The Cost of Spiritual Community

Someone asked me the other day “Why do we have to pay to worship?” That’s a good question. The simple answer is that things cost money.

Yes, of course, we can go to a park and set up a card table for an altar and host a circle ritual if we wish. I’ve done this many times for my household. But while we had a cute suitcase with all the stuff for a field altar, we did have to spend some small amount of money for cakes and ale. This also applies to household coven circles. Either the host or some members of the coven must spring for the libations, candles, incense and other ritual consumables etc.

These costs are relatively minor when distributed across the membership of a coven or loose circle group. What’s always troublesome is when a couple of folks in the group forget to purchase the thing they committed to bring. Then there is a last-minute scramble to find a substitute for the cakes or the ale or some other consumable just before the ritual. This last-minute rush frequently upsets the mindset of the hosting Priest or Priestess. Which should be a no, no!

Because of this, many established covens and circles have chosen to have a dues system. This gives the lead members budget to purchase the needed things in an orderly manner. Even this dues system has its problems. Several times over the years I’ve observed circle groups implode because a few members get the idea that the coven/circle leadership is lining their pockets.

In a few rare cases, the leadership were lining their pockets, shame on them. Although, most of the time group membership just plain didn’t have a handle on what things cost and how fast the costs on a shopping list adds up.

Where things get complicated is when you want to scale up for a really big event. I’m not speaking of a Festival size event but let us say a Wiccan Temple congregation or a Gathering of a Clan Covens.

Alright, I hear some of you saying, “But can’t we just keep our events small and in our living rooms?” Sure, you can! But keep in mind that Wicca is one of the fastest-growing religions. There are now more of us than the Presbyterians. We as a community and our leadership are being compelled to scale up some of our events.

Let’s do an exercise to illustrate what things cost and the details involved when you scale up.

A Wiccan Temple congregation could be a membership between 25 to 180 persons. A Clan level gathering can vary in size but easily similar numbers as a congregation. Let’s assume 4 or 8 hives off covens/circles each with about 12 members. Do the math, we’re talking about a gathering between 48 to 96 persons.

During warmer months, sure private land is a fine setting. But if you are going to reserve a city or county park facility, there is usually a rental fee. Already we are incurring a cost. If you are hosting this event in the colder months, obviously we must rent indoor space, again a sizeable cost is involved.

As of this article’s writing, it’s a couple of weeks before Imbolc. Our Temple’s Events and Ritual team are busy planning our Temple’s Ostara 2020 event for the congregation and an unknown number of guest participants. Our group’s mailing list is over 160 persons. Will they all attend, absolutely not!

The rule for planning a large group attendance is that “life, job and family obligations get in the way.” So, we use a planning rule of roughly 40% will attend. 40% of 160 persons equals about 64 persons, give or take 10 persons. This is our initial target for planning purposes. Of course, we do use an Events app on Facebook to measure projected planned attendance. If the “Going” responses are greater than or 40% baseline, then we adjust our planning.

Scheduling: Our preferred date for our group ritual and congregation social was to be Saturday, March 21st. Our ritual director can’t make the 21st because of a day job commitment. While we have other qualified persons, presently, our ritual director is using each Sabbat as a teaching event as well, since the congregation has many newbies in their first year.

We looked at Friday evening the 20th, but the facility we routinely use is booked for Zumba classes. Our fall back is Sunday the 22nd. The facility is available, and so is our Ritual director. If this had been scheduled on a Saturday, we would have scheduled an evening ritual.

As we are now scheduled for Sunday, the moms in the planning team pointed out that it’s a school night. With that in consideration, we decided to schedule our Ostara 2020 as Sunday afternoon function starting about 1 pm and ending at about 6 pm or 7 pm.

I called the facility coordinator and reserved the date and time window and drove over the next day with the $100 rental fee. Roughly $20 per hour for space and we have negotiated a special rate due to our planned yearly volume.

Social Materials: Since our events are a bring a dish to pass for the post ritual social time, our Events director must plan for bulk purchases of paper plates, single-use utensils, napkins, condiments and beverages: bottled water, soda sugared and diet, coffee and tea. Also, we need cups for hot and cold beverages. Trash bags for cleanup etc. The shopping list as you can see, is complicated and bares a notable cost to the temple’s operating expenses.

Ritual Materials: Our ritual director also presented the Temple’s board with an exacting shopping list for items he needs for ritual use. Some of the items are a one-time purchase and will be used again and again. Other items are consumables like the cakes, ale, candles, incense and bouquets of Spring Flowers on the Ostara altar.

Some of the things he wants are unique to the Ostara holiday and might get used once per year. Some of these things the old-timer witches have in our kitchens or in our ritual equipment closets, other things we don’t. The Event team negotiates with the Ritual Director whether the odd items are critical or just nice to have. Our temple is young; we have resources but not super deep pockets.

This temple Sabbat event Ostara 2020 is budgeted to cost an estimated $250 US.

Let’s calculate that out for eight sabbats. 8 x $250 equals $2000 US for a year’s sabbats overhead alone.

We aren’t even discussing lighter attended, smaller-scale 13 moon events which adds an additional overhead of another estimated $1500 US per year. Or a rough yearly budget of $3500 US, which is only the operating expenses for our 21 ritual events.

This doesn’t include our yearly Liability Insurance premium or the cost of maintaining a commercially supported website for the temple, advertising etc. Also, it doesn’t cover the additional cost of facility rental for classes, seminars, special events like Wiccaning’s, Handfasting’s, Memorials and Special events. Let's say the Temple’s year budget to cover all I have described is perhaps $5000-$6000 US per year.

I hear some of you coughing and remarking about that much money. That’s a bargain.

Please note that NONE of our nine board of directors, officiating clergy and their support committees makes a cent on any of this. Our sponsored Chaplains to regional hospitals will have reasonable expenses covered but they are not paid either.

If we were a mainstream church, congregation members would be asked to Tithe 10% of their wages. For someone making $31k per year that would amount to $3100 or about $260 per month. OUCH!

To cover our operating budget, we have established a membership system to build a yearly budget using subscription membership. A family membership is $25 per month, covers both parents and kids, an individual membership is $20 per month, Seniors-Disability $15 per month, Students $5 per month and course we have a sliding scale for special circumstances of $5-$10 per month.

Non-member Guests who visit our openly advertised Sabbats and moons pay at a minimum $5 at the door to support the event and perhaps much more on popular high holy-day events.

Properly planed and with memberships, you can run the whole Temple Congregation operation with a mix of committed monthly membership payments with between 25-50 paid members.

Some of you might be asking, what if we have lots of members, what will we do with fund excesses above our budget need. That’s easy, most of it will be banked for unforeseen expenses, future long-term projects, the occasional paid out-of-town notable guest speaker and of course leaner times, etc.

Fellow WICCANS, our numbers are considerable. Now is the time to step up, and form governing boards and groups of people to establish formal and legal Wiccan and Pagan Church/Temple communities in your regional area.