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Priests too play football, and not only in parish courtyards or youth clubs. A European championship with teams composed exclusively of priests is in fact due to take place this year (for the second year running) at Zagreb, in Croatia. It begins on 6 February and will last for two weeks. News of the championship is given by some Spanish and Portuguese media, which are following their national teams in their final preparations. Over a dozen teams are involved, from as many countries, including Romania, England, Italy, France, Germany, Switzerland, Portugal and Spain. Only seven teams participated in the event last year (“Champions Clerum” as it is called). That was held in Austria, with the victory of Croatia, which is hosting this year’s championship. Twelve priests from Portugal, for example, will be taking part for the first time. “My main vocation naturally is that as a priest explains Father Emanuel Bernardo, parish priest of Canedo (Santa Maria da Feira) in an interview with the Catholic press agency Ecclesia -. But in my spare time I like to play football. I also consider it a way to draw closer to people, show them a more attractive side of the Church, and make them feel that the Church is actively involved in the world”. Monsignor Jorge Ortiga, president of the Portuguese Bishops’ Conference, even made a point of meeting the soccer-playing priests to wish them good luck. And there are even those in the team who hope that some bishop may be persuaded to participate next year! One of the more feared teams in this branch of football even in Italy there exists an Italian national football team for priests is the Spanish squad “Os chispas”, meaning “The Sparks”. “He alone is the light and we are mere sparks”, that’s the meaning of the name, as explained to the church magazine Revista Ecclesia by don Luis Pérez, parish priest of Santiago de la Caldas and trainer of the Galician team. Before beginning any match “Os chispas” recite together the “Our Father”: our aim is “to win, if possible, and especially not injure ourselves, because next day we have to celebrate mass and have the parish awaiting us”, explains one of the players, Father Tomàs, 46 years old. At times it’s difficult to get the whole team together at one and the same time: someone has to celebrate a baptism, another a marriage, or a nocturnal eucharistic adoration; or the team may even be wholly deprived of a promising new player because he has to depart for the missions, such as Father Isaac Pereiro, currently in Jipijapa (Ecuador). Usually the Spanish priests play on Saturday evenings, and it has happened that “some referee will come to mass on the following morning to check out whether we were really priests”. According to Father Tomas Delgado, parish priest of Xinzo de Limia, this passion for soccer “is also a way to be present in this world of football and bring home to people that we priests are just like anybody else”. On their arrival in Zagreb, the soccer-playing priests will be received, among others, by the Croatian Minister for Sport. They will celebrate together the first common mass in the church of St. Anthony, on 6 February. The fixtures will begin on the following days.
