The role of chaplains at the Olympic Games is not just for Catholics and other believers, according to a priest currently serving at the Winter Games in Milan and Cortina d\u2019Ampezzo.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy service is much more individual and open to everyone, even nonbelievers,\u201d Father Old\u0159ich Chochol\u00e1\u010d, chaplain of the Czech Olympic team, told EWTN News. \u201cIt is a service of presence, prayer, and blessing.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Czech priest, who serves as parish priest in Telnice in the Diocese of Brno, has accompanied his country\u2019s athletes to every Games since Rio de Janeiro in 2016. This year, the Czech Republic sent 114 athletes \u2014 the largest delegation in the country\u2019s Olympic history.<\/p>\n
Chochol\u00e1\u010d told EWTN News his program is quite simple. He comes daily to the Olympic village in Milan to the space reserved for Czech team accommodation and meetings, and can travel to some of the sports venues using athlete transport. It is up to the team members whether they make use of his presence, he said.<\/p>\n
But the multisite format of these Winter Games presents challenges. Part of the Czech team is scattered across smaller Olympic villages in the Alps northeast of Milan, meaning Chochol\u00e1\u010d relies on electronic communication to stay in touch with athletes at distant venues.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey know they can contact me at any time,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The pastoral work was easier during the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris, he observed. With the Games now spread across multiple locations, chaplains of individual national teams do not meet as they did in France.<\/p>\n
Spiritual service among Czech athletes differs from that of more religious countries, where team members come in large numbers to church services, Chochol\u00e1\u010d noted.<\/p>\n
\u201cI am glad that I remain in friendly contact with some of them even long after the Olympics,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Besides national team chaplaincies \u2014 a practice established at the Seoul Olympics in 1988 \u2014 the Olympic Village in Milan offers a modest prayer room and various religious services for participants. The Basilica of San Babila in central Milan has been nicknamed the \u201cchurch of athletes\u201d for the Games.<\/p>\n
The Olympics press office did not respond to an EWTN News inquiry about how many national teams have chaplains this year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The role of chaplains at the Olympic Games is not just for Catholics and other believers, according to a priest currently serving at the Winter Games in Milan and Cortina d\u2019Ampezzo. \u201cMy service is much more individual and open to everyone, even nonbelievers,\u201d Father Old\u0159ich Chochol\u00e1\u010d, chaplain of the Czech Olympic team, told EWTN News. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":39071,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"bron":[41],"class_list":["post-39070","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nieuws","bron-cna"],"acf":[],"featured_image_urls":{"medium":"https:\/\/explorecatholic.nl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/39070-meet-the-priest-serving-even-nonbelievers-at-the-milan-winter-olympics-300x225.jpg","large":"https:\/\/explorecatholic.nl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/39070-meet-the-priest-serving-even-nonbelievers-at-the-milan-winter-olympics-1024x768.jpg","thumbnail":"https:\/\/explorecatholic.nl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/39070-meet-the-priest-serving-even-nonbelievers-at-the-milan-winter-olympics-150x150.jpg","medium_large":"https:\/\/explorecatholic.nl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/39070-meet-the-priest-serving-even-nonbelievers-at-the-milan-winter-olympics-768x576.jpg","1536x1536":"https:\/\/explorecatholic.nl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/39070-meet-the-priest-serving-even-nonbelievers-at-the-milan-winter-olympics-1536x1152.jpg","Inhoud breed":"https:\/\/explorecatholic.nl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/39070-meet-the-priest-serving-even-nonbelievers-at-the-milan-winter-olympics-860x645.jpg","echo_preview_image":"https:\/\/explorecatholic.nl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/39070-meet-the-priest-serving-even-nonbelievers-at-the-milan-winter-olympics-195x146.jpg"},"appp_media":null,"yoast_head":"\n