Christianity and the Super Bowl
Feb 3, 2013 11:08 pm
To start off i will admit i was partially rooting for the Ravens to win. Really the only reason i was going for them was because the 49ers are from San Francisco and that's where the Giants (MLB) are from, and after they beat the Rangers in the playoffs. So i've just decided that nothing good can come from sports in San Francisco. i say "sports" from San Francisco instead of "everything" because i like the band Train. You might be asking what this has to do with where the blog is going and the truth is that it really has nothing to do with it.
So, now to actually begin. i would like to pose a question. Why are we so enthralled by sports? It could be that we live vicariously through the athletes we have come to know and love. Maybe it's because we were raised up around it. Perhaps it's because a person who is playing is a personal friend. It could be a number of things, in fact i can relate to all those reasons. i love NASCAR because i grew up around it as well as i wish that i could really be doing it so i have basically invested my dreams into the hopes that my favorite driver will win. i also love baseball because my family loved it and i get to see people that i went to high school play on professional teams. i don't think that these things are necessarily wrong. it's not wrong to be a fan. There are just times when we can take things to far.
As i watched today's game there were several things i noticed and we will get to those in a little while. The first issue i would like to point out was actually not made known to me until after the fact while i was wandering around on Facebook. One of my friends had posted that Flacco had dropped the "F-bomb" on national TV and it was in fact not censored out. This disturbs me, but not in just the fact that he said it on national TV but also the comment itself. First off Flacco shouldn't have said what he did. He knows just as well as anyone else that by being a professional athlete he is a role model to kids and that's definitely not a good picture to portray. i don't know what religion he belongs to or if he even does belong to one. Perhaps it is the picture he wants to paint or perhaps he just messed up by getting caught up in the moment and just lost his "role model" train of thought.
What bothers me more perhaps is the way people responded. Maybe this is just the NASCAR coming out in me, but from what i know a lot of professional athletes have said bad things on the air before. To turn this one mistake of his into a scenario to say that your kids will never see athletes as heroes is a pretty big jump from understanding it was a mistake to stereotyping a whole group. All of a sudden as a Christian group we just went from the forgiving, graceful, and merciful attributes of God that we probably heard at church this morning to the stereotypical, judgmental, and non-understanding attributes that we often relate to how the devil tries to ruin people. Perhaps instead of casting out athletes and condemning them to a life where none of our offspring will ever look up to them, we should pray for them. Athletes often have the physical abilities that most of us dream to have and their hard work is something that should be respected. i know there are many athletes who still act like little kids but they have definitely stood up and committed to their dreams and aspirations in a way that many people would never do. They put themselves on display for the world to see and sometimes that's what gets them in the end. Just as athletes should view their fans as real people and not just as revenue from their t-shirt sales, we should look at the athletes we often immortalize and idolize as real people who might make mistakes occasionally.
If you don't understand how anyone could ever cuss, especially over national TV, you should really go to a NASCAR race. Definitely go if you don't think a Christian can cuss. It will be the shock of your life. Make sure to get a radio scanner as well, then you can hear everything the driver has to say. Quite a few of the drivers are simple country boys who grew up racing on the dirt track on Saturday and going to church on Sunday. They definitely don't have everything right as you will be able to tell when they're on the track.
What i'm trying to get across is not that we should condone bad behavior and bad language. Instead i would like us to see that they are people too. i imagine Flacco will more than likely have to pay something for his words and he will more than likely learn from it. Learn to look at athletes as people instead of idols and understand that even though they're on TV it doesn't make them any different than us. They will mess up and it will more than likely be in front of a whole bunch of people.
So why are we so enthralled by sports? Because it's something we've been doing since the beginning of time. We all compete and we enjoy it. Competing can be a great thing and it can be a bad thing. It can bring out the best, the worst, and sometimes a mixture of both. Please don't give up hope in sport stars, just be cautious in how high you elevate them. The higher the pedestal the harder the fall. We all should look up to someone and athletes can be a good place to look to. Just understand that all will fall at some point whether they're an athlete, movie star, or pastor. Some just more visible than others.
