Church condemns bookie's plan as 'reprehensible'

The Catholic Church has said a plan by the country's largest bookmaker to take bets on a televised Easter Sunday sermon is "reprehensible".

Paddy Power bookmakers is offering odds on the length, the theme and the audience for a sermon to be delivered at St Muredach's Cathedral, Ballina, on Easter Sunday, which RTÉ will broadcast.

In 2005, the company was forced to remove a skit on Leonardo da Vinci's painting, The Last Supper, after the Advertising Standards Authority of Ireland (ASAI) received almost 100 complaints. The Advertising Standards Authority in the UK said the poster "could cause serious offence" and warned Paddy Power not to repeat it.

A Catholic Church spokesman accused the company of a publicity stunt. "Easter is the high point of the liturgical calendar and it is reprehensible that it be used in the way as suggested," said Martin Long, of the Catholic Communications Office. "It is very disappointing that the company involved is again using the Church for publicity."

Paddy Power, the company's spokesman, said: "I'm a Catholic myself and I fully respect the importance of Easter in the Catholic calendar. I think it is a little bit of fun. Some people would see it as an extra incentive to watch the Mass and maybe you could look at it from the point of view that the more people who watch the Mass the better."