The criticism we often face that The Satanic Temple is somehow “exploiting” the First Amendment and Religious Liberty protections reveals a profound and ubiquitous ignorance of the underlying principles of pluralism, free speech, and democracy. Interrogating our authenticity and motives, as a prerequisite to our participation in public forums, or our access to public accommodations, already puts us on unequal ground as Culture War-obsessed “Christian” groups relentlessly attempt to stake their claims to power with demands for exclusive representation and accommodations that arguably have everything to do with wholly non-spiritual political interests, and without any attempt at discerning any scriptural legitimacy to their efforts. Christian Nationalism is a political tribe that appears to use “religion” as nothing more than a means of exempting itself from any rational inquiry into its demands, among other non-negligible benefits.
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