Leaned down over the starting block, knees sore but spirits high, Junior June Tau makes a quick prayer before the starting pistol fires. As a practicing Catholic, she believes that with her faith, anything can be achieved. Tau is among many athletes who have a strong relationship with their religion. When you watch a game on TV, you frequently see athletes praying before a match or doing the sign of the cross in the midst of play. For many, faith can be the foundation that supports athletes in excelling in their athletic performance. However, there are also some conflicting factors regarding prayer and play. Different beliefs, rituals, and codes attached to religion may interfere with a high school athlete’s experience.
Religion intersects with sports in more ways than one, and one important factor is the strengthened connection between the mind, body, and soul. Many athletes believe that when they are able to connect to their religion, they feel better, more complete, and subsequently can often perform at higher levels than they would have reached otherwise.
Palo Alto High School represents a diverse and culturally rich community, where all religious identities are present and welcomed to express themselves freely. For this reason, it is common to have athletes who are involved in religious activities that may affect their play and routines. Oftentimes, religious athletes must make a choice when their athletic and religious responsibilities clash. For example, Tau, an active Christian, misses games, practices, and training on Sunday due to her faith’s teachings.
“In my faith, we are taught not to participate in any extracurricular activities on Sunday,” Tau said. “This belief often conflicted with my sports practice and game schedule since I was unable to play or practice on Sunday.”
Sophomore Sione Fusimalohi shares a similar experience when practicing Catholicism, the branch of Christianity to which she belongs.
“My faith gives me a motivation to strive for my best in practice, and I believe it’s protected me and my team throughout the season,” Fusimalohi said.
Specifically in Catholicism, one prays to the five rosaries which each of which has a different significance. Fusimalohi keeps these rosaries in mind and usually makes a prayer designated to each.
“Many people I’ve talked to, in addition to me as well, seem to think that with God watching over us, we can do well throughout the process,” Fusimalohi said.
Despite this, curveballs in athletics are hard to avoid. Religion acts as a pillar for athletes dealing with injuries, bench time, and disappointment. Sophomore Adam Maldonado believes that God gives the toughest battles to the toughest soldiers. Just this year, Maldonado experienced a battle for himself- the long recovery from tearing his ACL.
Maldonado tore this ligament near the end of his football season, which unfortunately compromised his ability to participate in the upcoming varsity basketball season. “God has a plan for us all,” Maldonado said. His belief that everything happens for a reason has allowed him to maintain his composure and continue his dedication to basketball.
“My religious beliefs have allowed me to feel a sense of ‘home’ the same way playing my sports has,” Maldonado said.
Injuries like Maldonado’s are hard to avoid, but proper diet and nutrition can improve performance and actually aid injury prevention. Many religions around the world celebrate holidays that require dietary changes for short periods of time. Christianity, Islam, Judaism, and Hinduism all have one thing in common- holidays that require fasting or changes in diet. For example, Passover is a Jewish holiday when people can not eat fermented grains, in respect to the Israelites’ exodus from Egypt, when they did not have time for bread to rise.
For many Paly athletes, these holidays lead to short-term diet changes, which can impact sports performance, energy, and mood. Sophomore Yotam Rachman, who follows Judaism, often needs to turn to alternative sources to make sure he can meet his nutritional needs during Passover or similar holidays in the Jewish religious calendar. Passover lasts for eight days and can have meaningful impacts on an athlete’s diet.
This is a common struggle for athletes who celebrate religious holidays that require dietary restrictions. Even at the high school level, many athletes are on strict diets or at least have specific goals for the amount of nutrients and calories that they must hit every day, no matter the circumstance.
“This [passover] forces me to change my diet so I am still consuming a healthy amount of food and calories that my Gymnastics diet requires me to do,” Rachman said.
Instead, believers who celebrate Passover, not just athletes, eat special dishes like matzah, which is an unleavened or unfermented flatbread, matzo ball soup, gefilte fish, and others.
Other religious holidays require followers to completely fast — eating no food or drink at all for extended periods of time, which can leave the participant low on energy or exhausted. The most well-known holiday is Ramadan, an Islamic holiday which is celebrated predominantly during the month of March.
During Ramadan, similar to Passover, requires worshipers to abstain from eating or drinking anything while the sun remains in the sky, feasting once the sun sets and darkness covers the land. Transitioning into complete fasting during the day, especially for young athletes, can have negative effects on performance, especially endurance. As calorie and carbohydrate intake decrease, the body lacks the energy necessary to fuel its muscles. The shift in meal timing and disturbance of sleep patterns impact both real and perceived physical performance.
