Ep.18: A Satanic Halloween

# Satanists Nextdoor
# Ep.18: A Satanic Halloween

[Lilin Lavin]
Welcome, dear listeners, to Satanist Next Door. We're your hosts, Lilin Lavin and Tommy Lavin. Whether you're an open-minded curious onlooker or a fellow Satanist seeking camaraderie, our goal is to share our personal experiences and delve into the intricate tapestry of Satanism in our daily lives, occasionally inviting other guests to share their unique perspectives, leaving no pentagram unturned.

We'll explore how our beliefs shape our views on society, dive into struggles and triumphs we've encountered, and reveal the humanity that unites us all. So grab your favorite chalice and join us on this captivating journey. Satanist Next Door is ready to peel back the curtain and offer you a glimpse into our world, one captivating episode at a time.

[Tommy Lavin]
Hello and welcome to another episode of Satanist Next Door. This episode, we are going to be talking about Halloween. Lillian Levine Goofball.

Well, I mean, as Satanist, Halloween is like, you know, obviously a favorite holiday, but, you know, we do do all those things.

[Lilin Lavin]
I'm actually going to correct you on that one. My favorite holiday as a Satanist is my birthday.

[Tommy Lavin]
Well, yes. Okay. Okay.

Yes. As a holiday, my birthday, but as a national sort of, like, recognized holiday, the United States doesn't recognize my birthday.

[Lilin Lavin]
Are you sure?

[Tommy Lavin]
As a holiday. I'm still working on that. We will get that bill through somehow.

Probably not.

[Lilin Lavin]
But now Halloween is definitely an amazing holiday. I know a lot of people try to make it into something else, and we'll talk about that in a little bit. But the fun thing is TST has it as one of its recognized holidays.

And as they describe on the website, Halloween holiday to celebrate indulgence and embrace the darkness and its aesthetic. Halloween is consistently described as evil, demonic and satanic by those steeped in religious dogma, costumes, candy and facing fears are to be embraced. And I love that.

No, I mean, a serious note, though, like facing fears, think about that. So much of what we do, and even, again, not trying to crap on people that do hold very strong religious beliefs and ideologies, they're welcome to those things. But we do often have so many things that are created, especially the extremist aspects of it out of fear and the inability to cope with or face fears.

And I think it's so important, especially for religion like Satanism, where you are supposed to be accountable for everything. To be able to face fear is a huge part of accepting accountability and understanding the motivation behind your actions.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, definitely. And so what we as Satanists don't do on Halloween, regardless of the rumors that you've heard or what the church tells you or the pastor tells you or the youth group minister or all the wacky people out there tell you is we do not kill cats. We do not kill animals.

We do not kill babies and drink their blood or summon up demons or any of that bullshit. Sometimes we do rituals, but they are, again, metaphorical. So we don't actually believe that we're like summoning up demons or something like that.

[Lilin Lavin]
Well, and to be fair, I do know some theistic Satanists and I'm not going to speak for what they do or don't do. But at the end of the day, I know of no Satanists, no real Satanists that would ever harm a living thing in order to use ritual or anything like that. That is something completely different.

It is not condoned by any of the different varieties of Satanism that I'm aware of.

[Tommy Lavin]
Right. In fact, it's specifically called out. Yeah.

I mean, anywhere from C.O.S. to T.O.S. to T.S.T. Luciferianism.

[Lilin Lavin]
Yeah.

[Tommy Lavin]
Every single one of them.

[Lilin Lavin]
You do not harm animals. You know, it's often looked at as a weak behavior to pretend that harming something gives you strength is the very opposite of what it is to be Satanic.

[Tommy Lavin]
Right. Exactly. I mean, if you have to supposedly steal something else's life force in order to do whatever you're going to do, then you're pretty damn weak as a, you know, magician.

You know, again, we don't look at magic as real. So but that's kind of the way that, you know, I have even looked at it in the past as I was exploring different things. But some of our favorite, you know, crazy Christians have posted some stuff out there.

Yeah.

[Lilin Lavin]
Greg Kroc. Yes. So the I don't even want to call him pastor because that actually means something.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah.

[Lilin Lavin]
Definitely not what he does. But but Greg Kroc a crap who many people may probably already be aware of. If you aren't, feel free to look that craziness up because, boy, is that something.

He runs something that they call Deliverance Ministry and Deliverance Ministry is very widely spread. Unfortunately, it's found in many, many places. And the problem with Deliverance Ministry is it's one of the most extreme ministries out there.

It is incredibly critical of the LGBTQ community. It is very much an incitement of violence and violent behavior. It is exactly what extremism is elsewhere around the world in relation to other religious beliefs.

This would be right up there with that, that sort of stuff. So the thing that they're currently doing in their fun little Halloween night event is they are having a while they're doing two things. They said they're conducting a mass deliverance service for children, which guys, indoctrination, I don't have to tell you this.

But as parents ourselves, and knowing other parents, it is not our job to tell our children what to believe. We can definitely guide them, we should be guiding them on things to be cautious of and and things to to learn. But we're not we're not ourselves experts on life.

I'm still learning about life. So this is just such an insult to me. And it's pretty scary.

