Virgin Mary Poster sparks anger in New Zealand

A church poster viewing a stunned Virgin Mary panting as she observes a pregnancy testing kit has sparked anger in New Zealand.

A big poster outside St Matthew's in the City, a famous Anglican church in Auckland, was intended by a marketing agency and shows Mary in the style of a classical Renaissance painting.

A caption competition on the church's website has by now drawn some disputed answers. Proposals include "Yay! I hope it's a girl," "Now, which way to the abortion clinic?" and "If I say I'm a virgin, mum and dad won't execute me."

One donor complaints: "You have crossed the limit! Mary should not be the entity of a stale campaign, whatever your good or not so good objectives."

Another criticizes the poster: "Can it be further hateful?"

St Matthew's, on a busy corner area in the centre of New Zealand's largest city, is no outsider to controversy.

A poster the church posted at Christmas two years earlier presented Mary and Joseph in bed, apparently naked after having sex, with the caption: "Poor Joseph. God was a tough act to follow." 

It aggravated such rage that it had to be taken down after being assaulted many times. 

Protecting the newly billboard, the vicar, the Rev Glynn Cardy, said: "Though the make-consider of Christmas is pleasurable, with tinsel, Santa, reindeer and carols, there are also some truths.

"It’s about a true pregnancy, a real mother and a real child.

"It’s about actual concern, bravery and hope.

"Mary was unmarried, young and poor," he said.

"She was definitely not the first woman in this circumstances or the last."

Lyndsay Freer, a spokesman for the Catholic diocese of Auckland, was unenthusiastic. "Once again, St Matthew's proves us that they have moved away from established Christianity, even if their hearts might be in the right direction," she said.

"It is sure that Christmas is genuine and celebrates a true pregnancy.

"It is also true that the concern and requires of young solo mothers today need to be deal with sympathy and care.

"But in making this point, St Matthew's overlooks the gospel account of issues nearby the pregnancy and birth of Jesus, in which Mary is not a stunned solo mother but a young woman who has given her consent and confident to God."