Satanists denied opening prayer for the third time in Boston.

[Subduction Zone]

Hi Shadow Wolf. Good afternoon. If I've said something wrong, please do correct me. The Britannica Encyclopedia says: Satanism, any of various religious or countercultural practices and movements centred on the figure of Satan, the Devil, regarded in Christianity and Judaism as the embodiment of absolute evil. Historical Satanism, also called devil worship, consists of belief in and worship of the Judeo-Christian Devil and the explicit rejection of his antithesis, God, and (in Christianity) God’s Incarnation, Jesus Christ.

As far as I'm concerned, it's despicable that anyone would even consider worshipping a being that is a despicable murderer, liar, that has caused many and still causes many to lose their salvation and tried to cause our Savior and Messiah to sin and lose His as well as all our salvation.

One should not assume that the version of a deity in one's own religion is the same version in others. For example if one reads the Old Testament literally the description of "absolute evil" and "murderer, liar . . ." applies far more to Yahweh than to Satan. Look at the Adam and Eve story. Yahweh lied, the Serpent was the only honest one. Look at all of the deaths in the Old Testament, almost all were caused by God or demanded by him. The only time that Satan was personally responsible for deaths in the Old Testament he did so with God's express permission. Have you even read the book?

 

[Shadow Wolf]

So how is art incompatible?

Next you'll claim they should erase all the artwork of Greek Zeus and what not from public buildings ... It is a religion after all.

How about you make an honest statement instead of showing us you prejudice?

 

[Shadow Wolf]

As far as I'm concerned, it's despicable that anyone would even consider worshipping a being that is a despicable murderer, liar, that has caused many and still causes many to lose their salvation and tried to cause our Savior and Messiah to sin and lose His as well as all our salvation.

We've been over this, how many times now?
We don't worship.
We don't pray.
We aren't put doing evil.
Now, how about we look to the Bible of your god and examine all his wickedness, genocide, and bloodthirst?
And you better hope your god isn't real because you judgemental lot are going to have a lot to answer for. For I'm sure you can be judged of believing despicable things yourself.

 

[Shadow Wolf]

One should not assume that the version of a deity in one's own religion is the same version in others. For example if one reads the Old Testament literally the description of "absolute evil" and "murderer, liar . . ." applies far more to Yahweh than to Satan.

Satan as a devil doesn't exist in the OT. The devil is a Christian invention who never appears until the NT. That Satan in the OT is a fiercely loyal and obedient angel of god. This rebellious devil figure in a heresy in the "source material."

 

[Shadow Wolf]

Anymore Christians care to show us they only accept freedom of religion for themselves, don't heed their gods words about not bearing false witness and not bearing judgements, and absolutely hate sharing and accepting things that go against their preconceived notions?

 

[Shadow Wolf]

Yet you act offended that I call out TST because of their political activism ... okeydokey.

Do you want to go back and recount each time you have not been honest and put forth lies about the Satanic Temple?
And are you are aware Mormons, Baptists, Catholics, all these people instructed to not be of this world and yet they (and many more of your brethren) are more political than the Satanic Temple. The Satanic Temple wants equality of law enforced. Christians widely want special privileges and rights for themselves (notice this trend they respect rights for themselves but not others) to legally be allowed to discriminate against others. Black people, homosexuals, military status, marital status, Christians often can be heard demanding they get to run the show, call the shots, and decide for themselves who rights apply to and who may have them.

 

[Subduction Zone]

Satan as a devil doesn't exist in the OT. The devil is a Christian invention who never appears until the NT. That Satan in the OT is a fiercely loyal and obedient angel of god. This rebellious devil figure in a heresy in the "source material."

I know. The Devil role evolves throughout the Bible. What became the Devil started as the Serpent. The only power that version had was the ability to tell the truth and a bit of a nasty side. In Job he does the only direct killing that he ever does. He kills ten members of Job's family, with God's okay. He is not openly against God until he tries to convince Jesus to part with him. And he is not the ultimate evil until Revelation. As the saying goes, stories grow with the telling. If the Bible continued to form who knows what new roles Satan would take on.

