Apologies are big news, especially the one in regard to a segment of the 2024 Olympic opening ceremony. Most of my readers watched or heard about the parody of Leonardo da Vinci’s painting of the Last Supper. The French organizing committee scrabbled to do damage control.
The French director, Thomas Jolly, denied the Last Supper interpretation. He explained the original intent: “Dionysius arrives at the table because he is the Greek god of celebration.” It portrayed the gods of Olympus celebrating the Olympic games. Tolerance and inclusivity were the intent.
If Mr. Jolly’s explanation is true about the original intent, then this raises a question of whether the ancient Greeks were tolerant and inclusive. The Olympics originated in ancient Greece. Greeks were polytheistic and Dionysius was one of the gods. Emily Katz Anhalt stated, “The ancient Greeks were not models of tolerance and civility. Even as their democracy flourished, the Athenians remained bellicose, kept slaves, and subjugated women.”[1] The chosen reenactment of ancient Greece’s Olympic festivity failed to support the committee’s ceremonial theme of tolerance and inclusivity and it offended millions of people’s moral, religious, and theological values.
As a minister of the good news of Jesus Christ, I strive to choose my sermons’ words and illustrations carefully to align with my purpose. Similarly, as a writer, I want my title and content to support each other. Destin Word Weavers members critiqued a recent draft of one of my blog articles. The readers said my title and some of the content didn’t support each other. This helpful feedback aided me in making the article better before posting it online.
Did the French committee do its due diligence in evaluating the intent and content before the opening ceremony? I don’t know. In my opinion, it knew exactly what their show might elicit from viewers standing on the Seine River banks, looking at their televisions, or watching live streaming. They had an agenda that superseded the religious and moral sensibilities of millions of people around the world. The show didn’t achieve the desired universally accepted response. The show failed “to send a message of love, a message of inclusion and not at all to divide” people.
The committee said it was proud of the show and offered a weak apology to offended people, “We are sorry if anyone was offended.” They knew the show offended people. Why didn’t they simply admit that? Effective apologies own such failures.
The committee’s weak apology gives us an example to evaluate our apologies. The late Dr. Aaron Lazare left the world with four ingredients of a good apology: acknowledge the offense and take responsibility for it; explain what happened; express remorse; and offer to make amends. I’ve used these to evaluate two apologies I recently made to two people.
Here’s my suggested wording for a good apology from the committee: We are sorry our show offended so many people around the world. Our intent was to take an ancient Greek Olympic festivity and reenact it in this year’s opening ceremony. Our intent failed to communicate love, inclusion, and tolerance to all people. We are sorry. Please forgive us.”
Why not revisit an apology you recently offered to someone? Did it include the four elements of a good apology? Let’s learn from the weak apology of the committee to make our apologies good ones so they are more effective next time. And remember, the offended person has the right to decide if our apologies are effective. Offended people are more likely to respect the apologetic person more if their apology is a good one.
[1] ‘Paris Olympics organizers say sorry for offense, but insist opening ceremony did not depict “The Last Supper.”’ Updated July 29, 2024, 2024/8:59 AM EDT / CBS/AP.