The organization asserts that HAIL teaches students “about values such as empathy, compassion, and justice in a fun environment without religious pressure or coercion.”
Ohio’s Satanic Temple has launched an instructional program at Marysville School District in central Ohio to counter Christian teaching in the classroom, The Sentinel reported Thursday.
The temple is opposed to Christian organizations such as LifeWise Institute that teach the Bible at public schools, however, this instruction is not mandatory and students must choose to participate. The Satanic Temple is now offering students at Edgewood Elementary School instruction from the Hellions Academy of Independent Learning, also known as HAIL, under the Release Time Religious Instruction, or RTRI, program in the state.
The organization asserts that HAIL teaches students “about values such as empathy, compassion, and justice in a fun environment without religious pressure or coercion.” Betty Elswick, one of the parents promoting the program, has also insisted the program does not “push a religious agenda,” according to The Sentinel. The program was first launched on November 15 in the Northern York County School District in Pennsylvania
The Satanic Temple says Christians are “only allowed to operate in public schools because they take students off site, they do not use public funding, and the school districts in principle do not discriminate against any similar programs based on the religion organizing the activity.” The temple says it “will be testing school districts on that last requirement.”
The temple, which claims it does not believe in a literal Devil, has been the subject of criticism for pushing its programs on the public as a means of exercising its free speech rights under the First Amendment.
The group has also been behind the idea of creating Satan clubs at schools that meet after hours – just as there are Christian clubs that offer fellowship for believers and Bible study. This initiative has also been met with resistance from the public and led to litigation from the temple. One lawsuit the temple filed alleged that a Tennessee school district “substantially burdened its ability to exercise its religiously motivated practice of offering inclusive, welcoming religious clubs at public schools.”
The Satanic Temple of Iowa was behind the creation of a demonic shrine that was placed in front of the Iowa State Capitol last year. A local Christian and military veteran decided to decapitate and push over the statue. Michael Cassidy pleaded guilty to the offense after hate crime charges were reduced to a simple misdemeanor. The Satanic Temple has also been at work in Virginia, and offers a “telehealth abortion clinic” in the state with abortion pills available upon request. It claims the termination of a pregnancy is a religious ritual.
Gov. Ron DeSantis has opened up a chaplaincy program for his state’s public school system but has said the slots will not be open to members of the Satanic Temple.
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