In recent years the United States has seen an influx of Christian athletes and coaches into big-time sports, as well as a heightened importance placed on sports in church programs and enormous platforms for intercollegiate sports at Christian schools and colleges. However, as Shirl Hoffman critiques, a Christian vision of sport remains merely superficial--replete with prayers before free throws and praises after touchdowns but offering little if any alternative vision from the secular sports culture. Far from being the kind of life-affirming, faith-affirming events that they could be, games played in Christian college gymnasiums, for example, too often end up as mockeries of the faith statements given prominence in their mission statements.
Here, in this thoughtful, narrative-driven exploration, Hoffman retells numerous fascinating stories from the world of ancient and contemporary sports and draws on the history of the Christian tradition as he seeks to answer the question "What would it mean to think Christianly about sport?"
"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.
Shirl James Hoffman is Professor Emeritus of Exercise and Sport Science at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. The Executive Director of the American Kinesiology Association, he is the author of Sport and Religion and the editor of Introduction to Kinesiology: Studying Physical Activity, now in its third edition.
The breadth of [Hoffman's] knowledge of the history of sport, especially in its relationship to religion, and his keen insights into what it might mean to think Christianly about sports contribute to a readable and impassioned plea for more careful and more spiritual reflection about what sports have come to mean for us and our world.
(Journal for the Sociological Integration of Religion and Society)Tom Krattenmaker’s recent Onward Christian Athletes (2009) explored the efforts of the Christian Right to join evangelical Christianity with professional sports. Here Hoffman takes a slightly different approach to what is essentially the same subject, tackling the relationship between faith and sports from a more ideological perspective. He suggests that while evangelical Christian groups are forging connections with sports (because sports is a high-profile platform), they really don’t understand the nature of sports. He explores the fundamental paradox of joining sports (which encourages and celebrates success) to religion (which "consistently stresses the importance of losing"). The essential problem, he says, is that, in harnessing itself to sports, the Christian community doesn’t really have a clear sense of its goal or a coherent plan to achieve it. As a result, sport is becoming, in many ways, a mockery of Christianity, a superficial set of rites and behaviors with no spiritual or philosophical foundation. Many readers may disagree with the author’s thesis, but even they will agree that he supports it abundantly and argues it well.
(Booklist Magazine)[ Good Game] will open your eyes to ideas and knowledge that may have never crossed your mind.
(Hard Music Magazine)"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.
Shipping:
US$ 4.00
Within U.S.A.
Book Description Paperback. Condition: new. New. Fast Shipping and good customer service. Seller Inventory # Holz_New_1932792104
Book Description Paperback. Condition: new. New Copy. Customer Service Guaranteed. Seller Inventory # think1932792104
Book Description Condition: new. Seller Inventory # FrontCover1932792104
Book Description Paperback. Condition: new. Buy for Great customer experience. Seller Inventory # GoldenDragon1932792104
Book Description Condition: New. Book is in NEW condition. Seller Inventory # 1932792104-2-1
Book Description Condition: New. New! This book is in the same immaculate condition as when it was published. Seller Inventory # 353-1932792104-new
Book Description Paperback. Condition: New. Seller Inventory # DADAX1932792104
Book Description Soft Cover. Condition: new. This item is printed on demand. Seller Inventory # 9781932792102
Book Description paperback. Condition: New. Language: ENG. Seller Inventory # 9781932792102
Book Description Paperback or Softback. Condition: New. Good Game: Christianity and the Culture of Sports 1.15. Book. Seller Inventory # BBS-9781932792102