Sport & Church. Final essay about sport & church.

Sport and Church
Student Name
Institution Affiliation
Physical recreation and sporting activities in particular have been part and parcel of communities around the world for many centuries. They have been used as platforms that bring people together despite their differences to cheer and celebrate their favorite players and teams to victory. Communities used sports as a platform to not only interact but also compete and where victors receive accolades, prizes and recognition in society. They have also served as avenues that help individuals relax and work through some stressing situations. Over the years, sports have also been used as ways to counsel and guide young people on the right path to becoming responsible members of society. Institutions including governments and the church have also used sports to unite communities and consequently, further their agendas. While it is evident that sporting activities are as old as humanity, there are suggestions that the Catholic Church embraced them only recently. The logic behind the resistance stemmed from the fact that the Catholic Church perceived the body and soul as being two different entities. It is shared that according to Catholic faithful’s during the early periods, the body was sinful and evil and as such, was always considered to be inferior to the spirit and soul. With majority of the sporting activities requiring substantial use of the body and muscles and which by the Catholic account were evil, engagements in physical activities and sports would lead people away from God and His teachings. These sentiments coupled by the influence of the Puritans are believed to have contributed significant to the initial resistant stand taken by the Catholic Church towards sports. However, there is a section in society that believes that different sporting elements evident on the window and other artifacts in the medieval Church prove that sports were being practiced. There are also proponents of a school of thought that suggest that it is not until Pope Leo III through his Encyclical Letter of 1891 where he encouraged the establishment of Catholic Sports Organizations that Catholic faithful’s begun to embrace sporting activities to develop the youth. During the same period, the Catholic Church had also changed its stand associating the body with sin. The research paper seeks to examine and describe the development of sports in the Catholic faith and provide several factors that support play and games being present during the early church.
Understanding the Benefits and Association of Sports and Church based on the Poster
The Church has for many centuries been a platform that seeks to guide people in society to live in accordance to God’s teachings and proposed way of life. Through sentiments and scriptures in the bible, society has been directed on the right path. However, it has not always been easy to get people to embrace these biblical and religious perspectives let alone to attend church forums including the daily and weekly church service. With the hustles and bustles of everyday life, many individuals consider going to church as a waste of time since they would be better placed working or trying to improve their livelihoods. It is in this regard that the church has identified sports as a means of bringing people from diverse backgrounds together not only to compete but also to receive essential biblical information that will guide them throughout their lives. One major benefit of sporting activities is the fact that the participants and the audience tend to see beyond their differences (Baker, 1988). It is common to find individuals from different ethnicities, age, gender and religion enjoying a game of football at the stadium.
As a result of the ability of sporting activities to connect different people, the Church has been at the forefront of sponsoring various events within their premises and around the world. The logic is that sports not only connects families and fosters communities but also strengthens nations. They help to bring people together and promote greater inclusion which is also one of the primary objectives of the church. It is the will of God that individuals are able to accommodate their differences and live together harmoniously and in ways that don’t impede on each other’s peace and tranquility. Over the years, various Church leaders have shown their support and appreciation of various sporting events including the Pope. The initiative showcased on the poster with the Pope signing football jerseys tends to endear to many Christians who view him as a role model. It is likely to influence many people to participate in the recreational activity as opposed to engaging in criminal and sinful activities.
Additionally, the Church has also employed sports as peace building tools particularly in war-torn regions in Africa. During games, the players don’t see differences in aspects such as color, age and height and just wish to compete for a common objective. Eventually, the atmosphere that fills stadiums characterized by vibrant fans from either divide helps to transform the ill-temperatures that fueled the conflicts to positive feelings filled with mutual respect and understanding. Furthermore, the Church’s focus on sporting activities is centered on the belief that they assist in not only relaxing the body but also allowing individuals to connect with their spiritualties (Baker, 1988). They make people to be physically fit and fresh to understand the significance of allowing God into their lives. For instance, an individual who is not plagued by any health concerns and complications because of their involvement in sports has more time to dedicate in serving the Lord compared to another ailing in bed because of obesity-related issues.
Examination of the Factors that Contributed to the Resistance of the Catholic Church towards Sporting Activities
Over the years, there has been the assumption that sporting activities have been part of mankind for many centuries and that some of them are as old as humanity. Conventionally, communities including the church have used sports for different purposes. However, there have also been proposal that it is only recently that the Catholic Church embraced sports into the holy institution. Based on that proposal, there are various factors that are attributed to the initial resistance of the Catholic Church towards sporting activities. To begin with, it is strongly believed that the Church prohibited games and recreational activities from the holy and religious institution because it believed that they would jeopardize the relationship between God and mankind. Sports can be very engrossing as characterized by the ardent fans of the various games and activities. It is common to find true and strong sports fans foregoing some of their daily activities just to attend and watch their favorite teams play. Sports fans also travel many miles just to follow their teams and players on the road for away matches and miss out on spending quality time with their families. There are cases and instances where individuals have been distracted and other have skipped work because their teams were in action or they had to participate in a local neighborhood football tournament. Overall, ardent sports fans can prove to be uncontrollable and a menace in society. Considering that an individual can forego their daily activities including work that sustains their living and also miss spending time with their families and loved ones just for the sake of either watching or participating in different sports, it is clear as to why the Catholic Church was skeptical and prohibited games and recreational activities in the institution. According to the Church’s perspective, individuals would be so focused on sports that it impedes their devotion to God. It feared that majority of people would forego church services and their commitments in serving the Lord would diminish drastically.
