Ibadan, 31 July, 2024 / 11:25 am (ACI Africa).
A section of Catholic Bishops in Nigeria has described the drag queen-led parody of the Last Supper featured during the July 26 opening ceremonies of the 2024 Paris Olympics as offensive to Christianity, and raised questions as to whether freedom of religion really exists in the West.
The highly denounced parody portrays DJ and producer Barbara Butch, an LGBTQ+ icon, as Jesus in what appears to be a part of a fashion show, apparently mocking Leonardo da Vinci’s famous painting of the Last Supper.
According to Catholic Bishops of Nigeria’s Ibadan Ecclesiastical Province comprising Ibadan Catholic Archdiocese, Ilorin, Ondo, Oyo, Ekiti and Osogbo Dioceses, the mockery is shocking and disrespectful, and a “deliberate move to demean Christianity.”
In a statement shared with ACI Africa on Tuesday, July 30 at the end of their two-day meeting in the Diocese of Ondo, the Catholic Bishops say the caricature also questions the respect that the rest of the world has always had for Western countries that, according to the Catholic Bishops, are supposed to be civilized.
“That this decadent caricature of one of the most cherished events of Christianity, ‘The Last Supper’, is publicized in France, a country with a rich and old Christian heritage, and at the Olympic games detracts from the status of the Olympics and belies all claims to enduring civility and respect for freedom of religion in the West,” the Bishops lament.