Hoping to see Missouri’s strict abortion laws overturned, The Satanic Temple has taken the state to court. By God’s grace, the state of Missouri has some of the most restrictive abortion laws on the books. In Missouri, abortions past 21 weeks and 6 days from conception are illegal, as is using public funds for abortions. Among other regulations, it’s mandated that women have to wait 72 hours, and minors have to obtain parental consent in order to have an abortion. The Satanic Temple argues that Missouri’s abortion laws violate the religious freedoms of its members.
According to an article on HuffPost:
The temple first filed a complaint in May of 2015 on behalf of a member identified as Mary Doe, who had sought out an abortion. Doe reportedly had to drive over three hours to a Planned Parenthood, taking time off work and paying for a hotel room. In accordance with Missouri law, the clinic told Doe she had to wait 72 hours before she could get the procedure. She was also asked to review a booklet of ‘informed consent’ materials that assert: ‘The life of each human being begins at conception. Abortion will terminate the life of a separate, unique, living human being.’ … By promoting the belief that human life begins at conception, the temple’s attorney James Mac Naughton argued, ‘the state is actively promoting a religious belief’ that conflicts with Doe’s convictions.
A follow-up complaint was filed in 2016 which was promptly dismissed because the plaintiff was no longer pregnant. Last Monday, The Satanic Temple took the case to the Missouri State Court Western Appellate District. The State Attorney General’s office argues that “the informed consent law only mandated that Doe receive information she didn’t agree with.”
The Satanic Temple has chapters in twelve states and two other countries (England and Canada). The group’s website states:
The mission of The Satanic Temple is to encourage benevolence and empathy among all people, reject tyrannical authority, advocate practical common sense and justice, and be directed by the human conscience to undertake noble pursuits guided by the individual will.
The organization’s stated goals include a litany of SJW activist aims geared towards legal action. In the past, The Satanic Temple has:
…advocated on behalf of children in public school to abolish corporal punishment, applied for equal representation where religious monuments are placed on public property, provided religious exemption and legal protection against laws that unscientifically restrict women’s reproductive autonomy, exposed fraudulent harmful pseudo-scientific practitioners and claims in mental health care, and applied to hold clubs along side other religious after school clubs in schools besieged by proselytizing organizations.
The use of the term “Satanic,” however, is a bit of a misnomer. The organization claims:
It is the position of The Satanic Temple that religion can, and should, be divorced from superstition. As such, we do not promote a belief in a personal Satan. To embrace the name Satan is to embrace rational inquiry removed from supernaturalism and archaic tradition-based superstitions.
In other words, The Satanic Temple appears to be a juvenile combination of the ACLU and American Atheists, using the tag “Satanic” as simply a means to provoke an emotional response in people. That being said, defending the murder of babies is exactly the sort of thing that Satan loves.
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