But they'll be conducting this mass deliverance for children. He talks about praying for the freedom and health of your children. I don't see how indoctrinating them is in any way emboldening them to be free.

It's kind of the opposite. And then he goes into how the adults we deal with in deliverance ministry have been under attack since they were kids from what?

[Tommy Lavin]
So this, this goes into that wacky sort of spiritual warfare, because I saw this a lot on the from evangelicals, they like actually believe that as you're walking through life, you know, your everyday life, like you're dragging along either demons or angels with you. And like, if you do something sinful, you allow demons into your house, and then they battle with the angels. Like, it's like a whole sort of fantasy.

I don't know, like war game going on in the back. And they've got some pretty funny books.

[Lilin Lavin]
I'm not gonna talk about where it is. You guys are free to look this crap up. And you know, I'm not in any way telling anyone to go near this thing to involve yourself.

I do not do that. No, far away from it as you can. And you know what, I don't agree with it.

But that's their it's their religious thing.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah.

[Lilin Lavin]
The only problem I'm starting to have here is once you start involving children, again, consent, very big deal. This isn't about sex. I certainly fucking hope it's not about sex.

But when you're talking about consent, it's more than that. So consent also means kids don't understand this stuff. And you're you're not giving them an opportunity to get an understanding for who they are, what they want, what their beliefs may even be.

Maybe they do want to be Christian, that's great. But you don't brainwash them into stuff when they should be out. This is a good time to play pretend, you dress up, you go out and get candy with your friends.

You know, good, good job checking the candy. Don't just munch it all down your face the moment that you get it in the bag and come home to stomachache.

[Tommy Lavin]
But, you know, but imagine the emotional damage that there this is like emotional abuse, because these kids are being taught that, like these pretend demon things are constantly hanging over, you know, and as they do things wrong, it gives these things more power over them. And I mean, this is like a horror movie, like you're actually teaching your children that they live inside of a horror movie. You know, I mean, it's it's incredibly abusive, guilt, shame, blame, just the scariness.

I mean, think of you're a kid and you think, oh, my God, you know, there's there's surrounded by demons in my room and they're looking at me and people, other people contained.

[Lilin Lavin]
Could you imagine as a kid looking at other people wondering, is this one demonic? Is that one demonic? There's enough crappy people that exist in the world that we don't need to add fictional demonic entities to everything that a child meets.

What a terrifying existence that must be.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, that's that's the part that really pisses me off, you know, burn as many of the. Well, yeah. And that's part.

[Lilin Lavin]
That's part two of what they're going to be looking to accomplish in the mass deliverance ceremony that they'll be holding Halloween night is that they will once again be burning all things related to witchcraft and the occult. And then they say, you know, ask the Lord to show you what's in your home that needs to be removed. I can assure you there are some items that must go.

Look, look, one of the things that was really difficult for me growing up is I would go into foster care and foster care would would put you in different homes. These people were well intended for the most part, you know, and so you would experience. I said for the most part, there's crappy people in every every job.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah.

[Lilin Lavin]
And foster fostering is a calling, but it is also a job. You get paid for it, whatever. But some of the foster families that I went to live with were incredibly religious.

They did, in my mind, ultimately mean well, but part of what they did was try to involve you in the church because they thought that it was helpful. And if you're ever been involved in foster care, no kids who have been one of the things that you'll you'll know is that owning things, having things, things that are yours that are reminiscent of the life you had, or any of those things are few and far between. So you don't have a lot of stuff.

And what you do have tends to be very precious because it's a memory and a thing. So it tends to be very important to you. Some of the things that I had received were from one of my caseworkers who was amazing.

She had gotten me some Nirvana tapes, and they were really important to me because I love Nirvana. And it was something nice that they did. Because listening to music was a nice way to not be in an uncomfortable environment because you're constantly surrounded by people, especially in group homes.

And one of the homes that I went to, they took all these things, like all of my tapes, anything that they deemed to be, quote unquote, demonic, and they burned them. And that was really traumatizing to me. It was something that I held dear.

And it was very emotional for me. And it built some real strong feelings towards those people. Resentment.

And not towards the religion entirely. But yeah, I did resent them. I was angry.

I was frustrated because I had so little power anyway, being part of the system. You know, you have so little to say over what happens to your life, and it's constantly out of your hands. So that was just such an insult to have someone decide for me that this was a demonic influence in my life and to take it from me.

Clothes, shirts, just different things. They chose to burn that. And I felt it was horrible.

You know, even as a kid, and I believe when that happened, I was 14. And that was just awful, especially since it wasn't that long in the realm of when Kurt Cobain had died. So it was sort of even worse because, you know, I dealt with my own emotional things.

And so that just made things worse for me. So listening to this, my fear is parents will go around their home and things that children hold dear. It probably won't all be things that belong to the kids.

But my fear is that things that some of their children hold dear will be taken from them. And that's just yet another hurt that they'll have to endure. And then I've met some people, lovely people, on the other end of this trying to unpack religious trauma.

And this does. It does traumatize your children. Definitely.

[Tommy Lavin]
Very, very much does traumatize them. And again, when I hear evangelicals, fundamentalists, these radicals, they're extremists, they're radicals. You know, there's no ands, ifs, or buts about that.

