TORONTO, ON, October 2, 2012 – The Catholic Civil Rights League has protested the satirizing of the Last Supper in the Sept. 28 episode of CBC’s “This Hour has 22 Minutes.” In a letter to the show’s producers, the League commented on the double standard often seen in portrayals of religious stories and caricatures.

Based on the recent news story that some fragments of an ancient parchment refer to a “wife of Jesus”, the skit presented The Last Supper, as depicted in Da Vinci’s masterpiece, interrupted several times by a woman portrayed as Jesus’ wife.  One interruption, to the elevation of the wine including the familiar words of the consecration, was greeted with “…can’t this wait, I was in the middle of something.”

In the League’s letter, Executive Director Joanne McGarry stated, “While… the discovery of a fragmentary parchment alluding to the possibility of a married Jesus was in the news recently, it’s hard to believe your writers could find no other incident in the life of Jesus where the humorous possibilities could be exploited in a non-offensive way. By instead mocking one of Christianity’s most revered Gospels, the foundation of the sacrament of Holy Eucharist, you are certainly upholding the principle that it’s okay to ridicule Christianity to a degree never contemplated for other religions.

“There have been many violent responses to anti-Islamic “entertainment”. The fact that Christians only respond with the channel changer and with words does not make offensive portrayals  acceptable. Be assured that believers, and many other fair-minded Canadians, do not appreciate their tax dollars being spent on this type of entertainment.”

Christians resigned to media bias, Catholic Register, Oct.7