Sophomore Owais Valiani, a muslim who participates in Ramadan, needs to make adjustments to his diet and schedule to keep his performance as high as possible. This can prove to be difficult in practice.
“Sometimes I have to play during Ramadan, during which I will not have eaten or drunk water from sunrise to sunset, which affects my effort as well as energy level during the game,” Valiani said.
One’s diet is not the only complicated intersection between sports and religion. Scheduling conflicts affect everyone, regardless of religion. However, additional challenges exist for practicing religions that end up being less included in the calendar. Tau explains some scheduling issues she experiences each Sunday.
“For the AAU basketball season, I did not attend the tournaments on Sunday, and I would miss open gyms and practices on Sunday due to my faith,” Tau said.“Some of my coaches throughout my career appreciated me and my commitment to my beliefs, and some coaches did not support my decisions, which made it difficult for me.”
Especially in high school, many deal with athletic and academic commitments, as well as religious practices. Incorporating these practices into everyday life is a challenge, and so some compromises and sacrifices must be made.
“I try to balance my religious practices and athletic commitments by trying to maximize the amount of time and effort going into both without letting one fall behind,” Rachman said. “This could mean missing a couple of practices to celebrate the holidays with my family, or if I am traveling for a competition, then it could mean celebrating the holiday abroad, doing whatever I can to try and maintain my commitments to both.”
Religion and spirituality can also positively impact mental health through various pathways, including providing social support, offering a sense of meaning and purpose, and encouraging healthy coping mechanisms. Studies suggest that religious involvement can lead to lower rates of depression and anxiety, increased life satisfaction, and reduced substance abuse. And for some athletes, sports are only a temporary pleasure. But religion is a lifelong agreement, and many are keen on honoring that commitment.
“I believe that there is always a life beyond sports, which means that we won’t be playing our specific sports forever, and that we shouldn’t worry too much about the future, cause everything will be okay,” Tau said. “Failing is just a way to learn, and every great athlete has more failures than successes.”
For high school athletes, almost nothing remains constant- schedules shift, the demands of school and athletics pile up, and routines are often disrupted. For Lee and many others, faith can bring security and structure to moments of uncertainty.
“Through Christ, I’ve found greater purpose and strength to give my best in the sport I love,” Lee said. Finding the perfect balance between her priorities: Taekwondo, school, and Christianity can often be challenging, but “when I take time to reconnect with [Christianity], everything starts to fall into place,” Lee said.
Beyond the stability that practicing a religion can bring for Paly athletes, being a part of a religious community can also bring connections that may have been challenging to find otherwise. Religious events often lead to one being surrounded by people that they otherwise may never have spent time with, and the closeness of ceremonies can form tight bonds.
In fact, many people compare the closeness of religious communities to that of sports teams: both, after all, centralize around a specific area, where working closely and passionately together with others can lead to improved results for all involved.
“Everyone within my religious community believes the same things, and everyone within my sports community wants the same things,” Tau said. “These mutual wants make it easier for everyone to come together.”
.Whether you are fasting all month for Ramadan or Yom Kippur, or saying prayers before a meal, religion helps people stay grounded through all walks of life.
Even though sports and religion have been deeply intertwined throughout history, it has not come without its fair share of struggles. In fact, it was not until fairly recently that American athletes have openly shared their religious beliefs in sports. According to ESPN, the first prayer circle in the National Football League is thought to have happened in a 1990 game between some players of the New York Giants and the San Francisco 49ers. Even though athletes have been found wearing religious symbols since the early days of the Olympics, there was a push by sporting organizations to separate religion and sports. FIBA, the International Basketball Federation, had a rule banning any headgear, including religious headgear. Eventually, a muslim athlete, Bilqis Abdul-Qaadir, was brave enough to stand against those guidelines and wear her hijab during a basketball game. Even though there was heavy backlash by the league and some fans, enough supported what Abdul-Qaadir stood for, and eventually was able to lift the ban for all athletes across sports, essentially paving the way for modern expression of belief in sports and across society as a whole.
Balancing athletics, schoolwork, and relationships can be extremely stressful for many of Paly’s hard-working students. While following a religion can add another layer of complication on top of the existing confusion, faith offers a unique way to bring a sense of order and unity with oneself and with others to the lives of students.
