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Writer's picturePaul Coulter
Aug 110 min read

Olympics Open Ceremony: What is happening to the West?


The title for this article is not mine. I received it as a message from an in-law in

Malaysia, together with a link to a video entitled, ‘What Happened at Olympics 2024

will SHOCK YOU!’. I suspect my relative-by-marriage is typical of many people in the

majority world who will have found the Opening Ceremony in Paris 2024 confusing

and disturbing.


The video my in-law sent is an 11-minute commentary by a Christian on the Olympic

Opening Ceremony which described it as a “Luciferian Ritual”. I must be honest, I

was unconvinced by most of the video’s supposed evidence of Satanism. It

suggested that carrying a flaming torch is intrinsically satanic and that a silver horse

leading a procession of flags represented the pale horse ridden by Death in

Revelation 6:8. Such claims seem dubious at best to me – the results of reading our

own suspicions into what we see. The video also suggested that a golden bull’s head

and calf behind a choir must depict the golden calf worshipped by Israel at Sinai and

that the Eiffel Tower represented the Tower of Babel. If these are evidence of Lucifer

worship, the blame lies not with the Olympics but those who designed them as

permanent features of the Parisian streetscape much earlier.


One claim in the video seemed less tenuous than these others and has caught

widespread media attention. The claim is that a scene in the Ceremony intentionally

mocked Christianity. The scene in question involved a line-up of people in bold

costumes, including drag queens, LGBTQIA+ activists and people identifying as

‘transgender’ posing behind a table on which the comedian Philippe Katerine,

almost-naked and painted blue, sat amidst flowers. Some viewers quickly suggested

on social media that this scene was based on Leonardo Da Vinci’s famous painting,

‘The Last Supper’, replacing Jesus at the centre with DJ and LGBTQ+ activist

Barbara Butch and his disciples with an assortment of gender-queer persons.


The following day, French Roman Catholic bishops issued a statement complaining

that the Opening Ceremony included, “scenes of derision and mockery of

Christianity, which we deeply deplore".[i] They were joined by complaints on social

media from numerous leaders of other Christian churches and organisations. Some

leaders of the political right, including Italy’s deputy prime minister Matteo Alvini,

Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, and US presidential hopeful Donald Trump,

also expressed their outrage.[ii][iii]


The organisers of the Paris Olympic Games responded to these accusations with a

classic ‘non-apology’: [iv]


Clearly there was never an intention to show disrespect to any religious group.

(The opening ceremony) tried to celebrate community tolerance. We believe this

ambition was achieved. If people have taken any offence, we are really sorry.


When Ceremony’s artistic director, Thomas Jolly, was asked to comment, he

expressed his surprise that Christians had been offended and said no offense had

been intended. He insisted that the disputed scene depicted the gods of Olympus

feasting as an homage to French gastronomy and a celebration of diversity. Jolly

said:[v]


Our idea was inclusion. Naturally, when we want to include everyone and not

exclude anyone questions are raised. Our subject was not to be subversive. We

never wanted to be subversive. We wanted to talk about diversity. Diversity

means being together. We wanted to include everybody.


By now, however, the social media storm had spread in unpleasant directions.

Barbara Butch’s lawyer reported that she had been targeted by, “an extremely

violent campaign of cyber-harassment and defamation”,[vi] in response to which she

planned to lodge legal complaints. Meanwhile, in relation to this specific section of

the Opening Ceremony, some Jewish outlets reported antisemitic social media

trolling, apparently drawing on false claims that Jolly is Jewish and the fact that

Butch is.[vii]


What are Christians to make of this social media conflagration and of the Opening

Ceremony that sparked it?


We must ask, first, whether Christians were right to think the scene mocked their

faith.


I believe the answer is, ‘No’.


Social media posts comparing the scene with Da Vinci’s painting showed Barbara

Butch with six people on one side of the table and five on the other. This is one short

of the number at the table in ‘The Last supper’, which shows Jesus with six apostles

on each side. The poses in the Opening Ceremony tableau, meanwhile, are not the

same as those in the painting. Most importantly, the image from Paris has been

cropped to make it resemble the painting more closely. In fact, many more people

lined up behind Katerine.


