Sports talk, Rose, Vick, rehab and recognition

Here are my thoughts since these subjects are in the news.

I think Pete Rose should be considered for and voted into the Baseball Hall of Fame. Here is my reasoning. Yes, gambling and the implications, if not the reality, for throwing a game is rightly considered the greatest enemy to the integrity of the sport. (I would argue that illegal drug use and performance enhancers have overtaken gaming/game throwing to share the greatest threat category, however). So I was certainly in agreement when Pete Rose was banned for life, even though as a fan, I felt the agony along with him of such a finality.

Having said that, however, I have always felt he should be inducted according to his real accomplishments in the sport, minus the punishment he received. Punishing for a wrong doing must logically be separated by a fair minded people from now erasing, shunning or denying what was good and valid in his achievements. If his performance and statistics were achieved because he had clubbed guys on the opposing team on the head before the game, LOL, thus lowering their stats to increase his, of course that would be different. I'm being a little silly in that example just to make a point. Gambling and game throwing, while a severe threat to the sport overall, do not automatically mean either his accomplishments were ill gotten gains either via performance enhancement OR performance degradation of opponents, unless a conspiracy was uncovered where everyone was throwing games in unison. Without such evidence it is obvious that Pete Rose was correctly punished for his proven singular role, but he should still be recognized for his valid and legitimate accomplishments.

This is particularly obvious because after Pete Rose, we now have decades of "asterisk" baseball, where a muddle of baseball achievements will always be questioned because of the years of performance enhancement, such as steroid, usage. This era, by negative example, demonstrate even more the singularity of Pete Rose's misdeed and bad choice. While he committed an error that is considered a grave threat to the sport, the sport itself is now filled with statistics that result from widespread collusion in the use of performance enhancing drugs. This makes what Pete Rose did put in its proper perspective: punishment by banning from the game, yes, but ignoring his legitimate achievements, no. Consider him eligible and be honest in appraising his record and put him in his place in the Baseball Hall of Fame, is my advice.

This makes me think of Michael Vick, as I have thought about him during this week and these past months. Again, as a people, not just sports fans, you must ask yourself one question: Do you believe in punishment followed by a chance at rehabilitation and redemption, or not? Don't be hypocrites. Either you believe in the theory that one punishes according to the crime (and he was given a prison sentence, which he served, fines, loss of his income and job, etc, all as punishment and consequences, such as loss of endorsement opportunities) or you don't. You either believe a fit sentence is adjudicated, served, and then considered completed, or you do not. If you do not that means you don't think anyone can ever be punished enough, and that is a breakdown of both civil and moral code. Secondly, either you believe in rehabilitation and redemption, or you do not. Do not be a hypocrite and say that you are enlightened etc yet you will never trust someone again once he or she had erred. Either you believe in opportunity for redemption, or you do not. If you do not then you seem to fall into a category of considering others (not yourself of course) of being "once stained always stained." Like the hypocrisy of some about punishment, hypocrisy of not believing in redemption is also a breakdown of both civil and moral code.

So I believe that if a team wants to give a chance to Michael Vick, he should be made eligible and allowed to get on with life, consistent with what people SAY they believe about both punishment and rehabilitation/redemption.

Best of luck to both men, and all other people who find themselves in such a situation, and also those in the responsible positions to decide not to be hypocrites.

Football analogy to help understand "end of times"

I’ve written about proper understanding of Biblical “end of times” references before, and continue to focus on this topic because of the high interest in it and also to continue to help people toward a proper understanding. Rather than write long and comprehensive postings I like to take one aspect at a time to explore.

The point I would like to make is that God has not mapped out the specific set of events that takes humans to the “end of times.” God is all knowing, but that does not mean he is all manipulating. There is a huge difference. I’d like to use, since this is Superbowl season, American football and coaching analogies. In the Superbowl the winners of the two leagues compete and one team wins the game, making that team the Superbowl champion. God can be thought of as the overall sponsor of sports in general. God has encouraged humans to enjoy sports and recreation in addition to their devotions, their work and their family. So God likes seeing all the football teams compete and kind of cheers for both leagues and all the players. If it were up to God there would someday be Superbowl One Thousand. (It is Superbowl 42 that is going to be played this Sunday). In fact, if it were up to God, he’d be thrilled if someday people played Superbowl Ten Thousand, or Superbowl One Hundred Thousand!

