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The post Episode 218: Reliving the Absolute Stupidest Parts of “Michelle Remembers” appeared first on Black Mass Appeal.

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• From The Myth & Truth of Saint Patrick, Morgan Daimler, Irish Pagan School, 2024: Every March the pagan community, without fail, sees a surge in conversations and diatribes on Saint Patrick, usually rooted in the ideas that Patrick was a maniac who wiped out the druids (represented by snakes), destroyed Irish paganism, and converted the entire island. This is probably the thing that I hear the most often about Saint Patrick, leaning into Christian propaganda of the 7th and 12th centuries which positioned Patrick as the champion of Christianity in Ireland. In reality the druids survived well after Patrick’s lifetime. Druids, as a class, are included in the 7th and 8th century laws tracts and although their role had been diminished from their pre-Christian prominence they did still exist. There is even an 8th century hymn calling on god’s protection against “the magic of women, blacksmiths, and druids.” So we can say quite definitively that Patrick didn’t wipe out the druids. Many neopagans firmly believe that the snakes in Patrick’s story are actually a metaphor for druids. But this idea comes from one source, the 1911 book Fairy Faith in Celtic Countries where a man speculates that a certain lake is where Saint Patrick had a final confrontation with the Druids and drove them out, and he assumes the druids and snakes were the same because the lake is also where local folklore says the snakes were driven out. However, there are no earlier sources suggesting this, and it is quite clear that the snakes in the old stories were meant to be literal snakes.
  • Some claim Patrick committed genocide against the Druids, effectively destroying the pagan priesthood and Irish paganism and forcing conversion by the sword. Now, beyond the fact we’ve already addressed Patrick and the Druids above, it must be noted that converting to Christianity in Ireland wasn’t something that happened quickly, nor was any single person responsible for it. Christians have worked hard to make Patrick the face of conversion in Ireland in the 1500 years since his death, but Patrick himself in his book Confessions stated that he didn’t know if he’d had any significant impact in Ireland and faced a lot of pushback from the pagans for his work. Patrick was not the first Christian in Ireland, nor the most significant during his lifetime – that would probably be Palladius. Patrick seems to have little effect on Irish paganism during his life, and only took on the reputation as a converter hundreds of years after his death. Saint Patrick is a figure who has taken on a role as a kind of anti-pagan boogieman, a figure that can be pointed to as all that is terrible in Christian evangelism by those who prefer to consider themselves tragic victims of a cultural change that occurred more than a millennia ago. He is, in reality, someone who should be insignificant to history yet who, thanks to amazing church PR, looms large. Perhaps, as pagans, it’s time we let go of this mythological figure and see past it to the persistence and survival of Irish paganism and stop feeding into a Christian narrative about Patrick that is not only false but actively harmful. https://irishpagan.school/saint-patrick-myths-and-truths/ 
• From the Epic of Gilgamesh, 2000 BCE…ish: As the birds began to sing at the coming of the dawn, The Sun God, Utu, left his royal bedchamber. Inanna called to her brother Utu, saying: “O Utu, in the days when the fates were decreed, When abundance overflowed in the land, When the domains of the Great Gods were divided, And Enki did quest for the Underworld, Then did I pluck the Huluppu-tree from the Euphrates, Then did I plant it in my Holy Garden, and tend it, Waiting for my shining throne and luscious bed. But a serpent nested in the roots and could not be charmed, the Anzu-bird set his young in the branches, and the dark maid, Lilith, built her home in the trunk. How I wept! Yet they would not leave my tree.” Utu, the valiant warrior, would not help his sister, Inanna. As the birds began to sing at the coming of the second dawn, Inanna called to Gilgamesh, saying: “O Gilgamesh, in the days when the fates were decreed, When abundance overflowed in the land, When the domains of the Great Gods were divided, Then did I pluck the Huluppu-tree from the Euphrates, Then did I plant it in my Holy Garden, and tend it, Waiting for my shining throne and luscious bed. Then a serpent nested in the roots and could not be charmed, the Anzu-bird set his young in the branches, and the dark maid, Lilith, built her home in the trunk. How I wept! Yet they would not leave my tree.” Gilgamesh the valiant warrior, Gilgamesh, The hero of Uruk, stood by Inanna. Gilgamesh fastened his armor around his chest. He lifted his bronze ax to his shoulder. He entered Inanna’s holy garden. Gilgamesh struck the serpent who could not be charmed. The Anzu-bird flew with his young to the mountains; and Lilith smashed her home and fled to the wild, uninhabited places. Gilgamesh then loosened the roots of the huluppu-tree; And the sons of the city, who accompanied him, cut off the branches. From the trunk of the tree he carved a throne for Inanna. From the trunk of the tree Gilgamesh carved a bed for Inanna. From the roots of the tree she fashioned a pukku for him. From the crown of the tree Inanna fashioned a mikku for Gilgamesh, the hero of Uruk.
