Global Hospitality and Unifying Love at the 2024 Olympics

This summer, the world turns its eyes to Paris for the 2024 Olympic games. Meanwhile, over fifteen million visitors are expected to descend upon Paris for the event. These fifteen million visitors will arrive in an already bustling city, and many will be navigating language barriers along with unfamiliar streets. They will bring with them excitement and team spirit and national pride, certainly, but also the need for directions, food, Wi-Fi, and restrooms. Throughout the city there are churches with open doors that have been anticipating and preparing for their arrival for months. What some may view as a logistical challenge, a massive collective of French believers sees as an opportunity to practice global hospitality and demonstrate the love of Christ.

Ensemble 2024 is a collaboration and platform designed to connect and support the initiatives that Christian ministries and churches have planned to surround the summer Olympics. Throughout France, around five hundred initiatives have been organized by seventy-six ministries, ranging from music and arts to community service, sporting events, and discussions about faith and other topics. Through Ensemble 2024, they can support one another’s efforts, and their collaboration provides a tremendous opportunity for the church outside France to bolster the movement in prayer.

Long before the torch-lighting, medal ceremonies, and inspiring displays of teamwork, Ensemble 2024 had been forming an even greater display of teamwork as French believers came together across cities and denominations to prepare for the Olympics.

2024 Ensemble’s charter states:

Ensemble 2024 is a collective made up of different entities (companies, non-profit organizations, sports, cultural, tourism, religious associations…) and individuals who see the summer 2024 games period as an extraordinary and unique opportunity to work for the well-being of France. In the midst of these events, they also want to radiate the love of Jesus Christ in word and deed.

Radiating the love of Jesus in deed means meeting needs in incredibly practical ways. For example, Ensemble 2024 published a detailed guide for participating churches near Olympic venues to open their doors to visitors. The guide suggests providing practical literature like maps and restaurant guides, as well as loving, personal touches like soft towels and scented soaps in the bathrooms. Churches can also be turned into gathering spaces for guests to linger. They list ideas like having the games projected on large screen TVs, lounge areas with multilingual newspapers, and photo booths with festive accessories. These details show an anticipation of the needs of visitors and a demonstration of proactive and practical love.

While their efforts are aimed at benefiting both the French and their international visitors, Ensemble 2024’s network of partners works towards a goal of community among French believers that will last long after the closing ceremonies. “The Olympics is a catalytic event which accelerates collaborative opportunities,” Matthew Glock, National Coordinator of Ensemble 2024 said. “The long-term impact will be because the church has worked together, learned to work together, and will continue to serve.”

By connecting through Ensemble 2024, churches and Christian organizations across denominations have joined into city teams so that geographical regions can partner together. Across the nation, the partnership and unity among French believers is gaining momentum. On May 25, a March for Jesus brought twenty thousand believers to Paris for a walk together ending in a concert. Multiple prayer summits have also been held, joining pastors and intercessors across denominational and even international lines. During the first week of the Olympics, the Paris Praise Festival will take place, connecting believers from France, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and the United States in a week of events ranging from musical and artistic to evangelistic.

In all their efforts, the organization encourages their partners to be respectful of the highly secular social climate in France, offering legal guidelines to partners and participants about how to keep in compliance with both government and Olympic ordinances. Their charter explains: “It’s important to understand that we’re here to bring real benevolence to society, to respond to needs, and not to proselytize, especially around competition venues.” The Olympic charter, the ruling document upheld by the International Olympic Committee (IOC), prohibits proselytization at official events. There are also rigid copyright laws regarding wording and logos surrounding the Olympics.

In crafting the charter for Ensemble 2024, organizers met with legal counsel from the representatives of the Olympics to get their approval of the charter and to discuss parameters for faith-based events. These conversations, as well as the formation of the Ensemble 2024 charter, help the partnering organizations to navigate the boundaries in place while exercising their right to share their faith. Glock says the care in these details comes from “thinking about the heritage we want to have—we want the groups that come after us to be able to build on a good relationship with the Olympics.”

Despite the boundaries in place, the initiatives and partnerships joined together through Ensemble 2024 speak with a collective language that transcends words, one of love, service, and unity. After washing his disciples’ feet in John 13, Jesus said, “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13:34–35). Jesus’s prayer in John 17 informs the heart and prayers of the movement as well, echoing prayers for protection, enlightenment, unity, and witness. “O righteous Father, even though the world does not know you, I know you, and these know that you have sent me. I made known to them your name, and I will continue to make it known, that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them” (John 17:25).

While stadiums full of spectators cheer on athletic greatness, the love of Christ on display in hospitality and unity will be advancing the kingdom of God behind the scenes. Something significant is happening in France that will no doubt continue to bear fruit long after the Olympic torch is extinguished.

With every thrill of those opening notes of the Olympic fanfare this summer, may our hearts thrill more deeply with the knowledge that God is at work. France is aflame with kingdom work, and those of us watching from afar can join by supporting them in prayer.

Impact France, in partnership with the International Prayer Connect, have produced for the Ensemble 2024 partners a detailed prayer guide, made available here. For more information, follow along at Ensemble 2024.