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Wicca is not:

Satanic or Anti-Christian - According to Gerald Gardner, the Wiccan who brought out Wicca to the world, Wicca was a religious witchcult which had been practised through centuries in secrecy, even predating Christianity. It survived through the witch hunts, wars and so on. Wiccans don't believe in Satan. They don't believe in hell. Some, if not most follow a term "To each their own". Meaning, if a Christian is a Christian, leave it at that. You are Wiccan. You should respect people's beliefs and not enforce upon it or go against them. Leave them be, and go on with life. Satanic Witchcraft exists, but it isn't Wicca. Like I stated, Wiccans don't believe in Satan. If you meet someone who is Wiccan and says they believe in Satan or worship him, they aren't Wiccan. I'd advise you run a mile if you met someone like that. But hopefully, you won't.

Proselytizing - Wiccans don't go out of their way or to long lengths to push their religion on others. They are peaceful, solitary people. We keep to ourselves. If someone approaches us with interest, it's our choice to either open up or not. Not every Wiccan is comfortable with sharing what they believe and practise. Wiccans see proselytizing as bullying, therefore it goes against the Wiccan rede: "And it harm none, do as you will". Which means, do what you want as long as it harms nothing, no one, and yourself. (I will explain the rede in more detail in a later section). Harm comes in many forms. Wiccans know that there is more than one path to deity, and that everyone must find their own spirituality (or not, if they choose). Wiccans know that if they are meant to walk the Wiccan path, they will find it without someone proselytizing them. We also know that those who do find the Wiccan path on their own, value it more than if they were forced or convinced to have followed it.

Dualistic - Some religions see duality as antagonistic, like God and Satan, for example, Wiccans see them as opposite partners, or two parts of a whole. That whole ''black and white'', ''absolute right and absolute wrong'' mindset has no place in Wicca. Wiccans see many shades of grey. This doesn't mean that Wiccans have no ethics! I'll state what Wiccans do after this section.

Exclusive - There is nothing in Wicca which says you can't practice more than one religion. You get Buddhist Wiccans, Wiccans who worship many gods and goddesses, Kemetic Wiccans (the Ancient Egyptian practises). The types go on.

Only about magic - If you're exploring Wicca only so you can learn Magic, don't waste your time. Be honest with yourself: Does this path feel right? If so, you're cut out for it. If not, leave it. Wicca is a religion, and you don't need it to do magic. Magic exists outside of religion. Wicca provides one of many paths to magical practise, but magic is not its central theme. Some Wiccans don't do magic at all. (That doesn't mean they don't believe in it).

A Way to get Power over others - Wicca is a way to build your own power. Isn't that more important? If you're getting into it because your ex hates you, or someone punched you and you want to get revenge, walk away. Magic's a two way street. Whatever you put out, you're going to get back. Magically or materially.

Wiccans do believe: (Mostly from Thea Sabin's book: Wicca For Beginners. Some may be changed to my words or opinions/views).

Wiccan Principle 1: Deity becomes a polarity - Many Wiccans believe that there is a single great divine force, which they call "Spirit", "Aether", "The all", "The Divine", or just "deity". It gives life to the universe, and it transcends gender, space, and time. They also believe, as do practitioners of many of the world's religions, that deity in its entirety is too large and abstract for humans to comprehend fully. In the wonderful Power of Myth series of interviews that Billy Moyers conducted with Joseph Campbell, the twentieth century's foremost authority on mythology, Campbell sums up this idea: "God is a thought. God is a name. God is an idea. But its reference is to something that transcends all things. The ultimate mystery of being beyond all categories of thought." Wiccans believe that deity separated (or we separate it) into facets -or aspects -that humans can relate to. The first "division" of deity is into its male and female halves. In the Power of Myth interviews, Joseph Campbell describes a beautiful representation of this idea: the Mask of Eternity in the Shiva Cave at Elephanta in India. The mask consists of a central face looking forward and one face looking to each side. Campbell explains that the left and right faces of the mask signify the first division of deity and that "Whenever one moves out of the transcendent [deity], one comes into a field of opposites. These... come forth as male and female from the two sides." So by splitting into aspects, deity moves into the field of time, which is where humans exist. Campbell continues: "Everything in the field of time is dual. The past and future. Dead and alive, all this; being and nonbeing, is and isn't."

That's pretty heady stuff, but the Wiccan interpretation of the same idea is fairly straightforward. The two main aspects of deity that Wiccans work with- the male and the female- are simply called the God and the Goddess. The Wiccan God and Goddess represent yang and yin, positive and negative, light and dark. Since they are two halves of the same whole, they are separate but never truly apart; they are connected by their polarity. Neither exists without the other. The polarity- the relationship- between the God and Goddess, is a central, sacred dynamic of Wicca.

