A well-known art group has ruffled the Catholic Church’s feathers by portraying John Paul II as a paedophile.Artist group Surrend has once again achieved its goal of provoking the establishment through two displays on a Polish website depicting the late Pope John Paul II as a paedophile.
The webpage, placed on the vaticansex.pl website, shows an image of the late pontiff lifting the gowns of two alter boys while saying, ‘I’m against homosexuality but all for paedophilia’.
The second image is of the former pope burning in the flames of hell.
The webpage was intended to create debate over freedom of speech in the Polish elections and caused a stir in the Polish and German media.
But Iben Thranholm, spokesperson for the Catholic Church in Denmark, said he sees no correlation whatsoever between the content of the two depictions and freedom of speech.
‘Pope John Paul II wasn’t an oppressor. He was a great liberator, especially in connection with communism,’ said Thranholm. ‘It is due to his efforts that the Polish people are today free to say what they want.’
Surrend’s Jan Egesborg disagreed and pointed to a case from 2002, where a Polish newspaper editor was sentenced for writing a satirical piece prior to John Paul’s visit to Poland that year.
‘So I would say that it’s actually quite relevant,’ said Egesborg.
It is not the first time Surrend has succeeding in offending a powerful institution.
The group riled the Iranian government in December of last year after succeeding in getting an advertisement printed in one of the country’s newspapers that appeared to support Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmedinejad’s resistance to the United States. But the first letter of each line printed under Ahmedinejad’s picture spelled out ‘Swine’.
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Disclaimer
No responsibility or liability shall attach itself to either myself or to the blogspot ‘Clerical Whispers’ for any or all of the articles placed here.
The placing of an article hereupon does not necessarily imply that I agree or accept the contents of the article as being necessarily factual in theology, dogma or otherwise.
Sotto Voce