Faith at Football Games

Kopp Disclosure

(John 3:19-21)

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"Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain."

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    Though I'm dumbfounded by the intellectual inconsistencies aka hypocrisies of my state's governing body for athletics and its local affiliate that enable gross inequities juxtaposed to public/private/parochial schools when it comes to rosters, eligibility, recruiting, and "classes" that mock competitive fairness as well as causing even the most dumbfounded like me to question their integrity not to mention sanity, I've always liked when my favorite public school plays the parochial school in our conference.

    They pray before games; asking graces for safety and sportsmanship.

    Annnnnnnd maybe that's why their players and fans are consistently more civil than their counterparts.

    I won't speculate about the won/lost stats.

    Whoa.

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    Anyway, with my favorite public school football team out of the playoffs this year, I went to see the parochial school play a public school kinda related to my favorite one last Saturday.

    It was a really good game with David almost defeating Goliath.

    Truth is the parochial school had more numbers with better players because of their incredibly to unconscionably limitless geographical recruiting, uh, selective, uh, parochial, uh, borderless, uh, whatever, uh, uh, uh,...

    Psst.

    That's how those governing bodies mentioned in the first paragraph talk when asked about the competitive fairness of public schools limited to precise geographical borders playing parochial schools that don't have to play by the same rules.

    Geez.

    You can even smoke next to the boys/girls outhouses inside the confines of their stadium!

    Buuuuuuut that's not why I'm writing.

    I'm writing because the public school student-fans sported an interesting banner throughout the game: "Jesus Loves Us Too!"

    Because it was held up several times throughout the game, I figured administrators, coaches, parents, and their booster club thought it was kinda cool.

    Getting back to speculations, I ain't gonna speculate on the motivation or meaning; though the message, from everything that I know about Biblically Christocentric faith, is true.

    Jesus loves everybody!

    Praise the Lord!

    That kinda evens the score; even though there are almost as many priests on the sidelines as coaches when they play public schools that have banned their counterparts.

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    Yeeeeeeet I'm not sure that was the intent of the banner.

    Surely, the silence of the parochial school's partisans whenever the banner appeared was uneasy and didn't prompt me to sense their appreciation of the demonstration.

    Was it just kids being kids and having some fun?

    Was it something sarcastic?

    Was it mocking?

    Was it in good, poor, bad, or no taste?

    Was it classy or classless?

    Was it aimed at the priests?

    Was it aimed at the whole hyperbolized separation of church and state thing?

    I don't know.

    I won't speculate.

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    It just seemed ironic to me.

    Public schools have kicked out Jesus from their halls, classrooms, curricula, pre-game ceremonies, graduations, and...

    Yeah, I know they invite Him back in whenever there's some kinda tragedy that, uh, drives 'em to their knees.

    Buuuuuuut day to day and game to game, public schools have, essentially, outlawed Him.

    Again, apart from the irony, I haven't reached any conclusions about why He came up on the public side of that game with the parochial school last Saturday.

    On the other hand, it was kinda nice to see a public school mention Him by name.

    Maybe.

    Again, apart from the irony, I just don't know.

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Blessings and Love!