Pagan Pride Celebrated, 2000

September 19, 2000

Source: The New York Times

On September 19, 2000, The New York Times reported that "the bumper sticker on the sedan parked in front of Suzanne and Duke Egbert's house declares, 'We Are Everywhere.' 'We' refers to contemporary pagans, whose spiritual paths lead them to regard nature as divinely charged. To raise the public profile of pagans -- and try to gain them broader acceptance -- the Egberts and others have established Pagan Pride Day, to be celebrated with events in cities in the United States and Canada timed to coincide roughly with the autumn equinox, on Friday. The intent, said Mr. Egbert, 32, is to educate people that pagans live among them, that they are peaceful people (emphatically not devil worshipers), community-minded and as intent on claiming their constitutional right to freedom of assembly as anyone else...Since 1998, they have also run the Pagan Pride Project, a nonprofit organization, as well as an Internet site (www.paganpride.org) and are among those planning Pagan Day events at 70 sites in 36 states and in 5 Canadian provinces, starting this weekend and continuing over the next two weeks."