"God answers my prayers everywhere except on the golf-course."
Sport and St Paul
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a course for champions, Edio Costantini and Kevin Lixey, The John Paul II Sports Foundation, Rome, 2011
This book makes a valuable contribution to our understanding of sport and Christianity. It states its aim: “By taking a closer look at the life of St Paul and his sport metaphors, this book seeks to help us to distil from them some valuable lessons on the virtues that are as valid for sport as they are for daily life”. In fact, the authors argue that taking the time to apply the Bible to sport, will not only benefit sport but will also enhance our own understanding of the faith.
The authors rightly state that St Paul doesn’t speak about sport in order to advance any kind of theology of sport. At the same time they argue that he was writing about sport more than as a mere analogy suggesting that “a closer look at these metaphors through the eyes of a sportsperson reveals to us a man who possessed not only technical knowledge about sport, but also something of be agon spirit”.
They go further in suggesting “a further reason to explain why we often find competitive references in his writings. Paul highly esteemed athletic competition because he himself, in his mental, spiritual and physical attitude, breathed an Olympic spirit, as he himself wanted to be a champion for Christ’s cause”.
There is a fascinating comparison of Paul’s competitiveness with the modern sports “win at all cost” philosophy and the difficulty of accepting defeat.
The book is full of great one-liners:
“Sport is one of humanity’s greatest assets”.
“Sport is not man’s end, but a useful tool to reach his end when used in an appropriate way”.
“Paul and Barnabas escape for their lives to the town of Lystra and the score is now ‘0 and 2’”
One statement in the book surprised me; “Ever since its modem inception in society, the Church has valued sport”. This idea is stated more than once. Ladd and Mathisen, for example, give evidence of a Christian “disengagement” with sport. There are still parts of Christendom where sport is viewed as sinful. Hopefully books like this will help develop a more positive view of sport.
ISBN 978-14709-8991-0