Bacchanalia, The Olympics, and fake outrage
The 2024 Paris Olympics' Bacchanalia display generated controversy and fake outrage among Evangelical Christians, Conservative Catholics, and right-wingers.
The Opening Ceremonies of the 2024 Paris Olympics began with some overheated faux outrage about the Bacchanalia performance by drag queens, especially by among Evangelical Christians, Conservative Catholics, and right-wingers.
Thomas Jolly, the man responsible for directing the opening ceremony, speaks out on the Dionysus display, via PinkNews (07.29.2024):
In an interview with British Vogue, Jolly had said the lavish display would only be a success “if everyone feels represented in it”, but has faced a stream of right-wing criticism since Friday’s (26 July) event in Paris.
Among the angry right-wingers were tech billionaire Elon Musk, who unfollowed the Olympics on X/Twitter, and Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, who called the ceremony a “satanic drag show” – despite the fact that he is often compared to Jesus and jesting that Jesus should become the next House Speaker.
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“He is also the father of the goddess Sequana, who is connected to the river Seine. The idea was to have a pagan celebration connected to the gods of Olympus.
“You will never find in me a desire to mock and denigrate anyone. I wanted to make a ceremony that repairs, reconciles and reaffirms the values of our republic: liberty, equality, fraternity.”
Becca Wood at NBC’s Today (07.27.2024):
But one performance has prompted mixed reactions.
The four-hour ceremony kicked off the start of the Summer Games July 26, with athletes gliding down the River Seine and performers reenacting internationally historic moments.
During a controversial tableau, drag queens and dancers lined a long table in an image that some thought resembled Leonardo da Vinci’s “The Last Supper” portrait of Jesus Christ and his 12 apostles.
Following the scene, some called the imagery a “mockery” and “insulting to Christian people.” Meanwhile, others found the moment a celebration for the LGBTQ+ community and inclusivity.
Jon Holmes at Outsports (07.28.2024):
Thomas Jolly, the artistic director of the Opening Ceremony at the Paris 2024 Olympics, has dismissed claims that a section of the show involving drag queens was meant as a send-up of “The Last Supper” painting and Christianity.
Politicians, Elon Musk, Piers Morgan and even Kansas City Chiefs kicker Harrison Butker were among those venting fury on social media after Friday’s elaborate but rain-lashed spectacular.
The televised section that particularly angered them was titled “Festivity” and featured French singer and actor Philippe Katerine as the god Dionysus, semi-naked and painted blue, on a banquet table.
There was also a degree of backlash within France itself, including from bishops and Catholic groups.
Kelby Vera at HuffPost (07.28.2024):
Conservatives angered by the Paris Olympics might need to pivot their criticism of Friday’s opening ceremony.
Some were incensed over a vignette that appeared to resemble a drag-infused interpretation of Leonardo da Vinci’s “The Last Supper,” a 15th century painting depicting Jesus Christ and his 12 disciples at a fateful final meal.
But the tableau, which was slammed as “blasphemous” by many in the American right-wing, was actually a reference to something completely different, according to Thomas Jolly, the artistic director of the opening ceremony.
Jolly clarified his vision during an appearance Sunday on French media, explaining that the scene was a tribute to Dionysus, the Greek god of decadence and celebration.
“There is Dionysus who arrives on this table,” Jolly told French television outlet BFMTV of the scantily clad blue figure at the center of the tableau, according to an interpretation by NBC News. “He is there because he is the god of celebration in Greek mythology.”
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Jolly drew support in a post on the Games’ official account on X (formerly Twitter), which said: “The interpretation of the Greek God Dionysus makes us aware of the absurdity of violence between human beings.”
Despite the scene having nothing to do with “The Last Supper” masterpiece or Christianity, Paris 2024 spokesperson Anne Descamps apologized Sunday at a news conference “if people have taken any offense” from the performance.
Paris Olympics organizers consoled religious groups on Sunday after an Opening Ceremony segment featured a group of drag queens in a scene evoking Leonardo da Vinci’s “The Last Supper,” which sparked outrage among Christians.
The scene featured a group of drag queens, including contestants from Drag Race France, gathered behind a table with one woman adorned with a halo in the center. The group was eventually joined by a man dressed as the Greek god Dionysus, part of the Olympics’ intent to reflect “the absurdity of violence between human beings.”
The scene enraged Christian groups, as some felt the arrangement mocked the solemnness of Di Vinci’s original painting. The French Catholic Church’s bishops conference blasted the performance as “scenes of derision,” while the Anglican Communion in Egypt said the moment risked causing the International Olympic Committee to “lose its distinctive sporting identity and its humanitarian message.”
Carly Thomas at THR (07.27.2024):
The Opening Ceremony at the 2024 Paris Olympic Games featured numerous performances, but there was one in particular that drew mixed reactions, including outrage from conservative leaders.During the four-hour ceremony on Friday, drag queens and dancers at one point struck poses along a long table as a person painted sparkly blue, singing in French, was resting on a dinner platter in front. Some people quickly took to social media to say that the image resembled Leonardo da Vinci’s The Last Supper portrait of Jesus Christ and his 12 apostles before he was crucified.
