By Brandon Morse

December 20, 2021

-Red State

 

It would appear that The Satanic Temple wants to get some cheap laughs in during Christmas by placing a manger scene of their own within the rotunda of the Illinois Capitol.

According to the New York Post, horror artist Christ P. Andres has teamed up with the Temple to create a baby Baphomet display to celebrate “Sol Invictus,” which celebrates a Roman sun god, but the Satanists consider it to have a different meaning:

According to the organization’s website, Sol Invictus is a “celebration of being unconquered by superstition and consistent in the pursuit of sharing knowledge,” and has its origins in the cult of Sol in pre-Christian Rome.

“This year’s tradition marks a greater urgency in the Baphomet’s message of harmony and reconciliation,”  Satanic Temple’s Director of Campaign Operations Erin Helian said in a statement, obtained by the State Journal-Register.

This has obviously garnered anger from the Diocese of Springfield in Illinois, where Bishop Thomas Paprocki said that Satanic displays “have no place in the Capitol or any other place” according to the State Journal-Register.

This display features the baby goat demon Baphomet atop a blue silk blanket in clear mockery of Christ’s nativity scene.

This will actually be the third year the display will be set up in the Capitol.

“Mocking the millions of Christians in the state of Illinois and billions around the world by depicting the baby Jesus this Christmas with the ‘satanic deity’ Baphomet is the very definition of evil and causing division, but that is to be expected from an organization that is in existence to troll people of faith,” said diocese spokesman Andrew Hansen.

Hansen’s take on it is actually very close to the truth.

The Satanic Temple is more of an organization specifically looking to bother Christians with Satanic imagery and promote anti-Christian things like abortion. All in all, it’s more of a political activist group than a religious one, yet still, it favors activities that are evil such as the aforementioned killing of children.

Recently, the Temple attempted to sue Texas over its new anti-abortion laws, stating that it stops the Temple from performing “abortion rituals.”

The Temple extended an invitation to Bishop Paprocki to “hold hands with members of the Satanic Temple while we come together and stand before all of the religious displays at the rotunda” but Paprocki has obviously declined.

c. RED STATE