For those unfamiliar with the topic, a university course titled “Sports and Spirituality” or “Religion and Sports” might appear as something to enhance the G.P.A. of the school’s athletes. Fr. Patrick Kelly’s book Play, Sport, and Spirit demonstrates a very different possibility. The text captures the range and depth of academic content that will enrich both professor and student. Since childhood, sports played a major role in the author’s life, and early in his life as a Jesuit, he came to integrate his Christian spirituality with the experience of playing sports. And, he would emphasize the word play!

    Two thinkers shaped the development of Kelly’s scholarship and teaching. In the Preface he notes the influence of Johan Huizinga’s work, Homo Ludens: A Study of the Play Element in Culture. After being introduced to Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s Flow: the Psychology of Optimal Experience, Kelly recounts the good fortune of being able to complete his doctoral studies under his direction. In Csikszentmihalyi, Kelly notes that he discovered a correlation between what the psychologist identifies as “flow” with “spiritual consolation,” a key element in St. Ignatius’ Spiritual Exercises. While these two scholars provide the foundation for Kelly’s book, the thirty-four pages of endnotes attest to the extensive scholarship of the author.

With this fairly short book, Kelly seeks to answer a fundamental question – “How can sport, experienced as play and engaged in for its own sake, also have benefits for players and contribute to their own flourishing?” The heart of this question concerns sports as play engaged in for its own sake. The author’s earlier work Catholic Perspectives on Sports: From Medieval to Modern Times allows him to concisely describe sport as play. He observes how in medieval and early modern Europe people played games on feast days and Sundays. On these days “people could engage in gratuitous activities unrelated to the serious concerns of ‘ordinary time’” (p. 20).

Two chapters explore sport as play. In these chapters Kelly identifies a wide rage of Catholic and Protestant theologians who highlight the importance of play in human life. This approach to sports stands in marked contrast to a Puritan perspective emphasizing hard work while casting real suspicion on play. The contemporary industry of sports, as Kelly and others observe, shapes the worlds of professional sports, and increasingly collegiate and youth sports. Parents will emphasize achievement in a sport as path toward a university scholarship. Collegiate coaches often enough remind scholarship players that practice and play “are their job.” As Kelly will conclude that while it may be possible to reconnect sports with the freedom of play, this will demand going against an American culture that emphasizes instrumentalism and a market society.

The scholarly work of Gordon Burkhart provides the framework for exploring the evolution of play that also includes the work of Cardinal Ratzinger (later Pope Benedict XVI). In a similar way with two additional chapters, the author employs the work of Randolf Feezell and Csikszentmihalyi to connect with other notable figures to develop the themes of freedom and joy in sports. He reminds the reader of the important work of Michael Novak, The Joy of Sports. In the latter chapter he connects the experience of “flow” as it relates to egolessness, effortlessness, and union with one’s surroundings. For Csikszentmihalyi and for Kelly, the union with one’s surroundings includes a union, perhaps even better a communion, with others in love and respect. Kelly includes descriptions from high school and university athletes as examples.

Anyone thinking that the area of sports, spirituality, and religion lacks serious academic content ought to be dissuaded of such an opinion by reading Play, Sport, and Spirit. In fact, one criticism of the text might be that Kelly attempts to pack too much scholarship into this one book. At the same time, this very rich array of scholarship affords the curious scholar the opportunity to further probe the depths for deeper understanding. Kelly provides the sources and overall perspective. Finally, the text accomplishes the author’s objective. The reader will conclude that sport, experienced as play and engaged in for its own sake, can have benefits for players and contribute to their own flourishing. He answered his question and with this he reminds those of us in contemporary American culture that human beings do well to play.