Olympic Games: the greatness and weakness of human triumph

The closing ceremony of the 2024 Olympic Games - this time without unnecessary controversy - closed two weeks of intense sport, competition and emotion.

In a fractured world where international conflicts, cultural clashes and political battles dominate the news, sport has been a small oasis that reminds us of some universal principles that, perhaps, in everyday life, we tend to forget.

The Olympic Games show that we all need to conform to common rules of the game.

In a society that often scorns the idea of universal ethical standards, sport shows us that when rules are broken, injustice follows.

The whole controversy over the participation of athletes with male biology in a women's competition at these Games reveals the path to failure of ideologies that propose to redefine basic concepts common to all.

The Olympics allow us to recognise the virtues and weaknesses of human beings. There is joy in triumph, tears of emotion for the goals achieved.

Although all the athletes have worked hard and trained to achieve victory, not all of them have achieved their goals, not only because there are rivals who may be better, but also because there are unexpected injuries or difficulties that transcend the preparation or mentality of anyone.

Finally, the OGs show us how ephemeral victory is. Athletes who win medals will, perhaps for a few years, be widely recognised, but even the greatest achievements are eventually forgotten.

Today's triumph fuels the need for similar success in the next competition, until it becomes impossible to keep up the level of winning.

That is why so many Christian athletes have claimed that their identity is not in the sport they play or the medals they win.

As record-holder Sidney McLaughlin said: "What I have in Christ is far greater than what I have or don't have in life.

That is the truth in which all of us who have put our trust in Jesus, the one who triumphed over sin on the cross, achieving a victory of eternal transcendence that helps us face each day with hope, can rest.