Artistic freedom, religious freedom, and the sacred

Recent controversy surrounding Sydneyโ€™s Divine Playhouse has reopened an enduring and vexed question within liberal democracies: Should artistic freedom extend to the deliberate parody of religious symbols held sacred by millions of believers? Responding to performances and promotional material that appropriated Catholic imageryโ€”including references to the Eucharist and the sacrament of confessionโ€”Archbishop Anthony Fisher argued …