Offensive Last Supper Ad Banned by Churches in France

The Catholic Church in France has won a ruling in the Court yesterday to ban an "offensive" advertising poster, which is based on Leonardo da Vinci's famous painting of Christ's Last Supper. This is the second time the poster has been banned in Europe after the Italian city of Milan in February rejected to use it as a parody of a key event in Christian history.

The advertisement from the leading French fashion house, Marithe and Francois Girbaud, shows women in chic casual clothes seated at the table of the Last Supper in postures. To the right of the Christ figure in the poster, a woman embraces a shirtless man in jeans.

Reuters reported that an association called Beliefs and Freedoms, which was created by the French bishops' conference in 1996, complained against the poster. In a statement, it stated that the poster did "great injury to Catholics because it represents the Last Supper in denigrating conditions."

The representative lawyer of the Catholic association, Thierry Massis told the court the advertisement was deeply hurtful to Catholics.

"When you trivialise the founding acts of a religion, when you touch on sacred things, you create an unbearable moral violence which is a danger to our children. Tomorrow Christ on the cross will be selling socks," he said.

Judge Jean-Claude Magendie ruled yesterday that display of the ad posters in public was "a gratuitous and aggressive act of intrusion on people's innermost beliefs", quoted by the Australian newspaper.

"The offence done to Catholics far outweighs the desired commercial goal," he added, despite the fashion company arguing that the poster was just a photograph based on a painting, not on the bible and that caused no harm to Catholic religion.

Currently, the Paris Court have ordered the French fashion house to take down the posters within three days.

Da Vinci's famous painting - the Last Supper - depicts Christ's farewell to his disciples as recorded in the Gospel. In 1495, Leonardo Da Vinci began painting the Last Supper on the wall of the refectory (dining hall) of Santa Maria delle Grazie in Milan, Italy, and completed it in 1498. This church has now become a very famous tourist point.

Controversy over the clash between the increasingly secularised society and historical religious traditions was raised by the defence lawyer in the case. Reuters reported that the lawyer asked why the Church took legal action against the painting which is not designed to attack the Catholic faith at all, while doing nothing against the best-selling novel The Da Vinci Code by US author Dan Brown.

The international best-seller, argues against Christian teaching, and incorporates controversial and sensitive issues, such as that Jesus was married to his follower Mary Magdelene and that the Church had conspired for centuries to hide this.

In recent years, many similar cases of alleged blasphemy against religions were seen in Europe. The Australia newspaper cited that the Catholic Church reacted with anger to a poster for the film Amen by Constantin Costa-Gavras, which showed a cross whose branches turned into Nazi swastikas three years ago.