MEMPHIS, Tenn. (WREG/NEXSTAR) — After weeks of controversy, officials at a Tennessee school district say that despite some community objections, a school program operated by The Satanic Temple will be allowed to operate on campus facilities in January.
The Satanic Temple announced plans to host its “After School Satan Club” at Chimneyrock Elementary School in Cordova beginning Jan. 10. Attendance at the after-school club is not mandatory for students and it is not sponsored by MSCS — nevertheless, some parents were concerned after the news made the rounds on social media.
The club is a project of The Satanic Temple (TST), which, despite its name, doesn’t worship the Biblical figure — or even believe Satan exists. Instead, TST says Satan is a literary figure representing “rejecting tyranny over the human mind and spirit.”
The religious organization is well-known for its advocacy, saying it aims to “encourage empathy, reject tyrannical authority,” in addition to promoting “common sense” and “opposing injustice.” The group has made many court challenges to (often conservative) laws that may only protect or promote Christianity, as The Hill reports.
According to TST, After School Satan Club chapters are being opened at public schools in response to other religious groups opening or operating clubs at schools, including the popular evangelical Good News Club. A local chapter of the Good News Club, which says it aims to present the Gospel to children, meets at Chimneyrock Elementary every week.
TST says After School Satan Clubs “provide a safe and inclusive alternative” to Christian-based groups that may seek to “convert school children to their belief system.”
On Wednesday, Memphis-Shelby County Schools Interim Superintendent Toni Williams addressed the public surrounded by a group of faith leaders. Williams said about half of the district’s schools are supported by faith-based institutions.
“I want to assure you that I do not endorse, I do not support the beliefs of this organization at the center of the recent headlines,” Memphis-Shelby County Schools Interim Superintendent Toni Williams said Wednesday. “I do, however, support the law. As a superintendent, I am duty-bound to uphold our board policy, state laws and the constitution.”
The Chimneyrock chapter will be the organization’s fifth active club in the nation. Campaign Director June Everett said it started after she was contacted by MSCS parents expressing interest.
Planned activities for the club include science and community service projects, puzzles and games, nature activities, and arts and crafts. TST says its After School Satan Clubs encourage critical thinking, rationalism, creative artistry and science. Children ages 5-12 are allowed to attend with parental permission, the Temple says.
“Proselytization is not our goal, and we’re not interested in converting children to Satanism,” writes TST. “We prefer to give children an appreciation of the natural wonders surrounding them, not a fear of everlasting other-worldly horrors.”
MSCS school board member Mauricio Calvo, who represents the district that contains Chimneyrock, said the board would explore legal alternatives to “mitigate the situation.”
But others were more direct in their opposition, including MSCS school board chair Althea Greene, who is also a pastor, and said: “Satan has no room in this district.”
Rev. Bill Adkins, pastor of Greater Imani Church, said he believes in the First Amendment, but his “liberality is being challenged.”
“We cannot allow any entity called Satanic Temple to have private time with our children,” Adkins said. “I can’t go into the school building and pray. But yet we can rent a facility to the Satanic Temple and they can give a party for children. It’s ridiculous. It’s absurd.”
The school system says all non-profit organizations seeking to use facilities after school hours are guaranteed equal access. Students must have signed parents’ permission to take part in Satan Club activities.
Nevertheless, concerned parent Reggie Carrick said he felt the school system was letting kids down in order to dodge a lawsuit, warning parents: “This is gonna spread like wildfire.”
But Interim Superintendent Williams urged families not to “push away in fear but to push in with support … We can support the First Amendment and our students at the same time.”
What does the Satanic Temple believe?
The Satanic Temple says it has seven fundamental tenets:
- One should strive to act with compassion and empathy toward all creatures in accordance with reason.
- The struggle for justice is an ongoing and necessary pursuit that should prevail over laws and institutions.
- One’s body is inviolable, subject to one’s own will alone.
- The freedoms of others should be respected, including the freedom to offend. To willfully and unjustly encroach upon the freedoms of another is to forgo one’s own.
- Beliefs should conform to one’s best scientific understanding of the world. One should take care never to distort scientific facts to fit one’s beliefs.
- People are fallible. If one makes a mistake, one should do one’s best to rectify it and resolve any harm that might have been caused.
- Every tenet is a guiding principle designed to inspire nobility in action and thought. The spirit of compassion, wisdom, and justice should always prevail over the written or spoken word.
Though the Temple says it doesn’t have any required rituals, TST acknowledges some rituals that members have participated in. In addition to the aforementioned Unbaptism, there are also Destruction rituals (participants destroy objects symbolizing pain in their lives) and Defiance rituals (participants take a pledge to challenge the status quo in a personally meaningful way).
The Satanic Temple is often confused with the earlier Church of Satan, founded in the 1960s, which the Temple is not aligned with, per its website. Most notably, the Temple has protested anti-LGBTQ lawmakers and organizations and challenged GOP abortion bans, saying bans violate its beliefs that only individuals have rights to make decisions about their own bodies.