Better view?

Daniel Vitz sent me a link to a news story that is making the rounds around St. Blogs. Rich Lugari also posted on this.

Famiglia Cristiana, Italy’s best selling Catholic weekly raised more than a few eyebrows when it chose to run an ad which featured the image of a woman’s bottom through a slightly steamed glass door.

The advertisement was for bathroom ventilators, so I would imagine the underlying message was simply, “if you would like a better view of this, buy our ventilators.”

Famiglia Cristiana's director, Don Antonio Sciortino, appeared extremely impatient with all the attention that his magazine was receiving just because of an advert.

"People are making a big thing out of this when really it doesn't merit it. We haven't breached a taboo or reversed our policy. I don't think a female figure behind dirty, steamed up glass can cause particular agitation," he said. He admitted that the advert was on the borderline of what his magazine would publish and said a few subscribers might be slightly bothered by it. "If so we'll start a debate among readers," he added.

The story is here with a picture from the ad.

My take on this is that it is actually a subtle rebuke on some Protestant's concept of the rapture. That not only is there a "left behind", but a "right behind" also; you don't want to go off half-assed. As so frequently happens in Catholic discourse is is not either/or, but both/and so it is not just the "left behind", but the right also. Sometimes we need to get to the bottom of theology just as long as we are not too cheeky or become asinine.