It has been said, and I believe it to be true, that sports reflect human passions, both good and bad, and in a sense the playing field hosts the drama of life acted out as if on a stage. Two teams play today on this Super Bowl Sunday. They will work together in tandem to defeat the other, to tackle the other, to make that point. They are as fleet of foot as dancers, playing out their rehearsed moves to best the other.
Competition. There was a time when I thought competing wasn’t fair, since one side loses, and with the wokesters of the last few years we saw what happens when everyone gets a prize and no one wins by merit. (It is curious that sports still exist, and even more curious that all-male teams exist.) And so we hail football, where talent can still claim the day.
Watching the opening ceremonies just now in New Orleans, I realized how powerful the game has become, a national anthem in itself. Patriotic anthems were sung, and flags flown, and the drama of the players running out from the dark tunnel and into the bright stadium pulled us together as one nation. We grieved together too, as we remembered the fourteen recently slain. We play together. We compete together. We celebrate our nation together. And we mourn together.
In some ways the entire game is framed with ceremonial pageantry, rituals in which we act out our human yearning for order and grace and brotherhood. These men have trained their bodies and their minds to perform this dance. They disciplined their flesh to achieve what you and I cannot, and they disciplined their spirits to honor one another by honoring the rules of the game. We see mankind at its best.
Competition is a great motivator. It discourages sloth, appeases anger, celebrates something greater than what was before. To be the best, to achieve that one step that to the crowd in the bleachers seems impossible, is to celebrate humanity, body and soul.
We can see that here, on this field, and even when they pile upon one another like grade schoolers on the playground, we know they will soon stand back and follow the rules. As a mother and grandmother of boys, I wince, hoping no one is hurt, and yet I realize sometimes the stakes must be real, and we the watchers are pulled in as well.
And so the game mirrors our nation’s teams of citizens as they battle with ballots or in halls of Congress. It mirrors our nation’s military, our national team ready to fight other nations, to protect Americans, to keep us safe. For there will always be combat in this world, whether for power, or land, or food, or survival. It is “survival of the fittest” we are told by evolutionary theory. That is the human condition.
Into this world of charge and tackle enters the Prince of Peace. He does not do battle (although there were some tables overturned in the temple as I recall) but tells us to forgive seventy times seven. He says we don’t need to worry about tomorrow. He says to love one another.
This revolutionary messiah did not bring revolution, as we know, and yet the seeds of order and brotherly love were planted in the rich soil of Judaism, already honoring a code of civility. And thus in that first century came a new way of living together. The Way, as it was first called, would flower in Western Europe and the Mediterranean basin, scribbled by monks and taught on Sundays in sermons. This Way became Christianity, the child of Judaism, and built a culture of freedom and civility, protecting the weakest among us, women and children, honoring God and obeying civil authority. Parliaments grew and became true “talking institutions”, and these forms became congresses made up of elected citizens. Structures of civility forged democracies of thought and action and law and order.
America, like its mother, England, has beaten the odds of survival in our warring world. It is indeed an exceptional country, a city on a hill, a shining light. America says, “See, we did it. We did the impossible. We formed ways of living together, and while we fight one another, we honor the code. Our justice isn’t perfect. We are human. But we try and we do not lose sight of the ball as it travels down the field. We hold our flag high and honor our code of Mosaic mores and Christ’s commands. When we break those rules we expect punishment, for our country is one nation, all judged the same by our blind Lady Justice.
The players are now in a huddle, a bit like Congress, I suppose. They plan the next move. Now they are lined up ready for action. And after the action, we see the replay in slow motion, a ballet on grass. The ball is in the air after much scuffling and grabbing and halting and trying, again reminding me of the playground and perhaps Congress or our local school board.
And it is a playground after all. All of life is a playground not unlike this football game. We play our positions, keeping the goal in mind, following the rules. We hope the referee doesn’t whistle and judge us. It is our national sport and it provides catharsis as we see our own human condition civilized by order and design, a dance of body and soul.
This morning we heard about the wheat and the tares. Christ says he will burn the tares and collect the wheat. In the Epistle we are told to love and forgive one another. Just like football.
Christine Sunderland
Christine Sunderland 