Because you know there's good stuff to use here.
Alright, listen. You know, I know, we all know that it doesn't take too much digging to find all kinds of good, traditionally "witchy" (AKA cultural or pre-Christian) symbols for ritual workings. However, as you might guess from the magic coming from that thousand-year period where most of Europe was more or less Christian, eventually people simply had to work with what they had available to them.
And that meant working with Christian symbolism in magic and ritual.
And you know, you may very well be surprised as to how many of these symbols can focus your magic, given what they symbolize in the first place. After all, if we learn anything from Damien Echols in his book, Angels and Archangels, it's that actually, witches don't need any tools at all to do good magic. A magician should be able to do powerful workings with nothing but their own focus and their own energy. So why couldn't any of the symbols Christians use for their weekly services or to represent their religion also become a fixture of some powerful spellwork—if you're able to focus on its meaning and how it aligns with your goals?
For many a deconstructed witch that's walked away from Christian faith, the idea of using any such symbolism in their rituals may seem uncomfortable. For Christian witches, however, or witches who are stuck in the "broom closet" and need symbols for workings that don't immediately tip off any anti-witchcraft friends or family, this guide will break down a few of the most common Christian symbols and where it makes sense to incorporate them in your magic.
Symbol 1: The Cross
I believe this may just be the most recognizable symbol of Christianity of all time. There's a lot of significance packed into what used to be basically a Roman torture device for the absolute lowest of the low in society, those criminals so disdained that the Romans would deny them any chance at a proper burial and leave them to asphyxiate and get picked at by the birds if no one came for their bodies. It's a gruesome and terrible way to die, and that's why a good portion of the Christian year, or liturgical calendar, is spent focusing on the tragedy and pain Jesus experienced during His Passion. (I was only ever half joking when I referred to Lent as forty days of state-mandated sadness.)
That said, though, the cross has come to mean so many things in the roughly two thousand years it's been a Christian symbol. All throughout time, the Cross as a symbol of protection (and we can still see that in the way pop culture shows exorcists holding it up, or the way people still wear one or pray on it when going out to do scary things). It's also a symbol of Christ Himself, and as such can be a great way to draw closer to Him and invoke His specific presence through meditation, prayer, or magic.
Digging further, though, many theologians like Jürgen Moltmann in his The Crucified God have peered into the deeper symbolism of the cross and the grizzly Passion narrative. My favorite meanings have to do with those extremely human ones: the ones centered around defying the forces of the world, gathering the weak and wounded under a mantel of hope and strength, and taking a stand against a world hellbent on dividing us into castes of "worthy" and "unworthy."
One can also shift the angle in which they think about Christ "dying for our sins": many make this seem like a transactional thing, as if someone had to be brutally murdered because we're just so evil and bad—but in reality, with Jesus dying alone on that cross, abandoned by His own God, and for extremely unjust reasons thanks to a corrupt and callous empire, it's so much more than that. Jesus didn't just die for us. He died with us, in solidarity with us, right beside two common criminals in the most undignified way; He died not a hero, but an outcast, and for that reason, He showed that He doesn't take the side of the oppressor or the empire, but of the common folk robbed of justice and cast aside. Knowing that Jesus was, and still is, a champion of the oppressed and a savior of the outcasts, a true hero for the underdogs, is something that makes the cross not just a protective or holy symbol, but an activist and empowering symbol too.
As such, the cross is an excellent symbol to make the centerpiece of any kind of ritual centered on justice, protection, courage, and resilience. Bring these meanings into your rituals, your prayer sessions, and your conversations with Jesus to embolden you to truly walk in the spirit of righteousness Christ set us to.
In ritual settings, it makes a fantastic center symbol to organize all your other relevant materials around, and it's perfect as a meditation focus while you raise that energy. You can also cover things with it, like sigils, to represent them being sealed in Christ's love, or cover things you want to keep away to represent Christ's light and power sealing away their influence. All of it depends on how you want to approach these symbols and ideas.
Symbol 2: Crown of Thorns
This is another really rough symbol, because as we all know, Jesus was being actively mocked during the Passion narrative. On that tail end, His accusers were blindfolding Him and hitting Him, demanding Him to guess who did it; they crowned Him in thorns to make a stab at the idea of Him being "King of the Jews" (which Jesus never really said Himself, but people were quick to claim Him saying so that the Romans would get nervous).
