So we have come to a “drag queen” Last Supper!  How nice of those people who participated!   I agree with those who say that what these men did is blasphemy.  There was a disavowal that the organizers were depicting da Vinci’s Last Supper.  I believe that such a denial is false.

What can we learn from this sad event?  With regard to Christianity, the secular environment is on the attack.  This fact is nothing new.  In the pagan Roman world the same thing was happening, but with greater intensity.  What happened in Paris is one of many examples.

How should we respond?  First, we should recognize that this contempt will continue to occur.  Second, as Flannery O’Connor suggests, we should push back, that  is, we should respond with a clear, opposing, and respectful voice.  What happened in Paris is clearly inappropriate.  Christians should never use demeaning words in a critique of opposing views.    Third, we need to use such circumstances to provide a witness to the entire community.  Fourth, Christians must continue to support and uphold the teaching that sex is appropriate only in the marriage of a man and a woman.  People make mistakes and commit sins, including sexual sins.  But, Christians have recourse to repentance and the forgiveness of sins.   God is merciful and compassionate.

Christian teaching rejects the idea that there exists more than two genders.  It is not only Christianity that undergirds this fact, but also sense experience and reason.  Despite the ways of the world and our own sin, we must continue to defend Christian ethics.

There is an irony here.  Leonardo da Vinci may have been a homosexual.  This conclusion takes nothing away from his great works of art.  I doubt very highly that he would approve of the drag queen Last Supper.  He would probably say something like, “It’s a drag.”  It is not funny.  It is not art.  It is parody.

 

Michael G. Tavella

August 3, 2020