Mr Green, of the Christian Voice, brought a claim against the creator of “Jerry Springer: The Opera” and the Director General of the BBC (who broadcast a recorded performance) following another court’s decision not to allow a private prosecution for blasphemy to proceed.

The High Court judgment (made available yesterday) has dismissed his claim.

There have been very few cases relating to blasphemy and the theatre – with only two cases at all since 1922. However, the rules still exist, and a claim for blasphemous libel will succeed if:

• there is contemptuous, reviling, scurrilous and/or ludicrous material relating to God, Christ, the bible or the formularies of the Church of England AND
• the publication must be such as tends to endanger society as a whole, by endangering the peace, depraving public morality, shaking the fabric of society or tending to cause civil strife.

The court made it clear that the second limb of the test would not be fulfilled if only some people of particular sensibility protest.

The Theatres Act 1968 also contains a caveat:

“No person shall be proceeded against in respect of a performance of a play or anything said or done in the course of such a performance … for an offence at common law where it is of the essence of the offence that the performance or, as the case may be, what was said or done was obscene, indecent, offensive, disgusting or injurious to morality …”

The court decided that the Theatres Act 1968 prevents the prosecution sought by Mr Green (as far as the live performances were concerned). The Broadcasting Act 1990 contains an identical caveat for broadcasts, so the court also decided that the BBC could rely on this protection too.

The court accepts that even if their interpretation of the Theatres Act is incorrect, no evidence had been produced to satisfy the second limb of the definition of blasphemy set out above. The small demonstration mounted outside BBC Television centre (between 75 – 500 people) does not amount to damage to society or risk of civil strife.