America’s Catholic League publishes advert calling for cancellation of gay sitcom The Real O’Neals

The show is inspired by the experiences of LGBT campaigner Dan Savage who is accused of having a 'maniacal hatred of Catholicism' by the League in the New York Times

'The Real O’Neals', ABC's new sitcom about a gay teenager and his Catholic family (ABC)

America’s Catholic League has used an advertisement in the New York Times to urge the ABC television network to cancel a new sitcom based on the life of a gay activist.

The League, a campaign group which describes itself as a Catholic civil rights organisation, says its mission is to defend the Church from “slanderous assaults” in the media. It took out the ad in protest at the broadcast of The Real O’Neals, a series about a gay teenager growing up in a close-knit Catholic family in Chicago. The first episode is due to be screened on Wednesday night.

The show was inspired by the experiences of LGBT campaigner Dan Savage. An author, podcast presenter and writer of the syndicated “Savage Love” sex advice column, Mr Savage also founded the It Gets Better movement. He has long been outspoken in his criticism of the Catholic Church.

Presented as an open letter from Catholic League president Bill Donohue, the ad says Mr Savage’s “maniacal hatred of Catholicism is so strong that it would be as though David Duke were hired to produce a show about African Americans”. Duke is a former Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan, who recently endorsed Donald Trump.

Several other anti-LGBT conservative groups criticised the sitcom before it was produced, denouncing Mr Savage as an “anti-religious bigot”. Yet the show reportedly bears only a superficial resemblance to his upbringing. Mr Savage, who lives in Seattle, is an executive producer but was not involved in writing it.

In its review, the New York Post described the sitcom as “a witless collection of offensive anti-Catholic clichés.”

But The Hollywood Reporter said: “The Real O’Neals... is a story about a family whose faith is important to them, even if several of them have a complicated relationship with it, which seems like a fairly accurate representation of the way many people believe.”