When Satan ditches the shadows and strolls into the light of day, God-fearing people put aside their religious differences and band together.

That’s what happened in Maryland’s Montgomery County on June 27 when more than 1,000 protesters showed up outside a Rockwell school board meeting to make it known they are against teaching LGBT-themed lessons to elementary school children, according to The Washington Times.

The protest group included many who were self-described members of the county’s East African immigrant community who belong to the Ethiopian Orthodox Church. Others were professed Muslims. Protestant and evangelical parents and families joined the protester ranks to make it clear to all that parents should have a say in what their children learn at publicly funded schools.

The protest came in response to the introduction of six books featuring LGBT themes, one book for each grade level through the fifth grade. But that’s not what angered the protesters. They were upset that the Board of Education passed a no-opt-out policy. The policy meant that parents could do nothing to shield their children from being indoctrinated into the LGBT/Marxist ideology.

The no-opt-out policy is set to take effect during the 2023-24 academic year.

Spectator political reporter Mathew Foldi tweeted a clip of the event. “What do we want? Opt-out” “When do we want it? NOW.”

One protester, a man identified only as Desta, a priest at the Ethiopian Orthodox Church of St. Michael, told the Times, “We don’t hate anybody. Every human has rights, every human can behave any way that they want.

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“But we are taxpayers. They use our tax money for what they want. They have to use our tax money for what we want.”

Using tax money for what the taxpayers want — now that’s a novel idea.

It’s not just about LGBT-themed books. A larger concern is the discussion period that comes after the books are read. A rally organizer told the Times teachers can start sharing an “agenda” with the students during these discussions. This is not only a valid concern, it’s frightening.

How would you like it if your second-grader came home talking about transgender people marrying people of the same sex or the like? How’s a little kid supposed to process something like that?

Another protestor, Saba Asrate, mother of two elementary-aged boys, told the Times the political class pushes LGBT issues, but they don’t reflect those values in their personal lives.

“ Clinton has one child, she’s married, she’s living fancy life,” Asrate said. “George Bush has twins, they’re married, they are living a fancy life. And look at the Obamas, the same thing,” But when something negative coming out, it’s always targeted poor people.”

School boards determined to push LGBT ideology by stripping parental rights are not interested in Education. They are comprised of Marxist political ideologues who are bent on the indoctrination of your children.

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How did this happen in America? A lot of people are asking this question. Leave it to Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, a Russian who survived the Communist gulags, to say it best, “Men have forgotten God; that’s why all this has happened.” Yes, it’s getting that bad.

Solzhenitsyn blamed the forgetting of God on Marxism in his acceptance speech for the 1983 Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion. Men and women like Solzhenitsyn have been warning people about the evils of Marxism for decades.

“But the world had never before known a godlessness as organized, militarized, and tenaciously malevolent as that practiced by Marxism,” Solzhenitsyn said. “Within the philosophical system of Marx and Lenin, and at the heart of their psychology, hatred of God is the principal driving force, more fundamental than all their political and economic pretensions.”

Hatred of God would, of course, include rejecting Biblical tenets. Take, for example, Genesis 1:27, “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.” Hatred of God means a hatred of His image. This is a hatred of humanity itself. It’s satanic.

“Militant atheism is not merely incidental or marginal to Communist policy; it is not a side effect, but the central pivot,” Solzhenitsyn continued. “To achieve its diabolical ends, Communism needs to control a population devoid of religious and national feeling, and this entails the destruction of faith and nationhood.”

Whether they knew it or not, that’s what the small band of counter-protesters at the Montgomery County rally were doing as they stood waving rainbow “pride” flags and playing classic rock. They were doing their part to destroy faith in God and America.

One of the counter-protesters, John Zittrauer, a member of the Rainbow Defense Brigade, told the Times that any concern over there being inappropriate sexual content in the books was “misinformation.”

Former Board of Education member Jill Ortman-Fouch told the Times the books aren’t pushing a particular message.  “People have gay uncles who get married,” Ortman-Fouch said. “People have their own parents who get married to the same sex. That shouldn’t be offensive to people, because it’s literally the people at PTA night.”

Really? MCPS-approved titles for elementary school children include “Uncle Bobby’s Wedding” by Sarah S. Brannen, “Pride Puppy” by Robin Stevenson, “My Rainbow” by DeShanna and Trinity Neal, “Love, Violet” by Charlotte Sullivan Wild and “Born Ready: The True Story of a Boy Named Penelope” by Jodie Patterson.

Think of the discussion the woke teachers might have with young students after reading such titles. Grooming, anyone? Are you angry yet? Disgusted?

MCPS claims its no-opt-out policy falls under the county’s literacy curriculum. State law only permits parents to withhold their children from classes that teach human growth and sexuality.

A group of Muslim and Christian parents don’t agree. They believe that the books do address topics that are covered by the state’s opt-out law. They took legal action last month.

Three MCPS Board of Education members are up for re-election next year. The protesters chanted, “Vote them out.” That may be the best way to combat the godless progressives who would erase parents’ rights and replace them with a satanic totalitarianism.

If you believe in a higher power that is good and true, put aside your differences for a time and unify like the voters in Montgomery County.  Then get out and vote while you still have a voice.

This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.