The sixth-largest company in the United States, a telecommunications and technology company named C Spire, has announce that it is yanking all of its ads from the coverage of the Olympics broadcast by NBC over the opening ceremony of the event, which many argue mocked Christianity.
As background, the Olympics opening ceremony in Paris saw a mocking rendition of the Last Supper, the dramatic time when Jesus broke bread and shared wine with his disciples before being arrested in the Garden of Gethsemane, scourged by Pontius Pilate, and crucified on Calvalry Hill.
The mocking Olympics of rendition, which was based on the famous Da Vinci painting of the Last Supper, saw drag queens and transgender performers reenacting the Last Supper while seated in the same formation, with an odd number of young children sprinkled amongst the performers, which many argued was highly inappropriate.
In addition to the Last Supper mockery, the opening ceremony referenced the book of Revelation, in what appeared to be a mocking display, with a white horseman, one of the four horsemen of the apocalypse, riding across water with a pyrotechnics display in the background. That rider signifies death, making it all the weirder.
C-Spire then yanked its advertising of the event within 24 hours of the shocking display. Doing so, it posted on X (formerly Twitter), “We were shocked by the mockery of the Last Supper during the opening ceremonies of the Paris Olympics. C Spire will be pulling our advertising from the Olympics.”
Commenters on the post thanked it for doing so, saying things like, “Have never been more proud of a company. Thank you for representing the values of your customers” and “THANK YOU! 🙏 As a Mississippian, I already know what you stand for, and now I know what you value. Together, this is how we win. It’s us vs [them]—good vs evil. May we all continue to stand for what is right—thank you for leading the way on the corporate front. :)”
Other Christians and horrified viewers spoke out about the sickening display as well. “I think, folks, what’s interesting here is this deeply secularist, post-modern society knows who its enemy is. They’re naming it. And we should believe them. They’re telling us who they are. We should believe them. But furthermore, we Christians, we Catholics, should not be sheepish. We should resist, we should make our voices heard,” said Bishop Robert Barron of the Diocese of Winona-Rochester.
Similarly, In a statement released Saturday, a group of French bishops expressed outrage over “scenes of derision and mockery of Christianity, which we deeply deplore.” “We thank the members of other religious denominations who have expressed their solidarity,” the statement continued. “This morning, we think of all Christians on all continents who have been hurt by the outrage and provocation of certain scenes.”
Further, in an X post, Archbishop Charles Scicluna of Malta expressed 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.”
Featured image credit: By ERIC SALARD from Paris, FRANCE – Retour des medaillés de Tokyo 2020 au trocadero, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=108316806
