This is not an antireligious artwork.
Instead, it is based on the conflict in Northern Ireland between Catholics and Protestants during the 1970s and 1980s. Specifically, it is—in the artist’s view—about how the British government used religion as a justification for killing, torturing, etc., while in reality the conflict was about civil rights. To highlight this, he placed billboards across London in the early 1980s juxtaposing the activities of the British government with the name of God.
“The campaign was essentially about the war in Northern Ireland,” says Levine. “The British press wanted to imply that it was a religious war, when it was a civil rights issue. The only reason people were designated as Catholics or Protestants was because the Protestants had control of the police. They had control of the electricity company, of the gas company. They had control of everything. Obviously, if you were a Catholic, you couldn’t get work in those areas. It might have been taken to be a religious thing, but it wasn’t.”