Last Friday morning, I was eagerly anticipating the Opening Ceremony of the Paris Olympic Games. I am an Olympian, having represented Ukraine as an ice dancer in 2014, and care deeply about the Olympics and all it represents. This is the first Olympics that my oldest daughter will remember, so I was particularly excited to watch the replay of the Opening Ceremony Friday evening with my husband and two kids. I even wrote an essay titled “Why I Still Watch the Olympics, and Why You Should, Too,” in which I wrote, “Yes, the Olympic movement is imperfect, but I hope that many, many little girls and boys will be watching over these coming weeks, dreaming of one day competing in the Olympics.” I could not have imagined how soon I would regret those words – at least as applied to the Opening Ceremony.
After a tussle with the NBC and Peacock apps, we succeeded in watching the first half of the Opening Ceremony. The image of athletes from around the world floating down the Seine was magnificent, and it was beautiful to hear the bells of Notre Dame ring out for the first time since the fire that nearly destroyed it. As we watched, however, we became increasingly disappointed, and even disconcerted. By the time we had to tell our three-year-old to close her eyes until further notice (unfortunately after she had already gotten a good look at a decapitated Marie Antoinette), we were nearly ready to throw in the towel. When the polyamorous threesome appeared, we called it a night.
Thank goodness we did. The following day I discovered that, after we tuned out, there had been a drag queen parody of the Last Supper. Yes, I know that many people have argued the scene featuring a rotund woman flanked by drag queens on one side of a dinner table was not an EXACT copy of the famous Leonardo DaVinci painting. I know that the choreographer of the piece has claimed he did not intend it as a representation of the Last Supper, and the Olympic organizers have issued a semi-apology denying this was their intent. Nonetheless, as an Olympian, a Catholic Christian, and a mother who had hoped to share her love of the Olympics with her young daughter, I feel deeply betrayed.
There was nothing benign about this gaffe. The most charitable interpretation is that everyone who signed off on it was so isolated in an ideological and cultural silo, they did not realize that many people would immediately connect the tableau with DaVinci’s “The Last Supper” – one of the most iconic images in the world. If so, this is not much of a defense, but rather speaks to the tragic bankruptcy and cultural illiteracy of Western elites.
Part of me wants to believe this version of events; however, it seems nearly impossible that none of the people involved in staging the Opening Ceremony noticed the resemblance to “The Last Supper.” I find it more probable that the resemblance was purposely partial in order to leave room for plausible deniability. Perhaps they thought that these days, no one takes the Last Supper seriously enough to be offended. Perhaps they truly meant to mock and offend. Whatever the reason, there is no explanation that makes this an innocent, meaningless mistake.
For Christians, any parody of the Last Supper is an offense against the God who gave His life for us. The inclusion of drag queens, who symbolize the rejection of the truth that “God created man in his own image…male and female He created them” (Gen 1:27) only made it more offensive.
The display was also offensive to Christians themselves. As one Twitter commentator put it, “There are 2.4 billion Christians on earth and apparently the Olympics wanted to declare loudly to all of them…NOT WELCOME.” I cannot imagine how the Christian athletes competing in the Paris Olympic Games must feel. Athletes don’t put themselves through years of grueling training for the sake of the spectacle that comes with every Olympics; they do it for love of sport, for the pursuit of excellence, and for the glory of victory. Still, they deserve an Opening Ceremony that is awe-inspiring, respectful, and truly inclusive of all the athletes who have devoted their lives to being there.
Obviously, non-Christians will not view the Last Supper parody as blasphemy, and they will not feel the sting of mockery in such a personal way. Nevertheless, it should outrage and concern everyone who cares about the Olympic values of “excellence, respect, and friendship,” which were so readily sacrificed in the name of “inclusion.”
The problem wasn’t just the Last Supper parody. The glorification of drag queens, polyamory, the decapitation of a Christian monarch – these are not unifying themes, and they are highly offensive to many individuals, faiths, and cultures. Until recently, they universally would have been acknowledged as inappropriate content for an event that is traditionally family-friendly and meant to inspire the next generation of Olympic enthusiasts.
The Olympics has always been more than just a sporting event. Pierre Coubertin, the father of the modern Olympic movement, believed that the Olympics could foster peace among nations. We are long past having an idealized vision of the Olympics. Even in recent years, the Games have been used to promote tyrannical regimes and ideology, and the Olympic truce is routinely ignored. Still, there is a sense that the Olympics matters, not just for athletes and sports fans, but for the world. As Fred Kempe of the Atlantic Council aptly put it in a recent article, this was supposed to be “the Olympics of hope,” showcasing the merits of democracy and providing the “something unifying” for which “the world really is longing” (in the words of IOC President Thomas Bach). There was nothing unifying about this Opening Ceremony, though. By mocking the faith of Christians around the world and allowing ideology to replace the Olympic values, the organizers also made a mockery of the Olympic spirit and the hope that this Olympics would renew the world’s faith in that spirit.
The inclusion of such controversial elements also handed an easy geopolitical win to countries eager to discredit Western democracy. Russia was barred from this Olympics, but Vladimir Putin has nonetheless won a PR gold medal, as the Opening Ceremony played into his narrative that the West has been irredeemably corrupted by an anti-Christian, anti-family, woke agenda.
Despite all these reasons for dismay, I still believe in the Olympic values and the Olympic spirit. I used to think the Olympic spirit was a cliché – until I competed in the Olympics. I am not naïve about the failings and hypocrisy within the Olympic movement. I was on the Ukrainian team at the Sochi Winter Olympics as our host, Vladimir Putin, prepared to break the Olympic truce and invade Ukraine. I also know that many Olympic athletes aren’t paragons of virtue. Yet throughout the 2014 Games, there was a tangible sense among the athletes that we were part of something greater than ourselves, and that, in dedicating ourselves to our sports, we were in some way contributing to peace and solidarity.
As long as there are athletes, coaches, and fans who believe in what the Olympic Games represent and strive to embody it, the Olympic spirit lives on. The poor decisions of the organizers cannot, in themselves, snuff out the Olympic flame. On Friday, I wrote that “despite its failings, I still think the Olympics is worth watching, and despite fallible humanity’s best efforts to quash it, the Olympic spirit lives on.” I still believe this, even if this particular Opening Ceremony was not worth watching. To be clear, I am not advocating “cancelling” the Olympic movement; to do so would be to fall prey to the same “woke” worldview that inspired this whole debacle.
My fear, however, is that if future Olympic Games continue on the trajectory set by this Opening Ceremony, the Olympic flame will cease to burn in the hearts of the men and women, boys and girls, who keep the Olympic movement alive. How can such divisive, disturbing displays inspire young people to devote themselves to athletic excellence in hopes of day marching in the Parade of Athletes? Or worse, what if these displays DO inspire them? What if boys and girls come to associate them with all they love about the Olympics and mistake absurdity, mockery, and divisiveness for excellence, respect, and friendship? I also worry that, given the cultural importance of the Olympics, this Opening Ceremony will set a precedent and normalize such displays.
If we want to keep the Olympics from succumbing to infamy or irrelevance, we must speak up now. Christian Olympians, in particular, have a responsibility to make their voices heard, but anyone who wants to preserve the Olympic movement for the next generation should protest. Doing so is not condemning the Olympics. Rather, it’s saving the Olympics, and it’s a step toward saving what is left of Western culture.