Stephen Green, director of evangelical group Christian Voice, has refused to join in a panel discussion with Australian comic Jim Jeffries, explaining that: “Freedom of speech doesn’t go so far as being blasphemous. This is a matter of God being gratuitously insulted. God is Almighty and beyond insult.”

How’s that again?

Heaven forbid! BBC drops ’sick and repellent’ comic

By Oliver Duff

Published: 10 August 2006

* A rather unholy row at the Edinburgh Fringe: the Australian comic Jim Jeffries has been dropped from debating in the BBC1 religious affairs show Heaven and Earth this Sunday, following a run-in with the evangelical activists Christian Voice.

They have their robes in a twist over Jeffries’ production, The Second Coming, which claims to be “his most morally bankrupt show to date” - not bad considering that his last one, Porn Idol, delivered “lashings of the most explicit and offensive punchlines of the festival”.

Jeffries, above right, was billed to join a panel discussion on blasphemy with Stephen Green, director of Christian Voice, but Green refused to engage with such a “sick, repellent man”.

“Heaven and Earth called to confirm at 11am,” Jeffries tells me. “At 11.40am they rang back to cancel. It’s stupid because I was looking forward to dropping the knob gags and having a serious debate about blasphemy. He could easily have beaten a hungover bloke on a Sunday morning.”

Green admits he “spoke to the producers”, adding: “Freedom of speech doesn’t go so far as being blasphemous. This is a matter of God being gratuitously insulted. God is Almighty and beyond insult.”

A member of the H&E production team said the change was “no big deal”.

Jeffries denies charges of blasphemy: “Jesus didn’t know he was the chosen one until he was 30. I have got a couple of months left - and as much chance as anybody.”

From http://news.independent.co.uk/people/pandora/article1218024.ece