SPORT AND RELIGION

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CHAPTER 14

• SPORT AND RELIGION

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SPORT AND RELIGION
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SPORT AND RELIGION

• The Lord delighteth in a pair of sturdy legs.
• Leslie Stephen (Maitland, 1906, p. 138)

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SPORT IS RELIGION

• Prebish (1984)particularly sport in its
  modern, commercialized, spectacular form
• acts as a religion
• is viewed by its fans like a religion
• and so really is a religion

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Sportianity

• Religion
• is organized and structured
• begins with ceremonies, at which a few surrogates
  perform for all
• consecrates certain hours as sacred time
• has heroic forms for its followers to emulate
• is built upon ascetics and the development of
  character through self-denial, repetition, and
  experiment

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Sportianity

• In official religious ceremonies
• sacred vestments are used, rituals are
  prescribed, customs are developed, with actions
  that are highly formalized
• right ways and wrong ways of acting are plainly
  marked out, and professional watchdogs supervise
  formal correctness
• moments of silence are observed
• concentration and intensity are indispensable

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Sportianity

• Sport cannot deal with such questions as
• where we came from
• where we are going, nor
• how we are to behave while here

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Sportianity

• sport exists to entertain us, not to disturb us
  with questions about our destiny (Chandler, 1992,
  p. 59).
• religion makes explicit the almost nameless
  dreads of daily human life aging, dying, failure
  under pressure, cowardice, betrayal, and guilt
• sport has little to do with these fundamental
  issues
• people are not simply spectators during religious
  rituals.

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SPORT AND RELIGION IN EARLY SOCIETIES AND CULTURES

• sport and games have long been associated with
  religion.
• the Olympic games had their roots in religion
• evidence of the use of games in and as religious
  rituals and ceremonies

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Sport, Games, and the Early Christian Church

• In the fourth century CE the Roman Empire had
  become officially Christian
• The church was strongly opposed to the Roman
  Games
• The Games were officially abolished in 393 CE

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St. Paul and St. Augustine

• The flesh corrupts
• Suspicion toward anything to do with the body

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RELIGION AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SPORT

• the beginnings of modern sport occurred sometime
  between the 1830s and the 1880s.
• for traditional folk games to be changed into the
  beginnings of modern sport (in the new
  scientific, rational, world order) the games had
  to have usefulness.
• Sports could be permitted, even accepted, if they
  were seen as useful.

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Modern Sports Characteristics

• participation in sport is not limited to only
  certain social groups or classes
• sport skills, techniques, and training methods
  are highly specialized and scientific in nature
• the playing and training systems used in sport
  are highly efficient and focused
• sports organizational structures are
  bureaucratic in nature
• sophisticated and complex measurement of
  performance is a central feature of the
  competition
• records are kept
• Out of the irregular, crude, idiosyncratic,
  traditional sports, a new efficient,
  standardized, rationalized, modern type of
  sport evolved.

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Muscular Christianity

• Thomas Hughes and Charles Kingsley novels and
• essays promoted muscular Christianity virtues
• robust and active
• honesty and open
• strength of character
• dedication to ones country

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Superstition and Sport

• Day-of game rituals
• Pre game rituals
• Activity-specific-rituals
• Rites of protection

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Normative Values of Competitive Sport Culture

• The importance of winning
• The importance of social status
• Relationships with coach and team
• Relationships with opponents
• Expectations of others

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Approaches Used by Christian Athletes in Elite
Sport

• Separate Relationship
• faith and sport are divisible
• Combined
• faith and sport are one
• Conflicted
• faith or sport

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Evangelical Christianitys Use of Sport

• a means of attracting audiences to their cause
  and their message
• opportunistic toward their star recruits from
  the world of sport
• a belief in the traditional family glorify the
  American way of life and its emphasis on
  success, conspicuous consumption, obedience to
  authority, the nuclear family, and right-wing
  politics

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Evangelical Christianitys Use of Sport

• deliberate ignoring of social issues (racism,
  gender discrimination, violence, brutality) in
  the sport context
• an approach to competition - Total Release
  Performance or Praise Performance. (your
  performance is an act of love toward God, and so
  you should always put everything you have into
  it)

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Praise Performance Implications

• Any instance of losing must mean
• that the athlete was in fact not giving 100
  percent
• not trying as hard as they could
• not obeying the coach as they should
• almost anything can become sanctified