If a coach wants to pray in the middle of a football field, shouldn't that count as a time out ?

[Pinback]

11. Proselytizing.

They believe you have to be a missionary in your daily life and browbeat others into adhering to your religious beliefs. It’s also a way of weeding out undesirables and giving special treatment to the ones who get with the program.

Notice it’s all about performative virtue, sanctimony. He’s not getting them to volunteer at a food bank or homeless shelter in off hours, just to convene the group to thank his God for blessing their team’s football efforts, apparently.

I never played school sports, but I knew several guys who did. In high school, the Fellowship of Christian Athletes was a huge deal, and all the top jocks were participants. A bunch of them got involved in DeMolay, too, which was a junior arm of the Masons.

The phenomenon always struck me as depressing and stifling, but then I was already an agnostic by that time and on my way to full-blown atheism. So I was glad I didn’t have to deal with that pressure. I pitied any kids playing school sports who didn’t conform to the dominant paradigm.