It’s an even year, and we all know what that means! It’s time for the best athletes from around the world to come together…and offend Christians everywhere! In case you haven’t heard, let me set the scene.
The Paris Summer Olympics which kicked off Friday, July 26th, opened in lavish fashion with the regular entertaining artistry that only comes every 2 years, but this time, French style.
Thomas Jolly, the artistic director for the opening ceremony put together a decadent show, with allusions to the Greek origins of the Olympics, culminating in a portrayal of the Feast of Dionysus. The feast was a major ancient Athenian festival honoring Dionysus, featuring dramatic tragedies and comedies. This time, the 2024 rendition included drag queens, a transgender model and a partially naked singer sitting in a fruit bowl.
Jolly said the idea was to “to have a big pagan party linked to the gods of Olympus, Olympian, Olympianism.”
And although Jolly didn’t name the painting his rendition of the feast may have been based on, many people pointed to the painting called “The Feast of the Gods” by Jan van Bijlert, created between 1635 and 1640. If you look at the ceremony and the painting side-by-side, they do look strikingly similar.
But even an explanation from the director of the ceremony himself didn’t stop the rage of Christians from coming down, claiming he was blaspheming God with a depiction of the last supper in drag.
And while President of France Emmanuel Macron praised the show saying it showed France’s audacity, Christians with platforms weighed in early and often. This included Candice Cameron Bure, star of Full House, calling it “disgusting.” Former president Trump calling it a “disgrace.” And even the Vatican saying in an official statement, “The Holy See was saddened by certain scenes at the opening ceremony of the Paris Olympic Games and cannot but join the voices raised in recent days to deplore the offense done to many Christians and believers of other religions.”
If this wasn’t enough, Christians have become enraged again, a mere days later, because JK Rowling and others labeled Imane Khelif, a female Algerian boxer, as a transgender individual. They claimed that she was a man (she isn’t) and was beating up on women.
I won’t go into this story but a great article checking the facts and cutting through all the internet muck has been written here.
Now that you’re caught up, I want to explore the why of it all.
Why are Christian’s so upset? Why is all the rage coming out at the Olympics?
More relevant, why is all the rage coming out all the time here in the US, including political rage which threatens the rights of millions of already marginalized US citizens and immigrants?
When searching for the purpose of all the rage, I first had to look at my own life and upbringing. As a child and young adult raised in an Evangelical Christian household, there were many things we had to be accountable for. Don’t be gay, don’t have premarital sex, don’t lie, don’t get divorced, don’t get an abortion and on and on. In some circles, don’t play cards and don’t dance! All violations of God’s perceived rules.
As I grew though, this personal accountability for my own moral behavior soon spread. I was now allowed to hold others accountable too. Even if it sounded like gossip:
“Did you hear Brenda had sex under the bleachers with Adam during Friday night’s football game?”
As a young Christian kid, I had so many questions for fictional Brenda and Adam, but the main one I had to ask in order to perform my duty as a Christian was, “How could you?” How could you violate God’s law in that way?
Continuing my spiritual growth, I soon became aware that I could hold others accountable, even if they didn’t claim to abide by the rules of evangelical rules of Christianity.
We were taught to enter into the “secular” world to make sure abortion wasn’t acceptable to anyone and to have conversations with our LGBTQ+ friends and family to let them know they were sinning and they needed to change their ways. I guess what Jesus meant when he said “Go make disciples of all nations,” he really meant don’t let your friend Ben have gay sex.
But how did this all turn into rage?
I can point to one theory from my childhood. Growing up we used to hear the stories of Christian martyrs in under-resourced lands, bringing the gospel of Christ to native people, only to be killed for their witness and passion. As a young child in the US, I didn’t have to worry about such death, unless I chose to become a missionary to far away lands. And while I was told I should be like these martyrs, I didn’t feel like encroaching on other people in that way, let alone traveling overseas to be killed with Bible in hand, so I had to figure out what I could do here in the US to become a metaphorical martyr.
I could maybe tell someone about Jesus on the street and maybe they would spit in my face. Yeah, that could work!
But also, it felt a little weird and out of my comfort zone. So how do I become a martyr if I’m not willing to force myself on others? Well, maybe others could force themselves on me! Yeah, that was it!
I just have to ask myself, what are others doing to me to hurt me and my Christianity!
Well believe me, once I figured out this little loophole as a kid, I became a martyr very quickly, yelling at the top of my lungs “They’re trying to take the 10 commandments out of schools!”
There were so many things to be upset about. Really it was the same list from before: abortion, gay people, premarital sex, etc, but now anyone who was doing those things was an affront to who I was as a person. I was a martyr and I didn’t have to get off my couch! I could connect with the suffering of Christ, by perceiving others actions and behaviors as going against who I was. This was the perfect plan.
But eventually, it got tiring. Raging all the time. There were always people who were going to believe different things than I did as a young Evangelical Christian and eventually I couldn’t hold it anymore. As soon as I let it go, out came the pain.
Pain. That is it. That is why all the rage.
I think James Baldwin, civil rights activist and writer said it best in his book, The Fire Next Time. He said,“I imagine one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone, they will be forced to deal with pain.”
The purpose of the rage is to cover the pain that lies beneath. You know how I know? Because I was there. Raging at abortion clinics, on the picket line, taken there by my parents at age 8. Raging against my friends for their perceived misdeeds, and raging at myself for all my moral failures. In the end, I was uncomfortable with always pointing the anger outward, so it inevitably kept pointing back to myself and my failings. In order to continue to live, I had to drop the rage. I was tired of always feeling beat down by my own anger. And when I dropped it, there was a ton of pain underneath. Dealing with the unaddressed emotional pain wasn’t easy but it was worth it.
This is why many Christians rage. Especially Evangelical Christians. Anger is the easy way out. Be mad. Be mad at others. Defend God’s honor. Defind your own honor.
But when you’re ready, stop posting about how insulted and angry you are about the Olympics, and look at yourself. Why do you feel angry and insulted? Is it because you too want to identify with Jesus and his suffering in a modern 21st century world? Is it because you don’t feel you are good enough as you are? Whatever the reason, find it. Release the rage and deal with the pain. In the end, there are truly enough other horrific injustices in the world to occupy our righteous anger. Quick wasting time being mad at the Olympics.
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