Wicca is modern form of witchcraft practiced by thousands of followers around the world. In South Africa it is led by arch-priestess Donna Darkwolf Vos.

Fiery Oak

Guardians of the watchtowers of the South

Hear the words sounded from my mouth

Camel, saffron, brown and green

Mountains visible and gnomes unseen

Fertile fields and healthy yields

Homes of rock and metal shield

Lend us now the gift of creation

To produce our needs through our elation

Grounded and secure we can now stand

Reaping harvests from the land

Nurturing Mother and Father Pan

Pregnant woman and virile man

With sincerest piety and joyous mirth

And thus we hail and welcome Earth.

– Peter Bocetti, Fiery-oak

Absolut Hypocrisy

Donna Vos fell in love with a minister while she was attending Bible College in Kalk Bay. He confessed to the elders, who absolved him and threatened to expel her for leading the cleric astray.

‘More importantly than my outrage over my treatment and the repressive attitude of the church to women,’ says Vos, ‘this incident led me to question the very “pie in the sky” nature of Christianity. I’m a very practical person and I soon realised my religion represented the very essence of abstract theology. We simply weren’t compatible.’

Religious Standard Bearer

Vos’s mother was an atheist and her father a staunch non-churchgoing Dutch Reformist. This gave the young Vos a church, but little spirituality – something she craved because from an early age she was aware that she had a calling as a religious standard-bearer. Like the sangoma tradition, she knew that if she did not heed her mission she would fall desperately ill until she did

By age four her life was ‘the Bible’ and she would later go on to become deeply involved in the Assemblies of God Pentecostal movement, where she was exposed to speaking in tongues. While her schoolmates were busy at sports or roaming malls, she undertook an evangelical tour of the country as head of the South African Christian Association. And as her horizons broadened, so she began to formulate a philosophy based on her own interpretations of the scriptures and the ideas of Christians she met on her year-long journey.

Bible College

Vos, from school, engrossed herself in the study of theology – with her Master’s thesis on the church and the Black Consciousness ideology that was emerging to confront the apartheid regime. It was about this time that she made the fateful decision to attend Bible College. It was a resolve that would completely change her life because it forced her to re-evaluate her faith.

‘I had a complete spiritual breakdown,’ says Vos. ‘One minute I had a God, the next he was gone. I felt empty, an outcast, and so filled with pain and angst that I became physically and mentally ill – even considering suicide.’

Zen Buddhism

Vos left her theology studies and enrolled for a degree in Library Science at the University of Cape Town (UCT). There she became involved in Zen Buddhism until she read a book on witchcraft. Before this she had not considered Paganism as an alternative, but their down-to-earth beliefs and their acceptance of women as equals appealed to her pragmatic nature and radical feminism, and she immediately attended a workshop on Wicca – an ancient European pagan religion that cherishes earth as the manifestation of God.

‘The funny thing is that since an early age I’d been called a witch because of my black hair and pointed nose,’ she laughs. ‘But even if others recognised me, I remained ignorant of my purpose until I got to UCT.’

The Darkest Hour

Paganism was enduring its darkest hour in South Africa when Vos converted to Wicca. Followers were shunned by organised religions and society turned their back on them – as Vos found out when her fiancé tearfully abandoned her on learning of her faith.

Moreover, they were persecuted by the state, which had the power to arrest them for Satanism simply for wearing their sacred pentagrams. Pagans, because of this, went underground and practised in secret – itself fuelling misunderstanding. Vos set out to do something about this unsatisfactory situation when South Africa’s new Constitution guaranteed freedom of religion.

Pagan Federation

She began to make contact with reputable pagans with the idea of establishing an umbrella organisation that would allow believers to emerge from the closet while educating the public to facilitate acceptance. By the winter solstice of June 1996 a constitution had been drawn up, and the Pagan Federation of South Africa was launched with Vos, the ‘Dark Wolf’, as its first president.

‘I’d always believed there was nothing on earth too difficult for me to achieve,’ sighs Vos. ‘But trying to get anarchic Pagans together nearly beat me. It was like herding cats.’

Aquarian Tabernacle Church of South Africa

Today she is President Emeritus of the Pagan Federation, concentrating her efforts on establishing the recently launched Aquarian Tabernacle Church of South Africa of which she is the arch priestess – the Queen of Witches. It is a church unlike any other in the country.

‘Our places of worship are found in nature, not in artificial structures wrought by man,’ wrote Vos.  ‘We worship in the solitude of gardens, the spires and cathedrals of mountains, the beauty of our shade-dappled glades. Any part of Earth, the Great Mother, becomes our temple, or shrine, as we see it. No clarion calls our faithful to worship – the warmth of the sun, the whisper of a breeze on our bodies and the impelling glow of the majestic full moon are reminders enough.’

Form a Circle

Vos, in ceremonial headdress and traditional robes of black that absorb negative forces, channels energy through the wand she wears on her finger and casts a circle when a suitable place of worship is found. Once the circle has been ritually cleansed, she summons the guardian angels and the totem spirits of the four quarters: east-air, north-fire, west-water and south-earth.

After a period of meditation, drumming quickens the pace and the faithful run and chant round the circle. Then it stops, suddenly, allowing a period for the focusing of enough energy to generate magik spells that will heal, protect and bring luck to the congregants. This is followed by a communion of cakes and ale, a closing ceremony and a feast to replenish spent energy.

Concentrated Energy

‘The one thing that non-pagans have the most problem with is magik spells, which they believe are used to perpetrate evil,’ says Vos. ‘But, in reality, spells are just concentrated energy-forces sent into the universe. While we do not differentiate between good and bad spells or black and white magik, we do have an injunction that states, “and it harm none, do as ye will”. It is also understood that whatever we do we receive twice back, so if harm is done then the perpetrator will be punished at some time with double what they dished out.’

When Vos is not busy with the affairs of her church, she practises as a traditional healer. There is no rest in this lifetime – that will come in Summerlands when she prepares for her next life.