The Electric Daisy Carnival and the Perceived Impossibility for Pagan Worship in an Atheistic Society

I'm always amazed when I see Christians cringe at the pagan rituals of both ancient and modern cultures. In tribal religions, festivals are set around sexual dancing, sex, drinking, drugs, and music that puts the mind into a state of movement in the exaltation of impulse. Scantily clad women dance around to entice other participants. All of it, clothing, atmosphere, music, etc. is meant to heighten the desires of the flesh, so that the worship of pagan gods isn't just a worship of external deities, but of the self.

American Christians cringe at it, not because they are not involved in it themselves, but because the manifestation of pagan worship in other cultures is largely set around an idol, which is strange to us already, but is also just unfamiliar. In other words, they often are not disturbed by what should disturbe them, i.e., the elements and activity I just mentioned, but rather at the strangeness of the expression that is not their personal cultural expression. In this way, their disgust with pagan worship is often just xenophobic rather than based in good theology.

The problem with this is that this sort of superficial analysis causes them to be thougthless about their own pagan forms of worship, and therefore, they are completely uncritical toward what festivals they attend and why they attend them.

 More civilized versions of the pagan festival seen in tribal religions in antiquity were the Roman festivals centered around the worship of Roman deities and the emperor. These festivals were filled with all of the same things: drinking, drugs, music, sexual dancing, sex, etc. They were just as pagan as the other, and yet, they were more acceptable to many Christians in their days simply because the Christians had grown up with them. It was just what the culture did. It was just what everyone did. Christians not only didn't cringe at them. They enjoyed them. Why? Because paganism, in short, is fun. It was the party of parties to attend. It was either that or be antisocial and miss out on the fun.

You may think that people went because they really loved their gods, but that is not why they went. In fact, the very fact that Christians, who did not worship these deities, loved going to them displays the fact that they were enjoyable. They were fun. Christians argued that it was fine to attend and enjoy the festivities as long as they didn't worship the false gods.

And yet, the apostles write so harshly condemning it. John argues in Revelation that those who partake in the festivals belong to the devil, even if they claim to be Christians, and are going to hell. Why such a stark contrast between what the apostles thought about it, and what the average Christian thought about it? Why would the apostles be so down on fun?

What I'm about to say may be a bit of a Debbie Downer to the mindless reader who simply doesn't ever think about it, nor does he want to. After all, I'm about to spoil the illusion that this type of "fun" is acceptable to God. It isn't.

The reasson why the apostles still condemned a more sanitized version of participating in the pagan festivals is because participating itself was the worship of another god, even when not paying respects to a particular deity. And this is important to understand. The ultimate goal of pagan worship is worshiping the devil by worshiping oneself and one's pleasures.

God will not be worshiped through paganism and the indulgence in the flesh. Hence, God cannot be worshiped by worshiping the self. Hence, God is not, and cannot, be worshiped by going to a pagan festival.

What does all of this have to do with us? We don't have pagan festivals, right? Do we have festivals, where the religion of our culture that is not Christianity is exalted in the revelry of sexual dancing, sex, drinking, drugs, and the music that sets the tone and lifts up the gods of our culture? Um, yes, we do. That's because the gods of our culture are ultimately the same as the gods of pagans. Paganism, as I have said many times before, is essentially the worship of self. Other gods are just brought in to be a means to do so. The real object of worship is the self and its pleasures. This is the devil's religion in our culture. It isn't Caesar worship in America. The beast is us. We've simply removed the middle man. 

John, in Revelation, argues that whoever takes upon himself the mark of the beast will perish in the lake of fire with the beast, and it is clear throughout the book, that John is talking about, not only some acknowledgement of the beast, but also includes the participation in the festivals that are characterized by the things stated above. In fact, he even states them independently so that the reader will understand that no element of pagan worship can be sanitized simply by worshiping Jesus as the central deity. Jesus is not worshiped through paganism/the worship of self, and hence, anyone who participates in these things is worshiping the devil.

That's quite a radical take on parties, big or small, I know. I'm sure most Christians don't think about pagan parties that way at all, but it is the logical conclusion of what is happening. John's point with pagan religion isn't that it is Satan-worship because everyone is literally calling out to Satan and bowing down to a goat's head on the wall. He's arguing that it is Satan-worship because it is worship of the beast, and worship of the beast is via the means of worship of the self. We just happen to live in an atheistic culture where the beast isn't something other than the self. Our pantheon is made up of every American. Our polytheism exists in humanity and not in the unseen realm. Our idolatry is self satisfaction and pleasure, not external things made of metal and wood.

So when I see something like the Electric Daisy Carnival, or something like it, that is made up of all of the elements mentioned: scantily clad women, sexual dancing, sex, drugs. drinking, and the music that provides the atmosphere, and even explicitly in the words, that exalt the self and its pleasures, and then I see Christians who partake in it without any thought of what they are doing, I am reminded again that we have not left the first century and the battles the apostles waged with the average church member who ignorantly thought all of this was OK.

I'm reminded by it when people go to pagan parties in high school, or they go different events that contain these elements. I have to ask, "Why?" For fun? Fun in pagan pleasures is the religion of the devil. We not only worship antichrist, we become antichrist. Is Christ being exalted here? Are you exalting Christ by participating in the very things for which He was crucified? In participating in the world against which He is at odds? 

It is the perceived neutrality of atheistic culture that lies to us and convinces us to think that these things can be sanitized if we are Christians. How is pagan worship sanitized? How is the exaltation of sexual provocation outside of marriage, either through a type of dancing or music or actual sex something that can be sanitized? God isn't worshiped through drugs. Don't confuse God being pleased with your being pleased by something.

This, of course, has ramifications for what music we listen to, what movies we watch, what conversations we partake in, and why. 

I am continually disheartened by the lack of ethical thinking in the modern Christian generation. They allow the things they ought to condemn and condemn the things they ought to allow. Our remedy for all of this is true worship. Exalting God through the worship via the Word, prayer, and communion of the saints. This is what our festivals should look like, and we hold them every week. Sometimes we have special occasions where we celebrate holidays that ought to look more like the latter worship mentioned than the former. I am not advocating, then, for the abstaining from fun, but from the abstaining from paganism as fun. Let us redeem every holiday because we redeem every day in the worship of God. Let us not only condemn obvious Satan religion in explicit "isms," but also in the warping of our own Christianity. In the days of the Kings, there was Baal worship that was obviously evil, but there was also the worship of God on the high places, a more sanitized version of pagan worship where YHWH was the deity in view. And yet, it was just as Satanic as the other, perhaps moreso, because of its stealthy nature to disguise itself as acceptable to God.

Somehow, believers are always led astray by the idea that if they remove the middle man, and even replace God as the deity in view, it sanitizes their pagan worship.

Some of the saddest words in the Deuteronomistic History are, "but he did not take down the high places." As Christians, let us not only smash the idols of others, but our own.