It’s really important for Catholics to make reparation for the Olympics blasphemy: here’s why

(LifeSiteNews) — When we are confronted with public blasphemy like that of the 2024 Olympics opening ceremony, is it better to talk about it, or to ignore it?

Some of us felt that it might be better to starve this affair of attention. It is clear that the creatures responsible for such blasphemy thrive upon the outrage and attention of Christians.

In some ways, they even benefit from this outrage: after all, it provides them with free publicity. and it’s well known that “there’s no such thing as bad publicity.” Many find it tempting to share videos and images of such events with each other, and to ask, “Can you believe this?”

The same thing occurs from time to time when so-called conservative influencers respond to the latest filthy music by reading them aloud on their shows. We sully ourselves by sharing such things. After all, St Paul said:

But fornication and all uncleanness or covetousness, let it not so much as be named among you, as becometh saints:

Or obscenity or foolish talking or scurrility, which is to no purpose: but rather giving of thanks. (Eph. 5.3-4)

The same clearly applies, to some degree, to these images of this blasphemous event.

However, there is an objective social disorder created by blasphemy like this, which can require us to give attention to these events.

What is blasphemy?

St Thomas wrote that blasphemy is a very great sin, a kind of unbelief which is aggravated by hatred of God. He compares it to murder in the following way:

If we compare murder and blasphemy as regards the objects of those sins, it is clear that blasphemy, which is a sin committed directly against God, is more grave than murder, which is a sin against one’s neighbour.

On the other hand, if we compare them in respect of the harm wrought by them, murder is the graver sin, for murder does more harm to one’s neighbour, than blasphemy does to God.

Since, however, the gravity of a sin depends on the intention of the evil will, rather than on the effect of the deed, as was shown above (I-II Q73.8), it follows that, as the blasphemer intends to do harm to God’s honour, absolutely speaking, he sins more grievously than the murderer.’ (II-II Q13.4)^[1]

The social disorder and guilt caused by the sin of blasphemy – especially when it is perpetrated by those responsible for governing the community – must be rectified, both as a matter of justice to God, and as a matter of urgency for society.

This is because collective responsibility can sometimes be incurred by the social body through the crimes of its head, or through the crimes of such a number of its members as to constitute an act of the whole body. As such, the sins of leaders of a society cam have implications for the members.

St Thomas explains:

[A]ll men born of Adam may be considered as one man, inasmuch as they have one common nature, which they receive from their first parents; even as in civil matters, all who are members of one community are reputed as one body, and the whole community as one man. […] Accordingly the multitude of men born of Adam, are as so many members of one body. (I-II Q. 81.1)

This text explains why it is that a community – which is  “reputed as one body, and the whole community as one man” – may be justly punished together with measures like an interdict (or economic sanctions, etc.) for crimes committed by the nation as a whole or by its leaders.

For the same reason, as we have seen many times throughout history, the just God may well choose to punish such a community that provokes him with egregious sin and blasphemy – unless the injury done to him can be repaired.

This is what is meant by “reparation.”

But can we really offer restitution for sins against the infinite God?

Is reparation even possible?

It is a well-known axiom of the Christian religion that sin is, in a certain sense, infinite – and that this is because of the infinite dignity of God, the person against whom sin is ultimately directed. St Thomas writes:

[A] sin which is committed against God, is infinite: because the gravity of a sin increases according to the greatness of the person sinned against (thus it is a more grievous sin to strike the sovereign than a private individual), and God’s greatness is infinite.

Therefore an infinite punishment is due for a sin committed against God.^[2]

It is another axiom of Christianity that no mere, finite man is able to make restitution for such a sin. St Thomas writes:

“[N]o penalty endured could man pay [God] enough satisfaction [for the debt of sin.]^[3]

There are two points which we must notice here.

The first is that our radical inability to make an adequate restitution for sin – whether our own or for another’s – does not thereby remove the obligation to try to make such restitution. We are obliged at least to make an attempt at restitution, and at repairing the disorder, injustice and guilt of public blasphemy.

The second is that, through his own goodness, God himself gave our race the means of making atonement for sin – which was achieved through the passion of Christ – a divine person with both a divine nature and an assumed human nature.

By assuming our human nature, Christ was able to offer a sacrifice to God as one of us, as man. This sacrifice was of infinite value, “inasmuch as it was God’s flesh” that suffered, and inasmuch as he endured this extreme suffering out of perfect obedience and exceeding love for God.^[4] In so doing, justice was perfectly fulfilled, because our otherwise unpayable debt was paid in full; and yet also in so doing, God manifested his great love and mercy for our fallen race.

