Ohio schoolchildren can now spend part of their school day learning the teachings of the Satanic Temple through the state’s religious release program.
The temple’s Hellion Academy of Independent Learning, or HAIL, announced that it’s offering lessons once a month during school hours to students from Edgewood Elementary School in Marysville, beginning in December.
The new off-campus lessons provide an alternative to Bible study that’s offered through the religious release program and was prompted by the wishes of local parents, leaders of the Satanic Temple said.
June Everett, an ordained minister with the Satanic Temple, told WCMH Channel 4 that parents were the ones to approach her with the idea to introduce HAIL to their schools.
The requests came as parents searched for an alternative to LifeWise Academy, an Ohio-based Christian program that takes participating students out of class for 55 minutes once a week to study the Bible.
LifeWise, headquartered in Hilliard, Ohio, is active in over 170 Ohio school districts.
“We aren’t trying to shut the LifeWise Academy down, but I do think a lot of school districts don’t realize when they open the door for one religion, they open it for all of them,” Everett said.
The eyebrow-raising Satanic Temple program is not affiliated with or approved by the local school district or board members and its teachings are far from the red-horned underlord its name brings to mind.
HAIL is intended to strengthen students’ “critical thinking,” “good works in the community,” “compassion and empathy,” “self-directed learning,” and “creative expression,” according to the flier.
“We are not devil worshipers. Different Satanists across the United States will give you different answers depending on how they personally believe,” Everett told WOSU.
“But as a whole, we are non-theistic, meaning we don’t believe in any supernatural deities and that includes, you know, God or Satan.”
Leaders of LifeWise Academy, including CEO Joel Penton, said that HAIL’s program offerings are just further proof that the state legislature should pass proposed bill HB 445, which would provide “greater clarity” to the released time religious instruction programs.
“LifeWise isn’t fearful of other organizations offering [released time religious instruction],” Penton said in the statement to WOSU.
“We believe all families should have the opportunity to choose religious study during school hours and we trust parents to make the best choice for their children.”
The proposed bill would make one alteration to the existing bill permitting the programs in the first place. It aims to strike the word “may” and replace it with “shall,” thus requiring all school districts to adopt the policy that allows students to leave school for religious instruction instead of it being optional.