Olympic Committee's Apology for Last Supper Parody Fails to Mollify Critics
The lesbian who portrayed Jesus says she has been subjected to death threats, antisemitism and homophobic harassment online and that she had sued several of those who targeted her.
By Gary Gately
The Paris 2024 Olympics Committee’s apology for the drag parody of Leonardo da Vinci’s “The Last Supper” painting during the opening ceremony rang hollow to Catholic and other Christian leaders throughout the world.
Paris 2024 spokeswoman Anne Descamps told reporters Sunday: “Clearly, there was never an intention to show disrespect to any religious group. It tried to celebrate community tolerance. If people have taken any offense, we are, of course, really, really sorry.”
The Friday night tableau, parodying the painting of Jesus’ last meal with his apostles before his crucifixion, featured drag queens, a transgender model and a scantily clad signer portraying the Greek god of wine, Dionysus. Olympic organizers wrote on X that they intended for the performance to symbolize “the absurdity of violence between human beings.”
On Monday, Barbara Butch, a Jewish lesbian who wore a silver headdress while portraying Jesus in the Last Supper parody, said in a statement through her lawyer that she had been subjected to death threats, antisemitism and homophobic harassment online and that she had sued several of those who had targeted her.
The harassment did not come from Catholic and other Christian leaders or conservative lawmakers in the U.S. and France who criticized the performance, but from some of the thousands of people who took to social media to condemn it.
The Olympic organizers apology notwithstanding, criticism of the Last Supper parody continued to mount.
Bishop Robert Barron of Winona-Rochester, Minnesota and founder of the popular Word on Fire ministry, said in a video posted on X: “I saw the so-called apology from the organizing committee, and I thought it’s anything but an apology. In fact, it’s kind of a masterpiece of woke duplicity. If they felt this is meant to mollify Christians, I would think again….
“We have a group of drag queens cavorting in a sexually provocative way clearly in imitation of Da Vinci’s Last Supper, which presents to the world the Last Supper of Jesus, and no disrespect was meant? Do you think anyone takes that seriously?”
Barron lambasted the organizing committee for its assertion that the performance was to “celebrate community tolerance,” adding: “Yeah, tolerance except for those pesky 2.6 billion Christians on the planet…..
“Everyone’s welcome, everyone’s tolerated, all this lovely diversity, until you get to anyone that disagrees with your ideology, like these 2.6 billion people. So don’t give me this business about tolerance and diversity,” he said.
“Christians were offended because it was offensive, and it was intended to be offensive. So please don’t patronize us with this condescending remark of, ‘Well, if you had any bad feelings, we’re awfully sorry about that.’”
Bishop Barron said a genuine apology would say unequivocally: “This was a mistake, it should never have been done, we’re sorry for it.”
He urged Christians not to be “mollified” and said: “I think we should keep raising our voices.”
“Christians were offended because it was offensive. And it was intended to be offensive. So please don’t patronize us with this condescending remark of, ‘Well, if you had any bad feelings, we’re awfully sorry about that.’” — Bishop Robert Barron
Meanwhile, the German Bishops’ Conference, which had been among the first to condemn the Last Supper parody, said in a statement Monday that the organizers’ assertion that the scene was intended to depict Greek mythology in hopes of celebrating tolerance “is not convincing.”
“It creates associations with the famous painting by Leonardo da Vinci, which shows Jesus Christ surrounded by his disciples,” the German bishops said. “This obvious interpretation is supported by statements from the participating artists.
“Critical comments are appropriate and necessary when the representations touch on central elements of our faith and other religions and the religious sensibilities of believers are seriously violated,” the bishops said.
Leaders of Catholic churches in Iraq also denounced the Last Supper parody.
"What happened at the opening ceremony of the Paris Olympics is shameful and a mockery of the Christian religion," Iraq's Chaldean Catholic Church said in a statement. "The Olympic Games aim to bring people together in love, respect and cooperation, not in wounding and division.”
Archbishop Younan Hano of the Syriac Catholic Church of Mosul told AFP that he had urged his congregation to fast and pray on Monday.
