Sport as Liturgy: Towards a Radical Orthodoxy of Sport

In this essay I take up the idea presented in 'All Things Shining' that sport events „may be the place in contemporary life where [people] find sacred community most easily”.

Physical education and sport through the centuries, 2018

The scientific contribution of this paper consists of an innovative approach to the issues of Orthodox faith and sport, which opens up a new creative area for theology itself, where sport also gets new opportunities. Given the known "affair" in almost all sports branches, which illustrate the state of "alarming helplessness", the contribution of faith in solving it is indisputable, especially in the way advocated in this research work. The primary goal is to extract from the plethora of theological literature those contents that can encourage the creative responsibility of all positive factors of sports events, from the athletes themselves, through their managers and club officials to the fans. Recognizing these problems and referring to theological sources as "clear content", without the bias of the members, with critical awareness, qualifies work to search and find adequate answers to the asked questions. The mere fact that a new research field has been opened, without the intention to make the last word on this, points to the scientific contribution of this paper.

in Richard D. Hecht Vincent Biondo III (eds), Religion & Everyday Life and Culture, Praeger, 2010, Vol. 3, pp. 915-943. Reprinted in in Richard D. Hecht and Vincent F. Biondo III (eds), Religion and Culture: Contemporary Practices and Perspectives, Fortress Press, Minneapolis, 2012, pp. 307-326.

At first glance sport and religion appear to have little in common, apart from being perennial human activities. Yet there are at least five ways in which sport and religion are deeply interrelated: first, it can be demonstrated that in pre-modern societies ritualized sport was very often part of worship of the gods; second, altered states of consciousness attained during sport have frequently been compared to religious or mystical experiences (for example, where a sense of oneness with the universe is felt, or a loss of ego-consciousness); third, some modern sporting champions have professed religious faith and attributed their success to divine power; fourth, the devotion of fans to sporting teams and individual “stars” resembles religious fervour; fifth and final, in the modern West sport has become a functional equivalent of religion (or an actual religion) for some people. The academic study of sport and religion has focused on the centrality of ritual in both phenomena for multiple reasons. Sociologist Emile Durkheim (1858-1917) argued that religion was, at a fundamental level, concerned with the classification of the world into two categories, the sacred and the profane. Rituals enacted these categories and revealed the deepest concerns of the community. Further, ritual (both traditional and modern) may involve apparently profane activities from everyday life, such as tea-drinking and cleaning. It is clear that Durkheim’s interpretation of religion, and the categories of sacred and profane, can be applied to phenomena other than religion. Before considering the relationship between sport and religion in two case studies, the ancient Olympic Games and Japanese sumo wrestling, it is necessary to observe that the modern West acknowledges a diversity of “ultimate concerns” among its citizens. In a variegated culture without a unifying religious, civil, or cultural metanarrative, individuals are free to attribute absolute significance to a range of activities, including sport, rock music, film and television, art, family, and politics. Sport is religion for some, but not for others.

2009

The intersection between sport and spirituality has attracted unprecedented academic interest in the first decade of the twenty-first century, as a general survey of the field in this volume by Rob Hess shows. One sign of a quickening of interest in the area has been the emergence of academic conferences devoted to the theme, with one (held in the United States in 2004) generating considerable interest among the sport history community, and another (held in Great Britain in 2007) providing the impetus for the establishment of the International Journal of Religion and Sport. Other beacons have been tertiary courses devoted to the field, notably a new unit ‘Sport and Spirituality’ taught by former Olympian Richard Pengelly at the University of Western Australia, and the newly established Centre for the Study of Sport and Spirituality at York St John University in England.1

The Chinese Olympics, the 2010 FIFA World Cup, the Delhi Commonwealth Games, and the approaching 2011 Rugby World Cup demonstrate that sport is an amazing spectacle of the modern world. Sportsmen and women are admired and emulated by millions. Sport is a vast world-wide business. At the time of the emergence of Christianity sport was a bloody, idolatrous and often fatal activity for those who participated. This paper will argue that Christianity has profoundly influenced modern sport. We will explore the origins of sport; its value and effects on society; how Christianity has influenced sport; and explore some of the pastoral and theological implications.

