Football and religion: Few priests, many saints | sports

We accept the regulations with the same discipline with which a believer venerates the Holy Scriptures. We display our devotion in the stadiums as if we were in a temple. We worship players as gods and they point to the sky as if they have direct communication with The Most High. We collected (we collected…) soccer player cards as if they were pictures of saints. The English make a pilgrimage to Wembley like someone traveling to the Holy Land. And, above all, we feel part of a community: the one made up of the fans of our team, wherever they are, wherever they are from. Soccer is a religion. Opium of the people, say those who do not understand. A religion with many saints, many martyrs and some miracles. Although the own miracle usually requires the misfortune of others.

The link between football and religion has been especially deep in the British Isles, especially since, after 1840, football was differentiated from rugby and began to receive the support of the Church and movements such as the so-called muscular Christianity, which he defended the importance of physical exercise to distance man from the temptations of the flesh and bring him closer to God. Although muscular Christianity also defended less mystical values, such as British imperialism, imposed with a rifle in one hand and the Bible in the other…

The origin of many English clubs is in the industry or in the Church. The Arsenal (the gunners, the gunboats) was born in the shadow of the military industry; the West Ham (the hammers, the hammers) comes from the metal industry; Sheffield United (the blades) is linked to the knife industry. Many other clubs are born from local parish teams, such as Aston Villa, Bolton Wanderers, Southampton (Los Santos), Everton.

The influence of religion explains why matches in England were played on Saturday because Sunday was the Lord’s day. When Arsenal moved in 1913 from its original headquarters in south London to Highbury in the north, it leased the ground from St. John’s Divinity College, which made it a contractual condition that no games be played on Sundays and no serve alcohol to the public. Arsenal had to buy the field in 1925 in order to get around those requirements.

Liverpool is the English city where the most Catholics live, but that does not mean that it is the city with the most religious sectarianism in British football. Many believe that Everton represents the Catholics and Liverpool the Protestants. Others believe the opposite. In reality, Everton was founded by the Methodist Church (that is, Protestant) of Santo Domingo and Liverpool was born as a split from Everton for mainly economic reasons. In the mid-20th century, many Catholics in Liverpool were considered to support Everton, but there is no religious division among the fans. And even today, as happened from day one, there is a temple physically embedded in Goodison Park, the Anglican (Protestant) church of San Lucas Evangelista, which maintains superb relations with the club and with the fans. If there is any club with a marked Protestant profile in the Premier, it may be Chelsea. Or Manchester United.

The greatest exponent of religious sectarianism in British football is the eternal Scottish duel between Catholic Celtic and Protestant Rangers. But that religious aspect is diffuse today and if anything remains it is the anti-Catholicism of the radical Rangers fans, more than their Protestantism.

In general, the whole country has long since embraced the paths of secularism and even in highly religious and highly divided Northern Ireland, sectarianism is losing ground: 85% of Northern Irish believe that sport is a good tool to break down barriers between Catholics and Protestants. Perhaps for all this there are hardly any priests left in football, although there are still saints. Many saints.

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