A Satanist Veterans Affairs employee filed a civil rights complaint over his supervisor’s joke sign that read, “Not today, Satan, not today,” claiming it was a “grotesque Christian supremacist” symbol.
The unnamed Air Force veteran, who “subscribes to many non-theistic (including Satanist) teachings,” had the case taken up by the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, whose founder agreed to file a formal complaint.
The self-described Satanists complained about an already hostile work environment at the undisclosed facility when they were invited into their supervisor’s office and saw what they considered a “Christian supremacist grotesque” sign.
It was positioned “in such a way that it was physically directed at anyone sitting in the guest chair in front of his desk,” the offended employee wrote in an email to the civil rights group.
The employee then sent a “passionate and deeply emotional email to my supervisor describing my feelings about her and that.”
The civil rights group’s founder and president, attorney Michael Weinstein, agreed to represent the employee and prepare to file a lawsuit.
He agreed because the sign was a “harmful example of trying to express a particular religious view in a situation where it was simply not justified,” Weinstein told the Christian Post.
A supervisor at a Veterans Affairs office removed her sign that read “Not today, Satan, not today” after an employee contacted a civil rights group about the decoration. Military Religious Freedom Foundation
He was scheduled to meet with a higher-ranking supervisor and a union representative, but before that could take place, the sign had already been removed after other internal meetings, Weinstein told The Post.
Senior management is also now considering “providing more cultural sensitivity awareness training, moving me to a new supervisor, and sending an apology email to my entire team,” the Satanist vet said in a thank-you email to the group.
Weinstein has since defended the civil rights group’s actions.
When asked by the religious news outlet how he responds to critics who claim he is defending devil worship, the lawyer said some people simply ignore “the full nature of Satanism.”
Attorney Michael Weinstein describes the fight to have the sign removed as a fight for religious freedom. Facebook / Mikey Weinstein, MRFF
“This is not about sacrificing children at midnight with knives,” he said, although he acknowledged that most people consider Satan to be evil.
He went on to describe the fight to have the sign removed as a fight for religious freedom.
“Our republic must be a secular democratic republic; that’s how we do it in this country,” he said.
“We don’t look at whether Satan is evil, or Jesus is evil, or Vishnu is evil, or Buddha or Yahweh. We observe the time, place and form of expression of a religious or non-religious tradition.”
“I ask people all the time [to] Remember, we are not a Christian nation, we are not a Jewish nation, we are not an Islamic nation. We are a secular democratic republic.
“And that’s why we have a separation between church and state,” Weinstein said. “Everything is time, place and manner.”
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Source: vtt.edu.vn