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a few questions & answers regarding my current satanic beliefs

   Yes. I'm a devil-worshipper.
   My current conception is that Satan (or Lucifer), is a deity worthy of admiration and honor, and one who has been unfairly maligned and, unsurprisingly, demonized. (As a side note, in my mind, the demonization of Lucifer is so obviously a reflection of the demonization of outgroups in human civilization).
  
   Though I don't go to a Satanic temple, I do have my own methods of praying to the "Center of All Opposition."
   While Satan is cast as the most repellent of all beings, I venerate what Satan personally symbolizes, which, to me, means freedom and dissent. I look up to Satan for protection from extremists, absolutists, and evangelists, for guidance away from norms and anti-human cultural traditions. Satan is less an "evil" being and moreso the force of creative destruction or "entropy," if you believe in that. Satanism is the place where everything (arbitrarily) unacceptable and undesirable finds a place of belonging and acceptance. Being as such, I do not worship "evilness" in the christian or "moral" sense.   I exalt freedom, tolerance, knowledge, and self-awareness.  

     No. I do not worship "evil."  Neither do I make animal sacrifices, nor do I support or tolerate physical violence or other types of abuse or harm. However, it is my opinion that the popular understanding of  "god" is, in fact, the greater evil. 
   Satan represents choice, and the knowledge necessary to even be able to make a choice. Satan symbolizes resistance to ignorance, obedience, conformity, blind submission, delusions of superiority, arrogance, and the like. Satan is contrary to the congratulatory self-deception of "goodness," and "righteousness," as Satanism equates to the awareness required to acknowledge one's harmful traits and behaviors, and the power and freedom to change.
   For example, if I'm an alcoholic, it's not to god I will pray to make me sober. It is my own self-awareness of the harm I am generating, and the decision to either maintain that harm, or to make a different choice. If I were to relapse, it is not because "the devil" tempted me, but because I chose to do so. And both of those decisions are my responsibility, alone. This logic applies across the board of human behavior.
   It is evil, in fact, to shirk one's personal responsiblity and blame "god," or the "devil." It's eviller still, to use religion and superstition to kill, maim, and torture, as so often has been the case over the course of human history.
   If there is something "evil," it is the hubris and conciet of most religions, and their denial and suppression of the uglier aspects of life. Rather than accept and come to terms with the grotesque, they chose to deny and repress, which, much like "god" when he exiled Satan, only allows those pathological seeds to take root in the underworld—out of sight. I challenge these unsavory inclinations, and am unafraid to confront them and deal with them directly.
   In a similar vein, "god" promotes ignorance. Rather than question things, "god" encourages the whole writing off of other people and other modes of existence by labelling them as "evil." This has serious consequences for human lives, and for our understanding of our place in this world. If we weren't conditioned to see material form as "evil," perhaps we would have been kinder and more equitable towards this earth.

   Whether it be animals, pre-colonial tribes, "witches", or competing religious faiths: the inclination of the "godly" to demonize what's novel and different is, ultimately, a greater evil than siding with the opposition to that disunifying and tyrannical force.

   I identify as a Satanist because I believe in and admire rebellion, skepticism, (non-violent) adversarial conflict, disobedience, enlightenment, personal autonomy, freedom and the necessity and beauty of rejection.
  I value many of the concepts considered undesirable by most mainstream religions. I do not admire subservience. I do not encourage guilt and shame. I do not find value in suffering or punishment. I do not admire blind faith. I do not even find plausible the concept of "unworthiness."
  On the contrary,  I venerate human freedom, knowledge, autonomy, sexuality, indulgence, individuality, and carnality. I love the material world and find no issue with the endless opportunity and experience that corporeal form allows. I adore the capacity of humans to engineer, tinker, and invent.  I admire and respect nature, with all its ugliness and brutality.
   While I, personally, exercise the power of rejection to refuse (to the best of my abilities) perpetuating violence, hatred, division, and harm, I applaud Satan for refusing to shy away from and deny the existence of that abyss of depravity.