Wiccan Principle 2: Deity is Immanent - Wiccans believe that deity, the life force described in principle 1, is immanent, or inherent in all people or things. It is in the greatest cathedral and the smallest grain of sand. This is not quite the same thing as the animist idea that a cathedral or a grain of sand have a consciousness of their own, but rather that there is a sacred force that infuses everything, and that force is deity or a part of deity. Deity is in each of us as well, regardless of our religion. Because deity is immanent in us, each of us is apart of the divine.

Wiccan Principle 3: The Earth is Divine - Wiccans believe that the earth is a manifestation of the divine, particularly of the Goddess, who gives birth to all things and receives them again in death. Therefore, everywhere on Earth is sacred space. Although you may argue that some places are more sacred than others, Wiccans believe that there's a bit of the Divine in every corner of the earth, so they focus on attuning and working with earth energies. This means understanding the cycle of the seasons, participating in these cycles through ritual (the eight Wiccan Sabbats and Lunar events: Esbats) and contact with the earth, and living within the flow of the earth's natural power rather than working against it.
The ultimate religious experience for many people is to transcend the mundane, the earth, and go to some higher place. Such as a mental place or image during meditation and trance-work. It can be a "location," like the Christian heaven, or an inner place, like when one finds Nirvana. Although many Wiccans believe that there is a special place that they go to after they die, and many of them believe in an "otherworld" or "underworld" (not Hell), the majority of their practice is centred in the here and now, on planet earth. For example, Wiccan rituals often mimic the seasonal changes and Wiccans include trees, rocks and herbs in ritual and magic.

Many Wiccans believe that a significant part of their spiritual path is taking care of the earth, whether it is by everyday actions such as recycling, larger efforts such as work for environmental causes, or any number of things in between. This is not a requirement of Wicca, but many Wiccans do it anyway because it flows from the belief that the earth is divine.

Wiccan Principle 4: Psychic Power - Wiccans believe that abilities exist, that they work, and that each of us is born with our own psychic gifts. If each of us is infused with the same divine force, and the earth and everything around us are too, we ought to be able to tap into that force to get information and do things beyond the realms of the five senses. We know that many things we encounter in nature occur in patterns, like the shapes of spiral nautilus shells and the patterns of leaves and branches on many trees, the geometry of which are related to the Golden Proportion. (The Greeks, among others, made great use of sacred geometry and the Golden Proportion in building their temples- talk about working in concert with nature!) Wiccans believe that in addition to these well-documented natural phenomena, there are other, less scientifically verifiable patterns in nature and in the spiritual realms, and they work at understanding and using those patterns. Psychic ability is simply a sensitivity to and awareness of those patterns.

Psychic abilities help Wiccans with many things, like honing their intuition, divination (reading astrological charts, or tarot cards for example), and sensing things that science can't explain yet, like the spirits of the dead or the presence of the gods. Like many other talents, psychic abilities can be sharpened, and Wicca can help us harness these gifts. One of the most obvious but important ways in which Wicca does this is simply by teaching us that psychic abilities are real. After all, it's hard to use something you don't believe exists. Wiccans also strengthen their psychic abilities through practice. They do meditation, magic, divination, and ritual, all of which require them to flex their psychic muscles.

Wiccan Principle 5: Magic - Wiccans believe that magic is real, that it works, and that they can use it to better their lives and help them on their spiritual journey. By magic, I don't mean pulling rabbits out of hats, turning your younger brother into a toad, or hexing your ex-girlfriend. I mean something closer to the definition of Magic given by the famous (and infamous) twentieth-century magical practitioner Alesiter Crowley in his equally famous book Magick in Theory and Practice. Magic (or Magick, to Crowley) is "the science and art of causing change to occur in conformance with will."

Magic, like psychic ability, depends on knowledge of the patterns of the cosmos. But where using psychic ability means attuning to and understanding those patterns, magic means bending or working with them to bring about desired change. The philosophy of magic goes back again to the idea that everything is infused with the divine. If all things contain some divine energy, we can tap into that energy to affect things that seem- to the regular five senses, anyway- to have no connection to us. This idea is summed up nearly in the introduction to Magick in Theory and Practice, which opens with the following quote from The Goetia of the Lemegeton of King Solomon, a magical grimoire, or spellbook:
"Magic is the highest, most absolute, and most divine knowledge of natural philosophy, advanced in its works and wonderful operations by a right understanding of the inward and occult virtue of things, so that true agents being applied to proper patients, strange and admirable effects will thereby be produced. Whence magicians are profound and diligent searchers into nature, they, because of their skill, know how to anticipate an effect, which to the vulgar shall seem to be a miracle."

As witch psychic ability, one of the ways in which Wicca helps people develop magical abilities is simply by allowing them to believe that magic is possible. Another way is by teaching us is that each of us must find our own path and moral compass- our magical will. Magic is a tool for empowerment and personal growth. True, Wiccans use magic all the time for mundane (material) things, like healing. But its ultimate purpose transcends the mundane.

