‘The horns gotta go. . . . And the red outfit. He’d wear nice pastel shades.’ : The Devil Is Making Me Do It

I have spent the past two weeks trying to gain entry into the Church of Satan but have been turned down by the devil’s press agent, a Van Nuys woman named Dea Lucas. My purpose was not to join the church but to write about it. Dea, however, had read my column and said in so many words that I could go straight to hell. Well, straight to heaven, I guess.

It all began when I found a three-line magazine advertisement tucked between an ad for a center for “bisexual, gay, straight, transsexual, transvestite and intersexed men and women” and one for a feminist workshop that utilized radical therapy, Gestalt and Reichian therapy “with the end goal of empowering the individual.”

Nothing special about them. Just ordinary L.A.-type ads.

The message that really caught my eye was one that said “CHURCH OF SATAN Van Nuys accepting members. Dea Lucas Box 5345. North Hollywood 91616.”

Mr. Scratch, as he is also known, has always intrigued me. My mother, a devout Catholic, used to say the devil would get me if I ever lied, stole or married a Protestant. I believed her up until I did all three and nothing happened.

When I confronted Mom on that, she simply explained that I was lucky to have sinned during presidential election years when the bad angel, as she called him, was busy campaigning for the Republicans.

I wrote to Dea Lucas and she called one day to leave her phone number. When I returned the call, I was answered by a recorded message that began, “How nice of you to call, you little devil.” There was evil laughter in the background; the kind of laugh that might come from Satan when he is having a good time.

I didn’t mind the evil laughter or the fact that Old Scratch might be enjoying himself at a cookout of skewered souls, but I cannot abide telephone-message cute. When you call the Pope, does the message say, “Be an angel and leave your phone number”? I pray not.

When I finally made contact with Dea, she explained that people who worshiped the devil were tired of being depicted as “wearing a black hat.” I said she had to expect some of that because the devil has been considered a bad guy since about the second century B.C. Or B.D., depending on how you look at it.

Dea insisted, however, that she would not cooperate unless I promised not to attack them. I don’t even promise that to family members. Later, after she had read one of my columns, a piece she described as “a hatchet job on the Nazis,” she said she would talk to me only if I allowed her to approve the article before it went into print.

Well, that ended that. It seemed a strange attitude coming from someone who is acting as the devil’s p.r. man in Southern California. Instead of hanging up on me, Dea should have been hustling up a new image for the prince of darkness as a fun guy, nice sense of humor, good dresser and quick to buy drinks.

Satan is not exactly history’s most popular dude. The New Testament mentions him as Beelzebul, the Lord of Dung, and the Zoroastrians saw him as a slimy, foul-smelling keeper of the wicked dead, neither of which are terrific images.

In addition, the devil is always trying to buy someone’s soul in a seven-year deal. The way it works, he gives you what you want in terms of youth, beauty, popularity, a clear skin or controlling interest in Herbalife in exchange for signing your soul over to him at the end of the contract period.

It is what is known in the television business as a firm deal with options to renew, no first-draft cutoff.

I have no personal knowledge of what Mr. Scratch does with the souls, since I have never been asked what I would take in exchange for mine (I want it all), but you can bet your rosary beads it isn’t either noble or uplifting.

Just for the hell of it, I asked a press agent friend of mine, Bob Abrams, how he would improve the devil’s bad image.

“The horns gotta go,” Bob said. “Horns bug people. And the red outfit. He’d wear nice pastel shades.”

As I suspected, Abrams would make sure Satan had a big expense account on the theory that people are more inclined to talk to a guy with a tail when they are getting free drinks.

“I’d sell him as a sweet guy. No more fire and brimstone. That’s over.”

He would have to give up his old digs and move into a condo in Encino and wear Aramis cologne. No more diabolic threats. From now on it would be, “Let’s do lunch sometime, have your girl call my girl.”

God knows, I gave Dea Lucas a chance to convince me that that Old Scratch was numero uno and that the church did not eat dogs or engage in sexual orgies with spider monkeys during rituals honoring the Prince of Dung.

I don’t know where she’s going to go to get a better shake than the one I’m offering. The National Enquirer, perhaps.

Heaven help her.