 

[Shadow Wolf]

In Job he does the only direct killing that he ever does. He kills ten members of Job's family, with God's okay.

This story can be fascinating, as they look like two different stories when we consider the interpretation of Satan as angel just doing his god-ordained job, and it's completely different with Satan as Devil.
The Jewish version looks more like a test of extremes. Satan is just doing his job amd finds something interesting to examine.
The Christian version makes, what is interesting now is it gives support for the idea that all things--including evil--do come from god. For he encouraged the Devil just to make a point.

 

[Shadow Wolf]

Reviewing this thread to pick out the prejudiced and bigoted comments made against Satanism, comments based in ignorance yet asserted as fact, making repeated misstatements even after being corrected, and being opposed to civil equality for Satanists, I also noticed there is a lot of atheist bashing going on in this thread. Hypocrisy, faulty judgements, lies, arrogance, and loud proclamations you don't accept freedom of religion, but only freedom for your religion.

I don't agree with America being open as so far we loose all of our traditions. I can see why it's taken as a discriminations but I'd assume they'd do the same for Muslim prayers as well.

Pure insanity to side with Satanists.

THE PERVERSION OF EQUALITY strikes again.

The very EXACT opposite of liberty is embracing Satanism.

The community has EVERY RIGHT to establish community standards.

I consider them a hate group

yeah I have them; it's called the satanic temple.

I think they're being petulant.

I suppose they save puppies and like long walks on the beach as well ...

The religion that guided our country's founding is not equal to all other religions.

So all that nonsense about benevolence

You assert benevolence is a precept of Satanism? Bless your heart.

So their prayer is a farce. If they can't take it serious they shouldn't be involved. And even if they do believe in satan; then that's even more disturbing ... so I guess we can be thankful for that at least.

Legitimate religions

There is no reason for anyone to stand for it.

Then you agree their prayer act is a farce.

My knee jerk reaction is to say the worship of Satan should not be allowed.

Satanism is based on the Bible as Satan is described in the Bible. So how can we tolerate a religion that tells us that Satan is evil and allow people to worship him?

That's not invocation. Invocation is a prayer.

I think prayer should be led by an organization that actually believes in God.

It doesn't make any sense to have someone lie.

That's what this is all about. Traditional norms

Basically, TST couldn't be more insincere

Well should we allow militant atheists to pray to spaghetti monster at city hall?

What is praying. Praying is talking to God. If you don't believe in God, then you are only pretending to talk to God, which is a lie, or you are not actually praying, which is a farce.

that is just so much baloney. don't bother talking to me if you can't be honest about things.

An invocation is an opening prayer.

TST is militant antichristian, theism in general and trying to get rid of belief in God everywhere they can with any tactics.

The fact is these city halls hold prayer because it pleases the majority of the citizens of that city. If there were ever a majority of atheists in a given city then they could stop the prayer and probably would waste no time in doing so.

Seems pretty democratic to me. Why not?

So really atheists have had to warp the idea of separation of church and state to mean that all government should be 100% atheistic. But in my opinion that opens a new imbalance in the system. That is atheism now has too much power which we see today. Especially when they want to erase culture, art and tradition just because it's "religious". When it's usually something really general and like a monument to 10 commandments or whatever. It's like atheists want to erase Western culture and start over. I don't like that and I don't think that's what is meant by "separation of church and state".

For example the motto "In God we trust" is not really violating this. All it does favor is theism over atheism ... but that's not really a religion.

Keep telling yourself that.

So how is art incompatible?

Next you'll claim they should erase all the artwork of Greek Zeus and what not from public buildings ... It is a religion after all.

Yet you act offended that I call out TST because of their political activism ... okeydokey.

You might be correct the way things go these days but that doesn't mean it's right.

As far as I'm concerned, it's despicable that anyone would even consider worshipping a being that is a despicable murderer, liar, that has caused many and still causes many to lose their salvation and tried to cause our Savior and Messiah to sin and lose His as well as all our salvation.

I am certain I know what circle of Hell I will be cast to by King Minos. Do you know where he will send you?

