The NFL congregation questions its faith
Last year I was at a Jewish wedding. The bride was raised in the Catholic faith but converted to Judaism, the religion of her groom. I don’t know if that made some happy or sad. I’m not a close relative to them nor am I Catholic or Jewish. People change their religion all of the time for a variety of reasons but mainly (I suppose) they change religion because their old religion wasn’t doing anything for them anymore. What happened was that somewhere along the way they lost faith in what they once believed in and replaced it with something new and improved or just gave up altogether. But I wonder what would happen if we had found out that God had changed his religion? What kind of impact would that have on all the millions of faithful if they woke up one day to find out that they were not the same religion as their God? Well, for us to answer this, we need look no further than at one of the biggest gods in America today, the NFL.
Allow me to make a parallel. I teach Sunday school at my church. I spend some time during the week studying out a lesson I will present to my class on the following Sunday morning. I finish my preparation for my Sunday school lesson on Saturday evening. That evening I review my lesson and then go to the clothes closet to make sure I know what I’m going to wear to church on Sunday. I pick out a suit, shirt and tie to match. When Sunday morning comes, I’m ready to go to church. I get up early, eat, shower and get dressed and off I go. I spend an hour in Sunday school teaching and then another hour in church where the pastor gives us a message that he had prepared. Sunday evening at 6 I’m back in church because we have a morning and evening services at our church.
Those who worship the NFL are no different than I, we just go to different churches on Sunday. The NFL congregation begins preparation on the Saturday before the Sunday game the same as I do except they are making sure they have plenty of chips, beer, soda and food for a full Sunday of football. When Sunday morning comes around, we go through the same rituals, but their Sunday morning attire is not a coat and tie, it is a jersey sporting their favorite team logo on the sleeve and player’s name on the back. Their preachers are Joe Buck of Fox or maybe Jim Nantz of CBS. Then when Sunday evening rolls around, they go back to the NFL church for some Sunday night football before retiring to bed. This is the way it has been for years and years in our country and everything was hunky dory, that is, until this year. Now one thing is different: The NFL congregates have just discovered that their god has changed his religion.
The NFL that stood as an example of ultimate physical toughness and competitive spirit, the NFL that we thought believed just like us, has all of a sudden disappeared. The NFL god used to welcome everybody and its “churches” did likewise, just as churches should. It didn’t matter if you were white or black, conservative or liberal, cop or landscaper, you were welcomed into the “worship house” of the NFL. But all of a sudden that has changed. NFL congregates went to “church” last Sunday only to find out that they are no longer the same religion as their god.
What happened? Did the congregate change? No, their god had changed his religion. The NFL congregates discovered that their god really wasn’t as inclusive as they were lead to believe. They found out that their god really did take sides and that they were on the wrong side of what their god believed. The NFL god, they thought, was just as patriotic as they were. When men and women in uniform unfold a field length stars and stripes during pregame ceremonies honoring the military and nation a sense of American pride crept through their veins. Except now they watch in horror as the NFL “trinity” (owners, coaches and players) take the field and kneel in protest during the anthem against police, and a country that they love. Even worse, in other NFL “churches” the “trinity” was nowhere to be found during last Sunday’s “song service.” Instead of on the field where they belonged, they were huddled up inside the locker room, a safe space they thought, that was away from controversy. What is the NFL congregate to do? Does he still raise his cup of drink offering to the TV screen on Sundays praising a god that is not his religion anymore? Or does he disavow his god altogether and become an agnostic or unbeliever, a choice the “faithful” never thought they would have to make in a hundred years?
Only time will tell. As for me, I’ll be at my church next Sunday, doing the same thing I’ve been doing for almost two dozen years. There is still a God alive today that is the same yesterday, today and forever. This God was once the God of America. He’s ready to take you back if you are willing to come to Him. And as for the new Jewish couple I spoke of at the beginning, it has been a year since the wedding and they are doing just fine.