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House Speaker Mike Johnson wrote on X (formerly Twitter) following the performance, “Last night’s mockery of the Last Supper was shocking and insulting to Christian people around the world who watched the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games. The war on our faith and traditional values knows no bounds today. But we know that truth and virtue will always prevail. ‘The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.’ (John 1:5)”
French far-right politician, Marion Maréchal, denounced the performance on social media, writing, “To all the Christians of the world who are watching the Paris 2024 ceremony and felt insulted by this drag queen parody of the Last Supper, know that it is not France that is speaking but a left-wing minority ready for any provocation.”
Harrison Butker, the Kansas City Chiefs kicker who faced backlash earlier this year after giving a controversial commencement speech, also quoted the Bible on X after the ceremony: “‘Be not deceived, God is not mocked. For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting.’ Galatians 6:7-8.”
John Pavlovitz breaks it down succinctly (07.27.2024):
Social media was flooded with the performative histrionics of professed American Christians, incensed at the inclusion during the Olympics’ opening ceremony, of a drag performer parody of Leonardo DaVinci’s Last Supper, which they claim is another example of their incessant persecution.
How could they mock God like this?
What a brazen anti-Christian display!
Jesus is weeping!These folks seem to lack self-awareness, a mirror, and a Bible, because they’ve been openly ridiculing God for nearly the last decade by passionately supporting Donald Trump and doing so quite unapologetically.
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The greatest irony of the Olympics’ opening ceremony, is that drag performers represent an LGBTQ community who is the most vulnerable and most experiencing violence here at the hands of professed followers of Jesus. They are those Christ would be most embracing in these moments, as he was always with the least of these.
As with every MAGA protest, they will look everywhere but in the mirror (an intentional misdirection), because to do that would confront them with the truest ridiculing of Christ: from those claiming his name.
The Olympics on X posted this (07.26.2024):
The right-wing faux outrage campaign against the Bacchanalia performance at the 2024 Paris Olympics is all about fomenting anti-drag and anti-LGBTQ+ sentiments. These are the same people who holler up and down about the “persecution” of Christians-- in the process trivializing actual instances of Christian persecution-- if even the slightest thing goes against their worldview.
I was once an Evangelical Christian (and a liberal one at that), but left for the United Church of Christ in 2013, so I know first-hand the effects of the persecution fetish aspect of the Evangelical culture and how it drives politics and theology. These folks believe in a dangerous canard that “you can’t be a Christian and a Democrat.”
On one hand, we can’t help it– we’ve been programmed to label any negative experience related to our faith in the category of “persecution”. However, we should know better– and should know that this is actually hurting the Christian reputation in America.
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Ugh. In American Christianity we love persecution.
Like a Rorshach test, we are able to see it anywhere we look.
We are so culturally programmed that there “will be persecution” that we develop a persecution complex which causes us to look at any given ink blot and see an intriguing case of anti-Christian discrimination.
What is most sad to me, is that this is hurting the message of Jesus– a beautiful message that I want everyone to hear and experience. However, because of our persecution complex we are often seen as cry-babies– who are constantly crying “Wolf!” no less. As a result, a lot of people are turned off to Christian culture, and by default turned off to actually wrestling with the message of Jesus.
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I think the reason why the American Christian persecution complex troubles me so much is because there is plenty of real persecution going on in the world. Yet, when we take negative push-back we receive as a result of our own arrogance, insensitivity, and hostility– and call that persecution– we cheapen and detract from the real examples of religious persecution in the world.
When Christians who are being thrown in prison or beheaded are overshadowed by stories of American Christians who get in hot water because their public business discriminates, or because they’ve made their co-workers miserable, we become guilty of self-centered arrogance.
Seth Tower Hurt for Relevant Magazine (03.21.2017):
The other problem with the “white Protestant persecution complex” is that there’s just no evidence to back it up. Persecution is not someone saying something negative to you, being forced to attend school or work with a person of an opposing viewpoint or a general anti-religious sentiment. Persecution is real, tangible harm inflicted on a person or group, and white Protestants seem to be holding a permanent hall pass.
In the history of the United States, no white church has ever been burned as a hate crime. In the last 10 years, nine black churches have been terrorized or burned. Only one time has an American on U.S. soil been killed for the Christianity (Cassie Bernall at the Columbine High School attack, and eye-witness accounts are conflicted on whether or not she was questioned about her faith). On a single day in 2015, white supremacist Dylann Roof murdered nine African Americans due to their race and faith in Christ.
When white evangelicals become obsessed with controlling the government, there isn’t much room left for sharing Christ. And there’s even less chance that non-believers will want to hear from Christians who are openly trying to dominate and control behavior through force.
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