Mississippi’s Michael Cassidy stands charged with fourth-degree criminal mischief for “vandalizing” the Satanic Temple’s display in the Iowa capitol. Well, there’s been a bunch of vandalizing going on, including that directed at a 25-foot-tall statue of a mounted Confederate general, Nathan Bedford Forrest. It stood just to the east of I-65 for us Nashville commuters to see until an art critic painted it pink, and steps toward its removal ensued. (A bust of Forrest has also been removed from the state capitol, and his remains have been displaced from a Memphis park.)
Of course, vandalism is as American as apple pie (or, as the case may be, mud pies). Gang “tags” were ubiquitous in Chicago’s Cook County (our home for 11 years). Now, down this way, we savor the serial artistry of boxcar decorators as we wait at crossings. For my seminary aesthetics course, I shot field video of graffiti on random surfaces in Boston Common, just down from the Augustus Saint-Gaudens Robert Gould Shaw Memorial, itself vandalized with cop-hating messages during the George Floyd riots. And, indifferent or oblivious to the “broken windows” theory — which proposes that unchecked vandalism prompts the breakdown of law and order — a couple of visual savants celebrated the spirit and craft of those who defaced New York’s subway cars.
Typically, vandalism gets bad press, so I was surprised to see a banner strung over the main drag of Moscow, Idaho. On a trip to the Northwest, I’d made a run to the city (with an intimidating name) to see New Saint Andrews College, where a friend served as dean. The town and school proved to be delightful. They are nested in the Palouse Region, which is just across the border from Washington State University. But there was that banner: “Welcome Back Vandals.” Was it surly, or perhaps progressive? No, as it turns out, that’s the team name for the University of Idaho, and the city was simply greeting new and returning students. (Come to think of it, even without the mascot, San Francisco and other centers of sidewalk defecation and smash-and-grab reparations-shopping might be in the market for a knockoff banner.)
So why do people deface and tear down other people’s property? It strikes me that the big messages are “Look at me! I’m somebody,” “To heck with you,” and/or “Listen up, sleepy heads!” So, what shall we make of Michael Cassidy? Well, some might say that, being a failed candidate for Congress, he was drawing attention to his political self. But he claimed different motivation: “I saw this blasphemous statue and was outraged. My conscience is held captive to the word of God, not to bureaucratic decree. And, so, I acted.” (Of course, all three impulses could be in play, and legitimately so.)
That being said, let’s examine the merits of the case.
The Satanic Temple and its Baphomet display (a “sabbatic goat” with a pentagram) are nasty, delusional phonies. Yes, the group says they’re anti-supernatural, recognizing neither God nor the Devil as actual beings, but they pitch themselves as a religion identifying with a deity. It’s like “Lutherans,” “Franciscans,” and “Mennonites” denying the existence of Martin Luther, Francis of Assisi, and Menno Simons. Just what you’d expect from a group honoring the one whom Jesus calls “a liar and the father of lies.” They’re probably sincere in disavowing Satan-worship; the point is, rather, to be so gratuitously obnoxious as to force tender legislators to toss out the Christmas trees, crèches, and menorahs in the name of fairness. But, in doing so, these “Satanists” do, indeed, serve Satan, a personage they will meet, regretfully, one day. Yes, he’s outsmarted these geniuses who’ve trifled with his name.
Ah, but they’ve clarified things for us by posting their seven tenets, explaining that they stand merely for “compassion and empathy,” “the struggle for justice,” “nobility in action and thought,” and the rectification of “any harm that might have been caused” — all of which happen to be the opposite of what Satan values. It’s like calling yourself the Church of Hitler while championing Zionism. If you want a look at the real Satan, read the Bible to get acquainted with your “adversary” who “prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour” (1 Peter 5:8). Or pick up a copy of Anton LaVey’s 1969 classic, The Satanic Bible, which celebrates Satan as the one who “represents man as just another animal,” “represents vengeance, instead of turning the other cheek,” and “represents all of the so-called sins, as they lead to physical, mental, or emotional gratification.” But, again, the point is not accuracy or candor, but rather the forging of a blunt instrument to bash Christian images from civic spaces. If they spoke “in all honesty” (not Satan’s thing), their libertine secular-humanism would be better represented by a statue of Bertrand Russell, but it wouldn’t pass as “religious” or pack the desired punch.
