Posted on 04/26/2024 2:04:38 PM PDT by Twotone
The Sunshine State is now welcoming chaplains into public schools, but Satanists need not apply.
On Thursday, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican, signed a bill into law allowing chaplains to volunteer to offer counseling at public and charter schools. However, the Catholic governor warned that Satanists would not be accepted into the program, as some Christian and conservative groups had feared.
“Now some have said if you do a school chaplain program that somehow you’re going to have Satanists running around in all our schools,” DeSantis said in a press conference. “We’re not playing those games in Florida. That is not a religion. That is not qualifying to be able to participate in this. We’re going to be using common sense when it comes to this, so you don’t have to worry about that.”
The Florida Senate version of the bill was approved in February and the House version was approved early last month. The legislation’s text states, “Each school district or charter school may adopt a policy to authorize volunteer school chaplains to provide supports, services, and programs to students as assigned by the district school board or charter school governing board.”
The new law requires volunteer chaplains to pass a background check and would require school administrators to publicize each volunteer chaplain’s religious affiliation and obtain parental consent before a student begins counseling.
“Any opportunity that exists for ministers or chaplains in the public sector must not discriminate based on religious affiliation,” said The Satanic Temple’s “Director of Ministry” Penemue Grigori in February. “Our ministers look forward to participating in opportunities to do good in the community, including the opportunities created by this bill, right alongside the clergy of other religions.”
Ryan Jayne of the Freedom From Religion Foundation’s Action Fund added, “I think there is a 100% chance you see satanic chaplains, and also of course other religious minorities that the majority-Christian population might not be a fan of. The Satanic Temple is a church, whether people like it or not.”
“It is wonderful to have such a strong statement denying the legitimacy of Satanism as a religion or church from Governor DeSantis. But I worry that appeals to common sense will not hold in the most ideological school systems, even in Florida,” Meg Kilgannon, Family Research Council’s senior fellow for education studies, commented to The Washington Stand. “Regardless, this is an important step in acknowledging the role that faith plays in our lives and how important it is that the big questions students have about morality, life and death, and God’s plan for their lives are best answered by a parent or priest, pastor, or chaplain.”
DeSantis has criticized Satanism in the past, arguing that it is not a religion. In December, after military veteran and outspoken Christian Michael Cassidy toppled and beheaded a Baphomet idol erected in the Iowa State Capitol Building by The Satanic Temple, the Florida governor declared, “Satan has no place in our society and should not be recognized as a ‘religion’ by the federal government. … Good prevails over evil—that’s the American spirit.”
On its website, The Satanic Temple responds to the question “Do you worship Satan?” The organization states, “No, nor do we believe in the existence of Satan or the supernatural.” The Satanic Temple adds, “Satan is a symbol of the Eternal Rebel in opposition to arbitrary authority, forever defending personal sovereignty even in the face of insurmountable odds. … Our metaphoric representation is the literary Satan best exemplified by Milton and the Romantic Satanists from Blake to Shelley to Anatole France.”
Now that it has been signed by DeSantis, Florida’s new law goes into effect on July 1.
There is no logically coherent alternative to the fact that God created everything. I’m not trying to upset you or to goad you into wanting to insult me. I’m only asking you to think logically.
Again.
Your religious belief that there is a god that does everything, except bad things, does not make you special. It provides you with no special rights. It doesn’t allow you to claim credit for all the good things, and distance you from bad things. And it’s not in the constitution.
You have no dominion over anyone else.
If the rights stated in our Constitution don’t come from God, then where do they come from?
For example, what is the origin of free speech? If you refuse this request, I’ll take it as an admission that you agree our freedom of speech comes from God.
You have an irrational, emotional need to say things like “you’re not special” and “you have no dominion over anyone else.”
It’s like telling a fish it can’t survive out of water. Why would anyone go to the trouble of doing such a thing?
But now you have to tell me, as I asked above, what is the origin of freedom of speech?
Lol.
If I don’t respond to your question, you win?
Are you 12?
I’ll answer though. The idea of free speech goes back to at least Ancient Greece. So maybe the god was Athena?
But if Athena gave us freedom of speech, then it wouldn’t be unalienable, so it couldn’t have been Athena.
And for your sake, I should point out that this isn’t a game of win/lose between you and me. It’s much bigger than that.
If you continue in your beliefs and end up in hell, I consider that a loss for me because I don’t want such a horrible thing to happen to you.
You appear to see the world through a very specific theistic prism, forcing everything through it.
It’s fine if it’s you living your life.
It’s not fine when you attempt to force that view on everyone else, including the people that composed the country’s founding documents. Especially when they expressly spoke and wrote against that view.
Ok. Now you can get lost with that patronizing bs. See how you think you’re special?
But there’s no thing more horrible than ending up in hell.
I’m not saying I like being insulted by posters here. But it’s really nothing, especially compared to the horrors of hell.
I truly hope you don’t go there.
“It’s not fine when you attempt to force that view on everyone else”
But then why do you assume the right to force yours on the majority of Americans, and on our founding fathers, all of whom know our rights come from God?
You seem to be avoiding the wording of our founding documents.
The word here is “unalienable.” Why would you want to run away from it?
How have I insulted you?
Unalienable isn’t a religious term.
You’re all over the place here.
You mean when they wrote “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights” in our Declaration of Independence?
And then, many years later, you didn’t understand how this informs us that the rights in the Constitution are referring to the same unalienable rights?
And how the word “unalienable” means they couldn’t have been given by anyone other than God our Creator?
I don’t remember any insult from you.
A government absolutely has the right, even the duty, to not support beliefs that promotes actions and beliefs that contradict the common good.
Now I don’t think they should out right ban religions unless the “religion” actively promoted conducts that are illegal. But withholding public support should have a much lower criteria, and people can always fire the politician if they disagree.
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