Satanic Temple Sues For Right To Say ‘Hail Satan’ At City Council Meetings

Members of the Satanic Temple in Chicago are suing the city and alleging their First Amendment rights have been violated be being excluded from giving invocation at City Council meetings, Block Club Chicago first reported.

A minister from the temple tallied up the number of religious groups that gave invocations at the start of City Council meetings since the end of 2019 and found over 50 had been allowed, according to Block Club Chicago. The Satanic Temple first requested to give an invocation in December of 2019.

The Temple alleges that city officials have not acted on their request, or responded to followup inquiries.

“I think the choice to ignore me was the hope I’d just go away,” Minister of Satan Adam Vavrick told Block Club Chicago. “If we can just ignore a Satanist’s request purely because they’re a Satanist, then we never believed in equal access in the first place.”

The Satanic Temple is federally recognized as a religion, and Vavrick told Block Club Chicago it should be allowed to give invocation as such. The mission of the Satanic Temple is “to encourage benevolence and empathy, reject tyrannical authority, advocate practical common sense, oppose injustice, and undertake noble pursuits,” according to their website.

“This religion is an affirmation that you cannot touch me, because I’m happy with who I am,” Vavrick told Block Club Chicago.

Chicago Alderman Daniel La Spata told Block Club Chicago the invocation request “ceased being something I could support,” and it would be “a betrayal of my personal faith” because the invocation ends with “Hail Satan.”