There is no Vatican Olympic team, at least not this year (though I recommend that you see the recent film “Cento metri dal Paradiso” to see what could happen if the Vatican decided to enter…). But the Holy See and the Catholic Church have been fully involved in the preparations for the 2012 London Olympics and Paralympics. Holy See diplomats supported the UK’s call for observance of the Olympic Truce at the UN General Assembly last year. Our Joint Communique in February looked forward to London 2012 and “a year characterised by the spirit of the Olympic Charter and the Olympic Truce”. The More than Gold initiative in the United Kingdom has seen extraordinary work by religious leaders in ensuring that there will be a healthy legacy for young people following the Games.
So it was no surprise, but wonderful all the same, that Pope Benedict spoke about the 2012 Olympic Games in both English and Italian at the 22 July Angelus at Castel Gandolfo. He said in English that: “In a few days from now, the Olympic Games are due to begin in Great Britain. I send greetings to the organizers, athletes and spectators alike, and I pray that, in the spirit of the Olympic Truce, the goodwill generated by this international sporting event may bear fruit, promoting peace and reconciliation throughout the world. Upon all those attending the London Olympic Games, I invoke the abundant blessings of Almighty God.” And he added in Italian, for good measure: “the Olympics are the greatest sporting event in the world, at which athletes from a great many nations will participate, and as such they have a strong symbolic value. For this reason the Catholic Church watches them with particular warmth and attention. We pray that, by the will of God, the London Games will be a true experience of fraternity between the peoples of the earth.”
The Olympic and Paralympic Games are about sport. But also so much more. For all the hype, competition and commercialisation, they remind us of human endeavour and ambition at its most pure; the will to come together to measure our abilities and soar to ever greater heights in the name not of profit or greed but, in the words of the Olympic Charter: “at the service of the harmonious development of man, with a view to promoting a peaceful society concerned with the preservation of human dignity”. Pope John XXIII spoke during the 1960 Rome Olympics of sport as endowing man with “perseverance, courage and the practice of self-denial”. We often fall short of the ideal. But we should never stop trying to attain it. Pope Benedict may be the one Head of State in the world with no interest in the outcome of individual sporting events. But he does see the bigger picture of London 2012.