Unverified Personal Gnosis

So, let's talk about unverified personal gnosis.  It's the difference between Hecate being culturally associated with dogs, snakes, keys, torches, and so on, and the goddess personally coming to me and telling me that she really likes goats, too.  I have no way to back this bit of knowledge up; thus, it remains unverified.  I am welcome to use this knowledge, or gnosis, in my personal practice, but it would be unethical to pass this on to someone else.  For one, this knowledge might be for my ears only, so to speak.  The goddess might not have intended for me to share this information.  Secondly, what is true for me may not be true for someone else.  Someone might get really offended that I've ascribed goats to Hecate.  Unverified personal gnosis is what gives paganism its particularly unique flavor, but also what keeps us from forming a solid community a la Christianity and other major religions.  One might even posit that UPG is what keeps paganism from really catching on in a big way.  In any case.

UPG makes it almost impossible to have a frank discussion about the nature of deity in the pagan community, at least not without allowing for every person's interpretation of deity.  It's impossible to even have an argument.  For instance, I think the very idea of godspouses and astral babies is the dumbest thing I have ever heard of, but maybe that's just because no god or goddess has decided to wife me up yet.  It goes against the basic tenants of paganism to dismiss UPG altogether; although the old school Wiccans that I know would have us do so.  I've had this discussion many times.  Many (older) Wiccans find new traditions like Universal Eclectic almost distasteful.  A fair amount, too, don't care.  This puts us in a strange position as a community.  What do we do when we can't agree on anything, and, furthermore, we can't even argue with one another?

Some would say that we shouldn't even attempt a discussion.  There can't be any end to it, no agreements to be made; it's pointless.  We should focus on our own lives, instead of squabbling over technicalities.  But can we really call the nature of our beliefs "technicalities?"  How do we explain our faith to other people without getting bogged down by UPG?  It is clear that apologetics is nigh impossible.  And I've mentioned this before, but it also turns our online communities and discussion groups into endless rounds of agreeing with one another for fear of offending anyone.  This is my site, and I can say that godspouses are the delusions of self-important ninnies, but I might face serious heat if I said it elsewhere.

We could try to learn from one another, but accepting another person's UPG as your own is somewhat problematic.  After all, what if there are fifty people out there who claim to be married to Loki?  Either the gods are running mortal harems, or the source of some UPG is not as solid as they would like to believe.  How do we separate the wheat from the chaff? 

What I'm asking are unanswerable questions, and what ultimately comes down to the largest flaw (or strength) of paganism today.  Either we accept the reality of UPG and go on with our unique spiritual practices, or we come to a compromise and start instituting dogma like mainstream religions--and that isn't going to happen.  Paganism will always be a minority religion, because it lacks the ability and will to impose itself on other people.  Part of the reason Christianity is the force it is today is because it condemned heresies and burned the heretics.  As much as someone claiming to be married to an Avengers character (er, that is, a god) annoys me, I'm not about to set them on fire for it.