(LOL, "faith" is a funny word.)
Anyway, the following is a brief description of some of the things I have taught my brother in the faith, and what we intend to teach other unsuspecting young lambs that happen to come our way, heh heh heh!
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Our beliefs have elements of Deism, hard polytheism, and the African-based Diaspora religions. Our rituals are based purely and simply on expressing reverence for the Prince of Darkness and various demons, and communing with them while in prayer. We don't really practice any sort of ceremonial magic, nor do we even do anything as complicated as a traditional black mass; you might call us "Satanic Quakers" because we believe simplicity is best. (LOL, how 'bout "the Society of Fiends"?)
(On the other hand, we do get rather loud sometimes. It's not unusual for us to crank up a Kiss album on the car stereo while we go running through the woods at night, screaming like banshees and acting like we're possessed. Also, we enjoy making ritual sacrifices to Satan all the time - in the form of fried chicken, watermellon, and pumpkin pies.)
The central idea of our belief system is that, while more popular gods want to enslave our minds and our bodies to their perverse dogmas, the Old Dragon wants us to exercise our freedom of both. Therefore, anything that you do that gives you mundane pleasure is not only an act of pleasing yourself, but also an act of worshiping the Prince. And if this sounds too easy, this is where the exercising the freedom of your mind part comes in. We believe that the Prince of Darkness continually puts us into situations in which we are FORCED to re-think everything we believe - including the things we believe about HIM! It's important to Him that all dogmas be challenged, including those that center around Himself. So we will often find ourselves poring over philosophy books and debating over various metaphysical questions. It tends to become quite restless; in fact, you could call it a sort of Hell. Thank Satan for the carnal aspect, at least that part's easy enough!
But seriously, I believe that the Dark One truly wants all dogmas to be questioned, including (especially!) Satanist dogmas. And so I teach my student that it's okay to experience moments of doubt in Satanism, or to question one's faith, and that these are GOOD things. By questioning our faith and challenging our own ideas, we are also worshiping the Prince of Darkness. And by going out and getting OTHER people to question their faith and challenge their ideas, we are also worshiping Him. As Devil worshipers who call Satan our Lord and Master, we believe very firmly that it is our mission in life to make both ourselves and other people THINK as much as possible. You might say that we enjoy desecrating "mental graveyards." And trust me, this has an ugly habit of earning us more enemies than friends...
We also believe that the Prince of Darkness wants us to do what we can to fight persecution, wherever it might exist. So whenever we find a Christian saying false things about Satanism or Wicca or whatever, we point out the facts. Whenever we find an atheist saying false things about Christianity, we point out the facts. Whenever we find a Wiccan saying false things about Satanism, we point out the facts. Even when we find a Satanist saying false things about Christianity, we point out the facts. This also has an ugly habit of earning us quite a few enemies.
When my student first approached me about wanting to be taught by me, I didn't know what to say. All I could think about was how difficult it has been, being a Satanist. Having friends become my enemies, losing potential lovers because I follow a "spooky" path, and perhaps most difficult of all, having the ideological rug pulled out from under my feet whenever the Old Dragon apparently thinks I've grown too complacent in my beliefs. The first thing I told my student was, "I have to be honest with you. This is a very difficult path to follow. You're going to lose friends. There will be many times when you will really feel like you're alone. There will be times when you won't even be completely sure of what you believe. There will be times when you will be forced to live with your uncertainty."
Well, he decided he wanted to dedicate himself anyway, so I initiated him all right...And it's been almost three years now. Just a few months ago, he told me, "Boy, when you told me how hard this was going to be, you sure as Hell weren't lying!"
