This is Pastor Tim’s article which appeared in the Evening Leader on Tuesday, August 6, 2024
So the Olympic Games opened this past week and during the opening ceremony, a group of drag queens recreated Leonardo DaVinci’s painting of the Last Supper. I hate that I had to write that sentence. I hate even more than I am writing an article explaining why something like this should not happen. I am a fairly creative person, but even I never saw myself writing an article explaining why opening the Olympics with a bunch of drag queens recreating an iconic work of Christian art is a bad idea. But that is the world we all live in now.
I admit that I did not know the Olympics was going on and I heard about this blasphemy second hand. I spent a few minutes trying to find video of this, but it has been scrubbed from the internet. Yes, I just admitted to searching for drag queens on the internet and admitted I did not find what I was looking for. I am starting to hate my life.
All I found was a whole bunch of outrage. So, whatever happened, enough people were upset by it that you can no longer find the opening ceremony online anywhere. But I did find a video that claimed to be an apology for what happened during the opening ceremony. I listened to the apology, and I think that calling what the spokesperson said an apology was over stating what they said. It sounded more like they were saying that French culture is more inclusive and tolerant of other lifestyles than other places in the world.
That is probably true and that would be something that could be said in defense of what happened. There was a cultural misunderstanding, those things happen from time to time. But I just can’t help but notice that they did not do a depiction of Muhammad as a drag queen nor did they do anything that could possibly be misinterpreted as that. By some miracle, they managed to steer clear of that cultural faux pas, but somehow messed up portraying Jesus as a drag queen. Gosh, how could we expect the Olympic planners to know that NEITHER the Muslims NOR the Christians would want the focal point of our faith to be portrayed in that way. Must have been a lucky guess.
The response to this blasphemy is a call to boycott the Olympic games. I guess I am participating in this boycott the same way I am participating in the Bud Light boycott when they had their drag queen do a commercial. I drink exactly the same about of beer as I watch the Olympics. My boycott isn’t going to change much because I am 49 years into boycotting both of them anyway.
The question I have in all of this is where does the disrespect stop? If there was a so-called Christian group out there who was making fun of any other group for any reason, I would not support that. I can disagree with these other groups of people, but I don’t even need to hate them to do it. I can disagree with their lifestyles, their ideology, and even their religion that they worship without being disrespectful to them in any way. These kinds of statements do not win anyone over to either side of the debate. I can honestly say that I don’t understand why network TV televised drag queens during a time when children would most definitely be watching. I believe that is morally wrong and I believe that sponsors should pull out of the Olympics over this. I can win this argument without hating anyone. Why can’t the organizers of the pride parade masquerading as the opening to the Olympic Games do the same? Why can’t we have a celebration of humanity rather than pushing an agenda that only includes a vanishingly small percentage of the population of the world? Most people saw that and won’t watch another minute of Olympic coverage. Is that bringing us together? Is that building bridges? But you had to go and cross the line by doing something that you knew was over the line and all of your claims of how you didn’t know this would not be appreciated fall on deaf ears and you know it.
Issue all the apologies you want, you know what you did. You got a bunch of half-naked men paraded on national TV and got to poke fun at a religious icon. Thanks for making the Olympic games which for thousands of years had been a symbol for unity and worldwide celebration as divisive as it has ever been.