Unnatural performing arts

According to Islamic beliefs, drama and dance stereotype unnatural actions and abuse artists' talents. They are merely different forms of moral laxity and idolatry. When human actors and actresses replace as living idols those ideals, emotions and aspirations which should only be enshrined in the human mind and strengthened in communal congregational worship, they create a precedent encouraging similar treatment for such idols as wealth, beauty and fertility. The decadence of modern music has encouraged the emergence of disorderly, sensuous and quite uncivilized dances which are now an integral part of the life of a large proportion of the younger generation.

We know that impious or immoral dramas are exhibited on the stage; that books and journals are written to jeer at virtue and ennoble crime; that the very arts, which were intended to give pleasure and proper recreation, have been made to minister to impurity. (Papal Writings, Exeunte Iam Anno, 25 December 1888).