Mike Warnke was a man who built his life upon a lie that was finally exposed by the people at this site which has mirrors including this one. Mike Warnke was a pathological liar, a Christian fundamentalist who wanted to tell a more interesting "How I found Jesus" story than anyone else and decided to portray himself as a former Satan worshipper. I was interested in Mike Warnke because I had read his book The Satan-Seller in high school and I believed everything.

The book, Warnke's supposed autobiography concerns a college kid gradually being sucked into Satan worship. Pretty soon he is at the head of a cult, living in a luxury apartment with sex slaves and great drugs. As he gets more powerful in the third level of Satan worship which is the ritualistic level (apparently level 1 is a discussion group while level 2 is the sex orgy group. It's not until you are at level 3 that you get to summon demons and own a dagger +1 and cast that spell about the lightning bolts) he learns more about the occult and the organized church of Satan. Rape scenes, cocaine blues and demonic vengeance are bursting from the pages.

There's even a glimpse of level 4 or the Illuminati which is part of the Satanic conspiracy to unite the world in one world government. As he teases the reader with conspiracies and plots that he was not privileged to see., things turn ugly. Suddenly Satan betrays him and he's out on his ass. The last third of the book recount Warnke coming to Christ and then telling us not to read horoscopes or look twice at someone with Tarot cards. You can read the reviews on Amazon. I have one in there.

Too bad it's not true. His friends in college never once saw him drink a beer much less go to wild orgies. They knew of his story telling and that was all. His life didn't improve when he gave it to Jesus. He went through two nasty divorces and became a coke fiend on the Christian music tour. The linking article has much more details, but it's an ugly picture.

If my only criteria was the dignity of Christianity vs. Satan I'd feel betrayed. What mattered to me was that The Satan-Seller was an entertaining read. Instead of telling us that it was fiction, Warnke seduced the reader into his twisted world. In the grand tradition of The Amityville Horror and Go Ask Alice he disguised his fiction as biography and it worked. It scared me. As an impressionable teenager, I had heard of the ritual sacrifice and black arts that they talked about on television. Satanic rituals happened in suburban high schools like mine.

I didn't know any Satan worshippers but I knew they were there. I even knew several people who frequently did drugs and had lots of sex. I wasn't one of them and they never would invite me to their parties, but I knew that at least a couple of them must have been practicing Satan worship. There was even one kid who wore all black and listened to all the metal bands, not just Motley Crue but Slayer and Venom and King Diamond. I heard it secondhand that he was a Satan worshipper. Warnke spoke as if he was one of those Satan worshippers, and through him I could live vicariously in the grim world of anti-Christ.

Even better, his Christian life was as an utterly boring preachy self-righteous jerk. That appealed to me even more. The party going fools would pay for their arrogance. They might get laid but their fates were sealed. They would one day be on 20/20 trying to convince Stone Phillips that they drank urine in college. Keep me away from your parties you jerks. I have plenty of time to catch up on premarital adolescent sex.

So my first glimpse into Satan worship would be through the eyes of a dishonest Christian. No surprise at all. Anton Levay's neo-pagan semi-Freudian Ayn Rand wannabe religion might be good for a laugh, but Marilyn Manson didn't learn his schtick from Levay alone. There was some serious anti-Satan education in his Christian upbringing. Warnke's lies point us to a fascinating truth. Without Christianity there would be no Satan worship. Satan worship is an outgrowth of Christianity. I know Satan literally means adversary in Hebrew and but that would make every New Yorker into a Satanist.

The Satan-Seller gets dull when it becomes a mouthpiece for missionaries, because without Satan, Warnke is boring. The term Coincidentia Oppisitorum describes when you have two contradictory personalities and viewpoints in one mind. In Christianity's desire to be pure and good and stainless, it needs a Satan in order to deal with that rampaging id. If Warnke were telling the truth, then the scenes of blood drinking, coke snorting and sexual sacrifices wouldn't be so scary, but these are his fantasies. He wanted to drink blood, snort coke and rape coeds. When you are expected to be perfect, you force yourself into really bad places through sheer repression.

From his book, I didn't become born again, but I didn't know why. Now I know that I was like Warnke. Through his book, I was infinitely more attracted to Satan than Jesus. Sadly Warnke could never admit that he felt the same way and you can read the other article to see where that lead.

Mike Warnke, where ever you are, thank you for the book, and keep telling those stories. May you write more confessionals and show us the vivid fantasy world that only you can portray. You are both entertaining and informative. Life is a dream, and Warnke is one of my favorite dreamers.