Holiday Display Outside State Capitol Included a Satanic Statue - It Didn't Last Long

If your civil institutions require equal time for Jesus Christ and Satan, then your civil institutions have lost their way.

Fortunately, only a basic grasp of history—and a touch of courage—is needed for civil servants to realize that American institutions are under no obligation to accommodate evil.

According to WMUR-TV in Manchester, New Hampshire, a Satanic Temple "holiday" display at the State House in Concord was vandalized shortly after being set up on Saturday. This act revealed that the unidentified perpetrator had a clearer understanding of history and a firmer backbone than the government officials who allowed or encouraged the display.

The Satanic Temple claims to stand for values like empathy and reason.

However, as its disturbing website openly shows, its primary purpose is to promote abortion.

In other words, it operates true to form for a group bearing the name of the "father of lies."

As seen elsewhere, The Satanic Temple installed a statue of Baphomet—a goat-headed symbol of the occult—at the New Hampshire State House.

Unsurprisingly, an elected Democrat supported the display.

“I approached them as a person who cares about equal representation on public grounds for religions,” Democratic state Rep. Ellen Read stated.

On Facebook, Concord city officials revealed they felt pressured into permitting The Satanic Temple's display.

“Throughout the country, the Satanic Temple has both threatened and brought lawsuits under the First Amendment when excluded,” the City of Concord wrote.

Thus, “[u]nder the First Amendment and to avoid litigation,” the city chose to allow all holiday displays.

Concord Mayor Byron Champlin, to his credit, objected to The Satanic Temple’s underlying motives.

“I opposed the permit,” Champlin told the Boston Globe, “on the basis that the request was not made in the interest of promoting religious equity, but to drive an anti-religious political agenda leveraging the attention one can receive during this time of year.”

Within 48 hours, the statue bore “cracks across the middle and chunks of text missing.”

We owe thanks to the bold vandal for that.

Meanwhile, public officials need to understand that the First Amendment does not shield satanism. It has no bearing on Baphomet statues.

This debate also surfaced during the 2023 holiday season when The Satanic Temple presented a similar display at the Iowa Capitol.

In both cases, officials mistakenly assumed that the First Amendment mandated equal protection for these displays. In both cases, they were wrong.

“Before any man can be considered as a member of Civil Society, he must be considered as a subject of the Governour of the Universe,” wrote James Madison, the First Amendment’s author, in 1785.

Additionally, President John Adams asserted that the U.S. Constitution cannot be interpreted through purely secular lenses.

“Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious People. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other,” Adams stated in 1798.

Thus, while the Constitution safeguards anti-religious speech, it does not—and cannot—mandate equal protection for religion and satanism. For the Constitution and "Civil Society" to endure, communities must embrace the former and reject the latter.

Angry citizens, including the courageous Christian who destroyed the 2023 Iowa statue, grasp this truth far better than many public servants do.