Algeria’s Imane Khelif (in red) punches Italy’s Angela Carini in the women’s 66kg preliminaries round of 16 boxing match during the Paris 2024 Olympic Games at the North Paris Arena in Villepinte on Aug. 1, 2024. / Credit: MOHD RASFAN/AFP via Getty Images
Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Aug 1, 2024 / 16:46 pm (CNA).
An Algerian boxer with male chromosomes defeated an Italian woman boxer in an Olympics boxing match on Thursday after landing a devastating punch to the woman’s face in the brief 46-second fight.
The winning boxer — Imane Khelif — has XY chromosomes, according to a 2023 International Boxing Association eligibility test that got the boxer disqualified from the World Championships that year.
Typically, men have XY chromosomes and women have XX chromosomes, but a person born with a sexual development disorder can sometimes have both male and female sexual characteristics, such as someone born with Swyer syndrome having XY chromosomes and female genitalia.
Khelif has never publicly identified as transgender and has not disclosed any sexual development disorders, so the reason for the test result is unclear. Taiwanese boxer Lin Yu-ting, who was also disqualified from the 2023 World Championships for tests showing XY chromosomes, will also compete against women in the 2024 Olympics.
Both Khelif and Lin competed in the 2020 Olympics as well, prior to the release of those tests.
Angela Carini, who lost the fight to Khelif, left the boxing ring in tears and refused to shake Khelif’s hand. While still in the ring, she reportedly yelled “this is unjust,” according to the New York Post.
In a post-fight interview, Carini said she had “never been hit so hard in my life,” according to the Post. According to Yahoo Sports, she apologized to her country after the game for only lasting 46 seconds into the fight.
“I had entered the ring to fight,” Carini said, according to Yahoo. “I didn’t give up, but a punch hurt too much and so I said enough. I go out with my head held high.”
The article also reported that Carini’s coach, Emanuel Renzini, said postgame that many people discouraged her from competing in the fight, telling her: “Don’t go, don’t go, please. She’s a man. It’s dangerous for you.”
Mary Rice Hasson, the director of the Person and Identity Project at the conservative Ethics and Public Policy Center, told CNA that a sexual development disorder “does not make someone ‘not male’” and that “genetics don’t lie.”
“The [International Olympic Committee’s] decision to permit males who self-identify as ‘women’ to participate in women’s sports — particularly a physically brutal sport like boxing — is unconscionable,” Hasson said. “The female Italian boxer stopped the match because she felt her life was in danger, after being pummeled by the male Algerian boxer for less than a minute.”
Hasson said the situation “exposes, on the world stage, the ludicrous nature of the ‘transgender’ charade” and added that “males and females are biologically different, from conception, and sex cannot change.” She said the committee’s “wokeness” violates “the true Olympic spirit of fair competition [and] … degrades and endangers female competitors.”
Former swimmer Riley Gaines — who competed against the biologically male transgender swimmer Lia Thomas in college — said in a post on X that the Olympic fight “is glorified male violence against women.”
“Call me crazy, but it’s almost as if women don’t want to be punched in the face by a male as the world watches and applauds,” Gaines said.
Khelif’s next Olympic match is scheduled for Saturday against Hungarian boxer Luca Anna Hamori. Lin’s first match is scheduled for Friday against Uzbekistani boxer Sitora Turdibekova.
If you value the news and views Catholic World Report provides, please consider donating to support our efforts. Your contribution will help us continue to make CWR available to all readers worldwide for free, without a subscription. Thank you for your generosity!
Click here for more information on donating to CWR. Click here to sign up for our newsletter.
Pope Francis speaks at the general audience on June 22, 2022. / Daniel Ibanez/CNA
Rome Newsroom, Jul 28, 2022 / 03:16 am (CNA).
The Vatican is asking Catholics around the world to share their experiences welcoming migrants and refugees. In… […]
Pope Francis, pictured on Oct. 4, 2014. / Mazur/catholicnews.org.uk.
Vatican City, Jul 20, 2021 / 15:00 pm (CNA).