• From the Hymn To Apollo, Homer, 8th Century BCE…ish: But nearby was a sweet flowing spring, and there with his strong bow Apollo, the son of Zeus, killed the great Python, a fierce monster wont to do great mischief to men upon earth, for she was a very bloody plague. She it was who once received from gold-throned Hera and brought up fell, cruel Typhon to be a plague to men. Once on a time Hera, because she was angry with father Zeus, spoke thus among the assembled gods: “Hear from me, all gods and goddesses, how cloud-gathering Zeus begins to dishonour me wantonly, when he has made me his true-hearted wife. See now, apart from me he has given birth to bright-eyed Athena who is foremost among all the blessed gods. O wicked one and crafty! What else will you now devise? How dared you by yourself give birth to bright-eyed Athena? Would not I have borne you a child — I, who was at least called your wife among the undying gods who hold wide heaven.” Then straightway queenly Hera prayed, striking the ground with her hand, and speaking thus: “Hear now, I pray, Earth and wide Heaven above, and you Titan gods who dwell beneath the earth, harken you now to me, one and all, and grant that I may bear a child apart from Zeus, no wit lesser than him in strength — nay, let him be as much stronger than Zeus, as all-seeing Zeus was stronger than Cronos.” And thus she birthed a creature neither like the gods nor mortal men, but fell, cruel Typhon, to be a plague to men. Straightway Hera took him and bringing one evil thing to another such, gave him to Python to raise, and she received him. And this Typhon used to work great mischief among the famous tribes of men. Whosoever met Python, the day of doom would sweep him away, until the lord Apollo, who deals death from afar, shot a strong arrow at her. Then she, rent with bitter pangs, lay drawing great gasps for breath and rolling about that place, breathing forth blood. Then Apollo boasted over her: “Now rot here upon the soil that feeds man! You shall live no more to be a fell bane to men who eat the fruit of the all-nourishing earth, and neither Typhon shall avail you, nor ill-famed Chimera,” and wherefore that place is now called Pytho, and men call the lord Apollo the Pythian, because on that spot the power of the piercing sun destroyed that monster.
• From Satanism Today, James R Lewis, 2001: The word Leviathan is originally Hebrew, and means “the coiled one” or “that which gathers itself together in folds.” It has come to mean any formidable, monstrous being or thing. The term is originally referring to a multiheaded sea monster defeated by Yahweh. Leviathan is associated with—and is sometimes used interchangeably with—Behemoth, another biblical monster. Because of the association between the Devil and serpents, Leviathan is often identified with Satan. Alternately, it is also sometimes used to designate one of Satan’s demons. Leviathan was sometimes portrayed as a kind of aquatic dragon; sometimes as a whale. Most biblical references are, however, tantalizingly brief. It is unclear how much of the content of Yahweh’s challenge to Job refers to an earlier tale and how much is being composed on the spot. In any event, the Hebrew tale appears to derive from a story in which Baal defeats a sea monster with the aid of Mot. This seems to be a variation of the well-known Babylonian myth of Marduk’s defeat of the sea monster Tiamat. In Hebrew scriptures, Yahweh is sometimes depicted as a storm god. The battle between Yahweh and the dragon is very popular in the visions of the later Hebrew prophets, although the dragon usually embodies a purely symbolic meaning as the enemy of Israel, that is to say the Assyrians, the Babylonians, or the Egyptians. The endtime significance of this creature is that Yahweh will release Leviathan to wreak havoc upon the earth shortly before the end of the world. Then god will finally destroy the beast.
• From The Old Enemy, Neil Forsyth, 1987: The serpent of Genesis was quite plainly just a serpent. True, he could speak, and he seemed to know god’s mind. But Genesis nowhere says he was anything other than a talking snake. But in the curious work we know as the Book of Revelation the church found “the great dragon, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan.” We have already noticed that these passages bring together most aspects of the apocalyptic combat myth, from the star-like angel to the accuser at the heavenly court and the agent provocateur who leads astray the whole world. Perhaps the author intended the phrase “that old serpent” to refer to the Genesis serpent? Certainly, in view of the Gnostic identity of the serpent, the church found it convenient to think he did. Justin, for example, is clearly alluding to this text in his First Apology: “Among us the chief of the evil demons is called the serpent and Satan and the devil. Christ has foretold that he will be cast into the fire with his host and those who follow him, to be punished for endless ages. ” Justin’s appeal is one of the earliest signs that the idea of a Christian canon was developing and shows that the need to identify the devil was a prime motive. But Revelation does not actually say that by Satan means also the Genesis serpent, and indeed the church would later go to considerable trouble to insist on the equation. Without the Book of Revelation as a sanctified text, the identification of Genesis serpent with the adversary would have stood on much shakier ground. The placing of the Apocalypse at the end of the Bible brought some advantages also for the shape of the canon: Revelation points forward to the end of time, just as Genesis talks of its beginning. The tree of life at the end of the book balances the tree of knowledge at the beginning. And the enemy, he who had started all the trouble in the beginning, could be seen to be finally defeated here at the end. This means of closure gives to the Bible the shape of a combat myth, and thus the identification of Satan/serpent as “he who leads astray the whole world” made the struggle with heresy seem to be an extension of the mythological combat.
• From Satanic Feminism, Per Faxneld, 2017: Feminist historian and mythographer Marina Warner has claimed that in spite of its primary function as the main Christian symbol of evil, the serpent also denotes something positive, ‘‘a kind of heterodox knowledge and sexuality that Christianity has spurned.’ This is true, but primarily in terms of counter-discourses protesting against the hegemonic significance of the serpent and its wider social implications. Serpents can have quite different meanings, as seen, for example, in the one entwining the Rod of Asclepius, which is used as a symbol of the medical profession. Nevertheless, in the Old Testament, snakes are fairly consistently negative symbols, with the exception of Moses’s serpent. Like the notion of the serpent as Satan, the later idea of Eve as a temptress luring Adam to his doom does not really appear in Genesis (she simply gives some of the fruit to Adam, who is with her, and he eats), but was a development that should, as the Bible scholar Jean M. Higgins underscores, be seen as an expression of imagination, drawn mainly from each commentator’s own presuppositions and cultural expectations. Pseudo-Tertullian wrote with horror about the Ophite Gnostics that prefer the Edenic tempter ‘even to Christ himself; for it was he, they say, who gave us the origin of knowledge.’ Subversive nineteenth-century readings of the serpent as a bringer of enlightenment, and Eve as a heroine by implication, occasionally drew on these condemnations for inspiration. 
