Olympics opening ceremony uses drag queens to parody “The Last Supper”: A paradoxical response that can change our broken culture
The Daily Article
The Denison Forum
4.9 • 576 Ratings
🗓️ 29 July 2024
⏱️ 7 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The Paris Olympic opening ceremony included a depiction of Leonardo da Vinci’s “The Last Supper” that included drag queens, a transgender model, and a naked singer. A Paris 2024 spokeswoman said yesterday, “Clearly there was never an intention to show disrespect to any religious group.” However, it may have been better if an offense against the Christian faith had been intentional.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Good day. It's Monday, July the 29th, 2024. Welcome to the Daily Article podcast. I'm Chris Elkins, |
| 0:09.0 | narrating today's article written by Denison Forum co-founder and CEO, Dr. Jim Denison. |
| 0:15.2 | The USA defeated Serbia in Olympic basketball yesterday, while America's Cocoa Golf won her tennis match |
| 0:22.7 | and Simone Biles dominated in women's gymnastics despite calf pain. However, many are still talking |
| 0:29.6 | about the opening ceremony's depiction of a Bacchanalia that was clearly inspired by Leonardo |
| 0:35.1 | Da Vinci's The Last Supper. The tableau included drag queens, |
| 0:39.1 | a transgender model, and a naked singer. Reaction was swift. Pierce Morgan posted, |
| 0:45.4 | Would they have mocked any other religion like this? Appalling decision. Elon Musk called the |
| 0:51.0 | parody extremely disrespectful to Christians. House Speaker Mike Johnson agreed, calling it shocking and insulting to Christian people around the world. |
| 1:00.0 | I was similarly grieved as the parody ridiculed our Lord and denigrated the event which Christians around the world commemorate as the Last Supper. |
| 1:08.0 | Many include this sacred observance as part of their worship every week. |
| 1:12.8 | But there's more to the story, and the more we learn, the worse it gets. A Paris 2024 spokeswoman |
| 1:19.3 | said yesterday, clearly there was never an intention to show disrespect to any religious group, |
| 1:25.3 | claiming that the opening ceremony tried to celebrate community |
| 1:28.6 | tolerance, she added, we believe this ambition was achieved. If people have taken any offense, |
| 1:35.5 | we're really sorry. End quote. How could they believe that their parody would not show disrespect |
| 1:41.6 | to any religious group? For an answer, listen to Thomas Jolly, |
| 1:46.0 | the opening ceremony's artistic director, defending the production. Quote, |
| 1:51.0 | our subject was not to be subversive. We never wanted to be subversive. We wanted to talk about |
| 1:56.1 | diversity. In France, we are a republic. We have the right to love whom we want. We have the right not to be worshipped. We have lots of rights in France, and that is what I wanted to convey. In quote. In other words, his purpose was to use what he sees as a cultural artifact to make a cultural point. In a country where only about 5% of the people attend church weekly and less than half the |
| 2:20.5 | population even believes in God, the ceremonies producers were surprised that a depiction of what |
| 2:26.3 | they consider an archaic and irrelevant religious story would offend anyone. |
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