I can’t remember what, if anything, my parents told me about Satan.
If this is a serious question, you may be interested to the answers to a related question in Skald’s old thread:
Persons raised Christian: what were you taught about Satan’s motives, origins, & destiny?
After my parents had me baptized Catholic, they left the church and religion behind. I grew up where religion was never really mentioned at all. I remember getting Chick Tracts from a neighbor on Halloween and my mom saying that they were just bad comic books, so that’s the closest I came to “Satan”. Oh, that and someone spray painting “SATIN RULES” on the road a block away from me.
I’m glad I wasn’t indoctrinated into believing any religion. At the same time, I wish I had some religious education to understand it as an outsider. I’ve still got a lot to learn. My partner is Catholic and I think he gets a little exhausted having to explain what X is for all the time. (At the same time, we don’t need to visit every single church in every country we visit either.)
I was raised being taught the Devil was real and all sorts of superstition. My mother would freak if shoes were left upside down and if one of us whistled at night indoors. I was told if I didn’t cover my mouth when I yawned, a demon might try to go down my throat and steal my soul. It certainly didn’t enrich my childhood.
My parents taught me about Satan as a child, and I feel that it enriched my childhood. Of course, when I got older I found out that it wasn’t really Satan who came into the house to give me gifts, and that my mom and dad were actually Satan. Still, I cherish those memories.
They weren’t Satan – they were just Satan’s helpers.
I was raised Methodist too and while they mentioned Satan in stories I don’t ever recall any real theocracy being taught about him. We went to church every week but looking back I think it’s because my parents (who are VERY conservative) more believed that that was what you were supposed to do as good citizens rather than the spiritual aspect of it. To that end I think it enriched my childhood - it certainly gave us a good social network of friends and we were expected to take part in civic duties to serve the community at large.
Raised Catholic. I’m sure the topic came up in CCD but I don’t remember any specific instance of it. Never directly discussed it at home that I can recall. Although my sister had an illustrated Bible with an oddly compelling picture of Satan trying to tempt Jesus during his forty day fast.
By in large though my religious upbringing was more “Be good to please God” than “be good to avoid Satan”.
Can’t speak for if it was enriching or not since it played a very insignificant role but I can’t claim to have been deprived of the experience either.
Nah. I would drape myself in velvet if it were socially acceptable.
My father hosted group exorcisms at our house. So, yeah. My childhood was perhaps richer, but not in a good way.
FTFM
My parents are good little Pentacostalists, but I don’t recall a whole lot of Satan talk growing up.
Of course, we attended a church where the Devil was talked about almost as much as Jesus was.
I don’t think I was ever a strong believer in Satan (or God/Jesus either, for that matter). But I accepted “him” well-enough. Enough to nod my head whenever someone would say something like “The Devil is a liar”. “The Exorcist” also freaked the hell out of me. So there must have been some part of me that believed.
But I grew up and put away those childish fears.
Not only was I taught Satan was real, he apparently visited me frequently and made me do all kinds of terrible things. I would say 90% of all church services were about Satan and how bad Hell was and how easy it was to fall victim to him.
Southern Baptist
Funny, I am Episcopalian now too so I think my kids will report the same thing when they get older. There isn’t any significant Satan or fire and brimstone talk in the Episcopal church either.
I think many of the Dopers who never regularly attended church don’t really understand that denominations differ greatly on many matters and this is a good example. Methodists, Episcopalians, Quakers, Unitarians and many other denominations don’t talk about Satan much at all or even have a strong stance on what it represents (Satan and Hell only barely appear at all in the Bible after all). You have to head to your local Southern Baptist or fundamentalist church like the Church of Christ or Pentecostal churches to get a stern talking too about hellfire and eternal damnation.
You mean besides the people who actually believe in that stuff?
My dad certainly believed in Satan, and was always ranting about his influence in the world and on people. But it was Mom who raised us, and while I’m pretty sure she takes his existence for granted, she also never seemed to think Satan was all that important. I don’t think Satan’s existence or lack thereof had much influence on my childhood one way or the other.
Nope. My mother was marginally Presbyterian, but didn’t make a habit of it. I never went to church growing up, other than a brief stint in Sunday school. My stepfather’s religion was Canadian Club with a splash of water, which is, in my opinion, the worse evil.
Yes, my parents were Biblical literalists… It wasn’t too much of a big deal for me either way, I never found the talk of God, Satan, Heaven and Hell very convincing. I read a lot, and I was agnostic by 11 or 12 and an atheist by 16.
This.
Grandaddy was the preacher.
I definitely diminished not just my childhood, but a good portion of my adult life.
Yes,and they still do. My brother became a far right wing pastor (graduate of Bob Jones for those that know it) and is continuing the fine tradition. I strongly feel that it diminished my childhood. My life would have been a lot better without the religious delusions that were put on me.
Nope. Dad of atheistic leanings, and Mom liberal Lutheran. I went to Sunday School and Confirmation school, but don’t remember hearing any talk about Satan at all. I mostly remember the stuff about compassion and mercy, and the faith vs good works debates. Compassion, mercy, good works were sufficiently enriching.
I did wonder what the unforgiveable sin was, and worried about it for a few days, but then my good sense let that worry fall away. Laughed hard the first time I saw Carl Dreyer’s Ordet (The Word), featuring the theology student who went mad pondering that same question. Or was it from reading too much Kierkegaard? I don’t recall…but I saw the movie the year after the Kierkegaard seminar, so it still would have been funny to me. Wait, it was one of the L.M. Montgomery novels that had a character who went crazy worrying about the unforgiveable sin.