Pope Francis is “deeply saddened” by a bombing at a market in the Iraqi capital, Baghdad, that killed at least 30 people.In a teleg… […]
A close-up of the copy of Michelangelo’s Vatican Pietà, usually kept at the Vatican Museums. / Ela Bialkowska/OKNO studio.
Rome Newsroom, Mar 7, 2022 / 04:00 am (CNA).
As war rages in Ukraine and the pandemic lingers, Michelangelo’s celebrated Vatican Pietà — and two lesser-known figures he also sculpted — can be deeply meaningful to a pain-wracked world, says a priest and art historian.
Michelangelo Buonarotti’s Pietà depicts a larger-than-life Virgin Mary as she mourns her crucified Son, Jesus, lying limp in her lap. The masterpiece, carved out of Carrara marble, was finished before the Italian artist’s 25th birthday.
Over the course of more than 60 years, Michelangelo created two more sculptures on the same theme — and a new exhibit in the Italian city of Florence brings the three works together for the first time.
The Three Pietà of Michelangelo exhibit at Museo dell’Opera del Duomo in Florence, Italy. Museo dell’Opera del Duomo
The exhibit opened at the Museo dell’Opera del Duomo on Feb. 24, and includes the Florentine Pietà, also called the Deposition, which Michelangelo worked on from 1547 to 1555, and exact casts, or copies, of the Vatican Pietà and Milan Pietà — which could not be moved from their locations.
Msgr. Timothy Verdon, the director of the Museo dell’Opera del Duomo, told CNA by phone that the gallery wanted to do something to show its solidarity with a Feb. 23-27 meeting of mayors and Catholic bishops.
“The images of suffering that the Pietà always implies I think will deeply touch people. I think that visitors will be moved to see these works,” he said. The image of the Pietà evokes “the personal suffering of mothers who hold their children not knowing if their children will survive.”
A close-up of the copy of Michelangelo’s Vatican Pietà, usually kept at the Vatican Museums. Ela Bialkowska/OKNO studio.
The 75-year-old Verdon is an expert in art history and sacred art. He was born in Hoboken, New Jersey, but has lived in Italy for more than 50 years.
“So many of the issues that face the Mediterranean world today are forms of suffering,” he said, “and so this ideal series of images of the God who becomes man [and] accepts suffering, and whose Mother receives his tortured body into her arms, these are deeply meaningful.”
“All human situations of suffering and exclusion invite a comparison with the suffering of Christ, the death of Christ. And [the Pietà] condenses and concentrates a devout reflection on that,” the priest said.
The lesser-known Pietàs
Many years after Michelangelo completed the Pietà displayed in St. Peter’s Basilica, he began his Florentine Pietà, which depicts Nicodemus, Mary Magdalene, and the Virgin Mary receiving the body of Christ as it is removed from the Cross.
The 72-year-old Michelangelo worked on the sculpture for eight years before eventually abandoning it in 1555.
Michelangelo’s Florentine Pietà, part of the permanent collection at the Museo dell’Opera del Duomo in Florence, Italy. Museo dell’Opera del Duomo in Florence, Italy.
He probably began the Rondanini Pietà, which is in Milan, in 1553. Michelangelo continued to work on the piece until just days before his death in 1564.
According to a press release from the city of Florence, “near his own death, Michelangelo meditated deeply on the Passion of Christ.”
One way this is known is because shortly before his death, Michelangelo gave a drawing of the Pietà to Vittoria Colonna, the Marquess of Pescara, on which he wrote: “They think not there how much of blood it costs.”
The line, from Canto 29 of Paradiso, one of the books of Dante’s “Divine Comedy”, is also the subtitle of the Florence exhibition.
A perfect cast of Michelangelo’s unfinished Rondanini Pietà, on display at the Museo dell’Opera del Duomo in Florence, Italy. Museo dell’Opera del Duomo
Bringing the three Pietàs together into one exhibit gives the viewer the chance to see “the full range of Michelangelo’s reflection on this subject across 60-some years,” Verdon explained.
Not only is the Renaissance artist’s stylistic evolution on display, but also his spiritual development.
