Wednesday, August 01, 2018

God, Sports and Martyrdom

There are quite a few people out there who seem to believe that He takes an interest in sports. This is not new. We know that as far back as the glory days of the Empire the Blues and Greens both called out for divine favor on behalf of their respective chariot teams in the Hippodrome. The Blues were generally supported by the upper crust of society and were associated with strict Orthodoxy. In contrast the Greens were seen as the team of the working class and were suspected of harboring at least some sympathies for Monophysitism.

Personally I have been rather skeptical of the idea. How could a just God allow something as abhorrent as the New York Yankees? See this earlier discussion by Dr. Hart. All of which said, I have been toying with another line of thinking. Perhaps God's intervention in sports is solely for the purpose of preparing the righteous for eventual martyrdom.

How else can one explain this...?

2 comments:

Fr Nathan Thompson said...

This is the whole reason I checked your site today.
Normally I come for Orthodox news, today I wanted to see if you would reference the shellacking that your Mets received or if you would try to duck it.
As a longtime Padres and Chargers fan, I always say one should own their losses.

Stephen said...

Recent evidence (say the past 20 years or so) would suggest that a logical rationale for the Met's existence is to enable the Phillies to win. Which is an unalloyed objective good. It is known.