Proverbs 19:11 "Good sense makes one slow to anger, and it is his glory to overlook an offense"
As a born and raised, with Bible degree in hand, Christian....y'all, I'm so tired. I'm so tired of the Christian outrage everytime a secular organization does a secular thing - we become the snowflake, the bully, and morally superior, when it best suits us. We start yelling "God shall not be mocked" out of context, and subsequently hurl insults and degradation every which way until something sticks, like al dente pasta to the wall.
Recently, the Paris 2024 Olympics had an opening show with drag that many interpreted as a mockery of the DaVinci Last Supper painting. That narrative didn't make sense to me, so I waited, I decided to be "slow to anger" and not quickly offended, and wait for the situation to flush itself out. The parts that didn't make sense, were that there was no supper, what was with the big blue guy, the amount of "apostles" was incorrect, and none of the social groupings were the same as the painting...perhaps the satire was lost on my very literal self, but I just didn't get it...As with all symbolism, many cultures and time periods share symbols - a line up of people on a stage doesn't mean it is inherently a Last Supper portrayal (neither is a white horse inherently from Revelation either). In this case, the artistic designer, Thomas Jolly, didn't intend for it to be that way. What did he intend? Feast of Dionysus/Bacchanalia. A Greek event, riddled with indulgent pleasure, revelry, and just excessive debauchery - so his "art" definitely makes sense in that context. As does the white horse, Sequanna, the Goddess of the Seine - The same Seine river where the entire show took place... Please remember, we are talking about PARIS(a city swimming in centuries of worldly wilds) and the Olympics - you know, the originally Greek event(also historically riddled with millennia of revelry)?! There has been a whirlwind of press and instagram posts that have followed this original writing that I am now editing, but I still hold to my opinion.
I didn't care for the show - what little of it that I've seen, mostly photos. I'm not into drag, I'm also kind of a prude, I haven't let my kids watch it at all. We generally don't participate in most things like this - including the Super Bowl. It's overall not my cup of tea. I am not defending or approving of the drag show in any way, shape or form... I'm also not shocked that Paris did such a thing, also not shocked the Olympics were okay with it.
What I am not okay with, is the *constant* string of Christians on my feed clutching their pearls about the trendiest thing to clutch - a nonsense, secular, high art show, in another country, that they were obviously not the focus group for, that was based in the context of ancient Greek mythology, for an ancient Greek event, held in an ancient European city. Many, MANY other things have done mockups of the Last Supper, including loads of examples in Hollywood: South Park, House M.D., The Sopranos, etc. and even SNL did a mockup with Trump at a Last Supper portrayal, after one of Trump's remarks likening himself to Jesus....I didn't know any of those existed till I went looking for them, there was absolutely no outrage when those venues did those sacrilegious portrayals, or even the outright blasphemy of Trump likening himself to Christ - total silence in the Christian community, except for when they applauded it...
It gets dicey here, please bear with me...All that said, Christians loooove to be victims - we can't exert our moral superiority when we are doing a-okay...we have to be downtrodden in order to pick ourselves up with our bootstraps. Therefore we fabricate things that aren't actual persecution, in order to rally loyalty and a sense of fight and dignity, while demonizing the humans around us. A few minor examples include: playing cards, Harry Potter, drums, electric guitars, the Starbucks Christmas red cup era 2015, Taylor Swift, Chipotle being owned by a gay man, Netflix donating to the Harris2024 campaign, and on and on it goes. We perpetually SLAM cancel culture, while we promote boycotts at every turn, we make fun of liberals and "safe spaces" yet are aghast when secular Europeans do secular European things...and we demand they stop...and then post about how we are boycotting an entire global event, because of the choices of a few people...denying the honor the athletes are due, because we didn't agree with an opening show...
My heart is so tired of this...
Subsequently, some time after the show, Paris lost electricity for about an hour in some areas, affecting some 125,000 people, but not for very long. The response by many was "God bless" and "that's what you get" and so on and so forth. That doesn't gleam with grace or promoting Christ, that screams bitter and vengeful. Christ could have joined in at stoning the Woman at the Well - he had every "right" to do so, but he showed grace, mercy, and compasion, amidst her multitude of sexual exploits...God could have struck the performers down during the show, and did not - chances are, He's not asking you to do so online...
Another major critic told me she is just trying to be salt, to preserve from rot...As someone who is familiar with salt on the molecular level, as well as a multitude of applications in the culinary world - be careful that you don't salt your words into uselessness. Salted fish is indeed preserved from rot - it's also useless and inedible until you chip away that salt and soak it in milk and THEN prepare it to eat...Salt enhances flavor and texture of food...but too much renders the food inedible...be careful with that delicate pinch...
Jesus said Mt. 5:39 "But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also."
Peter said 1 Peter 3:9 "Do not repay evil with evil or insult with insult. On the contrary, repay evil with blessing, because to this you were called so that you may inherit a blessing."
2 Thess 1:8 "He will punish those who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus."
Deut 32:35 "It is mine to avenge; I will repay. In due time their foot will slip; their day of disaster is near and their doom rushes upon them.”
Mark 11:25 "And when you stand praying, if you hold anything against anyone, forgive them, so that your Father in heaven may forgive you your sins.”
Prov. 20:22 "Do not say, “I’ll pay you back for this wrong!” Wait for the LORD, and he will avenge you."
Romans 12:18 "If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone."
If your faith rests in Jesus, then be at peace. Stop taking offense at all these things - whether or not they were intended for offense. It simply doesn't matter. If God is sovereign, then we needn't worry about literally anything, nor should you be stirring up strife and vitriol...
My honest and humble opinion, was that the show was far more of a mockery of the peasant class. I very quickly saw it as an extravagant take on the Hunger Games and their Capitol at Panem, where revelry and riches prevail, while the commoner is stifled and supressed. THAT analogy made sense to me, coming from the French, coming from our own much less intense version of the Hunger Games (The Olympics), while we are in the middle of a low-key class war globally...THAT parallel...that is perhaps where your angst and derision should be directed towards...
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