In the Bible, thorns are often symbols of either sin or hardship. St. Paul talks about the thorn in his side in 2 Corinthians, and how he asked God to take it away from him, but God didn't in order to humble him and remind him to persevere and stay gentle. In other places, like Genesis, thorns spring up under the ground after Adam and Eve royally screw up with the apple. Other places yet, like in Numbers, describe how the people the Israelites fought with need to be eliminated, lest any that remain become "as pricks in your eyes and thorns in your side" (Numbers 33:55). That one's a little rough, as it does describe the military conquest and destruction of a separate nation.
Still, you get the point: thorns in the Bible represent burden, problems, pain, and the curse of sin. In traditional Christian thought, Jesus wearing that crown of thorns is a symbol of the sins He took on for the sake of humanity—but it can also be an overall symbol of all that vexes you in everyday life. Be it your own flaws or mistakes, be it outside forces you can't control, be it enemies looking to tear you down, the thorns are a great representation of it all, and as such, they're perfect to incorporate into any banishing or purification rituals. Asking God to get rid of your thorns in ritual, practicing the virtues of penitence and seeking forgiveness, go a long way with this classic symbol.
And if God doesn't take away whatever thorns you're asking about, it's also a great time to do some magic centered on fortitude and resilience, so that like St. Paul, you can continue going and overcoming the challenges set before you.
In a ritual setting, you might burn the thorns to represent God's cleansing fire taking them away from you, or you might get a plant that has thorns, like a rose, to add in other significant symbolism (finding beauty in the hardships, etc.). You might also scatter them on your table to represent the difficult environment you're in, and wipe them away. Or, if you get really creative, you could scatter them as a trap and make it into a baneful protection: one that pricks the eyes and puts a thorn in the side of those trying to hurt you.
Again, your magic is as open-ended as you are creative.
Symbol 3: Medals (Miraculous Medal, St. Benedict's Medal, etc.)
Now, these are an admittedly more Catholic and Orthodox type of symbol, as many Protestants tend not to hold any stock in anything that happened outside the pages of the Bible. However, across the two thousand years of time since Revelation was penned, many other things have happened to the holy people of God—including visitations from Mother Mary and other Saints. One medal, the Miraculous Medal, is just such a thing, and has such a story: it's said that Mother Mary visited St. Catherine Labouré, where she told the Saint to have a medal fashioned with her likeness standing on the globe or on a snake with rays of light coming from her hands (signifying her as Queen of Heaven and one who treads on Satan, the snake). Around the border are the words, ""O Mary, conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee." According to St. Catherine, anyone with this medal is eligible to receive her grace and her help.
That's just one example, though. Others, like St. Benedict's Medal, have shown up recently in films like The Pope's Exorcist (2023), where Father Amore holds up a massive one and makes the possessed follow it with their eyes to see if there's actually a demon in there. St. Benedict, known to have miraculously overcome effects of poison, among other things, is often depicted with a snake, a raven, and a poisoned chalice on one side of his medal, and with a cross on the other side with the words, "Crux Sacra Sit Mih Lux, Non Draco Sit Mih Dux" (May the Cross be my light, may the Dragon not be my guide).
These medals can be found as jewelry, as keychains, as all kinds of things. Generally, they're awesome as protective amulets or as items to use when asking for grace or help. If you have a need for protection from evil or a need for some divine assistance or favor, therefore, these are great to either wear, bless, or make the focal point of a ritual set up.
Symbol 4: Bread & Wine
Another symbol that cannot be overstated in its significance to Christian life is, of course, bread and wine. In denominations like Catholicism, Orthodoxy, and Episcopalian, the sacrament of the Eucharist starts with bread and wine that miraculously takes on the real presence of the body and blood of Christ. Like, it's actually flesh and blood, baby. We are straight up eating our God; we are becoming one with His Son by incorporating His flesh and blood into our own with what is called "spiritual food."
And that's metal as hell.