 

[74x12]

Ideally, there should be no official prayers at all, and every member should be privately pray - or not - as they personally feel obligated to do.

Putting a big Christian stamp on a secular government institution sends the message to every non-Christian who might come before it that the institution does not represent them, and that they should expect to be treated unfavourably compared to Christians.

Someone wearing a colander on their head at a Council meeting is silly, but it's not offensive and anti-democratic the way that allowing only the prayers of one religion would be.

So you're claiming only Christians are allowed to pray? I don't think so.

 

[74x12]

There are worse purposes, frankly. There are a lot of things in Christianity that need opposing.

I kinda like them as the "poison pill" to fight anti-secularism: "oh - you want official prayers at Council meetings/religious literature handed out to kids in public schools/paid chaplains in prisons/whatever? Then you're going to have to put up with us and all the things you hate about us until you do the right thing and stop abusing your religious privilege."

So they're basically real life trolls trying to force cultural change in America against the will of the majority of the people. Thank you for your honesty.

 

[Shadow Wolf]

So they're basically real life trolls trying to force cultural change in America against the will of the majority of the people. Thank you for your honesty.

It's only a change in such a way because Christians have long assumed everything is theirs to take. They typically have to be booted and pried out of power so they don't dominate others with their dogma.
All these religious rituals are best reserved for privacy. Even Jesus agrees it's better to pray in a closet than openly making a scene of it. He also taught to not be of this world, for he promises better things to come.
So, really, Jesus agrees with the Satanists on this one.

 

[Aštra’el]

We don't worship.
We don't pray.
We aren't put doing evil.

There is that “we” again.

Many Satanists worship. Many Satanists pray. Many Satanists engage in acts others might subjectively perceive as “evil”.

You speak for yourself.

 

[Shadow Wolf]

There is that “we” again.

Many Satanists worship. Many Satanists pray. Many Satanists engage in acts others might subjectively perceive as “evil”.

You speak for yourself.

We've moved on, the topic is clearly the non-theistic Satanist. The non-theistic part has been a very heavy focus and emphasis.

 

[Aštra’el]

We've moved on, the topic is clearly the non-theistic Satanist. The non-theistic part has been a very heavy focus and emphasis.

Non-theistic Satanism comes in many forms, and not all of their world-views are aligned with yours or the Satanic Temple. So your inflated overuse of the word “we” when discussing Satanism was called out if only to clarify that you and the “Satanic” Temple do not speak for all within Satanism or the LHP when you say “we”.

 

[Shadow Wolf]

Non-theistic Satanism comes in many forms, and not all of their world-views are aligned with yours or the Satanic Temple. So your inflated overuse of the word “we” was called out if only to clarify that you and the “Satanic” Temple to not speak for all within Satanism or the LHP when you say “we”.

I'm not the one doing it.
Some have been using atheists and Satanist basically interchangeably.
Because the topic is about non-theistic Satanists. Just about everyone has acknowledged not all Satanists are non-theist. And we aren't talking about them. This isn't about them. They aren't being discussed. This is like a someone stepping into a thread about Catholics to be a bug of contrarian just to shout out the obvious that not all Christians are like the Catholics just so this person can hear the sound of their own voice.

 

[Aštra’el]

Because the topic is about non-theistic Satanists.

No, it is about the “Satanic” Temple, who make up a fraction of non-theistic Satanists, and who hold many views that are not aligned with other forms of non-theistic Satanism.

 

[Shadow Wolf]

No, it is about the “Satanic” Temple, who make up a fraction of non-theistic Satanists, and who hold many views that are not aligned with other forms of non-theistic Satanism.

Specifically, but if you've read the thread you know it has been more broadly as non-theistic Satanists as well as the Temple of Satan. Sometimes even more broadly than that.
But clearly it's not about you. Gripping about it doesn't change anything.

 

[Aštra’el]

But clearly it's not about you.

I am glad for it. There are many who have no desire to be associated with yours and the Satanic Temple’s views.

 

[Shadow Wolf]

There are many who would have no desire to be associated with your views.

This is a given, no? And I think you've made this apparent.
Anymore obvious statements?