Are you sick of proselytizing, preaching athletes & coaches?

[Bundbuster]

Teed off by K.C. Chiefs kicker Harrison Butker's recent racist, sexist, and homophobic commencement rant, I am re-posting a GD thread which should have originally appeared in the safe haven of this Forum.
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"I just want to thank my Lord & Savior Jesus Christ, without whom this would not be possible."

Anyone watching sports hears that increasingly familiar unsolicited refrain launched by proselytizing evangelical athletes into TV cameras and cringing interview microphones - always after a win, never following a loss. This refrain is stating that Jesus loves the proselytizing winner more than the loser, and it is intended to convert you to their Faith. Does God really care about the results of a sporting match? Instead of caring about genocide, poverty, environmental destruction, or the host of problems facing the globe He has decided to focus on a sporting match?

Tom Krattenmaker, who has written on Christian athletes, remarks that these athletes are promoting a particular type of evangelical Christianity that has an us vs. them mentality. It's good vs evil, winner-take-all. Therefore, the team that has won clearly is favored by God. Krattenmaker has argued a unique problem is that the same players that praise God for winning are usually silent about issues like racial discrimination, which you would think a Christian would be fighting against.

These proselytizers are the same hypocrites who drove Colin Kaepernick clear out of the NFL for silently taking a knee in support of Black Americans murdered by police brutality. These are the hypocrites most likely to oppose a woman's right to choose, and to call for banning any support by sports teams for LGBTQ rights, such as one Pride Day a year. These are the same hypocrites most likely to identify with the Christian Nationalist movement threatening our democracy as I write. They slather their bodies with tattoos of biblical verses and huddle in their divisive "Christian" prayer groups, but strike out on humanity and empathy.

I have seen athletes literally grab the microphone from the hands of a shocked tv announcer to forcefully inject their propaganda onto the airways and into the public sphere. They just cannot be content keeping their religious beliefs where they belong - in their own hearts, minds, and churches.

My message - Keep your damned preaching and evangelical proselytizing out of my face!

Ratcheted up a few levels of influence and danger is the insidious militaristic evangelizing of sports coaches, managers, and owners. I need only look at my own small Blue State of Colorado for 3 quick examples:

"Evangelicalism Is the Official Religion of the Air Force Academy"
"Chaplain of the Year" Maj. Warren Watties reportedly told incoming cadets last summer they "will burn in the fires of hell" if they are not "born again." The Air Force ruled in late April that Watties' remarks, calling for cadets to evangelize bunkmates during basic training, as well as warning of burning in hellfire, were "appropriate and consistent" with federal workplace rules.
https://ffrf.org/component/k2/item/13195-evangelicalism-is-the-official-religion-of-the-air-force-academy

"McCartney’s Views on Homosexuality Draw Fire : Football: The Colorado coach is criticized for using his position to gain publicity for a fundamentalist group."
Regents, faculty members and others were outraged. Rep. Pat Schroeder (D-Colo.) accused McCartney of “hate-mongering” and called him a “self-anointed ayatollah.” Students protested. The furor isn’t McCartney’s first brush with controversy. Three years ago, he endorsed the anti-abortion group Operation Rescue.
https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1992-03-25-sp-4239-story.html

"Baseball's Rockies Come Out as "Christian Organization"
Colorado, headquarters of Christo-fascist leader James Dobson and his Focus on the Family cult. Not surprisingly, the Colorado Rockies are owned by Republican wingnut and brewery magnate Pete Coors. Quotes from Scripture are posted in the weight room. Chapel service is packed on Sundays. Prayer and fellowship groups each Tuesday are well-attended. It's not unusual for the front office executives to pray together.
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2006/6/3/215665/-

This all reeks of the same stink as House Speaker MAGA Mike Johnson, which should nauseate you. I call for the separation of Church & Sport, asking holier-than-thou jocks and coaches to keep your damned preaching and evangelical proselytizing out of my face!
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The original thread of this slightly edited version, with all replies, is here:
https://www.democraticunderground.com/100218489750

[underpants]

1. They thank Jesus for touchdowns but don't mention him when they fumble

The Air Force Academy has been a mess for decades. Supposedly they did a big clean up 10 or 15 years ago. Apparently not.