"We have nothing to offer but praying and fasting so God forgives this great insult — an insult not only to the religion but also to humanity," he said.
"We were shocked because France is a country of secularism and humanity, a country that respects all nationalities and religions, that such very offensive behavior towards religious symbols would come from it.”
Patriarch Cardinal Louis Raphael Sako of the Chaldean Catholic Church said in a statement that he "stands with the Church in France and its bishops.” They criticized the performance’s “scenes of derision and mockery of Christianity” and said they “very deeply deplore” them.
Archbishop Charles Scicluna of Malta and adjunct secretary of the Vatican’s powerful Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, said in an X post that he had sent two messages to the French ambassador to Malta expressing his “distress and great disappointment at the insult to us Christians during the opening ceremony of the Paris 2024 Olympics when a group of drag artists parodied the Last Supper of Jesus….
"The gratuitous insult to the Eucharist during the opening ceremony has caused immense disappointment among many Christians," Scicluna wrote.
And Bishop Andrew H. Cozzens, chairman of the Committee on Evangelization and Catechesis for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, said in a statement: “During the opening ceremonies of the Summer Olympics, the famous DaVinci Masterpiece ‘The Last Supper’ was depicted in heinous fashion, leaving us in such shock, sorrow and righteous anger that words cannot describe it.”
Cozzens added: “Jesus experienced his Passion anew Friday night in Paris when his Last Supper was publicly defamed. As his living body, we are invited to enter into this moment of passion with him, this moment of public shame, mockery and persecution.”
He called for fasting and urged prayers “for healing and forgiveness for all those who participated in this mockery.”
The performance at the opening ceremony, which took place along the River Seine, also prompted a Mississippi-based telecommunications giant C Spire, to announce that it would pull its advertisements from Olympics broadcasts.
And conservative lawmakers in the U.S. and other countries also roundly criticized the performance, as did thousands of Christians who posted on social media.
House Speaker Mike Johnson said in an X post that the performance represented “a mockery of the Last Supper” that “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,” Johnson wrote.
But Thomas Jolly, the gay 42-year-old creator of the tableau, said at a news conference Saturday: “The idea is not to be subversive or shock people or to mock people, not at all…. The idea was to send a message of love and of inclusion.”
France, a historically Catholic country, has also had a long tradition of secularism and anti-clericism, Jolly and others noted.
On Monday, Butch the lesbian who portrayed Jesus in the performance, took aim at those she said had criticized and threatened her.
“Since the opening ceremony of the Paris 2024 Olympic Games, artist, DJ, and activist Barbara Butch has been the target of an extremely violent campaign of cyber-harassment and defamation,” she said in the statement released by her lawyer. “She has been threatened with death, torture, and rape, and has also been the target of numerous anti-Semitic, homophobic, sexist, and grossophobic insults. Barbara Butch condemns this vile hatred directed at her, what she represents, and what she stands for.
“She is today filing several complaints against these acts, whether committed by French nationals or foreigners, and intends to prosecute anyone who tries to intimidate her in the future.”
Butch said in an Instagram post: “All my life, I have refused to be a victim: I will not remain silent. I am not afraid of those who hide behind a screen, or a pseudonym, to vomit their hatred and their frustrations.”
She describes herself on Instagram as “a Love activist, DJ and producer” based in Paris whose “aim is to unite people, gather humans & share love through music for all of Us to dance & make our hearts beat at unison!”
Butch had posted an image of the parody of the Last Supper above one of Da Vinci’s original painting on Instagram with the words:, “Oh yes! Oh yes! The new gay testament!”
The post was later deleted.
If the aim of this parody was to be "inclusive" then why, might I ask, did the centrepiece display also not reference Muslims or Mohammed? Their "inclusive" portrayal has excluded the several billion Muslims in the world. The answer is simply out of fear of the consequences. Yet AGAIN Christians are being viewed as an easy and safe target to use to ridicule and further their agenda. This is wrong. This is sectarian. This is discrimination. This is offensive. The IOC needs to be held to account.