But in fact, Christ did not redeem our race by paying our debt in merely a “sufficient” way, but rather in “superabundant” way which gives us the means to make supernatural acts, which are meritorious to the degree that they are united to the passion and animated by supernatural charity.

Such acts – always drawing their value from Christ’s passion, grace and supernatural charity – are indeed capable of being more pleasing to God than blasphemy and other sins are offensive to him.

Because of this, it is truly possible to make reparation for sin. Of the attempt to offer reparation, Pius XI wrote in a 1928 encyclical:

[T]he just and merciful God who would have spared Sodom for the sake of ten just men, will much more be ready to spare the whole race of men, when He is moved by the humble petitions and happily appeased by the prayers of the community of the faithful praying together in union with Christ their Mediator and Head, in the name of all.^[5]

The example of Sodom shows that, just as the sins of leaders or a number of individuals affects society as a whole, so can the reparation made by some do the same.

Reparation taking place worldwide

Following the travesty in Paris, groups of Catholics have carried out public acts of reparation. In the week following, LifeSiteNews reported:

As of Friday, Aug. 2, three cardinals and 24 bishops from nearly every continent signed the letter, by which they committed to “a day of prayer and fasting in reparation for this blasphemy.”

“With shock, the world watched as the Summer Olympics in Paris opened with a grotesque and blasphemous depiction of the Last Supper,” the prelates wrote. “It is hard to understand how the faith of over 2 billion people can be so casually and intentionally blasphemed.”

“We, Catholic bishops from around the world, on behalf of Christians everywhere, demand that the Olympic Committee repudiate this blasphemous action and apologize to all people of faith,” the letter continues.

While a majority of the signatories are from the U.S., including Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone of San Francisco, Archbishop Emeritus Charles Chaput, OFM Cap, of Philadelphia, and Archbishop Joseph Naumann of Kansas City, bishops from Nigeria, Lebanon, England, France, and Argentina have also signed the letter, as well as Bishop Athanasius Schneider of Astana, Kazakhstan.

Signing cardinals include Cardinal Raymond Leo Burke; Cardinal Wilfrid Fox Napier, OFM; and Cardinal Berhaneyesus Demerew Souraphiel, CM.

In Canada, Catholics have been planning public processions to the French embassy in reparation for the event. The organizer John Pacheco told LifeSitenews:

Reparation is something that has long been forgotten in the Church and society. Blasphemy against God is a very serious sin.”

Traditionally, such a sin was considered one of the worst (even worse than the sins of the flesh) because it was a direct attack on the persons of the Godhead, but today it is not appreciated in the Church and, in society, it’s become a bit of a joke.

Sadly, many believe that God will allow this mockery to continue without a response. Such an attitude betrays a flippant attitude towards God’s majesty and a total lack of fear of God.  This is a serious delusion.

In England, Catholics gathered for a public act of reparation outside London’s French Consulate. The organizers of the speech stated:

We’re here because last week in Paris, for the opening ceremony of the Olympics, we saw one of the most brazen examples of blasphemy in living memory.

[It was a] complete mockery of the last supper, wherein our Lord Jesus Christ instituted the Eucharist, a sacrament of complete intimate union with our Lord himself – something so holy and pure, something that bestows so much grace upon its worthy recipients, and something they clearly hate!

Especially in the face of such silence from our supposed Catholic hierarchs, it’s imperative that Catholics make reparation for such blatant acts of blasphemy, for something that was nothing short of an occult luciferian ceremony.

So today, we offer up the Rosary in union with countless other Catholics throughout Europe, in reparation for the outrages, sacrileges and blasphemies of this world and in honour of Christ the King, true King of this World.’

Those who have taken part in these events should be encouraged, knowing that Pope Pius XI wrote the following of them nearly 100 years ago:

[W]hosoever of the faithful have piously pondered on all these things must need be inflamed with the charity of Christ in His agony and make a more vehement endeavour to expiate their own faults and those of others, to repair the honor of Christ, and to promote the eternal salvation of souls.^[6]

Excessive focus on the offense caused to Christians

Much of the commentary on this event has turned around the offense that such blasphemy has caused to Christians. Many were surprised by Francis’ silence for over a week, but in some ways the statement is worse than silence:

The Holy See was saddened by certain scenes at the opening ceremony of the Paris Olympic Games, and can only join the voices that have been raised in recent days to deplore the offence caused to many Christians and believers of other religions.

In a prestigious event where the whole world gathers around common values, there should be no allusions ridiculing the religious convictions of many people.

Freedom of expression, which of course is not in question, finds its limit in respect for others.

While focusing on the offense caused to Christians – and “to all people of faith” and to “believers of other religions” – might be somewhat appropriate when dealing with those who reject Christ, the offense caused to God himself is far more significant.