Katerine’s blue character, who is missing from the image used in the comparison,

but who was central to the scene in the Ceremony, has no parallel in Da Vinci’s

painting. Jolly says he was representing Dionysus, the Greek god of wine. This

identification can hardly be disputed. Dionysus is not normally (perhaps never) blue,

but the flowers around him evoke a Bacchanalia – a festival named for Dionysus’s

alternative name Bacchus. Jolly asked, “Why is he there?”, before answering his

own question, “Because he’s the god of feasting, of wine, and the father of Sequana,

the goddess of the River Seine”.[viii]


I find Jolly’s claim plausible. It fits with the title of the segment – ‘Festivity’ – and with

social media posts by the Olympics organisers at the time of the performance.

Further evidence for Jolly’s claim comes from examinations of the costumes of the

line up behind Dionysus, which echo the Greco-Roman gods. Most obviously, Butch

wears a crown of stars that has no parallel in the Last Supper but is reminiscent of

one worn by the god Apollo in some paintings. Art experts have pointed out that the

scene evokes not Da Vinci’s biblical painting but ‘The Feast of the Gods’ by Dutch

painter Jan van Bijlert.[ix]


A final piece of evidence is the lyrics of the song Philippe Katerine sang. It was an

ode to nudity that was intended to be humorous:[x]


Would there be wars if we had stayed entirely nude?

Where to hide a revolver when you’re entirely nude?

(I know what you’re thinking but it’s not a good idea)


Distasteful, perhaps, but hardly mocking Christianity. One participant in the ‘Festivity’

scene, drag queen and rapper Piche, reportedly did claim that there was a parallel

with ‘The Last Supper’ but said, “There were no real provocations or anything that

was truly obscene. We didn’t make fun of the painting at all … it’s really just because

it’s queers and drag queens who use that representation that it bothers”.[xi] Barbara

Butch is also reported to have posted the images side by side on Instagram with the

message, “Oh yes! Oh yes! The new gay testament!”, although the post has since

been deleted. Importantly, however, these comments are not from official

spokespeople and came after the controversy had already come to light and do not

prove that the intention of a parallel was there beforehand.


It seems, I am sorry to say, that some Christians were overly sensitive and too quick

to read into a scene what its organisers almost certainly did not intend.


Even if some Christians remain unconvinced by the explanations offered by Jolly and

others, we should not assume that offence was intentional when we have no clear

proof. In the world of instant, worldwide expression of one’s views through social

media, we should be careful not to post or share what others say without pausing for

thought. This should be a lesson for us in being slow to judge and slower still to

express our opinions. The ways in which trolls built on the criticisms to attack various

groups give further cause for caution.


This does not mean, however, that Christians have no cause for concern at the

Opening Ceremony.


I confess that, having tuned in with my wife quite late in the proceedings, we

switched off around the point when ‘Festivity’ was shown. That is not because we

detected any overt mockery of Christianity – I did not interpret ‘Festivity’ that way –

but because we found the hypersexualised costumes and dancing distasteful and

the overall quality of the Ceremony poor.


It was only later, aware of the controversy that was unfolding, that I watched back

and sought to understand what values lay behind the Ceremony. I still found the

quality of the show lamentably poor but was also troubled by the values behind it.

Three things struck me.


First, it was clear that, for Jolly, promoting diversity meant using his global stage to

promote gender diversity to the watching world. A pro-LGBTQIA+ message is now,

more than anything else, what Western Europe is known for around the world. The

West appears determined to spread this ideology to less ‘enlightened’ parts of the

globe with the same zeal with which we once sought to control them or absorb them

into our empires. This ‘new imperialism’ should concern Christians in the West. We

must develop a thoughtful and fair biblical response to this all-pervasive gender

ideology. We must understand that it as an expression of underlying convictions that

identity is created by the individual self, that morality is relative, and that happiness is

to be found in freedom to express one’s sense of identity.


We must never engage in trolling activists for this false cause and should stand with

the victims of homophobic or transphobic abuse against their attackers. Such

behaviours are unworthy of followers of Christ who are called to love even those who

act as enemies towards us. We must, however, be faithful in our testimony to God’s

truth. The truth that we do not create ourselves, that morality is not relative, and that

expressing our own desires is not freedom but bondage to sin. Above all, we must

present the glorious truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ, which is the power of God to

save those who believe from every background.


Second, contemporary Europe is increasingly rejecting its Christian heritage and

reaching back past it to pre-Christian religious ideas, which are seen as more

appropriate for the predominant values of our culture. In this case the Greco-Roman

gods were the stopping point. In Ireland, which was unreached by the Roman

Empire, its people go back instead to Celtic gods. Celtic and Greco-Roman gods

alike were personifications of the powers of nature. Katerine’s ode to nudity, whilst

apparently intended to be humorous, is a call to a myth of primal innocence. Strip off

the accretions of technology and religion and get back to nature.


