麻豆社

Good Morning.

The Spurs and England defender Danny Rose has this week become the latest high profile footballer to talk personally about the effects on him of racism in sport.

In an honest and moving interview, 28 year old Rose admitted that he鈥檇 had enough. He said that, at the minute, he programmed himself by thinking that 鈥淚鈥檝e 5 or 6 more years left in football and I just can鈥檛 wait to see the back of it.鈥�

Since the appalling behaviour of some in the crowd during England鈥檚 recent away fixture in Montenegro the issues around racism in football seems to have reached a nodal point. Danny Rose鈥檚 comments back up his England team mate Raheem Stirling鈥檚 observation, after the same game, that players have endured as much as they can take.

And all of this, as the Premier League, in its No Room for Racism Campaign which ends on Monday, attempts, once again, to urge action to eradicate racism rather than just words.

The problem, it seems, is that latent or inherent racism is too often unchallenged. And, more often than not, it is inappropriately dealt with. At the start of another huge sporting weekend perhaps Danny Rose鈥檚 confession that enough is enough will mark a turning point across a range of sports as well as to our perceptions as to why change is now needed.

Part of the bedrock of New Testament theology is an appreciation that saying one thing and doing another just isn鈥檛 right. Jesus tells his followers that it鈥檚 actually the in thing to say one thing and do another: In Matthew鈥檚 Gospel he says: 鈥減ractise and observe what they tell you - but not what they do. For they preach, but do not practise鈥�

The theologian Andrew Bradstock suggests that, before we can enact any kind of transformative change and be able to 鈥渕ove mountains鈥� we must first identify the problem; then tackle the root causes; and finally believe that change can be affected. It鈥檚 how that is achieved which remains the challenge.
St James, the Patron saint of common sense, opens his letter to the Christians in Jerusalem with some advice that all of us who love sport might heed. He appeals that they be 鈥� doers of the word [what you believe to be right] and not hearers only.鈥� And only then perhaps, when such behaviour starts to be the norm, will those doing their best for country and club on the field, hear a very different and more appropriate song coming from the terraces?

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