The column title is sure to provoke in most readers the experience of flipping through television channels either to navigate through or to escape from a plethora of college basketball games. This experience is immediately preceded by a concentrated focus on the girls and boys high school state championship tournaments. If you love basketball, March is your month! If you don’t, then turning off the TV for this portion of Lent won’t be much of a penance (but I wholeheartedly recommend it nonetheless).
In our culture, obsession with sports is nothing new. In fact, it is part of what defines American culture. This sad reality comes with a price attached—one that true Christians can ill afford to pay! For many, spectator sports have become their god. One need only observe how many valuable resources—time, energy, money—are expended by those who have become fixated in this aspect of our culture. It’s real madness! And, regrettably, it doesn’t rear its ugly head only in March.
Mr. Webster defines madness in this context as "extreme folly." We should note that folly is defined as "a lack of good sense or normal prudence and foresight" or "a foolish act or idea." It certainly is not befitting a Christian to act with an extreme lack of good sense or to engage in extremely foolish actions or ideas. However, it would seem that just such imprudent choices are being made on a regular basis as we allow sports (or other mundane things) to interfere with what should be top priorities for us (e.g. faith, family, friends, etc.).
The expansion of sports offerings to children who can barely walk and talk, much less write their full name on a registration form, is itself a conspicuous sign that there is indeed a crisis of discretion, while simultaneously propagating the hysteria over sports. In recent times, formerly sacrosanct timeslots such as Wednesday evenings and Sunday mornings that were protected for religious instruction and church services have been impinged upon by sports practices, games and tournaments.
To compound the insanity, young impressionable minds have been brainwashed into believing that the consequences of non-participation in such sporting events are far worse than any that could come from missing out on religious instruction or attending Mass. Sadly, many well-meaning parents are key contributors to this confusion of priorities. Our secularized, sports-crazed culture has enticed entire generations of willing participants to worship a host of false gods that readily are placed before the One True God—a serious offense against the First Commandment.
When will such madness come to an end? Not any time soon, to be sure. Nonetheless, as people of principle, we must begin making things right by putting our priorities in order. Such is the task of Lent. Only when our own religious priorities become non-negotiable will we cease to be part of the problem and begin to become part of the solution. Spiritually strengthened by our Lenten discipline, let’s march together out of the madness that surrounds us. Let’s be bold. And let’s be unabashedly Catholic! Our faith, our family and our friends deserve at least that much.
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