  • A more straightforwardly female Satan can be seen in the actually very common depictions of the snake in the Garden of Eden with a woman’s head on its serpentine body and sometimes also breasts. This motif was widespread in both visual art and theatre for hundreds of years. JB Trapp even states that it was the most frequent way of representing the Edenic serpent from the late twelfth century until the late sixteenth century, when the human features of the creature disappear and it becomes, once more, only reptilian. Exactly when the notion of a female snake was established is difficult to say, but the earliest translation of the Bible into Latin rendered the word as “serpens”—with a feminine gender.  The first explicit statement of this is probably in the twelfth-century French History of Genesis which suggests that Satan chose this guise ‘since like approves of like.’ A female serpent later appears in well-known literary works like the allegorical poem Piers the Plowman. where it is described as ‘like a lizard with a lady’s visage.’ ’Worth mentioning here is also ‘The Book for the Education of Daughters’ by Geoffrey. Geoffrey attempts to instil in his daughters the lesson that women should defer to fathers and husbands in anything but domestic matters and makes his point by retelling how Eve broke this rule when she conversed with the serpent, ‘whiche as the Hystorye sayth hadde a face ryght fayre lyke the face of a woman.’ There are countless images of a female serpent-Satan in the Garden, and some occupy what must be counted among the most central positions in European culture imaginable. For example, Michelangelo’s Temptation and Expulsion in the Sistine Chapel.
• From The Secret Doctrine, Volume 2, Helena Blavatsky, 1893: The Beings, or the Being, collectively called Elohim, who first (if ever) pronounced the cruel words, “ Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil” must have been indeed the Ilda-baoth, the Demiurge of the Nazarenes, filled with rage and envy against his own creature. In this case it is but natural—even from the dead letter standpoint—to view Satan, the Serpent of Genesis, as the real creator and benefactor, the Father of Spiritual mankind. For it is he who was the “ Harbinger of Light,” bright radiant Lucifer, who opened the eyes of the automaton created by Jehova. He still remains in esoteric truth the ever-loving messenger angel, the Seraphim and Cherubim who both knew well, and loved still more, and who conferred on us spiritual, instead of physical immortality—the latter a kind of static immortality that would have transformed man into an undying “ Wandering Jew.” As narrated in King’s “ Gnostics,” “ Ilda-Baoth, whom several sects regarded as the God of Moses, was not a pure spirit, he was ambitious and proud, and he set himself to create a world of his own and fabricated man, but this proved a failure. Man was a monster, soulless, ignorant, and crawling on all fours on the ground like a material beast. And thus arose out of the abyss Satan, serpent, Ophiomorphos. This is the esoteric rendering of the Gnostics, and the allegory seems true to life. It is the natural deduction from Genesis. Hence the allegory of Prometheus, who steals the divine fire so as to allow men to proceed on the path of spiritual evolution. Hence also, the curse pronounced by Zeus against Prometheus, and by Jehovah-Il-da-Baoth against his rebellious son, Satan.
• From Herbert Sloane, Catherine Yronwode, Satan’s Service, 2013: In 1948, Herbert Sloane was living in Cleveland. As a Spiritualist Reverend it seems likely that Sloane was engaged in seances. According to the 1972 interviews, this was the year that he founded Our Lady of Endor Coven of the Ophite Cultus Sathanas, which he also created. The name of Sloane’s group has puzzled many: “Our Lady of Endor” is a word-play on the use of the common Roman Catholic terms Our Lady of Grace, Our Lady of Lourdes, Our Lady of Guadalupe, and so forth — however, in this case, “Our Lady” refers to the Witch of Endor, mentioned in the Bible in the First Book of Samuel. The word translated as “Witch” in the King James Bible is more properly rendered as “medium,” described as a manifesting spirit medium known for her ability to raise the ghosts of the dead and converse with them. Interestingly, in French books, “witch” is sometimes encountered as “Pythonisse” — a priestess of Apollo, known as a Pythia or Pythoness, named in honour of Pythian Apollo who killed the serpent Python. In French, the word “Pythonisse” refers generally to any female psychic who claims to be endowed with the gift of prophecy, and is also the specific name given to the medium of Endor. The group that Sloane called a “coven” was his circle of seance sitters, but he had left mainstream Spiritualism by this point and was experimenting with dark seance performances: Sloane’s local coven, Our Lady of Endor, was presented as being a branch of the larger Ophite Cultus Sathanas, a Gnostic religious organization. “Ophite Cultus Sathanas” translates roughly from Latin as the Snake-Worshiping Cult of Satan. He apparently chose the word “Ophite” for his cult in reference to a defunct historical group of Christian Gnostics, the Ophites or Ophians, described by Hippolytus. Thus Sloane connected the Witch of Endor to the Pythoness in his over-arching Satanic Snake cult. https://www.satanservice.org/wiki/Herbert_Arthur_Sloane 
• From Holiday displays – including the Satanic Temple’s – return to Illinois, Jerry Nowicki, Capitol News, 2022: The Satanic Temple of Illinois debuted a new display in the Illinois Capitol rotunda Tuesday, taking its place next to the annual Christmas and Hanukkah displays. “Minister Adam” of the Satanic Temple of Illinois was joined by about 15 Temple members to dedicate this year’s display. It consists of a crocheted snake sitting on a book and a pile of apples crocheted by Temple members. “Every year, we do a holiday display and a show of unity and religious pluralism within the state Capitol rotunda,” Adam said. “And this year, we wanted to focus on the book bans that people have been trying to do all over the country.” The book on which the serpent is perched is Polish mathematician Nicolaus Copernicus’ “On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres,” a 1543 work which posited the then-revolutionary idea that the Earth revolves around the sun. The Nativity scene, meanwhile, has been on display for at least 14 years during Christmastime. Tom Brejcha, president and chief counsel of the St. Thomas More Society, said the precedent for religious displays in public spaces in Illinois stems from a 1989 court decision regarding a Nativity scene at Daley Plaza in Chicago. That precedent was honored when it came to the state Capitol, he said, when advocates framed it under a free speech lens. While the Capitol Satanic display has received pushback from some religious groups in the past, Brejka said “free speech applies to everybody.” Henry Haupt, a spokesperson for Illinois Secretary of State Jesse White, said “Temporary displays of this nature, erected in a public space in the Capitol rotunda, are protected by the First Amendment.” https://capitolnewsillinois.com/news/holiday-displays-including-the-satanic-temples-return-to-illinois-capitol/ 
