Roker's Rocky Faith

By Stephen M. Silverman

09/01/1998 at 12:00 AM EDT

Generally, "Today" show weatherman Al Roker is about as offensive as a bowl of Jell-O. But the portly personality -- promoting his new book about fatherhood, "Don't Make Me Stop This Car!" -- took his lumps from the 350,000-member Catholic League this week. The group has attacked Roker for remarks he has made on TV shows about how the fertility drug Pergonal, taken by his wife Deborah Roberts, is made "from the urine of menopausal nuns . . . that live in the Vatican," and that "it was cheaper to adopt a nun . . . and just have her pee in a cup." On Conan O'Brien last Tuesday, Roker said he should have recruited Sister Bertrille of "The Flying Nun." Catholic League president William Donohue issued a statement protesting "the coarseness of Al Roker's brand of humor . . . How much would it cost to rent a slave, he does not say." Confronted with Donohue's remarks by The Washington Post, Roker referred the paper to "my sixth-grade nun, Sister Manuella, who . . . can vouch for me."