Madonna Explains the Crucifixion

Madonna's "Confessions" tour, which recently concluded, included a scene in which she sang a song while wearing a crown of thorns during a mock-crucifixion. This drew the ire of religious and conservative groups alike, even prompting one priest to phone in a bomb threat to a concert venue.

This is what Madonna has to say about the scene: "It is no different than a person wearing a cross or 'taking up the cross' as it says in the Bible…Rather, it is my plea to the audience to encourage mankind to help one another and to see the world as a unified whole. I believe in my heart that if Jesus were alive today he would be doing the same thing."

First, as I understand it at least, "taking up the cross" is meant as a metaphor for being humble, i.e. to acknowledge your faults and weaknesses. What you're doing is creating controversy in the attempt to drive up ticket sales. While I could be wrong, I'm not convinced that those are the same things.

Secondly, how exactly are you trying to "encourage mankind to help one another and to see the world as a unified whole?" Being divisive is the polar opposite of being unifying. However, perhaps, when you looked in your thesaurus, you thought that antonyms meant that things were synonyms. This is perhaps and honest mistake.

However, when you say that you think Jesus would be doing the same thing if he were alive today, I'm not sure that you truly appreciate the fact that he already did his time on the cross. If I were Jesus on earth today, I'd think that the cross would be something that I would avoid pretty heartily.

But that's me.

Links: Pic. Source.