Time to Move On: Religion Has Cost Too Much

This page is a conglomeration of some of the harshest arguments against monotheism from a practical and pragmatic point of view. It is about the terrible results of monotheism as embodied by Christianity and Islam in particular. I have a wealth of statistics and arguments behind every argument made here, so, each topic is a summary and a link to more in-depth reviews. The scale of the horror presented is too much to be contained in a single web page.

1. Monotheism and Violence Intolerance
   1. The Violent Defence of Religion Derives From Secret Doubt
   2. Organized Religion Makes 'Beliefs' Dangerous
   3. An Abrahamic Tradition: Wiping Out Competing Gods
   4. Anti-Semitism
   5. Heresy Versus Orthodoxy
2. Sexuality and Gender Issues
   1. The Peacock vs. The Ostrich
   2. Religion Versus Womankind
   3. Child Abuse
   4. Irrational Hatred and Prejudice Against Homosexuality
3. The Search for Truth
   1. Religion is Bad for Intelligence
   2. The Struggles of the Faithful Against Academia, Science and Freethought
4. Religion's Negative Effects on Society
   1. Societal Stability
   2. Violence, Crime and Mass Suicide
5. Dark Ages: When Faith Rules
6. Animal Welfare and Ritual Sacrifice
7. Satan as a Figurehead for the Oppressed. Who is the Real Enemy?

1. Monotheism and Violence Intolerance

1.1. The Violent Defence of Religion Derives From Secret Doubt

I start this page off by quoting from my page "Why Question Beliefs?" (2009):

“

Atheists and scientists do not kill each other over their beliefs. The adherents of superstring theory have never killed opposing theorists, and Lamarckian Evolutionists never killed any Darwinian Evolutionists on account of their beliefs. Newton and Einstein may have disagreed, but they refrained from violently attacking each other's followers. Like them, Arius and Athanasius disagreed over theory in the 4th century, although in their case it wasn't physics, but about the nature of Christ. The Arians and the Nicene Christians, however, soon ended up damning each other to hell because of the other's "wrong" beliefs, and then resorted to murder, aggression and burning until the Arians had been wiped out. Well, that is one way to settle a theoretical dispute. But why is it the religious way? There is something about religious beliefs that leads to violent intolerance. I think it is this: the beliefs that you cherish, but which you think are maybe silly or untrue, are the beliefs that you will defend most irrationally and most aggressively. It's a defence mechanism. Rather than subject dodgy beliefs to the rigors of debate and questioning, it is easier to claim outrage and act aggressively when dodgy beliefs are challenged. This is why scientists, who want to learn which theories best describe the truth, actively engage in debate without ever, in history, killing each other over their differences with other strands of scientists.

A commentator said to me that it would do no good to eradicate religion. He said "then they'd just kill each other in the name of something else. Like which football team they support!". I still think we would be better off. Football teams do not claim to be divinely inspired. They do not force upon people any particular intellectual framework, nor link it to moral theory. Under footballism, people are still free to enquire about the world with a free mind. The fact that religions claim divinity, that they claim absolute truth and link morality, society, authority and philosophy all into one whole, makes people more likely to fight and die for them. What is so weak about religious truths that they require defending with such bloodshed? It is this: People would rather cling to wishful thinking and false hopes, rather than face the complex realities of life. Simple answers appeal to people more than complicated scientific ones.

Because religious people secretly doubt religious beliefs, they do not permit their beliefs to be calmly questioned. They fear that their beliefs will unravel. Instead, they declare that faith is greater than intellectualism (in other words: they want to continue believing even though the evidence is against them). They declare that it is offensive to question their beliefs. They declare that questions are wrong! And if you persist in your questioning as a person, they'll declare you an intolerant bigot. If two such groups of faithful people meet, the consequences are dangerous for all in their midst. The starting point of this slippery slope was when individuals ceased to allow their beliefs to be calmly debated and questioned.”