God is all about life and being fruitful. If one was going to try to summarize God’s “agenda” it would be to be “fruitful and multiply.” This does not mean just numerically having babies. It means stewarding a world that humans did not create but have day to day responsibility for so that people stimulate life and increase in goodness, since that is what “fruitful” really means. Think about a fruit tree. It could yield tons of sour and inedible apples, for example. You could call that a “fruitful” tree but that is not the spirit of the meaning of the term. Fruitful means an abundance of goodness that is passed along to one’s children, children that are encouraged and welcomed into the world.

So God is not interested in humans having children who are then made to suffer in an increasingly sour world. That is only half the spirit of the words “fruitful and multiple.” That is the “multiply” without the joy of sweet “fruitfulness.” God does not want humans to be “mean SOB’s and multiply.” God does not want humans to “prune away babies so you can have unlimited sex and then multiply just enough to provide low income workers or as accessory babies.” God wants sweetness and goodness to be produced by humans along with and FOR their children. Therefore, God would be thrilled if the humans kept multiplying in children and in goodness until they could see Superbowl 100, 1000, 10,000 or more! So long as people are pious and in fear of God (by fear I mean the proper definition which is to respect God’s place and fear the consequences of losing him) and they bear and love children, and work toward making a flawed species and their flawed world as good as possible, the “end of times” will not come.

However, God understands the nature of humans all too well, and he knows everything about everything. Like a coach God knows the strength and weaknesses of his team, of each of the players, and of the circumstances they are playing under (weather, injuries, home or away, etc.) God knows that there is only one winner of the Superbowl each year. Likewise God knows human weakness. Someone could be a great football player but a rotten human being, for example. God knows about drug use, about gambling, about throwing games, about poor refereeing and bad breaks. (I’m mixing my analogy a little bit because I’m more of a baseball fan than a football fan!) But God continues to coach and cheer all of the individual team players, coaches, fans and support staff, whether they are 0-18 or 18-0 for the year. That is because it is the enjoyment of sport, the family focus of sport events, the providing of jobs, the gathering of community and the stimulating of the honest economy that is the fruitfulness of the football season and the Superbowl. It’s not the winning team, it is the annual season of coming together in good natured sport crowned in the Superbowl, and then the anticipation of second chances in the next season, and the next, and the next, and so forth. Therefore why would God decide that humans will live until Superbowl Number (imagine some number) and say, well, this is enough, time for the Second Coming? God would not want that because so long as each year and each generation is fruitful and multiplying, it is “Good.” God will not destroy what is good. That is the temptation of humans, to destroy what is good for others in order to achieve power and control. A related temptation is to define what is good and force people to conform to societal dictatorships of vices that are now defined as being “good.”

So God knows that it is inevitable that at some point in human’s future they will make choices that will take them to the brink where they are no longer being “fruitful and multiplying” in the way that God wills and plans for humans to live. When the fruit of humans is predominately sour apples you can expect the Second Coming. But just because an awful lot of sour apples are being made today, does that mean one should throw up one’s hands and say, “Ah ha, time for the Second Coming, I’m ‘covered’ in my ‘faith’ and now I’m going to dump the world in the Lord’s lap?” You better not think that lest you be one of the ones who cries “Lord, Lord!” and yet find thou art judged to be chaff instead of wheat. Remember chaff is the indigestible part of the wheat. People who gleefully point to the sorrow of the sour apples and hope that it is a counter toward the Second Coming at the “end of times” are useless, since they are not working to put off the ill deeds that could reckon with the end of times. Those who gloat for the end of times as being comeuppance for others of different faith have made themselves into chaff rather than wheat.

So would God give up on a franchise that has a 0-18 record and say, “Well, football is no good, let’s cancel this team altogether?” No, of course he would not. If God had a team full of immoral people, would he cancel the entire sport for all the rest of the teams and end the Superbowl? Obviously not, he would get a coach to reform and/or replace the players on that team. Would he not crown with laurel leaf crown the coach who is like a role model for the team, and who brings a team that lacks character into honorable, if not winning play? Yes he would.

