Most will be familiar by now with how the controversy over the Last Supper parody during the Olympics' opening ceremony was followed by an <a href="https://catholicherald.co.uk/olympics-organisers-half-apologise-as-italian-catholics-decry-endless-gay-pride-culture/?swcfpc=1"><mark style="background-color:rgba(0, 0, 0, 0)" class="has-inline-color has-vivid-cyan-blue-color">insincere “apology”</mark></a> along with claims and gaslighting arguing it was actually a Greco-Roman bacchanal feast being depicted.
In trying to unravel all this and the counter claims that have been banded around, one thing I would like to point out is that it is already very difficult – somewhat suspiciously so – to find online the original videos or transcripts from this part of the ceremony. As a result, one is increasingly left with having to reply upon second-hand captures of the ceremony through various media outlets.
The responses of the Catholic and Orthodox communities have overall been characterised by peaceful but firm indignation at the mockery of the institution of the Holy Eucharist. For example, Bishop Baron’s <a href="https://catholicherald.co.uk/give-me-a-break-bishop-barron-calls-out-disingenuous-apology-by-olympics-committee/"><mark style="background-color:rgba(0, 0, 0, 0)" class="has-inline-color has-vivid-cyan-blue-color">video responses</mark></a> rightly went viral, and he offered excellent insight. Protestant responses have generally been reasonable too.
However, many people – and sadly some Christians included – seem to have accepted the gaslighting that has tried to argue that because of the blue Dionysus figure who appeared during the sketch, it was never meant to parody the Last Supper, but a bacchanal feast.
So just what was it: a Greco-Roman bacchanal or the Last Supper? Leaving aside that various performers involved in the performance have discussed it as intentionally parodying the Last Supper, alongside the play on words given to the display of <em>la Cène sur la Scène sur la Seine</em> – “the Last Supper on the stage on the Seine” – let's look into that bacchanal claim as an "adequate explanation", after which Christians are meant to rest easy.<br><strong><br>RELATED: <a href="https://catholicherald.co.uk/drag-queen-confirms-it-was-a-parody-of-last-supper/?swcfpc=1"><mark style="background-color:rgba(0, 0, 0, 0)" class="has-inline-color has-vivid-cyan-blue-color">Drag queen confirms it was a parody of Last Supper despite Olympic committee’s claim</mark></a></strong>
It is true that later in the performance the Last Supper scene morphed, as more performers joined and an ostensibly naked man painted in blue body paint appeared on a platter. The blue man, playing the Greek God Dionysus, began singing about how much better the world would be if we were all naked.
The lyrics included lines such as: “Would there be wars if we had stayed entirely naked? Where to hide a revolver when you’re entirely naked?” and “No more wealthy, no more poor, when we go back to all being naked”. And all with a child present.
However, what makes a child’s involvement all the creepier is that it is not a mere feast we are being shown but, as regularly pointed out online, a <em>bacchanal</em>.
The word “bacchanal” comes from Bacchus, another name for Dionysus.
Dionysus/Bacchus was the Greek God of wine, fertility, festivities and ritual madness. He was later embraced by the Romans who equated him to their <em>Liber Pater</em> or “Free Father”, a God dedicated to unrestrained freedom.
In Roman culture, Dionysian festivals were known as bacchanalia, and involved, among other things, drunkenness, orgies, and all sorts of degrading practices.
Speaking of the bacchanalia in his <em>History of Rome</em>, the Roman historian Livy wrote:
“When wine had inflamed their minds, and night and the mingling of males with females and young with old, had destroyed all sense of modesty, every variety of debauchery began to be practiced, since each one had to hand the form of pleasure to which his nature was most inclined.”
Bacchanals eventually became so problematically degenerate that the Romans banned them in 183 BC.
Even if we granted – which we don’t – that the scene at the Paris Olympics was only a bacchanal, why was a child present for this orgic-themed celebration? And, why was it broadcast for the whole world? What’s the message here?
The goal of the new form of Western liberalism would appear to now be on display for all. That liberalism, or freedom, is not truly free unless all things – and they do mean all – are permissible.
People’s acceptance of it <em>just </em>being a bacchanal, which in part it was in the latter half of the performance, admits it was presenting a licentious drunken orgy! Is this what we as the West want to show the world? Are these the core values of our civilisation?
But the question still remains, what does Dionysus have to do with the Last Supper? Why link the two? And it is here that the real problem occurs.
Bacchanals were not just feasts, they were events focused on the worship of Dionysus.
During bacchanals omophagia was practiced, which involved ripping apart live animals and eating their raw flesh. This practice was done to represent Orpheus’ myth in which Dionysus is ripped apart by the Titans and later resurrected. This has led to Dionysus sometimes being called a “dying and rising god”.
Another part of the bacchanal rituals was a practice known as “drinking the god”.
Through consuming wine, the spirit of Dionysus – also known as the God of wine – was being consumed by the drinker. The drinking of the wine also allowed the drinker to be in communion with Dionysus and transcend their mortal form to achieve an ecstatic state.
The parallels to the Eucharist are clear.
On the altar, the Host is broken by the Priest, and we consume it. We then drink Christ by His blood. Through these acts we receive the grace of God and come into closer communion with Him.
Is this coincidence? Maybe, but it seems unlikely that someone reading about bacchanalia for more than a few minutes, as Thomas Jolly, the artistic director of the opening ceremony, must have done to design the scene, could miss the connotations and connections. Not least given that Jolly chose to present Dionysus on a platter – a clear nod to eating him.
Dionysus’ presence in the Last Supper scene represents the crux and apex of the mockery, not an escape from it.
It is not just that Christians are being gaslit and mocked; it’s that the scene represented a truly satanic replacement – an unholy parody.<br><br><strong>RELATED: <a href="https://catholicherald.co.uk/theatre-of-satan-cardinal-burke-condemns-olympics-ceremony/?swcfpc=1"><mark style="background-color:rgba(0, 0, 0, 0)" class="has-inline-color has-vivid-cyan-blue-color">‘Theatre of Satan’: Cardinal Burke condemns Last Supper parody in Paris</mark></a></strong>
The Blessed Sacrament, the Body of our Lord which we consume in the Holy Eucharist, was replaced with the body of a licentious Dionysus.
The Body of the self-sacrificial saviour was replaced with one which represents self-interested love above all else.
The Body of the one who offers true freedom was replaced with a god that appears to offer freedom, but actually represents slavery to sin.
The one true God was replaced with a false god.
This is the real mockery of the Paris Olympics opening ceremony. It’s out in the open, and it’s not going away any time soon. And Christians are right to voice their just anger in love and without violence.
Unless Christians expose the liberal establishment’s gaslighting for what it is, this will continue. But most of all, we must pray for France.
Not that long-ago Parisians wept as their great cathedral burned – how sadly symbolic. We must ask Our Lady, under her ancient title of Notre Dame de Paris, to continue to pray for France, and for the rest of us. <br><br><em>Photo</em>: <em>Scenes from the opening ceremony of the Olympics, including the the Last Support parody and the arrival of 'Dionysus'; screenshot from <a href="https://x.com/Olympics/status/1816929100532945380"><mark style="background-color:rgba(0, 0, 0, 0)" class="has-inline-color has-vivid-cyan-blue-color">The Olympic Games @Olympics</mark></a>.</em> <br><br><em>Thomas Casemore teaches RS and is pursuing a master’s degree in divinity, researching St Bede and early British ecclesiastical history and spirituality.</em>
