Spread: A Focus on Faith Opinion

Is Religion a Starter on the Field?

by Ari Krane

“Dear Lord, the battles we go through life, / We ask for a chance that's fair / A chance to equal our stride / A chance to do or dare

/ If we should win, let it be by the code, Faith and Honor held high / [...],” the Husker Prayer reads. For the last two years, as a member of the varsity football and varsity boys lacrosse teams, I have chanted the “Husker” before every game. While the prayer seemingly emphasizes religion, the passionate chanting has never felt like a religious imposition. Nearly every player on the team huddled close together and recited it in unison before a game began, ending with emphatic cheering to energize the team.

The prayer originated as a pregame ritual for the 1994 national champion Nebraska Cornhuskers football team. According to the Nebraska Athletics website, the ritual motivated players who aimed to win a national title after a missed last-second field goal ended the Husker’s season the previous year.

Despite the allusion and direct address to a god, the website does not mention a religious focus, supporting its identity as more of a pregame hype speech. As a non-denominational school, Menlo’s administration separates religion from classroom activities and athletics. This clear distinction makes a subtly religious prayer like the Husker come off as a simple team tradition.

Junior Mikey McGrath identifies as Catholic but believes the Husker remains non-denominational. “I don’t think that it is actually about religion; it’s more about the values that the Husker prayer talks about,” McGrath said. “If you’re not religious, you can still participate in it, and I don’t think it’s very exclusive.”

Much of the pregame rituals and prayers are left to the player’s discretion, and McGrath believes it should stay that way. “It would seem more forced [if led by the coaches],” McGrath said.

Despite this separation, Menlo is a “supplemental member” of the West Catholic Athletic League, a CIF Central Coast Section league composed primarily of nine schools. All nine full-time member schools are religious, and their athletic teams compete primarily in the WCAL. Menlo and Sacred

The WCAL never pushed a Catholic agenda back to Menlo that I could detect, but things were different at this meeting. Each school sent a representative from every team involved in the league, leaving me as the only Menlo student in attendance.

“As members of the West Catholic Athletic League, let us pray...,” the WCAL leadership said to us at the beginning of the summit.

As a non-Catholic representing the only non-denominational school, I felt out of place. I surveyed the room as everyone lowered their heads into their hands, closed their eyes and followed the prayer.

Heart are the only supplemental schools competing in the WCAL in a select few sports. The boys and girls water polo and boys lacrosse teams are all members of the WCAL because Menlo’s primary league, the WBAL, does not have enough schools that sponsor these sports. “We saw a good fit in the WCAL, and they were willing to grant us affiliate member status and welcome us to the league,” Director of Athletics Earl Koberlein wrote in an email to The Coat of Arms.

As a four-year lacrosse player, the Catholic variable wasn’t important to me until I attended the WCAL Spring Sportsmanship Summit on Feb. 15.

Aside from awkward glances around the room, to which nobody met my gaze, the sequence didn’t impact me much. However, the leader continued to focus on the role of religion in sports and the league overall to a degree that I found fairly distant from Menlo’s values and identity.

This is, however, in accordance with the WCAL goals listed on its website, “to promote the student-athletes greater appreciation of his/ her spirituality by fostering an understanding of athletic competition within a Christian context.”

In short, Menlo sacrifices a slight sense of religious independence as a member of the WCAL. Fortunately, the religious practice ended when I left the summit, and I haven’t experienced it again in any form.