CNA Newsroom, Jul 28, 2024 / 10:51 am (CNA).
Crookston Bishop Andrew Cozzens this weekend slammed what he described as the “heinous” mockery of the Christian faith displayed at the Summer Olympics in Paris on Friday, urging Catholics to respond to the spectacle with fasting and prayer.
The drag queen-led parody of the Last Supper featured during Friday’s opening ceremonies of the 2024 Paris Olympics sparked a wave of incensed reactions and denunciations from Catholic leaders and others around the world.
The controversial scene, part of the 1.5 billion euros (about $1.62 billion) spectacle to kick off the Olympic Games, featured drag queens portraying the apostles and an overweight DJ as Jesus in what appeared to be a part of a fashion show apparently mocking Leonardo da Vinci’s famous painting.
In a statement on Saturday, Cozzens—who also serves as the chairman of the board of the National Eucharistic Congress—said the performers “publicly defamed” the Last Supper with the “evil” display.
Cozzens noted that at the National Eucharistic Congress this month, the faithful gathered to “make reparation for our sins” and pray for “healing and forgiveness.”
Yet a week later, he noted, nearly a billion spectators in person and via telecast “witnessed the public mockery of the Mass,” in which the Last Supper “was depicted in heinous fashion, leaving us in such shock, sorrow and righteous anger that words cannot describe it.”
The bishop said that throughout history Christ has “called us—the people of God—to respond to the darkness of evil with the light that comes from the Lord.” Cozzens pointed out that the Last Supper, along with the crucifixion, death and resurrection of Christ, form the Paschal Mystery.
“Jesus experienced his Passion anew Friday night in Paris when his Last Supper was publicly defamed,” the bishop said. “As his living body, we are invited to enter into this moment of passion with him, this moment of public shame, mockery, and persecution. We do this through prayer and fasting. And our greatest prayer—in season and out of season—is the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.”
Cozzens urged the faithful to attend Mass this week with “renewed zeal,” to “pray for healing and forgiveness for all those who participated in this mockery,” and to “commit ourselves this week to greater prayer and fasting in reparation for this sin.”
He further suggested attending Mass more than once in the coming week and considering an extra Holy Hour.
“We may also be called upon to speak about this evil. Let us do so with love and charity, but also with firmness,” the bishop said. He urged Catholics to “ask the Holy Spirit to strengthen us with the virtue of fortitude.”
“France and the entire world are saved by the love poured out through the Mass, which came to us through the Last Supper,” he wrote. “Inspired by the many martyrs who shed their blood to witness to the truth of the Mass, we will not stand aside and quietly abide as the world mocks our greatest gift from the Lord Jesus.”
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I shall vote with my eyes. I will not watch the Olympics.
Surprised that the archbishop of Malta was outraged, I thought that he was these people’s apologist?
That Paris suffered a power surge that blew the lights in all buildings save the Basilica of the Sacred Heart and it’s bright light was beautiful to behold!
I am outraged at this heinous display and mockery of our most sacred Holy Eucharist. May God have mercy on the souls of all involved. I will not watch a single minute of these games. Paris and all concerned should be ashamed of themselves.
I hope that the Holy Father joins us, in a public pronouncement, his rebuke of this blasphemous display.
So many Catholics on these pages ask, “What can I do?” regarding the disgusting display at the Olympics. For starters, stop using the term “TRANS”. By so doing you are giving the appearance of a reality it does not merit. There’s no such thing as “trans.” Call it for what it is: homosexuality. That’s what what was on display. Stop being suckers for the woke nonsense this culture is handing you. I’m afraid my brothers and sisters in Christ are some of the most gullible people I’ve seen. This gullibility evidenced itself during the Great Covid Paranoia Psychosis of 2020. Even the Pope himself was forcing Vatican employees to take a vaccine against their will. I sometimes think that otherwise intelligent people are under a spell
Deacon Edward,
I am with you on the issue of “Great viral paranoia”. I will take it further though. The Church gave a sign to the world, of a blasphemous communion when it closed its doors to the unvaccinated and allowed in only the vaccinated. The vaccines were abortion-tainted i.e. they utilized the aborted human embryos’ cells either for the design of the vaccines or/and their production or/and their testing. PF cracked a letter which actively discouraged Catholics from demanding an ethical alternative (which already existed). Most gladly embraced it. As a result, those who partook the vaccine “made” on human sacrifice were allowed to the Holy Communion. Those who refused were not allowed. This is a very gross blasphemy done by the Church and not many noticed it.
The Church “sanctified” children’s sacrifice, for the first time in its history and tried to force its members to participate in it. It made a participation in the sin of a murder of children a condition for receiving the Body and Blood of Christ. It was done in an oblique form (as everything is being done in the postmodern world) but it was done nevertheless. In some places vaccination took place in churches, in some places with great solemnity. In Salisbury Cathedral the “holy injections” were accompanied by the live sacred music, some written for the Eucharistic hymns. (I wrote a paper about that “communion of abandonment” that is a hellish communion contrary to the true Communion of the Union with Christ and each other.)
And so, I see this parody of the Last Supper as a logical consequence of the Church’s blasphemy of the Holy Communion. The Church has never repented that. The world simply takes the Church’s sins on board now, being semi-conscious of it.
Yes, Anna. I agree. The world simply takes the Church’s sins on board now, being semi-conscious of it.
Re those church leaders who have not publicly spoken against the repugnant spectacle. Are they privately thrilled to see their ‘faith’ represented as their imagination would have it? Do they privately applaud the abhorrent spectacle? Why else would they not speak against it?
JMJ, have mercy.
Anna, I hadn’t thought about this dimension of the rot that is our current moral culture and how it has thoroughly infiltrated our Catholic Church.
Satan is our enemy. He has recruited much of the pagan world and actively seeks recruits in the Catholic Church as well. Satan hates Christ. Satan hates the Mass. Satan hates the Eucharist. Satan hates the fact that Christ’s death and resurrection has brought the possibility of redemption to a fallen world.
Not all men dressed as women are homosexual. Some are Drag Queens not transgendered like they like to be called and are doing it for entertainment purposes only and have wives that are genetic females. It’s awful what has happened and evil. let’s pray for them and someday like us all they will have to answer for what they did.
Paul reminds us in 1 Corinthians 1:18, “For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.”
At the Last Supper, of those who followed Jesus most closely, one betrayed Him, one denied Him, and all fled like sheep whose shepherd has been smitten.
Jesus loved them anyway and commissioned them to spread the word after His resurrection. We have the grace of God, and should we fail to follow in the Disciples footsteps, how different will we believers be than those who hate Christ, mock his cross, and persecute Christ’s followers,
Displays such as this in the LGBT+++ movement, are the devils work and prayer is the force that will spread God’s word and protect his people.
“Words cannot describe it.”
Gotta disagree with you on that – let me trot out just a few: Disgusting, pathetic, sad, outrageous, blasphemous, insulting, inexcusable – and that’s just the start.
Yet there are those who claim that the whole pathetic performance was not meant to insult anyone. I say to anyone who believes that for one instant – I have 6 acres of oceanfront property just north of Brattleboro Vermont that I can let you have for a song.
Your Holiness – We’re ALL waiting on you to say something – ANYTHING – about this.
Please
The current Vatican is unbothered by all of this garbarge from Paris. Nothing official has been said…yet.
And it is unlikely anything will be said. So be it, Francis. Sad.