[Vision2020] Christian billboard about God

[Ralph Nielsen]

Christian billboard about God!

1. From Australia

http://www.news.com.au/world/mary-and-joseph-post-sex-billboard- 
upsets-catholics/story-e6frfkyr-1225811281048

Billboard depicts Jesus's mother after sex
Outraged Christian groups
Creator said bilboards are 'cutting-edge'
A RISQUE billboard that depicts Jesus's mother looking dejected after  
unsatisfying sex with Joseph has given Kiwi Catholics a nasty pre- 
Christmas surprise.

The huge ad erected in downtown Auckland today shows the unhappy  
couple in bed accompanied by the slogan: "Poor Joseph. God was a hard  
act to follow".

In the fresco-style work, Joseph looks down red-faced while an  
anguished Mary looks to the heavens.

It was the brainchild of a progressive Christian church, St  
Matthew's, whose vicar Archdeacon Glynn Cardy says it was a cutting- 
edge strategy to engage non-believers.

"Progressive Christianity is distinctive in that not only does it  
articulate a clear view, it is also interested in engaging with those  
who differ," Cardy said, with the advertisement still appearing on  
their website.


"Its vision is one of robust engagement," he said.

But the city's Catholic diocese is not impressed, saying the  
implication that Mary and Joseph had just had sex was "disrespectful"  
and "offensive" to Christians.

Spokeswoman Lyndsay Freer told the New Zealand Herald it was  
particularly inappropriate given the inference was wrong.

"Our Christian tradition of 2000 years is that Mary remains a virgin  
and that Jesus is the son of God, not Joseph," she said.

But statistics show New Zealanders may need such edgy advertising to  
help spark interest in religion.

The latest 2006 Census showed that 32.2 per cent - or 1.3 million  
Kiwis - profess to have no religion, up 270,000 people on the  
previous survey.

That's significantly more than the 18.7 per cent of Australians who  
ticked the No Religion box in the same year, and higher than most  
other Western countries worldwide.

It's not surprising that a recent atheist fundraising campaign to put  
controversial "No God" posters on buses was overwhelmed with  
donations from non-God fearing Kiwis.

The organiser, Simon Fisher, collected more than double the $NZ10,000  
($8000) he needed in just two days for the ads which read: "There's  
probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life."

He said the campaign, which mimics one which ran in Britain, was  
designed to break religious taboos.

"Religion should not be a taboo subject that no one brings up at  
dinner parties," he wrote on the website www.nogod.org.nz.

"We should be discussing what we believe and why."



2. Later, from New Zealand (same web site)



Paint thrown at church's bedroom billboard



The billboard shows Joseph looking down dejectedly and Mary looking  
sad, with the caption, "Poor Joseph. God is a hard act to follow" (NZPA)



UPDATED: 4:40PM THU, 17 DEC 2009 3:24P.M.

St Matthew-in-the-City Church's controversial new billboard has  
reportedly been attacked with paint.

It is not clear at this stage who did it, or why, but 3 News is on  
the scene.

The church's archdeacon says its mischievous biblical bedroom  
billboard has provoked support and disapproval in about equal measures.
The downtown Auckland church's billboard, erected today, shows Joseph  
looking down dejectedly and Mary looking sad. Underneath is a  
caption, "Poor Joseph. God is a hard act to follow."

Archdeacon Glynn Cardy said the church had received emails and phone  
calls since it made the public aware of the billboard yesterday.
"About 50 percent said they loved it, and about 50 percent said it  
was terribly offensive," he told NZPA.
"But that's out of about 20 responses - this is New Zealand."

Archdeacon Cardy said one person had threatened to rip the billboard  
down but nothing worse had been offered up.
The billboard has already raised the wrath of the traditional values  
pressure group Family First.

"The church can have its debate on the Virgin birth and its spiritual  
significance inside the church building, but to confront children and  
families with the concept as a street billboard is completely  
irresponsible and unnecessary," Family First national director Bob  
McCoskrie said.
"The church has failed to recognise that public billboards are  
exposed to all of the public including children and families who may  
be offended by the material."

Catholic Church spokeswoman Lyndsay Freer said the image was  
inappropriate and disrespectful.
The archdeacon said the plan behind the billboard was to lampoon the  
literal interpretation of the Christmas conception story.

"What we're trying to do is to get people to think more about what  
Christmas is all about," he told NZPA.
"Is it about a spiritual male God sending down sperm so a child would  
be born, or is it about the power of love in our midst as seen in  
Jesus?"
The billboard has already raised the wrath of the traditional values  
pressure group Family First.

Archdeacon Cardy said the church had asked an advertising agency to  
come up with a few ideas in November, and that the billboard they  
chose wasn't the most radical one offered up to them.
"One of the options we turned down had a sperm coming down with the  
words `Joy To The World'."

He said the true importance of Christmas "is in the radical  
hospitality Jesus offered to the poor, the despised, women, children,  
and the sick, and says: 'this is the essence of God'. His death was a  
consequence of the offensive nature of that hospitality and his  
resurrection a symbolic vindication".

The archdeacon said St Matthew-in-the-City was at the progressive end  
of the Christian continuum, and that he believed God was "more like a  
force but not a being in any sense".
He said some fundamentalist groups and churches would not be strong  
supporters of theirs, but that there were those in the Christian  
community who supported him.

Last week a campaign by New Zealand Atheist Bus Campaign raised  
$20,000 in public donations to fund bus ads which read "There's  
probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life".
Those ads created a storm when they ran on the London Underground and  
British buses this year. Similar ads have run in the United States,  
Canada, Italy, Spain, Australia, Finland and Germany.

NZPA / 3 News



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