From: Ted Davis (tdavis@messiah.edu)
Date: Wed Oct 09 2002 - 08:58:48 EDT
George Murphy's humorous comment about theodicy and baseball spurs me to add
some thoughts of my own. I'm not trying to start a new thread here, just to
throw a little humor into the world. I teach a course on baseball and
american life, which sometimes leads me to think strange thoughts.
One thought, that God is lefthanded (as I am, of course, and so is my wife
and one of our daughters), is almost capable of a deductive proof. It's too
long to give here, but the central points include the fact that baseball has
been divinely revealed and the fact that first base is on the right side of
home plate, from the catcher's point of view, rather than vice versa. If
God were not left-handed, this would not be so. Get me to provide the
details in person, rather than online, at a future ASA function....
I have also thought of writing a modern Bridgewater treatise, as follows:
On the Power, Wisdom, and Goodness of God as Manifested in Baseball. I've
actually given this one some serious thought, but as yet no serious effort
to write it. But it would be lots of fun to try, and I'd start with a
theology of suffering: since God is clearly a Cub fan who also likes the Red
Sox (God thinks baseball should be played on grass, close to the fans, and
preferably in the daylight), then why do those two teams not win the World
Series? The answer does have something to do with suffering and theodicy, I
suspect. But I won't detail that one too far here, so as not to appear too
frivelous with deadly serious theology. But you get the point.
George, have you given thought to this line of reasoning? Isn't there more
evidence here of the divine character, than in the fact that the Angels beat
the Yankees--though I too am rejoicing in that event?
Ted Davis
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