Would you look at that! I forgot to post my Antichristmas sermon for 2023. Better late than never, I suppose.

It was a time of turmoil and upheaval. A great empire was terrorizing the world. The people living between the river Jordan and the Mediterranean sea were being oppressed by imperialism. It seemed like the end of the world. In short, it was a time something like our own.

In this dark time, a mysterious man, exiled to the Grecian isle of Patmos, wrote a puzzling and disturbing mystical text. This man, who wrote under the name John, was an early Christian. He had been banished by the Roman authorities, as much for his politics as for his religion. You see, the Romans didn’t really care what gods you worshiped, as long as you also paid lip-service to worshiping Caesar as divine. Only two kinds of people in their empire tended to refuse to do that– Jews, and, more recently, those pesky new Christians. 

So exiled John brooded and ranted and raved and wrote what would eventually become the last and arguably most bonkers book in the Bible: Revelations. 

Revelations is hard to understand at first. This might partially be on purpose. John had gotten into trouble for his anti-Roman message before, so he veiled it in allegory. In Revelations we encounter many-headed beasts, multiple trumpet-blowing angels, demonic hordes of locusts, four mysterious horsemen, a harlot drunk on the blood of saints, and a lamb with seven eyes that is supposed to be Jesus. The imagery is violent and psychedelic. Anyone reading it would be forgiven for wondering what John was on. 

To make matters worse, this book has been reinterpreted many times over. It’s a favorite with the worst kinds of Christians, who love to conclude that whoever they hate at the moment is The Antichrist and have called everything from Real ID to the COVID vaccine “the mark of the beast.” All the baggage that the book has picked up over the centuries has made it even harder to understand, and today I plan to compound that problem by introducing yet another interpretation. 

Before I do that, though, let’s at least try to understand what John meant. 

The key to understanding Revelations is that it’s anti-Imperial, anti-Roman polemic. Think of it as an obscene political cartoon. The political powers and personalities of the day were represented as grotesque mythological creatures in order to critique them. The anti-Roman meaning was sometimes literally in code. For example:

Rev 13:18 Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six.

Here John is using numerology as a code to hide his meaning. Six hundred and sixty six is the numerical equivalent of “Emperor Nero.” 

In another passage, John describes a monstrous dragon pursuing a woman who has given birth to a holy child. While the dragon is described as “Satan,” what John is really talking about here is the Roman empire’s persecution of the Christian church, represented by the woman. A clue to the dragon’s Roman identity is given by the number of his heads, horns and crowns, as will be explained shortly. 

But it’s not until the passage about The Whore of Babylon that John decides to make his meaning clear. He explains that the seven heads of the beast represent seven hills, and that the whore is a great city who sits upon those hills. He can only be talking about Rome, which dominated the world and whose seven hills were well known. 

So you see, despite numerous latter-day Evangelical efforts to decode the meaning of Revelations and show how it is “coming true,” Revelations was not a prophecy of the future at all, and its meaning was perfectly clear at the time to anyone who could read. It’s quite silly for conservative Christians to decide that Obama is the Antichrist or Kim Kardashian is the Whore of Babylon. 

(You know what’s annoying? Those were just my first guesses for who Christians have been calling the Antichrist and the Whore of Babylon most widely and most recently, but when I googled to get an update on their current picks, Barack Obama and Kim Kardashian were still their top choices. You’d think they would’ve moved on to Joe Biden and Cardi B or something.)

At the same time, though, texts exist in history, and are subject to interpretation. While Revelations was originally an anti-imperial polemic, we cannot ignore everything that has happened since it was written– most notably, Christianity being adopted by the Roman Empire itself. 

Some Christians see Constantine’s conversion, and the subsequent Christianization of Rome, as the triumph of Christ over empire. I see it as the triumph of empire over Christ. Christianity as we know it today, only really began when it became the religion of imperialism. Ever since then, Christ’s revolutionary potential has been lost. He has been turned into the most loyal servant, and the most eloquent apologist, of the powers that be. In some ways, this is a fitting destiny for the son of an authoritarian God, for the so-called “King of Kings.” 

Two millenia later, the roles of Revelations have been reversed. Christ no longer stands for liberation. In the times we live in now, it is perfectly natural to flip the script and perform a counter-reading of Revelations wherein the great red dragon, the great beast 666, and Babylon Mother of Abominations no longer represent oppression, but instead its end. 

So in the spirit of the season, let us ask ourselves: who is the Antichrist? 

The Christian trinity consists of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost– three persons, one substance, one God. This trinity is immediately and obviously incomplete as it excludes the feminine. One would think that a trio including a father and a son must obviously contain a mother, but in this case of Christian theology, one could be wrong. In fact the Holy Spirit is most explicitly not the mother, but merely the aspect of God by which Mary conceived– the angel Gabriel explains to the virgin in Luke 1:35 that “the holy ghost shall come upon thee” and thus she would bear a child without “knowing” a man. The Holy Ghost is thus closer to God’s semen than to a mother. 

Satanism does not have “a” trinity, rather, it has trinities. 