Secondly, the initial resistance exhibited from the Catholic Church concerning sports stems from the idea that the body and soul were two distinct entities. Furthermore, the ancient church perceived the body in negative terms and also associated with sin and evil. With a majority of physical activities involving substantial use of the body and its muscles, the ancient church was hell bent on accepting sports into the institution. It considered that all sports were sinful and evil and should therefore be prohibited because they contravened God’s teachings. During the periods that preceded the 19th century, members of the Catholic faith believed that the body and soul were two distinct entities with the former being sinful (Bebbington, 2003). It was also the belief of many Catholic faithful’s that the body was inferior to the soul and was continuously driving mankind into activities including sports that pushed them further from the teachings of God (Ober and Wishard, 1927). Based on these negative attitudes, Catholics failed to recognize physical recreation and sports as being important. According to Bebbington, (2003), “Early Christianity gradually built a foundation based on asceticism, which is a belief that evil exists in the body, and therefore, the body should be subordinate to the pure spirit”. From the above statement, promotion of sporting activities was tantamount to siding with the devil and as such, strongly prohibited.
During the periods before the 19th century, spiritual salvation was not only paramount but was also the dominant feature of the Christian faith. As such, salvation of the spirit has to take precedence over the cultivation of the body which the Catholic faithful’s believed could obstruct the realization of that objective. There is a section of individuals in society that believes that the mistrust of physical environments that characterized Christians during the ancient church were rooted since inception. According to Baker (1988), “The Apostle Paul expressed the view in his letter to Timothy that bodily exercise profits little in comparison with godliness, for example”. The above sentiment by a renowned religious figure in the Catholic Church also supports the resentment the institution had towards sports and games.
The aspect of ascentism is also supported with the concept of dualistic ontology that define human beings based on the mortal body and immortal soul. As such, Christians were very hostile in regards to sports and associated them with pagan cults. These sentiments are shared in Mathew 19:2 where it is noted that the mortal bodies to mean the individuals who participated in sports were disregarded. Their bodies were considered to be mere prisons and sinks of corruption that continuously led mankind astray. There is however some truth to these sentiments considering some of the ancient sports involved blood duels where participants fought to the death. They were mostly engaged during times when the society intended to appease the gods and gain their fortune and favor through bumper harvests and sufficient rainfall. It is because of these facts shared above that the Catholic Church perceived that the body was being used negatively to sin and corrupt the soul. To avoid going astray, many Christians stayed away from the pagan activities in sporting events and dedicated their time and efforts in joining the ranks of eunuchs who were inclined on serving God and in seeing the kingdom of Heaven.
Additionally, it is widely believed that the prohibition of sporting activities among the Catholic faithful’s was in part fostered from the repressive regime of the Puritans not only in England but also America (Ober, 1891). The Puritans comprised of English protestants during the early 16the and 17th century who were inclined on purifying the Church of England from all influence of the Roman Catholic practices. Puritans comprised of individuals who were of the notion that they had a unique covenant with God and that they primarily tasked with making the society change their sinful ways. According to (Constatini, 2011), “The Puritan work ethic played a significant role in shaping their attitudes towards play: they regarded play with suspicion and even associated it with sin, primarily because it led the believer away from work”. They were highly inclined on uniting the body and soul and as such, prohibited any activities including sports that may have jeopardized that initiative. As such, it is only after the Puritan regime ended that sports and games were accepted, albeit, reluctantly.
Puritans strongly believed that it was the true religion not only in England but also New England and as such, sort to influence both politics and social life. According to Boojamra (1982), “Puritans believed that it was necessary to be in a covenant relationship with God in order to be redeemed from one’s sinful condition, that God had chosen to reveal salvation through preaching, and that the Holy Spirit was the energizing instrument of salvation. It made several behavioral regulations when it came to power in the tail-end of the 17th century. For instance, it outlawed certain holidays including Christmas which it considered as impious. Moreover and in particular concerning the research paper, Puritans were vehemently opposed to sports and recreation activities on Sunday because they would distract congregants from religiously observing the Sabbath.