“We know that [Michelangelo] was a religious man,” Verdon said. “His interpretation of religious subjects, even in his youth, is particularly sensitive and well informed.”
According to the priest, Michelangelo seems to have had a range of theological influences.
“His older brother was a Dominican friar and in Michelangelo’s old age we’re told that he could still remember the preaching of Savonarola,” Verdon said.
Girolamo Savonarola was a popular Dominican friar, preacher, and reformer active in Renaissance Florence. He spoke against the ruling Medici family and the excesses of the time, and in 1498 he was hanged and his body burned after a trial by Church and civil authorities.
According to the Catholic Encyclopedia, “In the beginning Savonarola was filled with zeal, piety, and self-sacrifice for the regeneration of religious life. He was led to offend against these virtues by his fanaticism, obstinacy, and disobedience. He was not a heretic in matters of faith.”
“That’s an interesting page in cultural history,” Verdon said, “because the early Pietà is done in effect shortly after the Savonarola period, or in the Savonarola period.”
“So we’re talking about an artist to whom this subject means a great deal, and which he is also equipped to treat.”
The Three Pietà of Michelangelo exhibit at Museo dell’Opera del Duomo in Florence, Italy. Museo dell’Opera del Duomo
The artist’s last Pietàs were created, instead, in the context of the Counter-Reformation.
The council, he explained, “had to rebut the heretical ideas of Protestant reformers, and so it insists, in a decree on the Eucharist published in 1551, that indeed in the bread and wine, Christ’s Body and Blood are truly present.”
“So Michelangelo, who was personally religious, and who, especially in his later period, worked exclusively for the Vatican, was therefore very close to the changes occurring in Catholic thought, Catholic theology, Catholic devotion,” Verdon said.
The exhibit “really gives us the opportunity to gauge the evolution of a theme from one time to a very different one, from the end of the 15th, to the mid- 16th century.”
The St. Peter’s Basilica Pietà
Verdon said that the Vatican Pietà is the only one of the three to remain in the place it was intended for — above an altar in St. Peter’s Basilica.
The sculpture was originally created for the 4th-century Constantinian basilica, the “Old St. Peter’s Basilica,” which was replaced by the Renaissance basilica standing today.
In Michelangelo’s Pietà, the Virgin Mary holds her Son as she did at his birth. . Paweesit via Flickr.
Viewing art in a church is not the same as viewing it in a museum, the art historian noted.
“Obviously it is different, especially for the fact that the Vatican Pietà has remained on an altar, above an altar, and so the body of Christ depicted by Michelangelo would have been seen in relation to the sacramental body of Christ in the Eucharist.”
“This was true of the first situation in the Old St. Peter’s, the work was on an altar, and it’s true of the present collocazione [position],” he said.
“And actually,” the priest continued, “the same thing was true of both of the other Pietàs. They were intended by Michelangelo to go on an altar in a chapel in a Roman church where he expected to be buried. We think the church was Santa Maria Maggiore.”
“So the relationship of the image of Christ’s body with the Eucharistic Corpus Christi is very important,” he said.
The Three Pietà of Michelangelo exhibit at Museo dell’Opera del Duomo in Florence, Italy. Museo dell’Opera del Duomo
The copies of the Vatican and Milan Pietàs are on loan from the Vatican Museums, and will be in Florence for the Three Pietàs exhibit through Aug. 1.
“And in our museum, in the Florence Opera del Duomo Museum, we have put the Pietà, our Pietà, on a base that evokes an altar, as the very specific Church meaning [of an altar] has to do with the Sacrament,” Verdon said.
There is no such reality as a “boxer with male chromosomes.” You’re either a man or a woman. Here’s the reality check: the Olympic gods deigned to allow a man to pummel a woman. Let’s set the record straight.
The Olympic Games, just like so much of our perverse culture, has turned sports into an arena for politics. Soon, sports will have fragmented into total chaos. There will be no order to the enterprise and it will end. My guess is that that is what the poseurs wanted all along. Have at it.
Thank you.
And let us never use the phrase “biological man” or “biological woman.”
