Adirondack with magine!
02.01.2010





















































Adirondack Header with magine
Michael Fox CPCC,
founder of  magine!,
is a professional
coach and trainer,
author and creative artist, whose work has been featured throughout
the world.
And they say it's only a game...
There is an element of the Divine in baseball.

This post is a tad long, but a spiritual aha! awaits the patient reader at the conclusion...

In the Old Testament, the word "holy" is often contrasted with the word "profane," or "common." With respect to the meat offered in sacrifice, the Lord told Moses, "And everyone who eats it will bear his iniquity, for he has profaned [or, made common] the holy thing of the Lord..." [Leviticus 19:8]. Holy, uncommon. Wholly uncommon.

And now for something completely different...the game of baseball is "wholly uncommon" among outdoor team games; consider:

Baseball can't be played in inclement weather. Baseball respects, and is perfectly placed within, the seasons of the year: it begins in spring when all things are new; it endures the long, intense days of summer; it bids farewell with the lengthening shadows and turning leaves of autumn.

Baseball, consistent with its pastoral character, is played in a park. The first modern baseball game was befittingly played at Elysian Fields in Hoboken, New Jersey. In Greek mythology, the Elysian Fields was the final resting place of the heroic and virtuous. Early Church Fathers adopted the term Elysian Fields as a synonym for Paradise.

Baseball is played on a field within the park. A baseball field features a compelling tension between the symmetrical and the irregular. Every field features a circle (the pitcher's mound) within a diamond (the base path) within a cropped circle (the infield), the placement of which are prescribed in the rule book with an engineer's precision. In contrast, the walls of the outfield--while subject to prescribed minimum and maximum distances from home plate--may differ from one field to another. One field may be "shallow," a hitter's park, while another may be "deep," a pitcher's park; the walls of one field may form a fluid curve from left to right, while another may be distinguished by sharp, random angles. The left and right field foul lines--which, in spite of the misnomer, mark fair territory--run the depth of the field at a right angle from home plate, where they ultimately meet the foul poles and where the boundaries of the field turn heavenward and, in effect, know no bounds.

Baseball, incidentally, may be the only game where players succeed by hitting the ball "out of the park"--they are rewarded by hitting the ball beyond the bounds of the field. And, by the way, in what other team game does the defense have the ball?

Baseball's symmetry on the field has its counterpart in the rules of the game. There are three strikes, three outs, three sets of three for a total of nine innings, nine players on the field. And only in baseball is there the hope of perfection, when a pitcher gets three up and three down in each of nine innings.

Baseball's objective is to leave home and to return home safely. Football's objective, by contrast, is to make "incursion" into "enemy territory"--perhaps by "throwing a bomb," often against the defensive "blitz"--and crossing into the opponent's "end zone." Baseball's home "plate," not  home "base"--unlike the geometrically simple squares, circles and diamonds of the outlying field--is a familiar pentagon that recalls a child's stick drawing of home. Home plate, in a striking display of ecumenical fellowship, is shared by both opposing teams.

Baseball is timeless. There is no clock in baseball; in fact, as if in spite of the clock and time itself, the game of baseball moves around the bases counterclockwise. A baseball game could, in theory, extend endlessly into extra innings. Although the uninitiated regard baseball as a slow game, at any given moment there are numerous areas of activity on the field, in the dugout, in the bullpen.

Baseball is a narrative. Within the rigid structure of the playing field and the rule book, each game is an unfolding and unanticipated, sometimes indeed chaotic, drama of redemption--of reconciliation--a Homeresque story of coming home to the embrace of family. The individual and the team, or community. Law and grace. Hits and misses. Runs and errors. Players enter and leave the story, sometimes only to sacrifice themselves for the benefit of the team, never to return. And only baseball chronicles each game so methodically that the game's narrative can be read and recounted, unedited, from the scorecard.

Baseball. A timeless narrative of reconciliation and coming home. To wonder-filled readers of scripture, it's a familiar theme.


Granted, you may sense no connection with the game of baseball. What, then, is there in your life that might metaphorically connect you with the timeless narrative of reconciliation and coming home found in scripture?

What can you do to deepen your appreciation, your sense of wonder, around the divine narrative of scripture?

Michael Fox
m�agine!

530/613.2774
P.O. Box 9144
Auburn, CA, USA 95604
In addition to personal and professional coaching,
m�agine! specializes in spiritual transformation coaching,
employing its proprietary models: Values, Vision, Voice and Heart, Soul, Mind & Strength
.
Michael's books include Complete in Christ,
Complete in Christ Spiritual Transformation Workbook, and Biblio�files.

Coaching fees are based upon a sliding scale. Contact us for details.

Limited scholarships are available for spiritual transformation coaching.
On the flip side, if you are able, please inquire about opportunities
to fund scholarships for those who cannot afford coaching fees.