Some hilarious comments on Butker here
https://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=18963742

[Bundbuster]

5. Great Butker jabs there

"Keep 'em in the kitchen, barefoot and pregnant."

[Traildogbob]

2. I am

I love sports but it sickens me when winners, like track and field start praising God for their victories.
Like he hates all the others. Instead of being glued to sports and his chosen ones, maybe he could protect children from bombs and razor wire as they flee persecution and death. What about that Valley of death rant, and fearing no evil.
70 percent of our country alone is fearing evil, evil that has tied itself to God’s glory.
Olympics will have a lot of thank you God. So I guess everyone not competing in the games is own their own to avoid evil this summer. Then he will be helping college and pro football win in his name.
From the wisdom of a brilliant GQP sports fan, “Shut up and dribble”. Unless you are dissing Dems, then shout it loud.
Of course all this is,

[LakeArenal]

4. White jesus is quite the US sports nut.

[Bundbuster]

9. Last season I stopped watching all MLB

after overdosing on players pointing to their skydaddy in heaven after every hit or home run. FFS, do they really believe that their gawd helped them swing a baseball bat?

[LakeArenal]

3. Not any more than anyone else proselytizing + preaching in public.

Take heed that ye do not your alms before men, to be seen of them: otherwise ye have no reward of your Father which is in heaven. [2] Therefore when thou doest thine alms, do not sound a trumpet before thee, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may have glory of men.
quod.lib.umich.edu
Matt.6 - Bible, King James Version

[PittBlue]

6. How about Touchdown Jesus at Notre Dame?

[Bundbuster]

8. Not my cup of tea, but

at least that's at a private religious institution so I guess they can do and say whatever they want without repercussions.

[SarahD]

7. My experience with college football players.

We had a moderately successful football team, although it was NCAA division two. They recruited heavily from junior colleges, where they could find good players with a high enough GPA to be academically eligible. Many of them had rather modest GPAs of 2.75 or somewhere in that range, but that was not a problem because they majored in Criminal Justice, where they could take easy classes designed for them. They were also tutored heavily, so they made it through, got degrees, and became cops. But they were not smart, to make a sweeping generalization. They had the Fellowship of Christian Athletes and they liked to pray before games. They knew they were lucky to be gifted with a free and easy college education, and many of them thought God gave them that, although it was really the taxpayers and their fellow students.

[Irish_Dem]

10. Same situation in the Big Ten school I attended.

Graduate students friends earned extra money tutoring the football team and they reported a similar story about the IQ level and academic acumen of the school's football team.

(However they were not funneled into law enforcement.)

[Bundbuster]

11. Fellowship of Christian Athletes

From a thread reply by Deep State Witch on 11/29/23:

The Fellowship of Christian Athletes is a huge organization that started in 1954. They push stuff like this. It's all part of this "Muscular Christianity" stuff that is promoting "patriotic duty, discipline, self-sacrifice, masculinity, and the moral and physical beauty of athleticism."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fellowship_of_Christian_Athletes

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muscular_Christianity
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They are hand in glove with hyperpatriotic Air Force Flyovers at sporting events, gigantic American flags covering football & baseball fields, grandiose extended performances of the National Anthem, keeping the 7th inning "God Bless America" going indefinitely after 9/11. And they totally squash and attack anyone not completely on board with all of it.

[Cartoonist]

12. Jesus also attends car auctions.

One guy who restored a Corvette, and sold it for a hefty sum, says he owes it all to Jesus.

[Bundbuster]

13. Last summer I saw an immaculately restored vintage mint Corvette,

which would have been worth probably $150,000 if the owner hadn't plastered the paint job with "Powered by Jesus," "Created by Jesus," "Fueled by Jesus."

[JoseBalow]

14. Thank you, Jesus

[Timeflyer]

15. Heartily sick of men telling women how to be, live, feel, express themselves in the world.

Especially heinous when they or anyone uses imaginary supernatural Omnipotent Sky Scold to make rules that always favor MEN and subjugate women.

[shrike3]

16. If you wouldn't mind me butting into your forum.

I get sick of it as well.

[Bundbuster]

17. All non-believers welcome here

[shrike3]

18. Well, I'm a believer, which is why I consider this butting in.

I won't make a habit of it, I promise. But I saw this post and it spoke to me. SO tired of athletes spouting off in what is supposed to be a secular setting. They should save it for church.