The Bishop of Oswestry has written a message to Her Excellency the Ambassador of France concerning the Opening Ceremony of the Paris Olympic Games:
Your Excellency,
I wish to express in the strongest terms the revulsion I felt, along with very many millions of Christians worldwide, at the scenes from the Opening Ceremony of the Olympic Games in Paris. The mockery of Da Vinci’s The Last Supper was an appalling and offensive error on the part of those whose responsibility it was to represent France to the world. What ought to have been a celebration of the nobility and beauty of French culture, and the all-embracing spirit of the Olympic Movement, became at the organisers’ hands an international broadcast of blasphemy which has done France grave dishonour. No one should be in any doubt that Da Vinci’s depiction of the Last Supper of the Lord, because of its historical and devotional significance to Christians, is emblematic of the Holy Eucharist itself. To subject this image to such mockery was to ridicule what it depicts – the gift by Jesus Christ of himself to the Church in the Holy Eucharist. It is simply unthinkable that the organisers of the Opening Ceremony would ever have considered ridiculing an equivalent rite, image, or event of any other religion in this way.
I respectfully ask you to ensure that these comments are passed on to those with the authority to hold the individuals responsible to account.
Faithfully yours,
✠Paul Oswestriensis
