Hello,

I am a Satanist, so I (naturally) agree with the Church of Satan's perspective on how its membership should conduct itself in regards to self-destructive and illegal behavior. As survival is of the highest order to a Satanist, it's not terribly conducive to personal success to engage in criminal, addictive, or otherwise unnecessarily dangerous activities.

I am curious, though, about how the Church of Satan might view something along the lines of revolutionary activity. Say a Church of Satan member were present for the Boston Tea Party, or a Polish resistance movement during the era of Nazi Germany. Putting myself in that position, I could understand an argument, in the interest of personal liberty, where participating in something like that might be worth the risk. Would my illegal resistance involvement disqualify me as a CoS member, even if it were an attempt to harm a system that was oppressive to free thinkers?

This is a hypothetical scenario, of course, and while I'm not terribly happy with the increasingly intrusive machine that is the US government, I hardly see myself being put in a position where anything like this might apply. Still, as a general point of interest, I'm curious about what the Church's official stance on something like this might be.

Thanks for your interest.

http://churchofsatan.com/Pages/Politics.html

The Church of Satan is not a political organization. While most individual members have some political orientation or another, that is separate from the Church of Satan.

In a "hypothetical scenario" you should keep your revolutionary activities separate from the Church of Satan.

In a "hypothetical scenario" if the illegal political activities of a member jeopardized the Church of Satan without serving the interests of the Church of Satan, I would see no reason why the Church of Satan should maintain association with the individual, especially if the individual was dragging the Church of Satan into their issues without authorization or sufficient reason.

Odds are, in your "hypothetical scenario" - in any event as big as a "revolution" - there would be Satanists on both sides of the issue.

In other words: When it comes to politics, you are on your own. The Church of Satan is not the ACLU.

Also, we have no need or use for martyrs.

Thank you, Svengali. In such a situation, the Church's stance is clear to me.

I agree with the sentiment concerning martyrs, as well. I'd think long and hard before ever involving myself in something that seriously risked my own welfare; chances are, it would probably be the kind of situation where there wasn't much choice at all. A little foresight should do well in avoiding it ever coming to that.

The whole idea came to me while I was reading a book on the American Revolution, and pondering the idea of 'heroism' versus martyrdom in general. I was just trying to put myself in the shoes of one of the country's forefathers, and wondered how the Church of Satan might view those individuals if it existed at that time. Clearly, as an apolitical organization, it would be in the Church's interest to not officially affiliate with either side. Makes perfect sense.

Thanks again for your response.