Abstract
Holistic models of personal development include spirituality as an important
aspect of every individual to be developed (Chandler et al. 1992; Myers et al. 2008), but comprehension of the term is very broad. Christianity is the largest religion in the world according to data gained in social research based on religious self-identification of people (Pew Research Center, 2010). Christianity is based on God's revelation in Biblical texts. Therefore the purpose of our research was to define 'spirituality' considering the Biblical understanding of words 'spirit' and 'spiritual', and to describe real life examples of Christian sportspeople living their spiritual life. A theological interpretive method of the Bible was used in this research to create the definition of spirituality. To describe spiritual experiences of Christian sportspeople we studied testimonies collected in the book "Power to win: riveting stories of struggle and triumph to inspire you" written by A. D. Ribeiro (2016). God is the ultimate reason of human beings and sport. Through our research we have created the definition of 'spirituality' and we introduce a new term: 'pre-spirituality'. Spiritual sportspeople experience God in their sport. They give credit to God for their physical abilities, talents and success and take part in sport to glorify God. Spiritual sportspeople recognize their need for Jesus in order to live a spiritual life and they find their ultimate joy, meaning and purpose in a loving relationship with God and not in their athletic success.
aspect of every individual to be developed (Chandler et al. 1992; Myers et al. 2008), but comprehension of the term is very broad. Christianity is the largest religion in the world according to data gained in social research based on religious self-identification of people (Pew Research Center, 2010). Christianity is based on God's revelation in Biblical texts. Therefore the purpose of our research was to define 'spirituality' considering the Biblical understanding of words 'spirit' and 'spiritual', and to describe real life examples of Christian sportspeople living their spiritual life. A theological interpretive method of the Bible was used in this research to create the definition of spirituality. To describe spiritual experiences of Christian sportspeople we studied testimonies collected in the book "Power to win: riveting stories of struggle and triumph to inspire you" written by A. D. Ribeiro (2016). God is the ultimate reason of human beings and sport. Through our research we have created the definition of 'spirituality' and we introduce a new term: 'pre-spirituality'. Spiritual sportspeople experience God in their sport. They give credit to God for their physical abilities, talents and success and take part in sport to glorify God. Spiritual sportspeople recognize their need for Jesus in order to live a spiritual life and they find their ultimate joy, meaning and purpose in a loving relationship with God and not in their athletic success.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 72-92 |
| Number of pages | 20 |
| Journal | LASE Journal of Sport Science |
| Volume | 7 |
| Issue number | 2 |
| Publication status | Published - 2016 |
Keywords*
- spirituality
- Jesus
- Holy Spirit
- pre-spirituality
- sport
- Biblical perspective
- God
Field of Science*
- 3.3 Health sciences
- 6.3 Philosophy, Ethics and Religion
Publication Type*
- 1.2. Scientific article included in INT1 or INT2 category journal of ERIH database