Tebow on the Knee 0
Leonard Pitts, Jr., takes a look at the Tim Tebow fuss. After contrasting Tebow’s actions with what passes for normal amongst football players (grandstanding, hot-dogging, leg-breaking, and the like), he considers some of the reasons why Tebow’s actions have attracted so much attention.
He concludes that the reaction to Tim Tebow’s actions must be viewed within the context of those who debase faith (and the faithful) by using it (and them) to earthly ends:
Moreover, it becomes a whirl of God talk and God iconography, a cross as fashion statement, a WWJD bracelet, a football player kneeling on the field.
But that is faith externalized for public consumption, faith that runs the risk of being shiny and superficial. It doesn’t speak to the decisions we make, the people we are, when despair comes creeping into the midnight hour. Nor does it speak to any obligation toward the scabrous, the lost, the unwashed, the impoverished, the disgusted, the detested, the detestable. Indeed, those whose faith is most loudly externalized are often the ones most silent on that obligation.