(Of course, it’s one thing to punch Christians and their sensitivities; it happens all the time. But let the “Satanists” take a shot at Shia Islam by erecting a statue of Sinan bin Anas, the fellow who stabbed and beheaded Husayn ibn Ali, the grandson of Mohammed. You can bet the Sunnis would abuse more than the statue. And the legislators would look for cover.)
What shall we say to “conservatives” who stand guard around Baphomet on “constitutional grounds”? As we say in the say in the South, “Bless, their hearts.” One’s a former Alliance World Fellowship pastor who, as a state representative, defends his stance, saying, “I don’t want the state evaluating and making determinations about religions. I am guided by the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution,” and “My faith is never imposed upon others, nor should it ever become a direct part of government. It is always a response to the person and work of Jesus Christ. I don’t want to mix the kingdoms! Government is a poor arbitrator of religion.” But would he apply this logic to proffered displays in honor of Shiva or Kali? Bacchus? Camazotz, the Mayan bat/death god? the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence? Isn’t at least some religious discrimination in order here?
Look, I’m sure he’s good guy with honorable impulses. But he seems to have had a cup of the extremist Kool-Aid served up in recent years by secularists and religionists alike, including evangelicals, particularly those running around with their hair on fire, horrified by the “Christian nationalism” label (a designedly vague, multi-purpose smear word). To help sort things out, let’s go to the Constitution, at Article 1, Section 7, Clause 3: “If any Bill shall not be returned by the President within ten Days (Sundays excepted) after it shall have been presented to him, the Same shall be a Law, in like Manner as if he had signed it, unless the Congress by their Adjournment prevent its Return, in which Case it shall not be a Law.” So right off, our nation was “making determinations about religions” with a measure of “faith becoming a direct part of government”: the Christian holy day (Sunday, the “Lord’s Day”) takes precedence over the Jewish Sabbath (Saturday) and the Muslim Jum’ah (Friday).
Let’s press on to the First Amendment, the part about religion: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” So, what requires us to accommodate a Satan-labeled grotesquerie in the state house? Does Iowa (and the White House) “establish” Christianity when it puts up a Christmas tree? Not if you work with the ordinary meaning of “established religion,” as in England (Anglicanism); Denmark, Iceland, Norway (Lutheranism); Saudi Arabia, Algeria, Egypt, Iran (Islam); Costa Rica, Malta, Monaco (Roman Catholicism); Israel (Judaism); Greece (Orthodoxy); and Cambodia, Myanmar, Sri Lanka (Buddhism). These faiths are established in a variety of ways, whether by tax support, appointive authority, or membership requirements for officials. In contrast, Christmas trees signify honor, not institutionalization.
On the hysterics’ model, the U.S. government could, by extension, be said to “establish” all sorts of desiderata, e.g., physical strength and vigor. We’ve established a National Council on Fitness and Health and levied “sin taxes” on cigarettes, whose packaging must bear warnings over cancer, stunted fetal growth, and lung disease. And we funded the First Lady’s “Let’s Move!” campaign (“America’s Move to Raise a Healthy Generation of Kids.”) Christianity gets none of this. We share tax exemptions with the Sierra Club, mosques, and other nonprofits, and our pastors enjoy clergy housing allowances along with rabbis and imams.
As for the “free exercise” clause, nobody is stopping Satan’s Temple from erecting a Baphomet on its property (subject to HOA strictures and zoning requirements) or in their “Legion Hall” or sanctuary. Let them mutter incantations against a local church, drink chicken blood, or howl at the moon. Just don’t ask us to put their practices and accoutrements in a place of honor. The same goes for fitness shunners. They’re perfectly free to smoke five packs a day on the couch while watching TV endlessly and wolfing down brats and shakes. When, at 350 pounds, they die of heart failure, there’s no rap sheet dogging their descent into disability.
To be sure, our special regard for theism in general and Christianity in particular extends well beyond Article 1, the First Amendment, and the Declaration of Independence (“endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights”). A brief sampling might feature reference to God in 20 state constitutions, including Iowa’s (expressing gratitude “to the Supreme Being for the blessings hitherto enjoyed, and feeling our dependence on Him for a continuation of these blessings”); Franklin Roosevelt’s endorsement in the New Testament published by the Government Printing Office and distributed to the army in 1942; and Abraham Lincoln’s Order for Sabbath Observance, which was published on November 15, 1862, and wherein he said that “he desires and enjoins the orderly observance of the Sabbath by the officers and men in the military and naval service,” and added, “The importance for man and beast of the prescribed weekly rest, the sacred rights of Christian soldiers and sailors, a becoming deference to the best sentiment of a Christian people, and a due regard for the Divine will, demand that Sunday labor in the army and navy be reduced to the measure of strict necessity.”
