Last Sunday evening more than 100 million Americans watched
the 2015 Super Bowl. This annual, end-of-season professional football
match, attempts to bring together the top U.S. professional football players
for a chance to show off their amazing sports talent.
I watched part of the game, including the exciting last few
minutes of the game ---- what a surprise ending! Later, while I was in
bed, attempting to fall asleep, I wondered what life might be like as a
professional athlete. I envied the gracefulness, poise, strength and
agility I had watched that evening on TV. It was truly inspiring.
Then I began wondering about the "moral universe"
of modern sport. It seemed to me it is oriented around victory and
supremacy. So, the sports hero tries to perform great deeds in order to
win fame and glory. It doesn't really matter whether he has good
intentions. His job is to beat his opponents and avoid the oblivion that
goes with defeat.
I was thinking that the modern sports hero must be
competitive and ambitious for his own success. (Let's say he's a man, though
these traits apply to female athletes as well.) He is theatrical.
He puts himself on display.
He is assertive, proud and intimidating. He makes
himself the center of attention when the game is on the line. His
identity is built around his prowess. His achievement is measured
by how much he can elicit the admiration of other people ---- the roar of
the crowd and the respect of ESPN.
His primary virtue is courage ---- the ability to withstand
pain, remain calm under pressure and rise from nowhere to topple the greats.
This is what we go to sporting events to see. This
sporting ethos pervades modern life and shapes how we think about business,
academic and political competition.
Well, it was Sunday night, and thoughts about the life
style Jesus was seeking for us slipped into my head. We had talked about
this somewhat that morning in our Central Presbyterian Church worship
service. The message had been about redemption, self-denial and surrender
to God.
So, I was unable to avoid comparing the sporting ethos and
the religious ethos. One's ascent in the sports universe is a straight
shot ---- you set your goal, and you climb toward greatness. In fact,
your progress usually can be measured. However, one's ascent in the
religious universe often proceeds by a series of "reversals," by
which we seem to be turned inside out. You have to be willing to lose
yourself in order to find yourself. To gain everything, you have to be
willing to give up everything. The last shall be first! Most
importantly, "It's not about you."
For many religiously-oriented people, humility is the
primary virtue. One achieves loftiness of spirit, in their view, by
performing the most menial services. Think about Mother Theresa.
Or, the Old Testament King David who started out as a
shepherd. You achieve your identity, the religious believe, through
self-effacement. You achieve strength by acknowledging your
weaknesses. You lead most boldly when you consider yourself an instrument
of a larger cause.
The most perceptive athletes have always tried to wrestle
with this conflict ---- the demands of the sports ethos VS. the demands of the
religious ethos. Can these be reconciled? Is it possible to
give up playing for your team, so as to play selflessly for God?
A few years ago, The New York Times published a column by
writer David Brooks, in which he quoted Joseph Soloveitchik, a prominent Jewish
theologian. Soloveitchik was quoted as saying that people have two
natures. First, there is "Adam the First," the part of us that
creates, discovers, competes and is involved in building the world. Then,
there is "Adam the Second," the spiritual individual who is awed and
humbled by the universe as a spectator and worshiper.
David Brooks saw Soloveitchik as assuming that humans are
the product of God's breath, but also "from the dust of the earth."
The two natures of mankind, he would say, have different moral
qualities. One nature is "the morality of majesty," and the
other is the "morality of humility." They exist in creative
tension with each other. A religious person shuttles between them, says
Brooks, feeling lonely and slightly out of place in both experiences.
If you agree that each of us has these two natures all the
time, and that they are always in conflict, then when and by what rules do you
decide which nature to "exercise" at any point in time? Of
course, there will always be those who believe they have only one nature, only
one morality. For them, life's purpose appears easy. But, for the
rest of us, don't you think that life and religion are more complicated than
that?
Which "nature" are you pursuing at this
moment? Why?
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These thoughts are brought to you by CPC's Adult
Spiritual Development Team, hoping to encourage you to pursue some personal
spiritual growth this winter at CPC.
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