"Why Question Beliefs?" by Vexen Crabtree (2009)

1.2. Organized Religion Makes 'Beliefs' Dangerous

Everyone has personal beliefs, I would hazard a guess that no two people believe exactly the same thing. The only problem comes when you organize these beliefs into religions... then you get the conflicts that lead to violence and real evil. As soon as belief ceases to be personal, it causes great problems. No two people have exactly the same beliefs... if we removed organized religion, there would be no "them" to fight against. People can believe whatever they want about gods and sons of gods, it just doesn't have to lead to violence because beliefs do not have to be organized into official monoliths and defended. Resist organized religion, and you resist one of the greatest forces of evil in history.

Authors such as Sam Harris have argued that given the destructiveness of modern weapons and their proliferation across the planet, the irrationality of religion is a time-bomb waiting to go off.

“Words like "God" and "Allah" must go the way of "Apollo" and "Baal," or they will unmake our world.”

"The End of Faith: Religion, Terror and the Future of Reason" by Sam Harris (2006)₂

1.3. An Abrahamic Tradition: Wiping Out Competing Gods

“The God of the Abrahamic religions, so far as it is concerned in The Koran, and The Bible and in history, hates opposing Gods. The Israelites are described as being commanded by God, time and time again, to wage war against and kill nonbelieving pagans because they dare to worship icons, fake gods, and any number of things that are not Jehovah. A long series of biblical condemnations set in motion the wheels of a series of religions deeply hostile to all other religions. Christianity started out tolerant and peaceful: the first Christians, the gnostics and ebionites, accepted respectively that their religion was one interpretation of the truth amongst many, or that it was a devout, personal path and not something that could be enforced on to others. Centuries later, though, the Nicene Christians arose and murdered their more peaceful predecessors, preparing Christianity to embrace the Dark Ages like no other religion could have, or would have.”

"Religious Tolerance for Competing Ideas: Why is Monotheism Intolerant?" by Vexen Crabtree (2008)

1.4. Anti-Semitism

“The violent and irrational anti-semitism in history has had its roots in one common cause: the teachings of early and middle ages Christianity. Anti-semitism has always been rife within Christianity from the original Church Fathers of the first century. Many of the most influential Christian theologians, for example Augustine, St Aquinas and later, Martin Luther, all indulged themselves by writing anti-Jewish volumes. Aquinas wrote that "since the Jews are the slaves of the Church, she can dispose of their possessions". The Christian anti-semites took their cue from Biblical verses such as Mark 15:15, Luke 23:3, John 19:4-6, 1 Thessalonians 2:14-16 that blames Jews as a whole for the death of Jesus, John 8:42-47 that says Jews are descended from the devil, and in Rom 10:3 that they are ignorant of God's will, and other verses are often cited by early Christians too although sometimes the logic of their exegesis confuses me.

No other religion has displayed such immovable hatred towards another religion as Christianity did towards the Jews. No holy war has ever lasted so long and been so bloody as the one the Christians waged against innocent Jews from the first century and through the Dark Ages. History provides us with only few occasions where Jews, or even Muslims or pagans, were as intolerant or morally corrupt as the West was under Christian rule. Thankfully modern Christianity, since it lost its power, is generally more humane. Christianity has slowly been forced to change its ways mostly due to pressure from increasingly powerful secular, poly-cultural governments and changing culture.”

"Anti-Semitism: 2000 Years of Christian Love" by Vexen Crabtree (2004)

1.5. Heresy Versus Orthodoxy

It isn't just others who have been systematically assaulted in the name of God. Often, religions engage in a lot of internal suppression, subjecting their own followers to careful scrutiny to make sure that they are not merely believers, but, that they believe precisely the correct things. It is only religion that even has the concept of heresy; in all other disciplines, a variance of belief is seen as good and healthy because it fosters debate, truth-seeking and diversity.

The number of Christian groups, including all forms of early Christianity, that were eradicated by other Christians is long, including the Gnostic Christians, Ebionites, Arians, Marcionites, Cathars, Albigenses and Waldenses. They are unheard of today, because modern Pauline Christians succeeded in wiping them out.

