The NFL Needs God

Many people ask me what I’d being doing if I was not a pastor, often I say, “I don’t know, but I know I would not be happy if I was not a pastor.”  I truly cannot imagine doing anything other than ministering to others, cultivating faith, teaching, and providing spiritual care.  However, I could be a chaplain to an NFL team.  What a dream job!

I have already blogged about my experience providing the invocation at the NFL Players Gala in Washington D.C.  Besides doing my ministerial duties, I got to meet Bill Cower,  Ben Roethlisberger, John Riggins, Clinton Portis, and Larry Fitzgerald.  Believe it or not, the NFL regularly uses chaplains and spiritual advisers for players and teams.  You could imagine the sweet perks of the job!

Time Magazine wrote a piece on NFL chaplains who regularly counsel and meet with players.  What is most interesting about the article is how one chaplain tells players they shouldn’t “pimp out Jesus”:

Carey Casey, chaplain for the Kansas City Chiefs, uses the Book of Proverbs (Chapter 7: 6-27) to warn the players about crafty women they might meet in downtown clubs. When crises hit, a chaplain can provide paths to repentance; however, most prefer not to help anyone play Monday-morning Christian. Faith, they say, should be cultivated, not used as a fallback position. When a player gets into trouble, the coaches and management might be tempted to trot out his Christian faith to help with public opinion, but that makes the chaplains nervous. One’s religiosity should assist the players to find direction, not serve as misdirection from what they did wrong.

“The question is: Are you using Jesus for monetary gain or eternal gain?” says Trapp. “Monetary gain says, ‘We have an issue with a guy; let’s now throw the Christian hat on. Let’s get the media to play that. We don’t want to lose money — that’s our star player!’ But if you’re really trying to use Jesus for eternal gain, it’s going to show up in the NFL and in our society. That’s my encouragement. Stop trying to pimp Jesus.”

With all the money, fame, popularity, women, and glory that comes with being a NFL player, professional athletes utilize chaplains and spiritual directors more than you think:

Every NFL team offers optional Masses or chapel services on game weekends, said Corwin Anthony, director of pro ministry for Athletes in Action, a division of Campus Crusade for Christ, which provides the chaplains for 30% to 40% of the teams.

These days, NFL surveys show that about 87% of the league’s players come from some kind of Protestant background…

The NFL needs God.  Not to win, but to sustain its players.  You may think it is bunk, but we have seen what happens to celebrities who do not have a grounding in something greater than themselves.  Too often, celebrities turn to self destructive means to find meaning in life.   After the fans stop screaming, the parties stop rockin’, and the money stops flowing what does a celebrity have?  Hopefully, friends and family, but more importantly faith in the Divine.  Prayer, faith, and community are sometimes the only thing a player has to get through the difficult times.  Hopefully, their faith in God is what sustains them through the losses, heartache, injury, and personal failure.

Chaplains, especially former players turned chaplains, are best positioned to minister to the needs of NFL players and their families.  NFL players like Kurt Warner, David Akers, and Matt Hasselbeck can tell you faith in God is critical to their life, family, and football career.

If any NFL team out there needs a chaplain give me a call… just not the Cowboys.  I’m a Redskins fan.