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It's Brady Time
By adamg on Sun, 12/18/2011 - 7:20pm
Did Jesus take the weekend off? And gotta love that 29-yard run the wrong way at the end.
AFC East champions. Again.
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Comments
Yes, yes he did.
http://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/video/tebow...
Denver, Where is your God now?
"If I'm the son of God, Tom Brady's gotta be the guy's nephew."
The whole Fundy, Evangelical
The whole Fundy, Evangelical Football Quarterback thing, especially situated in Denver, shows that God has a sense of humor.
Jesus was on the Injured Reserve list for the game
But his younger brother Tom stood in for him.
Tebow
Yeah, he's kind of obnoxious about exercising his right to practice the religion of his choice in the manner of his choice. We should celebrate that freedom - and extend it to others who choose to practice free assembly, free speech ...
FREEDOM!!!!!!
I celebrate the freedom to mock those that exercise their religion in an obnoxious way. Is this a great country or what!
Swirlygrrl has the concern troll down to a science.
Uninformed? Check. Mistaken about basic law? Check.
It's always nice to see swirlygrrl executing her bread and butter play.
Nice to meet you
Whoever you are. Seems sad that nobody informed you of your own name.
I'm hardly "uninformed" - I at least spent a couple years in my boring gym homeroom reading all the posted rules about these things - and, yes, they were prominently posted and grounded in law. I think anon is simply accustomed to living in an area that, until recently, was heavily Catholic and lacked some of the more strict protestant denominations. In Protestant Megachurch territory, Tebow is a pretty standard issue "THAT guy in your class who ALWAYS has to pray before everything" person in much of the south and west. Thanks to Tim Tebow, we now have a standard name for That Guy.
Yes, solo prayer is permitted in the schools and many states prohibit employers from demanding that people not pray, too. I had teachers who would pray between classes, and fellow students who would take a moment to do so quietly at test time and at competitive school events. Religious groups renting the schools wasn't allowed like it is (or was) in MA, however, and a principal or coach or teachers leading a prayer was forbidden.
THAT is the basic law that I remember being in play and often posted in places where "Tebowing" is quite common, at least where public education was concerned. It may not be a familiar brand of Christian or meet individual interpretations of the Bible, but what some see as showboating, others see as "witnessing", "testifying" and "spreading the gospel". If you have lived in areas where there is little consensus over what it means to be a Christian, you wind up with both Tebowing and a lot of rules to keep employers and schools from either restricting or requiring prayer because enough different factions do not agree. That's where the first amendment meets reality of a diverse society.
If you want to find out more where the law and case law lie, try searching around at http://www.politifact.com/
Nope.
He doesn't have this "right." The first amendment protects us from government action (and only government action) that infringes on our freedom of religion and speech. Last I knew, the NFL and Denver Broncos were private employers. They can have a policy of no public displays of religion, just like they can have a policy of no public use of profanity, offensive tats, etc., and not violate anyone's first amendment rights.
If Congress passed a law prohibiting Tebowing, he might have a case. But until then, I think the Broncos management and the NFL are making a mistake in letting this go on. It's divisive, unsportsmanlike, and unprofessional.
Not at Work
I'm so glad that none of my co-workers is big on an ostentatious display of religion, especially in speech. Thanking Jesus for that big contract we landed would be a bit much.
What's devisive,
What's devisive, unsportsmanlike and unprofessional about it? I think the reason people have a problem with this is because he's a white Christian. No one says anything when the atheletes or entertainers are non-white. If he was a Muslim all you people that are looking at this in a negative light would be singing a different tune.
O, I'd be just as annoyed...
... and just as vociferous.
I grew up "not in the majority religions" out in the square states, and believe me, *every* crazy prayer before every action behavior cheeses me off. And I'm likely to go to my client and say it's gotta stop around me, or I'll be taking my services elsewhere.
If a Muslim needs to take 15 to go wash and pray, I don't care; just not in my damn cubicle, right? Same with a Southern Baptist saying grace before lunch, or a Catholic with the dirty forehead on Ash Wednesday, or whatever.
If Tim Tebow wants to offer to lead a prayer in the locker room before the game, fine. If he wants to pray under his breath throughout the game, he ought. But this blatant religiosity is a violation of his own damn scripture; Matthew 6-6, anyone?
