St. Paul, Minn., Jul 18, 2017 / 12:08 am (CNA/EWTN News).- A proposed Satanic monument in a city-run veterans’ park has drawn strong opposition from Catholics in Minnesota, who have led prayer rallies and spoken before the Belle Plaine City Council.
Susie Collins was among the attendees of a rosary rally in Belle Plaine’s Veterans Memorial Park to oppose the monument. She told the Minneapolis Star-Tribune that the monument “is not the message of life and love, it is the message of death and decay.”
Other critics of the monument waved signs urging passersby to reject Satan. Several dozen people attended the rally, in a city with a population of about 7,000.
The Satanic Temple, based in Salem, Mass., had proposed to place its own monument in the city park. The monument, a black cube inscribed with pentagrams with an upside-down soldier’s helmet on top, was approved by the city.
In May city officials said that the application for the monument met the criteria of city policy. It has not yet been installed.
Lucien Greaves, a co-founder the five-year-old Satanic Temple, said his organization does not believe in the supernatural but sees Satan as a “metaphorical construct” of “the ultimate rebel against tyranny.” It claims 10,000 members worldwide, the Archdiocese of St. Paul-Minneapolis’ newspaper The Catholic Spirit reports.
The group tried to organize a “Black Mass” at Harvard University in 2014 before a student group moved the event off-campus. It has created an after-school program based around its beliefs and worked to install a Satanic statue at the Oklahoma State Capitol.
A smaller group of supporters of the monument, from Minnesota’s Left Hand Path group, also demonstrated on Saturday. The group includes Satanists.
Koren Walsh, a member of the group, said the presence of the monument would show “all faiths have a voice in the city of Belle Plaine and the state of Minnesota,” the Minnesota CBS affiliate WCCO reports.
The protest of the monument was organized by the Pennsylvania-based group America Needs Fatima, a lay-run non-profit that says it promotes the message of Our Lady of Fatima.
The proposed Satanic monument adds to a previous controversy at the park concerning a two-foot-tall statue of a soldier praying over a grave marked with a cross. The Wisconsin-based Freedom from Religion Foundation had objected to the statue, which was initially put up without city approval by the Belle Plaine Veterans Club. The foundation objected that the cross on a public veterans’ memorial could create the impression that the city only cares about Christian soldiers.
According to the foundation, it aims to place its own memorial to honor non-religious service members, including “atheists in foxholes and other free-thinkers who have served their country with valor and distinction.”
The city council initially sought to remove only the cross, then removed the statue entirely in January. In April, its location in the park was then designated a free speech zone by the city council, allowing the statue to return. The city council voted to allow private organizations to place memorials featuring religious symbols in the designated area as long as they met certain requirements related to material and size.
On Monday the city council was set to debate a resolution to remove the free speech zone, and thus preventing either the praying soldier or the Satanic monument from being placed in the park.
Local Catholics had spoken out against the Satanic monument.
Father Brian Lynch, pastor of Our Lady of the Prairie Church, was joined in prayer at the park by more than 50 Catholics at the park June 3.
“Sometimes these things which are evil can really, maybe, wake some people up,” Fr. Lynch said, according to The Catholic Spirit. “We really have to take our faith seriously and live it.”
He testified against the proposed monument before the city council in early June. He cited atheistic Satanists’ use of Satan “as a symbol of the rejection of moral authorities and the constraints on human behavior these authorities teach and support.” He said they also use inverted pentagrams as a symbol “almost exclusively associated with opposition to God and goodness.”
According to Fr. Lynch, the presence of Satanic symbols would have a negative effect on the public and violate several sections of the city code, including laws against committing offenses against decency or public morals in parks or public lands.
Jason Adkins, executive director of the Minnesota Catholic Conference, said both freedom of speech and religious freedom have legitimate limits.
“With rights come responsibilities,” he said, adding that more people should be shocked by the Satanist advocacy.
“You’re invoking Satan,” he said. “Traditionally, Christians have understood that when you invoke demons, you’re cursing yourself and your community.”
Article Archive
Satanic monument in city park a really bad idea, Minn. Catholics say
Related Articles • More Articles
The spiritual shepherd of the Church in Singapore is Cardinal William Goh, archbishop since early 2013 and a cardinal since 2022. / Credit: Sean Boyce/EWTN NewsNational Catholic Register, May 3, 2024 / 06:00 am (CNA).Pope Francis recently announced his intention to travel to Southeast Asia in September to visit Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, East Timor, and Singapore. The island nation of Singapore is one of the most ethnically and religiously diverse regions in Asia and is home to about 395,000 Catholics. The small but strategically important nation also has the highest urban density in Asia but is ranked as the country with the highest quality of life. Like everywhere else, it also faces the threats of secularism and relativism and a loss of traditional values, especially a commitment to family and respect for the elderly. The spiritual shepherd of the Church in Singapore is Cardinal William Goh, archbishop since early 2013 and a cardinal since 2022. He sat down in his res...
null / Credit: ShutterstockWashington, D.C. Newsroom, May 2, 2024 / 18:20 pm (CNA).The Florida Agency for Health Care Administration (AHCA) released a pair of emergency rules that it said are aimed at combating "misinformation" and a "deeply dishonest scare campaign" by the Biden administration about the state's new six-week pro-life law. The rules, published on May 1, establish guidance for lifesaving measures and clarify that certain procedures, including treatment for ectopic pregnancies, are not considered abortion and remain legal under the Florida Heartbeat Protection Act, which went into effect on Wednesday. This comes amid significant criticism over the state's pro-life law that prohibits abortions on women after six weeks of pregnancy except for in cases of rape, incest, or when the life of the mother is in danger. The new AHCA rules further clarify those exceptions. "The agency finds there is an immediate danger to th...
Oviedo Archbishop Jesús Sanz Montes accused the government of focusing "in a biased and manipulative way on the problem of pedophilia as something attributable only to the Catholic Church." / Credit: Archdiocese of OviedoACI Prensa Staff, May 2, 2024 / 18:50 pm (CNA)."They have done it again. It is a kind of obsessive mantra every time they need a smokescreen to distract from the real problems we have and to which they so clumsily and insidiously apply their tortuous governance."That is how the archbishop of Oviedo, Jesús Sanz Montes, began a letter released this week titled "The Accusing Rattle" in which he responds to the socialist government's announcement of an exclusive plan to address sexual and power abuses committed within the Catholic Church.In the opinion of the prelate, the country's executive "has tried to focus in a biased and manipulative way on the problem of pedophilia as something attributable only to the Catholic Church, which represents an exclusive...