There's a post I've seen making the rounds on Christian Facebook lately which describes, in excruciating detail, how painful and horrific the crucifixion was. And it's absolutely not wrong – in fact, that's where we get the word "excruciating," from the Latin excruciare (to torture), from cruciare (to crucify), from crux (cross). It is, quite possibly, one of the most brutal ways we humans have yet devised to put our own kind to death.
So the question I have to ask this Easter weekend is... so what?
It's not news that the Romans used crucifixion rampantly to put to death criminals of all sorts – rebels, thieves, heretics, etc. Nor is it news that Jesus, if he existed, was reportedly put to death in this manner.
What the author intends you to understand, of course, is that the God of the Universe knew that brutality would happen and chose it anyway, so determined was He to be reunited with us.
But that assumes so many facts not in evidence. First, we must demonstrate that a deity exists. Then, we must demonstrate that said deity has foreknowledge, not only of what will happen, but of the potential outcomes of any possible action He might take when interacting with time. (So much science fiction novel fodder in that contemplation.) Then, we must demonstrate that the itinerant Jewish preacher history remembers as Yeshua ben Yosef was in fact a god-man (but not any of the other alleged god-men throughout history) who was sent on purpose into our world with that as the known result. We also would have to have evidence of the purported separation between deity and human driven by humans violating the undemonstrated laws of that deity. (Setting aside the ethical discussion of holding humans to those laws.) And finally, we'd need to know the motivation of that deity in sending that god-man had something to do with undoing the judgement for those laws.
If all of those things were demonstrated with solid evidence, then the worse the cross was, the better a demonstration of love it might have been. But as it is, the mere fact that a historical method of execution was brutal and awful tells me only that humans are capable of being awful to each other. And perhaps that we're improving, since we don't visit that particular form of brutality on each other any more.
It's a hallmark of Christian Facebook that they assume you already know and are convinced of the story they want to convince you of. They assume that you're already convinced of every other aspect and they only need to discuss this one detail to complete the picture. That lets them conveniently ignore proof for... anything, it often seems!
Easter is where the contradictions of Christianity are on their highest display. God is angry, but also just, but also pacified by the death of the innocent. Humans are loved, but also universally depraved. Jesus died for everyone, but only for those who are willing to reshare someone's Facebook post.
Despite those contradictions, Easter is great pageantry. I suspect every culture and faith has their "good triumphs over evil" holiday and victory celebration. It's the self-reassurance that "we're right, and we win!" (For Satanism, that's Sol Invictus, celebrating the triumph of reason over superstition.) Easter services can be a lot of fun, whether you believe there's any historicity or not to a decomposing corpse coming back out of the grave.
And I've got news for you: Satan doesn't really care if you learn about ancient execution methods. Because Satan doesn't exist. Satanists don't really care whether you learn about it either. No one is trying to stop you from doing your historical research, such as it is, or writing fan fiction expanding on the details of your favorite ancient documents. Get over the persecution complex; we just think you're weird.
Happy Zombie Jesus Day, fanfic writer!
Hail Satan! Amen.