Absolutely. I intend to use
Absolutely.
I intend to use my freedom of speech to make a Tebow macro. "WHERE IS YOUR GOD NOW?!"
Amazing Lack Of Understanding
Not specifically just you, Dan, but your comment seems like a good place for me to jump in.
If anyone believes that Tim Tebow is asking God to win a football game for him, when he is praying, you are most likely seriously mistaken.
I say "most likely" because I don't have the ability to read minds. I don't know for sure what Tebow's prayers are. I do have a decent idea, though. I am a Christian. I have also been involved in athletics for most of my life. I pray before and after games I take part in. At no time do I ask God to influence the outcome of the game. That would be near-blasphemous, lowering the use of God's awesome power to a trivial level.
Tebow probably asks for the ability to perform at the highest level of his God-given abilities, perhaps with an added request to be protected from injury while doing so. That's basically what my prayers are. I'm positive that Tebow also says "Thanks". I do, too.
(Would that more people did in everyday life, but I digress.)
That he kneels on the sideline is irrelevant. Would the person commenting below, who talks of the scripture's "pray in private" advice, want Tebow to go into the locker room every time he feels moved to pray to his God? He is a public person, involved in an endeavor in front of large crowds, and as such he will not always be afforded the privacy he really may wish. So, he is more than willing to put up with the jibes and snide remarks and caricaturing of himself.
We all would be hard pressed to find a more gracious and self-effacing athlete. Have any of you read his answers to reporters who questioned him concerning disparaging remarks made by some of his fellow players? If you have, and you still want to shoot this guy down for some reason, then I would suggest that you have way more problems than Tebow does. For instance...
Brian Urlacher, following Chicago's loss to Denver and having been asked what he thought of Tebow's play, said: "He's a good running back. He does a good job running for them."
(That's what you'd call damning with faint praise. If you don't understand that, you don't understand football.)
Tebow's response?
"Coming from a really good player, that means a lot."
He could have gotten righteously indignant. He had, after all, just completed EIGHTEEN passes against Urlacher's team in the fourth quarter alone. Instead, he was gracious in victory.
Even better was his response to the Detroit Lions.
The Lions croaked Denver (that was the last game Tebow lost, prior to yesterday) and one of the Detroit players, following a sack of Tebow, got down on a knee and mocked Tebow's posture of prayer. Asked about it in the locker after the game, Tebow said:
"He was just celebrating, having fun with his teammates, and I don't take offense to that."
You really want to denigrate a guy who says stuff like this? Really? You may not agree with his religion, or his way of displaying it, but I think the world would be a much better place, overall, if more people had the attitude that Tebow shows.
Many others mileage obviously varies. And that's truly sad.
Suldog
http://jimsuldog.blogspot.com
With all due respect....
...if one professes to be a fundamentalist Christian, one ought to pay rather close attention to explicit instructions provuided by Jesus. Since Jesus told his followers, don't make a public show of your praying, why would someone who takes the Bible literally believe he can disregard such instruction?
(No one needn't go the locker room to pray -- one can "pray privately" in public -- however, this would not serve to advertise one's piety).
The Assumption Is Prayer When He Kneels
And I have little doubt that's what he is doing. But, is he verbalizing on field while in the posture we see him? He is quiet, so far as I can tell. And he is in a posture that, more or less, many other players also take during a game.
If we talk about his gestures toward the sky following a play, yes, that's ostentatious. I also think it's spontaneous. Many players do similar things, so I hardly see why it would be upsetting to see Tebow do it, at least more so than any others.
That's just my take on it, of course. The truth may be near or far.
Suldog
http://jimsuldog.blogspot.com
I think it is disingenuous...
... to argue that he is NOT making the sort of public display of piety that Jesus nixed.
If fundametalists did not insist that they took every single word in the Bible to be literaly true, this sort of insconsitent behavior would not seem so annoying (to me). But American Christian fundamentalists are just as much "cafeteria Christians" as the more traditional variety of Christians they commonly deride.
