The Swiss Federal Supreme Court affirmed a decision by the Federal Administrative Court to refuse the registration of the sign "Madonna" as a trade mark in Switzerland (Class46 reported on the lower court's decision here).

The Supreme Court put down some guidelines for dealing with signs that may be considered offensive by a religious group:

1. it does not matter for what kind of goods and services protection is sought. It is the fact that the state should grant exclusive rights for commercial use of a sign as such that is deemed offensive, not the particular use of the sign for specific goods;
2. it is not required that a "substantial part" of the public is offended, because this would leave the religious views of minorities unprotected. Not only traditional religions, but any religion, deserves protection;
3. the view of the average adherent of the respective religion is to be considered, not, however, the views of extremely easily offended adherents of the religion (I am glad they added the qualifier, otherwise, we would have to refuse the registration of any figurative sign depicting a living thing, wouldn't we).

Considering the above, the IPO and the Federal Administrative Court had correctly assumed that the registration of the sign "Madonna" would be contrary to public morale ("sittenwidrig").

 German summary of the decision here (with link to full text).