Christians plan to both enjoy the Olympics and protest it

Canwest News Service

When it comes to next month’s Winter Olympics, Metro Vancouver’s 1,300 Christian congregations aren’t exactly sure whether to welcome or protest it. So they’re doing both.

The two out of five residents of Metro Vancouver who identify with the Catholic, Protestant or Orthodox denominations are being urged to greet the Olympic onslaught with “radical hospitality,” which includes reaching out to the disadvantaged.

Some Christian denominations will be throwing open their doors to February’s flood of Olympic visitors with free coffee, Olympic pins, Internet access and a quiet place to meditate. Many church members are also offering travellers free places to stay.

Some of those same denominations will be holding demonstrations and workshops to raise the profile of the city’s homeless during the multi-billion dollar Olympics, as well as draw attention to sex-trade workers whom they are calling victims of “human trafficking.”

If some Christian activists have their way, the most popular T-shirt to emerge out of the Olympic Games, which they argue typically places prostitutes in high demand, will be the one reading, “Buying sex is not a sport.”