I Respectfully Disagree
I truly don't believe he is doing the praying to call attention to himself and, IMVHO, that's where Jesus would make the distinction between hypocrisy and reverence. Aside from those you reference below, there is another scriptural passage wherein Jesus asks us to consider two people praying in temple, one calling attention to himself as a righteous person and the other referring to himself as a sinner.
“Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, ‘God, I thank You that I am not like other men — extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I possess.’ And the tax collector, standing afar off, would not so much as raise his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me a sinner!’ I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.”
The problem wasn't with the public nature of prayer, per se, since both men were praying in public, so much as with making use of public prayer to call attention to oneself as worthy.
Is Tebow doing that? This is where our opinions differ. I say no, but you seem to believe he is doing so. Since neither one of us can answer that question definitively, I assume we'll just have to respectfully disagree.
Suldog
http://jimsuldog.blogspot.com
I grew up in a highly religiously conservative....
...part of the country (i.e. Oklahoma). Consequently, my tolerance towards fundamentalist hypocrisy (and highly public displays of piety) is "slim to none".
Understood
I've certainly got issues that push my buttons.
(Hey, considering how often I've stated my libertarian beliefs, I think it's very magnanimous of me to have quoted a biblical passage wherein a tax collector is the hero.)
Suldog
http://jimsuldog.blogspot.com
Publicans....
...were actually tax farmers. they bid on the right to collect taxes for Rome in a particular rerritory. If they could collect more than their bid, they could make a hefty profit. Very free enterprise-ish. ;~}
Common canned Christian response
The Bible also says something about taking a candle out from under a basket...so that's what he's doing...shining his Godly light out from under that basket you keep wanting to trap him under and hide his piety away in.
Maybe
Private prayer isn't synonymous with advertising on eye black...
That said, as I said, I don't really have so much a problem with it, but more with the media making it a spectacle and a reason to draw attention to someone, who by all accounts, seems like an average NFL quarterback.
Plenty of other players pray, and are religious. They do so with a little more discretion, or they don't, and the media doesn't pick up on them.
True, Anon2
I think the greater problem is with the media making a big deal of it. There have been many players who have previously answered the first question of an interviewer with "First, praise to my Lord and savior...", etc., and not much was made of it. Also, there is usually a group prayer in the middle of the field following every NFL game, and those players who wish to take part join in. Many do, many don't. It just happens and no big deal is made of it.
As for the eye black, it's now a moot point. College rules are looser, but the NFL specifically does not allow messages on eye black, so Tebow has never done that in the NFL.
We could argue his merits as a QB (personally, I think he will be around for a long time to come, and winning more than losing) but no need to open that can of worms :-)
Suldog
http://jimsuldog.blogspot.com
He'll only win more than lose
He'll only win more than lose as long as he has an incredible defense to actually win the games.
Time Will Tell
n/t
Suldog
http://jimsuldog.blogspot.com
God's nephew
put to rest the holiness of the Denver defense. Once they calmed down (got winded), they weren't a threat and didn't force turnovers.
:)
Tebow probably asks for the
This IS asking his god to intervene in the game! If Tebow can't play at his highest level on his own, then what good is having him on the team? And how is a request to avoid injury, which would help one team and hurt the other, a request that doesn't intervene in the game? And if he's on the "ask for no injury" train, why not ask for no injuries to anyone?
Injuries, etc.
I can speak for myself, but I think much (or all) may apply to Tebow.
When I pray not to suffer injury, I also ask for no one else to be hurt. I'd like to think Tebow also does.
Asking to perform at your highest level involves having the gumption and resolve to continue pushing when (as Lombardi expressed it) fatigue makes cowards of us all. That's what I mean by asking to perform at my highest level. I'm asking for courage to keep going when I'm tired, and to keep my mind alert. It is more a prayer to keep me from being disappointed in myself afterwards, for not having done all that I might have. I am not asking for superhuman strength or miracles. I am asking only that I be permitted, as it is in God's plan, to utilize what I have already been granted by Him.
Suldog
http://jimsuldog.blogspot.cvom
Sure...
But much as the most effective way to counter free speech you don't agree with is with counter speech, most people counter the Tebow-espoused beliefs they don't agreement with either their own religious beliefs -- as stated in the bible passages below -- or with their belief that Tebow's god doesn't exist.
I celebrate freedoms.