Journal for the Academic Study of Religion, 2015

The Chinese Olympics, the 2010 FIFA World Cup, the Delhi Commonwealth Games, and the approaching 2011 Rugby World Cup demonstrate that sport is an amazing spectacle of the modern world. Sportsmen and women are admired and emulated by millions. Sport is a vast world-wide business. At the time of the emergence of Christianity sport was a bloody, idolatrous and often fatal activity for those who participated. This paper will argue that Christianity has profoundly influenced modern sport. We will explore the origins of sport; its value and effects on society; how Christianity has influenced sport; and explore some of the pastoral and theological implications.

2015

Sports have captured the minds and hearts of people across the globe but have largely evaded the attention of Christian theologians. What is the meaning of sports? There seem to be two polar responses: some dismiss sports as merely a game, while others worship sports as nearly a god. This essay argues that when viewed through the lens of Scripture, sports are more than a game, less than a god, and when transformed by the gospel can be received as a gift to be enjoyed forever.

Journal of Social Philosophy, 2001

Sport is a form of game. In games we waste time, energy, and ingenuity on pointless and childish tasks. Even the most performance-oriented game remains unproductive. It is all show, a display of excellence for the sake of excellence in activities that are completely irrelevant to life. That which is not, or is no longer, important for "real" life is precisely that which is boisterously celebrated: physical power, skill. Some suspect that there is something wrong with people who are fascinated with this sort of thing. Perhaps it is a form of psychological immaturity, obsessive behavior, or an infantile compulsion for order? Alternatively, is it a form of mass hysteria urged upon us and manipulated by entertainment giants? However, none of these reductionist explanations makes the extraordinary attraction of sports in modernity understandable. This attraction points rather to elements that aptly appeal to modern persons, not in their aberrations, regressions, and infantilisms, but to the very basis of their scale of values and to the heart of their culture. However, how can we be appealed to by that which seems irrelevant to life and apparently is without any meaningful purpose? Precisely because the game is outside of life, and is eminently not real, it can be a symbol. Because it is nothing, it can mean everything. The way that modern Western persons experience relationships to themselves, to their fellow persons, to nature, and to society is pregnantly staged in their games. We catch the modern person in an unguarded moment, a moment of spontaneous fervor, when engaged in activities that are not in service of urgently vital interests. Sports could be compared to that other unguarded moment when the censor and the demands of reality are weakened: the dream. The game is a lived phantasm. 1 Moreover, there is a second reason why sports can so accurately stage modernity. Being separate from life, the game is not affected by life's ambiguities either. In daily life every meaning is ambiguous, every value stained, every task a risk, every victory an injustice, every law an oppression. Not so in a game. The rules of the game separate it from this dark everyday ambiguity. Amidst the confusion of life, it offers what Huizinga calls a 'limited perfection'. 2 All ambiguity is cleared away. The game is ruled by the clarity and univocality of a closed formalism. The rules are logically exhaustive. Every case is solvable. One could object that real games are never completely separated from life. Actors are real human beings with their own idiosyncrasies, their own

Physical Education and Sport Through the Centuries, 2019

Contemporary sport offers man the eclectics of industrial neopaganism, hidden behind the splendor of Olympism. Man through sport, as in many other ways, can find a way out of himself in order to encompass and gather the world around him. A good, Christocentric movement allows us to transform the world for the better, proving ourselves both in soul and body to be blessed helpers of the Lord on the journey of our salvation. Even though it is just an auxiliary means, sport is never agnostic, considering that in it, in the beginning, the gifts bestowed to the soul and body are brought closer together and guided towards salvation from sin, decay and death. In such a sense, sport cannot be equated with industrial sport in which the very concept of sport is only a mask for sin (profit).