It seems there is a thumb sucking attitude afoot nowadays, in that certain outspoken individuals feel they out to be given carte blanche entry into any occult group, just because they demand it.
Upon receipt of the news that the occult group which these jokers intend a forced entry has decided to resist them, we are all subjected to the spectacle of a heel-pounding tantrum, printed if possible, and usually bulwarked by a myriad of phone calls, in-person complaints, gibing letters, plain and fancy character assassination, and a reprise of the Hallelujah Chorus in a minor key.
There is no way in this world or the next that any Lodge (to use Fortunes good old-fashioned term) can be all things to all people. The medieval Catholic Church tried this, and to their vast surprise, found an explosion in their faces they are still trying to mop up.
People are too individual for concerted togetherness. And if the common denominator ever served anybody anywhere on a practical basis, it is more in line with a national patriotism or loyalty to some sport, and even there you have anarchists, and people who just downright dislike sports.
Is there some reason why anybody's tradition, coven, or pagan group should be forced to be everybody's? Or why any struggling coven or group should be forced to open their doors to every cockamamie who comes down the pike, regardless that the applicant is totally unsuited to the philosophy, structure, and aims of the group?
Now, Ill be tripleyedamned if I can see the point in accepting some Linus
who totes the security blanket of Accept Me or Ill Scream! Or who says in
effect,
Give me access to all your esoteric writings and oral tradition or Ill throw
a fit! Or who demands to be taken into the bosom of the brethren when the
same would heave with revulsion upon contact.
You bet your posterior that any occult lodge is an in-group. It has to be,
to survive and pursue its aims without such a lot of internal bickering
that no one else gets anything done.
Where the lodges go wrong is in publicly laying down their life concepts as the path all out to follow or the bugabear will get you. In that case, they ask for it. It simply follows that the broader the base for acceptance, the broader the common denominator, the lower the final quotient of quality. Proctor and Gamble is in the business of quantity; but then they aren't training occultists.
Could this just be the reason for the old-timey traditional small group-coven-lodge? Well? Maybe the forefathers knew something after all.
We've all met people from other groups and soon knew damn right well there is no way on Earth we are going to make it with that group...but is it sane and logical to expect them to open their arms with glad cries, nonetheless? Oh, come on!
There are groups who find ________ (pick one) unacceptable and this Thing
may well be a cherished Tenet of some other group. That does not make either
group a many-headed monster, but simply states the parameters of their personal
and group working
philosophy. And when Linus finds this a thorn in his little buttsy, its
this writers suggestion to the
offending group to not only shut the door, but slam it and bar the goddam
thing, and let Linus use his own tweezers and buy his own salve.
In the interim, Linus may either grow up from the friction of sudden experience, or decide to go another route, or quit altogether. But that's Linus's karma; let Linus work it out.