Friday, December 18, 2009

Rated X-tianity.

Well, this seems like as appropriate a season as any.

HuffPo reports of a billboard in New Zealand featuring Joseph and Mary in a rather...compromising position which has had devout Xtians Christians up in arms.



Okay, so this is supposed to be...sacrilegious.

WELLINGTON, New Zealand — A billboard at a New Zealand church depicting a downcast Joseph lying beside Mary in bed and the heading "God is a hard act to follow" provoked more than the intended reconsideration of the meaning of Christmas.

The sign was defaced by a paint-wielding vandal just hours after it was erected Thursday outside the St. Matthew-in-the-City Anglican church in Auckland, and triggered passionate and sometimes angry debate on talk radio and the Internet.

The billboard was commissioned by the church and was the work of  M&C Saatchi.  According to the HuffPo story:

Church vicar Archdeacon Glynn Cardy said the billboard was intended to challenge stereotypes about the way Jesus was conceived and get people talking about the Christmas story.

"This billboard is trying to lampoon and ridicule the very literal idea that God is a male and somehow this male God impregnated Mary," said Cardy, who described his church as having very liberal ideas about Christianity.

"We would question the Virgin Birth in any literal sense. We would question the maleness of God in any literal sense," he said.

On the opposing side, Auckland Catholic Diocese spokesperson Lyndsay Freer said

"...the billboard implied the Virgin Mary and Joseph had just had sex and was inappropriate, disrespectful and offensive to Christians.

'We would see a billboard like that being used by an anti-Christian group to actually poke fun at the divinity of Christ,' Freer told National Radio."

Strictly as an ad man, I consider the billboard in bad taste. A cheap shot, a lazy execution, even though it got a chuckle out of me. Then again, Kiwis - like their Aussie neighbors - have always struck me as having a refreshingly irreverent sense of humor. Be that as it may, while the offending billboard certainly has generated attention and interest, I'm unsure if it was the kind the church was aiming for. Judging by the response thus far, instead of thought it seems to have provoked anger instead. Way to lose your target audience, Saatchi.



But what do you call throwing brown paint over an image of the BVM, then?

Mmm I wonder if these guys ever surfed LOLJesus. They only have 30 piddling entries in their Hate Mail section as of presstime. Whatever stripe of Christian you are, you just gotta love their tagline: Dedicated to Damnation. That's as truthful a disclaimer as there ever was.

However, if you value your eternal soul, maybe you better not click on that link. Just stick with seancody or xtube or chat away on mIRC. These fine alternative sites are supposed to roast you in hellfire forever and ever the same way, anyhow - but with less LOLs and more tiKOLs.

In the meantime, I look forward to your knee-jerk reactions the same way I am looking forward to my family Christmas reunion tomorrow. Because if ever there is a hell, that annual event comes closest to it.

12 comments:

  1. I visited LolJesus.com and I think that it is more offending and not good to my soul than watching porns in redtube, xtube, youporngay, etc.. how weird it that? Haha.

    I still don't get what's the church agenda about the billboard.

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  2. @ Ternie : The internet's meat-packing district is still alive. Only its denizens are dead - in the head.

    @ JayPee : LOLJesus' biggest sin is that it's not even that funny. Regarding the "church," which church are you referring to? The Anglican church that commissioned the billboard, or the Catholic church that condemns it?

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  3. ah basta... if you want heaven... come to me... blep... :)

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  4. the church looks familiar, i think i've been there last year. hmmm.

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  5. Irreverence is one of the hardest and trickiest types of humor to pull off because of the high degree of probability that you'll tick a group of people off. And depending on your execution, those same people may not even realize that you're joking; or if they do, they still are offended anyway. But all of that comes with the territory.

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  6. @ Yj: And I suppose you'll give us rest, eh? :P

    @ gillboard : Let's hope no one burns it down in the name of the Lord.

    @ joelmcvie : Well-said, Joel. As your profile says: "Dying is easy. Comedy is hard."

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  7. awesome. what a good way to start my morning, (yes i just woke up) Sean cody and Xtube. you're a lifesaver! LOL

    speaking of kiwis, i find them weird. especially their accent. y'know. they're just those people who lives right next door who clearly doesnt know good humor.

    i love you for having LOLJESUS up there. and please, everybody knows that Abstinence is only 99.99% effective. Ask the virgin mary!

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  8. we can never can tell. lots of secrets were untold in the bible.

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  9. @ Herbs D.: Don't forget your morning RandyBlue.com. As for abstinence, doesn't it make the heart grow fonder? Oh wait. That was "absence." Abstinence merely makes one cranky.

    @ Ming Meows : I'm glad to hear that. If only more Christians didn't take the "gospel truths" so literally, the Bible can be a fascinating read. Especially the OT. All that intrigue! Sex! Lies! Murder! Incest! It's positively scandalous.

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  10. not on abstinence LOL. parang drug lang eh no? :-p

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  11. @ Herbs D: As far as I can recall, abstinence is only a Lenten kinda thang :P

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