    Satan gives us the opportunity to enlighten ourselves to our monstrousness, so that we may be better able to become truly autonomous.

   No. I mean, sometimes?
   On the one hand, oftentimes, everything seems so fake that I can barely swallow the idea of an actual "hell" existing. I find so little value in the concept of punishment and "detention" that I cannot, in good conscience, subscribe to the idea that something like that could exist. Imprisonment for the safety of a population, in some circumstances, maybe I can agree with, but torture simply doesn't work, mystically, or terrestrially. You might utterly destroy a person, but it isn't going to rehabilitate, let alone, "save" them.  That one ought to be tortured until they're (arbitrarily) "purified" is also a repugnant postulation.  
   On the other hand, I don't care if I go to hell. If I am sent to hell for my "sins" in life, then I will take it, and endure it, much like I endure unpleasurable things in this life.
   Primarily, however, I find that heaven and hell distract from our world, and give magical logic to support much of the injustice, degradation, and predation that has, and continues to pervade human civilization, up until this very day. I do not support ideas that help perpetuate harming the living.

   Sort of. I abhor much of the state of human society and humanity, and I accuse the concept of "god" as being a principal culprit in the tragedy.
   For a bit of theology: when the devil, staunch in his belief that humans were inferior and unworthy, disobeyed god by refusing to bow down to the new Adam, he showed that his influence over god was far greater than what we might credit him with. It makes me wonder who, in this fairytale world, is truly "in control."
   Regardless of whether Satan is the "true god", from thereafter, the devil made it his mission to prove to god that his creations were defective and unworthy.
   While religion takes this example as proof that the devil is evil, I find it to be the opposite. The devil gave us a chance to prove our goodness, our god-likeness—our unyielding respect for one another, our ability to create, build, and heal. Instead, we, by blinding ourselves with ignorance, blind faith, false virtue, and arrogance—all of which the alleged creator imbued within us—chose to replicate some of the most tyrannical, hierarchical, violent, oppressive, exploitative, and disgusting behaviors and systems imaginable.
   Instead of taking the opportunity to prove our loveliness, we took advantage of the chance to become even worse.
   Religion aside, I find it reprehensible that a god could exist when such things as child abuse, neglect, human trafficking, slavey, colonization, genocide, etc. exist. If anything, it is the instrumentation of the concept of “god,” that is behind many of these abominations against life and against human autonomy. And, if indeed, this is the face and wrath of "god," then I am more than pleased to side with "his" adversary.
   Finally, the utter loathing I have for the type of magical thinking that religion preserves is sometimes unbearable. Personally, I have no use for it and I find it a grave obstacle to civilizational harmony and human flourishing. It is simply in the way of creating a better life on earth for all. Good, evil, heaven, hell... all these polarities and extremes. It is a breeding ground for hatred and conflict, and is, itself, a source of profound evil. External controllers like demons and gods pave the way to psychic serfdom, powerlessness, a shirking of accountability, a denial of self-agency and autonomy. It is not a worldview I want to entertain.

   I respect people’s individual choice to practice their beliefs, just as I would like them to respect mine (in the image of Satan himself, my transgressive worldview often tests other’s values regarding their capacity for kindness, compassion, mercy etc.).
   Despite my tolerance, I do not condone proselytizing or praying to one’s god for another without their expressed consent. I believe in secularism, and in keeping religion private, in favor of a more discrete, accessible, and homogenous public, where diversity can coalesce into a larger harmony. I am unsupportive of invasive questions, such as, “do you accept Jesus?” I freely choose to share my beliefs online, but we are not entitled to know the beliefs of others.
   Often, I feel a bit of pity for people who are in the depths of religion, particularly Christianity, as it is the religious sect with which I'm most familiar (obviously, lol).
   Similar to how they might view me for my satanic beliefs, it hurts to see someone entirely submit themselves to repression and enforce a psychological structure built on control, shame, guilt, and oppression.
   However, as long as someone is happy, and doesn’t try to convert me, push their agenda of pseudoscience, or generate real life harm, I love everyone, and I love whichever beliefs make them happy and give them meaning and purpose. ♥