In this episode of Sacred Tension, Lucien Greaves joins me to reflect on the upcoming ten-year anniversary of The Satanic Temple. We also discuss the After School Satan Club, standing up to theocracy, the importance of conversation and depolarization, and much more.
Continue reading “Sacred Tension: Ten Years of The Satanic Temple | Lucien Greaves”
Mysticism is like sex. Let me explain.
I don’t believe in god or gods. I have no belief in an afterlife or supernatural beings. I’m not saying that they don’t exist. I’m open to being wrong. I just have an absence of belief in them. I’m what could be described as a “soft atheist”.
And yet, I also have a lifelong fascination with altered states of consciousness and the experience and practice of mystical self-transcendence. This fascination started when I was a child growing up in a charismatic family.
Continue reading “Mysticism Is Like Sex”
Satanism is frequently called an “anti-religion”. This perception arises from the notion that Satanism is established as Christianity’s opposite. It is the yin to Christianity’s yang, the dark to Christianity’s light. Hence, it is an anti-religion.
This makes no sense to me. I’m sure there are Satanists out there who describe themselves as following an “anti-religion” and set themselves up in direct opposition to Christianity, but I’m not one of them. My Satanism is not an anti-religion. I’m just religious.
Continue reading “I’m Not Anti-Religion, I’m Just Religious”
In this episode of Sacred Tension, I speak with sex worker, disability activist, and Minister of Satan Azura Rose about the encroaching threat of theocratic censorship against sex work and pornography.
Continue reading “Sacred Tension: Sex Work and Censorship | Azura Rose”
In last week’s article The Motte and Bailey of Christian Belief, I commented on a trend I’ve noticed among Christians to make bold, hard-to-defend claims (the resurrection of Christ) and then retreating to broad, easy-to-defend claims (God is the ultimate mystery or “ground of being”) when pushed to defend the former.
Continue reading “Are the Truth Claims of Christianity Literal?”
In this episode of Sacred Tension, I’m joined by gay activist, author, and Brookings Institute scholar Jonathan Rauch to discuss his recent article Uncanceling Ourselves. We discuss how a tiny minority of activists have an outsized chilling effect on necessary discourse, and steps we can take to free ourselves from a fearful mindset.
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I remain connected to the Christian world, even though I’m not a Christian. This is because I value friendship, and I don’t want to cut ties with people who are very dear to me. While having conversations about faith with Christians, though, I’ve noticed a trend that annoys me.
Christians will often make strong, extraordinary, and hard-to-defend claims about the world. But when pressed on these claims, they often retreat to more philosophical, vague, and easier-to-defend claims. This tactic is called the Motte and Bailey. When the Bailey is under attack, they retreat to the Motte.
Continue reading “The Motte and Bailey of Christian Belief”
In this episode of Sacred Tension, I’m joined by Brookings Institute scholar Richard Reeves to discuss his new book Of Boys and Men. We discuss the unique challenges facing boys and men, how intersectionality is a valuable tool, the crisis of meaning among some men, whether porn is a negative force in society, and much more.
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In this episode of Sacred Tension, I’m joined by podcaster David Rutledge of ABC’s The Philosopher’s Zone to talk about his religious upbringing, his interest in Satanism, his loss of religious faith, and his objections to public intellectuals who take an over-simplified and divisive approach to “postmodernism.”
Continue reading “Sacred Tension: Derrida, The Exorcist, and Losing Faith | David Rutledge of The Philosopher’s Zone”
For the past few weeks on the blog, I’ve been discussing the importance of reading challenging texts. “Challenging” covers a broad range of books — it can mean books you hate, books you don’t enjoy, books that you are ideologically opposed to, or books that are worth reading but hard to get through.
Continue reading “Mitch Horowitz on Reading Great Occult Texts”
Stephen Bradford Long 