2024 Olympics Opening Ceremony’s ‘Last Supper’ tribute draws criticism from Harrison Butker, others

PARIS — In an Opening Ceremony that featured a seductive ménage à trois, a singing decapitated head, and a nearly-nude blue deity, it’s a scene of mealtime that’s drawing essentially the most warmth.

Properly into the four-hour-long ceremony, a set of drag queens and different performers gathered to pose in a scene that was intentionally paying homage to Leonardo da Vinci’s well-known portray, “The Final Supper.” The scene ended with the revelation of a beefy blue Dionysus, apparently able to partake in all method of earthly pleasures.

Da Vinci’s “The Final Supper” — which is definitely in Milan, not the Louvre — depicts Jesus’ ultimate meal with the apostles, the night time earlier than Christ’s crucifixion. It’s a holy and sacred second in Christianity, so seeing nontraditional performers put a 2024 spin on it didn’t go over effectively with a vocal section of the Christian religion.

Matteo Salvini, an Italian official, posted the pictures side-by-side on X and wrote, in Italian, “Opening the Olympics by insulting billions of Christians world wide was a very dangerous begin, pricey French. Seedy.”

Kansas Metropolis Chiefs kicker Harrison Butker, who aired his conservative views on religion and household earlier this 12 months, posted video of the scene, together with a Bible verse, Galatians 6:7-8. That verse reads, partially, “Be not deceived, God isn’t mocked.”

Paris Olympics officers pushed again on the competition that the efficiency was anti-Christian. “Clearly, there was by no means an intention to point out disrespect in the direction of any spiritual group or perception,” organizers stated in an announcement to the Telegraph. “Quite the opposite, every of the tableaux within the Paris 2024 Opening Ceremony have been supposed to have fun group and tolerance.” Organizers additional famous that popular culture, from “The Simpsons” to “The Sopranos,” has parodied “The Final Supper” for many years, if not centuries.

This wasn’t the primary sociopolitical controversy of those Video games, and it received’t be the final. In any case, the one factor that travels sooner than Olympians is opinions concerning the Olympics.