Pope says Olympics can show good relations among nations

Published: 2004-08-12

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Pope John Paul II invoked God's blessings on Olympic participants and said the international games can show the world that violence does not have to mark relations among different nations. In an Aug. 11 telegram to President Constantinos Stephanopoulos of Greece, host of the Aug. 13-29 Summer Games, the pope invoked "divine blessings" on everyone participating in or watching the games, including television viewers around the world. "I hope these games will be an occasion of fraternity between peoples and cultures, because sports are a universal language of human relations," the pope wrote in the telegram released Aug. 12 at the Vatican. Through international sporting events, he said, people can develop "a familial spirit," which can help "overcome the violence that marks the modern world." The athletes' Catholic chaplains gathered in Athens' Roman Catholic cathedral Aug. 11 for a concelebrated Mass before the games began.

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