2. Sexuality and Gender Issues

2.1. The Peacock vs. The Ostrich

“The high child abuse and sexual abuse rates within the Christian priesthood highlight a problem that many religions face: We should not attempt to mould human sexuality around otherworldly religious ideals. Sexual dysfunction always results. Psychologists and sociologists have noted the association between extreme religious fervour and psycho-sexual problems (the former causing the latter), and the highly negative stance that many monotheistic religions take towards sexuality in general have contributed to a general malaise amongst their lay adherents, and a serious pandemic of abuse amongst professional religionists. The religious attitude towards religion is to behave like an ostrich and stick its head in the sand, hoping that theology can override biological truth, but merely making its victims unable to cope with adult sexuality. Witness the hateful and confusing statements that Christians and Muslims make about homosexuals, the anti-contraception stance that the Catholic church has in an over-crowded world ridden with disease, the harmful and simplistic rejection of abortion and the patriarchal dominance over women that has gone hand-in-hand with traditional religion on every continent.

In the modern world, many modern popular movements provide an alternative to traditional religions, and have enshrined normal sexuality. The secular world merely lets sexuality remain natural, and the New Age movement amongst many others, actively engage sexuality. The results have been much more positive and healthy than those of the classical monotheistic religions. This is one reason why countries that have liberal laws on abortion also have much lower rates of abortion than highly religious countries that restrict it heavily. An atmosphere of taboo and restriction serves limits responsible sexual behaviour. Rather than an ostrich, be a peacock!”

"The Peacock vs. the Ostrich - Religious Behaviour and Sexuality" by Vexen Crabtree (2008)

2.2. Religion Versus Womankind

“Most religious traditions have subjugated womankind. They have been barred from any leadership, prevented from religious learning or even secular education, and forbidden to hold power, or sometimes even to speak. [...] In all Muslim countries, women have severely restricted rights and are deeply subjugated to man. Such states of affair are brought about by the superstitions found in world religions regarding men and women. The Abrahamic religions (Christianity and Islam in particular) share inherited doctrines found in the Hebrew Scriptures that are highly negative of women. [...] As we will see, even central Buddhism has had difficulties with accepting any equality of womankind. [...]

This isn't just a historical battle. Amnesty International's 2009 compendium of horrors, "The State of the World's Human Rights", devotes some space to women's rights, including tales of torture and oppression, and compared (as always) the statistics to previous years. "In Iran and many other countries, Amnesty detected a retreat in women's rights, often in the name of religion. [... But] it is not just Muslim theocracies that Amnesty blame for maltreating women" as their stance on equality and women's rights has also brought them into conflict with the Roman Catholic church.

It seems that there is little that can be done to remove matriphobic commentary from the texts of the traditional world religions; societies must come to either ignore the texts (as most Christians do) or abandon religion (as many Westerners have done). New religions have tended to practice and enshrine gender equality, such as Paganism, Satanism and Wicca. Feminist groups have frequently been anti-religion, simply because it is religion that has presented itself as one of the biggest oppressors of womankind.”

"Religion Versus Womankind" by Vexen Crabtree (2007)

2.3. Child Abuse

“Child abuse and paedophilia has been a particular problem for Christian institutions. It seems that the Church's teachings on sexuality, and the general restrictions of the strict teachings of Christian churches, lead to a development of sexual dysfunction amongst its priests. Christian Churches, the biggest example being the Catholic Church, have fought to conceal paedophile priests and move them from place to place when allegations arise. They have tried to deal with paedophilia by sending priests on sick leave or to rehabilitation centres ran by other Christians, but, it appears that Christian hierarchies are the last places you should trust when it comes to dealing with sexual abnormality. The scale of the scandals has led to various Churches declaring themselves bankrupt as they attempt to pay some of the court costs and settlement fees demanded of them. No other industry - even those closely associated with children such as boarding schools - has a rate of abuse anywhere near the rate found amongst Christian clergy. Counting is difficult, but, around 3% of all priests appear to be prone to recurring sexual indecency with children. Catholic Archbishop Silvano Maria Tomasi represented the Vatican before the United Nations Human Rights Council, and stated that Jews and Protestants have worse rates of child abuse, but still admitted that in the last 50 years "somewhere between 1.5% and 5% of the catholic clergy has been involved in sexual abuse cases".

