Wore Rather Well, All Things Considered

I first offered this a year ago smack in the middle of the professional football playoffs. Like maybe sixteen weeks of pro football wasn't enough to determine a world champion in a sport no one else plays, we tack on another three (or four, I lose track) contests to get us to the Super Bowl. Yeah, boy howdy, do I love it? Let me count the ways......

I fell across a Facebook entry that made reference to a verse from Exodus which sparked comments from a large number of folks who found the time to write, somewhat animatedly, on his wall. I like the verse and feel the timing of the posting and what I choose to believe is its meaning enough to have shared the link. 

It really got me thinking, or as close as I ever get on most days, about the majesty and glory of The Divine (when you get up here in years, you discover a fondness for hymns you didn't have in your Twenties (at least I didn't). Ask Mick Jagger.) and how we invoke His/Her name (or that of a family member) for all manner and missions and see Him/Her move in various mysterious ways His/Her wonders to perform.

We have waged war on one another in some shape, size and form for millennia but always first seek out God's blessing of our arms against those of our enemy, oblivious to the inevitability that those on the other side are pursuing the same course in the hopes of the same desired outcome. I'm not sure how we and thee think all of that is supposed to work out. Et nos mutuo destruunt.

And even now, in these enlightened times, where sports have replaced wars (but the metaphors remain) we've still sought to curry His/Her favor. Whether it's the basketball player with the Sign of the Cross before EVERY foul shot through to the Major League Baseball pitcher who nails that third strike and kisses a cross on his necklace while pointing a finger skyward in Thanksgiving. And football players taking a knee.....well. I've wondered how Matthew of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John (not the injury attorneys; the 'bless the bed that I sleep on' New Testament authors) would react. 

I was toying with that thought in light of yet another football-filled weekend just passed. Do you (or can you) remember when Sundays used to be church-time? Now the priests are battling for our pre-game attention with the TV networks who paid billions for the right to air professional and its unpaid variant, NCAA, football. There are Saturday evening services but also Monday night games so I'm thinking it all cancels itself out. 

Of course, if the church elders (regardless of affiliation) had any marketing savvy at all, they'd schedule services in the off-peak game time hours and work on more cross-promotional activities with the Lords of the NFL like ten decades of the Rosary as a penance for a crack-back block or perhaps, only on game days (of course), renaming houses of worship into something more fan-friendly like Our Lady of the Immaculate Interception. 

A nation of conspicuous consumers, sufficiently sanctimonious, with Houses of the Holy filled to beyond capacity like the football stadia just down the road, all erupting into thunderous and rapturous applause and hosannas while salvation approaches as we exchange sudden death for eternal life. 

-bill kenny