US Satanic leader says after-school clubs send positive message

The Satanic Temple is waging religious battles along a variety of fronts across the United States, and its co-founder says it’s just getting started.

The three-year-old organisation is fighting to get a nearly 1.5-tonne statue of the goat-headed idol Baphomet placed on the Arkansas Capitol grounds as a counterpoint to a planned Ten Commandments monument.

Members have also proposed “After School Satan Clubs” in elementary schools from Oregon to Georgia where evangelical Christian “Good News Clubs” are operating.

And they’ve been pushing city councils from Alaska to Massachusetts to allow Satanists to give the opening prayer at public meetings — just as Christian, Jewish and other religious clerics have long done.

The Associated Press caught up with Temple co-founder Lucien Greaves as the organisation settles into its new international headquarters in a former funeral parlour in Salem, the city north of Boston infamous for its 17th-century witch trials. The organisation claims about 20 chapters and 50,000 members worldwide, including outposts in Britain, Finland, Italy and the Netherlands.

Greaves’ comments have been edited for clarity and length.