My main recommendations are:

1. That Christian institutions cease running organisations that deal with children such as schools and orphanages. Secular managers should be appointment to oversee any institutions that are mostly staffed by Christians.

2. That Christian teachings on sexuality are viewed as a historical form of idealism, like communism or fascism, which has unfortunately proven itself to have failed on moral and pragmatic grounds.

”

"Child Abuse by Christian Priests: Horror, Paedophilia and the Clergy" by Vexen Crabtree (2009)

2.4. Irrational Hatred and Prejudice Against Homosexuality

“Abrahamic religions have contributed to the most negative and destructive attitudes towards sexual issues, especially homosexuality. Christian and Islamic groups are the most vocal assailants on any legal or societal moves towards tolerance and equality. The liberal wings of some of these religions have adapted to the wide (European) acceptance of homosexuality. Many traditional religions reject the scientific, medical and psychological knowledge that we have gained about sexuality and regard homosexuality as "unnatural", a "choice" or a "moral evil". These religions are themselves immoral and evil in their attitude, causing hatred, bigotry, violence and oppression in the name of God. Homosexual communities have become accustomed to the ranting of religious fundamentalists and traditionalists.”

"The Battle Between Monotheism and Homosexuality" by Vexen Crabtree (2002)

3. The Search for Truth

3.1. Religion is Bad for Intelligence

“The historical battles between religious institutions and science, such as those in physics, astronomy and biology, indicate there is something wrong with the religious approach to the study of reality. The underlying problem extends to negative effects on the individual intelligence of believers, and a related negative effect on educational achievements. Hardly any of the several-hundred Nobel Prize winning scientists have been Christians. Only 3.3% of the Members of the Royal Society in the UK and 7% the National Academy of Sciences in the USA, believe in a personal God. The more senior and learnéd the scientist, the less likely they are to believe in God. Countries with a higher rate of belief in God have lower average intelligence; all countries with high average intelligence have low national levels of belief in God. The children of highly religious parents suffer diminished IQs - averaging 7 to 10 points lower compared to their non-religious counterparts in similar socio-economic groups. As you would expect from these results, multiple studies have also shown that IQ is opposed to the strength of religious belief. 39 studies since 1927 (out of 43) have found that the more educated a person is, and the higher one's intelligence, the less likely someone is to hold religious beliefs.”

"Religion and Intelligence" by Vexen Crabtree (2007)

The damage to intelligence caused by religious beliefs, especially strong beliefs, has a knock-on effect for violence and imprisonment rates. Higher rates of criminal activity is associated both with higher levels of religiosity, and with lower levels of intelligence:

“Prison incarceration is inversely linked to intelligence. Intelligence is inversely linked to faith. Religious parenting causes a reduction in children's average IQs. Evidence for this is that religious types (notably Catholics) are over-represented amongst prison inmates and other nasty classes of human, such as drug addicts, alcoholics, compulsive gamblers and sex industry workers (including strippers); not to mention the fact that sectarian religious schools promote the social divisions that hundreds of sociological analyses have proven to destroy community cohesion and increase violence and crime. If religion makes a person more likely to fall foul of societies' penal codes and moral judgements, and so does lower intelligence, and also religion causes lack of intelligence, then we have a self-perpetuating cycle. Two ways forward are an increase in non-religious education and the reduction of the authority given to religious ideas.”

"Religion, Violence, Crime and Mass Suicide" by Vexen Crabtree (2009)

“My contention that Christianity has brutalized men and kept them ignorant, rather than educating them and raising them up, is not based on some bold but false claim made by a handful of outspoken freethinkers, but on a historically demonstratable and bitter fact. This fact is not the result of the chance failure of a long succession of popes who were hostile to learning and limited in their vision to provide any suitable education, but of the irreconcilable opposition of faith to rational thought.”

"The Misery of Christianity - a Plea for Humanity without God"
Joachin Kahl (1968)₃

Improved education, especially in statistical sciences, is the best way to increase the general intelligence of the population and therefore, is the best way to remove superstitions and religion.

