[from http://www.satannet.com/raven.html ]

   MISCONCEPTIONS ABOUT SATANISM

   Satanism is clearly not understood by the public. We, as
   Satanists, do not feel the need to convince others of the
   "correctness" of our religion. I have no such compulsion. I
   will deal with common misconceptions of Satanism, to bring
   light to a subject cast into darkness by christianity.

   My purpose is to dispel lies christians constantly spread.

   Satanism has nothing whatever to do with the christian devil.
   "Satan" comes from ancient Hebrew and means "opposer." Opposing
   the ideas of the judeo-christian religion, we make an alliance
   with "Satan" who opposes the morals and dogma of the so-called
   holy church and all its followers.

   Furthermore, we are proud to call on our brothers, the names of
   the demons and devils, which were the Gods and Goddesses of
   peoples conquered by christian hordes and "converted" to
   christianity. A great crowd of deities has suffered this
   treatment. Remember the crusades? Live by the "word of god" or
   die by the sword. The moslems have not forgotten and they have
   not forgiven.

   Once they conquered, the "holy church" stole the holy days of
   captured peoples and converted them to christian "holidays."
   The most obvious example is christmas. What is the xmas tree
   for? Why do we give presents? Who is St. Nicholas? Why is the
   holiday at the time of the winter solstice, when the sun begins
   on its journey of "rebirth," when the days become longer again?
   Pagan practices were woven into christianity to weld the new
   believer to his new home. Why is easter always the first Sunday
   after the first full moon after the spring equinox? The pagan
   origin of this date is obvious.

   We have taken back our gods and our holidays. Those who stole
   them from us are long gone, but their ancestors remain. What
   they tout as "evil" is only what they wish to destroy, much as
   Hitler called the Jews evil to stamp them out and it is no
   different with christians. They label us evil. Unlike the
   pagans of the past, we do not fear their name calling. We
   proudly wear the label EVIL! After all, "Evil" is only "live"
   spelled backwards.

   We do not sacrifice animals and we do not harm children.
   Period. Every man, woman and child was killed at Jericho
   (according to the bible), their heads were severed and placed
   on the stakes. This was at the order of jehovah. Satan gives no
   such orders. No Satanist would take such an order anyway. We
   are not the sons of Abraham, we will not offer our children up
   to jehovah to die.

   We consider the statement, "god exists," to be FALSE.
   Therefore, in the strictest sense, we are atheists. The
   so-called arguments for the existence of god are travesties to
   reason. Every argument for the judeo-christian god is clearly
   FALSE due to being illogical. George S. Smith's, "Atheism, the
   Case Against God," provides iron-clad proof that god does not,
   cannot, exist.

   We choose life here, not in some fantasy world proposed to
   exist after we die. The idea of an afterlife is to us, plainly
   stated, stupid.

   Christians at large consider us dangerous and twisted. Please
   note that we are not the ones who believe in something that we
   cannot see, we are not the ones willing to lay down our lives
   and the lives of our families for the hope of future happiness.
   We base our lives on reality, not on spiritual pipedreams!
   Everything is subject to the scrutiny of our minds and the
   senses of our flesh. Blind belief has no place in our lives. We
   feel that it is christians who are twisted and dangerous.

   The sunset of christianity is upon us. The dawn of Satanism is
   at hand.

   The Raven

   scotts@pe.net

EOF