Bill Donohue comments on reviews of “An Act of God,” a play that opened on Broadway last night:

What’s not to like about another religion-bashing Broadway play? Studio 54, home of drug addicts, tramps, and celebrities in the 1970s, is the perfect venue for this gay-happy play starring Jim Parsons. Dressed in a white robe and red sneakers, he plays God. The script is a contemporary rewrite of the Ten Commandments. Does it work? For those perpetually frozen in their adolescence, it sure does. Here’s an example of what makes these people howl: “The reason masturbation is a sin is not that it’s intrinsically evil. It’s that every time you do it, I have to watch.”

Parsons’ God doesn’t want anyone to think that he speaks to the faithful: there is no such thing as a personal relationship with God. The Lord is a fan of separation of church and state, but what he really likes is gay sex. “Thou Shalt Not Tell Others Whom to Fornicate” was a crowd pleaser. They also roared when God described himself as “a jealous, petty, sexist, racist, mass-murdering narcissist.” And yes, God really did create Adam and Steve. He even created a gay serpent.

It is for these reasons that the Hollywood Reporter dubbed the play a “wickedly irreverent and surprisingly thoughtful anarchic comedy.” But this account is not completely accurate. NY1 also got it wrong when it said that “for the liberal-minded, it is hysterically funny.” Jokes about the Holocaust—unlike jokes about Jesus—weren’t seen as “hysterically funny” by the “liberal-minded” crowd. Moreover, the script was anything but anarchic when it balked at offending Muslims. After God says that the angel Gabriel also gave us the Koran, he comments, “That of course was the beginning of Islam, and at the request of the producers, that is the last you’ll be hearing about Islam tonight.”

To show how original the script is, there are jokes about Sarah Palin, the Kardashians, and Bruce Jenner. About the Jenner joke, the New York Times said that it “alone [was] worth the price of admission.” It doesn’t take much to make these people laugh—as long as it doesn’t touch any of their hot buttons.

Bill Donohue comments on a court hearing yesterday before a New York State judge that considered the rights of chimpanzees:

Steven M. Wise is the president of the Nonhuman Rights Project and he believes that apes should be granted identical rights to most humans. I say most humans because his expansive idea of rights does not extend to unborn children. Whether it extends to unborn apes is not known. He is, of course, a professor.

Wise was taken seriously by State Supreme Court Justice Barbara Jaffe. Too bad she didn’t question him about a comment he once made comparing his son to an ape: “I don’t see a difference between a chimpanzee and my 4 1/2 year-old son.” Having not met his son, I’ll just have to take his word for it.

Wise wants to liberate Hercules and Leo, two chimps, from Stony Brook University; they are being studied there by a researcher. He did not say whether they should be able to matriculate at Stony Brook, or whether they should be allowed to pay in-state tuition. More important, he says the chimps possess “bodily liberty.” Which begs the question: Why doesn’t a child who is living in his mother’s womb possess this right?

Curiously, the rights of the unborn are not mentioned on Wise’s website. But he is quoted elsewhere saying, “There are many reasons to support the argument that a woman should have the legal right to an abortion.”

In Wise’s mind, the Catholic Church is the enemy of human rights. He teaches, by the way, at St. Thomas Law School, a Catholic institution. So who is his champion of human rights? Peter Singer. Singer believes that it should be legal for parents to kill their disabled newborn children. He also believes that bestiality should be legal because “sex with animals does not always involve cruelty.” He is, of course, a professor (at Princeton).

I have some advice for Wise: Keep Singer away from Hercules and Leo.

Bill Donohue comments on the report released today on sexual abuse at Horace Mann School, an elite private school in New York City:

The Horace Mann sexual abuse scandal has much in common with the one in the Catholic Church: a) the abuse took place mostly between the mid-1960s and the mid-1980s b) little or nothing was done about it c) most of the abusers were gay and d) the gay role was discounted.

Horace Mann started as a co-ed elementary and secondary school but in the 1920s it became a high school for boys; girls were readmitted in 1975, after most of the abuse had occurred. The graph on p. 33 shows that sexual abuse thrived during the 1970s, the heyday of the sexual revolution.

Just as the John Jay Study on priests tried hard to deny the role of homosexuals in the scandal—despite clear evidence to the contrary—the Horace Mann report strains to slight the role of gays. For example, it says on p. 6 that the abusers were both men and women, but this is deceiving: none of the case studies involve a female and only one of the abusers had sex with a female.