The incongruity of this focus is very clear when this statement is compared with Miserentissumus Redemptor, Pius XI’s 1928 encyclical to which I have alluded several times.

This encyclical shows us what should be the public sentiments of a true pope in response to public blasphemy against the Son of God and Redeemer of the human race.

I have included some extracts from this encyclical below. It could have been written this very week, and something similar would have been written last week if we had a pope who had any concern for God’s honor.

We should all take note of his teaching and at least offer private prayers of reparation.

—

Miserentissimus Redemptor

Pius XI’s 1928 Encyclical
On Reparation to the Sacred Heart

The absolute necessity of reparation in the modern era of apostasy

Now, how great is the necessity of this expiation or reparation, more especially in this our age, will be manifest to every one who, as we said at the outset, will examine the world, “seated in wickedness” (1 John v, 19), with his eyes and with his mind.

For from all sides the cry of the peoples who are mourning comes up to us, and their princes or rulers have indeed stood up and met together in one against the Lord and against His Church (Cf. Psalm ii, 2).

Throughout those regions indeed, we see that all rights both human and Divine are confounded. Churches are thrown down and overturned, religious men and sacred virgins are torn from their homes and are afflicted with abuse, with barbarities, with hunger and imprisonment; bands of boys and girls are snatched from the bosom of their mother the Church, and are induced to renounce Christ, to blaspheme and to attempt the worst crimes of lust; the whole Christian people, sadly disheartened and disrupted, are continually in danger of falling away from the faith, or of suffering the most cruel death.

These things in truth are so sad that you might say that such events foreshadow and portend the “beginning of sorrows,” that is to say of those that shall be brought by the man of sin, “who is lifted up above all that is called God or is worshipped” (2 Thessalonians ii, 4).

Reparation also to be made for our fellow Christians – and for the problems which they face

But it is yet more to be lamented, Venerable Brethren, that among the faithful themselves, washed in Baptism with the blood of the immaculate Lamb, and enriched with grace, there are found so many men of every class, who laboring under an incredible ignorance of Divine things and infected with false doctrines, far from their Father’s home, lead a life involved in vices, a life which is not brightened by the light of true faith, nor gladdened by the hope of future beatitude, nor refreshed and cherished by the fire of charity; so that they truly seem to sit in darkness and in the shadow of death.

Moreover, among the faithful there is a greatly increasing carelessness of ecclesiastical discipline, and of those ancient institutions on which all Christian life rests, by which domestic society is governed, and the sanctity of marriage is safeguarded; the education of children is altogether neglected, or else it is depraved by too indulgent blandishments, and the Church is even robbed of the power of giving the young a Christian education; there is a sad forgetfulness of Christian modesty especially in the life and the dress of women; there is an unbridled cupidity of transitory things, a want of moderation in civic affairs, an unbounded ambition of popular favour, a depreciation of legitimate authority, and lastly a contempt for the word of God, whereby faith itself is injured, or is brought into proximate peril.

But all these evils as it were culminate in the cowardice and the sloth of those who, after the manner of the sleeping and fleeing disciples, wavering in their faith, miserably forsake Christ when He is oppressed by anguish or surrounded by the satellites of Satan, and in the perfidy of those others who following the example of the traitor Judas, either partake of the holy table rashly and sacrilegiously, or go over to the camp of the enemy.

And thus, even against our will, the thought rises in the mind that now those days draw near of which Our Lord prophesied: “And because iniquity hath abounded, the charity of many shall grow cold” (Matth. xxiv, 12).

The obligation of anyone who loves Christ

Now, whosoever of the faithful have piously pondered on all these things must need be inflamed with the charity of Christ in His agony and make a more vehement endeavour to expiate their own faults and those of others, to repair the honor of Christ, and to promote the eternal salvation of souls.

And indeed that saying of the Apostle: “Where sin abounded, grace did more abound” (Romans v, 20) may be used in a manner to describe this present age; for while the wickedness of men has been greatly increased, at the same time, by the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, a marvelous increase has been made in the number of the faithful of both sexes who with eager mind endeavour to make satisfaction for the many injuries offered to the Divine Heart, nay more they do not hesitate to offer themselves to Christ as victims.

For indeed if any one will lovingly dwell on those things of which we have been speaking, and will have them deeply fixed in his mind, it cannot be but he will shrink with horror from all sin as from the greatest evil, and more than this he will yield himself wholly to the will of God, and will strive to repair the injured honor of the Divine Majesty, as well by constantly praying, as by voluntary mortifications, by patiently bearing the afflictions that befall him, and lastly by spending his whole life in this exercise of expiation.