Jews, Muslims and Anglicans in protest over Pope cartoon

BY CHRISTINA FARRELL
A PROMINENT interfaith forum has attacked a forthcoming cartoon about the Pope which it describes as "Insulting and offensive" to Catholics and harmful to interfaith relations.
The letter front the Three Faiths Forum is the latest high-profile protest against Popetown, a Sirnpsons-style cartoon, scheduled to be broadcast on the digital channel BBC3 in January 2004. The programme is currently in production, but has generated outrage among Catholics.
Publicity for Popetown said the Pope will be depicted as a doddery. old man, subject to petty and infantile outbursts and cardinals as "sinister, corrupt and mysteriously wealthy".
Comedienne Ruby Wax has agreed to provide the voice of the Pontiff, who is shown bouncing around the Vatican on a pogo stick. Jerry Hall. model and actress, provides the voice for a media-obsessed nun.
The Three Faiths Forum, represented by founder Sir Sigmund Sternberg, of the Jewish community, Dr Zaki Badawi, of the Muslim College, and the Anglican
priest, Rev Marcus Braybrooke, wrote to Greg Dyke, director-general of the BBC, in June this year to request that the programme is cancelled.
The three men said they wanted to bring "understanding and respect" to the three Abrahainic monotheistic faiths. "Now more than ever, blatant attacks on any faith cannot be acceptable," they said.
The BBC has defended its decision to commission the programme from CHX Productions, in conjunction with the French production company Moi J'Aime La Television, insisting that it is lighthearted and in a similar vein to Channel 4's suc
cessful Father Ted series, which poked fun at Catholic clergy. A spokesman described the programme as an "office comedy that happens to be set in the Vatican". The corporation said it had received several hundred complaints, but The Catholic Herald learned this week that a national petition against Popetown
has gathered 24,000 signatures and more signatures are still being received.
Kathy Goble, from the Centre for Peace in Ilford, Essex, has helped to coordinate the national protest. Mrs Goble told the Catholic News Network that she had received hundreds of letters from people opposed to Poperown. She said the programme was an
insult to John Paul II. "He is one of the only leaders in the world who has the courage at a time like this to stand up, tell the truth and talk about peace," she said.
A spokesman for the Catholic Church in England and Wales said "high-level discussions" were now underway with the corporation, but he declined to be drawn on whether the BBC is considering pulling the programme.
"At the moment we are speaking to the BBC about this at relatively high levels. There are several ways of effecting change. One is to go down the public route and the other is to use internal channels,he said.
Letter: Page 9 Media Matter: Page 10