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In the attached article, what sentences caught your attention and why? Did you find any run-on sentences or fragments? Are there sentences that you believe could be improved? Why? Did this writer use correct sentence structure and formulation? What is your overall experience with this review?

Christian Scholar’s Review
204 of normativity for a continuing development of practices is what Fiddes demonstrates by

delving into Christian doctrine, such as the Trinity. But this begs an important question in
terms of the identification of the instructive error necessary for continuing this development.

The third strand leads beyond the textual examination and the logic of trajectory and
error within these texts and contexts to the question of reality. What stands beyond thought
as its ultimate condition and end? I am anticipating the criticism from others that Fiddes’
reliance on post-modern and Continental scholarship may seem like raising the flag of
surrender to anything that might be counted as an objective truth. But two crucial links
challenge that criticism. First, from an apophatic standpoint, everything we can say or think
is always understood as semiotically related to the Real without being equivalent to the
Real, without claiming that the Real (or God) is just a figment of imagination, a product of
false hypostatization, or a reification of a particular concept. Second, from the hiddenness
of wisdom tradition we can take the demonstrable fact of developing wisdom (in all the
pragmatic richness of that process) as itself a conditioning of the Real as the elusive but
concrete ground of that growth, sustaining a temporally infinite quest. These two aspects
of the Real are joined, I believe, in Fiddes’ concept of Christ as a space for human dwelling.
Believers living into that space re-realize or re-narrate Christ without equaling or making
Christ redundant. The obedience of the journey into that space is infinite in its meaning for
a human life, and all human lives, and yet the end is not an absence but a concrete person.

Implicit in all these three strands of questioning is the concept of error, and to my
reading of this book and others by Fiddes, it remains somewhat opaque. Error is essential
for the development of the trajectories, as wisdom was mistakenly elided with Isis, and
the moderns, like Descartes, cleaved to a notion of the self and God as fully knowable. But
the error of disobedience, or sin, is negative in a different way than an error of conceptual
thought. The conception that “God is in all human wisdom, and all wisdom is in God,”
requires a further articulation of the way error is identified and corrected. Is original sin just
the absence of wisdom, or is it an erroneous orientation toward wisdom? Or is the doctrine
of original sin an example of error? My criticism is not that Fiddes improperly utilizes a
concept of error, just that the ground by which he determines errors of interpretation and
development are not fully clear. And the importance of addressing this opacity is heightened
by his emphasis on processive inquiry as a means of revelation in his approach to theology.

Fiddes’ great gift to the Christian and especially Baptist community is his own display
of wisdom, resplendent with charity both in his reading and in his personal and profes­
sional life. This book in particular stands as a symbol of a way of thinking about God and
human life that will shows its dividends in both the individual minds it will inspire and
the community that will rise to interpret it.

Rebecca T. Alpert. Religion and Sports: An Introduction and Case Studies. New York, NY:
Columbia University Press, 2015. x + 209 pp. $28.00, ISBN 9780231165716.

Reviewed by Tracy J. Trothen, Religion, Queen’s University

In this very effective and much-needed book, religious studies scholar Rebecca Alpert
convincingly argues that religion must be part of the interdisciplinary sports conversation.
Through a case study exploration of what she calls “the interconnections” between sports
and religion, Alpert aims to introduce students to the growing scholarly field of religion

Reviews

205and sport.
This book is intended as a text for university courses in religion and sports. To this end,

after discussing scholarly perspectives on sport and religion, and the relationship between
them, Alpert presents a series of case studies designed to engage the student and instructor in
further discussion about the theoretical issues raised in the substantial introductory chapter.

The introductory chapter is 38 pages long and provides the base for the subsequent
chapters, which are collections of case studies organized by theme. She begins by acknowl­
edging the potential for both moral good and moral bad in world religions and in sports
(3). Alpert follows this thread throughout her book, asking questions about values in sport
and values in world religions. Next, using a conversational tone, Alpert explains that there
is no one agreed-upon definition of religion. Alpert charts the movement of scholarly ap­
proaches to defining religion, explaining why there has been an overall shift away from
searching for an essence common to all religions, toward a functionalist approach, to even
more “all-encompassing” (7) approaches. Similar to well-known scholar of religion and
sports Joseph L. Price, Alpert settles on Ninian Smart’s understanding of religions as being
characterized by varying degrees of six dimensions, combined with a “family resemblance”
lens. As she concludes: “Smart’s tool is useful for mapping religions and understanding
them as living, breathing, changing phenomena that may share characteristics but use and
express them quite differently” (7).

