Jesus Mary and Joseph indeed. With Christmas just around the corner, a seemingly progressive New Zealand church found the opportune time to erect the above billboard (created by M&C Saatchi) that says “Poor Joseph. God is a hard act to follow.”
Painted in the same style as the murals you’re used to seeing in churches, the ad features a sullen Joseph and a disappointed Mary under the sheets and perhaps post-coitus. According to vicar Archdeacon Glynn Cardy, whose St. Matthew-in-the-City Anglican church in Auckland has “very liberal ideas” about Christianity, the billboard is meant to challenge notions about how Christ was conceived. “This billboard is trying to lampoon and ridicule the very literal idea that God is a male and somehow this male God impregnated Mary,” Cardy tells HuffPo. “We would question the Virgin Birth in any literal sense. We would question the maleness of God in any literal sense.”
As expected, the billboard has been deemed inappropriate, disrespectful and offensive to Christians by the Catholic Church and has already been defaced (above). Still, Cardy tells the New Zealand Press Association that feedback he’s been receiving about the ad has been split down the middle. “About 50% said they loved it, and about 50% said it was terribly offensive. But that’s out of about 20 responses–this is New Zealand.” Happy holidays everyone…
Via Gawker