It is an unrecognized assistance, yet officially recognized by the International Olympic Committee.

During the fortnight of the Olympics, the athletes can have religious help.

But Covid obliges, it is done far from Tokyo.

Example with Joël Thibaut, Protestant chaplain, installed in Rennes.

For the past week, the high mass of sport has been taking place in Tokyo, the theater of the Olympic Games.

A competition during which the athletes sometimes need precisely religious references.

As for all faiths, the Holistic Sports association offers spiritual support to Protestant Christian athletes.

A completely official mission, recognized by the IOC, which, because of the Covid, is taking place this time remotely from Rennes.

Joël Thibault should indeed have been in Tokyo, in the heart of the Olympic village.

But health crisis obliges, this Protestant pastor responds from a distance to the spiritual needs of athletes.

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And beyond the individual telephone exchanges, this chaplain also organizes collective sermons for twenty French-speaking athletes by Zoom.

An official mission planned by the IOC.

"We have times of celebration with songs and times of freedom where everyone can discuss and also share what weighs on him," he explains.

"We are not magicians"

The requests are multiple since it is not only a question of asking for divine help before a major ordeal. "There are some who ask us to pray for them because they are afraid of having the Covid, because they can find themselves eliminated overnight," says Joël Thibault. "I have seen athletes who had lost a member of their family and who could not tell the staff because they were afraid of not being qualified, because they were not going to be deemed fit. We are not magicians, nor performance makers. They have physiotherapists who are there, around them, coaches. They even have mental trainers. We are there to offer something that others cannot to propose."

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And everyone can have access to it since the main faiths - Christians, Muslims, Jews, Hindus and Buddhists - also provide this religious accompaniment service.