If you, this is where I had the hard time with like drawing the line between religion and mental illness. Not that there's anything wrong with people that struggle with mental illness. No, because you should get, you should treat mental illness as an illness and it should be treated like any other illness.

You know, if you had cancer or something, you wouldn't go, you know, not treat it. And so when I read this, if you listen to the way that they talk, they actually believe like God is going to be talking to you, or, you know, and you're going to hear God and you're going to do things that God tells you to do. Now, if I took the word God or Jesus out of half of their statements and said, Bob is, you know, I have Bob who tells me what to do.

I wake up in the morning and I hear from Bob and Bob from the closet tells me what to do. And then I go do whatever Bob tells me to do. I'm going to be put in a, you know, in a asylum.

You know, I mean, I'm going to be- I don't think they call that. Okay.

[Lilin Lavin]
Yeah.

[Tommy Lavin]
You'll be probably hospitalized. Hospitalized.

[Lilin Lavin]
Yeah.

[Tommy Lavin]
Struggling for the word. There may still be asylums. I mean, I don't know.

But you're definitely going to have some sort of, you know, if I went to a psychiatrist and I said, Bob tells me to do this, they're going to be looking at me like- It would really depend.

[Lilin Lavin]
There's certainly people that do utilize God as a reason they're going to do something bad and say it that way. I've definitely heard that. But yeah, I like the Bob from the closet thing.

It's another joke because of another evangelical extremist that they had their kid would supposedly go into different areas of the house and be able to communicate with a deity who I believe they thought was maybe Jesus. I think that's what it was. And at one point they were running for a political office.

I'm not going to say who it is. You can definitely look it up. And I'm sure you'd find that if you said, you know, a kid praying in closet talks to Jesus about parents' political career or something.

But, you know, apparently this lady goes on to say that her kid goes into her closet and is talking to Jesus.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah. I remember.

[Lilin Lavin]
Yeah. And then is like, yeah, you're going to run for office and blah, blah, blah. So it was just wow.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah. I mean, so that's where literally when you look back at religion and you read the Bible and stuff like that, you kind of look at some of this stuff and say, I mean, the way I look at a lot of these stories is these were people that, you know, they didn't understand what schizophrenia and all of that stuff was back then, you know? So, hey, here's Bob and he's hearing all these things and they're telling him to do this.

Oh, my gosh, you must be talking to God, you know?

[Lilin Lavin]
And there's tons of different things that can cause that disassociative issues. There's tons of issues. But there's also, I think, people that, honestly, they are so desperate to feel special.

Yes. And I feel that sometimes in these extremist cults, which is what they definitely are, the ability to become special hinges on, you know, speaking in tongues or having a relationship with the Holy Spirit. I mean, folks think that Satanists have never been into a church.

And let me tell you what, I've been into quite a few different types of churches. Yep. And I've seen many different things, including people speaking in tongues and dancing up and down the aisle.

[Tommy Lavin]
The funny flag lady that would run up and down the aisle and dance in front of everybody.

[Lilin Lavin]
They were ribbons.

[Tommy Lavin]
That's right, the funny ribbon lady. And it's like, you just look and be like, okay, this is just, unfortunately, it's a very sad, desperate cry for attention.

[Lilin Lavin]
Yeah. And it's okay to want people to interact with you and to have a relationship with people. And there are definitely ways to learn how to do that constructively.

I just don't personally feel like those behaviors are. Yeah, I don't feel like they're healthy. But what happens with Halloween a lot of times, I think, is that you'll see it monopolized by these religious extremists to take away just people's regular joy, just fun that you can have adults down to kids.

And I really, I'm sorry if you're one of these adults. I don't care if the kid's 20 freaking years old. Yes, I'm saying a kid because if you're all just doing kid stuff, it's okay to be juvenile now and again.

If you're out just with your friends, just going to collect some candy, you're not hurting anybody. If you're not out there egging people's houses and all that stuff, which yeah, it's part of being a kid too. But if you're out there doing this stuff, screw it.

Just give the people some freaking candy.

[Tommy Lavin]
No shit. I give anybody that comes to my door, I don't give a crap if they're two or 22. If they're in a costume and they say, happy Halloween, I'm giving them fucking candy.

[Lilin Lavin]
Yeah. The other thing I'm going to say, I hate to have to put this out there, but parents, just be careful. There's a lot of folks with guns that are really weird.

So as you approach homes this year, please be very mindful that you're being aware, cautious, and just aware of your environment. Make sure the lights are on and people are wanting to interact because I don't trust a damn person anymore, especially if you live in one of the southern states.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah. I mean, so to Satan is Halloween's a very joyful, but again, it's all metaphoric. If we do a ritual, it's metaphorical.

We have fun with that ritual. There's psychological components.

[Lilin Lavin]
Yeah.

[Tommy Lavin]
Depending on if you're with a group or if you're just with your significant other, you can even do a little sex magic and have some fucking fun with it. Have fucking fun. Fucking fun with sex magic.

There you go. And if something ever comes of that, if something ever comes of that, we know that's just a coincidence.

[Lilin Lavin]
Well, not even necessarily that. One of the things I like to talk to people because they're like, well, you don't buy into any of that black magic crap. It's like, well, no, I don't buy into it as magic.