3.2. The Struggles of the Faithful Against Academia, Science and Freethought

There are countless tragedies in history where scientific discoveries have been suppressed, lost, destroyed, burnt and hidden, with scientists murdered, ousted, silenced and tortured. In nearly all cases, the antagonists have been religious institutions who are offended, scared, or outraged by new discoveries and by challenging ideas.

• “The Ionians discovered the truth about the Sun, the Earth and the stars. But their era ended when their last great scientist, Hypatia, was attacked by a mob of Christians and burnt in 415CE. The center of science, the Alexandrian Library, was also burnt and destroyed. Scientists had to suffer torture, silencing, imprisonment and death at the hands of Christians who didn't agree [...]. Copernicus (1473-1543), Kepler (1571-1630), Galileo (1564-1642), Newton (1643-1727) and Laplace (1749-1827) all fought battles against the Church when they published scientific papers challenging religious orthodoxy. [...] The Church retreated... only to go on to fight similar ignorant battles, and violently impose dogmatic errors, in the arenas of physics, biology and philosophy.”

  "Christianity v. Astronomy: The Earth Orbits the Sun!" by Vexen Crabtree (2006)

• The Ionians also theorized that humans had evolved from earlier species and had changed form over time. In particular, Anaximander of Miletus "proposed the spontaneous origin of life in mud, the first animals being fish covered with spines. Some descendents of these fishes eventually abandoned the water and moved to dry land, where they evolved into other animals"₄ - all, he said, without any need for god(s) to step in. Needless to say, it took science hundreds of years to rediscover the theory of evolution after an age of Christianity wiped it out.

4. Religion's Negative Effects on Society

4.1. Societal Stability

The academic Gregory S. Paul has published a study comparing 25 indicators of societal stability against the practice of religion. In developed countries, there is a strong correlation between stability and lack of religion. In other words, the more actively religious the country was, the worse its rates of crime, suicide, drug use, imprisonment, unemployment, income, abortion and public corruption.₅

“Paul also believes his study helps refute the controversial notion that the moral foundation of religious doctrine is a requisite for any high-functioning society - what he dubs the "moral-creator hypothesis."

Phil Zuckerman, a sociologist at Pitzer College whose research looks at the link between religion and societal health within the developed world, agrees with that assertion. [...] Zuckerman says the findings are consistent with his own data, collected for his 2008 book Society Without God: What the Least Religious Nations Can Tell Us About Contentment — a portrait of secular society in Denmark and Sweden — and his forthcoming Faith No More: How and Why People Reject Religion.

Scandinavian countries, in particular, have achieved high levels of economic strength and social stability, and yet the influence of religion there is in steep decline, perhaps the lowest in recoded history. Coincidence or not, those countries also rank among the world's happiest populations. In The Netherlands' Erasmus University Rotterdam's annual World Database of Happiness the same Northern European countries that score low in religiosity rank high in reported levels of happiness. (The U.S ranked 27th).”

www.alternet.org ₅

This is hardly news to many of those who now live in largely secular countries, looking on at the troubles of the world. In 2006 The Guardian reported that 82% of the British public say they see religion as a cause of division and tension between people. Only 16% disagree.₆

4.2. Violence, Crime and Mass Suicide

The contents of "Religion, Violence, Crime and Mass Suicide" by Vexen Crabtree (2009) is fully worth persuing, but contains too much information to attempt to duplicate it here:

1. Violence and Religion
   1. Religious Wars: Politics and Culture
   2. The Role of Strange Beliefs
   3. Africa: A Modern Christian/Muslim Front
   4. The Divine Endorsements of Violence
   5. Monotheism and Violent Intolerance
2. High Rates of Imprisonment
   1. Incarceration, Poverty, Intelligence and Religion
   2. Why Are There So Many Catholics in Prison?
   3. Discords Between Religious Belief and Law
3. Sex Crimes
4. Mass Murder and Suicide Cults
   1. Mass Delusion: 276 Child Murders and Over 600 Adult Suicides: Jim Jones' Peoples Temple
   2. Apocalyptic Survivalism: The Branch Davidian's Shoot-Out and the Sarin Gas Attack
   3. Rejection of the World and Mass Suicides: Order of the Solar Temple and Heaven's Gate
   4. The Role of Reactionary Mass Media in Isolating Idealistic Groups
5. Scriptural Justifications for Murder
   1. Hinduism
   2. Buddhism
6. Conclusions
   1. Religious Authority and Idealism
   2. Intelligence
   3. Prevention