Wiccan Principle 6: Reincarnation - Although most Wiccans will tell you that they believe in reincarnation- the soul returning to the earth again in a new body or form after death - their views vary widely on what that means. Some simply believe that our souls are reborn into new bodies, and others think our essence "recycles" after our bodies die and become cosmic energy. Some even believe that we all share one soul, and that this soul experiences the many possibilities of life by inhabiting all of our bodies at the same time.

Gerald Gardner, the "grandfather" of Wicca whom I mentioned earlier, believed strongly in reincarnation (as do I). Part of the reason he was accused of being a publicity hound in his day was that he was trying to drum up interest in Wicca so the Craft wouldn't die out and he'd have a Wiccan family to be reborn into. This focus on reincarnation stems in part from what I called Wiccan Principle 3; that the earth is divine. As we've already seen, Wiccan practice is earth-focused; here-and-now-focused. It's natural, then, that Wiccans wouldn't believe that death is not the end of their existence, and that they're going to be back again in some form, some day.

Wiccan Principle 7: Sex is Sacred - In Wicca, sex, the physical joining of two people, is a sacred act, one that brings joy and wonder, not shame and guilt. Sex is treasured and revered. Sexuality is considered a gift from the gods, a pleasure and responsibility that comes with a physical body, and a manifestation of the polarity if the God and Goddess and fertility of the Earth.
There is a lot of sexual symbolism in Wicca. The sabbats- the eight Wiccan holidays- include stories of the union of the God and Goddess (Beltane). The chalice (goblet), and athame (ritual knife) on the Wiccan altar represent female and male reproductive organs, among other things. And the focus in Wicca on the cycles of nature emphasizes fertility of both the earth and its people.
Does the prevalence of God-and-Goddess and fertility symbolism mean that gay sex is taboo in Wicca, since gay sex doesn't involve both a male and a female? Absolutely not! Polarity is expressed whenever two consenting adults come together to make love, and gay sex is as much about enjoying our earthy humanity as heterosexual sex is.
Does holding sex sacred mean that Wiccans have ceremonial orgies? That's not the point of sacred sex in Wicca. Understanding the spiritual side of sex frees some people from society's tight constrains about sex, so they may be more likely to experiment with multiple partners (which is hardly an orgy). But the idea that sex is sacred also means that it should be treated with reverence, which gives Wiccans a reason to approach sexual relationships with greater care and respect than they might if they viewed sex as simply mundane. An eighty-something-your-old medicine woman from central Mexico that I know puts it this way: "You are sacred. Your body is sacred. Your v****a is sacred. Your p***s is sacred. You don't put anything that isn't sacred in your body. And don't put your sacred body into anything that isn't sacred." I can't think of a better way to say it than that.
If you are uncomfortable with the idea of sex is a sacred or of sexual symbolism, Wicca probably isn't the path for you. That may sound harsh, especially in the United States where they're taught they can be anything thay want to be. But the truth is that Wicca challenges us. It is not comfortable or static. (She doesn't mean that you're never going to be comfortable in your path. You will be!) We do not change when we're not challenged to do so, and a great deal of Wicca is about change and the personal power that comes from embracing it. The idea that sex is sacred is only one of the many ways that Wicca might challenge some commonly accepted social norms.

Ethics and Empowerment - As you may have gathered, Wiccans are pretty independent folk. It should not surprise you, then, that there is no centralized authority that determines Wiccan ethics. Ethics are essentially principles of good conducts; rules about proper behaviour. The ethics or morals of most religions stem from the culture in which the religion developed, the religious institutions (if any) that evolved within the religion, and the religion's sacred books and teachings. Christianity, for example, has its Ten Commandments, which the Bible tells us came to humanity from God by way of Moses.
In Wicca, however, there are no "thou shalt's." There is no book, religious figure, or burning bush to tell Wiccans what is ethical and what is nor and what will happen to them if they screw up. One of the empowering- but terrifying- things about Wicca is that a Wiccan has to determine what ethics to follow for him- or herself.
Does this mean that Wicca is a free-for-all, where people do whatever they want, whenever they want, to whomever they want with no consequences or restrictions? Does it mean that there are no Wiccan guidelines for ethical behaviour at all? No, and the following section tells you all about this.

