The temperature has been turned up in advance of Madonna's August 15th concert, and we're not just talking about the need to sport sun hats.
The Queen of Pop, whose Warsaw concert clashes with the holiday of the Assumption of the Virgin, is the focus of increasingly vocal protests for refusing to reschedule her oncoming gig.
Mass prayer sessions have been organised to inspire divine intervention, and heavyweight figures have joined in the anti-concert protests. Lech Walesa, hero of Solidarity, is amongst recent figures to speak out against the pop idol.
Madonna, raised a Catholic by her Italian father, Silvio P. Ciccone, has long courted controversy, not least in relation to her religious background. She once aped the crucifixion onstage, whilst her hit song "Like a Prayer" was littered with lewd references to carnal adventures. That said, it cannot be proven that the Queen of Pop knowingly chose to hold her concert on a feast day. She performs in Prague on the 13th, and Munich on 18th, and Warsaw is just one stop in a vast chain of concerts.
President Lech Kaczynski has himself said that it is not within his rights to cancel the concert. Meanwhile, church-going in Warsaw is markedly less frequent than in other towns and cities.
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