Couldn't resist posting this article on one of my all-time favorite subjects. I heard live everything that David Robinson said. I'm a huge Spurs fan--to a large extent because they are such classy guys. Didn't think what he said was classy at all.
I was caught up in the excitement, too, so it didn't totally turn me off as such statements usually do partly because I know he's very religious (but otherwise faultless <g>) and I know he was excited and I recognize that this championship really came together for him in a script that Hollywood couldn't write--and because at least he had the good grace to say "God" rather than "Jesus"--and because I'm nuts about the Spurs. But I do hope he reads the column and understands why it was inappropriate, preferably prior to today's celebration in San Antonio where he will surely speak again.
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MONSON: If Spurs Are Blessed, Are Nets Damned?
By Gordon Monson
Salt Lake Tribune Columnist
God is not a bleacher bum.
I didn't pull that little truth out of any chapter or verse in the Good Book. I do not claim it as profound inspiration, or as answer to prayer. It just makes sense to me, and maybe to anyone else who believes in a just, merciful, loving God in Heaven.
Most anyone else.
Every so often, an athlete, usually one buried in confetti and dripping in champagne, makes it seem and sound as though God has favored him, has helped him and high-fived him, straight to a touchdown or a knockout or a clutch three-pointer or a championship.
A well-intentioned David Robinson did exactly that, moments after the San Antonio Spurs beat the New Jersey Nets to clinch an NBA title the other night.
Caught up in the spirit of jubilation, as teammates danced around, embracing one another, and the Nets filed solemnly off the court, Robinson professed his position of gratitude.
"The Lord," he said, "carried us."
That kind of statement, though, can be seen in diverse light.
It can be viewed as a prayer of thanks.
It can be viewed as sharp-edged spirituality that cuts to the quick.
If, after all, the Lord carried the Spurs, what did he do to the Nets?
It might be less wrenching for them to absorb the fact that their butts were kicked by Tim Duncan, not the Lord of Hosts, not God Almighty.
But that implication, no matter Robinson's motivation for praising a higher power in that blessed celebratory setting, is difficult to miss. Especially for the losers.
The damned losers.
The winners, almost without exception, are the ones who in the postgame say Heavenly Beings were with them.
The other guys were on their own. Or worse, had their names unfavorably written in the wrong celestial ledger.
I will never forget, as long as I toil in this terrestrial existence, heavyweight Evander Holyfield's spiritual expressions in the ring after he pounded his fallen opponent into a bloody mess during a prizefight a few years ago.
God, he said, was with him that night.
God was smiling.
God . . . God . . . God.
By my reckoning, it wasn't the Sovereign of the Universe throwing those wicked punches with bad intentions. Nor was he facilitating them.
Neither does the Omnipotent aid a wide receiver to haul in a game-winning touchdown pass in the final seconds, regardless of how much prayer and praise that receiver subsequently sends heavenward in the end zone, in full view of the crowd and cameras, while the poor SOB defending him on that play walks away, burned and beaten.
I'm not buying that the Hosts of Heaven root for any one competitor or group of competitors over another. Except for maybe the Anaheim Angels. Everybody else in the competitive arena is equal. Victors can pray all they want, give as much postgame credit as they want, they can sing praises until kingdom come.
God, meanwhile, is busy watching over the welfare of souls, not the back and forth of the NBA Finals.
He's fully engaged, trying to soothe the world, to curb the spread of evil, to cherish children, to proliferate peace and charity and goodness among all of humankind.
Blessed are the pure in heart, not the San Antonio Spurs.
Sports, hard as it is to believe, probably doesn't rank among Providence's top priorities.
Everyone should quit, then, clogging the prayer lines with pleas and thanks for miraculous triumphs over honorable opponents, and quit taking God's name in vain when it comes to explaining victories that are significant only in our own foolish minds.
The Author of All Things is not a bleacher bum.
That truth should be a source of divine comfort for you and me, and faithful sports fans everywhere.
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