Playboy magazine says it will cut ties with its publishers in Portugal following a racy Jesus-themed pictorial.
The July issue of the Portuguese Playboy edition displayed images of Jesus Christ with multiple naked women, including an image of the Christ-like character with a topless woman which was featured on the magazine’s cover. The shoot, that was meant to be a tribute to Nobel Prize-winning author Jose Saramago’s The Gospel According to Jesus Christ (an account of Christ’s life that shows him as a flawed human) has sparked backlash from Playboy execs, who say the edition’s cover was not shown to them in advance of its publication.
“We did not see or approve the cover and pictorial in the July issue of Playboy Portugal,” Theresa Hennessy, Playboy Enterprises vice president of public relations told the UK’s Daily Mail. “It is a shocking breach of our standards and we would have not allowed it to be published if we had seen it in advance.” Hennessy added that Playboy is currently ending its agreement with the Portuguese publisher.