5. Dark Ages: When Faith Rules

If you were to doubt that religion, in particular single-god monotheistic religions such as Christianity and Islam, are as bad as I have made out, then consider what happens when these organized religions become dominant. Christianity today is hemmed in by liberalism, democracy, human rights and multiculturalism. What happens when none of these controlling factors exist? Such a time occurred in history, and such a time continues now. In these ages of faith, organized religion becomes the leading authority on morality and civil administration. In the history of Europe, it is called the dark ages. Europe saw, during the time of Christian rule, a collapse of all development, the loss of science and academia, and the backtracking of humanity towards barbarianism. During this time, the Arab world overtook the West and became the light of humanity, developing science and intellectualism while Europe floundered.

The fall of the West during this time was not solely the fault of Christianity - part of the reason for the rise of Christian theocracy was the fact that the collapsing Roman Empire left some anarchy in its wake. But it definitely did not help matters that the Age of Faith was embodied by religious, Christian governance.

“It is strange that the last men of intellectual eminence before the dark ages were concerned, not with saving civilization or expelling the barbarians or reforming the abuses of the administration, but with preaching the merit of virginity and the damnation of unbaptized infants. Seeing that these were the preoccupations that the Church handed on to the converted barbarians, it is no wonder that the succeeding age surpassed almost all other fully historical periods in cruelty and superstition.”

"History of Western Philosophy" by Bertrand Russell (1946)₇

Uncounted numbers were tortured and killed for practicing witchcraft, sorcery, magic, satanism, trickery and alchemy. Witches and werewolves were hunted down by people on the payroll of the Church. The infamous Spanish Inquisition was formed by the Catholic Church to hunt down Christians who didn't believe quite the right things about Jesus, and Jews, and atheists, and all sorts of other people. A second instrument against heretics, apostates and infidels was the Crusades. With Christian Churches exerting massive influence over Western peoples, entire armies were raised in its name to wipe out Jews (the first crusade), heretics (Cathar Christians) and Muslims (later).

The troubled life of anyone developing new ideas under the shadow of organized religion (who justify their power in terms of "truth") slowed down every science and medical school imaginable. Except torture equipment of course!

“In his study of the death penalty over a period of three thousand years, Kurt Rossa makes the remarkable statement: 'Anyone who wants to know everything about us Christians should read the Sermon on the Mount. Anyone who wants to know more about us, should read a history of the death penalty'. The Inquisition, which continued to exist in the Papal States until they were dissolved in 1870, caused countless people to suffer unspeakable torments for centuries.”

"The Misery of Christianity - a Plea for Humanity without God"
Joachin Kahl (1968)₈

Pagan literature is fond of a phrase used to emplore the world not to return to the rule of faith-based intolerance and superstition: "Never Again the Burning Times". It is a pledge never to let the world fall again into an age of faith. However Humanity continues to fail, because a dark age continues to engulf much of the world even in the twentyfirst century.

Now, much of the Muslim and Arab world is enshrouded in an age of faith so dark that once again, religious police and theocratic regimes enforce forms of religion on the people. Massive ignorance exists of science, human rights and comparative religion because it is unlawful to teach anything that contradicts the Qu'ran. The Muslim world today is in a dark age, as was Christianity before it.

“As the Roman Empire progressed, scientific knowledge and academia flourished as best as was possible in the ancient world. Europe was largely the beneficiary of this knowledge "but during the Dark Ages in Western Europe the ability to read and write had become largely confined to the clergy, as too had a knowledge of the Latin tongue". After the collapse of the Roman Empire, the only major European power that remained was that of the Catholic Church, which had largely become synonymous with all forms of rulership. Under its influence, science was all but destroyed as Church dogma and doctrine was violently enforced. Philosophical works were burned and lost, medicine and psychology set back hundreds of years. Neurologists Davison & Neale note during the "Dark Ages for all medicine [...] Christian monasteries, through their missionary and educational work, replaced physicians as healers and authorities on mental disorder. [...] When monks cared for the mentally disordered, they prayed over them and touched them with relics or they concocted fantastic potions for them to drink in the waning phase of the moon". The Age of Faith was an era of Christian fundamentalism and superstition, of theocracy (rule by religion). During this time, the Arab world carried the torch of knowledge and surpassed Europe in its understanding of philosophy, mathematics, and the sciences in general.

