Florida Isn’t Passing Out Satanic Coloring Books—Yet

Florida kids will have to wait for devilish activity book.

The Satanic Children’s Big Book of Activities, now available in public schools in Orange County, Florida. Photo: the Satanic Temple.

Although reports that Florida’s Orange County school district has granted Satanists permission to distribute coloring books (see “Satanic Coloring Books Distributed at Florida Public Schools“) have triggered online protests, the reports are in fact premature. So far, the Satanic Temple has not approached the school for permission to pass out The Satanic Children’s Big Book of Activities, reports the Orlando Sentinel.

Nevertheless, the story has gained traction in the Catholic community. Robert Ritchie, executive director of the Pennsylvania-based America Needs Fatima—a Catholic organization dedicated to the “Defense of Tradition, Family, and Property,”—has responded with a furious email campaign, posting on his blog that “we must not turn away and surrender our school children to the Satanists!”

School board chairman Bill Sublette and vice chair Kat Gordon have received 8,150 email messages from Ritchie and his followers urging them to save the children and cease the distribution of said coloring books—which, as it turns out, haven’t even been printed, let alone handed out.

This seems similar to the furor over the Satanic Temple’s planned Oklahoma Statehouse Baphomet statue (see “Satanic Temple Monument Almost Ready for Oklahoma Statehouse“), which only exists in maquette form, and has not been acknowledged by the state government. (Oklahoma is not allowing any new statues to be installed until the controversy over a Ten Commandments monument has been resolved.)

According to district counsel Woody Rodriguez, the Satanic Temple has not yet made a formal request regarding the coloring book, and any materials would have to be reviewed and approved by the district before being given to the children. Sublette, for his part, is in favor of risking future law suits by banning the distribution of all religious materials from outside groups at Orange County schools (the current controversy was triggered after another group was allowed to give Bibles out at local high schools).


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