Gaga over Gaga?

Lady Gaga, apparently a pop icon of some sort, apparently also has a reputation for over the top activity in her music videos. Her most recent one has her doing variously disgusting acts with symbols of Catholicism.

That isn't surprising. One sure way to call attention to yourself is to use religious imagery in anti-religious fashion. Years ago a so-called artist made a name for himself by photographing a Crucifix in urine. In short, shocking use of religion is nothing new, and the Catholic Church, which has so much imagery, is quite easily the common victim of such abuse.

Why? Or perhaps an even better question is, why not employ the more regular use of the icons of other faiths?

For starters, other faiths, particularly non-Christian belief systems, are somehow exempt for different reasons. It is not PC to use images of Islam or Buddhism, one because people are afraid of it and the other because Buddhism seems accepted as simply a creed of peace and harmony. It is not viewed as hierarchical or tied down by theology.

But the chief reason that the Catholic Church is so often mocked so savagely is because she is not only the biggest religious institution in the Western world, but the one with the most comprehensive morality. The intellectual and cultural elite, especially, it seems, those who want to do as they please when they please (entertainers are high on that list) do not want to be told what they can and cannot do. They want to be their own judges about what is right and what is wrong.

So they belittle and disrespect in any way they can that one shining example of absolute and objective morality: the Church of Rome.

Do not confuse the priest sex abuse scandal with the teachings of Christ through his Church. The sins of an individual, any individual, are not in themselves a reflection of the espoused teachings of any given institution, let alone Catholicism. Even Catholics of rank and distinction are still human and subject to human failings. It is the rightness of Her teachings which are under attack with videos such as Ms. Gaga's.

Perhaps she is doing it simply for fame and fortune. But seeing as she already has an audience, there seems little point to mock the Church except to mock Her. That is not art. That is drivel of the worst kind: self interested behavior for no other reason than sensationalism. It is like swearing for the mere sake of swearing, and below the dignity of any human person.