This is a Twitter post, so I'll cut and paste. I found it interesting because "Chariots of Fire" was on TV a few days ago, and I couldn't help but think what a contrast there was between London and Paris of 1924 and what things are like today. The opening ceremonies pretty much confirmed that for me:
Jay W. Richards
@DrJayRichards
How far we have fallen: 100 years ago, teammates Eric Liddell and Harold Abrahams, representing Britain, ran in the 1924 Paris Olympics. Liddell, a devout Christian, refused to run the 100 meter sprint because it landed on a Sunday. His Jewish teammate Abrahams won that race. Liddell won the 400 meter, which was held on a weekday. Most know their story because of the movie Chariots of Fire. ...
What happened to these men after their Olympic victories? Liddell was born in China to Scottish missionaries. In 1925, Liddell returned to China to continue their work. He died in 1945, a mere five months before the liberation of China from the Japanese during WWII.
Abrahams, the son of a Jewish immigrant from Polish Lithuania, became a leader of British athletics. He served as a radio reporter for the 1936 Olympics in Berlin--"Hitler's Olympics"--and was later present when Roger Bannister broke the 4 min. mile--the first to do so.
In Chariots of Fire, there is a hint of another part of his story: the movie begins and ends with Abraham's memorial service, held in 1978 at a church. As it happens, he was buried at St. John the Baptist Church in Amwell, Hertfordshire. Why?
Abrahams had converted to Catholicism in 1930--a bold move at the time. Chariots of Fire treats the (no doubt realistic) anti-Semitism of the era. But the church service that bookends the movie is the only hint of this later part of Abrahams' story.
The freak show of the opening ceremony in Paris is a mockery and repudiation, not just of sacred Christian symbols, but of the civilization that, until recently, had the sanity to celebrate men like Eric Liddell and Harold Abrahams.
Our civilization is being attacked by a toxic pathogen *from within.* Do we have the strength, and the will, to fight it? How many men like Eric Liddell and Harold Abrahams do we have left?
July 26, 2024
Jay W. Richards, PhD, is Director of the DeVos Center for Life, Religion, and Family and the William E. Simon Senior Research Fellow.
