Praying beyond winning

We might have just witnessed the most prayerful FIFA World Cup in history. Individual players were praying. Fans were praying. Teams were praying before and after games.

Public expressions of faith – especially the Christian faith – ran all the way into Monday’s final, with Argentina’s kit manager setting up a prayer altar in the dressing room as his team prepared to take on Spanish coach Luis de la Fuente, known for his public devotion to Jesus Christ and commitment to pray every day. At the most watched sporting event in the world, prayer has been ubiquitous.

But what were these people all praying for? Was Spain’s victory in the World Cup final driven by prayer, or were her coach and players praying for something beyond the scoreboard?

In the 1986 World Cup, Argentine player Diego Maradonna scored a goal with his hand. The referee didn’t see it and there were no video replays, so the goal was allowed. Afterwards, he cheekily claimed that his goal came with some help from the ‘hand of God.’ His comment speaks to a widely held assumption: Athletes (and their fans) pray to win. And of course, some do.

But a closer look at the plethora of Christians who publicly demonstrated their faith this World Cup suggests that there’s much more happening than mere attempts to co-opt divine intervention for sporting glory.

It can’t have been about winning when the Democratic Republic of Congo knelt as a team to pray after their loss to England. It can’t have been about winning when some of the German team prayed with their opponents after their games with Curaçao and Ecuador. And I don’t think it was purely about winning when members of both the Argentine and Spanish teams prayed before the final.

Anecdotal evidence from Christian players and coaches suggests that winning is rarely – if ever – a focus of prayer.

Instead, the most common subjects of prayer are submission to a higher will, protection from injury, mental clarity, gratitude for the opportunity to play, sportsmanship and integrity.

After the German-Curaçao prayer, Germany’s Felix Nmecha remarked that “After the match we are all Christians … We all believe that Jesus is glorified through the game.”

Dutch winger Crysencio Summerville prays with his family before every match so he can “come into a focus”.

Spanish football manager Luis de la Fuente has publicly stated that his prayers are not for on-field results but are a “habit of constant gratitude.”

Lionel Messi is probably the most revered living footballer. After Argentina’s win over England that sent them into the final, Messi said: “God is great, and he always has something else. But honestly, I cannot ask God for anything else. I am grateful for everything he has given me.” I doubt Messi’s views have changed since losing in the final.

These don’t seem the words of people for whom the scoreboard is all that matters.

These seem like the words of focused professionals who are playing a finite game, with their eyes looking beyond the scoreboard to something infinite.

In an increasingly secularised public square, public prayer is often met with queasiness, ignorance or religious illiteracy. In response to an on-field prayer during this World Cup, one BBC commentator referred to praying players as “taking a quiet moment” – apparently unwilling (or unable) to even say the word “prayer”.

However, there seems much to learn from those who look beyond the ”scoreboard”. In his book Finite and Infinite Games, philosopher James L. Carse identifies “finite games” as activities with fixed rules, time-limits and clear winners and losers. Our transactional world is full of these games. Job titles, salaries, politics, social media feeds and bank accounts offer up quantitative metrics for success.

By contrast, “infinite games” are open-ended, relational, ongoing, and offer deeper meaning and satisfaction. In “infinite games”, the objective is not to win, but to keep playing. In this context, Carse contends that “Groups that adopt an infinite mindset enjoy vastly higher levels of trust, cooperation, innovation and all the subsequent benefits.”

Harvard University’s Global Flourishing Study nods at the virtue of infinite games – finding that identity, meaning and flourishing come not from “finite winning” but from relationships, purpose, character, community and connection to the sacred. These findings also chime with the Christian idea that prayer is not so much about achieving better lives for ourselves, but becoming better people for others.

Spain’s World Cup victory will be rightly celebrated by her fans and players for decades. But for the Spanish team – and any of us willing to look past our earthly scoreboards – the opportunities for gratitude, humility, connection and self-improvement are infinite.

World Cups come and go, but the human need for identity, meaning and purpose is constant. Victory can be sweet. But an infinite mindset that looks to something beyond the scoreboard – one in which losing is impossible – might be even sweeter … and worth praying for.