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• • From The Moral Philosophy of Individualism, Mark D. McCombs, University of Northern Iowa, 1991: Individualism refers to a social theory or ideology assigning a higher moral value to the individual than to the community or society. It consequently advocates leaving individuals free to act as they think most conducive to their self-interest. Society, then, may be defined as an aggregate of autonomous but interacting individuals. This then leads to the idea of the public good, defined by Rousseau as the collected good of all separate individuals. Such being the case, collective interests are considered to be the sum of all individual interests, and the interests of autonomous individuals are recognized. The concept of individualism often carries with it negative connotations. Associated with selfishness and egotism, its principles are seen by many to be in opposition to social stability. However, individualism does not necessarily result in extreme selfishness nor does it always promote competition. One can argue, in fact, that individualism is as much a description of social reality as it is a morality directing the behavior of individuals. These ideas developed in response to previous feudal societies: Medieval societies did not recognize the autonomous individual or an individual’s rights. As Europe progressed out of feudalism, the reconstruction of political authority freed people from the anonymity and insecurities of feudal society, providing the circumstances for a birth of individualism. As a philosophy, full-fledged individualism seems to have emerged first in England. Because England was a relatively less rigid society than the rest of Europe, it was a state in which it was easier for individuals to assert their demands. 
  • The precise term “individualism” arose out of the European reaction to the French Revolution and to its apparent source, the thought of the Enlightenment. The Enlightenment was characterized by a new spirit of inquiry, of discovery, and of individual self-confidence and assertiveness. This change in attitudes allowed for the onset of individualism, yet at the time of the revolution, conservative thought condemned the interests and rights of the individual. ince individuals pass out of existence, conservatives argued that society requires that the inclinations of its members should frequently be thwarted, their will controlled, and their passions brought into subjection.” The French Revolution was thought to qe proof that the ideas of the individual imperilled the stability of the commonwealth. Scottish economist Adam Smith proposed that individuals pursuing their own self-interest would be a part of a natural system which would ultimately help society. Smith advocated government noninterference in the economy. British statesman and philosopher Edmund Burke built upon these ideas when he recognized the system explained by Smith as a natural one. Capitalism was seen as the simple and obvious system for mutual advantage. Burke equated the laws of commerce with the laws of nature and thus, by extension, with the laws of God. Hobbes argued that people were like atoms, each separate and individual, acting in their own self-interest in response to, and as a part of, a larger whole. He envisioned a society in which individuals, acting in their separate self interests, would form a harmony when those interests were considered together. Hobbes was advocating a political structure which would facilitate individualism within society.  Locke argued that the rights of life, liberty, and property were natural rights for all people. These rights came before any idea of an organized society. Thus, society’s role in respect to these rights was to protect them. The views of Locke were powerful support for the establishment of industrial capitalism in which freedom from government restraint was vital. Tttttttthttps://scholarworks.uni.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1120&context=draftings 
  • From On Liberty, John Stuart Mill, 1859: Protection against the magistrate is not enough; there needs to be protection also against the tyranny of the prevailing opinion and feeling, against the tendency of society to impose, by other means than civil penalties, its own ideas and practices as rules of conduct on those who dissent from them.Like other tyrannies, the tyranny of the majority was at first, and is still vulgarly, held in dread, chiefly as operating through the acts of the public authorities. But reflecting persons perceived that when society is itself the tyrant—society collectively, over the separate individuals who compose it—its means of tyrannizing are not restricted to the acts which it may do by the hands of its political functionaries. Society can and does execute its own mandates: and if it issues wrong mandates instead of right, or any mandates at all in things with which it ought not to meddle, it practises a social tyranny more formidable than many kinds of political oppression. Protection, therefore, against the tyranny of the magistrate is not enough: there needs protection also against the tyranny of the prevailing opinion and feeling; against the tendency of society to impose its own ideas and practices as rules of conduct on those who dissent from them; to fetter the development, and, if possible, prevent the formation, of any individuality not in harmony with its ways, and compel all characters to fashion themselves upon the model of its own. There is a limit to the legitimate interference of collective opinion with individual independence: and to find that limit, and maintain it against encroachment, is as indispensable to a good