In their inaugural addresses, all presidents have noted respectfully the Creator, some quoting Scripture (e.g., John Quincy Adams from Psalms; Jimmy Carter from Micah), and some sounding distinctively Christian themes: “to consider a decent respect for Christianity among the best recommendations for the public service” (John Adams, who knew a thing or two about the U.S. Constitution) and “a profound reverence for the Christian religion” (William Henry Harrison).
In an 1822 report to the House of Representatives on the “Condition of the Several Indian Tribes,” President Monroe listed various missionary societies (including Baptists and Moravians) as government agents to help Seneca, Oneida, Cherokee, Chickasaw, Miami, and Osage people. Then there are commemorative stamps honoring “These Immortal Chaplains, Interfaith in Action” (1948) — a rabbi, a Catholic priest, and two Protestants who drowned together, having handed their life preservers to troops on the torpedoed S. S. Dorchester as it sank into the North Atlantic — as well as Junipero Serra, the Franciscan friar was instrumental in establishing San Diego and eight other California missions up the coast.
That earlier roll call of “establishment” nations points to a connection between core beliefs and national well-being. It takes willful blindness to suggest that a Myanmar and Algeria are as attractive to immigrants as Texas. To put it another way, we trace our national character to William Bradford and the Pilgrims who stepped onto Plymouth Rock. What if the Mayflower had been a Ming dynasty junk, an Ottoman galley, or a sea-going Sinhalese outrigger? What if those other religious orientations had predominated? Well, the answer is not puzzling. All we have to do is look to the nations of China, Turkey, and Sri Lanka. The cultural relativist might say, “So what?” I’ll simply leave him to his puzzlement.
Throughout the land, there are scores of hospitals with Judeo-Christian roots, e.g., Baptist Health of Louisville; Advocate Lutheran General in Chicagoland; Cedars-Sinai of Los Angeles; Saint Francis of Nashville; Methodist in San Antonio; and New York-Presbyterian. Furthermore, the lengthy roll of universities with Christian roots extends back to the 17th century — Harvard (Congregational) and William and Mary (Episcopalian) — and the 18th century — Yale (Congregational), Princeton (Presbyterian), Columbia (Anglican), Penn (Anglican), Brown (Baptist), Rutgers (Dutch Reformed/Calvinist), and Dartmouth (Congregational, with special missionary focus on the Indians). Of course, many of these schools have been secularized, but there’s no denying their heritage, as reflected in Harvard’s original motto, Christo et Ecclesiae (“For Christ and Church”).
Our National Anthem, “The Star Spangled Banner,” includes the words, “Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just.” And “In God is our trust” is our motto. Also, the “Battle Hymn of the Republic” features, “In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the sea, with a glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me. As He died to make men holy, let us die to make men free, while God is marching on.”
On a road trip through the basketball, baseball, and football halls of fame, I started in Springfield, Massachusetts, home of the old YMCA missionary training school. It was there that James Naismith invented the game that ultimately gave us Air Jordans, Bracketology, Hoosiers, and Yao Ming (the last the product of a Chinese government, tall-guy breeding program spurred by basketball fever, ignited by YMCA missionaries.) Entering the museum, one find Naismith’s New Testament on prominent display.
I was reminded of that exhibit when I visited the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, D.C. There, I found Harriet Tubman’s copy of Gospel Hymns No. 2, edited by P. P. Bliss and Ira Sankey, “As Used by Them in Gospel Meetings.” And speaking of abolitionists (i.e., Tubman), Frederick Douglass’ 1845 slave narrative recounted his use of the Bible in Sabbath schools to teach literacy (a complementary inversion of Massachusetts Bay Colony’s 1647 “Old Deluder Satan Law,” which established literacy schools so that children could arm themselves spiritually through Bible reading). And let me note another museum, the one devoted to the Pony Express at its starting point, St. Joseph, Missouri. It introduced me to Alexander Majors, who established that service along with Messrs. Russell and Waddell. He ensured that riders took an oath before “the Great and Living God” to eschew profanity, intoxicating liquors, quarreling, and dishonesty and that each rider was issued a special, calf-bound edition of the Bible.
