I have been a baseball fan since I was young. My grandfather was a huge New York Yankee fan and I followed suit. I have since split my allegiance to the Chicago Cubs since I live near Chicago now and not near New York. However, my love for baseball remains pure. Why pure? Because if I was made commissioner for a day we would go back to having 2 leagues and no divisions and there would be no playoffs. Right to the World Series!! And don’t even get started with the designated hitter rule (the rule in the American League where the pitcher does not have to bat….they have a “designated hitter” to do it for him). Please!! Really?!! Are pitchers really that big a group of putzes?
Then there was the steroid crisis. This is where many pitchers and position players took illegal substances to enhance their performances on the field. Mediocre players became good and good ones became great…overnight. Images of sudden gargantuan players with big heads (literally) graced America’s stadiums and baseballs began flying out of these parks in record numbers. We accredited it to baseballs being manufactured differently, to better conditioned athletes and improved diets. But the truth was finally revealed….we were actually seeing chemically conditioned clowns clandestinely cloaking their careers. Like how I did that? 🙂
How did the players react when finally outed? Well, some fessed up..admitted their wrong doing. The Yankee star pitcher of the nineties and early 2000’s, Andy Pettitte, was implicated in the steroid scandal and immediately came clean. He admitted his involvement and his sorrow for his actions. Pettitte finished his career and has had his number retired by the Yankees. An honor only one step below getting into baseball’s Hall of Fame.
However, some clung to innocence in the face of overwhelming evidence of taking illegal substances. Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Sammy Sosa and Mark McGuire are players who would have made it into the hall on the first try but whose involvement and, more importantly, lack of repentance have doomed them to be on the outside looking in. And this baseball fan hopes they never see the inside of the hallowed halls of Cooperstown, New York (where the Hall of Fame is located).
How does this contrast of how players responded to the drug scandal relate to today’s readings? When reading the the section from Genesis I noticed a similarity between Bonds and Pettitte and between Adam and Peter. Just as Barry Bonds said “Not me!!” to claims of artificially improving his talents, Adam passed the buck of his involvement in eating from the Tree of Knowledge to Eve, thus refusing to take responsibility, and ask forgiveness, for his actions.
Compare that to how Andy Pettitte took his shame and guilt and stood before his fans clearly stating, I messed up..I took advantage, fell to weakness and I AM SORRY. The fans responded by embracing Pettitte. Taking him back into the Yankee fold.
And this was also Peter. He denied knowing Christ three times at a moment when his friend and Lord needed him the most. And when confronted by Jesus after the Resurrection he didn’t turn to Him and say, “Who? Me? No, you got that all wrong. It was another guy who looked like me”. Nope. Peter took his lumps. He admitted his sin and three times told the Lord how much he loved him. And he was rewarded with the keys of the church.
I remembered when I was in 8th grade I had passed a note around the class making disparaging remarks about one of my classmates. I was clearly trying to build up myself to my friends by tearing down someone else. The note found its way into the hands of Sister Mary Rose, our teacher. She made everyone stand up and said that no one would leave school that day until the guilty party came forward. Talk about being put in a tough spot. I probably could have kept quiet and eventually she would have had to let us all go. And I was leaning that way. But after 5 minutes, that seemed like 5 hours, I finally fessed up and came forward. I don’t recall what the punishment was that day but I never forgot the feeling of shame for what I did and, more importantly, the feeling of relief when I finally admitted my actions.
It was certainly difficult for Pettitte to step up to the plate and admit his weakness, as it was Peter, as it can be for each one of us who falls short of the mark. But until we do come clean of our weaknesses we remain mired in that guilt preventing the growth that God expects from all of us. Who knows where we would all be now if Adam merely said in the garden, “It was me Lord and I am truly sorry for having not trusted you”.