To start off i will admit i was partially rooting for the Ravens to win. Really the only reason i was going for them was because the 49ers are from San Francisco and that's where the Giants (MLB) are from, and after they beat the Rangers in the playoffs. So i've just decided that nothing good can come from sports in San Francisco. i say "sports" from San Francisco instead of "everything" because i like the band Train. You might be asking what this has to do with where the blog is going and the truth is that it really has nothing to do with it.
So, now to actually begin. i would like to pose a question. Why are we so enthralled by sports? It could be that we live vicariously through the athletes we have come to know and love. Maybe it's because we were raised up around it. Perhaps it's because a person who is playing is a personal friend. It could be a number of things, in fact i can relate to all those reasons. i love NASCAR because i grew up around it as well as i wish that i could really be doing it so i have basically invested my dreams into the hopes that my favorite driver will win. i also love baseball because my family loved it and i get to see people that i went to high school play on professional teams. i don't think that these things are necessarily wrong. it's not wrong to be a fan. There are just times when we can take things to far.
As i watched today's game there were several things i noticed and we will get to those in a little while. The first issue i would like to point out was actually not made known to me until after the fact while i was wandering around on Facebook. One of my friends had posted that Flacco had dropped the "F-bomb" on national TV and it was in fact not censored out. This disturbs me, but not in just the fact that he said it on national TV but also the comment itself. First off Flacco shouldn't have said what he did. He knows just as well as anyone else that by being a professional athlete he is a role model to kids and that's definitely not a good picture to portray. i don't know what religion he belongs to or if he even does belong to one. Perhaps it is the picture he wants to paint or perhaps he just messed up by getting caught up in the moment and just lost his "role model" train of thought.
What bothers me more perhaps is the way people responded. Maybe this is just the NASCAR coming out in me, but from what i know a lot of professional athletes have said bad things on the air before. To turn this one mistake of his into a scenario to say that your kids will never see athletes as heroes is a pretty big jump from understanding it was a mistake to stereotyping a whole group. All of a sudden as a Christian group we just went from the forgiving, graceful, and merciful attributes of God that we probably heard at church this morning to the stereotypical, judgmental, and non-understanding attributes that we often relate to how the devil tries to ruin people. Perhaps instead of casting out athletes and condemning them to a life where none of our offspring will ever look up to them, we should pray for them. Athletes often have the physical abilities that most of us dream to have and their hard work is something that should be respected. i know there are many athletes who still act like little kids but they have definitely stood up and committed to their dreams and aspirations in a way that many people would never do. They put themselves on display for the world to see and sometimes that's what gets them in the end. Just as athletes should view their fans as real people and not just as revenue from their t-shirt sales, we should look at the athletes we often immortalize and idolize as real people who might make mistakes occasionally.
If you don't understand how anyone could ever cuss, especially over national TV, you should really go to a NASCAR race. Definitely go if you don't think a Christian can cuss. It will be the shock of your life. Make sure to get a radio scanner as well, then you can hear everything the driver has to say. Quite a few of the drivers are simple country boys who grew up racing on the dirt track on Saturday and going to church on Sunday. They definitely don't have everything right as you will be able to tell when they're on the track.
What i'm trying to get across is not that we should condone bad behavior and bad language. Instead i would like us to see that they are people too. i imagine Flacco will more than likely have to pay something for his words and he will more than likely learn from it. Learn to look at athletes as people instead of idols and understand that even though they're on TV it doesn't make them any different than us. They will mess up and it will more than likely be in front of a whole bunch of people.
So why are we so enthralled by sports? Because it's something we've been doing since the beginning of time. We all compete and we enjoy it. Competing can be a great thing and it can be a bad thing. It can bring out the best, the worst, and sometimes a mixture of both. Please don't give up hope in sport stars, just be cautious in how high you elevate them. The higher the pedestal the harder the fall. We all should look up to someone and athletes can be a good place to look to. Just understand that all will fall at some point whether they're an athlete, movie star, or pastor. Some just more visible than others.
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