My Sweet Nude Lord

Oh my God.

A midtown Manhattan hotel has canceled an exhibition of a sculpture of Jesus that was scheduled to go on display during the Catholic Holy Week. The creative director of the gallery inside the hotel has resigned.

So what's the big deal? Did I mention that the sculpture was made entirely of chocolate? Is that was caused Cardinal Egan to call it "a sickening display'?

No, it couldn't be the chocolate factor, because just last August a California chocolatier discovered the image of a chocolate Virgin Mary under a vat which dripped the 2" column into the sacred shape. Employees placed rose petals and candles around the pile of drippings and prayed to it.

So we've ruled out chocolate as the offensive factor in the Jesus sculpture. Oh, did I mention that the Jesus sculpture did not have a loincloth and that his penis is anatomically correct? That must be the reason William Donahue of the Catholic League called it "one of the worst assaults on Christian sensibilities ever".

No, it couldn't be the penis factor, because once upon a time an employee of the U.S. Postal Service airbrushed the image of a baby Jesus to cover up the little saviour's penis, and that employee got in a lot of trouble and the USPS corrected the desecration and issued the stamp with the little penis intact.

So we've established the fact that Jesus has a penis and that it's OK to depict it in art. So what in Heaven's name prompted this response?

The hotel and the gallery were overrun Thursday with angry phone calls and e-mails about the exhibit. (Creative director Matt) Semler said the calls included death threats over the work of artist Cosimo Cavallaro, who was described as disappointed by the decision to cancel the display."In this situation, the hotel couldn't continue to be supportive because of a fear for their own safety," Semler said.

Death threats? For a chocolate Jesus? Maybe for a spinach Jesus, that I could understand. Yeech.

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