But one of the fun things about human beings is when you put intent and focus on things, you're much more aware whether or not you're aware that you're aware of it. So these subconscious cues that we will sometimes pick up on because we have an idea out there will sometimes lead towards fruitful ends. Right.

And so, yeah, that's, that takes away a little mystery of that. I mean, again, I'm not crapping on people that happen to feel or think differently. That's fine.

That's up to you. But for us, that is, we understand it is not a real estate thing. Magic does not exist like it does on Hocus Pocus or, you know, Charmed.

Although that would be freaking cool. I would like to shoot fireballs or something.

[Tommy Lavin]
You know, if magic like that existed, I got fucking ripped off the last 30 years. Seriously. I'm telling you, I want that contract back for my soul.

I am taking it back because you crawfished on that freaking contract, Satan. I'm taking it back now.

[Lilin Lavin]
I'm ready to go back to reality now. Okay, I'm back.

[Tommy Lavin]
Damn crawfish.

[Lilin Lavin]
It's wild to me. I'm seeing a lot more of this kind of stuff throughout, again, social media. If you want to see the extremes of the extremes, that's where you're going to find them.

But people like Greg Locke are not few and far between. Their fellowships are not small. I would not be surprised.

I mean, you'll see these pumpkin festival things other churches do, and there's nothing wrong with that. You know, they're still offering kids a constructive way to enjoy fun and costumes and do pictures and it's a family event and that's great. But when you turn into something like that, where Greg is burning things, causing harm to people, you know, even if it's not physically harming people, psychological harm lasts a whole hell of a lot longer than a bruise that you would get.

And there is psychological harm that goes along with being abused. Oh, very much so. But when you take things from people, where you assign blame, guilt, shame, when you, you know, tell them they're wrong, they're evil, and all these other subjective crap-ass terms that they're going to lob towards people that are just, you know, figuring life out like we do.

[Tommy Lavin]
Well, it's like one of the things that my parents did after they became extremists, you know, and the kids were young and all of a sudden they come home one day and it's like, you know, you could tell something's wrong. And it's like, what's wrong? And they're like, well, we're not going to see you after you die.

And I'm like, what the hell are you talking about? And so, yeah, at some point with their grandparents, and again, when I grew up, my parents were, you know, probably not necessarily atheists, but more agnostic. But, you know, we didn't go to church.

There was no discussion of God, or I didn't even know who the hell Jesus was until I was like 13. And a friend was trying to describe it to me. And I'm like, wait a minute, hold on, God is Jesus and Jesus is God and God sent his son himself down here as his son to kill him.

I mean, it made like no sense to me. So, that's how far removed from religion we were. And now all of a sudden, you know, as my parents got older and, you know, after some things happened in the real world, they went totally, you know, extreme Christian.

And so, we were still at that point trying to have our kids interact with them, but they came home and it's like, well, what happened? And it's like, well, Nana told us that because you don't believe in God and Jesus.

[Lilin Lavin]
I don't remember if it was them that specifically said it, but I know that they heard it.

[Tommy Lavin]
No, it was them, I remember, because I picked up the phone and was like, what in the fuck are you telling my kids? And that was like, you know, at that point, we had to start distancing ourselves and, you know, the kids from their grandparents, unfortunately, because of the abuse that would happen.

[Lilin Lavin]
And it was like, I was glad, you know, they were curious about it. They got to go and experience church. Unfortunately, I'm sure that that definitely helped them feel like, oh, I really don't like that.

I would have more of wanted them to just say, oh, it's not for me, or if it is for me, but for like different reasons.

[Tommy Lavin]
Well, our second oldest went to the church functions and I was like, why are you just out of curiosity? Why are you going? She's like, they give candy and food.

I was like, so you don't actually like, do you believe any of this? She's like, oh, hell no. But they give candy and food.

Okay, well, but, you know, we always took the stance of if our children wanted to explore religion, it didn't matter what religion it was, as long as it wasn't harming people, you know, we were okay with that. They've been to churches, they've been to Buddhist temples, they've been to, you know, mosque, they've been to Hindu temples, I mean, all sorts of things. And they've been able to experience that on their own, you know, with us there to answer questions or anything, depending on, you know, age.

[Lilin Lavin]
And how I know we didn't know about a lot of the things. So the cool thing is a lot of these places will have folks that'll kind of explain it, guide you through it and explain some of the history and the whatever, you know, associated things with it. And so, you know, we always have fun doing that.

I remember when we went to one of the Hindu temple was really cool, because they brought over a lot of the stone and things. I think they brought it all. Yeah, he said they brought over every single piece of marble.

And this whole made of marble. It's like insanely beautiful. But it was so funny, because I, you know, not that it's necessarily funny that you're stereotyping folks.

But it was funny to me, because like, super sweet, dude, really friendly, did not, I don't think have any ill will in the way that they keep doing. And they're like, you're Christian, right? We'd be like, No, no, definitely not Christian.

And you know, like a little bit later, you'd be looking at something else, you know, and ask Krishna. No, no, I remember we talked about that non Christian, just just here, you know, just exploring, you know, so it was it was nice, though, because they did such a detailed explanation of the different deities, because this particular temple, they had a few, um, we came at nap time, one of the nap times, it was like, all of them are taking a nap, they change their clothes, and they get nap breaks. And and then we got to bathe one of the deities, which was really cool.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah.

