Sometimes, some Christian groups make me embarrassed to be Christian. Witness the hypocrisy of this group.
Ian Scott of Ianism does an excellent job of chronicling the hysteria of certain Christian groups over an art installation called the Chocolate Jesus (correction: My Sweet Lord). The statue is a sculpture of the messiah in crucifix pose, naked and anatomically correct.
The idea, apparently, that God so loved humanity that he sent his only son down from heaven, to take our nature upon him, is so offensive to some Christians that the effrontery demands the highest punishment.
“Semler (a hotel owner who had intended to exhibit the sculpture —jb) said the calls included death threats over the work of artist Cosimo Cavallaro, who was described as disappointed by the decision to cancel the display.
“In this situation, the hotel couldn’t continue to be supportive because of a fear for their own safety,” Semler said.
(link)
Front and centre in this attack on the artist’s work is Bill Donahue, the President of the Catholic League For Religious and Civil Rights in the USA. As you can see from this transcript from CNN, the guy is very close to googly-eyed crazy.
C. CAVALLARO: You go to the Catholic Church, and you’re going to see statues from Michelangelo that are nude. Are you going to clothe them for the Holy Week?
[…]
DONAHUE: All right. All right, first of all, Leonardo, you’re not.
But, quite frankly, where should you have this displayed? In New Jersey is where New Yorkers put their garbage. There’s a big sanitation dump. That’s where you should put it.
Yeah, nice comeback, Donahue. Very “Christian” of you.
DONAHUE: Look, you lost. You know what? You put your middle finger at the Catholic Church, and we just broke it, didn’t we, pal?
And, later:
DONAHUE: No, I — you heard what I said. I said you’re — you’re lucky I’m not like the Taliban, because you would lose more than your head, which is why…
Funny Donahue should mention the Taliban. Indeed, this isn’t the first time Donahue’s group has made comparisons to itself and the Muslims. As Ian richly picks out, there’s an interesting, unrelated press release on the group’s website:
“If this is all it takes to anger Muslims — along with cartoons they don’t like — then we’re all in big trouble. It’s time we started asking the tough questions.”
Yeah, it’s amazing, isn’t it? How some people can be so insecure in their faith that they can sound off, send death threats and otherwise intimidate those who question the religion with a set of cartoons… or chocolate statues.
But woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye shut up the kingdom of heaven against men: for ye neither go in yourselves, neither suffer ye them that are entering to go in.
—Matthew 23:13