condition of human affairs, as protection against political despotism. But though this proposition is not likely to be contested in general terms, the practical question, where to place the limit—how to make the fitting adjustment between individual independence and social control—is a subject on which nearly everything remains to be done. All that makes existence valuable to any one, depends on the enforcement of restraints upon the actions of other people. Some rules of conduct, therefore, must be imposed. What these rules should be, is the principal question in human affairs; but if we except a few of the most obvious cases, it is one of those which least progress has been made in resolving. People are accustomed to believe that their feelings, on subjects of this nature, are better than reasons, and render reasons unnecessary. The practical principle which guides them to their opinions on the regulation of human conduct, is the feeling in each person’s mind that everybody should be required to act as he, and those with whom he sympathizes, would like them to act. No one acknowledges to himself that his standard of judgment is his own liking; but an opinion on a point of conduct, not supported by reasons, can only count as one person’s preference. Wherever there is an ascendant class, a large portion of the morality of the country emanates from its class interests, and its feelings of class superiority. The morality between Spartans and Helots, between planters and negroes, between princes and subjects, between men and women, has been for the most part the creation of these class interests and feelings: and the sentiments thus generated, react in turn upon the moral feelings of the members of the ascendant class, in their relations among themselves.  https://www.econlib.org/library/Mill/mlLbty.html
  • From A history of happiness, Carl Cederström & Sean Illilng, Vox, 2018: Aristotle was one of the first to offer what you might call a philosophy of happiness. For him, happiness consisted of being a good person, of living virtuously and not being a slave to one’s lowest impulses. Happiness was a goal, something at which humans constantly aim but never quite reach. Epicurus believed that happiness was found in the pursuit of simple pleasures. The rise of Christianity upended Greek notions of happiness, and suddenly the good life was all about sacrifice and the postponement of gratification. True happiness was now something to be attained in the afterlife. The Enlightenment and the rise of market capitalism transformed Western culture yet again: Individualism became the dominant ethos, with self-fulfillment and personal authenticity the highest goods. Although Freud didn’t think human beings were especially designed for happiness, there were other figures who emerged from that movement, people like the Austrian psychoanalyst William Reich, who popularized this idea that happiness was connected to free love and free sexuality. These ideas got picked up by the early Bohemians and later countercultural movement. Happiness became increasingly about personal liberation and pursuing an authentic life. So happiness is seen as a uniquely individualist pursuit — it’s all about freedom. By the end of the ‘60s, there’s a feeling that society is not allowing people to be authentic, that corporations are the enemy. People are thirsting for solidarity, and they see corporate life as dead and two-dimensional. And this is very powerful stuff that upends society. But what happens as you move through the ‘70s and into the ‘80s is the advertising industry effectively co-opted these countercultural trends. At the same time, Reagan and Thatcher were advancing a notion of happiness and consumerism. The idea of happiness we now have, this pursuit of authenticity and personal freedom, may have once been a genuinely noble goal, but over time, these values have been co-opted and transformed and used to normalize a deeply unjust and undesirable situation. There really is no way to accurately compare happiness today with happiness 50 or 100 years ago. We’ve looked at ideas of collective happiness as ugly or creepy or totalitarian, but they need not be. I believe we desperately need to reimagine what collective happiness might look like. https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/2018/9/4/17759590/happiness-fantasy-capitalism-culture-carl-cederstrom 
  • From Is Christianity Individualistic or Collectivist? Derek Rismawy, UC Irvine, 2013: People have often wondered whether Christianity was more of an individualistic religion, with an emphasis on the person, or collectivistic, with a emphasis on the whole race or community. At different points in history the church has emphasized one over the other. I offer you Machen’s answer first: “It is true that historic Christianity is in conflict at many points with the collectivism of the present day; it does emphasize, against the claims of society, the worth of the individual soul. It provides for the individual a refuge from all the fluctuating currents of human opinion, a secret place of meditation where a man can come alone into the presence of god. It does give a man courage to stand, if need be, against the world. If a man once comes to believe in a personal god, then the worship of Him will not be regarded as selfish isolation, but as the chief end of man.”  And now C.S. Lewis on the twin errors of Totalitarianism and individualism: “The idea that the whole human race is, in a sense, one thing —one huge organism, like a tree—must not be confused with the idea that individual differences do not matter or that real people are somehow less important than collective things like classes, races, and so forth. My nose and my lungs are very different but they are only alive at all because they are parts of my body and share its common life. Christianity thinks of human individuals not as mere members of a group or items in a list, but as organs in a body—different from one another and each contributing what no other could. When you find yourself wanting to turn your children, or pupils, or even your neighbours, into people exactly like yourself, remember that God probably never meant them to be that. A Christian must not be either a Totalitarian or an Individualist. I feel a strong desire to say which of these two errors is the worse. That is the devil getting at us: He always sends errors into the world in pairs, and he always encourages us to spend a lot of time thinking which is the worse. He relies on your extra dislike of the one error to draw you gradually into the opposite one.” So, is Christianity collectivistic or individualistic? Machen and Lewis answer: Yes. https://derekzrishmawy.com/2013/01/03/is-christianity-individualistic-or-collectivist-yes-c-s-lewis-and-j-gresham-machen/ 