[Lilin Lavin]
So it was a wonderful experience. I definitely think you know, if you're out there curious, check some places out. But I think it was a Hindu temple in Stafford, Texas.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, something cool, cool, cool place. But again, as Satanists, we understand, these are all metaphorical, you know, that's how we feel.

[Lilin Lavin]
But for them, they're definitely not. And and the fun part for me as as a Satanist, and what I think we've both kind of done is just immerse yourself in it as if it is, you know, you're there and open minded, right? And, you know, don't bring your preconceived crap, don't push your assumptions or your thoughts, just go and experience that moment.

And it's been fun because I mean, I think I've had some of the most wonderful conversations and the coolest experiences just doing that.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, yeah. So but again, you know, kind of back to Halloween, we Yeah, so rumors that people are because, again, I kind of became a Satanist in the towards the end of the satanic panic. So, you know, I heard everything from the there's black cats missing in the neighborhood.

Oh, the Satanists must be taking them and killing them, they're gonna kill them. I know, I still well, it went away for a while, but now it's like back. And that's the scary part is because there was that break in between where it's like, okay, people became normal.

And they were like, Oh, wait, this is like some really, you know, out there bullshit that these people are selling, or trying to sell. And now, at least in the United States, anyways, and specifically, especially in the southern United States, in these conservative states, it's back again. And and it's, it's, it's back in a different way.

But it's there. And I've, I've heard the whole cats missing from the neighborhood. I mean, you saw it on Facebook, what a couple years ago, or something in our neighborhood, yeah, where it was like, there are some cats missing.

So be careful, because the Satanists are out there killing cats. Of course, we walk around almost every night with Hail Satan shirts on. So I'm sure people are looking at us being like, Oh, they're hunting for cats.

No, and it's like, Nope, not well, we don't do any of that.

[Lilin Lavin]
And it was interesting, because earlier, I think it was Lucian had put something out also on social media, another thing, a different thing. Other than the people's the other people article where yes, the exorcist believer is based on real life possessions to folks, folks, folks, possession, that whole thing that is there. I don't even know where to go with that.

But look, demonic entities possessing bodies is most likely others, health related issues that are definitely non demons. And we don't need to be abusing children or anybody else for that. But it's crazy to me that here we are, like you were just saying, dealing with with things like people telling you the exorcist is based on a true story.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, it's based on real life stories. And they have expert exclusive content, you know, so I, of course, I had to comment on the people article and put a Bert and Ernie gift, you know, where, where, you know, Ernie didn't realize Bert was possessed until Bert turned his head more than 100. And, you know, but that goes back to like Bert is evil.

If you think we're going way back with the internet now, which was a kind of funny for a while.

[Lilin Lavin]
But no, it was crazy, especially seeing it in people. I mean, not that I'm saying that they're always say like, they've definitely had some stuff on there that has been questionable. But this was just way, way, way, way out there.

As far as what are you doing here? Yeah, loading this crap.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, seeing it in people magazine. I was like, what?

[Lilin Lavin]
I appreciate the quotation marks around enhance the authenticity. So I mean, maybe they're, they're implying that they don't, you know, I don't know. And again, quotes around these are real phenomena.

So again, at least I'll give them journalistic integrity points on that.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, they've got quotes around stuff. So but it is sad how many people actually believe this crazy stuff out there, you know, and think like Satanists are running wild on Halloween, and they have like their prayer groups and stuff like that.

[Lilin Lavin]
And that if they pray hard enough that they can win the spiritual warfare battle of the night I feel really sad, honestly, because I can't imagine how terrifying it is to have to go through life, really believe in that crap is happening.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah. I mean, I don't know, you know, this is where you have a lot of empathy. And I don't, you know, it's like, you feel bad.

And I'm like, No, you're choosing to believe this stuff.

[Lilin Lavin]
Not if you're one of these kids that go to this kind of crap.

[Tommy Lavin]
And that's what the kids.

[Lilin Lavin]
But yeah, but they grew up in adults, you know, and you've been like indoctrinated into that your whole ass life. So I mean, really, is it really a choice? Not not for everybody.

I don't know.

[Tommy Lavin]
I mean, at some point in your life, everybody should at least look at who they are, what they believe, and then question it.

[Lilin Lavin]
I do. I agree that that would be a great thing in the ideal world. But you have to understand how insulated so many religious communities are.

There are some individuals within these communities. That's their only experience. They don't go to school, they don't have normal friends, everything is church based.

So going outside of that is scary, because they've made it scary. No, I agree.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, I understand that part. And, and it is, I mean, for those individuals, I do have, you know, some empathy for the people like my parents, that were not and they chose to kind of go into that. And they chose with their eyes wide open, because I remember, you know, as they started to go tiptoe into Christianity, I remember I had that discussion with my father that night.

And I was like, this is because my father had always sort of believed if you he believed in heaven, you know, but he believed if you were a good person, you went to heaven. And I was like, No, no, no, no, no, you don't understand if you start going down this route that, you know, if you don't believe in Jesus as your Lord and Savior, you go to hell. You know, it doesn't matter how good you were or how bad you were.

