World Cup teams should be religious fanatics

(751 words)

I think the World Cup would be more compelling if the teams were comprised of those who share extreme religious beliefs.

So instead of games like, say, Cameroon v. Brazil or Croatia v. Mexico, viewers would be treated to matches between Christians and Hindus and the Sikhs against the Fightin’ Scientologists.

I think athletic competitions between bitter enemies helps humanize those we reflexively hate for appearing or acting differently. And sovereign nations have many non-lethal ways to blow off competitive steam. Besides World Cup soccer, we have the Olympics; golf has the Ryder Cup, etc.

But with religion, the only way we have to settle the old my-God-is-better-than-your-God argument is on the battlefield.

And that is one busy battlefield. Throughout history, anyone with the temerity to worship differently is often forced to either change their beliefs or die for the sake of pilgrim purity.

That’s what’s so confusing about what’s happening in Iraq right now and for, I guess, the past 1,500 or so years.

The Shiites and Sunnis hate each other for reasons that remain elusive to my feeble comprehension.

I’ve read and forgotten many times over the source of the conflict, but if I were an international peacemaker, I’d say, “Look, you’re all Muslims. You all read the same Koran and worship the same Allah. And if we ever sat all the major religions together alphabetically, you’d all be in the same homeroom.

“Can’t you all just try and get along?”

It seems to me a religious World Cup might do the trick. Because they’d all be rooting for the same team — and for sporting purposes I’m not talking about Team Mohammed.

I thought about suggesting the teams be broken down along less ecumenical lines; that means splintering the major faiths into sects (like Sunnis and Shiites), but a broader approach might be more unifying. This would save having the Protestants going against the Catholics, which would be preposterous, at least to those too young or ignorant to remember what happened in Ireland from about 1967 through 1998. 

Some might argue population would be a determining factor in which countries succeed. Not necessarily. Tiny Uruguay won in 1950. That’d be like the Druids winning the Religious World Cup.

The organized religions would, I’m sure, be avid supporters of the idea because they’d know what a promotional bonanza they’d reap if their team won, especially since every single participant will boldly proclaim that they had God/Bismillah/Buddha/Zeus/etc. on their side.

I think, too, it would be informative.

Imagine a match that would include members of the Falun Gong gang from China. 

I’ve heard that one tenet of Falun Gong is the belief among some adherents that they are capable of achieving human levitation. That sounds cool until you realize the typical soccer ball obeys the laws of gravity and spends most of the time on the ground, several feet below the foot of your floating F.G. worshipper.

So simple levitation might be a disadvantage in soccer.

Imagine the interest if Falun Gong played a team comprised of members of the Wicca religion. They can fly, can’t they? Of course, they’d need a ruling to be allowed to take brooms on the pitch.

But my, what a fun game that would be to watch. It’d be like ESPN broadcasting one of those Quidditch matches from the Harry Potter books.

You’d have to think organizers would take great pains to ensure the Atheists didn’t play the Satan worshippers in one of the later rounds, a ratings draw that would be Super Bowl equivalent to Cincinnati playing Atlanta.

Of course, it’d be great for world religions if during that game a lightning storm struck the non-believers on the pitch and in the stands.

The best finale, of course, would be the Jews vs. the Muslims.

I always hate it when mayors of competing cities make those lame bets over things like bowls of chowder or Primanti sandwiches.

Imagine the stakes of a futbol match between the Jews and the Muslims?

Winner gets Palistine!

Sorry, but I won’t be rooting for the hometeam Christians. Many Christians are way too smug for my tastes and I can’t root for a team that will likely wind up being coached by Pat Robertson.

No, I’ll be rooting for the one religion that’s all about true peace and spirituality, the only religious team that’ll enter the tournament with what no one can deny will be real buzz.

Go Team Rastafarian!

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Earthquakes, promiscuity and Pat Robertson

It’s not really a natural disaster if people are bummin’ they missed it.

All the news channels rushed in with “Breaking News” bulletins about the Tuesday earthquake that registered 5.8 on the seismic Richter scale, not to be confused with the structurally stout Andy Richter scale.

It seemed to rivet the nation -- and that’s a useful civic reaction to a situation where things like tectonic plates are coming apart.

As expected, we’ve seen scores of interviews with disheveled office workers saying it lasted 30 seconds and involved a lot of uncontrollable shaking.

One said it felt like being on a wooden roller coaster. Another said her whole world shook.

There wasn’t much property damage and everyone feels a little exhilarated.

It’s kind of like everyone on the East Coast enjoyed a simultaneous orgasm.

That leaves me faking it. I didn’t feel a thing.

This happens at the same time OKCupid released a list saying Pittsburgh is America’s third most promiscuous city.

Lot of good that does me.

I have only myself to blame. It was my idea to in 1992 shack up with the fair Valerie and stroll eyes wide open down the path to marriage, fatherhood and the sexual oatmeal of monogamy.

Yes, that’s my fault.

I saw footage of the White House shaking and wondered if Republicans will try and blame the earthquake on Obama.

That’s, of course, crazy. It couldn’t be his fault.

It couldn’t be the San Andreas Fault either.

This will smack of regional jingoism, but besides urban sprawl, challenging winters and New Jersey, I didn’t realize the East Coast even had any faults.

