God doesn't care about baseball

Rockies General Manager, Daniel O’Dowd, stated in a recent news article that God definitely had a hand in the Rockies winning streak at the end of the season. That is pure religion drivel. What in the world is this guy thinking? That is absolutely the worst kind of theology imaginable. The real problem with it is that more people in America probably agree with him than don’t.

Popular theology, especially that of Evangelicals and religious conservatives has offered this notion of prosperity gospel for too long in this country. If O’Dowd or anyone else thinks that God cares about the outcome of a baseball game or a baseball season then answer me this question. If God really cares about that then why doesn’t God care enough to prevent Clint Hurdles’ daughter, Maddie, from being Prader-Willi, a random birth defect caused by the deformity of chromosome 15?

I don’t think God caused Maddie to be a Prader-Willi anymore than I think God caused my sister, Dinah, to be a Prader-Willi. It’s random and rarely happens. Just as rare as a team as poor as the Rockies winning 21 or their last 22 games coinciding with the collapse of the San Diego Padres and the New York Mets, both much better teams who would have had a better chance against the Red Sox. Actually I doubt if the National League All-Stars could beat the Red Sox or the Yankees or the Angels or even the Indians.

I do think that God deeply cares about Maddie, Clint Hurdle, Dinah, my parents and each individual person who walks across the face of the this earth. God cares enough to take the risk that we will care back without being manipulated. God cared enough to want to understand our trials and tribulations to come into this world and risk being born in a first century out post. God cared enough to live and die as one of us. This is the care and empathy of God. God cares and understands.

While I would have to say that God has the freedom to be God and to manipulate the flight of a baseball if God wanted to – but nothing in this world suggests that that is so.