And you could be really bad. And you could, though, and he was like, Oh, no way, no, no. And I'll never believe anything like that.

I'm like, No, come talk to me in about, you know, five to 10 years. And let's see. And unfortunately, I was right, you know, five or 10 years later, and they, you know, so they went in with their eyes wide open.

And I have no empathy at that point for people.

[Lilin Lavin]
Yeah, it gets really difficult for me. Because when you look at what happened during the satanic panic, and why these kind of behaviors bother me, people like the McMartins, who were upstanding, normal human, I've never seen anything to the contrary. I'm not saying that there weren't things.

I don't know that. But from everything I've been able to learn about the McMartins, and what their experience was, they were everyday average people leading the best lives they could being genuinely decent human beings, and not doing any of the things that were claimed about them. Right.

And these individuals, as far as I understand, were religious. I think they were. And when I say religious, I mean, I believe that they were some some manner of, I believe, Christian, I could be wrong.

But as far as I understood, I believe some of them were in fact, and it was a family. It's not just like one person. They had a daycare.

And there was a whole mess of crap that went along with it. These people's lives were ruined. Yeah, they were in jail.

[Tommy Lavin]
I mean, some of them are in jail for years.

[Lilin Lavin]
Yeah, yeah. I mean, I believe the mom who was older already was in jail for a very long time. And you got to think their crime was running a daycare.

Yeah.

[Tommy Lavin]
That's literally all they did.

[Lilin Lavin]
Somebody made an accusation that there was child abuse, and then it became satanic based child abuse. And it just went like straight off the rails from there. And it involved no small amount of incredibly unethical, supposed psychiatric crap that has been well since debunked.

If you're curious about things like that, you could check out Gray Faction, or any number of other really cool things that talk about like counter psychological crap that is out there and on scientific pseudoscientific psychology. But the reason why this stuff scares me is because now you have communities like COS, like TST, and all the other type of satanism in between. We are actually satanist, you know?

Yeah. And so when you have people out there that are able to ruin other individuals lives, and McMartin's are one of thousands of such cases. It makes me worried when you have people that are actual satanists.

You know, how does that work? What does that look like? And these Halloween attacks and these made up Halloween issues, or when you have people that are out there telling you that, you know, if you share the wrong family movie, and it has the wrong message, it's going to come to the TV.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, demons are going to come through the TV and possess you or some shit.

[Lilin Lavin]
That's when things get really wacky to me.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah. I mean, but see, remember, when we had our first daughter, we were very, very active satanists at the time. And I remember we had that discussion, because again, this was still at the tail end of the satanic panic.

And we actually became, we sort of backed away from satanism at the time. Now, again, there wasn't a there wasn't a group like TST that was out there really active, fighting legal battles, being in the news, you know, you you saw, the most you saw was some stuff every once in a while from Church of Satan or every once in a while, Michael Aquino from TOS would go on Oprah or Geraldo. And, you know, because he was a lieutenant colonel in the military, it gave a little bit more credit to, you know, when he would say, No, we don't counterclaim.

Yeah, yeah, we won't do this stuff. But so because of the environment now, and again, like, I see it less scary now, because there is a TST out there, there are thousands of people proclaiming Yes, publicly, I'm a satanist. And, and, you know, there's a whole, you know, right.

[Lilin Lavin]
And it's a valid religion. And we have valid beliefs. And we're recognized publicly that way.

I agree.

[Tommy Lavin]
So it would be harder for them to do what they did in the 80s and 90s doesn't mean they can't do it. So it is still scary as I start to watch the country's sort of slip further and further that direction, some of the more outspoken leadership in the country.

[Lilin Lavin]
Anyway, I still firmly don't believe the majority of people align with these things. No, I really don't. But there are some incredibly outspoken, relatively unstable people that are that are doing things that really make me concerned.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, well, but if you look at it, the majority of people don't want abortion to be illegal, but it is because they got the right people in the right spot.

[Lilin Lavin]
Yeah.

[Tommy Lavin]
So yeah, things bad things can still happen, even if the majority of people don't agree with it or believe it, especially with the way the United States politics works.

[Lilin Lavin]
So, so yeah, now that we got the crazy cracker, like whole broke that apart into little crumbs. Can we go back to sex magic and if things come, you know, if things come from that? You're amusing yourself with your jokes way too much here.

But what does it look like to be celebrating Halloween as a Satanist? So I don't know, what are your experiences?

[Tommy Lavin]
Oh, I mean, you know, like I said, we've, of course, every year we sort of decorate, you know, turn on the lights, hand out candy. So that's big. I love giving the candy and, you know, I dress up and, you know, and so I'm out there sometimes pretending to, you know, not be real.

And then all of a sudden, when the kids walk up, I move and, you know, but, you know, it's just having fun. That's, that's what Halloween's about. And we've there's been some years where you and I have done some ritual and then there's been years where we've done some group ritual too, you know, and that was cool.

That was fun, you know, or, but most of the time it's just, it is, it's just celebrating. It's fun. It's interactive.

