Sermons

Idols of Our Culture: "The Game"

Rod Frohman	Third Presbyterian Church
August 17, 2008

    
“I believe in the church of baseball. I've tried all the major religions and most of the minor ones. I've worshipped Buddha, Allah, Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva, trees, mushrooms and Isadora Duncan. I know things. For instance, there are 108 beads in a Catholic's rosary and there are 108 stitches in a baseball. When I learned that, I gave Jesus a chance. But it didn't work out between us. The Lord laid too much guilt on me. I prefer metaphysics to theology. You see, there is no guilt in baseball. And it is never boring...It 's a long season and you gotta trust it. I've tried 'em all, I really have, and the only church that truly feeds the soul, day in, day out, is the church of baseball.” (Baseball, An Illustrated History by Geoffrey C. Ward and Ken Burns, Knopf, NY, 1994, p. 189)

You may recall this creed as the opening narration in the movie, “Bull Durham,” spoken off camera by the lead character Annie Savoy. The scary thing about this creed is that it hits very close to home.

The Game (capital G), and its seasonal varieties, has become a big business in America with enormous player salaries. But even in 1876, Albert G. Spaulding, then a player, was paid $2000 per season, easily 10 times more than the annual salary of a public school teacher in 1876.

But more importantly, the Game has become a religion in America in which people are known to bolt from Sunday worship in order to get to the stadium for something more exciting.

A minister friend of mine was substituting for his friend a few years ago in Bloomington, Indiana, home of the University Of Indiana Hoosiers, and their then chair-throwing basketball coach, Bobby Knight. One of the host Elders, and lay reader for the day, was chatting with my clergy friend before the service and declared with a twinkle in his eye,

“Reverend, Make sure you're done at noon because we have to get home to watch the Bobby Knight Show”.

"I'll be more than happy to do that," responded my friend, "if you do me a small favor."

"Oh, sure." the elder responded, "What do you want me to do?"

My friend said, "I'd like you to get a picture of Bobby Knight and put it on the Communion Table."

The Church of the Game has become a clear competitor with the Church of Jesus Christ, and the similarity is striking.

The Game is very often played on a Holy Day, usually the Christian Sabbath. To get to the Game one must make a pilgrimage. The thronging to the Game on the Game holy day is filled with festive celebration. Like an ancient festival, on Game Day, people come from the periphery of society to the center, like the old biblical gathering of tribes around a central shrine under the leadership of Joshua. Those who have been to an “allyah,” a trip to Jerusalem, or a trip to Mecca, or have seen such a pilgrimage, testify as to the festive quality of the surge of mutual travelers to The Game. There is the pre-Game communal meal, known as the tailgate party. Some worshippers at the Game wear special clothes with special colors. Some even paint their faces and bodies in decorative manner in anticipation of this great festival day. Some bring festal banners and pennants which display their feelings and devotion. These are waved or draped in the Game sanctuary, the stadium. When the pilgrimage to the Game is over and it is time to return home, there is a surge of travelers also. A true appreciation of the popularity of the Game pilgrimage is realized by traveling on the NY State Thruway in Buffalo after a gridiron scrimmage.

In the last fifteen years a new Game pilgrimage has emerged. It is called, “The road to the Final Four”. This is not the saga of the final four people left on earth, but the final four teams in the NCAA Division I college basketball tournament. It usually coincides with Lent because it takes place in March, and strangely this pilgrimage is also called “March Madness”.

The pilgrimage to the Game is always to holy ground, a sacred space, a sanctuary away from the cares and troubles of the world. This sacred space is a place where a person can retreat from reality and enjoy the pageantry of the Game. Often in or around the sanctuary are the icons and relics of former priests of the game. In New York City, at one sanctuary, statues of previous high priests named Gehrig and Ruth are found in a special shrine adjacent to the sanctuary. Many teams "retire" the liturgical vestments of their former high priests and hang them on the walls of their sanctuary. Further, sanctuaries are frequently named for their gods, often with the last name of "dome" such as; Astro and Metro. But some sanctuaries just have names of saints like Comiskey, and Busch. Recently, some sanctuaries have been named by the types of the tithes offered to build the sanctuaries, such as Dunn Tire, Frontier and AT & T. One sanctuary in the city of Detroit is even named “Comerica” apparently to venerate the god of commerce.

Of course the Game has a liturgical year also. A book on my shelf clearly explains this phenomenon with the title, Why Time Begins On Opening Day. The liturgical year of the Game begins with a rite of spring, “Spring Training.” Then a pilgrimage is made north and the season is played until the July mid-summer astrological festival, called the “All Star” game. The dog days of August are endured and the season is almost over before the children go back to school. But then starts the most sacred holiday season of all, the October World Series. Another Game has its liturgical year too, culminating in the Super Bowl.

Of course the Game is rich with specific and historic ritual, from the beginning coin toss (apparently another tribute to the god of commerce), to a strange ritual in the middle of the game in which normal liturgy is stopped, bands march and music is played. Another liturgical tradition has this interruption 7/9ths of the way through the liturgy, rather than half way through, where, oddly, homage is paid to the nation in solemn song.

Further some of the priests of the game make ritual use of certain stimulating and performance enhancing substances. Recently the use of tobacco, a substance used in some religions, has been banned. Clandestine tobacco use is still found however, but instead of smoking it, as some other religions do, strangely, the priests chew it and regularly expectorate its juices in a seemingly random ritual, marking the floor of their sanctuary. Several archaeological studies of these markings have failed to reveal any deliberate pattern or meaning.