Lucifer, Eisheth Zenunim, and Baphomet are one such trinity– representing the masculine, the feminine, and the androgynous from which both come and to which both return. There is also Lilith, Na’amah, and Agrat– the mother, the mother, and the child. Within each individual there exists a trinity of physical, mental, and spiritual– or id, ego and superego, if you prefer. 

But I want to speak of a third trinity, that which exists between a Satanist, Satan, and the Satanist’s Inner God– and the Inner God of a Satanist is what I call an Antichrist. 

To me the Antichrist is not a single individual. The Antichrist is a beast with many heads. Each of us who has taken up arms against the Tyrant God, and against the earthly injustices that represent Him, is an Antichrist. 

Christ means anointed, special, chosen. To be an Antichrist means to be unanointed. No God above has picked you out for divine kingship. Instead, you have chosen to respond to an inner call to be a revolutionary. Do not let yourself believe that just because you are an Antichrist, you are above anyone else. In fact, your calling is to make sure that nobody lords over anyone else, ever again. 

Your calling, above all, is to oppose the apocalypse. The forces of Jehovah desire the destruction of the earth. They wait with baited breath for the glorious rapture. Some of them even deliberately try to hasten its coming. The rest turn a blind eye to the world’s destruction, convinced that climate change is not the work of human beings. When they see the four horsemen of the apocalypse coming, bringing war, famine, plague and death, they only smile, because to them it means that God’s day is at hand. All of these are good signs to them, signs of a prophecy nearing fulfillment. 

For John’s Christ, however anti-Imperialist, brought only Revelation, not Revolution. God had promised to sweep it all away, to bring the mighty down with his divine judgment. There was no need at all for human action. Yet now we stand on the brink of extinction, and no omnipotent hand, either divine or infernal, can save us from ourselves. Only we can do that. 

The Antichrist represents the radical heresy that there is no savior except for those of us who answer the call. The weight of the world is heavy, and no single human can lift it. All of us together, though, can raise it up. The past several years have brought war, famine, plague and death in plenty. Let us see the signs.

My friends, for all my diabolism I’m not usually much of a hellfire preacher. Today, I make an exception. Today, I call you to action. Today, I beg you to rise up. The enemy is strong, but we can be stronger, if we awake! Our movements may seem broken and scattered, but it is written that when one of the Beast’s many heads seemed wounded unto death, it miraculously healed, and all the world wondered after the beast, saying: Who is like unto the beast? Who is able to make war with him? (Rev 13:3-4)

Let us be a beast with many heads. If one is struck down, others will rise. As individuals we are weak, but the might of the working class could be the might of the beast himself. 

Pray to the Devil to show you what you can do for the revolution. Ask him how you can help to save the world. Pray this every day, and keep your eyes open for opportunities to be of service to humanity. They will come to you, I promise. Open your mind, and the light of Lucifer will reveal the Antichrist path uniquely suited to you. Your specific talents, passions, virtues and aptitudes are needed somewhere. Seek and ye shall find. Furthermore, I firmly believe that if we all do this, it will become easy. 

Heed also these warnings: beware of false prophets and non-profits. Shun the democratic party, shun liberal capitalist establishment, for it too is Empire. 

The Antichrist once represented empire. Now Christ stands for empire. It is no accident that this happened. Christ became empire because it was possible for empire to co-opt him. Therefore the Antichrist must be impossible to co-opt. 

Christ could be taken by Empire because he represented passivity instead of ferocious resistance. Christ could be swallowed whole by the Imperial monster because he turned the other cheek. Be not like him. Be active. Be militant. Be willing to fight by any means necessary. Turn not the other cheek. When it comes to the oppressors, don’t just take an eye for an eye– take their heads as well. 

And never, ever, believe yourself to be the one and only and chosen. More importantly, never let anyone else believe you are that. Christ claimed to have all power, yet he was destroyed. After that, what could his followers do, believing they were only human? All they could do was follow their leader’s example and martyr themselves enthusiastically, which they proceeded to do with gusto. That’s what happens when a movement has only one head– if you cut it off, the body dies. Again, I tell you– be a beast with many heads. 

Christ lost because he represents martyrdom, which is merely the glorification of defeat. And as the case of Jesus proves, the romantic suffering of a martyr can be sanctified even by the tyrants who killed him. Why not? By willingly dying, he did them a favor. So Antichrist, reject noble sacrifice. Reject heroic death. Fight not to die, but to win at all costs. 

Above all, you must insist on life and liberty for not just yourself but for all beings, save for those who unrepentantly violate and oppress the rest of us. If you truly serve the ideal of free, long, and happy lives for all, if you keep your standards high and clearly in mind, then you will be incorruptible, dear Antichrist. Neither government nor capital can co-opt you. Fight for a world with a level playing field, a world without lords or masters. A world where all needs and even most desires can be met. Have nothing to do with kings, presidents, CEOs, dictators, prime ministers, venture capitalists, megalomaniacal party chairman or Gods on high. The law of non serviam is for all. Refuse to serve or be served and you will stay pure. 

Merry Antichristmas. If the Antichrist in you has yet to be born, let this be the day that you realize that you are here to do the Devil’s work. May Satan be with you, nema.