking at you, Wicca, as well as all you Druids) performing rites outside, with disastrous consequences (like putting the ceremonial fire too dang close to forest litter, not having a bucket of water handy, and everybody wearing flowy stuff that blows around a lot in the wind), or just skipping all that "outside" nonsense and doing everything in the warm-n-dry. And that's around the time I wonder if one shouldn't be more familiar with such things before deciding to worship that way.

So I'm interested in your input here. Is there any basic nature education as part of one's initiation into a nature-based religion? Am I just hearing about aberrant people and incidents? Do people who worship nature do so because they're already deeply connected/familiar with the great outdoors? Talk to me and my former-4-H self. I'm hoping to be reassured.

LOL!

That reminds me of my college's pagan club. They made a big deal about doing a ritual outside and than complained of it being too windy/cold.

For me personally, I find that its easier to contact certain spirits if your out in a particular area. If you want to deal with nature spirits, than out in nature you go.

I don't feel compelled to go outside into nature though. The only areas I view as uber potent to me are caves and those aren't the most common around here.

I think people who do "nature magick" need to have a little thing called common sense. A good suggestion would be for all those uber nature types to go take nature awareness workshops at state parks or volunteer to help pick up litter at a state park or other area like that.