Cheering for God: The Unholy Union of Sports and Religious Tribalism

The Spiritual Lessons Hidden in the Rivalries of the Game

Dan Foster
Backyard Church
Published in
8 min readOct 1, 2024

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Image by wildpixel on iStock

One hundred thousand and thirteen people.

That was the official attendance at the Australian Rules Football Grand Final last weekend.

You don’t have to understand the game of Aussie Rules Football to appreciate that this is a spectacle of tribal loyalty at its finest. If there were a stadium large enough, a million people might turn up to this game. It is the highest-rating sporting event on Australian television every single year.

Tickets to this game are so in demand that you have to put your name in a ballot and hope and pray your name gets drawn out.

And this year, I was fortunate enough to be one of them.

Mind you, the tickets I was allocated were standing-room only, and I was herded into a tight corner of the stadium, surrounded by hundreds of others in the same boat. It was packed, hot, and uncomfortable, but none of that mattered. I was there. I was part of it. From where I stood, I could see the entire field, but more importantly, I could feel the energy of the crowd.

Finding my tribe

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Dan Foster
Backyard Church

Writer, Poet, Blogger: Tackling life, faith, culture, religion, politics, and spirituality. Connect with me: https://linktr.ee/DanFosterWriter