Since Adam and Eve, Satan has been portrayed as the personification of evil. His alter ego, the snake, successfully tempted the first couple to eat of the forbidden fruit in the Garden of Eden, which apparently was the beginning of humankind’s woes, and we have been paying for their weakness and indiscretion ever since.

Throughout history, Satan, also known as the devil, Lucifer, Beelzebub, Mephistopheles, etc., has shown up in literature - “Doctor Faustus” by Christopher Marlowe, “Inferno” by Dante, “The Devil and Daniel Webster” by Stephen Vincent Benet - and in Broadway plays - “Damn Yankees” (based on the novel “The Year the Yankees Lost the Pennant”), where in a take on the Faustian legend, Joe Hardy sells his soul to the devil in return for having the then-Washington Senators defeat the mighty Yankees.

In more recent manifestations, the devil became the catchphrase in popular culture, thanks to comedian Flip Wilson (“The devil made me do it”) and Dana Carvey as the Church Lady on Saturday Night Live (“Now, who could it be? Could it be … Satan?”)

Some Christians are not amused by these recent seemingly benign characterizations of the Antichrist, and since references to God and Jesus have been sanitized from our public schools they have become less tolerant of this lack of acknowledgment of the evil we are presumably dealing with.

All of this said, you might imagine the ruckus that was caused in ultraconservative York County last month when a parent, Samantha Groome, proposed formation of an After-School Satan Club for the elementary schools in the Northern York County School District. Groome told the board that her children were missing out on after-school activities because of a lack of secular options.

Since this district and several others in the county are affiliated with Joy El Christian, a group which offers students off-campus, faith-based activities during the school day, Groome felt that the alleged secular-based Satan Club should be approved, too. (This reminds me of what was called “released time” when I was in Summit Hill High School, and we were “released” one hour early on a Friday so we Catholics could attend catechism classes at St. Joseph’s Elementary School.)

Well, this idea in York went over like the proverbial lead balloon. The board handily defeated the proposal, 8-1, after an overflow crowd of about 300 descended on a recent board meeting to voice their displeasure. If we can’t have God/Jesus in our schools, we sure as hell are not going to invite Satan/the devil in, most of the objectors basically said.

The After-School Satan Club is a project of the Satanic Temple, which describes itself as an American political activist religious organization based in Salem, Massachusetts, (site of the infamous witch trials of the 17th century) and is sponsored by Reason Alliance, a nonprofit group created as an alternative to Christian-based after-school groups, specifically at public schools that host the Evangelical Good News Club.

Despite its name, Lucien Greaves, the group’s co-founder and spokesperson, said that the program does not teach Satanism nor does it proselytize to convert members. Instead, he said, it teaches rationalism and understanding.

Maybe I’m missing something here, but any organization that has “Satan” in its title, then professes that it has nothing to do with “Satanism” must think that we are morons. That’s like saying, “I’m a member of the Chevrolet Motor Club,” but we have nothing to do with Chevrolets or General Motors.”

The status of the Good News Club, which the After-School Satan Club hopes to neutralize, was confirmed in a 2001 U.S. Supreme Court case - Good News Club v. Milford Central School District (Milford, New York). In its decision, the court ruled that a government that operates a “limited public forum” may not discriminate against speech that takes place within that forum on the basis of the viewpoints expressed.

“It’s critical that children understand that there are multiple perspectives on all issues and that they have a choice in how they think,” Greaves said. “?‘Satan’ is just a metaphorical construct intended to represent the rejection of all forms of tyranny over the human mind,” he said.

Despite the controversy that these After-School Satan Clubs have sown, they have not had much traction, and just four exist in the United States, probably for obvious reasons.

Those who blasted the idea of such a club during the Northern York School Board meeting in Dillsburg were having none of it. Resident Paul Miller said those in favor of the proposal should be kicked out of town. “There’s no room for you here,” he said, adding that if by some fluke the group is approved, the residents need to “do something about it.”

By Bruce Frassinelli | tneditor@tnonline.com

The foregoing opinions do not necessarily reflect the views of the Editorial Board or Times News LLC.