Political Action Group Suggests Asking Homophobic Baker to Make a Cake for Satan

Ahead of the U.S. Supreme Court case involving the Colorado Christian baker who refused to make a cake for a same-sex couple, the Salem, Massachusetts-based political action group The Satanic Temple announced a plan Tuesday for those who feel oppressed by the privileged status that religion holds over sexual orientation: Request a homophobic baker make a cake for Satan.

"Our organization has received a lot of concerned messages from people who are upset by the prospect of an environment in which the LGBTQ community are openly and legally treated as second class citizens," said TST spokesperson and co-founder, Lucien Greaves in a statement published on religion-focused blog site Patheos."The laws of the United States require that no one may discriminate by way of refusal of service against an evangelical theocrat for their religious beliefs, but the evangelical theocrat may discriminate against LGBTQ people because of who they are."

Greaves plan is to give religious freedom a taste of its own medicine.

"Because religion is a protected class, a baker may refuse service to LGBTQ people, but they may not refuse service based upon someone's religion," Greaves wrote. "If they aren't willing to make a cake for same-sex unions, let's have them make a cake to honor Satan instead."

Afraid to order a "Praise Satan" cake from a Christian baker? Don't worry. TST will happily do the honors.

"If you can't get a cake for your same-sex union," Greaves said, "we'll host a party in your honor at The Satanic Temple headquarters in Salem and order a cake that praises Satan from your offending discriminatory 'religious liberty' enthusiast."

The Satanic Temple was born as a response to the growing influence of the religious right wing in the George W. Bush era.

"The first conception was in response to George W. Bush's creation of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives," said co-founder Malcolm Jarry in a 2015 interview with The New York Times. "I thought, 'There should be some kind of counter.'�"

As the Times noted, Jarry's concept for TST "hit on the idea of starting a faith-based organization that met all the Bush administration's criteria for receiving funds, but was repugnant to them."

"Imagine if a Satanic organization applied for funds," he told The Times. "It would sink the whole program."

Since their founding, the group has been a mischievous thorn in the side of the religious right wing. In 2013, the group famously held a "pink mass" at the Mississippi gravesite of the mother of Fred Phelps, the founder of the viciously anti-LGBT hate group Westboro Baptist Church. The aim of TST's pink mass was to turn Phelps' mother "gay for all eternity."

According to the group's mission statement, The Satanic Temple aim "is to encourage benevolence and empathy among all people, reject tyrannical authority, advocate practical common sense and justice, and be directed by the human conscience to undertake noble pursuits guided by the individual will. Politically aware, Civic-minded Satanists and allies in The Satanic Temple have publicly opposed The Westboro Baptist Church, advocated on behalf of children in public school to abolish corporal punishment, applied for equal representation where religious monuments are placed on public property, provided religious exemption and legal protection against laws that unscientifically restrict women's reproductive autonomy, exposed fraudulent harmful pseudo-scientific practitioners and claims in mental health care, and applied to hold clubs along side other religious after school clubs in schools besieged by proselytizing organizations."