Game in His name

by Ron Coleman | January 25, 2009 10:52 am

I heard about this story[1] on sports radio Friday morning, and while I appreciated the hosts’ outrage, I think they missed the point:

A Texas high school girls basketball team has apologized for winning big. The Covenant School, a private Christian high school in Dallas, defeated Dallas Academy last week in a blowout: 100-0. . . .

During the lopsided Jan. 13 game, spectators said the Covenant School ran up the score, playing aggressive offense, even with their 59-0 lead at halftime. The girls kept on the pressure until they scored the 100th point.

The Dallas Academy, a small private school with 20 girls, is for students with learning disabilities.

Now that really is cruel. And the guys, Mike and Mike of ESPN, ripped into the coach of the winning school, the Covenant School [2]as was deserved. Here’s the audio[3] if you’re that motivated. But I think the boys missed the point when they started an exchange along the lines of “How do you think the parents feel?”

They were talking about the parents of the girls whose team was humiliated in this way, and recounting their own experience as parents driving home a child from a disappointing sports outcome — how do you explain to your girl, they asked, why she had to lose 100-0?

Well, yeah, but how about the other parents — the parents of the girls sent to a place as utterly lacking in humanity, decency and sportsmanship as the Covenant School? You know, the one with this “mission statement” on its website[4]:

The Covenant School exists to glorify God by equipping students with the tools necessary to pursue a lifetime of learning so that they may discern, reason, and defend truth in service to our Lord, Jesus Christ. . .

School Verse

Non nobis, domine, sed nomini tuo da gloriam.
-Psalm 115:1

Not to us, O Lord, not to us, but to Your name give glory!

The administrators have posted an apology[5], and that’s a good thing. But something is really, really wrong at the Covenant School — and it is the parents of those girls who really should be outraged.

Not to mention, you know… God. Considering they’re the ones who dragged Him into this in the first place.

Cross-posted on Likelihood of Success[6], Ron Coleman’s pretty good blog.