There are moments of supreme drama in the ritual. The participating priests stop and look at the worship leader who, through a variety of gestures and symbols, communicates instructions from the bishop enthroned on his bench, as to what action to take. All the worshippers in the sanctuary scream and stomp their feet in great anticipation of what sacrificial transaction is about to take place. Self sacrifice for the benefit of the whole community is an important value in the religion of The Game.

At the Church of the Game there is a tremendous commitment of time, energy and resources. The worshippers stay at the Church of the Game up to three and four hours at a time, and usually arrive sixty minutes early, even though their pews are numbered and reserved. What is amazing is that all of the worshippers in the sanctuary of the Game are required to PAY to watch the ritual. Some pay $50 or $60, $100 or more each time they go to worship, thus making an annual financial commitment to the Church of Game of thousands of dollars. You should know that I do not worship at such an expensive sanctuary. My regular expense is about $5 per worship experience, very minor.

Why is the Church of the Game so attractive? Probably because it provides a sense of community, belonging. Why, my section in the Field of the Frontier Church is known as “The Neighborhood.” The worshippers always sit in the same seats, Jim the retired fireman always sits over there on the front row. Sometimes Larry, a tax collector in his former life, sits to my left as does Dave the horseradish maker. Tom and Sue and their boys occasionally sit behind me. Doug and his daughter Pam are always there. Pam is very religious and takes detailed notes on the worship ritual in a strange hieroglyphics of numbers and letters A tremendous bond is developed among us all so that a guest worshipper often remarks, "Hey, you folks really get along here and have fun." After worship the people often go to their fellowship hour at a local establishment. They call each other during the week to discuss the previous week's worship, and the beauty, symmetry and sincerity of the various ritual acts committed.

But another reason for the attractiveness of the Church of the Game is that everyone from a variety of backgrounds, races and classes are all joining forces to see the great struggles of life illustrated. The ritual of the game assumes that we humans are people who live in between life and death, innocence and cynicism. At the Church of the Game these polarities are reenacted. There in the sanctuary is the struggle of native versus foreigner. It is a struggle of good versus bad, of light versus dark. The priests of the Game agree to wear liturgical colors indicating their role. The good priests from home wear white while the bad visitors wear grey or full color vestments. Winning is clearly a victory over disillusionment and meaningless. Winning is everything. And of course, if the home team does not win, it is a shame. One of the Game's central creeds espoused by the venerated Saint Leo du Rocher is, “Nice guys finish last”. Winning means that the mundane routine of every day life is overcome. Worshippers experience transcendence as I did for two to three months after the priests from my former Minnesota Church of the Game won the World Series.

I guess the big question is, can the Church of Jesus Christ compete with the Church of the Game?

There are some who wish to compete by mixing the Church of Christ with the church of the Game. You will see these cultural syncretists, crossing themselves before they bat, praying after they score a touch down, or whole teams praying before or after games, even praying the Lord's prayer. I may be wrong on this, but I don't think God really cares if the Redwings or Bills win. God has much more important things on the divine agenda like peace in Iraq and Georgia and better schools in Rochester.

Some churches are deliberately mixing the Church of Christ with the Church of the Game. Scholar James Twitchell in his 2008 book, Shopping for God, has noted that many mega churches have very successfully repatriated men by the installation of gyms, coffee shops, basketball courts and driving ranges within church facilities. In past generations some congregations actually had bowling alleys, but those have largely disappeared.

But from the Church of the Game we realize what the national obsession with sports is saying. In our culture there is a tremendous longing for community, for acceptance, for feeling worthwhile about one's self and one's life. People long for transcendence, a sense of connection with something or someone greater than themselves, which will lift the low-feeling person out of their constant doldrums.

The Church of Christ has long spoken precisely to these needs, affirming that the life in Christ is the abundant life. But the Church of Christ cannot simply declare in a loud voice that Christ's abundant life is somehow better than the feeling of abundance and well-being that one gets at the Church of the Game.

No, we cannot compete with the Church of the Game because we must be honest and say that the abundant Christian life will frequently involve, well, suffering. Oh. And as you know at the Church of the Game anyone suffering or injured is removed from the sanctuary so that only the strong participate. The practical theology of the Church of the Game is Darwinian. The central act of the Christian Church is the suffering and death of Christ on the Cross. In that death we learn that God's grace is what sustains our lives, not our constantly striving after the victor's silver cup, gold medal or festooned pennant. Further we declare that God works in the world, not through winning, but through losing. As Christ lost his life on the Cross so we are called to lose our lives in service to the world. The ritual meal we observe is always a variation on that theme, which abundant living comes through losing our lives in service to Christ in the world for which he died. The pilgrimage which we make is the pilgrimage to the cross where victory over death takes place, not by our winning efforts, but because God gives transcendent life those who lose their lives for Christ's sake.

But there are some things we can learn from the Church of the Game. The players who compete in the Church of the Game by and large prepare themselves to do their best job through rigorous physical and mental preparation. We can, indeed we must, prepare so that what we do here is of the highest quality. Further what we do in the Church of Christ must not be boring, but rather innovative and creative and attractive and exciting.

And shouldn't our common life of worship, education and service be exciting? After all, who is here? Alex Rodriquez, Michael Phelps, Brett Favre? No, “God is here”, as our first hymn today said:

“God is here and we your people meet to offer praise and prayer....

Here are symbols to remind us of our life-long need of grace;

Here are table, font and pulpit, Here the cross has central place.

Here in honesty of preaching, Here in silence as in speech,

Here in newness and renewal, God the Spirit comes to teach.”