Rome to host international conference on Sport and Spirituality

By Lisa Zengarini

In the framework of the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris, the French Embassy to the Holy See and the Vatican Dicastery for Culture are organizing on May 16-18 an international conference on Sport and Spirituality.

Titled “Putting our lives on the line” (“Mettere la vita in gioco”, in Italian) the event will gather some 200 participants professional/paralympic/amateur athletes, representatives of international sports bodies, managers of sports clubs, university students of sport/pedagogy/sociology/anthropology/philosophy/theology, and agents of the pastoral care of sport who will reflect on the spiritual implications of what has become one of the most practiced and followed cultural activities in contemporary society.

The spiritual dimension of sports

Indeed, sports has always had a connection with the spiritual dimension of life as emphasized on several occasions also by Pope Francis, remarked Cardinal José Tolentino Mendonça, who will open the conference on May 16.

“If we look at the history of sport in parallel with the history of the Church, there have been many moments in which sport has been an inspiration and a metaphor for the life of Christians, or Christianity itself has enriched sport with its humanistic vision,” the Prefect of the Dicastery for Culture and Education said at a press conference on Monday on the event, also attended by Madame Florence Mangin, Ambassador of France to the Holy See.

Church and sports

Participants will therefore try to understand why sports are so popular today, identify risks, assess their relevance for building a more fraternal, tolerant and fair society and therefore discern how God manifests Himself in sports competition. The outreach aim, is to find an answer to two fundamental questions: “What does sport have to say to the Church?” and “ What does the Church have to say to sport?”. Thus the title chosen for the conference, Cardinal Mendonça said.

Themes discussed at the conference

The first day (16 May) will address the relationship between "Church and Sport", through sharing the testimony of high-level athletes and some concrete pastoral experiences that put sport at the service of the Gospel and the Gospel at the service of sport. The second day (17 May) will focus on the relationship between "Man and Sport", through the reflection of a group of highly qualified speakers from Italian and French universities, who will discuss sport in terms of its pedagogical, philosophical, sociological and theological relevance. The third day (18 May) will have a more practical dimension, with a solidarity sporting event (the fraternity relay) to show civil society the social relevance of sport itself.