"there has only ever been one perfect man, the Lord Jesus, and we killed him. I only missed a putt."
A Brief Theology of Sport
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A Brief Theology of Sport, Lincoln Harvey, London, SCM, 2014. ISBN 978-0-334-04418-5
Jim Mathisen* wrote "The fact that the current [sports ministry] movement still operates in the absence of any clearly articulated theology of sport is troubling". As one who agrees wholehearted with that statement, I welcome a new book on theology of sport.
In the introduction the author’s stated intention to “help us understand our love for sport” and “to discover what it is that makes sport so popular today” raised one or two alarm bells as both those worthy goals are a bit different from understanding sport theologically. Further alarm bells were raised in the introduction by the following dualistic thought “We will therefore conclude that history regularly poses Christians a serious question: sport or a life of discipleship”. While this is true, it is equally true that there is a host of discipleship material which is based on the lessons learnt in and through sport.
The early part of the book reviews how the Church has engaged with sport, concluding that generally sport has been viewed with suspicion. The author summarizes the church’s attitude to sport in three words: instrumentalism, opposition and popularity.
His conclusion that “from the earliest days of the Church, through medieval papacies and on into evangelical piety, Christians have struggled with sport” sadly seems fair. Later recognizing the popularity of sport, he suggests that the Church sometimes tried to find a use for it, whether a missionary use or just a recognition that games were a lesser evil than drinking and fighting.
There is a helpful look at “play” which is applied to sport in the following way: “If play and creation are both fundamentally unnecessary-but-meaningful realities, we can say that creatures at play are expressing their deepest identity as the ones freely loved into existence by God”.
While the historical survey material is certainly interesting, the reader may feel that too much of the book have been devoted to it. The conclusion as to how we should approach sport theologically is to see it as a “meaningful non-necessity”.
However the way the ideas are put into words many times may makes them inaccessible to the average sports-playing, sports-loving Christian – the one who needs the message of this book more than anyone. Let me give a few examples:
“sport is a liturgy of the creature’s contingency”.
“sport is radically autotelic”.
“Simply put, sport complements the Sabbath-shaped liturgy of grace”.
“sport is the liturgy – the irreducibly embodied dramatic communal actualisation – of this most basic identity”.
And finally: “The task for Christians is to commentate on sport…we can point out to its fans… that they are enjoying a liturgy of contingency, a wonderfully unnecessary but internally meaningful way to chime with their own unnecessary but meaningful life as creatures”. I agree that Christians should commentate on sport but surely in a language that sportspeople will understand.
I resonated with the book’s statement that “the Church should be celebrating sport rather than opposing it” but that seemed to be contradicted at another place by the view that it was good thing “that the Church has been so vigilant in its opposition to sport, because we have to recognize that sport is very bad”. Having written elsewhere myself that sport should be seen as a gift from God, I struggle with the view that sport is “very bad”.
I had much sympathy with the view: “Christians have been misguided – and continue to be misguided – when they attempt to harness sport to their own agenda. Though we will be able to think of many fine reasons why Christians should attempt to connect sport to their missional programmes – not least evangelism - these are not sporting reasons. This means that Christians will inevitably be corrupting the sport in question when they attempt to harness it. Given the eternal stakes involved, we may judge that the end justifies the means. But, if we do that, we should be clear what we are doing. With ulterior motives, Christians will – quite literally – be acting as spoilsports”.
However, this is such a radical view that I felt its application needed proper development beyond a one paragraph warning of the dangers posed by “sport chaplaincies and ministries, as well as evangelistic programmes targeted especially at sport”.
The author states that: “Christians should never confuse sport with worship. They are fundamentally different directions, different ways in being” and “Sport is not worship. Worship is the liturgical celebration of who God is with us. Sport is the liturgical celebration of who we are by ourselves”. Having said that he rather undercuts his argument in raising the “the interesting question of whether God makes a distinction between worship and sport”.
I know many sportspeople who see their sports ability as a gift from God and their performance on the sports field as part of their worship, echoing the words attributed to Eric Liddell in the film, Chariots of Fire, “God made me for a purpose, but he also made me fast and when I run, I feel his pleasure”. To deny a sportsperson the opportunity of using their gifts to worship God seems dualistic and perhaps an inadequate understanding of worship.
The book’s treatment of professional sport is unsatisfactory. The author states: “Our theological analysis shows that sport should not be professionalized, any more than worship should be professionalized…people should not be making a living leading worship, and neither should they make a living playing sport…We need to recognize that professional sport is not true sport. It mimics it at best, it destroys it at worst. The professional sportsperson is simply an actor or a prostitute. Either way, they are not a player…Amateur sport is true sport; professional sport a corruption”.
My response would be that if the theological analysis shows that sport should not be professionalized, then the theological analysis is inadequate! Any theology of sport which excludes professional sport is inadequate**. Professional sport is an important part of the totality of sport must be understood theologically alongside all other types of sport. Otherwise the book title needs to be “A brief theology of some of sport”.
The wording is also insulting to the many sincere Christians who faithfully follow Jesus in professional sport and who are neither actors nor prostitutes. (I will leave those “actors and prostitutes” who earn their living as church musicians and worship leaders to speak for themselves!)
I think too, that the distinction between amateur and professional is a rather simplistic. With Lowrie McCown*** I prefer to see a spectrum from novice, through leisure, the player, elite and high profile who all process their sports experience in a gradually differing way.
I am grateful to Lincoln Harvey for his contribution to the task of ongoing task of understanding sport theologically. There are many good things in the book but a few areas where more work is needed.
*The Image of God in the Human Body, edited by Donald Deardorff II and John White, Edwin Mellen, 2008 review
**The Games People Play: theology, religion and sport, Robert Ellis, Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2014 presents a theology which applies to the full spectrum of sport
***Focus on sport in ministry, Lowrie McCown and Val Gin, 360 Sports, Marietta,GA, 2003 review