The rest of chapter 1 introduces four interconnections between religion and sports.
These interconnections provide the structure for the book. Each subsequent chapter (or
part) consists of case studies on each of these four ways that religion and sport interconnect.

In part 1, Alpert uses two cases to help the reader explore “why people think sports
are a religion.” In the introduction, Alpert laid the foundation for this question. Using
Smart’s dimensions, she suggests that the customary list of world religions is not the sum
total of religions. Readers are given an overview of the state of the field as it has historically
unfolded. Threaded throughout are the names of noted scholars such as Robert Bellah, Clif­
ford Geertz, Emile Durkheim, Michael Novak, Joseph Price, and David Chidester, among
others, as they have informed the field. Two cases are used to illustrate this interconnection:
Buzz Bissinger’s Friday Night Lights narrative of “how sports can become a religion” for a
community; and “the story of double amputee runner Oscar Pistorius” (39).

In Part 2, Alpert asks if religion has “a place in sports or sports in religion.” In the in­
troduction, Alpert provides a quick historical tour, beginning with sports as they intersected
with religion in the ancient world. Her use of examples such as the Mayan ball game (1,000
BCE), and martial arts in China (525 BCE) brings this complicated history to life, illustrat­
ing the longevity of the intermingling of religion and sports. She also shows how various
religious attitudes to sport have shifted over time and place (for instance, the evolution and
manifestations of muscular Christianity). The four cases include Jewish umpires and the
Baseball Chapel movement in the United States; controversy over the relationship between
Zen and archery in Japan; and the use of juju in African football.

The four cases in part 3 help the reader explore “what happens when religion and
sports come into conflict.” Using examples from several religions including Daoism, H indu­
ism, and Judaism, Alpert sketches out the conflicted attitudes regarding the expression of
religious practices in sport. Alpert explores what happens when athletes’ religious commit­
ments come into the sports venue. Cases include the refusal of the 1930s Belleville Grays,
a black Jewish baseball team, to play baseball on Saturdays; basketball player Mahmoud
Abdul-Rauf’s refusal to stand for the National Anthem on the basis that it conflicted with

C hristian Scholar’s Review

206 his Muslim values; and the wearing of hijab by Wojdan Ali Seraj Abdulrahim Shahrkhani
in the 2012 Olympics.

Part 4 considers “religion and ethical dilemmas in sport.” The four ethical “dilemmas”
in sports that Alpert addresses are gender, sexuality, disability, and race. She also looks
at the ethics of enhancement use in sport, and violence in sport. In particular, she asks if
“religious groups have an obligation to take responsibility for…[harmful] attitudes and…
practices (34). Cases in this part include: 11-year-old Caroline Pla’s determination to play
football on a boys’ Catholic Youth Organization team and requests for the Catholic Church
to condemn bullfighting in Spain.

The pedagogical goal is stated clearly at the beginning of each case. Diverse perspec­
tives are included in each case. Through carefully and creatively crafted classroom activities
such as writing a blog or a tweet, engaging in a debate, or small group discussions, Alpert
invites students and instructors to think critically about the relevant issues and form their
own opinions.

This is an excellent collection of cases and Alpert successfully demonstrates the complex
relationship between religion and sport and why this relationship is important to a liberal
arts education. There are, of course, some limitations to this otherwise impressive book.

Because Alpert’s intent is to introduce readers to the interconnections of sports and
religion largely through case studies, she provides an introduction to complex concepts, not
a comprehensive exploration. For example, if you elect to use this book in teaching a course
on sports and religion, and you want your students to grasp the concepts of civil, cultural,
or natural religion, you will need to supplement your desired course with other sources.

