‘Peace Games, the soul of the Olympics and Paralympics’ is the title of the book, published by Libreria Editrice Vaticana, directed by Vincenzo Parrinello and promoted by Athletica Vaticana. In the preface, Pope Francis relaunches the Olympic truce and sport as an antidote to war. The book was presented this Monday at the Olympic Stadium in Rome.
Giancarlo La Vella – Rome
“Thinking about the value of the Olympic Truce, my hope is that sport can concretely build bridges, break down barriers, promote peaceful relations.” A few words to Pope Francis are enough to find the effective and appropriate key to make competitive activity, at any level, an important driving force to look, through sport, towards a future of dialogue and peace. There is this and much more in the volume “Peace Games, the soul of the Olympics and Paralympics”, published by the Libreria Editrice Vaticana, directed by Vincenzo Parrinello and promoted by Athletica Vaticana. The preface of Pope Francis, a grand style presentation of this book, traces the fundamental lines to understand well and give proper meaning to the 85 stories of Olympic and Paralympic athletes contained in the pages of a kind of guide, to also better understand the great sporting events that we have experienced in 2024 and that we will experience in the coming weeks. All disciplines offered spectacle and excellence.
a liOlympic bro in the Olympic Stadium
“Peace Games” was presented in a place as emblematic as the Olympic Stadium in Rome. Precisely in this facility, created for the 1960 Olympic Games – it was recalled – the first Paralympic Games were held. Sacrifice, loyalty, commitment, it was said in the various speeches moderated by Alessandro Gisotti, deputy editorial director of the Dicastery for Communication of the Holy See, are the characteristics that make sporting activity something that is not an end in itself. Victories, records, medals and cups are important, but even more so is how sport manages to positively contaminate civil society with its values. Before the microphones of Vatican Radio-Vatican News, the editor Vincenzo Parrinello spoke of the essential characteristic of the volume: “This book, remembering the Olympic truce that was observed in the Games of ancient Greece, is addressed to everyone, to teach that the “Sport is not victory at all costs, but rather a baggage of values that can help the world find peace, a good that must be pursued in every human and social context.”
cardMendonça final: no one competes alone
It is the great humanity that permeates true sport, which makes the world of competition, whether for amateurs or champions, something exciting and attractive, which has all the potential to be a teacher of life. In his speech, Cardinal Josè Tolentino de Mendonça, Prefect of the Dicastery for Culture and Education, recalled how, along with passion, commitment is necessary: ”No one is born a champion, but can become one through training.” intense and constant”. An evangelical conclusion in the words of the cardinal, remembering, with Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, those who practice competitive activity with dedication and sacrifice: “Blessed are those who practice sport, because theirs is also the Kingdom of Heaven.”
minesports
Why, as happens in sport, also in life outside of it, is there no full inclusivity, no discrimination, no full dignity for those who win, but also not for those who lose? This was the provocative question posed by Luca Pancalli, President of the Italian Paralympic Committee. His intervention followed those of Marco Mezzaroma, president of Sports and Health, and Silvia Salis, deputy vice president of the Italian Olympic Committee. Then it was the turn of the moving testimonies of the athletes. Like Amelio Castro Grueso, Colombian Paralympic athlete, the Afghan Maria Sharifi and others: protagonists of dramatic events that the sport they practice managed to turn into positive ones.
Couple Dateís, passing through Gibraltar
The presentation of the “Peace Games” concluded with a highly symbolic moment: the delivery of two batons, the same ones used in team relay races, blessed by Pope Francis, to two athletes from Athletica Vaticana, the association multi-sport competition of the Holy See. They will be taken in a few days to Gibraltar, where next Saturday the World Championship of small European countries will be held, and then to the Paris 2024 Olympic Games, so that they can truly be “Games of Peace.”