All of this is to say that, from its founding, our nation has found it licit and inspiring to honor the God of the Christian faith who has revealed himself in the Old and New Testaments. And it is surpassingly irresponsible to demean this heritage. At the same time, we have refrained from dignifying tokens of the occult and demonic realms. And we don’t much like trifling with talk of the dark world. (One of my guys in the 2nd Armored Division had a real problem with wearing a patch reading “Hell on Wheels,” and I respected him for that. We need to go easy on making light of eternally transcendent, metaphysical horrors.)
So, did Michael Cassidy vandalize a display in the Iowa capitol? Having read the Oxford English Dictionary’s definition of a “vandalic” act (a deed that is “barbarously or ignorantly destructive”), I’m reluctant to say yes. Mr. Cassidy well knew that the Baphomet figure was “barbaric,” i.e., uncivilized, an affront to our nation’s guiding sentiments. So, I’ll reserve the term “vandal” for the Iowa Department of Administrative Services (DAS), which green-lighted emplacement of the demonic figure with the indulgence of the legislature and governor. I believe they acted “ignorantly,” misreading their constitutional prerogatives and obligations. And the result was barbaric, crude, and boorish. Unfortunately, we’re being conditioned to the barbaric by two presidents, whether through Biden’s raunchy guests on “pride” day, the First Lady’s creepy “Christmas” dancers, or Obama’s use of lighting to turn the White House into an obnoxious giant LGBT flag. Go ahead, raunch, creep, obnox it up, but not in our seats of government.
George Costanza’s dad introduced us to Festivus, and I think he’s opened the door to fresh alternatives. What about Skeptivus? Our nation is, indeed, indebted to individual atheists (e.g., Linus Pauling and Orson Welles), and we historically treasure our right to dissent and offend. Perhaps we could set aside a day or even a week for religious skeptics to position tasteful theme pieces in civic spaces.
How about a statue of Thomas Paine? He’s a Founding Father and an early slavery abolitionist. President Obama quoted him in his inaugural address. No, Paine wasn’t an atheist, but, as a Deist, he wrote, “I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish church, by the Roman church, by the Greek church, by the Turkish church, by the Protestant church, nor by any church that I’ve heard of. My own mind is my own church.” So there!
In his book, On Two Wings, Michael Novak argued that the combination of “humble faith and common sense” at America’s founding explains the nation’s goodness and prosperity. The Satanic Temple would have us clip the faith wing, and we have every right to resist that. Some charge that we Christians want to clip the common-sense wing through fundamentalist overreach. This is demonstrable nonsense: Esteem for natural law as well as scriptural fidelity is prevalent among believers. The real threat today is from those who would clip both wings, dismissing both the Creator and the deliverances of common sense, which is dependent upon a shared human order. (Paine wrote Common Sense, and there’s no way he could sign off on William Thomas’ competing as “Lia” in NCAA swim meets; or on condemning the use of fossil fuels; or on erasing the nation’s southern border, etc.)
As for the observance, perhaps they could go with six traits, using the keyboard set, QWERTY, as an outline since Paine and many other counter-culture scrappers were writers: Questioning, Withering, Eloquent, Radical, Transgressive, and Yeomanly. Maybe surround the statue with six decorative plates corresponding to the virtues. The problem is that Jesus himself manifested each of these in one way or context or another. Also, those who love Nativity scenes are some of the most skeptical Americans when it comes to trusting the conceits of the elites. They might well get on board with Skepticus.
What about Dustivus (or Epicurivus), a time of public celebration for metaphysical materialists who think we’re just a concatenation of physical particles and forces at play? A statue of Carl Sagan would do. Perhaps a nighttime, outdoor ceremony involving the discharge of Roman candles to a Peggy Lee recording of “Is That All There Is?” (or, of course, “Dust in the Wind” by Kansas). But maybe that’s not fair to the “Satanic” Temple crew. After all, they twice cite esteem for “justice” within their fundamental tenets; they must be a high-minded crew. So how about the statue of a blindfolded lady who is holding scales in one hand and a sword in the other, signifying impartiality in the courts. Wait! We already have those in government buildings. And Christmas tree enthusiasts long for the day when our justice system will track with this symbol.
Whew, this gets complicated. Or not, if you’re willing for the nation to fly on the two wings of humble faith and common sense. To the others, I say: Knock yourself out. But don’t try to knock tokens of respect for Christ and the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob out of our civic spaces.
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