Of course, for Christians of other denominations, they're just symbols of Jesus's body and blood and that's kind of lame honestly but no matter which way you think about it, the fact is that as a magical symbol, this is insanely powerful, too. In fact, in some branches of folk magic, people used to hide the Eucharist under their tongue during church and bring it home to do all kinds of magic with—including even some more nefarious magic against their enemies. I've heard stories in this era of priests chasing people down the road and accusing people of taking the Eucharist home to do witchcraft with, which is wacky, but also kind of funny to think about.
Nonetheless, as witches, we also know there's a lot more symbolism in bread and wine than just Christian symbolism, too. Bread is the stuff of life, even in the Bible: the manna that falls from heaven, the bread Jesus breaks and feeds hundreds of people with, the stuff that keeps people alive. Likewise, wine in Jesus's era may not have been as strong as ours today, but it still had many of its traditional associations: letting loose, chaos, breaking one's restraints, illusion, and whimsy. (Dionysus's associations with wine just can't be wiped away so easily, after all.)
Combining these ideas, knowing that bread and wine are life sustaining as both physical food and as spiritual food when transmuted (yes, I'd argue that the Eucharist is alchemy), we can do some insane magic with these two things. In fact, we can try our own hand at transmutation if we pay enough attention to the Eucharist ritual in any worship service. (Take note of how the priest goes about their Eucharist thing: what they say, how they move, where they focus.) But specifically, if you have need of magic that restores and heals, that stitches you and God together, that washes away stress and fear, that brings new life and vigor... bread and wine. Bread and wine on your ritual table.
Symbol 5: The Jesus Fish (Ichthys)
And of course, we couldn't very well end this talk without using that Jesus Fish™ you sometimes see people use as a bumper sticker on their cars. Almost as iconic as the cross itself, the Jesus Fish (or the ichthys) is a symbol early Christians would use to signal to each other that they were believers. Before the Way became the official state religion of Rome, after all, they weren't always treated so nicely, and so this code helped them stick together in secret. The term ichthys itself is apparently also an acronym. According to Camilla Klein of The Christian Educators' Academy:
The use of the fish as a symbol of Christianity has its roots in the early days of the faith. As the story goes, the Greek word for “fish,” ΙΧΘΥΣ (ichthys), served as an acronym for the phrase “Ίησοῦς Χριστός Θεοῦ Υἱός Σωτήρ” (Iesous Christos Theou Yios Soter), which translates to “Jesus Christ, Son of God, Savior.”
So that's pretty cool! Knowing it might've had to do with keeping secret, we can definitely add camouflage and going incognito onto our list of ways to use this (and we can even draw on specific fish that are known to camouflage really well, like flounder). However, more than that, one of the most iconic places the fish shows up in relation to Jesus is the same place bread shows up: in His miracle of the loaves and fishes.
Jesus fed hundreds, even thousands of people with what He broke of those loaves and fish—and then there were still several baskets left over. If that's not a prime symbol of abundance and having enough to sustain you, I don't know what is. It's also a symbol of making the impossible, possible, as Jesus's Apostles asked Him: how do You think we're gonna feed all these people with just a few fish and a couple loaves of bread??? But Jesus made it happen, telling them to just trust Him and let Him work.
And work He did.
So if you're in serious need of a miracle, or abundance, or security and provisions, then by all means, make that Jesus Fish a cornerstone of your ritual. Remind yourself of all the things Jesus made possible from the seemingly impossible, and know that just as He cared for all those that came to see Him that day, preaching from that boat on the shore, so too can He help you get what you need to sustain yourself and keep yourself going. Pair the symbol with His words from Matthew 6:25-34:
25 “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? 26 Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? 27 Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life[e]?
28 “And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. 29 Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. 30 If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? 31 So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 32 For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33 But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.
Take these symbols with you into your magic and let yourself, above all, really feel that connection with God. After all, that's where the magic really is: not in the symbols, but in the One that those symbols make you think of and speak to. ♥
Sara Raztresen is a Slovene-American writer, screenwriter, and Christian witch. Her fantasy works draw heavily on the wisdom she gathers from her own personal and spiritual experience, and her spiritual practice borrows much of the whimsy and wonder that modern society has relegated to fairy-and-folktale. Her goal is to help people regain their spiritual footing and discover God through a new (yet old) lens of mysticism.
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