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The Idaho chapter of The Satanic Temple (TST) withdrew from a Pride Month event for families and children after other sponsors dropped out following local news reports on the temple’s intention to offer renunciations of Christian baptisms.
“We are so excited to announce that we will have a booth and be participating Coeur D’Alene’s ‘Pride in the Park’ event next Saturday, June 11th from 10am-3pm!,” Idaho TST wrote in now-deleted Facebook post reported on by NBC affiliate KOBI. “We will have merchandise for sale, be offering support to our community and performing unbaptisms for those interested! Just know, Satan loves you for you! Hail Satan!”
The “family-friendly” celebration, called “Pride in the Park,” was hosted by the North Idaho Pride Alliance (NIPA) in Coeur d’Alene on Saturday. Dozens of masked men, suspected of being tied to a White nationalist group, were arrested near the event after they were found packed in the back of a U-Haul truck.
The Satanic Temple Idaho initially joined the ACLU of Idaho, Everytown for Gun Safety, Citizens’ Climate Lobby, Ecumenical Catholic Communion Church, Idaho State Police District 1 and a local public library in sponsoring the event.
The Baphomet statue is seen in the conversion room at the Satanic Temple where a “Hell House” is being held in Salem, Massachusetts, on Oct. 8, 2019.
(Joseph Prezioso/AFP via Getty Images)
A spokesperson for NIPA told Fox News Digital that the Idaho Satanic Temple “dropped out of the event on their own accord and will not be present at Pride in the Park.”
NIPA did not immediately respond to a follow-up query asking if their organization received backlash for TST’s involvement in their event.
TST spokesperson Lucien Greaves told Fox News that TST’s Idaho congregation pulled out of the event after receiving “a high volume of threats and harassing messages regarding their involvement,” but said he heard they ultimately decided to withdraw in response to other sponsors pulling out in protest against TST being a part of it.
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Idaho Capitol building in Boise
(powerofforever via Getty Images)
“Apparently these sponsors are not willing to support the LGBTQ community if The Satanic Temple supports them too,” said Greaves. “Having sought to assist with Pride, rather than cause conflict within it, our congregation opted to pull out so as not force organizers to accept that their real dedication to inclusion would deprive them of sponsorship from spineless, opportunistic corporations that seek to purchase an unjustified image of inclusivity, so long as it appears relatively uncontroversial to the mainstream consumer.”
One of the events at “Pride in the Park” specifically promoted by TST included an offering of “unbaptisms.” According to an explanation from TST of Austin, the ritual of unbaptism aligns with the Third Tenet of The Satanic Temple, which says: “One’s body is inviolable, subject to one’s own will alone.”
Candles are seen for sale at the Satanic Temple where a “Hell House” is being held in Salem, Massachusetts, on Oct. 8, 2019.
(Joseph Prezioso/AFP via Getty Images)
Unbaptism is “an opportunity for those in the community who feel they were baptized without their consent to revoke their baptisms,” according to TST Austin. “This ritual is intended to provide bodily liberation and catharsis to those who have been subjected to unwanted religious indoctrination.”
The Catechism of the Catholic Church says baptism “is the basis of the whole Christian life, the gateway to life in the Spirit, and the door which gives access to the other sacraments.”
Baptism for a Christian symbolizes “burial into Christ’s death, from which he rises up by resurrection with him, as ‘a new creature,’” according to the catechism, which says Christians through baptism “are freed from sin and reborn as sons of God; we become members of Christ, are incorporated into the Church and made sharers in her mission.”