The Wiccan Rede - Although there is nobody to tell them that they have to, many Wiccans follow a principle of ethics called the Wiccan Rede, which states: "An it harm none, do as you will." It's a bit like a Wiccan "Golden Rule."
At first glance the Rede seems to be saying, "Do whatever you want, but don't harm anybody or anything." This is great, in principle think before you act, don't hex that annoying telemarketer, and try to walk through this world doing as little damage as possible. But many people who interpret the Rede that way get hung up on the word "harm." Visit the archives of any Wiccan email list and you're bound to find a discussion of the Rede where the participants pick the word to death, trying to define exactly what constitutes harm. This conversation can, and almost always does, go to ridiculous places: "Did I harm someone when I got my new job because it meant that he or she didn't get it?" "Did I harm my friend when I didn't tell her about the half-off sale at Victoria's Secret?" "Did I cause harm when I squashed that big spider in my bathtub?" (I, personally, respect all animals).
Although this can be interesting philosophical exercise, it misses the point. After all, if you w ant to go this far, everything, by its mere existence, hurts something else. Trying not to harm anything to the point of asceticism- self denial as a measure of one's spirituality- defeats the point of Wicca, which celebrates life instead of trying to control it. In fact, "harm none" also means that you should not harm yourself either, and imposing this rigid morality muzzle on your life is hardly a healthy thing to do. If you're not harming anyone else, but you're not living your life either, you're still not living the Rede. The good news is that the important part of the Rede- the true power- is not the word "harm." It is the word "will."

The "Want" and the "Will" - Your "want" is, well, what you want. You want a new car or a date with Megan Fox or a pint of Ben and Jerry's. Want is about earthly things, both trivial and important. Your will, however, is the force that drives you to your ultimate spiritual goal. It transcends want. It's the thing that Joseph Campbell is referring to when he says, "Follow your bliss." Campbell's bliss is the inner knowing that puts you on the life path that will lead you to your highest mundane and spiritual purpose. In the print version of The Power of Myth, he states: "If you do follow your bliss, you put yourself on a kind of track that has been there all the while, waiting for you, and the life that you ought to be living is the one you are living. When you can see that, you begin to meet people who are in the field of your bliss, and they open the doors to you. I say, follow your bliss and don't be afraid, and doors will open where you didn't know they were going to be."
The same could be said for following, or doing your will. As you can see, this is a much bigger deal than "do what you want."
The Rede, with its emphasis on will, is challenging you to act according to your highest purpose; to infuse your spirituality, whatever it is, throughout your entire life. It's telling you to act out of that spiritual place when you make decisions. When you act in accordance with your true will, you are in harmony with deity. The focus of the Rede is really on you, your life, and your choices; not on someone you may or may not harm by your actions. It's all about personal responsibility and self-knowledge, which is both scary and freeing because you are accountable with yourself. The Rede is about both ethics and empowerment.

The Threefold Law - Since there are no morality police in Wicca, there is nobody to determine of Wiccans have done something right or wrong other than they themselves, and there is no cosmic time-out place they will be sent to if they have been misbehaving. This doesn't mean they're off the hook, though.
Many Wiccans believe in the "Threefold Law." The Threefold Law essentially says that whatever you put out into the world will come back to you three times. As with the word harm in the Rede, you can get hung up on "threefold" and argue about whether your deeds come back three separate times or one time, three times as strong, but that isn't the point. The point is simply "like attracts like." If you put positive energy out into the universe, living by your own set of ethics, trying to do "good" for yourself and others, you're likely to receive that kind of energy in return. If you put negative energy out, you'll get that back too. The difference is that when the good stuff comes back, it makes things in your life flow smoothly, and when the negative stuff comes back, it tends to sneak up on you and whack you on the head.
This is not to say that there is a cosmic energy bank somewhere in which you deposit good or bad deeds and someone monitors your account to make sure that your withdrawals reflect what you put in. The universe just doesn't work that way. It doesn't keep scorecards, so don't take the Law literally and expect an immediate reward or head-whacking for whatever you do. You also have no control of how it comes back to you. Letting someone merge in front of you on a crowded highway doesn't mean that someone will do the same for you later.

The Rede and the Threefold Law Together - When you put the Law and the Rede together, you see that if you are working with your true will, if you are in sync with the universe and the divine, the positive energy you generate ripples out and affects everything around you, and it's a beacon for other positive energy to be attracted to you. This is the place where Wiccans strive to be.
Taking personal responsibility is a major part of Wiccan practice. If Wiccans who adhere to the Rede and the Law screw up or do something nasty to someone, they know that they will attract that energy back in its own place and time. In addition, when you hurt others, you are also hurting yourself, even if it is only indirectly through the negative energy that you will attract. Hurting others marks you, and the energy signature sticks to you like flypaper. Even knowing this, sometimes Wiccans will take a risk and choose to do something that is ethically "iffy" because they believe that ultimately it's for the greater good. In that case, they take responsibility for the results, and they know that whatever they receive back, positive or negative, is partially their own doing. The important thing is that they are the arbiters of their own ethics; they have the responsibility and the power to choose their actions based on their own ideals rather than on rules imposed by someone else. This can be heavy stuff, but like I said earlier, Wicca is not about being comfortable all the time. It is about directing the course of your own life, and that can put you on shaky turf from time to time.