A Washington Post columnist has suggested that the artist behind a controversial part of the Summer Olympics opening ceremony widely viewed as mocking Christianity is a “better, truer worshiper” than his Christian critics.
WaPo sports columnist Sally Jenkins put her own spin on the controversy stemming from the Last Supper scene featuring a lesbian DJ surrounded by men in drag, a young girl, and a wardrobe malfunction in which a model’s testicle was exposed at the opening ceremonies in Paris, France, on July 26. Critics expressed particular concern about what appeared to be a depiction of the final meal Jesus Christ had with His disciples before His betrayal, arrest and crucifixion where He instituted the Eucharist.
The depiction featured lesbian Barbara Butch wearing a crown sitting at the head of the table where Jesus sat surrounded by drag queens posed around her.
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Paris Olympics spokesperson Anne Deschamps issued a half-hearted apology in response to the backlash over the display, insisting that “there was never an intention to show disrespect to any religious group” and that the purpose of the opening ceremonies was to “celebrate community tolerance.”
“We believe this ambition was achieved,” she added. “If people have taken any offence we are really sorry.”
Thomas Jolly, the artistic director for the opening ceremonies, claimed that the purpose of the choreographed scene was not to depict The Last Supper but rather portray a pagan feast that celebrated the Gods of Olympus.
Jenkins’ WaPo column rested on the premise that “the drag queen sequence” was designed to imitate “Greek pagan celebrations — not, as some Christian leaders insist, to mock Leonardo da Vinci’s ‘The Last Supper,’” referring to the artist’s painting of the events depicted in Mark 14:17-26.
“Perhaps, just perhaps, Jolly is a better, truer worshiper than his critics.” Jenkins wrote, referring to Christian critics as “the religious police.”
“Those flogging the Opening Ceremonies over one fleeting pagan tableau in a spellbinding four-hour ceremony belong to the same dry line of self-appointed judges left in the dust of history who misjudged works in their own day for not being properly venerating.”
“Why some church leaders are so often hostile to experimental art and treat it as anti-faith is an unanswerable question,” she continued. Jenkins repeatedly cited analysis from the late Presbyterian minister, writer and theologian Frederick Buechner in an attempt to demonstrate how art displays are not at odds with Christianity: “If we are to love our neighbors, Buechner preached, we first have to see them, attend to them.”
She continued: “That is all Jolly asked you to do in his spectacle: to see. All the religious police see are phantom insults.”
Favorably contrasting Jolly with Christian critics of the display, Jenkins asserted, “At the least, he did something they have failed to do: He saw faces and framed them with interest, rather than hostility.”
Jenkins concluded her column by claiming that “Critics of the Opening Ceremonies certainly have paid attention — to all the wrong things.”
Brent Leatherwood, the president of the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention, was one of several Christian leaders to express outrage about the display at the Opening Ceremonies. In a letter addressed to International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach last week, he took issue with Jolly’s assertion that his intention was to send “a message of love, a message of inclusion and not at all to divide.”
“If this is accurate, Mr. Jolly must have somehow calculated that insulting the over 2 billion Christians worldwide was going to accomplish that objective. That is ludicrous,” he stated. “How does something so grossly offensive get approval for this global sporting event?”
Leatherwood added, “These opening ceremonies fall far short of the values of the Olympics and have tarnished the reputation of the Olympic Committee.”
He identified the purpose of the Olympics as “to ‘develop harmony’ through instilling ‘a way of life based on the joy found in effort, the educational value of good example and respect for universal fundamental ethical principles.”
“Southern Baptist men and women watching these Games were highly dismayed that, once again, an event meant to inspire unity on a worldwide stage instead became an occasion to deride and marginalize Christians,” Leatherwood wrote.
Leatherwood asked the IOC to implement protocols to ensure that nothing like the controversial display appears at any other Olympics opening ceremonies in the near future, including by consulting with religious leaders before deciding to execute presentations that have any type of religious symbolism.
Ryan Foley is a reporter for The Christian Post. He can be reached at: ryan.foley@christianpost.com
