[Brassy up-tempo music plays. The studio audience welcomes the host from behind the curtain with enthusiastic applause. He waves, blows two-handed kisses to the crowd. He stands before the crowd.]
Hello folks and welcome to the show! We’ve got a great show for you tonight. I’m your host, Tommy Desiderio!
[thunderous applause and upbeat saxophone music that plays to panning camera and flashing lights, coming to a stop on a pulsing downbeat drop. Crowd continues applause.]
We have such a special guest, you’re not going to..believe it! Har, har! Pun intended! [drums: bu-dum tsh!] Our guest goes way back, to the beginning in fact. He is a master of music, film, and politics. He knows science, literature, law, medicine, and philosophy. In fact, he’s had his finger in just about every field you can imagine! And he bears a distinction that very few claim: an eponymous title of one of the Rolling Stones’ most famous hits!
Would you put your hands together for our special guest, The Prince of Darkness himself, the one, the only, Satan!
[thunderous applause. Satan comes out, bows, waves to the enthusiastic crowd. He continues to wave and bow as the applause continues. He feigns embarrassment at the continuing applause, does a little softshoe, a little moonwalking. Finally the two make their way to the stage where Tommy sits at a desk and Satan sits on a couch.]
Thank you, Tom! Hello everyone! Thank you, thank you! [waving, more waving, blows kisses to the audience, makes a heart shape with his fingers, pats his chest twice and throws a peace sign] Oh, you’re so kind! Thank you! Oh, my goodness, what a wonderful crowd.
Wow, that was great! Welcome to the show, Satan!
Thanks, Tom! It’s great to be back. What’s it been, a couple of years? I’m so glad to be here tonight.
Well thank you! It has been a while since you were here last, although it seems like only yesterday. Say, ya know, I love your work, man. Have ya’ll been keeping up? Can I get a round of applause? Just incredible.
[applause from the audience]
Let me list a few things, your work in Washington lately has been quite impressive. Am I right? [audience applause.] Yes indeed. Let’s see, uh, you got AI off the ground a couple of years ago, a very big deal, even taking time to answer some chat questions yourself from the Curséd Throne in your office in Hell! Yes, we all remember watching that unfold. And you’ve pretty much got all the world religions playing to your tune, oppressing, hating, killing in God’s name, all that jazz. And let’s just face it, the whole world feels like it is in absolute chaos! Every day the headlines are just atrocious. You must be feeling pretty proud of your accomplishments.
[applause from the audience]
I can’t deny it, Tommy, I’m at the top of my game. I just feel like the world is my oyster, you know?
I know, I know! You’ve been so busy! And you’re looking great, by the way. You must have lost some weight.
I’ve been taking GLP1’s and it has really paid off. As you can see, I got my six-pack back, which I haven’t seen since the Middle Ages!
That’s fabulous. Tell us a little about your latest project.
Ha ha! I knew you were going to bring that up. Well, I’ve been working especially hard lately, and…I have to say for those out there who have similar aspirations…I mean…You got to follow your dreams, right?
I know you can’t wait to hear this, folks. Stop being coy, Satan! Just put it out there.
Well, I gotta give a little background. There’s a common understanding, a presumption really, that I, Ruler of the Underworld, cannot utter certain words and phrases.
Unable? You mean, you physically speak them?
Right, that’s the misunderstanding: that I am unable to speak them. Certain phrases expressing personal piety or religious creeds. For example, The Apostle’s Creed. I believe in God the Father Almighty, Maker of Heaven and Earth, and in Jesus Christ his only son, our Lord, et cetera, et cetera. People think that saying these words is IMPOSSIBLE for me simply because the Big Man and I are enemies, and the Creed is anathema to the infernal hordes.
You don’t seem to be having any trouble with it now.
Right, you see, I guess people figure I’m an atheist, or something. [laughter from the crowd.] That’s nonsense. In fact, I believe every word of the Apostle’s Creed. I was there for much of it, and I personally happen to know that everything in it is true. Does that make me a Christian? No. Saying those words does not make anyone a Christian.
I got you. So it doesn’t make your tongue catch on fire.
[audience laughter]
No, in fact, I am far more orthodox in my beliefs than most Christians are. How could I not be?
Okay, I can see how that’s the case for a statement of doctrinal faith, but what about other things? Like prayer? Or forgiveness of your sins? Can you ask God to forgive your sins?
Piece of cake. I pray that prayer in the mouths of millions of people every year. It doesn’t phase me because most people aren’t really convinced they’re sinners. Here, I’ll do you one better! Watch this: I believe that Jesus Christ died on the cross for my sins, I have accepted him into my heart to be my personal Lord and Savior. He is my Lord and King forever, and he loves me and has adopted me into his forever family…Well, you get the idea.
Wow! That’s amazing, I have to say, I also sort of…assumed that anyone speaking those words would be a true Christian.
That’s the thing, Tommy. People hear religious leaders spout those words that they’ve heard in church a thousand times, and they are assumed to be legit. When they hear that, the sheep come running into the pen. So, I said that was background. The real news is that I’ve started a new religion, and the way I got subscribers is to put all kinds of pious and holy-sounding words and phrases into the leader’s mouths, along with a lot of other crap that people also want to believe, things about the inferiority of other races and the opposite sex, immigrants, Jews, and…ha! ha! ANY people who are not in their tribe! Also ideas about what they [speaks in a huffy voice] don’t want their tax dollars going to support, or uh, placating their gun fetishism (my personal favorite), ideas about the roles of men and women always to the advantage of men controlling women, light skin over dark skin, conservatives over liberals. Uh, it goes on—endorsing war, death, capital punishment? Oh! Shit, how could I forget: persecuting law-abiding immigrants under the ridiculous banner of ‘border protection’ of a land that was stolen from a previous nation?! Sweet Jesus, I could go on.
A whole new religion! It’s been a while since we had one of those. Are you bringing back the oldies for us?
You betcha, Tom. But this one is more bodacious than ever before—because this one is happening right in the same soil as those shlubs who refuse to join my club. That old story about the wheat and the tares. There can be two people sitting next to each other in a church service, and one of them belongs to God and the other belongs to me, both thinking they are saved, both thinking they’re going to heaven, and both thinking they’re worshipping the same deity.
I see. I guess it all goes back to the distinction between pious talk and hymn-singing, and real sacrificial love in action.
That’s right. The decoder goggles have always been there: you’ll know them by their fruit. I keep myself busy by making people with completely unChristian and antithetical behaviors actually thinking that their lives are all right, mainly because they sing the songs, feel the feelings, recite the prayers. It’s not about what you say. Even I can say any of that stuff with a fervent glint in my eye…but instead,
[Tom and Satan together] you will know them by their fruit.
Thanks for joining us, Satan. What a great night. Stay tuned folks! Coming up Ryan Gosling is here to tell us about his latest film. And bad girl Olivia Rodrigo is going to perform her latest single, so stick around.
[ten-person band fires up with bass-popping, snare drum heavy, wall of sound outro. Camera sweeps across the studio audience, catches Tommy and Satan chatting candidly under the music, all to heavy audience applause, aaaaand…cut to commercial.]
