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    • Black Mass Wrap Up

    By Damion Reinhardt • • 3 comments

    Here in Oklahoma City, a handful of dedicated Satanists managed to get hundreds of (mostly Catholic) believers in a complete tizzy over the possible incursion of demonic powers into our world via a dark ritual held on Sunday night. Prayerful processions and colorful banners and (mostly) peaceful protests, oh my! My old friend James Nimmo has an excellent collection of original images on his blog and the Oklahoma Atheists Facebook Page has a collection of images posted up as well, if you would like to see the sights from all around the outside of the Civic Center as demonstrators of all sorts converged upon it.

    A small sampling of the signage on hand
    A small sampling of the signage on hand

    But that’s not all! The meta-protest behind the main protest was much like a Christian trade fair, as the sort of folk who enjoy preaching on street corners descended from all corners and denominations. Just to give you a sense of how crazy things got in the park east of the Civic Center, at one point atheists were spotted arguing with black-supremacist fundamentalist Protestants who showed up to help convert Hispanics of color away from Catholicism and back to the Bible. Read that part again, if it confuses you as much as it confused me.

    The ceremonial Black Mass went off without a hitch, despite various pious attempts to shut it down:

    I get it, Christians. You believe that Satan is real and that demons may well be unleashed upon the Earth starting right here in the buckle of the Bible Belt. That’s cool, believe whatever you want. Maybe, though, you should resort to prayer and fasting  first and foremost (rather than appeals to government force) if you want anyone else to be persuaded that you really believe your God is all that powerful. Every time you call upon human authorities to shut down these sorts of events, you look less and less like people of faith, and more like people playing politics.

    As to the ceremony itself, it consisted of a local metal band, followed by a much-bowdlerized version of a LeVeyan Black Mass, followed by a ritual reverse baptism, which for some reason included a stuffed doll that looked a bit like Precious Moments Jesus. No, I’m not making that part up.

    debaptism
    The doll ends up on the floor, of course

    Even though these particular Satanists are not atheists (most of them are) I have to point out that I’ve seen plenty of atheistic debaptisms as well, and they also feature bearded weirdos in fancy robes. Have to wonder who is borrowing from whom, at this point.

    Now that this is all said and done, I’m quite proud to say that the Oklahoma City Civic Center stood firmly for freedom of religious expression, unlike those damnable cowards at Harvard. If our conception of free speech doesn’t protect unpopular speech, it doesn’t protect anything, really. Popular speech can always fend for itself.

    And with that, I’ll leave the last word to Man Destroys God . . .

    Category: Activism • Current Events • Free Expression • Oklahoma • Politics • Theocracy

    Article by: Damion Reinhardt

    Former fundie finds freethought fairly fab.