Religious satire

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Religious satire is a form of satire targeted at religion and religious practices.

[edit] Examples of religious satire and satirists

The Door magazine
The film Life of Brian by Monty Python
The film Dogma.
The play Tartuffe by Moliere.
The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams contains several examples of religious satire. The most well known is the story of how a computer was asked for "the meaning of life, the universe and everything", and came up with the answer of 42 after several million years
Job: A Comedy of Justice, a novel by Robert A. Heinlein
The Simpsons contains some examples of religious satire.
South Park has satirized Catholicism, Mormonism, Judaism, Scientology and other religions
Jerry Springer - The Opera
Voltaire
A Tale of a Tub by Jonathan Swift
The controversial Muhammad cartoons
Invisible pink unicorn:(IPU) is the goddess of a satiric parody religion aimed at theistic beliefs, which takes the form of a unicorn that is paradoxically both invisible and pink. These attributes serve to satirize the apparent contradictions in properties which some attribute to a theistic God.
The True Account is a religious text that mimics elements of several monotheistic religions, their holy books, and the nature of their beliefs.
The Flying Spaghetti Monster: (FSM) is a parody religion directed at intelligent design.
The Church of the SubGenius pokes fun at many different religions, particularly Scientology and other modern beliefs.
The Rapture Is At Hand An interactive, satirical Christian Endtimes novella.
John Safran vs God was a satirical documentary mini-series on the Australian television network SBS in 2004.

[edit] Criticism and censorship

Religious satire has been criticised by those who feel that sincerely held religious views should not be subject to ridicule^{[citation needed]}. In some cases religious satire has been censored - for example, Moliere's play Tartuffe was banned in 1664, and the film Life of Brian was initially banned in Ireland and Norway. This has lead to issues regarding the limits of freedom of speech.

This issue was hotly debated by the UK Parliament during the passing of the Religious Hatred Bill in January 2006. Critics of the original version of the Bill (such as comedian Rowan Atkinson) feared that satirists could be prosecuted, but an amendment by the House of Lords making it clear that this was not the case was passed - by just one vote.