Theistic Satanism: Home > Rituals, etc. > Blasphemy > Cautions truth-seeker's rite
The cautious truth-seeker's blasphemy rite and self-baptism
by Diane Vera
Copyright © 2004 by Diane Vera. All rights reserved.
- Introduction
The ritual on this page is intended for people who, for whatever reason, do not wish to perform any of the more classic blasphemy rites. This ritual need not involve any irrevocable declarations (a la the renunciation rite). Nor does it need to involve "blasphemy" in the sense of crude insults against the Christian god. It may involve crude insults if you feel that including them would be helpful to you as a catharsis, but they are not essential to the rite. Different people have different feelings about this.
Even without crude insults, this ritual is still "blasphemous" in a sense that once was quite illegal in all of Christendom. In the Middle Ages and for a couple of centuries thereafter, anyone caught performing anything remotely like this ritual - or the preparation for it - would surely have been burnt at the stake. Likewise in many Muslim countries today, it would surely earn you a death penalty for blasphemy.
This rite has the same purpose as other blasphemy rites - to help you rid yourself of unwanted unconscious baggage left over from your background. (See The purpose of blasphemy in Satanism.)
If you are from a Christian or Muslim background, it is hoped that this ritual - and the preparation for it - will help you get over such things as the fear of hell.
In the instructions below, it is assumed that the target of your "blasphemy" will be Christianity. However, if you are from a non-Christian background, or if your parents were nominally Christian but you never were taught to take Christianity seriously, then the target of your blasphemy should probably be something else, as appropriate: either another religion or a nonreligious ideology. The point is to help you free yourself from the lingering after-effects of some dogma which you once took seriously, but which you no longer believe on a conscious level. This ritual can be easily adapted to other targets.
- Preparation
For two or three months before you perform the rite, participate regularly in at least one online religious debate forum (or other relevant debate forum, if the ideology you need to free yourself from is nonreligious). Save copies of all your posts, and save copies of the better posts by other people. Also save copies of things that occurred to you to say in a post to the forom and which do reflect your honest thoughts and feelings, but which you decided not to say publicly because they were too rude.
After two or three months, go back through all the posts and notes you've saved and pick out a collection of memorable, pithy remarks which eloquently voice your thoughts and feelings about Christianity and the Christian god. Using a word processing program, put all these quotes into one file. Use a font big enough so that, when you print out the file, you'll be able to read it easily by candlelight or perhaps by the light of a small flashlight.
The point of the ritual will be to drive home to your subconscious mind the things you've learned from the debate.
In the debate itself, make an all-out effort to convince your opponents themselves, not merely to discredit your oppenents to others in the forum. A Socratic approach is recommended. Ask lots of questions.
Be scrupulously honest. Avoid straw-man arguments and other logical fallacies. When caught in an error, promptly admit it and apologize. A willingness to admit your mistakes will make you appear more honest and more trustworthy. And a commitment to honesty during the debate will help you feel more confident about the statements you end up using in your ritual.
In short, when participating in the debate, you should strive for logical soundness and avoid rudeness.
On the other hand, when selecting quotes for use in your ritual, different criteria should be applied. Remember, your subconscious mind is not logical. So, the most important criteria here are pithiness and emotional resonance.
If possible, your collection of quotes should cover quite a few different objections to Christianity (or whatever other ideology you've left), but at the same time should be short enough that you can easily read the whole thing aloud, slowly, with pauses of up to half a minute between quotes, in no more than twenty minutes to a half hour. For example, you could use ten to fifteen very brief quotes plus a few longer ones.
Then, in your own words, write a brief prayer of thanksgiving to Satan for having led you out of Christianity (or whatever). The prayer should be personalized to your situation and should mention those aspects of Christianity (or whatever) which you personally found most oppressive.
When you are ready to perform the ritual, prepare for it in your customary way (e.g. Preparations for formal ritual). In addition to whatever other ritual tools you may use, you should also have a bowl half-filled with water, large enough for you to dip your hands into it without overflow.
- The rite itself
This ritual should be performed three nights in a row. The ritual should begin and end in whatever way is most familiar to you. (See, for example, my recommended standard ritual format.)
After your standard opening (e.g. preliminary invocation and calling the four directions), say the following:
In the presence of our mighty Lord Satan, true God of this world and God of the nether realms, and in the presence of all the demons of the Pit, I declare that these things which I shall say are true, to the best of my ability to know the truth.
Pause briefly, then read your collection of quotes. Read them one at a time, pausing briefly after each one. Don't time your pauses by watching a clock. Just pause as long as feels natural to you.
When finished reading the quotes, say:
In the presence of our mighty Lord Satan, true God of this world and God of the nether realms, and in the presence of all the demons of the Pit, I declare that these things which I have said are true, to the best of my ability to know the truth.
Then say your prayer of thanksgiving.
Then dip your hands into the bowl several times and splash water on your face, including your forehead, symbolically washing away past delusion. While doing so, say three times:
O mighty Lord Satan, I ask to be set free from all past delusion and error. O mighty Lord Azazel, help me learn the truth, to the best of my ability to know it.
(It is suggested that you splash your face a total of four times, saying the above prayer in between.)
Then say your prayer of thinksgiving again.
Then close the ritual in whatever way is standard for you.
If you perform this ritual, feel free to email me with feedback on how it has affected your life afterwards.
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