Closing The Book of Daniel.(by National Broadcasting Company Inc.)

After airing just four episodes, NBC dropped its new series, The Book of Daniel, amid dismal ratings and growing protests from upset Christians. The network and its commercial sponsors were inundated with mail, telephone calls, and e-mail after the American Family Association, the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, Focus on the Family, and other Christian organizations alerted their members to the anti-Christian theme and blatant degeneracy of the program written by homosexual activist Jack Kenny.

"Having previewed the pilot and an additional episode," said Focus on the Family's Bob Waliszewski, in a January 5 press release, "I find NBC's new television show, The Book of Daniel, extremely repulsive in its portrayal of Jesus Christ and intentionally offensive in its flippant attitude toward behaviors almost universally agreed upon as unhealthy to society, morally bankrupt, and, dare I say it, sinful. Adultery. Teen sex. Involvement in a menage a trois to spice up a marriage. Homosexuality. A pastor who expects, and supports, premarital intercourse. Drug use as a sexual boost. And the list goes on and on."

But what Mr. Waliszewski found "most egregious" about the program "is its portrayal of Jesus." "On Daniel," he noted, "the Individual believed to be the Savior of the world by nearly a billion people around the globe is cast as a wimpy, white-robed visitor who cares little about evil, addictions and perversity. This Christ glosses over a teenager's sexual romps with a, 'He's a kid, let him be a kid.'"

"I doubt NBC would consider portraying a Muslim cleric or Buddhist monk in the same light," noted Waliszewski. "And rightly so.

Why? Because to do so would he mean-spirited and insensitive. But for some reason, portraying Jesus as a namby-pamby frat-boy-guru is fine."

According to the American Family Association, The Book of Daniel featured "Daniel Webster (the series' namesake, played by actor Aidan Quinn) as a drug-addicted Episcopal priest, his alcoholic wife, a very unconventional white-robed, ...