Sight-Seeing: How the Olympics opening ceremony was a missed opportunity for Christians

NILS VON KALM reflects on the recent controversy over the Olympic Games opening ceremony…

Now that the Olympics have finished and the controversy over the apparent mockery of the Last Supper at the opening ceremony has died down, it’s time to look at how Christians could have handled the whole furore differently.

I found the offence generated by many Christians over the whole affair to be predictable and profoundly disappointing. Whenever the secular world seems to mock our faith (whether they actually did or not in this case is another matter), our first response is too often to be outraged and offended. How dare they mock the name of Christ? In the process, we yet again miss a wonderful opportunity to proclaim the good news of the coming of God into the world.

Rings are illuminated on the Eiffel Tower during the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games Paris 2024 on 26th July, 2024. PICTURE: Cameron Spencer/Pool via Reuters.

The scene in question at the Olympics opening ceremony, in which a woman wearing a silver, halo-like headdress stood at the centre of a long table with drag queens posing on either side of her, caused outrage across Christendom with many seeing it as a mocking depiction of the Last Supper. Even the Vatican “deplored the offence” it made of the Christian faith.

My question to Christians outraged over this is, “how is your offence going to attract people to Jesus?”. Christians being offended happens regularly. As a result, our outrage has become predictable to the point that many people just roll their eyes and say, “there they go again”. It then just becomes further fuel to provoke us again in future. We take the bait, hook, line and sinker.

There was a similar situation in Australia back in the 1990s with a piece of art showing Jesus on the cross immersed in a vat of urine. P*** Christ, as the piece of art was known, caused huge offence at the time, with Christians saying it was disgraceful to portray Jesus in such a way.

My pastor at the time had a very different and – I’m still convinced – much more Christlike way of seeing it. I remember him remarking that he had heard no Christian leader see it as an opportunity to portray the good news of God coming into the mess of humanity. I thought his take on it was brilliant and it has always stayed with me. But we were too busy being outraged, and so missed an opportunity to evangelise, which, ironically, is the very thing we are often so strong about.

It was the same with the scene at the opening ceremony of the Olympics. What a wonderful opportunity to proclaim the message that Christ’s table is open to anyone: straight, gay, drag queen, anyone. As the late Christian author, Rachel Held Evans, said, what makes the Gospel offensive isn’t who it keeps out, but who it lets in. It seems that Christians were more offended by our faith being mocked than we were by the Gospel itself. Evans added that that is something modern Christians tend to forget.

The early church didn’t forget it though. In Acts 17, we see a beautiful example of Paul engaging with the Athenians about what the Good News really entails. When Paul speaks to the Athenians, we’re told that he was deeply distressed to see that the city was full of idols. It doesn’t say he was offended. I reckon he was saddened that they seemed such a lost culture. But instead of screaming in outrage, he had the insight and courage to engage with the culture, using their own symbols to proclaim Jesus.

Paul starts by finding points of commonality (“I see how extremely spiritual you are in every way” – verse 22). He doesn’t berate them for being idol-worshippers. Instead, he finds a link between the culture and what he is about to say. He also uses their own language and commends them for being so spiritual. In doing that, he establishes a connection where they are more open to listening to him.

Following that, Paul boldly proclaims that what they see as an unknown god, he proclaims as the God who made Heaven and Earth, a God who doesn’t need to be enshrined in temples. Then comes the clincher. Paul states that this God is not far from any one of us. This is a God who, far from being unknown, is accessible to anyone. Paul even quotes their own poets to make his point.

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Of course, it wasn’t just the early church that did this so well. They were inspired and empowered by Jesus, who did the same thing. Jesus used agricultural images in an agricultural society to illustrate the kingdom of God. Today we might use images of a computer virus spreading throughout the world to illustrate the kingdom of God spreading like yeast among dough.

A more modern example of an intelligent and gracious engagement with the culture is the ministry of the late Australian preacher, John Smith, and the movement he founded. In the late 1960s and early ‘70s, when the Jesus Movement was thriving, Smith and others used the music of the time to connect with young people. Smith would often quote the music of people like Bob Dylan and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young to proclaim the Gospel. As a result, the Christian message became relatable and thousands of young people came to faith.

The way we engage with our society ultimately goes to what type of God we believe in and what we see our Christian mission as being. If we believe in a God who is always angry at sin and that society would be a whole lot better if it went back to Christian values, we will regularly cast judgment on society and cast ourselves as “holier than thou”.

That’s not what Jesus did.

The only people Jesus was outraged by were His own people. He was regularly indignant at the religious people of His day who excluded people like the drag queens of that era.

Christian outrage at the Olympics opening ceremony has much more in common with the Pharisees than it does the Jesus of the Gospels. If we really want people to come to faith and see Jesus for who He is, we need to be more intelligent in using the symbols of the culture. It’s about creating a connection to God and what the reign of God on Earth looks like. It’s creating a link that people can relate to and showing them that God is indeed not far from any one of us. Just like Jesus did.