Barry Duke, the Angry Atheist

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   “The curriculum had already drawn tensions among the county’s religious parents, with some worrying about appropriateness and arguing the material…

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   As someone who produced dozens of nativity plays as a teacher and a Sunday School leader, that title ‘A Gay…

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   The defence of a Christian view never seems to be settled by debate: exchange of facts, reference to historical events.…

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   But …… Rwanda is a safe place: Parliament says so.https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2024/8/contentsSafety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Act 2024 S 2 Safety…

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UNLESS you happen to be Catholic you’re probably unaware that the RCC is celebrating Jubilee Year 2025 — “the 2,025th anniversary of the Incarnation of our Lord” — and has for its mascot a “Luce” (light), above.

In doing so it set off what might well blow into a full-scale row.

Rumblings of discontent began after it was revealed this week that the artist paid to create the mascot —Simone Legno — “is well known for his popular ‘Tokidoki’ brand but also for having produced gay pride gadgets and a line of vibrators.”

In reporting on what some are calling a “demonic” mascot because of Legno’s involvement, Newdailycompass.com asked:

Could it be that the Vatican, in commissioning Legno to do the work, did not know that it was entrusting itself to a creative designer in the field of merchandising applied to commercial brands who in his colourful portfolio also had products that could hardly be associated with the Church such as devil-shaped vibrators and rainbow unicorns?

One of Legno’s vibratators. Image via The Notice

Newdailycompass.com posed another question:

Doesn’t it cause embarrassment that gay pride events are increasingly a commercial and propaganda event with a clear anti-Catholic matrix, often displaying images that are disrespectful towards the Church, sometimes even blasphemous?

The mascot was made public on Monday during the press conference presenting the cultural events scheduled to take place in Rome before the official opening of the Jubilee and the Holy See Pavilion at Expo Osaka, and was conducted by Msgr. Rino Fisichella. He said.

Dulcis in fundo, I am pleased to present the mascot of the Jubilee and Osaka; it is Luce, created from the desire to live within pop culture, so loved by our young people. Born from the creativity of Simone Legno, Luce is the mascot that will accompany us. As you can see, she is a pilgrim depicted with the typical elements of the pilgrim … the boots soiled with earth from the road travelled; the missionary cross around her neck; the pilgrim’s staff and above all the luminous eyes, symbol of the Hope of the heart.

A writer for The Pillar, commenting on the negative responses to Luce that are gaining momentum of social platforms, told people to”chill.” The naysayers are claiming that Luce “is a symbol of everything wrong with contemporary Catholicism.”

The Church has also been accused by one site of “the public promotion of degenerate sexual vice.” It’s even been suggested that Luce is short for Lucifer.

In defending Luce, the author wrote:

Luce introduces the concept of pilgrimage in an accessible way, as an invitation that can be universally understood to take up a cross and follow after the Lord. I don’t think she’s a sign of the Church’s capitulation to modernism or crass commercialism or anything like that: I think she’s an example of the Church speaking in intelligible and approachable signs and symbols to the world as it is.

What church has every spoken in “intelligent” terms? One only has to read the garbage being pumped out by leaders of various denominations concerning the vote on assisted dying due to to place in the UK on Friday to see how completely out of touch they are with public opinion.

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