American Religion
I feel like I went back to church yesterday. Â I went into a large, publicly accessible building, engaged in arcane rituals, partook of, if not sacred, at least ritually specific food, and witnessed the public excoriation of the unfaithful.
Did I do this in a church? Â A mosque? Â A temple? Â Of course not, I did it in a ball park. Â I watched the San Francisco Giants take on the Chicago Cubs.
No one was called a sinner, but the unfaithful, the Cubs fans, were derided, shouted down, and then loudly booed when one of them caught a ball that had been hit into the stands.
There was music.  There was the sacred sing-along to “Take Me Out to the Ball Game.”  There was the playing of John Fogerty’s “Centerfield,” which is surely a baseball hymn or there is just no justice in the world.
And there were call outs and responses, though I don’t remember what they were.
Now I don’t know much about baseball statistics, so I don’t have any clue which team was favored to win, but I can tell you the outcome was far from Biblical. Â In the Bible David defeats the Giant, but in this case the Cubs failed at the same task. Â Maybe they should have used a sling.
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