Madonna crosses Xtians again
Madonna’s latest tour, “Confessions”, kicked off in LA last night. It included a controversial set piece in which the ageing songstress appeared nailed to a glittery crucifix.
As we all know, Christians own exclusive rights to the icon of the cross, and to the representation of crucifixion as a method of execution. So it’s hardly surprising that she has incurred the wrath of both the Church of England and the Evangelical Alliance.
A C of E spokesman asked:
Is Madonna prepared to take on everything else that goes with wearing a crown of thorns?
What, like omnipotence and permanent residence in paradise? I daresay she might be prepared to take that on.
David Muir of the Evangelical Alliance took up the old, confused refrain:
It is downright offensive. Madonna’s use of Christian imagery is an abuse and it is dangerous.
The Christian reaction to this sort of thing tends to be tempered but if the same thing was done with the imagery and iconography of other faiths the reaction would be very different.
Typically, he did not explain the reasoning behind this statement. Because he didn’t know what it was. He just thought it was a vaguely infuriating state of affairs.
(From The Daily Mail
I’m amused that David Muir thinks Madonna’s use of Christian imagery is dangerous.
What’s he expecting? Young women crucifying themselves as this summer’s fashion statement?
ROFLOL! Cool!
You know, the Japanese got there first…
If Madonna wanted to be provocative she would have her dancers shed burkas or abayas to reveal skimpy “sexually liberated†clothing. That would really piss off a few religious patriarchs. But she’s not after a fatwa (publicity is enough) so she hangs from a glittery cross. Wow that’s brave!
I’d suggest that the idea is blatantly lifted from Iain Bank’s brilliant rock-novel “Espedair Street”, where the singer Christine is raised up on a crucifix made from 2 guitars…thus infuriating the supernaturalists (one of whom takes it upon himself to shoot her for her trouble).
But it’s probably waaaaayyy older than that (my copy of E.S. is 1987).
I wonder if she’d dare try this in really skimpy, suggestive cloting, legs open, on an inverted white crescent on a green background?
Not being a fan of her “singing”, music, or pisspoor attempts at acting, I’d rather she just didn’t do it at all…
🙂
Maybe she thinks that she’s helping to promote her nonsensical Kabbalistic beliefs (sorry about the tautology), albeit it in a bizarre and deeply profitable showbiz styleee…?
i can’t stand the humourless, self-righteous old cow and her constant contrived attempts to ‘shock’.
I hope she falls off it.
It’s probably provoked the desired reaction in that bastion of christian mentalists, the u.s.
I see in a BBC update today Muir says ‘people need to find their own way of expressing their disapproval’, which to me sounds like the kind of carefully vague incitement to direct action which could be denied if something nasty happened.
Rather contradicts his (in my view) racist suggestion yesterday that other faiths could probably react and get away with it while nice Anglo Saxon Christians wouldn’t or couldn’t.
It’s a fine line, I know, but I actually think the Evangelical Alliance does the cause of rational non-belief no harm at all by pontificating about this sort of thing. And they also give us something to laugh at! (I’m no Madonna fan, incidentally, though I think she’s harmless enough in the great god-free scheme of things).
Not as good as this one though,
http://www.b3ta.com/board/5936845
[…] Madonna’s latest show, mentioned here before, has united religious leaders in Rome (BBC link). Reacting to her mock-crucifixion, which forms part of an appeal to her audience to donate to Aids charities, Father Manfredo Leone said it was: disrespectful, in bad taste and provocative […] Being raised on a cross with a crown of thorns like a modern Christ is absurd. Doing it in the cradle of Christianity comes close to blasphemy […]