What happens when you combine
baseball with a need for speed? You get pesapallo. Right now in Finland there
are little boys and girls waking up from dreams of becoming the next great
pesapallo pitcher. The pitcher stands next to the batter and tosses the ball in
the air so the batter can whack it out into a strangely-shaped field. Home run hitters become heroes not by hitting
it out of the ballpark, but by keeping it in the ballpark and beating the ball
to third base. Triples are home runs in the Finland. There are leagues for men and women, boys and
girls, with games played in big cities and tiny towns. It is an immensely
popular, community-based pastime. (Brian
Costa, WSJ, July 10, 2015)
I found all of that interesting.
What I found fascinating is the reason offered for the sports’ popularity among
the populace. Why would the government provide
funds for the sport? Why would people volunteer to be everything from “coaches
to concession workers”? Here is the
explanation offered by a top league official: “People don’t go to church here
that much anymore, so it’s kind of the same thing-to have community.”
What fascinates me is that
this official, Jussi Pyysalo, understands the purpose of the local church so
well. Why do local churches exist? To allow people of a common faith to be
together through the thick and thin of life, from birth to death; in
celebrations of baptisms, marriages and funerals; in coming together to praise
the God who creates and sustains the universe. The church exists to be a “happening
place” for a community of people who want and need each other and to experience
the joy of worshiping God.
What fascinates me even more
is that Mr. Pyysalo so succinctly captures the fact that people need community,
and when they don’t find it in a church, they find it someplace else. Or is
that people find community someplace else, so then they don’t need the
community of the local church? Once someone finds the new “community” offered
by pesapallo the perceived need for the church in Finland slowly disappears. Or is it that people stop finding community
in the local church and search it out by being a part of their local pesapallo
team? Regardless, I am left wondering, how can the joy of worshiping God in
community get satisfied by sitting in the stands watching pesapallo? Or have the Finnish people substituted the joy
of worshiping God for the joy of a home run? I mean, triple. I am sure glad we
don’t have pesapallo here.