But then the Arab world itself fell under increasingly conservative Islam. Some Universities in Europe (three existed by 1200CE), independent from most constraints, had survived. They obtained Greek knowledge about the world via Arab translations. The spark of the Enlightenment set fires under the authority of the Church in the West, and the West emerged from its dark ages as the Arab world plunged into its own, from which it has not yet emerged. [...]

The Arab world is not synonymous with the Muslim world, but, in the overlap between the two we see a lack of knowledge of science that is unimaginable to those brought up in developed Western countries. Those who do at least know of scientific theories are very likely to reject them as untrue. The Arab world is still in the depths of a Muslim Dark Ages, and although authors from time to time hail signs of an Islamic enlightenment, one has not yet come to pass, and for every step forward in one area of public engagement with science, there seems to be equal steps backwards elsewhere.”

"Science: Its Character and History: Dark Ages" by Vexen Crabtree (2006)

6. Animal Welfare and Ritual Sacrifice

“World religions such as Christianity, Islam and Judaism all embody a traditional and sometimes bizarre set of animal sacrifice rituals in their holy texts. These practices, despite being borderline barbaric and not in keeping with modern ideas of animal welfare, are still in use today by religious communities all over the world, including in the most modern countries. Although it might seem reasonable in the West to allow butchers to sell halal food, at the core of this familiar label is weird ritualistic behaviour that belongs in the dark ages. The ideals of pluralism have blinded us to the stark reality that some religious practices are simply unacceptable. Animal rights campaigners have joined forces with moral activists to try and curb religious ritual slaughter of animals. The general public associate blood rituals involving animals with Satanism, not realizing that they were all invented and are still practiced by mainstream religions - and that Satanism does not involve animal sacrifice. We compare scriptures below and look at some of the gory and shocking rituals that God directly asks people to do in the Jewish Scriptures / Old Testament. As modern governments continue to legislate against cruelty to animals, we will find that it is the world's mainstream religions' adherents who retreat to shady basements and hidden locations to perform secret rituals to kill animals, rather than Satanists or Pagans.”

"Animal Sacrifice and Blood Rituals in Traditional World Religions and Satanism" by Vexen Crabtree (2008)

7. Satan as a Figurehead for the Oppressed. Who is the Real Enemy?

The enemies of the gods are the friends of the oppressed. All can now find solace and security, protection and refuge in the houses of thought that make stands against organized religion.

The idols of the oppressed are ironically the demons and devils of theology. Successful Christian preachers turned the pagan God pan into a demon, turned the idea of a daemon into the idea of a demon, turned the good symbols of the oppressed into the devils of their own theology. The original symbols behind devils and demons are largely the remnants of defeated and victimised cultures. Beings and concepts that wish to destroy god(s) express the same sentiment as the oppressed masses through history who have had to fight and hide from religious authority. Most the time Satan itself is blamed for our existence and used as the excuse to allow Christians and Muslims to oppress free thought.

“This Satan, this scapegoat, is the bad guy of organized religion, he is the Saviour of the anarchist, the romantic, the fool who tries to cease human (and his own) suffering by removing the sheep mentality that allows powerful governments or forces to rule unquestioned; this Satan is the last strength for a moral person trapped in an immoral world.

Satanic rituals, the calling on the elements to remove hypocrisy and corruption, stupidity and irresponsibility is not the summoning of evil as white light religion sees it, and does not have the evil effects, but is the single most important stand against the mindless tyranny of the majority of the Human race: It is a cleansing of the air around the Earth.”

"The Power Of Symbols" by Vexen Crabtree (2001)