Archbishop runs into Valentine’s Day protest about nude Venus

Oh dear. On Valentine's Day too. And as the film Fifty Shades of Grey, with its themes of domination, humiliation and bondage, took over the media. With such distraction, you would imagine it would be safe for a papal nuncio to discard his uniform, however briefly, and go for a run without anyone noticing.

Not so. As Apostolic Nuncio to Ireland, and Dean of the Diplomatic Corps, Archbishop Charles Brown found out last Saturday afternoon. He had not expected a close encounter of any kind as he set off in his runners, orange top and shorts (a shade of grey) from the nunciature on Dublin's Navan Road.

Bliss was his ignorance about what was to come. Indeed, it was also his misfortune, as the prayer vigil outside the nunciature was only scheduled to take place for an hour, between 2pm and 3pm. Had he gone for his run earlier, or later, he might well have been in the all-clear and an embarrassing St Valentine’s Day meeting of unlike minds avoided.

The purpose of the vigil at the nunciature by the We Are Church Ireland group also concerned the themes de jour: domination, humiliation and bondage.

The group, unbeknownst to Archbishop Brown, had decided to stage its prayer vigil there on Saturday afternoon to protest against the “display on the website of the Vatican-based Pontifical Council for Culture of a headless and limbless bound figure of a woman which women from over the Catholic world continue to find offensive.”

The figure is a frontal view of Venus Restored (1936) by Dada artist Man Ray. It is a plaster cast of a nude torso – no head or face, no arms and no legs – tightly bound with rope.

So, the unsuspecting Archbishop Brown arrived back from his run into a phalanx of placards proclaiming "Vatican Image of Woman. No!", alongside a picture of Venus (somewhat)Restored.

It was a shock. He did not engage. He continued past the pilgrims and into the nunciature.

Members of the group rang the nunciature bell but he did not reply. So they left him a letter to deliver to the Vatican on their behalf.

They sang Resurrection Hope, to the tune of Danny Boy, and left. Some wearing shades.