NFL to allow church Super Bowl parties

Art Toalston is reporting for Baptist Press that the NFL has relented and will allow churches to show the Super Bowl on any size screen that they might choose, so long as they do not charge for the event.

Some members of the US Senate were beginning to investigate the matter and high profile Senator Orin Hatch (R-Utah) had sent a recent letter of inquiries that might lead one to believe he suspected an anti religious bias.  Another high profile Senator, Arlen Specter (R-Pennsylvania), had begun to draft legislation that would resolve the issue in favor of the churches.

Apparently this legislation was enough to back the NFL down.

A few personal thoughts here.

I was a little amazed that the NFL didn’t back down when so much was made of this in the media last year.  It really surprised me that they did not seem to want to budge this year at all.  I would have thought that in the year since, they would have worked hard to resolve this as it was clearly a publicity nightmare.  Whatever anti-church sentiments American culture maybe breeding, they are not so deep that the whole of the culture would side with bars over churches, which is how this is seen by the average person.

Of course, that is why it was taken up by these Senators.  The perception that churches were being discriminated against was just too much and the NFL was finally in a corner.  For whatever reasons, they were willing to deal with churches complaints and whatever sympathy they might stir in the media, but being legislated against by the Senate legitimizes the complaints and solidifies any doubts the American public may have about whether or not they were doing something wrong.

Last year, believing that they were discriminating against churches, we went ahead with our party as scheduled.  This year, when they did not budge, I thought the better solution was to disperse and have several parties in homes.  This gave our people a chance to invite lost friends and co-workers into their homes and generate conversations.  As with any change, the early response is often mixed.  Though we did not have any complaints, we did not have as many parties as I had hoped we would.  We did have a few and some positive conversations were had as a result.

You can read about the full plan and reasoning here:  Super Bowl Quandry

I think we’ll stick with this plan, regardless of the NFL’s acquiescence to allow the big screens to be used again in the future.

The truth is, lost people don’t want to come to a church building, even if they are showing the Super Bowl there.  They are much more likely to come to our homes.  Our church building parties often turn into church wide fellowships where the believers huddle and omit the commercials so we can have a sanctified fellowship that is unburdened with  the uncomfortable.

On the one hand, I feel somewhat justified in our “civil disobedience” last year.  On the other hand, I wish I would have figured out the better solution a year before.

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