And the thing is, from the photos I have seen, this fellow isn’t even trying to look like a woman.
Khelif is a coward. If he were not, he would box other men. Instead, he boxes women. Only the weakling, the wimp, the craven recreant, the yellow-bellied milksop, and the scaredy-cat chicken type of man abuses women. Khelif is that type of man.
If I may offer a suggestion for an alternative headline: A perverted man pretending to be a woman beats up a real woman in a boxing match. CNA can get my email from CWR if they would like make me an offer.
I don’t know the background story here but I have a family member who works in a hospital dept. where newborns with genital anomalies or ambiguities are treated. A simple DNA test will almost always reveal the correct gender.
If the boxer had been born in a “First World” hospital his condition, if he suffers from one, might have been identified early. Perhaps that’s the case in Algeria also. I just don’t know.
I do not follow the Olympics but I looked into that fight. Well, it was a man. A man! With much more developed muscles, male configuration of the body including his face, taller etc.
I emphasize with Carini; she has done well not allowing this butchering to continue. If I was a sportswoman I would refuse participation in this unjust, degrading madness. In my opinion, all women should refuse. Perhaps we should have our own “Females only Olympics”.
PS Feminists have been saying that the whole “trans-ideology” is an adult on women, men now legally entering our safe spaces.
Anna, You are perfectly correct, as a normal man I could spot three more advantages this absolute scoundrel would have. The International Boxing Association ,an NGO that governs the sport worldwide ,discovered what he was back in 2020 and banned him and his sort. Last year they did testing in advance with the same result. The IOC is setting itself up was the world arbiter of this. There may be a complete break with the IBA over this.
Carini needs a medal for refusing to “play”.
We can support her by refusing to watch.
The address, email address and telephone number of C Spire, please.
There’s got to be a word in the English language that captures the essence of the writing style of CNA succinctly. Bureaucratic, robotic, effeminate, politically correct, dull, legalistic, neutered, fastidious all are good adjectives for various aspects of their prose, but there must be something sums them all up neatly. Perhaps someone with a more expansive vocabulary can identify the term that eludes me.
As The Veil is being lifted, we can see, clearly, how the hand of the atheist materialistic overpopulation alarmist globalists is everywhere.
“In order to Return to order, we must return to God.”
Some interesting complications, here, plus a simple solution…
The first woman to win an Olympic event was Spartan princess Cyniscia whose horses won events, while still raced by male charioteers (396-312 B.C.),
Olympic male decathlon gold medalist Bruce Jenner now pretends to be a woman after doing some stuff to his body,
Marion Jones won five gold medals in the 2000 Olympics, but then admitted to using banned substances, and then returned the medals….Should an XY chromosome also be a disqualifying substance?
In the 1981 movie “Chariots of Fire,” a long-distance scene reveals that in Greece all of the (male) athletes competed nude….A “brief” scene, so to speak, and about which–
A SIMPLE SOLUTION: Wondering, here for elementary fairness, whether the IOC–meaning the Indifferent Olympics Committee–might favor reinstating this clear Greek tradition, since it seems they already clearly defend the more outlier and blasphemous drag-queen float in the Seine–or, as in personal “pronoun” is it pronounced “sane” or in-sane(!), or whatever?
Let’s lay bare the facts of this man. His pretended masculininity aspiring to femininity has been stripped. Nature, reason, and belief in the God of Abraham take offense. This boxer is a man without cajones. His hits and aims—fast, forceful, potentially fatal—are similar to God’s aims, but God’s aim [truth] is actual. God will judge as we have judged. Our wayward world is so backward that many have chosen to foster Khelif’s behaving as if he is a she.
[Even Grammarcheck flagged ‘he is a she’ as an error. Now that this has been pointed out, it too may change….Be ready, dear folks, to prepare for the way of the Lord.]
There is no such reality as a “boxer with male chromosomes.” You’re either a man or a woman. Here’s the reality check: the Olympic gods deigned to allow a man to pummel a woman. Let’s set the record straight.
