Posted on 07/27/2012 8:21:11 PM PDT by pastorbillrandles
Wisdom crieth without; she uttereth her voice in the streets:(Proverbs 1:20)
What a privilege and opportunity for any nation to be able to host an Olympics. The opening ceremony is a unique opportunity to display the glories of the host country. But that would presuppose that the presenters actually believe in the validity of their own national story.
I’ve been told that an unprecedented one billion people around the world witnessed this year’s London opening ceremony. I also was eager to see how the narrative of the nation of Shakespeare, Donne, Churchill, the Puritans, Wilberforce and countless other of the remarkable sons of England who have so enriched this world would be presented.
The only problem would be one of what to include and what to leave out of the national narrative. Surely they would present the fact that it was Great Britain which was the first nation to outlaw slavery, spending blood and treasure to put an end to the hated African slave trade. There would be no doubt that the brave stand Britain took against the Nazi juggernaut would be acknowledged.
Would there be any presentation of Britain’s contribution to representative government? What of the success of her former colonies, Australia,India, the United States? In any field imaginable, science, Law, Education, literature, the positive contribution of the British people to the benefit of the modern world has been immense.
But when given the chance, to tell the British story to an audience of one billion, the Olympic opening was a sad disappointment.
The beginning was promising, rightly acknowledging Britain’s Christian roots, in the beautiful singing of hymns appropriate to the four fold Kingdom of Ireland,England, Scotland and Wales.
We went from there to a cleverly choreographed reconstruction of the Industrial revolution, with an implied labor Capitol struggle, and four ugly smokestacks belching noxious fumes. Women’s suffrage was then acknowledged, and about ten minutes was devoted to the Britain’s National Health Service.
We then moved into British literary characters from Peter Pan to Mary Poppins to characters from the Harry Potter series. The finale was a heavily choreographed tribute to pop music and the amoral youth culture that grew out of it.
What is Wisdom saying through this spectacle to us?
Many things if we have ears to hear.
What was presented to one billion people as a representative sample of the contributions and development of British culture, is an extremely limited, stunted and biased selective history. This is exactly what our modern godless, amoral educational and academic elite have done to us for the last 60 years in the west. And it is extremely demoralizing.
Who would defend the culture of Ziggy Stardust or of gay marriage? Imagine there is nothing to live for or die for...? What is there in that to be proud of? By deleting the vast, rich Christian influence and contribution of our western Judeo Christian civilizations, our young have been denied a rich ,God-given heritage.
Our children could benefit by hearing again the stories of John Bunyan, Winston Churchill, William Wilberforce. The world has been enriched by them. The Proverbs teach us that the memory of the Just is blessed…
As if the music of the 1960′s through the 1990′s was the acme of the culture! Really? Britain deserves a better telling than that!
Other than the initial beautiful Christian hymns,(Which I thank God were not omitted), every other trace of Britain’s blessed and world enriching Christian influence was deleted. The valiant, slave liberating, civilizing force for universal good that is far more representative of Britain as the tawdry celebration of vanity that was presented tonight.
According to this article, Britain’s Olympic Ceremony Grapples With Weighty Issues, prominent British conservatives expressed similar concerns,
“
Aidan Burley, a lawmaker from Prime Minister David Cameron’s ruling Conservative party, tweeted: “The most leftie opening ceremony I have ever seen — more than Beijing, the capital of a communist state! Welfare tribute next?” He followed that with: “Thank God the athletes have arrived! Now we can move on from leftie multi-cultural crap.” Several people tweeted their support for his comments.
Alastair Campbell, former British Labour prime minister Tony Blair’s communications chief, retorted on Twitter: “Brilliant that we got a socialist to do the opening ceremony.”"
Perhaps Wisdom is also showing us by these distortions how far we have strayed from our God, and this could be another indicator of our need for repentance. It is not too late but time is running out...”Whosoever will call upon the Lord shall be saved”
Theme music from “The Exorcist”, followed by:
A celebration of Socialized Medicine, followed by:
Scary villains from children’s literature, chiefly Lord Voldemort, followed by:
The arrival of Mary Poppins singing “A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down”, followed by:
Theme music from the wonderful Christian film “Chariots of Fire” — which was rudely mocked and made fun of.
Where are we going? And why am I in this hand-basket??
bump
All I can say is thank goodness for the American Revolution.
I remember the China opening ceremonies: “One World, one dream.”
Translation: Communism will rule the World someday.
The could have, and should have ended it when they joined the five rings in the sky with the pyro technics.
That was a memorable shot.
Then they lost it, especially depicting digital age.
They feted the (British) inventor of the world wide web? Come on! There is no single person that deserves this recognition. The internet age came upon us as an evolutionary process.
The Muslim countries all witness to their religion by having the new moon and the star on their flags. Everyone knows what their religion is.
Where are the Christians? Hiding their faith because it is too offensive to the Muslims and the ungodly.
Christianity will soon be gone in most of the countries that marched in the opening ceremonies.
The opening ceremonies are loaded with Satanic symbolism as per usual - but more so than ever now.
The opening ceremonies are loaded with Satanic symbolism as per usual - but more so than ever now.
I didn’t see all of it, but as you synopsized it, it looks like they were trying to strike some ineffectual and lame sense
of “balance”, but predictably, “the glorious mosaic” that now defines Britain’s self-image rapidly seemed to take over.
As if the overwrought production numbers weren’t tedious enough, they were followed by an inexplicably gaudy , noisy,
and vapid bow to “youth culture”, complete with a montage tweeting, texting, and some apparently interracial “romance”
which played out like a cheesy, overproduced commercial for he latest cyber-gadget.
Aidan Burley had it right.
It screamed out “nanny state” and in any case, it’s only the Olympics, basically a chance for wealthy dilettantes to display their one skill. Our Islamic enemies will probably conclude that it’s a waste of time to destroy this, when it could so easily destroy itself.
Did Churchill make any type of appearance?
Now lets get on with the real show.
The cultural-political show was peppered with too many pre-taped segments which detracted from the spontaneity and real time-ness of a live Olympics opening ceremony.
Heh. That's not the line!
My wife and I sat there with our mouths agape that the opening ceremonies were so bad. I’ll use a very british phrase to respond to this claptrap- “Baaah, humbug!”
You may get an objection from the I.D. crowd. 8-)
Horrid PC show!! But I did notice one thing missing, young girls/ women in head scarfs!!!
Yes, Churchill did appear briefly. As the helicopter carrying the Queen and James Bond to the Opening Ceremony flew over the city, a statue of Churchill looked up and waved happily.
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