Furthermore, Puritans also prohibited card playing and gambling in England and across all its colonies. Hitchcock (1917) shares that “Directly challenging established royal legislation, they argued that Sunday was “no fit time” for archery practice and declared that men “must not come to Church with their bows and arrows in their hands”. Dances that involved men and women dancing together were also prohibited because Puritans believed that condoning the practice would ultimately lead to fornication. It is based on that fact that it was not only until the tail-end of the 17th century that the first dancing school was established in England. Additionally, once Puritans came to power, they shut down English theaters and prohibited such establishments in any of the other colonies because the regime associated the establishments with depravity and prostitution. Puritans shared that sporting activities only provided the public with opportunities to drink themselves silly and engage in a variety of sodomiticall exercises (Hitchcock, 1917). For instance, with the May custom that saw many young women head to the woods to gather and collect garlands to decorate their houses, majority of them returned to their homesteads defiled.
Puritans also prohibited various forms of leisure and entertainment on moral grounds. Some of the notable sports that were renowned not only in England but globally including cockfighting and bearbaiting were also opposed by the Puritans because they involved unnecessary injuries to God’s creatures. During the Puritan rule in England, boxing was also illegal. The Puritans were so vehemently against and opposed to sporting activities that they burned a small volume of approved activities by King James labelled the Book of Sports (Moffat, 2000). The King strongly advocated and encouraged his subjects to engage in sports. Many Puritan ministers who refused to obey the King’s law were punished and others suspended. It is noted that quite a number of Puritans left England for North America between 1620 and 1640. Parliament passed a law that ordered that the Book of Sports be read out in all churches in England. However, after years of being forced to listen to the readings from the Book of Sports, Puritans eventually managed to destroy the book in 1643 when it seized control of England and its colonies.
These sentiments echoed above from Puritan beliefs are what some members in society believe contributed to the resentment of sporting activities among the Catholic faithful’s. It is widely believed that with the end of Puritanism during the early years of the 18th century, the Roman Catholic Church swiftly took over and attempted to make changes. The changes were however not drastic or rapidly done and some aspects such as prohibition of sporting activities and games took time before they were abolished.
Elements of Sporting Activities in Catholic Institution and the Ancient Church during the Medieval Period
Based on the facts shared in the previous section, the involvement of the Catholic Church in sporting activities during the periods that preceded the 19th century still remains a contentious issue. There are those individuals who believe that sporting events were prohibited because during the period, the Church perceived the body and soul as being two distinct entities with the formers sinful and evil. The influence of the Puritans and their beliefs also plays a part in suggesting that Catholics in the medieval period didn’t engage in recreational activities. On the contrary, there are also strong indications that sports have been part and parcel of mankind for many centuries and there is evidence to support their existence in the ancient church. There are critiques who argue that physical recreation and sports were highly practiced by Christians including Catholics during the medieval period. It is shared that Christians engaged in sports not only on Sundays but also during feast days which Constatini, (2011) notes that they were so many that they accounted for at least one third of the Church calendar year. According to Constatini (2011), “after the sermon and the sacraments in the morning, villagers lounged or played on Sunday afternoon. For youths, especially, re-creation meant recreation. Nor was recreation confined to Sunday 2 afternoons. The church calendar of holidays, aligned with ancient seasonal patterns, granted festive occasions at Easter, during harvest season, and at Christmas”. These statements above are testament to the fact that sporting activities were a common part of religious worship. The Church encouraged and promoted sporting activities not only on normal days but also after the celebration of the Sabbath.
There are reports that the validity of sporting activities was realized as way back as the 12th century and even included in the curricula of cathedral schools. It is believed that as ways back as the Renaissance when the first schools were established, the developers established schedules that provided students with ample time to play games and sports in their daily routines. They were influenced by the medieval traditions that characterized the Greeks and Romans who were strong advocates of incorporating sports in the educational process. Proponents of fusing sports in society acknowledged that they were essential for leading virtuous lives (Barth, 1955). Moreover, it is noted that the existence of sports during the middle ages was exhibited in various religious materials including prayer books and glass windows of cathedrals and churches. Prebish (1993) reiterates this fact and shares that “A school established at the Court of Mantua in 1423 reserved ample space for games, riding, running, and all athletic exercises that were popular at the time”. Other notable sporting activities that were encouraged at the institution included ball games and fencing. Similarly, the early Jesuits who had a vast network of schools during the medieval period also advocated the belief that sports not only helped individuals/students to moderate but also to lead lives of virtue (Prebish, 1993). As such, they oversaw the development of sports to rejuvenate and relax their students.
There are various elements that indicate the existence of sporting activities during the ancient church. Considering the artistry that characterized that period, Christians decorated their churches with images of various sporting events. They made the decorations on the church windows and also had some engravings on the walls. These decorations showed individuals and communities participating in different recreational activities. They highlighted how the masses were united and found joy in the sporting competitions and that they assisted in preventing individuals from engaging in illegal practices. They highlighted images of people playing musical instruments while others danced. Some of the notable sports that were depicted include hunting and horse riding. Other sporting pass time activities that were depicted in the church decorations include chess which also provided the locals with a source of gambling entertainment.
Furthermore, there is evidence to support the fact that the church was one of the chief sponsors of tournaments and sporting events such as horse riding and wrestling. Moffat (2000) shares that “Tournaments in the Middle Ages were hosted and held on grand scales as displays of power, pr...