Why do you think Satan is evil, other than a convenient excuse?
A2 Thanks.A convenient excuse is exactly what belief in Satan is. An excuse promoted by religion, which is a very dangerous idea.People do crazy shit when they’re afraid and religion loves to make people afraid. Afraid of God and afraid of the Devil. It wasn’t that long ago that people thought witches could turn them into pigs. Have we progressed? Not much, as far as I can see.It’s ironic. Christians do believe in Satan, yet to them, Satanists are probably the worst people in the world. They have no idea what Satanism really is or their code of ethics. They fail to see that Satanism is a parody of religion…I’m pretty sure they’d even be afraid to go online and look up the tenets.So, I’ll do it for them:- One should strive to act with compassion and empathy toward all creatures in accordance with reason.- The struggle for justice is an ongoing and necessary pursuit that should prevail over laws and institutions.- One’s body is inviolable, subject to one’s own will alone.- The freedoms of others should be respected, including the freedom to offend. To willfully and unjustly encroach upon the freedoms of another is to forgo one's own.- Beliefs should conform to one's best scientific understanding of the world. One should take care never to distort scientific facts to fit one's beliefs.- People are fallible. If one makes a mistake, one should do one's best to rectify it and resolve any harm that might have been caused.- Every tenet is a guiding principle designed to inspire nobility in action and thought. The spirit of compassion, wisdom, and justice should always prevail over the written or spoken word.I’m not a Satanist and I dislike labels, but if I had to choose between Satanism and Christianity, it’s not even a contest. Christianity would lose in a heartbeat.
Can you tell me where God is?
'On December 13, about 30 [Japanese] soldiers came to a Chinese house at #5 Hsing Lu Koo in the southeastern part of Nanking, and demanded entrance. The door was open by the landlord, a Mohammedan named Ha. They killed him immediately with a revolver and also Mrs. Ha, who knelt before them after Ha's death, begging them not to kill anyone else. Mrs. Ha asked them why they killed her husband and they shot her. Mrs. Hsia was dragged out from under a table in the guest hall where she had tried to hide with her 1 year old baby. After being stripped and raped by one or more men, she was bayoneted in the chest, and then had a bottle thrust into her vagina. The baby was killed with a bayonet. Some soldiers then went to the next room, where Mrs. Hsia's parents, aged 76 and 74, and her two daughters aged 16 and 14. They were about to rape the girls when the grandmother tried to protect them. The soldiers killed her with a revolver. The grandfather grasped the body of his wife and was killed. The two girls were then stripped, the elder being raped by 2–3 men, and the younger by 3. The older girl was stabbed afterwards and a cane was rammed in her vagina. The younger girl was bayoneted also but was spared the horrible treatment that had been meted out to her sister and mother. The soldiers then bayoneted another sister of between 7–8, who was also in the room. The last murders in the house were of Ha's two children, aged 4 and 2 respectively. The older was bayoneted and the younger split down through the head with a sword.[50] Pregnant women were a target of murder, as they would often be bayoneted in the stomach, sometimes after rape. Tang Junshan, survivor and witness to one of the Japanese army’s systematic mass killings, testified: The seventh and last person in the first row was a pregnant woman. The soldier thought he might as well rape her before killing her, so he pulled her out of the group to a spot about ten meters away. As he was trying to rape her, the woman resisted fiercely ... The soldier abruptly stabbed her in the belly with a bayonet. She gave a final scream as her intestines spilled out. Then the soldier stabbed the fetus, with its umbilical cord clearly visible, and tossed it aside.[51]' Where is God?
What would the world look like without religion?
Then racism and nationality would be much more prevalent than it is. We can expect more Pride for region, language or geographies.The amount of love and respect that celebrities and leaders get, would be 100 folds more than it currently is.People who say that world would be a better place without religion fail to understand why religions originated in the first place. I do not claim to be an expert on the subject, but here's my 2 cents.We humans are tribal and need a feeling of being a part of something larger than ourselves. A sense of belonging to a group. The tribe made us feel secure and safe. Which served as the foundation of our social order. Some people took up the responsibility of protecting these tribe and others did farming, preparing the food and other stuff. While others pondered about the creation and theorised their beliefs. From the very beginning of civilization, God or religion have played a very pivotal role in keeping humans together and in groups that exceeds the geographical boundaries.I am an atheist and for quite a few years I was convinced that if everyone in the world became one, the world would be a much better place. But the more I thought about it, the more evident was the folly in my aassumption. Even if you somehow manage to take away religion from everyone, a century later people will find new gods and new prophets. You cannot take away the man's aforementioned need of belonging.In absence of religion, people shall yearn for this sense. That will most likely lead to excess regional pride, or language pride (as witnessed in India) and worst of all the pride of one's skin colour.While that shift occurs there is a high chance of Chaos on international stage. The society would be even more polarised than it is today.Lastly older religions like Hinduism were more of an attempt to understand the universe and actually help the early research in various fields like physics, medicine, mathematics, astronomy, astrology, biology, etc. But science today doesn't need religion. So even though the intent is no longer valid, the byproduct is. Although religion has historically brought many wars, we are moving past that. And the absence of religion might not really be as fruitful as atheist think.
Why are Christians so obsessed with the Devil?
Seriously I have never seen a religious group more obsessed with a negative, bad entity than Christianity!! Anything that does not agree with the thought or opinion of the Christian, work of the devil. Someone does something wrong, work of the devil. Someone goes to another religion, work of the devil. Gods above as a follower of Hellenismos I find this mentality so alien if not utterly inappropriate. The Christians like those of us who follow Neoplatonic Hellenismos essentially believe that the Divinity is wholly Good, that is the Divinity contains no evil or fault. In Christian theology the Devil is very similar to our Kakosdaemons, absolutely inferior shadows cast off by turning away from the Good. The turning away can only exist because Free Will is granted by the Gods to the souls. The souls can choose to live in alignment with the Light or turn away. Given this does it not follow that the Devil/Kakosdaemon cannot tempt or even do anything bad. Since they are shadows cast off by souls that through their free will turn away from the Light of the Good the issue is not the shadows but rather the soul and its use of free will. So why blame the Devil? It is the individual that erred if anything. In Hellenismos we do not go around blaming or even thinking on the Kakosdaemons if someone does something bad .. we look to the individual and see where he or she has erred and try to help them rectify the issue. We try to help return them back to see the Light of the Gods ( which is always shining and darkness is only perceived when one turns away and close one's eyes ) I cannot understand Christian mentality .. can any Christian explain to me this obsession with the Devil.