The Vatican has released a Ukrainian activist who stole a replica of baby Jesus from St. Peter’s Square Nativity scene while topless on Christmas day.
Iana Zhdanova was freed Saturday after being seen by a Vatican prosecutor, according to the Associated Press. She has been ordered never to set foot in Vatican City or on any Vatican property outside of the city-state again.
Zhdanova reportedly had the words “God is a Woman” written on her chest when she snatched the statue from St. Peter’s Square. Vatican police swiftly arrested Zhdanova, who is a member of the feminist group FEMEN.
According to FEMEN’s website, her protest was a part of their “Massacre of the Innocents” anticlerical campaign, which criticizes “the senturies-old Vatican stance on women’s rights for own body and reproductive function.”
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