When things like this happen we mortals are left to wonder why. We beseech higher powers for understanding.

But who needs higher powers when we have Pat Robertson?

He’s a reliable translator when it comes to so-called “Acts of God” and divine explanation as to why the poor bastards really had it coming.

For example, he said Haiti’s 2010 earthquake was the result of a voodoo pact with the Devil.

So Haiti gets hit with an earthquake and it’s because it’s home to Satanic forces.

And Virginia gets hit with an earthquake because it’s home to, hmmm . . . who?

Pat Robertson!

He lives in Virginia Beach. So do my in-laws.

I’m saying that for full disclosure purposes and not because I have any of the petty vindictiveness Robertson attributes to God.

Now Virginia is in some projected paths of Hurricane Irene.

Looks like God’s just getting warmed up.

I’d go to church more if Pat says God told him to skedaddle to the magnificent woods of northern Minnesota and a massive volcano suddenly erupted there up from amidst the timbers.

I wonder why acts of God always involve death and destruction. Pat hasn’t said He’s told him so, but I’d have to think God doesn’t like being indelibly linked with earth’s worst disasters.

Yesterday was a gorgeous day. Wasn’t that an act of God?

Our nation’s right now a nervous wreck. We’ve suffered through economic tumult, NFL labor strife and now eastern earthquakes and the thought that Will Smith might soon be single.

I hope someday soon a slew of really good newsworthy advances happen that’ll take the edge right off.

I hope gas prices plummet after someone invents a truly green engine that runs on grass clippings. I hope due to an accounting error the federal government learns it’s actually in surplus and everyone is getting a check for $5,000 in time for today’s Happy Hour.

I hope we hear an entire broadcast of “Breaking News” that doesn’t involve anything getting broken.

Awaiting Pat Robertson's take on the 'quake

I’ve spent the past two days praying for Japanese earthquake victims and looking forward to Pat Robertson’s explanation as to why the poor bastards really had it coming.

For more than 50 years, he’s been a sort of a sin meteorologist. He foretells where the sin storms are most severe and the consequences of living a life that doesn’t involve contributing far right Christian for-profit enterprises like his.

He’s not like the rest of us who react to catastrophe with instinctual humanity. We pray, send money and we feel compassionate pity for the victims of indiscriminate and so-called “acts of God.”

Not Robertson.

Less than two weeks after Hurricane Katrina killed 1,836, Robertson took to the airwaves to pronounce the storm as God’s response to America’s abortion policies.

He said the 2010 Haiti earthquake was the result of an historic “pact with the Devil” Haitian founders made that left the island cursed.

Speaking of cursed, I’d like to hear what Robertson says about the Pittsburgh Pirates, now embarking on 19 seasons without a winning record.

Then there are what should be called “acts of Pat.” These are things God specifically tells him are bound to happen that haven’t.

You sinners may have been too hungover to have heard it, but Robertson on  January 1, 2009, said, “If I’m hearing God right then gold will go to about $1,900 an ounce oil to $300 a barrel. But economically things are going to start turning around.”

Wow. Talk about covering all your bases. He was off on the price of gold by $500 an ounce and overshot oil by $170, but things did start slowly turning around.

And on January 2, 2007 -- and I really have to start tuning into the 700 Club right after Dick Clark signs off -- he said America was going to suffer “mass killings” in the next 12 months.

“The Lord didn’t say nuclear, but I do believe it will be something like that,” he said.

When observant reporters were doing year-end wrap up stories and saw no front page mushroom clouds, they called him on it.

“All I can think is that somehow the people of God prayed and God in his mercy spared us.”

Cue Maxwell Smart: “Missed it by THAT much.”

Sometimes Robertson, 80, seems to have more in common with Hollywood’s Jerry Bruckheimer, producer of “Armageddon” and other disaster films, than with the humble Baptist preacher he claims to be.

He said God told him in January 2006, “If I heard the Lord right about 2006, the coasts of America will be lashed by storms. There may well be something as bad as a tsunami in the Pacific Northwest.” He repeated the tsunami claim four times throughout the year.

The tides that year were more in tune with what you’d find in the Old Farmer’s Almanac than the Old Testament.

My favorite was he in 1976 predicted to much hoopla that the world would end in 1982 (the Pirates last won the World Series in 1979, so Pittsburgh appreciated the grace period).

He really hammered the doomsday prediction home, too, saying in a May 1980 “700 Club” broadcast, “I guarantee you by the end of 1982 there is going to be judgement on the world.”

Missed it by THAT much.

(Reminder: Christian broadcaster Harold Camping, the 89-year-old leader of the Oakland, California, based Family Radio Network, has issued his own scholarly update: world ending May 21. I haven’t paid cash for anything since the announcement three months ago).

I haven’t heard what Robertson’s had to say with the competing doomsday prediction.

You’d have to think, him being in the doomsday prediction business, Robertson secretly hopes something horrific will happen to people he judges as so morally inferior just so he could enjoy one of the world’s best “I told you so’s.”

Sure, it would mean the deaths of thousands of innocents, but it would prove he’s right -- as if anyone familiar with Robertson’s Christian Coalition needed further proof he’s really right.

It's only natural. We all want to be our predictions to come true. We all want to say “I told you so.”

I mean, we’re all only human, right?

Hmmm . . .

I may have discovered the root of the problem with Pat.