“All I know most surely about morality and obligation I owe to football”,
A Christian Theology of Sport and the Ethics of Doping
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Michael R. Shafer, PhD. Thesis, University of Durham, UK. 2012.
“The purpose of this thesis is to present a theologically informed alternative to common conceptions of sport in contemporary culture, particularly in response to the challenges of doping in athletic competition”. So states the preface. I am not sure that the thesis succeeds in its task.
It is a very disparate piece of work. Fundamentally it looks at two quite separate issues –each worthy of several PhDs in their own right - Christian Theology of Sport and the Ethics of Doping. The conceptual underpinning is diverse and varied – Alaistair MacIntyre, Josef Pieper, Shirl Hoffman etc to the extent that the thesis at times reads like a series of essays each one critiquing a particular writer.
There is a tendency to generalize. I felt that he did not sufficiently distinguish between UK and USA when commenting on either sport or Christian views of sport. Again he seemed to treat sport as an entity as if a recreational tennis player had the same mindset as a professional sportsperson. Thus when he agues against replacing “the leisure of sport with the intense desire for victory”, this is clearly irrelevant to elite sport.
With regard to his Christian theology of sport, I found a lot that I agreed with. I resonate with statements like: “sport was intended to be an expression of worship and celebration which imparts physical, moral, and spiritual benefits to those who participate” and “we must approach issues in sport from a spirit of gratitude and admiration of the One who created the gift of sport and also has redeemed creation through Christ”.
I felt that his Christian view of sport was too reliant on the Puritans whose opinions might be felt to be a little dated. For example when he quotes a recent report on sports injuries to children he comments “Baxter believes” as if Richard Baxter was a contemporary authorities rather than one who wrote in 1838!
How can I criticize the amount someone has read when he quotes me three times – but I have to. There was an uncritical overreliance on Shirl Hoffman’s Good Game. What a pity John White’s excellent critique of Hoffman appeared too late for the author. [The Enduring Problem of Dualism: Shirl Hoffman’s Good Game: John White, Christianity and the Culture of Sports, Implicit Religion, 2012, 15, 2:]
When he states “Christian theology’s treatment of sport has been negligible”, I am left wondered how familiar he is with the field. There is no reference to the most important book in the field The Image of God in the Human Body, edited by Donald Deardorff II and John White, Edwin Mellen, 2008. In fact of the top 20 books listed on my website only two are referred to. Of course, a few were published too late to be taken into consideration in the thesis.
The summary of the arguments surrounding the ethics of doping is excellent – raising and evaluating arguments on both sides. When it comes to presenting his conclusions he states: “Christians have (or should have) bigger concerns about the present state of the sports culture than finding a moral distinction between steroid enhancement and dietary enhancement” and “ A redemptive attitude in competitive sport does much to dissolve the need or desire for doping to gain a competitive advantage”. I, frankly, found this a cop out.
When he adds, “Christians are right to refuse any artificial enhancements, biological or otherwise, that weaken the relational dynamic of our dependence on God’s grace in our efforts toward excellence”, I am not at all sure what he means in practice.
At times I was left wondering how much he knows about sport. His confusion of rowing and sailing (Page 137) and the reference to Real Madrid as “European Championship club” (Page 173) certain raise the question. When he praises Maradona’s sublime skill in scoring against England in 1986, he seems unaware of Maradona’s gross act of cheating in the same game. And indeed I wondered what he really thinks of sport.
The comment: “Though it remains inaccurate to categorically condemn all sport, perhaps the Puritan critique of sport as idleness is not as far off the mark as many sports enthusiasts would have us believe” does not sound like that of a sports lover. I also did not feel that the world of sport that I live and work in was “consumed by the win at all costs mentality”, not that I recall him defining “win at all costs”.
At places his attempt to develop a theology of sport is undermined by an inherent dualism. He states (Page 156) “This is not to say that all the time available to a Christian should be spent in spiritual matters”. Surely the whole point is that when sport becomes “expression of worship” (his words) it is a spiritual matter. Again he is critical of sport being viewed “instrumentally” yet he regularly writes of “using sport”.
His argument that players have an obligation to admit it when they break a rule or touch the ball which the officials fail to see it. I found this section rather shallow in compassion with, for example Ed Smith’s writing on the subject and his insights into the norms of different sports. Again, it is much easier to play with this inherent honesty at the recreational level than in elite level.
Overall it was a thesis which promised more than it delivered.