The London Olympics opened with a five-hour spectacular extravaganza spiced up with Mr Bean’s comic antics, James Bond’s security effort on the Queen and a wondrous lighted cauldron. The competition started in earnest with world records being smashed, and the medal tally tightly monitored.
Honesty and fairness are considered as important as speed and strength in each contest; yet cheats still continue to hound the organizers. When Canadian sprinter Ben Johnson was stripped of his gold medal for doping, most sporting events, not just the Olympics, have been plagued with competitors using prohibited drugs to enhance their performances. Sports writer Peter FitzSimons described the Olympics as “a heady mix of personal ambition and unrestrained nationalism, creating a "win at all costs" attitude. Some athletes don't know when to draw the line, however, living by the creed that it's only cheating if you get caught.”
One such athlete who was caught was Boris Onishchenko. He won for the Soviet Union in modern pentathlon in the 1968 and 1972 Summer Olympics. In 1976, where he won gold for the third time, it was discovered that he used a modified weapon in the fencing contest that registered a touch (a hit) without making any contact on his opponent. He was stripped of his medal, causing great embarrassment to the Soviet Olympic team members with the USSR volleyball team threatening to throw him out of the hotel’s window if they met him. Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev gave him a personal scolding, and he was dismissed from the Red Army, fined 5,000 rubles and stripped of all his sporting honours. “Boris the Cheat”, as newspapers labeled him, became a taxi driver in Kiev.
Pope Benedict XVI has given his blessing to the Olympics in his message to pilgrims at his summer residence of Castel Gandolfo near Rome: “We pray that with the will of God the Games in London will be a true experience of brotherhood between the peoples of the world. 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.”
God has meant each one for a purpose. And there are those who are gifted with ability in sports. Surely, God wants these talented athletes to reveal Him through outstanding performances. God also wants us to enjoy life, and sport gives such joy. Russian poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko said, “I love sport because I love life, and sport is one of the basic joys of life.”
What did the founder of the modern Olympics have to say about the Games? Pierre de Coubertin, a French educator who is primarily responsible for the revival of the Olympic Games in 1894 stated, “For me sport was a religion... with religious sentiment.” He knew that victory in any sporting contest, was not just a victory for the individual or the nation represented, rather it’s meant to glorify the one God who wants every person to be perfect in spirit.
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