Nine case studies of molesting teachers are presented, and in the account of one of them, R. Inslee Clark, another molester is identified. Of the ten molesters, nine had sex with teenage boys. Yet the gay role is never cited.

Marc Fisher is a reporter for the Washington Post and an alumnus of Horace Mann. He is quoted today saying that the school was “something of a refuge for gay teachers.” He explains that “The Seventies were a time when sexual rules fell away in New York, and some teachers took advantage of the new freedoms, often inviting boys to spend weekends at their homes….” He calls them “pedophiles.”

The “some teachers” he is talking about are gay. Fact check: High school teenage boys are not victimized by pedophiles—they are victimized by gays. It’s time to stop the cover-up.

Bill Donohue comments on remarks made today by Sen. Marco Rubio:

Sen. Rubio told Rev. Pat Robertson that anyone who supports traditional marriage is being labeled “a homophobe and a hater.” He said “the next step is to argue that the teachings of mainstream Christianity, the Catechism of the Catholic Church, is hate speech….”

Rubio does not exaggerate. As if to prove him right, he was immediately branded as “anti-gay” by People for the American Way. Mediaite also sounded the alarm.

Gay organizations and publications that routinely brand traditional marriage advocates as bigots include the Human Rights Campaign, GayStarNews, the Advocate, lgbtqnation, Towleroad, and GLAAD. Non-gay groups that do the same include Media Matters, Salon, Huffington Post, and Think Progress. The Southern Poverty Law Center is the most irresponsible: an entity that believes in marriage as a union between a man and a woman runs the risk of being called an “anti-gay hate group.”

The lunacy never ends. Last year, a traditional marriage conference at Stanford University was condemned as “anti-gay.” Moreover, just staging the event was enough to provoke warnings that it might occasion a “significant increase in suicide” among homosexuals. Two years ago, the CEO of Starbucks said that if anyone didn’t like his company’s pro-gay marriage policy, “you can sell your shares in Starbucks and buy shares in another company.” He said this while saying Starbucks wants to “embrace diversity of all kinds.” Save for diversity of thought.

Rubio is right to warn that we are getting to the point where the Catholic Catechism will be condemned by the high priests of tolerance for its alleged hate speech on sexuality. Our side needs to respond with vigor. The Gaystapo is on the move.

Contact Rubio’s presidential website: contact@marcorubio.com

Bill Donohue wrote a letter today to U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon on the refusal of the United Nations to punish sexual abuse committed by its peacekeeping missions. He wants the U.N. to either implement its “zero tolerance” policy, adopted in 2004, or to stop all proceedings against the Holy See on this issue.

To read Donohue’s letter, click here.

Bill Donohue comments on the decision by Renald Luzier, the Charlie Hebdo cartoonist known as Luz, to leave the magazine:

Luz is sure to be hailed for his courageous career poking fun at religious figures. This is twice wrong: he is a coward and a pornographer, just like his co-workers.

After the Paris murders last January, Luz was praised for his bravery: he had the guts to put Muhammad on the cover of the next edition. The kudos were undeserved. In fact, his portrayal of the Prophet was benign: it showed him weeping, saying, “All Is Forgiven.” No wonder The Independent, a London newspaper, characterized the image as a “relatively cuddly and would-be consensual character.”

This would not matter much save for what was in this same issue: it featured an obscene anti-Catholic cartoon. Even though it was not done by Luz, it’s a sure bet he gave it his blessings.

Here is how The Independent described the cartoon: “A celebrated French nun, Soeur Emmanuelle, reflects on her life. She says: ‘Down here I masturbated. In heaven, I will suck c****.'”

Of course, it takes no guts to mock Catholics. That’s because a) we don’t murder those who offend us, and b) there is a big appetite for anti-Catholic bigotry.

Poking fun at religion, including Catholicism and Islam, is fair game for satire, and those who object need to get over it. But there is nothing legitimate or funny about pornography—it is sick.

Luz is no Mel Brooks. Brooks could lampoon everyone while insulting no one. More than that, he was truly original and comedic, qualities that neither Luz nor his colleagues possess.

David Letterman’s last appearance on “The Late Show” is May 20. We’re delighted to see him exit.

Letterman’s departure is being treated by the Hollywood crowd as a signature moment in television history. But no fair-minded person could ever come to that conclusion. Quite simply, the man is an anti-Catholic bigot. If anyone doubts this to be true, click here.

If this isn’t persuasive enough, question whether Letterman would be regarded as an icon if his “jokes” had been about one of the many protected classes of people in society. This is exactly the problem: among elites, anti-Catholicism is acceptable, but bigotry aimed at others is seen as offensive.

