I had to look it up to find out what "Hat Man" was about.
The thing that most Christians don't like to hear is the very real fact that the Christian faith is a hybrid religion that was made by combining the beliefs of an offshoot of the Jewish faith and several of the, at that time, existing Pagan faiths.
Satan/Lucifer is based on the half-god Prometheus who brought and gave fire to man against the wishes of the top god. For this, he was punished severely. The pagans saw him as their benefactor but that story when run through a different point of view became an Evil fallen angel in Christianity.
I personally don't believe in a Devil or Hell. The evil in this world is inherent in the nature of mankind. If not taught better people will be self-centered and have almost no empathy. Good people are that way because they were taught to be better than their base nature and work hard to resist their less charitable urges.
People seem to have a need to have someone or someTHING to blame their failings on. The old "The Devil made me do it!" is just an excuse for people doing what they want without concern for others.
There are psychopaths that seem to be evil incarnate and that love to kill and cause pain. They are seen as evil but in some ways, they probably are not. They are just doing as their nature directs just as a crocodile will do. The Croc is not evil it is just an animal that considders people as food as he was made to do. To me, evil requires an understanding of good and the decission to NOT be good. the human preditor is just an animal that happens to be in human shape.
The person that has gained wealth on the backs of poor people that lived a life of poverty and misery while they lived in the lap of luxury are much more likely to be evil, even if they have not personally killed anyone, than a psycotic killer who is simply following their nature.
Evil has more to do with intent, nature and how a person is raised than actual actions. We might see a canibal as pure evil but to them they are most often honoring an abmired enemy or allowing a lost family member to live on in the bodies of those that loved and cared about them. To someone that had not ever encountered Christian ways, the canabalistic rite of comunion would be seen as pretty disturbing.
The early Christians had a HARD time. It is not possible for someone to do anything that is less Kosher than the Christian Comunion. Even most of the pagans looked at it with a less than happy feeling. I have met people that were raised in totaly Islamic places that were told when they were kids that if they weren't good they would be sold to Christians to be eaten on Sunday. To them, as kids, Christians were almost monsters.
We live in a predominantly Chriestian Nation in the US and most of Europe. We tell stories about anyone that isn't Christian that are all as much misunderstanding as their stories about Christians. I generally am more open-minded than most people and have made the effort to at least read enough to understand the point of view that people raised in other faiths have. To tell the truth I have a part of my familly that are Fundamentalist Carismatic Christians and according to them, anyone that doesn't subscribe to THEIR faith and beliefs is evil and worships the devil. They are scary as hell to me.
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