[Lilin Lavin]
It's, you know, I mean, I enjoy it. I think one of the fun things we're going to be doing this year that I'm excited about is we work as a local pagan community, Polk County Pagan, and they're doing, they do it about every three months, their festival slash market, and they will be doing this Halloween, Halloween type market and they'll have costume contest and we will be out there turning on baptisms. And that's fun for me because there's a ritual aspect, we get to be out there.

And, you know, here you have the, the other side of it where they're condemning everyone and decrying people, which is, which hello, how are we still doing this, this fucking years into the, yeah, anyway, so we still have that stuff going on. But here we will be a group of different believing people gathered together to enjoy one another's company.

[Tommy Lavin]
And just, yeah, I mean, you're gonna have satanists, you're gonna have pagans, you're gonna have all sorts of people out there just having a good time. Except for the dude with the, except for the, yeah, the, the, again, the crazy, and I guess in his own way, he's having a good time. He's having a good time to talking, screaming about bestiality and all of that sort of shit.

But, you know, I don't know. Yeah, I'm sure this one will be even worse than the other ones, because you've got the added bonus of Halloween. So I'm sure that those wagadoodles will be out there in force.

[Lilin Lavin]
And maybe, I mean, last time, I'm not gonna remember the name of the group that was there, they had brought over some veterans that were, they helped out with doing security. Yeah, there's a group of veterans that showed up to be support. They were supportive allies within the community, many communities, but they were out with the pagan community that time.

And they were amazing. They had some speakers that they use to play Disney music. And they just, they had fun, and they were really fun to talk to.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, and they played the Disney music, because copyright law. Yeah, because these, these, you know, these, these sort of extreme radicals, you know, they'll be out there all day long on their bullhorn for like, you know, 12 hours or whatnot, screaming and yelling, and then they record all this stuff. And then they put it online, and they try and use it for indoctrination purposes.

But when you have the Disney music, or something like that in the background, they can't use it, because YouTube flags it and says, no, there's music and it is called veterans for equality. Awesome. Yeah, I went and kind of looked those folks were taking a picture of their business card.

[Lilin Lavin]
Yeah, they were awesome, cool people, just super friendly, fun, and just really nice. But it was it was good. It helped that it was like a million degrees.

So you know, there was that last time it was hot enough for folks that maybe can't comprehend Texas summers, that I had some candles, I bring them with me to certain just different things as part of a display. And I had the candles out, and they melted. Like they were all liquid wax.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, they're in a glass container, you know, so they're in these big glass containers. They weren't lit, but it was Yeah, it was hot enough that by the time we pack shit up, and the Polk County pagan folks, which like, I love these people so much, you have no idea.

[Lilin Lavin]
But a lot of them were having a blast with the fact like the Satanist one home because it's hot. It was too hot for the Satanist. Oh my god, what are they gonna do in hell?

We are going to bring ice now. Thankfully, since we don't believe in it, we're not worried about that. But you know, we do follow scientific understanding and heatstroke is scientifically a bad thing for your body.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yes, yes, as as yeah, because it was it was way above 100. Yeah, I think it was like 107 or 105, something like that. So it was brutal last time this time, hopefully fingers crossed, because in Texas, I mean, we've had our fucking air conditioner come on in the middle of the night in December before.

So it's been relatively it's starting off October has been kind so far. Beautiful right now. But yeah, I mean, so hopefully fingers crossed.

I don't think it'll be over 100 even if it warms up. But hopefully it'll be nice and cool. Kind of like it is today in the 70s.

Because that way, if you're in a costume, you're not burning up, right?

[Lilin Lavin]
Yeah, well, there's lots of fun costumes. So you don't have to burn up. But you know, if you want to look into these guys, the Polk County Pagan Festival, they're really fun.

They do a lot of different things. And it's a great community. So if you're in Texas, and happen to be out in the Livingston, Texas area, cool place, check it out.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah.

[Lilin Lavin]
But yeah, that's part of the ritual stuff. I love on baptisms for me are amazing.

[Tommy Lavin]
The baptisms are fun. They really are fun, because you can actually see a difference.

[Lilin Lavin]
Yeah, how it affects people. And so I love those and being able to do it in October, in costume out in public. It's amazing.

It's a lot of fun for me.

[Tommy Lavin]
So yes, yeah, really quickly, in case people don't know what an unbaptism is, you know, that's a good that's a good point.

[Lilin Lavin]
So an unbaptism is not a reverse baptism in that you might be thinking like, well, a baptism is an unbaptism is an opportunity for people who have been baptized, either as children or later as adults didn't really want to do it, felt forced into it, or would like to renounce it, or individuals who feel otherwise, you know, impressed upon that they must act or live or be a certain kind of person and the society is demanding them to do that.

This is a way for, you know, individuals to denounce that and to stand up for themselves and to reclaim who they want to be. And it's a psychological way to remove barriers that we naturally put in place when we feel that we have been told, yeah, traumatized and told who we are and how we have to be. And so the beauty of it is the ritual is very straightforward.

Everyone has an opportunity multiple times to leave the ritual. We always tell people when we start, if you feel uncomfortable, or just don't want to participate, you can leave at any time. And then we just symbolically, yes, consent's important.

We symbolically, you know, let them, we put little velvet ribbons that go on their wrist very loosely. And at one point, we say, you know, you can free yourself from what has been imposed upon you. And then we put a little upside down cross smudge for, you know, fun.

