One way to know that you are on the wrong side of God is when the devil joins your cause.
The Satanic Temple recently filed and won a legal challenge against Missouri’s abortion laws based on the devil worshippers’ and a woman who had an abortion’s “religious freedom.” The case will now move to the Missouri Supreme Court.
The Satanic lawsuits argue that Missouri’s conservative approach to abortion that requires women to receive and review informed consent materials, have an ultrasound and undergo a 72-hour waiting period violate the rights of Satan worshippers and women everywhere.
The suits have been log-jammed in the courts since 2015 after a Jane Doe case involving a woman who drove to a St. Louis Planned Parenthood to get an abortion was apparently outraged she had to wait 72 hours to take her child’s life. The woman went as far as to write a disclaimer saying she reviewed the informed consent materials in an attempt to get past the wait time. The abortion doctor, however, was bound by law to wait 72 hours. Jane Doe found supporters in a New Jersey lawyer, Satanic Temple founder Lucian Greaves.
The most disturbing part of this case may not be the immorality and desire to tear down Western values. It’s disheartening that the very Constitution that ensures religious liberty is being subverted to create a secular society where life can be freely snuffed out. The Satanic Temple lawsuit focuses on First Amendment rights, and claims Jane Does can abort babies based on free expression. The lawsuit also claims that the informed consent procedures runs contrary to the state’s Religious Freedom Restoration Act. Through this, Satanists have effectively weaponized religious freedom laws to suit their own twisted agenda.
Although “free expression” has roundly been considered things such as speech, peaceful protect and artistic creativity, the Satanists have gained traction with their counter-intuitive free expression argument. The Western District of the Missouri Court of Appeals recently ruled in favor of Jane Doe and the Satanic Temple. In a controversial opinion, the state appeals panel says the case “raises real and substantial constitutional claims.”
The New Jersey lawyer behind the anonymous Jane Doe continued to advocate for the righteousness of unfettered abortions. After the Satanic win, he reportedly said Missouri’s law “effectively deputizes doctors to preach the gospel according to the state of Missouri to pregnant women and essentially requires doctors to tell their patients, ‘If you get an abortion you’re committing murder.’”
Missouri Attorney General Josh Hawley does not appear phased by the legal setback. After the ruling came down he said, “I look forward to vigorously defending Missouri’s sensible waiting period law from this challenge by the Satanic Temple in the Missouri Supreme Court.”
Jane Doe received her abortion back in 2015 after complying with the regulations. Supporting the state’s case that the law is a sensible way to inform sometimes emotionally distraught women, this potential mother refused to listen to the fetus’s heartbeat out of a sense of “guilt and shame,” court documents assert.
Jane Doe’s lawsuit argues “the sole purpose of the law is to indoctrinate pregnant women into the belief held by some, but not all, Christians that a separate and unique human being begins at conception. Because the law does not recognize or include other beliefs, she contends that it establishes an official religion and makes clear that the state disapproves of her beliefs.”
While Missouri’s Western District Court did not necessarily side with Jane Doe or the Satanists, the unanimous opinion had this to say.
“Neither the Missouri Supreme Court nor the U.S. Supreme Court has considered whether a Booklet of this nature, an Ultrasound, an Audible Heartbeat Offer, and a seventy-two-hour Waiting Period violate the Religion Clause rights of pregnant women. Because we believe that this case raises real and substantial constitutional claims, it is within the Missouri Supreme Court’s exclusive jurisdiction…”
Missouri’s 72-hour waiting period ranks among the longest in the United States, with four other states requiring the same window. As many as 27 states have waiting periods in place before an abortion can be performed, according to the pro-abortion Guttmacher Institute.
The legal right of a woman getting an abortion is not under attack in this case. The Satanic Temple is attempting to exert influence so that women in a vulnerable state of mind do not reconsider and bring their child into the world.
All of this suggests that the Satanic Temple is less of a “religious” organization, and more of a political agitator.
~ Liberty Planet
