Now More Than Ever, We Need the Wisdom of Sports

Sports have mostly returned after being shut down due to COVID-19. From international and national football (soccer) to MLB, NBA, and golf, games have at least returned to TV for our pleasure. Although much is different due to all of the necessary health protocols, the essence of sports, competition, and what it means to be a part of a team, fans are back.

We should revisit some of those truths in light of our current culture.

Detachment

I love sports, from competing to watching them as a fan to now being the father of children participating in sports. Sports can teach lessons to all of us, no matter our relationship with them. That said, there might also have been some good from the break.

There is a beautiful spiritual truth about detachment. When you fast or actively give something up—in this case, you are forced to give it up—you can see things more clearly. You become rightly ordered, if you will.

As a worldwide community that at times can be fanatically attached to sports and our teams, we experienced firsthand that our lives could exist without the 24/7 sports news onslaught. More so, especially, we American parents were able to take a necessary breather from our busy sports schedules, leaving our kids to be kids. It doesn’t mean we gave up on sports; instead, we had the time to become rightly ordered more holistically and healthily to our relationship with sports. As a result, the time away from it rekindled and gave us the eyes to see the virtues and great attributes that athletics can provide.

Fans

As a fan, sports provide a healthy escape from our everyday lives. It provides entertainment and fosters a natural connection to others where we look with excitement at something outside of ourselves. That is always a great thing.

During these times, when division and tension reign supreme, sports provide common ground. Race, creed, political affiliation, or anything else we find to argue about becomes secondary to the same color jerseys we wear while we cheer our team on. Boy, do we need more sports than ever to experience a sense of unity with our neighbors again?

Player/Team

For most of the first half of my life, playing sports and being a part of a team taught me more about being a part of a community than anything else during my early years.

First, it taught me what it means to be in a healthy relationship or a group. We frequently hear that, as players, we are to play for the name on the front of the jersey, not the name on the back. I believe that is half true. We play for both. We don’t lose ourselves to having a healthy relationship with others. Instead, by becoming fully who we are and who we are made to be while in communion with others doing the same, a relationship is forged to create a healthy team and/or community. We never should lose ourselves for the sake of others.

Secondly, when I was 17 years old, I walked into my first professional locker room. I was one of 10 Americans or so on a team of 35. I had teammates from Puerto Rico, Venezuela, Mexico, and the Dominican Republic. I had teammates from Australia and Canada. Even my teammates from the USA came from the four corners of this country. What we all brought into that locker room were our differences. We had different races, religions, and languages. We had different socio-economic backgrounds and education. Yet, I learned throughout my career that the differences did not break any sense of team or community. What broke down our sense of team and community was our ego (pride), which was just a front for our deep insecurities. Insecurities come from being unable to look into the mirror and love the person looking back. Many of us believed that our primary identity and self-worth were rooted in the ability to hit a ball with a bat, not because we were uniquely made and loved. In light of the problems we face in our communities today, would those same principles apply? I believe that they might.

The world seems to be on fire at the moment. Having had the time to become rightly ordered in our relationship with sports, we need healthy distractions and are ready to be entertained. We are again prepared to be exposed to the great virtues and lessons that can heal the divisions we feel.

One game at a time, we might begin to change our communities for the better while holding a hot dog and beer on our couches.

As long as it is safe to do so, I say, “Playball!”

(Hopp YB!! The picture above was from a Champions League Match between Manchester United and the Young Boys. It was one of my great memories with the boys of our time in Switzerland.)