The Shofar is the ancient trumpet which called the people of God to prayer, repentance, sacrifice and war.

'JESUS' PORN FILM COULD BE LICENSED

6th April 2008

The Observer has reported that film censors have invited the maker of a film showing Christ being caressed on the cross to resubmit an application in the wake of the House of Lords vote to abolish the blasphemy laws.

The British Board of Film Classification refused a licence for Visions of Ecstasy, which showed St Teresa of Avila caressing the body of Jesus in 1989 on the grounds that it was blasphemous.

Nigel Wingrove, the film's director, appealed against the UK to the European Court of Human Rights but was ruled against. The UK , said the Court, had every right to have a blasphemy law.

Now, Craig Lapper, Chief Assistance (policy) of the board's examining body, has invited Wingrove to resubmit the film for classification.  It makes one wonder whether the role of the BBFC is to adjudicate on what is sent to it, or to go scurrying around for rotting morsels in the dustbins of sleaze.

Wingrove himself is now a distributor of horror movies, and admitted that the invitation to resubmit his 19-minute pornographic shoot had come 'completely out of the blue'. He said he was 'in two minds' about whether to agree. 'People say I should put it out, but on a personal level I have reservations. If I did release it, I would need to put it into context and perhaps release a documentary to accompany it.'

Wingrove believes the board is now largely 'irrelevant' because the internet has circumvented its ability to censor, but the Observer claims that 'secular groups' will be using him as a pawn, encouraging him to seek a release licence as a way of signalling the death knell of the blasphemy law.

Terry Sanderson, the homosexual president of the National Secular Society, who lives in Ealing with its creepy Executive Director, Keith Pompous Wood, said the blasphemy law 'put into the hands of bigots a weapon to punish those who want to criticise or satirise religion. We hope that the BBFC will now give a certificate to Visions of Ecstasy as a signal to film makers that they need no longer censor themselves when exploring religious themes.'

Nevertheless, Visions of Ecstasy was never about criticism or satire of religion. Wingrove himself said: 'I was exploring areas of dark eroticism'. It was a porn film blaspheming Christ as a selling point.

Mr Wingrove's production companies have names like Purgatory Films, Gothica Films, Salvation Films and Redemption Films. Themes of sex and violence predominate in what are brazenly described as 'exploitation cinema'. Do not make the mistake of visiting his website where films with titles like Satanic Sluts, Slashers and Killer's Moon are offered. The latter, which dates from 1978, is described on the website as 'a truly nasty little film' with 'no moral restraint'. The BBFC gave it an X-certificate. This is truly another world which should not exist in a civilised nation.

PRAY: That Nigel Wingrove will not resubmit Visions of Ecstasy.  Pray for him, that his troubled soul will find rest in the Lord Jesus Christ.  He needs to know where salvation and redemption are really found.