Harvard University students have “reimagined” the story of Jesus Christ and one of his disciples as a “heretical gaysian (gay, Asian) love story,” in a new play premiering this week.
“Iscariot is a queer, Asian American, heretical revisionist history about Judas Iscariot,” according to a description on the book author, Sofie Kim’s, website.
“Jesus and Judas are high school seniors at a fancy high school in Hollywood. They are both kind of outsiders in the preppy club of the Disciples. They team up to win prom king and then shenanigans ensue. There’s a betrayal. There’s a crucifixion,” Kim told the student newspaper, The Harvard Crimson.
Students said the play is less about the Biblical account and more about Asian American identity and a “universal” story of self-worth and empowerment.
The play’s message is “for anybody who wants to find themselves” a member of the production team explained.
Kim described the play as a mashup of Broadway musicals “Wicked” and “Jesus Christ Superstar” with “High School Musical.”
Maddie Sebastian who portrays Judas, told The Crimson the play wasn’t anti-religion, despite its controversial theme.
“The message of the show is not that religion sucks, or that God isn’t real, or Jesus isn’t real. We’re not saying any of that. It is merely just a retelling of a work of literary merit,” Sebastian stated.
Harvard did not respond to requests for comment from Fox News Digital.
The Supreme Court heard oral arguments earlier this year on a case involving Harvard’s race-based admissions process, which some say discriminates against Asian-Americans.
Harvard has also attracted attention in recent years over its progressive views on Christianity.
Last year the school appointed an atheist as its head chaplain, Fox News reported.
“We don’t look to a god for answers,” Greg Epstein, Harvard’s chief chaplain told The New York Times at the time. “We are each other’s answers.”
In 2016, Harvard refused to pull an article it published from one of its scholars in 2014 claiming that Jesus “had a wife,” even after the scholar’s source admitted their evidence was a forgery.
* Article from: Fox News