The Olympic Games, just like so much of our perverse culture, has turned sports into an arena for politics. Soon, sports will have fragmented into total chaos. There will be no order to the enterprise and it will end. My guess is that that is what the poseurs wanted all along. Have at it.
Thank you.
And let us never use the phrase “biological man” or “biological woman.”
And the thing is, from the photos I have seen, this fellow isn’t even trying to look like a woman.
Khelif is a coward. If he were not, he would box other men. Instead, he boxes women. Only the weakling, the wimp, the craven recreant, the yellow-bellied milksop, and the scaredy-cat chicken type of man abuses women. Khelif is that type of man.
If I may offer a suggestion for an alternative headline: A perverted man pretending to be a woman beats up a real woman in a boxing match. CNA can get my email from CWR if they would like make me an offer.
I don’t know the background story here but I have a family member who works in a hospital dept. where newborns with genital anomalies or ambiguities are treated. A simple DNA test will almost always reveal the correct gender.
If the boxer had been born in a “First World” hospital his condition, if he suffers from one, might have been identified early. Perhaps that’s the case in Algeria also. I just don’t know.
I do not follow the Olympics but I looked into that fight. Well, it was a man. A man! With much more developed muscles, male configuration of the body including his face, taller etc.
I emphasize with Carini; she has done well not allowing this butchering to continue. If I was a sportswoman I would refuse participation in this unjust, degrading madness. In my opinion, all women should refuse. Perhaps we should have our own “Females only Olympics”.
PS Feminists have been saying that the whole “trans-ideology” is an adult on women, men now legally entering our safe spaces.
Anna, You are perfectly correct, as a normal man I could spot three more advantages this absolute scoundrel would have. The International Boxing Association ,an NGO that governs the sport worldwide ,discovered what he was back in 2020 and banned him and his sort. Last year they did testing in advance with the same result. The IOC is setting itself up was the world arbiter of this. There may be a complete break with the IBA over this.
Our world has descended into utter madness.
Carini needs a medal for refusing to “play”.
We can support her by refusing to watch.
The address, email address and telephone number of C Spire, please.
There’s got to be a word in the English language that captures the essence of the writing style of CNA succinctly. Bureaucratic, robotic, effeminate, politically correct, dull, legalistic, neutered, fastidious all are good adjectives for various aspects of their prose, but there must be something sums them all up neatly. Perhaps someone with a more expansive vocabulary can identify the term that eludes me.
As The Veil is being lifted, we can see, clearly, how the hand of the atheist materialistic overpopulation alarmist globalists is everywhere.
“In order to Return to order, we must return to God.”
Some interesting complications, here, plus a simple solution…
The first woman to win an Olympic event was Spartan princess Cyniscia whose horses won events, while still raced by male charioteers (396-312 B.C.),
Olympic male decathlon gold medalist Bruce Jenner now pretends to be a woman after doing some stuff to his body,
Marion Jones won five gold medals in the 2000 Olympics, but then admitted to using banned substances, and then returned the medals….Should an XY chromosome also be a disqualifying substance?
In the 1981 movie “Chariots of Fire,” a long-distance scene reveals that in Greece all of the (male) athletes competed nude….A “brief” scene, so to speak, and about which–
A SIMPLE SOLUTION: Wondering, here for elementary fairness, whether the IOC–meaning the Indifferent Olympics Committee–might favor reinstating this clear Greek tradition, since it seems they already clearly defend the more outlier and blasphemous drag-queen float in the Seine–or, as in personal “pronoun” is it pronounced “sane” or in-sane(!), or whatever?
Let’s lay bare the facts of this man. His pretended masculininity aspiring to femininity has been stripped. Nature, reason, and belief in the God of Abraham take offense. This boxer is a man without cajones. His hits and aims—fast, forceful, potentially fatal—are similar to God’s aims, but God’s aim [truth] is actual. God will judge as we have judged. Our wayward world is so backward that many have chosen to foster Khelif’s behaving as if he is a she.
[Even Grammarcheck flagged ‘he is a she’ as an error. Now that this has been pointed out, it too may change….Be ready, dear folks, to prepare for the way of the Lord.]