This has been a wonderful summer if you follow sports: tennis championships, end-of-season tournaments and soccer’s European Championship and Copa America – all leading up to the most global event of all, the Olympics.
The Olympic Games began as a religious celebration in ancient Greece, with competitions to honor their gods. But the Olympics declined once the Roman Empire replaced Greek power in the Mediterranean; the final blow came from the Christian Emperor Theodosius I, who saw the Games as a stage for paganism.