  • From Introduction to Romanticism, M.A.R. Habib, Rutgers University, 2025: Romanticism included an intense focus on human subjectivity and its expression, an exaltation of nature which was seen as a vast repository of symbols, of childhood and spontaneity, of primitive forms of society, of human passion and emotion, of the poet, of the sublime, and of imagination as a more comprehensive and inclusive faculty than reason. The most fundamental literary and philosophical disposition of Romanticism has often been seen as irony, an ability to accommodate conflicting perspectives of the world. Romantics often insisted on artistic autonomy and attempted to free art from moralistic and utilitarian constraints, and their worldview spawned various oppositional movements such Socialism, anarchism, cults of irrationalism and revivals of tradition and religion. Romanticism cannot be placed within any set of these movements since it effectively spanned them all. Underlying nearly all Romantic views of literature was an intense individualism based on the authority of experience and, often, a broadly democratic orientation, as well as an optimistic and sometimes utopian belief in progress. 
    • Moreover, the Romantics shared Enlightenment notions of the infinite possibility of human achievement, and of a more optimistic conception of human nature as intrinsically good rather than as fallen and theologically depraved. In all these aspects, there was some continuity between Enlightenment and Romantic thought. However, many of the Romantics, including some of the figures cited above such as Blake, Wordsworth, Shelley and Byron, reacted against certain central features of the new bourgeois social and economic order. Appalled by the squalor and the mechanized, competitive routine of the cities, as well as by the moral mediocrity of a bourgeois world given over to what Shelley called the principles of “utility” and “calculation,” they turned for spiritual relief to mysticism, to Nature, to Rousseauistic dreams of a simple, primitive and uncorrupted lifestyle, which they sometimes located in an idealized period of history such as the Middle Ages. In general, the Romantics exalted the status of the poet as a genius whose originality was based on his ability to discern connections among apparently discrepant phenomena and to elevate human perception toward a comprehensive, unifying vision. The most crucial human faculty for such integration was the Imagination, which most Romantics saw as a unifying power, one which could harmonize the other strata of human perception such as sensation and reason. Hence the relation between Romanticism and the mainstreams of bourgeois thought, which had risen to hegemony on the waves of the Enlightenment, the French and Industrial Revolutions, was deeply ambivalent. Our own era is profoundly pervaded by this ambivalent heritage. https://habib.camden.rutgers.edu/introductions/romanticism/ 
  • From What isn’t humanism?, UK Humanists, 2025: Humanism is not Individualism/egoism: humanists believe we should be free to decide how we choose to live; however an excessive individualism or egoism that was overtly self-interested and ignored the consequences of our actions on others would not be compatible with humanism. Humanists do not deny the pursuit of sensory pleasures; however, these are not the only ingredients of a good life. Humanists do not subscribe to the belief that truth and morality are purely a matter of personal preference. Humanism is as opposed to atheist totalitarianism as it is to religious authoritarianism; both typically deny human rights and freedoms and devalue individual human beings in the pursuit of some unquestionable goal. Humanists do not believe we can build a perfect world, but typically believe we can build a better one. While denying the existence of some ‘ultimate’ meaning to the universe, humanists believe we can act to make our own lives meaningful. Nor is humanism the worship of human beings: humanists seek to remove the pedestal on which gods or other idols have been placed rather than place human beings upon it; human beings are to be valued and their positive capacities celebrated, but they are not to be worshipped. Sometimes people will describe themselves as being ‘religious humanists.’ This may be because they feel they belong to a religion in a cultural or familial sense, but they hold humanist beliefs. Some may simply define ‘religion’ in a way that includes all worldviews or approaches to life, and therefore define humanism as a religion. However, some may hold religious beliefs and define ‘humanism’ differently. It is important that students are aware that the word is being used here in a different way. Most modern dictionary definitions of humanism today define humanism as a non-religious worldview. https://understandinghumanism.org.uk/what-is-humanism/what-isnt-humanism/ 
  • From What is Satanism?, David Rutledge, Australian Broadcasting Company, 2022: Anton LaVey established the Church of Satan in San Francisco in 1966, and three years later published The Satanic Bible. LaVey was a notorious hippy-baiter — he hated the burgeoning peace and love movement at least as much as he hated the Christian church, if not more. He was also a devout individualist who articulated a philosophy of what today we would call self-empowerment. Says Peter Gilmore, “When it comes to celebrating ego and self-deification, we understand that nature is hierarchical, and that there are always going to be different levels of people. But in being our own gods, we can be beneficent gods, and we can deal with others in a very charitable and loving way. It’s not about crushing other folk, which is how people tend to interpret self-centredness.” This all sounds well and good, but even a quick browse through The Satanic Bible reveals an unnervingly steely kind of social Darwinism. LaVey was an admirer of arch libertarian Ayn Rand and described Satanism as “Ayn Rand’s philosophy with ceremony and ritual added.” It’s an often-noted irony that much of The Satanic Bible anticipates the social and economic doctrines of modern-day Republicans in the USA. He was also a eugenicist, and often advocated in interviews for the establishment of a police state. The Satanic Temple rejects the Church of Satan’s