Hockey: A National Sport or a Country’s Religion?
Yesterday marked the start to yet another season of Canada’s national sport, hockey. Hockey fans are dusting off their team jerseys, buying their seasons tickets and reuniting to cheer on their favourite team on the journey to the Stanley Cup. All of the hype surrounding this big event inspired me to sit down and form an opinion on sports being considered a type of religion, but more specifically, if hockey could be considered Canada’s religion? Hockey is a very common symbol of Canadian identity and as Canadians we do not oppose the title, as Tom Sinclair-Faulkner puts it “hockey is more than a game in Canada: it functions as a religion for many” (Trothen, 2006, p. 293). I am an avid hockey fan, though originally not by choice as I was dubbed a Leaf’s fan before exiting the womb. Similarly, I have been following the Christian religion pre-birth and continue to practice it to this day. It does not take much to see the similarities between hockey and religions. For example, Novack points out how both sports and religions ignite a sense of community and belonging among individuals through the use of rituals such as chants, songs, gestures etc. (Price, 2005). Hockey has this same uniting power, an example being during the 2014 Sochi Olympics, when the men’s gold medal hockey game gathered an entire country of people to their television screens at 5 a.m. to watch their country bring home the gold, the chant “#WeTheNorth” was trending on Twitter, symbolizing a united nation. Winning that game meant so much more to Canadians than winning gold in any other Olympic event due to the emotional investment in this sport. Eric Bain-Selbo elaborates on undergoing a religious experience through sports with his study on American football fans and found that the fans used a majority of the same language to describe a football related experience that they would also use in a religious context such as “joy, fellowship, passion and intensity” (2008, p. 3). When comparing hockey and football it is safe to say that football to America is what hockey is to Canada. Denis Bekkering presents a clear stance regarding hockey as Canada’s religion when he compares his theory to Americans and their “unifying civic religion of politics”, which holds Washington to be a scared place, Martin Luther King, Jr. as a martyr and the liberty bell as a holy object (Proudfoot, 2011). Bekkering further suggests that hockey shares similar characteristics for Canadians as politics do for the Americans when he points out that Canadians have built a collective religion around the rink and during the Olympics the Canadian jersey becomes a national talisman (Proudfoot, 2011).
Though the above provides compelling arguments as to why hockey can be considered Canada’s religion, there are some discrepancies to this theory. I would like to start off by bringing forth the issue of gender, if hockey itself is the Canadian religion then why is more attention and legitimacy given to men’s hockey leagues over women’s hockey leagues? There is no traditional religion that denies women the equal right to practice and follow the religion as a man would. Though Bekkering is in support of Hockey as a religion, he points out “NHL devotees are divided by the tribalism of supporting different teams” (Proudfoot, 2011). It is not common for traditional religions to divide their followers into smaller groups and then pit them against each other through competition. Price raises the problem that there are many devoted followers of traditional religions who also happen to be passionate sports fans as well, what can be said for those who follow both “religiously”? (2005) Will they have to choose one or the other if hockey is considered to be a religion? Lastly, I believe the one crucial characteristic hockey is missing in order to be considered a traditional religion is guidance through one’s meaningful journey. Religion is a common avenue people turn to when they are in search for answers or guidance, whether it be through confessional at church or private meditation and I personally do not see hockey as sharing theses same ideals that provide similar meaningful enlightenment that aids people in continuing on their life journeys. Overall, I agree that hockey plays a big role in Canada’s identity and it does embody many similar characteristics to traditional religions, however I do not believe that our national sport can so easily be boiled down to be defined as our country’s religion. Ultimately, in taking a neo-liberalist approach, the deciding factor of whether hockey is or is not a religion lies in one’s own beliefs as to the definition of what a true religion is.
Reference List
Bain-Selbo, E. (2008). Ecstasy, Joy, and Sorrow: The Religious Experience of Southern College Football. Journal of Religion and Popular Culture, 20, 4–4.
Price, J. (2000). An American Apotheosis. In Religion and popular culture in America (pp. 196–212). Berkeley, Calif.: University of California Press.
Proudfoot, S. (2011). Hockey as Canada’s National Religion. Telegraph-Journal.
Trothen, T. (2006). Hockey: A Divine Sport?—Canada’s National Sport In Relation To Embodiment, Community And Hope. Studies in Religion/Sciences Religieuses, 291–305.