And then you get to watch folks just, they just open up. And sometimes it's very emotional. And, you know, there's hugging and laughing.

And it's just a lot of fun. And I really love doing it. It is not meant to revoke the power of God.

It's meant to recognize that God is a fictional deity. And it has no power over you. You have all the power over you.

And this is how you reclaim it.

[Tommy Lavin]
And most people, at least in the United States, I can't speak for other countries, but most people in the United States were baptized in some way, shape or form, whether it's through Catholicism or Christianity, as a child, they had no choice. This was something that was just forced upon them. And so the like you said, this is more of a psychological, I guess that's how ritual is.

It's psychological. We don't believe actual demons or angels or spirits or deities or any of that sort of come around. A ritual is a psychological experience.

And in this one, you can like at the time see the release from some people that have been carrying around a lot of religious trauma with them.

[Lilin Lavin]
Yeah. And it is hard, especially since with that imposed belief, there's so many things that are taken from people, including their family. A lot of people when they can't live up to this unrealistic expectation so many religions place on you, people will withdraw love, support.

You lose community, family, you lose so many things. They'll disown them. And so you're walking around feeling lost.

You're walking around feeling rejected. You're beautiful. It's a really beautiful ceremony that we can do as far as of the many things that we do that provides people an opportunity to take the power back.

And even through the ritual, I believe that it's that, you know, the power that you bestow on me, not any God or deity or even Satan, again, metaphorical literary character. I don't believe in a literal Satan. But you know, it's fun.

And yeah, people don't have to be Satanist to be unbaptized. No, ever.

[Tommy Lavin]
You know, again, this is one of those things that like, you're not selling your soul over to the devil or any shit like that. You know, it's a literal just psychological ritual. It is, you know, to remove that religious trauma that people have had.

[Lilin Lavin]
Yeah. So it's, you know, something we just offer. There's no strings attached.

You don't have to give us anything. It's just a lot of fun. And I get to talk to folks.

Some people prefer one on one. We have a few of our ministers that are there, congregation leaders. And so it's just a nice time to just sit, talk, get to know our community, provide a service to our community.

And it's a lot of fun. So that's part of what we do during our Halloween time. We also spend time with our family.

We watch really campy, sometimes incredibly crappy, I apologize again for the movie last night, horror movies throughout the month of October. And, you know, that's part of our ritual.

[Tommy Lavin]
That reminds me, I forgot to change my ringtone. Normally, like the 1st of October, I change my ringtone over to the Michael Myers Halloween theme. And I need to do that now, because I totally forgot about that until you were talking about the movies.

Yeah, we didn't watch Michael Myers last night. Not yet. Our kids will hit us up for Halloween.

I guarantee you sometime, they'll hit us up to watch that.

[Lilin Lavin]
Yeah, that's one of the rituals that we have as far as family rituals, traditions. Traditionally, we eat fast food, junk food, we hang out, we watch movies. All October weekends are kind of dedicated in part to doing that as a family.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, indulge.

[Lilin Lavin]
Yeah, indulgence. Indulgence comes in many forms and enjoying foods and things you love is definitely a type of indulgence. Again, with all indulgences, indulge responsibly.

But yeah, there's so many cool things. And just seeing people be able to, I feel like, shed some of the, I have to be an adult all the time. Just play, pretend and dress up and have fun.

It's one of the beauties of Halloween for me.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, I agree with that. I love it when I see adults dressed up walking with their kids that are dressed up, because it's part of the experience. And the adults are partaking in experience with their kids.

And as the adult, you're still able to kind of have fun too.

[Lilin Lavin]
Yeah. Our neighborhoods are a little wild where sometimes you'll go and people have hot dogs, and they'll be out with little bonfires. And people have alcohol lined up that they'll give to the adults.

You want a beer? Like, they have it off to the side. Obviously, it's very responsibly done.

But it's kind of wild when you live in a neighborhood like that. And I love seeing it because there is a sense of community that comes with holidays, like Halloween. So yes, people want to demonize it.

And no, we don't. We don't do those things. We're not out there sacrificing cats, babies, using blood.

We're not, none of that. You mean I got to get the baby blood out of the fridge?

[Tommy Lavin]
That cost me so much money. I mean, the baby blood is expensive now. Now that they stopped abortions in Texas, I mean, you actually have to go out of state for this shit.

Excellent on the abortion day.

[Lilin Lavin]
But no, no. But yeah, that's just, it's always been wild to me, the things that happen during the month of October, because you finally get a little bit of permission to just have fun. Then there is a serious portion of it, you know, because we do live in Houston.

So Dia de la Muerte is another thing that happens during the month of October, where people are dressing up for a different reason and celebrating ancestors that have long since passed. And just, there's a lot to that too. So Dia de la Muerte is a really cool holiday as well that happens in the month of October.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah. So, well, I think we're coming up on our time here. And so hopefully you've enjoyed this little walk down a bit of memory lane with us, but also, you know, some of our shenanigans around Halloween.

And, you know, I hope you have a very safe and responsible, but indulgent Halloween. And enjoy yourself.

[Lilin Lavin]
Yeah, and we'll probably talk to you quite a few times between now and then. But until next time, Hail Satan!