So long as humans are working to have children in a moral society and be sweet in their fruitfulness people have nothing to fear about imminent end of times. That should be good news to everyone. If you are thinking, “Aw shucks, everyone is not going to die and be judged soon” you better start rethinking your culture of retribution, self satisfaction and death orientation lest it take you down too. Who hopes that the entire sport of football will be canceled by God because many of the teams are doing poorly and perhaps have serious moral flaws? That is not God’s way. If it was he would have canceled human’s football season, so to speak, a long time ago. And if you read your Bible and understand you will know that God had his moments when he thought “it was time.” But God gave the second chance and good men and women brought the world back from the brink before.

Make no mistake; understand that the world is in dire and abysmal moral condition. People have actively worked to make as much sour and rotten fruit as possible and they have succeeded on a scale that should surprise even them. But for the love of God, that should make people roll of their sleeves and work to bring back the sweetness and combat the sourness more than ever! Rather than gloating or becoming another boring media depressive everyone ought to recapture the memory of what a land flowing in milk and honey is like.

I understand devout people who think only Jesus Christ (and/or the Mahdi if you are a Twelver in belief) can fix the world. And they are correct to the extent that only in the faith is the way shown for goodness on earth under God and hopefully anticipation of eternal reward in heaven. But like the coach, this does not mean that the person who first wrote the football rule book has to attend every game. Imagine how the sport would go if no one knew how to play a game of football properly unless the one and only football rule book author had to be physically present at every game and shout out instructions, and call each play? Jesus Christ taught what people need to do in the Gospels. The Old Testament preserves the words of God through the prophets, including in good living advice in the Book of Proverbs! And the Prophet (PBUH) received from God’s angel the way to live in virtue and with strength and fidelity to the one God. Every time humanity gets itself into an awful situation people should not sit back and let their children (and the children of their global neighbors) to suffer while waiting for Jesus to arrive with his iron rod of final judgment.

Here is one final point with the analogy. Notice that I started with the observation that God would like to see “Superbowl” seasons for many, many years to come. I didn’t say each football season must be higher scoring, more talented, more exciting or more profitable than the season before or God will “cancel the sport for lack of progress.” To the contrary! It is “good” the way it is, just as the basic nature of humanity, if it lives by God’s rules and in the family unit is “good” already. It is maintaining the goodness that is humanity’s problem. But to use this example, every ten years of football, another generation of schoolchildren are born, learn about football, watch it on TV or attend games with their family. Later they grow up and become players, spectators, or part of the football economy (they at least wear a jersey!) Each child, each adult gains the benefit of football. It is not a cumulative success thing, just as the goodness of humanity is measured one person at a time in the goodness of their life and not by which team of humans won the Superbowl that season. If God fathered humans to be good and to live good lives, is not a thousand years of billions of humans being good even better? And is not ten thousand years of billions of humans being good better yet? Each person who lives in goodness and provides it to others is their own justification for life and for humanity continuing. So God wants to see the already “good” football sport continue to the Superbowl each year for season after season after season for as many as humans can muster and manage so long as the “goodness” is maintained. Likewise God wants to be a fan and coach of humanity, not be the one who has to turn out the lights and do the firings because humans stopped being good and gave up on the season.

I hope this helps.

Sports talk: football fav team the Packers

I can’t keep talking and thinking about the depravity in the world, so here’s a sports respite.

While baseball is my favorite sport I’m a realist (the season's winding down, just me and my radio). And so I have restored my interest in football. I have for a long time also enjoyed football (my brother was high school team quarterback), including my high school team during those years, college, and also pro football. My favorite pro team is the Green Bay Packers. They’ve been my favorite since during the Vince Lombardi times. I do remember them from that time very clearly (and am sometimes still frozen in those times as far as thinking automatically of Vince Lombardi and Bart Starr when I hear the Packers mentioned!) So while I’ve lived in areas of the country near different football team powerhouses, I’ve really only kept fond thoughts and fandom for the Green Bay Packers.