I’ve always thought the common conception of the Christian devil as some kind of evil mind rapist a bit ridiculous. I mean, is that really the sort of job you do with gusto? Tempting people day in and day out for a boss that really couldn’t care less if you dropped off the face of the earth (literally)? But then I got to thinking, maybe there are some perverted perks for a fellow like that. You don’t take that job on if you’re a decent person, that’s for sure.

Happle Tea will be two years old on July the first of this year and there has only been one (rather weird, if I do say so myself) strip that included Satan. For a strip that features God as the best bud of the main character, that’s a bit weird. It felt wrong to represent one side of the argument over the spiritual war for humanity while leaving the other one in the dust. That changes today! I wrote a few jokes this week about Satan, satanism, and I tried to make a joke about the supposedly official Church of Satan website but I’m afraid that thing is too hilarious all on it’s own for me to do that effectively. I’m planning to draw at least one of those strips this year.

Stay tuned.

As for the Church of Satan website, it seems a bit ridiculous that the devil, tempter and powerful being that he is couldn’t afford a graphic designer. That thing looks like shit.

Maybe it’s all part of some diabolical plan to make your eyes bleed or something.

As for the actual Devil, I can’t speak on the subject with much authority. Unsurprisingly, the concept of a great opponent of good isn’t a new one and didn’t show up with Christianity. Also unsurprisingly, this idea is a very complex one that leaves me baffled every time I try to research it. A great many spiritual concepts and mythological stories are complicated, but this one is even more difficult to unravel than most. The simple story that you hear from the Bible where Lucifer falls from grace for questioning God and becomes ruler of Hell isn’t even the half of it. With roots in Zoroastrianism and the Hebrew concept of “Ha-Satan” (a generic sort of adversary, an idea linked to God himself), it’s not easy to boil the Devil down into even a one page essay very effectively. Rather than give you misinformation I’ll just leave it at that.

You may notice I’m not doing anything super rad for April Fools’ Day. It would have been nice, but my hospital visit and subsequent catching up on comic work has been too difficult to take care of alongside April 1st hijinx. Please accept my apologies for that and the late strip today. Trying to get caught up on everything this weekend.

Thanks again to everyone who commented with well wishes or sent me emails about my hospital visit, by the way. I really appreciate all of them, it was very kind. You are marvelous people <3