Sure, Tebow can exercise his freedom to clasp his hands in prayer and bow after a touch down (because we all know that God has so much free time to bless sports games).
As he is quite public with his display of belief, others can surely exercise their freedom in speech or in word to offer a difference of opinion, right?
And quite frankly, I find any display of in your face religion obnoxious. But that is his right and I respect that.
Well said
the thing that irks me the most is when the victim card gets played by the fundies. Their persecution complex knows no bounds.
Tebow annoys me, but it so far he's not played the victim card, and he's only advertised his religion. He hasn't forced it on others, or tried to berate others.
Thats ok.
The religion thing doesn't annoy me, it's the media focusing on the religion thing giving air time to a mediocre quarterback that otherwise wouldn't have gotten that exposure.
Not knocking that
But it doesn't mean we have to shut up and take it, and keep quiet about how we dislike it. That's the nice thing about freedom and liberty. Everyone gets to be part of the dialogue, and ridicule isn't persecution.
Football is very, very religious. Never had a problem with it. Do have a problem with someone wearing it on their sleeve (or black eye guard), since it's really is only to draw attention to yourself.
Jesus said a thing or two about attention whores. It wasn't favorable.
Agreed
I'm pretty religious and I like to think God plays a big part in my everyday life but Tebow's Jesus-themed showboating rubs me the wrong way. In my head, whenever I see him take a knee I imagine him praying, "Thanks, Jesus, for making me so awesome, and for keeping me so humble at the same time. Good job, Lord! Keep up the good work."
I kind of want to throw things at his stupid bowed head.
to be fair he hasn't been
to be fair he hasn't been that bad, but I do feel he has the brains to know the media exposure is good and to run with it.
Ultimately my beef is with the media. They singled him out, and pumped him up into a story, because they could sell it.
I bet Matt Cassel or Matt Ryan wishes they thought of it first. It be like the media homing in on them, because of one little quirk.
Maybe...
But I think as big a part of the story is that he is a Heisman Trophy-winning, non-traditional NFL quarterback. The fact that he is an excellent runner, but a so-so passer, has fueled a lot of the conversation and the belief that he won't make it as an NFL quarterback.
The religion aspect is there, but I don't think Matt Cassel would get the same coverage as Tebow if Matt were as aggressively religious -- Tim's a bit of a physical freak as an NFL QB. Others have said that Kurt Warner was just as demonstrative about his religion in press conferences, but that it didn't get the same level of coverage.
He's been on the national scene since he was a freshman (and won the Heisman as a sophomore), so there's always been speculation about him in the NFL. Running quarterbacks don't usually survive, so there was a ton of speculation on who should draft him and then, should they start him. The heavy duty religious aspect has served to make him even more controversial (and inspirational to some).
can't disagree
Perfect analysis.
I'm just getting jaded of the sport punditry as a male version of TMZ. Gossip and talking head bloviating really turns me off, both in news, sports or entertainment.
You may be right
Now that I think about it, I was already fairly sick of him before he entered the NFL and the media went nuts (more nuts?). I still haven't managed to extract myself from all of the Fundy mailing lists, so I heard about Tebow and his faith and his single-mother-who-could-have-aborted-him fairly early and very often. I may be reacting to that more than to his praying on the sidelines. . .though I still think that's annoying, possibly attention whore-y and definitely NOT What Jesus Would Do.
what Tebow is praying
Wow, you know what Tebow is praying?? You can read his mind? And you think that Tebow thinks like you do? (Doubt it!) Of all the show-boating that goes on after almost every stinkin' play in so many sports these days, Tebow's half-genuflection is by far the least offensive, IMO. I think it's great, more power to him, I don't see it as show-boating at all.
Jesus was a bit critical....
... of public displays of piety.
http://www.bibliacatolica.com.br/25/47/6.php
A few extracts --
Be careful not to parade your uprightness in public to attract attention; otherwise you will lose all reward from your Father in heaven.
And when you pray, do not imitate the hypocrites: they love to say their prayers standing up in the synagogues and at the street corners for people to see them. In truth I tell you, they have had their reward.
But when you pray, go to your private room, shut yourself in, and so pray to your Father who is in that secret place, and your Father who sees all that is done in secret will reward you.