Saturday is a Special Day...Sports as Religion

Just like many of you, I thoroughly enjoyed BYU's beat down on Colorado State in football this past weekend . It is almost as if balance has been restored to Cougar football as we know it, or at least it appears to be going in that direction. I did not have the opportunity to watch the game live, as I had to go to a church meeting and take a test at the wonderful testing center, but thanks to the miracle of the DVR, I was able to watch the game.

I would NEVER miss watching a BYU football game, whether they are playing at home or playing away. My wife and I got Comcast Cable just for the football season so we could have the Mountain and Versus networks and watch the away BYU games. We’ve had season tickets for three years and took our one-month-old daughter to the BYU/Utah game last year. To say the least, we are diehard fans and follow it with religious devotion. Much of the rest of Saturdays after BYU games are devoted to watching whatever other games are on TV. It’s amazing I get anything else done on the weekends.

OK, so I may be over exaggerating the whole football fan scenario, but for many, sports are a form of religion. As mentioned in our reading in RCPA chapter 10, there are many similarities between sports and football. Both are organizations and are structured. Michael Novack, the theologian who is quoted throughout this chapter said, “Like religions, which ‘place us in the presence of powers greater than ourselves, and seek to reconcile us to them,’ sports help participants confront uncertainties of ‘Fate” by playing out contingencies in games, and recognizing the role that chance plays in the outcome of contests.” Novak also points out that both religion and sports help people confront “anxieties and dreads about failure, aging, betrayal, and guilt…”

Novak also points out that both religion and sports have high standards and expectations, demand discipline and strive toward perfection. Both also have chants, hymns, and gestures. (The Cougar fight song and the clapping and hand actions that go with it) Each has a place of worship in a sense (chapel vs. a stadium) and a designated day of worship. (Sundays vs. Saturdays for college football) All of these attributes, whether as church leaders /players and coaches, or as fans/active members of our church, have a sense of uniting people to a common cause. It can also cause rifts and fights between people from different faiths or different sports teams. Just look at the rivalry between Catholics and Protestants or BYU and Utah.

This is an example of the rift sports can cause between people just like religion can: (Watch the first minute)

Max Hall Expressing his Feelings about the "School up North." People expressing their disgust about other religions in a similar fashion sometimes...

On the other hand, here is how sports can unite people:

That is all fine and well, but does a unifying cause and zealous devotion to sports make it a religion? When I wrote down my generic definition of what religion is at the beginning of the semester, I wrote down that it is an organized concept that helps unite people to a power and cause greater than the individual. Going by that, sports certainly can unite a group of diverse people to something greater than the individual. If you look at football, no one person can do anything without the help of his teammates. A football fan who is watching from the stands or a Lazy Boy chair really has no control over what happens, but there is a sense of commrodery with those playing the game and those they are watching it with.

Whether football or any other sport is considered a religion or not, people spend a massive amount of time consuming it, especially thanks to various forms of media that make it possible to do so. This brings me to my next question, since many of us are members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, how weary should we be of sports becoming a form of idolatry? Since the days of the Old Testament, we have been warned about worshipping idols. We have been counseled by our church leaders that idolatry worship happens in many forms. It can be an obsession with cars, money, a house, or many other things. Can sports fall into that as well? Participating in or watching sports can take away from other things that we should be focused on such as increasing our faith or spending more quality time with our family members. Is this something we should be weary of?

My questions to you are: Do you think sports can be considered a religion? Should we be concerned that sports is actually a form of idolatry that is taking our focus off of Jesus Christ? What think ye?