The apparent failure of the Ceremony’s organisers to anticipate that some might

confuse the ‘Festivity’ segment with Christian imagery is symptomatic of modern

Western Europe’s collective amnesia about the influence Christianity had on its

culture. That flows from and feeds a tendency to read Christianity’s legacy as

oppressive (especially on our culture’s primary subject – gender and sexuality) and

to underestimate the goods Christianity gave us (including the idea of equality, but

supremely the related principle that every human life is sacred). This selectively

negative reading of Christianity is met with an equally distorted positive reading of

the religions that preceded its arrival in Europe. The gods of Olympus were

capricious and sadistic, treating humans as playthings, encouraging corruption, and

despising the weak. Ireland’s ancient beliefs were bloodthirsty and dark, ensnaring

people in terror and hopelessness.


Third, the Opening Ceremony presented a vision of human wholeness devoid of the

only whole human who has ever lived, the Lord Jesus Christ. It called for peace

without the Prince of Peace. We may welcome the idea that rivalries between

nations can be played out on the sports pitch rather than the battlefield, but the

Ceremony, like the games it opened, placed its confidence in humankind. The ideal

of the athlete achieving almost superhuman feats through dedicated discipline is the

epitome of achievement by effort rather than grace. In our modern mental health-

conscious age, this classic image is tempered by discussions in the commentary box

of the mental struggles of some competitors. This perspective also tells us

something about our age’s obsession with the psychological, which is seen as key to

identity. But the fundamental message remains that we can help ourselves and save

ourselves.


To be fair, the Olympics may not intentionally embody this counter-gospel humanistic

message any more than the Eiffel Tower deliberately apes Babel. Christians must be

careful, though, to walk the line between awe at the potential of our divinely created

bodies – such awe might lead us to humble ourselves before the Creator – and

worship of the creatures who stun us with their prowess.


Europe needs Christ. Europeans need the gospel. This is the message Christians

should be heralding. Sadly, as I read the comments some Christians made about the

‘Festivity’ scene, this was not the message I heard.


I comprehend why people want to express their disappointment when they feel their

faith is under attack. I can understand that some leaders want to express dismay and

disgust when they feel it is being mocked. But it was sad to see how few of those

who spoke as Christians presented a message of gospel hope. We may do well to

listen to Philippe Katerine (the blue Dionysus). When he was asked if his scene

mocked Christianity, he responded:[xii]


I was brought up as a Christian and the best thing about Christianity is

forgiveness. For me, it’s the most beautiful thing there is: forgiveness. So I ask for

forgiveness if I have offended anyone, and the Christians of the world will grant

me that, I’m sure, and will understand that it was mostly a misunderstanding.

Because when it comes down to it, it wasn’t about representing ‘the Last Supper’

at all.


Katerine is right. Forgiveness is beautiful and it is, at least when we understand what

it really means, a distinctively Christian concept. The Bacchanalia of the ancient

world were about escapism from the world’s drudgery and cruelty through the

indulgence of the body’s passions in pursuit of ecstatic experiences. The gospel, by

contrast, calls us to a realistic assessment of our rebellion against God, of which the

self-centred indulgence of our desires is a symptom, as the root of our problems.

From this acknowledgement, the gospel leads us on to know divine pardon for sins

through Christ and divine power to bring our passions to obedience to Christ. This is

true forgiveness. Not ignoring what is wrong or simply letting go of our negative

emotions about what offends us, but confessing our sins and hearing God’s pardon

on the basis of his Son’s death.


As we learn to live in a culture that is overtly hostile to Christian values, Christians

must not primarily bemoan the loss of Christian influence or presence in our culture.

We should not be known mainly for expressing our anger or sadness. Even if our

faith is mocked, we must be bold and gentle in presenting the hope that is ours in

Christ. Our Lord was mocked on the cross, who alone (unlike his bumbling followers)

does not deserve mockery, who offers forgiveness to those who mock him without

understanding, and who will return in glory ‘unmockable’ for all to see. To be mocked

for his sake is to follow in his path. To boast in him is to take pride in the one person

who will never disappoint.


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REFERENCES


[iv] Paris 2024 spokesperson Anne Descamps quoted in the Independent:

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