stance according to Stephen Long, a minister of Satan: “During the 1800s, the Romantic poets started to look at Lucifer as a heroic figure. The foundational belief structures of the Western world were being reconfigured, and so during that time he started to be seen as a champion of the outsider.” As a gay former Christian who underwent ex-gay therapy and other attempts at “deliverance” in his teens, Long knows what it’s like to be an outsider. But his perspective on Satan as champion of minority rights also informs his understanding of Satanism as a materialist, carnal religion in interesting ways. “Satanism is a religion of the body, and my concern as a Satanist goes downward, toward the earth,” Long says. “Part of that means material pleasure — but I’m not some kind of libertine, I’m very conservative in how I live my life. As I understand it, the carnality of Satanism also needs to be put in the broader context of material conditions, physical conditions — and that includes people’s physical needs being met. What are the conditions that people are living under, and are those conditions just?” https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-11-06/is-satanism-a-religion-of-social-justice/101591462 
  • From Satanism As Self-Empowerment, Alexandra James, Homegirl Talk, 2018: I don’t feel that I ever “became” a Satanist per se. I feel that my lived experience has shaped my attitudes, and the Satanic philosophy encapsulates my own particular perspective. The appeal to me is that it is a religion and philosophy that places the highest value on the Self, and as such, celebrates every manner of individual. As a Satanist, I believe that my power comes from within, and is attained through my own actions and will. I take all responsibility for my actions; in Satanism there is no “scapegoat” or idea that “the devil made me do it.” Quite the opposite, I believe both the triumphs and the ills of humanity are caused by individual’s actions themselves. Not “bestowed” upon us, or caused by supernatural forces of evil. Satanism values individualism, knowledge and self-empowerment. The beauty is that there’s many avenues for exploration within Satanism; there is no set doctrine or set of rules that “must” be followed. I have always felt that because humans are individuals, there is no one-size-fits-all religion, or set of rules for living. What works for one person might not work for another. Satanism attempts to transcend binary ways of thinking. There is no belief that you must conform to certain moral doctrines or commandments. Or that others must be taught the “one correct” way of living, otherwise they will be spiritually punished. Overall, Satanism is an inclusive philosophy because at its nature it celebrates the individual. I understand not everyone is going to like me, whether I am a Satanist or not. And I don’t feel I should have to apologize or change certain aspects of myself to conform or please others’ moral sensibilities. There are plenty of ways I was and am dragged down and insulted just by being a woman in the public sphere; if it’s not “witch” or “devil worshiper” it’s being judged by my age, appearance, hair, body, etc. Unfortunately, these are the realities of living in a patriarchal society. So I may as well work it in a way that feels self-empowering to myself. In many ways, we’re also playing with people’s phobias of what a stereotypical “Satanist” looks like, or on a larger scale, what a woman looks like. Evil, wicked, in cohorts with the devil, lustful, sinful, drinking blood, murdering babies. Tired narratives cast upon us by patriarchal rule.
  • From Satanism’s Pose of Individualism, Sam Buntz, Athwart, 2021: Mary Harrington recently wrote a lively and provocative piece on how Satanism has become the reigning ideology of the United States. This was daring work, since you naturally ratchet up the stakes in a debate by claiming, “My opponent is siding with Satan.” Harrington defines Satanism as pure, unfettered individualism or egoism, and sees it as the implicit and even in some cases explicit ideology of our time. She points to articles in publications like Salon, which suggest that Satanists are pretty cool, amounting to effective champions of liberalism. The pose of Satanism has been attractive for centuries: From exalted poets like Charles Baudelaire to the guys in Slayer, Satan comes to stand for the ultimate rebel, the person who cannot fit into the established order of things, who seeks to break it and remold it nearer to his heart’s desire. This is an admittedly powerful and romantic point of view, and it is not hard to understand why it has resonated throughout time. But, funnily enough, Satanism does not seem to lead to a state where unique personalities are allowed to flourish: By the time Paradise Lost ends, Milton’s Satan is like Dante’s Satan: boring. He is a snake with nothing to say. It is similar to the pattern presented in Lewis’s The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe: The White Witch lures you in with the promise of Turkish Delight and indefinite pleasure, only to leave you frozen as a statue in her garden. Baudelaire embraces Satanism in a spirit of authentic Romantic revolt, using a diabolic persona to express a universal sense of outrage at the oppressive weight of the universe; but Baudelaire’s poetic persona are ambivalent creations, more than half-cautionary. A contemporary Satanist, logging on to doomscroll or gaze at pornography, is devoid of this rebellious aura. He or she is simply like every bored teen on planet earth. Atomized Satanic individualism is a sad and numb person opening tabs in Google Chrome and then slamming the laptop shut when Mom unexpectedly walks in the room. I remember attending a Unitarian Universalist Church during a period of religious investigation. The congregation’s guiding mantra was “God is whatever you want God to be.” I reasoned to myself that if God was whatever I wanted God to be then I would, in effect, be God. This struck me as absurd. What Harrington calls Satanism is this very tendency—to deify one’s own will, whim, or power of arbitrary choice. According to this ideology, WHAT one wills does not actually matter; for obvious reasons, this is a recipe for unhappiness and insanity. As I have previously written, there is only one way to combat the hyper-capitalism of consumption and commodification: “You start by giving a gift.” This is how all great saints and statesmen found their virtue. https://www.athwart.org/infernal-bore-satanic-pose-dull-individuality/ 

