Indiana’s new law banning most abortions, passed after the Supreme Court’s June decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, is already on hold because of a lawsuit brought by Planned Parenthood.
But that hasn’t stopped an organization calling itself the Satanic Temple from filing a second lawsuit, alleging that the abortion ban violates the religious freedom of its members and amounts to “involuntary servitude” prohibited by the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
The Satanic Temple didn’t just burst onto the scene in Indiana this week. It’s been around a while and the group loves media attention … and abortion. A lot.
It likes to file lawsuits claiming abortion laws violate its members’ “rights.” It also likes to challenge government Christmas displays by using the First Amendment to demand an equal place for depictions of Satan. And don’t forget the important societal need to have Satanic Temple student clubs in the nation’s public schools.
They’re a fun group, if by “fun” you mean always opposing Christians and Judeo-Christian morality. Or even common sense.
The Satanic Temple alleges that its members don’t actually worship Satan. The group supposedly “venerates, but does not worship” the allegorical Satan as featured in the 17th-century epic poem Paradise Lost by John Milton.
That’s a distinction which might be lost on people. “If it walks like a duck,” and all that.
But the group, which claims over 11,000 members in Indiana alone, has “tenets” it believes, which, when added up together, supposedly results in a “religious belief” in a right to abortion. And that “right,” its lawsuit alleges, is “violated” by the Indiana law, which bans abortions, except in cases of rape or incest (but only before 10 weeks gestation), where the mother’s life is at risk, or in cases of fatal fetal anomalies.
The group even touts what it calls the “Satanic Abortion Ritual” which it describes as “a destruction ritual that serves as a protective rite.”
“Its purpose is to cast off notions of guilt, shame, and mental discomfort that a patient may be experiencing due to choosing to have a medically safe and legal abortion,” the document helpfully explains.
Pro-abortion activists everywhere work overtime to dismiss – as if that were possible – the emotional harm to women and regret that abortion causes. They can’t, of course, and this latest attempt by the Satanic Temple is just a new twist on an old game.
It’s all so sad.
The group doesn’t like that its “ritual” is now considered a crime by the state of Indiana and wants a federal judge to uphold its members’ alleged religious freedom “right” to kill a baby. And if its members are forced to give birth to the child living inside, that ought to be declared a violation of the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which prohibits slavery.
Motherhood equals slavery. Really, now?
And what “religious freedom” is the group relying on to justify killing an innocent preborn human being?
That’s a cheeky argument to make, but since the Left treats abortion as a sacrament anyway, these wannabe Satanists are perhaps letting more out of the bag than their more secular allies would be comfortable with the rest of us knowing.
Despite attempts to keep things sanitized behind non-religious terms such as “bodily autonomy” and “choice,” it’s hard for the Left to justify killing babies without admitting it is one of the “tenets” of their secular religion, albeit a religion that is wholly contrary to what most of the world’s historic faiths teach about life in the womb.
Believe it or not, the Satanic Temple, founded in 2012, is a recognized 501(c)(3) charity by the Internal Revenue Service. Donations are tax deductible. It claims over 700,000 members worldwide.
It also has a really nifty online gift shop where you can purchase a “Hail Satan” t-shirt for $30 or a 5 oz. bottle of the Satanic Temple’s Official Hot Sauce for $12, among the dozens of collectibles for sale.
That should tell you a lot about how serious the organization’s beliefs are.
Christians are, of course, familiar with Scripture’s condemnation of child sacrifice. Moloch, a Canaanite “deity” associated with the practice, is mentioned several times in the Bible, and specifically condemned by Moses in Leviticus 18:21 (ESV): “You shall not give any of your children to offer them to Moloch, and so profane the name of your God: I am the LORD.”
Abortion sellers these days may not use Moloch in their advertising, but preborn babies continue to be sacrificed on the altar of convenience, which isn’t that much different. The Satanic Temple’s claim to have a religious “right” to abort babies just seems to be an ancient lie dusted off and repackaged for modern sensibilities.
Photo from Shutterstock.