On a more fundamental level, after the first chapter, Alpert does not pay as much at­
tention to how sport is a religion itself as she does to how the world religions interact with
sport. Part 1 concerns why “people think sport is a religion.” However, there are only two
cases in this part, unlike four for each of the other three interconnections. I also wonder if
one of these two cases – the Oscar Pistorius case – might be better placed in part 4 as an
“ethics” case. Alpert frames Pistorius’ case – an Olympic runner with prostheses for run­
ning – as suitable to part 1 since his case “lends itself to thinking through ultimate questions
as expressed in two of the dimensions of religion outlined by Ninian Smart…: the ethical/
legal and the doctrinal/philosophical” (48). Her stated goal in introducing this case is for
readers to “apply our understanding of sport as a religion to the values connected to human
embodiment, justice, and fairness” (48). While Pistorius’ case is related to two of Smart’s
dimensions, it is more about questions of ethics and values than why people think sport is a
religion. For this reason, I think it belongs more appropriately in the ethics section of the book.

Alpert’s other case for part 1 – Buzz Bissinger’s Friday Night Lights, which illustrates
“how sports can become a religion” for a community – is a very fitting choice for this sec­
tion. Perhaps a case study on a flow experience in sport would be helpful in exploring why
some people experience sport as a religion. Differing perspectives on whether or not flow
is a sufficient condition to make the argument that a sport is a religion could be explored.
(For example, see Eric Bain-Selbo,3 Graham Ward,4 Nick J. Watson and Andrew Parker,5

’Eric Bain-Selbo, “Ecstasy, Joy, and Sorrow: the Religious Experience of Southern College Football,”
Journal of Religion and Popular Culture XX (Fall 2008): 9.
‘‘Graham Ward, “A Question of Sport and Incamational Theology,” Studies in Christian Ethics 25.1 (2012):
61, 64.
’Nick J. Watson and Andrew Parker, eds., Sports and Christianity: Historical and Contemporary Perspectives
(New York: Routledge, 2013), 18.

Reviews
and Kathleen M. Dillon and Jennifer L. Tait.6) Flow states are mentioned very briefly at the 207
beginning of the book as belonging in one of Smart’s dimensions (12) and toward the end
of the book in the final case study (184) but Alpert does not explain the concept.

Regarding the fourth and final interconnection, Ido wonder why Alpert chose to frame
the question in terms as “how religion might contribute to resolving” ethical “dilemmas”
in sport. Certainly, this is one way to approach this interconnection. I may be more inclined
to ask how the relationship between sport and religion further problematizes these issues
or how an understanding of sports as a religion might affect the ethical conversation. On
the other hand, Alpert’s framing of this interconnection may be a more accessible way to
introduce the topic of ethics as it relates to sports and religion.

One of the strongest features of this book is the way in which Alpert carefully explains
the field of religion and sports. Through skillful organization, the use of well-placed ex­
amples, and a down-to-earth writing style, Alpert engages the reader and explains complex
concepts in accessible terms. Unlike most other books on religion and sport, Alpert inten­
tionally uses cases from diverse religious traditions, diverse sports, diverse time periods,
and diverse global contexts. Although the book slightly favors examples from the United
States more so than other countries, Alpert does a very impressive job drawing on global
examples. Moreover, she manages to introduce student readers not only to the relationship
between sport and religion but also to aspects of different world religions.

For those who are looking for texts specifically on Christianity and sport, Alpert’s
book adds a much-needed contextual dimension to the conversation. The preponderance of
books on sport and religion has been restricted to Christianity or focuses mostly on Christian
examples and Christian theological reflection. Alpert’s situating of the relationship between
Christianity and sport within the broader discussion of religion and sport helps the reader
to understand better the issues associated with diversity and to perceive some common
themes that characterize the relationships of several religions to sport and vice versa. I will
certainly use this book as a required text in my undergraduate course on religion and sport,
and recommend it strongly to others.

6Kathleen M. Dillon and Jennifer L. Tait, “Spirituality and Being in the Zone in Team Sports: a Relation­
ship?,” Journal of Sport Behavior 23.2 (2000): 91-100.

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