We’re different at the Catholic League—we condemn all expressions of bigotry. That’s why we condemned the recent anti-Islamic cartoon stunt, and the pornographic Charlie Hebdo cartoons.

Letterman’s gall is limitless. Consider his obsession ridiculing predatory priests. Yet he is an admitted predator—he preyed on his female staffers. He was also involved in an extortion scandal. To top things off, his own pathologies are what drove him to secure weekly sessions with a psychiatrist.

When the hosts of the “Opie and Anthony” radio show staged an event in St. Patrick’s Cathedral in 2002—a couple had sex in the pews during the day—Letterman took the occasion to mock Catholicism again. In fact, he joked about a priest molesting an altar boy.

Letterman is no Johnny Carson, and he is no American hero. We only hope he makes good on what he told Jane Pauley yesterday, “I don’t think anybody will ever see me again.”

Contact Diane Ekeblad, CBS VP for Communications: diane.ekeblad@cbs.com

Bill Donohue comments on remarks by Louis C.K. made on the last episode of “Saturday Night Live”:

“Child molesters are very tenacious people,” Louis C.K. told the SNL audience. “They love molesting childs [sic]—it’s crazy. It’s like their favorite thing! It’s so crazy, because when you consider the risk in being a child molester…there is no worse life available to a human being than being caught a child molester. And yet they still do it. Which from—you  can only really surmise—that it must be really good.”

This “joke” didn’t go over too well with the audience. But they should have expected it—he’s gone to the same sewer before.

Five years ago Louis C.K. accused Pope Benedict XVI of molesting children. He told Jon Stewart that in his new FX show, “Louie,” he could not utter certain words, offering as an example, “I was going to say that the pope f**** boys.”

Louis C.K. needs to explain why he has child rape on his mind.

Contact his PR firm: lewis.kay@pmkbnc.com

Bill Donohue comments on remarks made by President Obama this week at Georgetown University:

Much of what President Obama said about poverty was insightful and accurate, but he made some statements that deserve a rejoinder.

President Obama clearly understands, intellectually, the need for character formation and the role that values play in accounting for social mobility. Why, then, hasn’t he promoted policies that address these issues? Because his real interest is not fighting poverty, or growing the economy, it’s fighting inequality.

Inequality can be resolved either by providing programs that allow those at the bottom to rise or developing tax schemes that punish those at the top. Obama has chosen the latter route, which explains, in part, why the poverty rate has increased during his tenure. Ironically, inequality has also increased under his watch: low interest rates, which is a signature of his administration, bolsters the equities market, making the rich richer.

Obama took the occasion to criticize Catholics and Protestants who are more concerned about abortion than poverty. Yes, Mr. President, the most fundamental civil right is the right to be born—it is not the right to eat. Just as important, the research overwhelmingly shows that  conservatives (those associated with the pro-life wing of Christianity) are more generous to the poor than liberals (the social justice wing). So his side is neither compassionate to the unborn nor charitable to the needy.

It was remarkable to hear Obama say that we should not “buy the idea that the poor will always be with us and there’s nothing we can do.” Who is the “we”? What has he done about it? He spoke throughout the conference as if he was just another one of the academics on the panel. He has been president for six-and-a-half years and there are more poor people today—they are disproportionately African American—than when he took office. Obama desperately needs a reality check.

Bill Donohue comments on a New York City advertising campaign by Viacom that is offensive to Catholics:

Viacom has long been known for its anti-Catholic fare on Comedy Central and other networks. We’ve dealt with them many times, both before and after their split with CBS. And I treasure the letters from head honcho Sumner Redstone defending bigotry as purely a free speech issue.

Now Viacom is pushing new buttons: their outdoor campaign in New York City includes a picture of a couple of gals from the Comedy Central show “Broad City” wearing an image of the Sacred Heart of Jesus; the depiction appears inside votive candles and is posted on the outside of phone booths that line city sidewalks.

I know Viacom’s first quarter ad sales are down 5 percent, and that they just laid off 264 employees in New York City, but nothing justifies ramping up their audience by exploiting Catholic iconography.

If they think we are overreacting, and that this is just fun and games, then they ought to demonstrate their much-vaunted fidelity to inclusion by posting Islamic iconography on street corners around the city.

We encourage Catholics to contact Viacom and demand that they discontinue this offensive ad campaign. For those who would like to see the ad click here.

Contact Carl Folta, Executive VP, Viacom Communications: Carl.Folta@viacom.com