Catholic Bishop Robert Barron says society’s love for athletic "excellence" on display at this year’s Olympic Games runs contrary to its current preoccupation with Diversity, Equity and Inclusion initiatives, and other efforts to ensure people have equality of outcomes in life rather than opportunity. 

In an interview with Fox News Digital, the bishop of the Diocese of Winona-Rochester in Minnesota and prominent Catholic influencer used the example of elite Olympic gymnast Simone Biles to illustrate the folly of DEI. He explained that her talent came about because she beat out other athletes to become the best. In other words, she excluded individuals who didn’t measure up in her sport.

"Well, that's not only unjust, but it militates against the very excellence that we're celebrating," Barron told Fox, regarding how forced equality of outcomes goes against what people cheer so hard for at the Olympics.

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Bishop Barron said there’s a "tension" between athletic achievement and so-called equity. 

"I don't think you can really have both those things at the same time," he said, noting that there is an important difference between equity of outcome and "equality of opportunity."

He used the record-breaking gymnast – who he called the "greatest of all time" –  to make the point: "Let's say if at some point in her career, Simone Biles was told, 'No, no, you can't go out for the gymnastics team because you're Black or because you're a woman' or whatever. Of course, that's unjust. And that should always be fought any time at any level."

He continued, "Well, there's that – equality of opportunity. But then there's equity of outcome, which our society now seems to be highly prizing; so that the outcome of a situation or a particular walk of life should correspond to, let's say, the racial breakdown of a society, etc."

Bishop Barron declared the latter framework unjust. He then went on to describe how Biles achieving a higher athletic standard than practically everyone else on earth in her field is contrary to that, and praiseworthy.

"She stands at the pinnacle of Olympic excellence because along the arc of her life, armies of people have been excluded. Now what I mean is, not that they weren't given equality of opportunity. What I mean is, well, she won a medal, which means the other people competing with her didn't win the medal."

"She made team after team after team, which meant all kinds of other people that went out for the team were excluded," he added.

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He used other examples of people or institutions achieving excellence as flying in the face of the equity of outcomes philosophy. He mentioned speaking at an American university where he asked the students if they believed their institution had achieved "complete inclusivity." 

Barron recounted that all the students nodded, so he confronted them with the fact that there was "an army of people" that was "excluded from the process so that you could be included in this university."

"I'm not judging the school at all. I'm not saying it's unjust. I'm saying they want to be an elite school. And so, they excluded all kinds of people so that the really excellent students might be included," Barron said, before making the same point with members of a world-class orchestra.

Video showing Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz claiming that he carried weapons of war into actual war has surfaced. A Minnesota National Guard response to Fox News disputes the fact that Walz actually went into battle, but rather he skirted any skirmishes and retired instead, leaving his troops behind.

Walz, who’s the chosen vice presidential candidate for Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris, served a quarter of a century in the National Guard. 

A video of Walz making the controversial statement can be seen on X.

"I spent 25 years in the Army and I hunt. I’ve been voting for common sense legislation that protects the Second Amendment, but we can do background checks. We can research the impacts of gun violence. We can make sure those weapons of war, that I carried in war, are only carried in war," Walz said in his speech, aiming toward voters who don't want guns on the streets.

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Retired Command Sgt. Maj. Thomas Behrends, who said he was a member of Walz's battalion, blasted the governor's comments.

"To most people, that would mean that he was actually in combat, carrying a weapon in a combat zone and getting combat pay and in a dangerous and hostile environment where he is getting shot at," Behrends told the ‘Ingraham Angle’ on Wednesday.

Walz never said which war he fought. During his time in the Guard, there were two wars in Iraq and one in Afghanistan, neither of which show on his military record.

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The Minnesota National Guard told Fox News that Walz was part of Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF) while he was stationed in Italy with his unit in 2005, but that he retired before his unit went into battle.

"Walz left the National Guard in May 2005 after 24 years of service. His unit was not given deployment orders to Iraq until July. He had put his retirement papers in 5-7 months prior to his retirement in May," the Minnesota National Guard said.

"Second, there are questions about whether he served in OEF. His battalion was sent to Europe, in his case Vicenza to train units in artillery - his specialty was artillery. If you are deployed overseas in support of OEF according to the National Guard you officially served in OEF, whether you touched foot in Afghanistan or not. That is in his official military service record below."

Fox News Digital reached out to Walz’s office for comment and received an automated response.

Walz was named this week as the running mate with Kamala Harris on the Democratic national ticket. Harris, the current vice president, will look to fill the shoes of President Biden and take on former President Donald Trump in the general election.

Trump’s running mate is J.D. Vance, who served four years in the U.S. Marine Corps. While speaking at an event Wednesday in Michigan, Vance said that Walz deserted his fellow soldiers who were heading off to war.

"You abandoned your unit right before they went to Iraq," Vance said.

Fox News reporter Jennifer Griffin contributed to this story.