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The post Episode 190 – Satanic Individualism appeared first on Black Mass Appeal.

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The post Episode 179: Rainbow Black w/Maggie Thrash appeared first on Black Mass Appeal.

How did a tiny Southern California school end up giving an object lesson in the dangers of mass hysteria? To help us prosecute the McMartin Preschool case, we’re joined by lawyer and YouTuber Leonard French.

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• (Watch this space, we’ll be right back.)

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The post Episode 146 – The McMartin Preschool Scare appeared first on Black Mass Appeal.

In 1992, FBI Special Agent Kenneth Lanning published his “Investigator’s Guide to Allegations of Ritual Child Abuse.” Though many sources today credit Lanning with sinking the Satanic Panic, few people have actually read this conclusions, so today we’re getting to the bottom of a national panic — and to the bottom of a few drinks.

CW: We drink and talk about alcohol throughout the episode; if that’s not the content for you, we understand!

SHOW LINKS

• IOL: South African Satanic Church co-founder explains why he turned his back on Satanism and why he now believes in Christ
• We Believe The Children, by Richard Beck (2015)
• U.S. Dept. of Justice: “Investigator’s Guide to Allegations of Ritual Child Abuse,” Kenneth Lanning (1992)

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The post Episode 124 – Drunk Heresy: Ending the Satanic Panic appeared first on Black Mass Appeal.

Evil is relative — but in our case it’s more like immediate family. Over the centuries, different cultures have used Satan-like figures to justify and explain their ideas about evil in the world, and to help us justify and explain those beliefs, we’re joined by professor Nick Brittin. Also, Satanic Bay Area is giving voice to the voiceless, and in the news, someone has been putting the screws to the Screwtape Letters.

SHOW LINKS

• Snopes: CS Lewis Quote Not From Lewis
• Nick Brittin’s “Demons to some, angels to others: An introduction to the class“
• Nick Brittin’s “Expressions of Evil” 
• The New Yorker: What do we mean by evil?
• Zoroastrianism and the Cosmic Conflict between Good and Evil
• Zoroastrianism, The Battle Between Good and Evil
• Encyclopedia Britannica: Messianic views
• John Edwards Le Bosquet: The Evil One
• The Center for Inquiry: The Lovecraft Theodicy: Cthulhu Has No Problem Of Evil

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The post Episode 70 – The Evil Aye appeared first on Black Mass Appeal.